by April Scheinoha
Reporter

Motorists should brace themselves. Highway 59 is set to be improved on the east side of Thief River Falls. Granted, the improvements aren’t scheduled until 2029 at the earliest. However, the Thief River Falls City Council wants to be prepared.

“We want to get the horse in front of the cart instead of behind it,” said Mayor Brian Holmer. He referred to past issues when the Minnesota Department of Transportation improved Highway 59 on the other side of the city. MnDOT and the city plan to improve the eastern part of Highway 59 as part of the upcoming project.

At its meeting Tuesday, April 19, the council approved hiring HDR Engineering to identify potential problems that should be addressed and considered for the project. The contract is not to exceed $21,000.

City Council approved a cost-share contract for the Greenwood Bridge and Wenzlaff property streambank repairs. The Pennington Soil and Water Conservation District received Clean Water Fund Matching Grants for the repairs. The local share is $156,288.75. The city and Pennington SWCD will apply for more grants to cover the local share.

Water Systems Superintendent Wayne Johnson said the repairs have been in the works since 2019. Set to be repaired are areas on the south side of the Greenwood Street bridge; across from Oakland Park; and near the Hartz Park pedestrian bridge. While the repairs were in the engineering process, the issues became worse near the pedestrian bridge to the point of encroachment on four houses. Johnson said the grant will be used for all of the repairs, but the Hartz Park repairs will be engineered separately.

The council formally elected the standard allowance available to the city under the American Rescue Plan Act. The city has been allocated $964,743.58. There have been no discussions at full council meetings about how the money will be used.

City Council approved seeking requests for proposals for the installation of all equipment to support the water system’s Advanced Meter Infrastructure. At the same time, the chosen firm would complete a service line inventory and inspect sump pumps.

When the city converted to AMI in 2014, city leaders were under the impression that the new system would be able to read the city’s water meters. That wasn’t the case. The city retrofitted many water meters with new heads to accommodate the new AMI system. However, quite a few water meter bodies were left in place. The situation is fine now, but city leaders would like to fully replace all of the city residential and commercial water meters by 2024 to be compatible with the AMI system.

The new meters would be able to report water usage to a fraction of a gallon. Now, the water meters provide residential water readings to every 100 gallons. Commercial water readings are provided to every 1,000 gallons.

The council approved paying $24,300 to Short Elliott Hendrickson Inc. to update the Water Distribution System Modeling Study. The study will evaluate the system in terms of water main sizing, pump performance and demand patterns as well as the age, pressure and flow of the water.

Johnson said there are water pressure issues on the north side of the city, and the study would also be useful in looking at the circulation of water for the Thief River Falls Regional Airport. The last modeling study was completed in 1993.

Public Works Director Travis Giffen provided an update on his communications with MnDOT regarding the Highway 32 roundabout. In March, the council directed Giffen to contact MnDOT amid concerns about snow removal at the above roundabout. Those conversations led to the roundabout being a first priority of dawn patrols of MnDOT and Pennington County snow removal crews, who start at midnight and 3 a.m., respectively. A snow fence may also be erected at on the northwest corner.

Giffen also provided an update on the new playground equipment that will be installed at Bill LaFave Park. He expected that the equipment will be installed the first week of June. The equipment will be located farther away from the beach.

The new equipment will include swings, climbing bars, a spinner, a slide and a seesaw. The pieces of stand-alone playground equipment are designed for ages 5 to 12.

The playground equipment will be funded with a $25,000 Fueling Futures Grant from Enbridge. The entire project is estimated to cost about $29,000.

By a vote of 5 to 0, the council approved summer hours for city employees. Council member Jason Aarestad abstained from voting. Council members Curt Howe and Rachel Prudhomme were absent.

Summer hours for City Hall employees, and other departments as appropriate, will be in effect from Sunday, May 15 to Saturday, Sept. 3. Summer hours will be from 7 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Monday through Thursday, and from 7 a.m. to 12 p.m. Friday.

City Hall will be open an additional hour each week at no additional cost while summer hours are in effect.
Aarestad gave no indication during the meeting as to why he abstained from voting. After the meeting, he told The Times that he abstained because he had no preference either way.

The next council meeting is scheduled Tuesday, May 3 at 5:30 p.m. at City Hall.