Last week during their regular meeting the Northfield City Council passed an interim ordinance that puts a temporary moratorium on development in the Northwest Area.
The ordinance comes from recommendations made by the Northfield Planning Commission and the Economic Development Authority to create better standards and detailed expectations by the City of Northfield with regards to any commercial industrial development on that land.
The Northwest Area is 800 acres located to the west of Northfield Hospital that was been earmarked for commercial/industrial development several years ago. Many members of the city staff and Northfield elected officials see it as vital to Northfield’s future economic growth and health.
Members of both the Planning Commission and the Economic Development Authority have shared concerns with the City Council and city staff about how the land will be developed. A plan for selective and/or orderly development has never been put in place. When the area has been discussed for development by the council, the discussion has only centered around vague ideas of an industrial park or a data center, without much detail. The ordinance passed by the Council on Tuesday night asks that the EDA and the Planning Commission make detailed suggestions on how to proceed within the area.
As local property taxes have risen over the last few years, and projections show they will continue to rise, city officials have pointed to the growth of Northfield’s commercial/industrial tax base as a necessary mitigating factor. City Administrator Ben Martig pointed out that Northfield has very little space available for that type of growth. Therefore, knowing exactly how the Northwest Area would be best developed is incredibly important. Martig used the example of a data center to illustrate the interest that has been shown by developers and how that could impact the city.
“We’ve had tremendous growth in interest and in particular we’ve talked about a data center would be one type of development that meets our city goals. It’s in our economic development plan. That type of business is a strong example of the type we’re trying to recruit, and we expect that there could be some interest with some applications to be coming forward but nothing immediate.”
The recommendations from the Planning Commission and the EDA are expected to come before the Council in November.
Pitsavas family is the focus of new History Center exhibit
One of the unique facets to life in Northfield is the culture of Greek pizza that has been a cornerstone of the town’s culinary life for more than 60 years.
In celebration of the rather uncommon fact that Northfield has three thriving Greek pizza restaurants, the Northfield Historical Society has unveiled their latest exhibit, Pizza in Northfield. The exhibit shows how the culture of pizza itself, beginning with Wednesday Pizza Nights at the Ideal Cafe in 1952 changed the town. It shows the arrival of Vasilios “Bill” Pitsavas in Minnesota, first in Duluth in 1956, but not long after that in Northfield where he established Bill’s Pizza in 1960 and goes through the trials of a Greek immigrant opening a small business in a small midwestern town. There are the family connections and disagreements that would eventually lead to the three restaurants, Basil’s Pizza, B&L’s Pizza and George’s Vineyard that are now all thriving Northfield businesses.
Northfield Historical Society Executive Director Sean Allen, a Northfield native who grew up eating the Pitsavas family creations, said the exhibit discusses much more than just the sauce-to-cheese ratio, and the toppings that make a pizza great.
“I personally believe that we have the best pizza in the world here in Northfield. I grew up here, I’ve traveled all over and I just I’ve never found a pizza that was better. And really it isn’t just about the pizza. It’s about the stories. because that’s what we do. We tell stories. This is a family story, it’s an immigration story, it’s an economic story, it’s culinary, there are all these different aspects to it.”
Allen said the focus of the Northfield Historical Society has shifted away from just showing artifacts and marking dates to, as he put it, humanizing the exhibits, and putting more of a focus on the people whose contributions made Northfield into the town it is today. Allen referenced the recent exhibit about Maggie Lee, the former Editor-in-Chief of the Northfield News, and an upcoming exhibit that will focus on Joseph Lee Heywood’s daughter Lizzie May, as examples of how the history center would like to put a more human face on Northfield’s past.
“You’re absolutely right that museums have changed a little bit. We’re trying to catch up and I think the exhibits that we’re doing now, multimedia, the things you can play with like the typewriter and the phone in the Maggie Lee exhibit. We’re really trying to be on the cutting edge and for a museum our size I think we’re doing something that’s really kind of extraordinary based on what I see at other museums.”
The Pizza in Northfield Exhibit is expected to run through August. The museum hours are 10am-5pm Monday through Friday, 9am -4pm on Saturdays, and 1pm-4pm on Sundays. For more information, visit northfieldhistory.org.
KYMN Daily News 7/15/24
Rich Larson is the KYMN News Director. Contact him at rich@kymnradio.net
