During Tuesday night’s City Council meeting, City Administrator Ben Martig gave the council an update on the initiative to standardize the
way the city’s various boards and commissions operate, and install, as he put it, some best practice of governance measures.
“Serving on a board should be a good experience,” he said. “In order to be effective and give the council good advice, there needs to be good structure.”
Martig said City Staff has been studying the issue throughout 2022. They’ve looked at some of the ways other cities are handling their boards, and he believes some good ideas have come from the work.
Right now, each of the boards and commissions operate differently, with a different set of processes and practices. For example, some boards allow for public comment at their meetings, while others don’t. The lack of standard operations from board to board can be difficult to follow, and Martig said that is not good for institutional memory.
“One of the challenges we have is that there are a lot of different types of processes and practices across our boards and commissions. It makes it difficult to remember how we do things from one board to another. With staff changing and board turnover, and mayors and councils and city administrators coming and going, it’s tough. So, we’re trying to come up with some core kinds of structures.”
City staff is recommending some policy changes, as well as ordinance changes, in order to create an atmosphere where the members of the boards can focus on policy work. Martig said changes will also be made to the onboard training for new board and commission members. The City Council will need to weigh in on some of the changes. That discussion is planned for a work session in January.
Voting information made readily available
Election Day is on Tuesday, and voting information is being made available to the community by several different groups, both private and 
governmental to ensure that local voters have all of the information that they need to make an informed decision at the polls.
The Northfield city website is linked in several different areas to the Minnesota Secretary of State’s office. Voters can verify that they are indeed registered to vote, find their polling place and view a sample ballot for their ward. Those questions can also be answered by calling the City Clerk’s office at City Hall. City Clerk Lynette Peterson has said she will personally look up information for those who are calling with questions, to help them know when and where they should go to cast their ballot.
Northfield Public Broadcasting, likewise, has a vast amount of information available on its website, including a series of candidate forums sponsored by the League of Women Voters. NPB Station Manager Sam Temple, who himself is running for the Third District seat on the Rice County Board of Commissioners, said NPB has tapped into the resources offered by the Secretary of State’s office to help every citizen of Rice County know where and how to vote.
“We just want people to get out and vote, regardless of who they’re going to vote for. So, if you basically look up voting or election on the Northfield Public Broadcasting streaming site, you’ll see a handful of videos from the Minnesota Secretary of State’s office that are offered in something like a dozen languages. They explain everything that you need to know about voting in Minnesota.”
KYMN is offering a plethora of information as well. Our Election Guide, which was established and is being managed by KYMN political contributor Logan Wells, will help visitors decide on the candidates who they feel would represent them best. The Election Guide Features interviews with many of the candidates, as well as written statements through the candidate questionnaire, a sample ballot for each ward in Northfield, and the full text of the Capital Projects Levy referendum that will be on the ballot as well. All of that, as well as special reports about the election are available by visiting kymnradio.net and finding the Election Guide prompt on the menu bar.
For the information available through Northfield Public Broadcasting, visit npb.ci.northfield.mn.us. The Northfield city website is at northfieldmn.gov.
Jeff Johnson’s full conversation with Sam Temple of Northfield Public Broadcasting can be heard here
Rice County United Way microgrants awarded to Three Rivers, Tri-Cities United
The Rice County Area United Way has offered the second round of microgrants as part of the pilot program it established in August. 
Rice County Unted Way is offering grants of up to $1000 to local groups with a specific charitable request, who are facing community-based challenges. A statement released by the Rice County Area United Way said the program has been established in order to offer help with situations that have a more immediate need. Through the microgrants, groups and organizations can access funds year-round, rather than wait for the larger formal grant process that takes place once a year.
In the second round of microgrants, Rice County United Way has awarded $1,000 to Three Rivers Community Action and $500 to the Tri-City Unted School District.
The grant to Three Rivers will help cover a rising demand for Meals on Wheels in Faribault. It will impact 80 homebound, isolated, and nutritionally at-risk older adults, 60 percent of whom are living at or below poverty level.
Meanwhile the grant to Tri-City United will assist with the Little Titans Preschool Scholarship program. Many of the area’s lower income families are asking for help to enroll their children to pre-school, but the program’s scholarship funds have run dry.
Earlier this year, microgrants were awarded to the Community Action Center to help support a new program providing halal meat for Somali Muslim residents in Faribault, and to Rice County Neighbors United to help support the Viking Terrace community’s new resident’s association in Northfield.
Applications to the program are reviewed bi-monthly, but in cases where timing is sensitive, the United Way review committee has agreed to consider granting outside the bi-monthly cycle. Grants are awarded on the last day of August, October, December, February, April, June.
For more information on the program or for an application, visit ricecountyunitedway.org
Rich Larson is the KYMN News Director. Contact him at rich@kymnradio.net
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