Council to vote on 35% assessments for 2020 Nfld street projects; Lonsdale resident, Moravchik, announces bid for District 20B seat; Nfld School board approves 20/21 budget; St. Olaf becomes "test optional"

April 20, 2020
12:02 pm

By Teri Knight, News Director

At least 20% of the City street projects are assessed to the property owner who benefits from them. Northfield Administrator Ben Martig explained that the City has to prove there is an increased value to the property and they do it by using a professional appraiser. With the $3.8 million 2020 project now underway, assessments are being determined now. Martig said the recommendation is about 35%. Northfield Council discussed it last week in a work session, “and depending on the type of property it is there’s different benefits to each type of property so single family might be one institutional larger ones are a different rate”. Carleton College owns both types of property which will be

combined for a significant assessment. It can get quite complicated. Council will be voting on it tomorrow night. With a hearing in May. Residents that are affected will be getting information on their assessment through the mail. Martig said to call City Hall if you have questions, doing it before the hearing will be best. The meetings are now held virtually and, though the community is encouraged to voice their opinion via a conference call, Martig said, “I would say especially in this environment even more encouraged people to reach out for information we’d be happy to try and explain how they’re impacted”. The council will meet early tomorrow in closed session to discuss Martig’s job performance. The regular meeting will begin at 6pm. You can view meetings on the city website HERE. This is the PDF on the 2020 Mill and Overlay

Lonsdale resident, Moravchik, announces bid for District 20B seat

Lonsdale resident Joe Moravchik announced last week that he will seek the Republican endorsement for MN House District 20B. There are now two candidates, Moravchik and Josh Gare who lost to Todd Lippert in 2018. Moravchik is a former coach, teacher, and law enforcement officer. He has graduated with his Juris Doctor from William Mitchell College of Law in St Paul. Active in the community, he serves on the New Prague Girls Hockey Booster Club Board. He lives in Lonsdale with his wife Chris of 27 years and their two daughters. Moravchik said that his top priority is to help restore Minnesota’s economy once the COVID-19 pandemic is resolved. This is his first time running as a political candidate. We are working to schedule an interview with him in the near future. MORAVCHIK ANNOUNCES BID FOR DISTRICT 20B

USA Hockey article

Nfld School board approves 20/21 budget

The Northfield School Board approved their 20/21 school budget a couple of months early as Finance Director Val Mertesdorf will be out on maternity leave. Superintendent Dr. Matt Hillmann said they’re projecting, “a $2.8 million deficit spend next year that will put us just under 16% fund balance at the end of next year”. Hillmann said they are in good shape in spite of not enough funding from the government. Because they’re dropping below where they would prefer to be, “with that we expect that we are going to do a budget a priority based budget process next fall”. He added, “we have escaped having routine budget adjustment processes because of the goodwill and the support of our local taxpayers, where many of our surrounding districts have had multiple budget reduction processes since 2011”. The point is to maintain the programming and long term financial stability.

St. Olaf becomes “test optional”

KYMN’s Logan Wells reports that St. Olaf College last week joined a growing movement in higher education to become a test optional college. Starting with next year’s applicants, they’ll no longer be required to submit an ACT or SAT test score. St. Olaf Dean of Admission Chris George said, “St. Olaf employs a holistic application review process, and each student deserves and receives consideration on a number of attributes, traits, and characteristics. As we employ a test-optional process for the Class of 2025 and beyond, we are affirming this commitment,”. 20 colleges in Minnesota are currently “test optional”