Eggs and Issues Begins This Season With City And County Representatives

Oskaloosa Mayor Dave Krutzfeldt (left) and Mahaska County Supervisor Greg Gordy (right) started off the Eggs and Issues season on Saturday

Oskaloosa, Iowa – The snow was falling ever so lightly as Oskaloosa and Mahaska County residents made their way off of gravel roads and city streets to the warmth of Smokey Row to hear an update on how their local governments are doing.

Mahaska County Supervisor Greg Gordy kicked off the 2012 season with covering the different issues facing the county, such as budget dilemmas. Gordy said total valuations in the county are up 5% for the year, and rural are up 6%. Gordy pointed out that if governmental entities don’t lower property tax rates accordingly, taxes will increase due to higher valuations of property.

Gordy recapped the agreement that was worked out between the county, city, and school district over the local option sales tax. “It’s been 10 years since that was implemented.” Gordy went on saying that the 1% for the school is capped to 10 years, so with changes at the state level, “so with some of that increase, we negotiated a return so that comes back to the City of Oskaloosa and Mahaska County”.

Gordy said the City of Oskaloosa will receive about $932,000 with the county receiving around $496,000 on estimation, possibly leading towards property tax relief, balancing the 25% ending fund balance as mandated by the state. The ending fund balance can’t be more than 25% of projected revenue. This is done to prevent government entities from hoarding cash reserves.

Gordy then touched upon the project known as ‘Highway 63 Coalition’ that has been underway for nearly a year and a half in hopes of getting the highway done. “We did the initial study which turned out positive on that.”

the NEPA study phase is next, based upon discussions that were had with Congressman Boswell and Congressman Oberstar where they informed the group that an inter-modal approach that would tie in the regional airport project along with the highway project “into a development for this area”, Gordy explained. “That’s what kind of what spurred the conversation with the airport and the road issue simultaneously.”

Mahaska County Supervisor Greg Gordy talks about what Mahaska County has been working on the previous year.

“To move forward with the Highway 63, the next phase is the NEPA study, which the NEPA study”, and is normally funded in part by the federal government, is the next step according to Gordy. “But because of tight money, there as well, they’re not doing that anymore. The city and county agree to step forward at this point”, stating that the cost for the study will cost approximately $500,000. “So the city has agreed to put in $130,000, the county has agreed to put in $130,000, we’re about half way there with the funding. We still have a ways to go in regards to the $500,000.” Gordy stated that there are ongoing discussions with other communities to contribute money to do the NEPA study. Without the support of the other communities it is unsure how soon the NEPA study will be completed.

Another point of concern, Gordy stated, is getting the section of road from the Oskaloosa area to Waterloo on the CIN (Commercial Industrial Network). “Currently that’s the only 97 mile stretch [of Highway 63] that is not on the federal highway system.

The Iowa DOT identifies the CIN as: Designated road system of primary highways that connect the state’s regional growth areas and carry a significant amount of the state’s commercial traffic; the CIN does not include the interstate system.

“There’s only about 70 some miles available, we’re 20 some miles short on the cap of what the State of Iowa allows in the Commercial Industrial Network”, Gordy said, “And it needs to be on the Commercial Industrial Network in order to have federal highway improvement.”

The group involved in developing will once again lobby the state legislature this coming year in the hopes of helping the project move forward.

If the group is unable to get the legislature to move on adding the additional mileage needed, Gordy said that in previous meetings with the Iowa DOT they looked at breaking the project down into 3 segments. “The next alternative would maybe be 1 or 2 segments and get this local 30 mile segment.” That stretch would take it from Oskaloosa to just past Interstate 80.

Also connected to the project is the proposed regional airport. Gordy stated that the airport discussion has been ongoing between Oskaloosa and Pella, mainly over a 28E agreement on the project. “Mahaska County is involved in that as well, but the bulk of the funding and the bulk of the details and the management is Oskaloosa and Pella because it involves their two airports.”

At the first December meeting of the Oskaloosa City Council, the Council approved to have Mayor Krutzfeldt execute a contract with Snyder & Associates for professional services related to joint justification report in an amount not to exceed $21,233 in regard to the regional airport.

Oskaloosa City Manager Michael Schrock Jr. stated at the time, ““No site has been selected. No site has been discussed. FAA does not want us to even talk about that because we’d have to go through the site selection process.”” Schrock indicated that the proposed study would take 8 weeks.

