June 10, 2021 at 1:12 p.m.
Cass County Board approves capital improvement plan
The primary change since the plan was initially proposed calls for the county to provide $4,000 as a 50 percent match to Deep Portage Learning Center's projects this summer to bring the kitchen fire protection system up to code and to install security cameras in the main entrance and hallways.
Cass County owns Deep Portage buildings, but the Deep Portage Foundation oversees and financially supports the maintenance and operations. User fees pay much of the operations.
The plan now also reflects actual bids the highway department has received in the last month.
Assessor Mark Peterson reported there were nine foreclosures the first quarter of 2017, down two from last year and half the number in 2014. Five were homesteads. Three were cabins. One was commercial.
All were valued under $400,000.
There were 136 arms-length sales of existing properties the first quarter this year, up from 116 in 2016.
A Protection Strategy Award will recognize Cass County Environmental Services Department and its aquatic invasive species coordinator, Rima Smith-Keprios, at an event from 3-4:30 p.m. June 15 in the Crow Wing County Lake Services Building in Brainerd for accomplishments with the AIS watercraft inspection program.
Cass County Commissioners approved an agreement and contract with Minnesota Board of Water and Soil Resources to complete a Leech Lake River One Watershed One Plan, which will address steps which can be taken to protect the water quality and prevent is future degradation.
When the plan, being drafted for Cass and Hubbard Counties, is complete, it will enable the counties to seek additional funding to build waste treatment, storm water runoff and other water protection projects, Environmental Services Director John Ringle said.
Probation Director Jim Schneider reported Minnesota Association of County Probation Officers presented Cass County probation officer Bryan Harris the 2017 Outstanding Performance award at its annual conference in May.
The county board accepted a $7,000 per year Minnesota Department of Corrections grant to help low-income county jail inmates be able to afford electronic home monitoring.
Normally, people must pay a $20 daily rate for the monitoring service when a judge permits them to serve time on home monitoring rather than in jail. This grant will pay $10 of the per day cost when a person cannot afford the full amount.
Cass got an additional $1,000 for this program for the state fiscal year that ends June 30, 2017, because some other counties did not use their full allotment.
Schneider said the electronic monitoring program enables more people who are charged with a crime to continue working at their regular job.
Minnesota Department of Corrections also will provide Cass probation department with a $44,364 caseload/workload reduction grant to pay half the salary and benefits of a case aide and half of a probation officer.
Land Commissioner Kirk Titus reported all six tracts the county offered for logging at the May auction sold. Loggers paid $37.93 per cord for aspen and $53.45 per cord for red oak. The county sold a total of 2,568 cords of 10 species of trees. The sale netted $126,421 revenue to the county.
Mutch's Forestry Service of Grand Rapids was the lowest of five bidders to win the contract at $1,944 to brush along the Old Grade, Blind Lake, Bull Moose and Moose Lake recreational trails.
There was a wide range of bids, with the highest at $13,200.
The commissioners approved transferring an easement over county land to private property from one owner to another upon payment of a $500 easement transfer fee.
They awarded a contract to Thomas-Lauren Company for $3,300 to appraise property in a 33-foot corridor for a cartway. Theirs was the lowest of three bids, which ran as high as $9,600.
The county board at an earlier meeting designated the cartway alignment, which will take a 16.5 strip along either side of a line between land the county and David and Samantha Nikkel own and land Blandin Paper owns.
Cass County will receive up to $16,058.61 in 2018 and $17,022.12 in 2019 from Minnesota Department of Corrections toward continuing operation of the Sentence to Serve program. Funds can be used to hire one crew leader to oversee up to 10 inmates on a work program where the inmates can work off fines and jail time.
Cass has been approved to renew its Minnesota Department of Health grant to receive up to $82,504 over the next two years for Temporary Assistance to Needy Families clients.
A $32,751 Minnesota Department of Health grant to Cass will assist the county with demonstrating organizational and operational capacity to carry out the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention public health preparedness capabilities: national standards for state and local planning.
Minnesota Department of Human Services has renewed its two-year $80,000 grant to pay for welfare fraud prevention services in Cass, Hubbard, Todd and Wadena counties through June 30, 2019.
Joey Wade, an Onigum area resident, appeared before the county board to provide a history of Two Points on the north shore of Leech Lake and to tell the board he does not believe state collected funds should pay for Leech Lake Band of Ojibwe to purchase an acreage there.
Minnesota Legislators approved this session the annual recommendation for distributing natural resource funds from Minnesota Lottery proceeds, and the governor has signed that bill.
It included lottery money, which will be distributed to the Leech Lake Band to enable the band to purchase the property and to hold it in a separate trust subject to property taxes that requires maintaining it in a natural state (not developing it) and keeps it open to public use.
Wade expressed concern that the band would apply to the Interior Department to have the land declared Indian trust land, which is not subject to property taxation.
After hearing Wade's concerns for the 10-minute time allowed for public comment before the board, Board Chair Dick Downham told him the county board cannot make decisions for the tribal government or the state. He recommended Wade take his concerns to the tribal council.
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