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LEADER-Minnesota Department of Transportation agreed to pay Cass County $1,091.66 for road life consumed when the state uses 1.9 miles of County State Aid Highway 21 for a detour planned around a portion of state Highway 200 north of Walker.

The state plans to begin a road reconstruction project there this fall and complete it in the summer of 2020. The detour is expected to run three weeks this fall and seven weeks in the summer of 2020.

County Engineer Darrick Anderson obtained county board approval Tuesday, June 18, to award contracts to the low bidder of four, Anderson Brothers Construction, for $3,394,652.78.

These projects include: reclaim road material, curve alignment and aggregate shouldering on county highways 1, 15 and 29. This bid was 3.8 percent under estimates. All other bids exceeded the estimate.

Rardin Excavating submitted the only bid at $84,794.30 to win a contract to install a forcemain and lift station to connect the new county highway garage and Longville Ambulance Service building at Longville to the city sewer system.

B&P Weed Control submitted the lower of two bids to win a contract at $40,650 to spot spray weeds along 550 miles of county road ditches. The full length of each road has been sprayed for noxious weeds in segments over the last two years.

This year's spraying will be only where weeds did not die on the first application.

In other business Tuesday, the board:

Learned the county can upgrade at no additional cost to higher 6 inch resolution on aerial photos from 9 inch, because Eagleview (Pictometry) will only have to make one flight rather than two over the county now that 6 inch has become standard.

Approved a resolution to name Medica and Blue Cross/Blue Shield as managed care organizations to serve Medical Assistance and MinnesotaCare recipients in Cass County.

Learned the county earned $550,131.27 interest on investments through May or 58 percent of budget expectations after 42 percent of the year. This compares with $480,761.22 earned in the same period of 2018.

Referred to the Planning Commission a request from Will Able to reclassify 20.11 acres in Wilson Township from Agricultural/Forest to Rural Residential 5.

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