One of the final items Gordy spoke about was the cooperation the County had with the City of Oskaloosa over the roads in the Lacey Complex area.

Oskaloosa Mayor Dave Krutzfeldt at Saturday's Eggs and Issues

Mayor Dave Krutzfeldt took over next, and went on to explain upcoming budget talks that will take place in the council chamber starting at 4:00 pm on Wednesday afternoon and do a “marathon session”. “Like he [Gordy] said, we’re seeing an increase in valuation, and so one of the things the city manager has already talked to me about, and we’ll be talking to the council about, well what do you want to do with that tax rate, because we do have some extra opportunities here to lower that thing if we so choose.”

“In the budget proposal will also be no new debt”, Krutzfeldt said to those in attendance. “A lot of time what cities will do, we’re in a multi-year process now of paying down debt on the part of the city. “We are looking at no debt, and it’s primarily because of the local option sales tax”. Krutzfeldt referenced at an earlier meeting where they spoke about what to do with that money, and “A number of the City Council members had run on the issue of fixing the streets, and that’s what we did. We said OK, we’re going to target that money towards street repair and then if there’s something that goes wrong underneath that street, we’ll go ahead and fix that as well.”

Krutzfeldt said that the coming year, they are looking to seal coat 40 to 50 city blocks and getting those reconditioned. “You’ll also notice we’ve replaced a fair amount of equipment, giving our folks a chance to do more work; be more effective on the street crew.”

Krutzfeldt said that if the fair weather were to continue, crews will be working on crack sealing. “At least stay busy fixing the problems that are going to occur later on. We’re trying to take a proactive approach”, is the plan since there has been a mild winter to date, helping both the budget and to also keep crews busy.

Krutzfelt touched on the airport and Highway 63 project also, and pointing towards the Legislative Days where they will join other area government entities in speaking with the legislators on the importance the project is to the region.

Also, Krutzfeldt brought up the topic of the skate park and its progress. He pointed to the discovery of an abandoned tank that slowed progress on the project, but work has since continued and with warmer temperatures crews have even been able to pour some concrete lately.

New equipment replacements are in the upcoming budget according to Krutzfeldt. “Years ago we use to spend a lot of time fixing equipment; a lot of overtime especially. Where yet, we didn’t want to spend the money on the equipment, we were spending the money on the overtime fixing it, which is a really inefficient way to run. Over the years we’ve had an aggressive equipment replacement program and so now we can reliably depend on the equipment that’s running around Oskaloosa.”

A new study will soon be starting in Oskaloosa that was done with local streets. “How about using that same approach for everything else the city does? One thing we’re going to be considering is whether or not to do a similar study on the waste water. It would involve the infrastructure underneath the City of Oskaloosa. “Wouldn’t it be good to know where the most likely breaks are likely to occur in your sanitary sewer, in your storm water system. Paying attention to that, it’s not a cheap thing to do, but if you can have that kind of data put together.”

“Start putting together 5, 10, 15 years plans for fixing this stuff, at least anticipating when your going to have problems, I think that’s a much better approach.”

Krutzfeldt then turned towards a plan for the city, “What’s the vision for Oskaloosa 10 years out?” “The plan that the city currently works from is 10 to 11 years old”, Krutzfeldt stated. “It’s getting to the point where some of the thinking that was done those years ago were based on assumptions that were very real back in the 1990’s. Oskaloosa has changed quiet a bit.” The planning committee will start working on these new plans, but citizens may be asked to be involved at a later point.

The Mayor spoke about “Live Health Iowa” and Oskaloosa’s involvement with that program. It received a $10,000 grant to enhance the health of the citizens of Oskaloosa.

$4,000 of that money will be used for a sidewalk study, inventorying what sidewalks are in Oskaloosa. “Do we have any sidewalks that lead to nowhere that ought to be connected up to something else.”

With money it would help to see how the students of Oskaloosa are able to use sidewalks to school. “There’s a ‘Safe Route To School’ program that is funded with grant money. That if you do the sidewalk study for $4,000, it opens the door for another grant to actually build the sidewalks necessary for a safe route to school. That’s a $250,000 grant that would be available if we would do this [sidewalk study].”

The City of Oskaloosa is looking to implement a new website according to Krutzfeldt.