Our guest this week was Ray Cox, member of the Northfield Safety Center Task Force (SCTF), discussing you-know-what. I’ve turned off comments on this post. Join the discussion on the April SCTF blog post where there are 40+ comments to-date.
Last week, the Northfield EDA recommended that the City enter into a partnership with the Archer House: a $100k forgivable loan in exchange for ADA-compliant toilets for public use. I like the idea and I think Dallas Haas would, too. See pages 9-21 in the June 25 EDA packet; the June 27th Nfld News story; and the June 26 Friday Memo in which Joel Walinksi wrote: (continued)
I waved Dianne Kyte, a realtor with Coldwell Banker South Metro, over to my corner office at GBM yesterday morning to ask her for an update on the status of the residential condo building at The Crossing where she lives. She confirmed that Highland Bank has taken over ownership of it from the developer, Mendota Homes. (The bank foreclosed on the property 6 months ago.)
David Hvistendahl has a new weekly show on KYMN Radio called Law Review. For this week’s show, he and associate attorney Britt Ackerman, discuss, among other things, legal matters involving former Northfield City Administrator Al Roder. They revealed that Roder’s former home in Northfield is now in foreclosure. And they confirmed with the Goodhue County attorney’s office that the investigation of Roder is still open. The connection? “Follow the money…” they say. For background, see these Oct. 2008 Northfield News articles:
Our guest this week was Northfield Economic Development Authority (EDA) President Rick Estenson, talking about… I’m actually not sure since I couldn’t be there and I’ve not yet listened to the show. My guess the topics were: business parks development and the proposals for Master Planning Services.
This article in the NY Times last week caught my eye: If All Doctors Had More Time to Listen. Are there are any doctors in the Northfield area who are practicing this way?
By stepping off the big-clinic treadmill, where doctors are sometimes asked to see a different patient every 15 minutes, Dr. Batlle has joined the vanguard of physicians trying to redefine health care. These doctors spend more time with patients, emphasize prevention and education to keep them healthy and can handle many medical problems without referrals to specialists.
Dan Freeman has once again taken the lead on Northfield’s 4th of July festivities. See the PDF poster for a schedule of all the fun. Note the new starting time for the Yankee Doodle kiddie parade: 12:00 pm in the EconoFoods parking lot. And see the Nfld News article: Expect less pop on the Fourth of July.
Ben Witt, Northfielder, blogger, and owner of Milltown Cycles in Faribault, is once again hosting the annual 4th of July Northfield Criterium in downtown Northfield on Saturday. Races start at 9 am and continue throughout the day… which brings a lot of people to downtown Northfield to participate and support/cheer the racers. And Ben could use a little help. From his blog:
At Northfield, the biggest challenge has always been find people willing to be corner marshals. The race has 8 corners, all of which need to be staffed all day with competent people from 9am to 6 pm. This is a big role to fill. If you’re coming down to watch, please consider volunteering. We really need your help to continue to make this race a success.
This is a race that is put on for the community at large, Jake and I don’t make any money and spend a lot of our time to put it on. Please consider helping out if you can, even if it’s for an hour or two. We also need help at the registration booth. This is a crucial point for getting the race running smoothly, and we really could use some good people to help us out.
Contact Ben at 507-331-2636 or benwitt11@hotmail.com
The study is about public support of private initiatives. It looks at the goals of the public support, the decision-making process, and the quantifiable results. From my reading, it appears that things went pretty well in Austin until fairly recently and then there were some projects that, to say the least, did not achieve the desired results. The study also includes recommendations for improving the economic development and public incentives processes in Austin.
I’m not sure that I agree with all of the objectives of the group that initiated the work or all their opinions on the causes and effects of the less than successful projects. However, I thought their analysis of the economic development and the evaluation/decision processes was quite useful.
Our guest this week was Ray Cox, member of the Northfield Safety Center Task Force (SCTF), discussing you-know-what. I’ve turned off comments on this post. Join the discussion on the April SCTF blog post where there are 40+ comments to-date.
Last week, the Northfield EDA recommended that the City enter into a partnership with the Archer House: a $100k forgivable loan in exchange for ADA-compliant toilets for public use. I like the idea and I think Dallas Haas would, too. See pages 9-21 in the June 25 EDA packet; the June 27th Nfld News story; and the June 26 Friday Memo in which Joel Walinksi wrote: (continued)
The Friday memos are published and archived in PDF form at the bottom of Joel Walinski’s web page. Friday’s memo and accompanying documents can be found on the memo page for the week.
This week’s memo includes information on a potential EDA loan to the owners of the Archer House to help with gap financing for a substantial and much-needed renovation. The memo also included a nice note of thanks to those, including yours truly, who have been intensely involved in the work of the draft Land Development Code (thank you, Joel!)
It’s a fairly slow week for meetings at City Hall this week, in part because there are five Mondays and Tuesdays in June (regular meetings are usually the 1st/3rd or 2nd/4th Mondays or Tuesdays of the month), and in part due to the July 4 holiday. You can view all City meetings here on the City calendar.
NOTE: The Library is closed on Friday, July 3, and Saturday, July 4 this week.
All four venues for the 2009 JuneBug Festival of Music have performances scheduled today, the final day of the 4-day bash. See the schedule. Left to right in the photos above:
I waved Dianne Kyte, a realtor with Coldwell Banker South Metro, over to my corner office at GBM yesterday morning to ask her for an update on the status of the residential condo building at The Crossing where she lives. She confirmed that Highland Bank has taken over ownership of it from the developer, Mendota Homes. (The bank foreclosed on the property 6 months ago.)
Could “Walking the Carleton College Arb” have the same euphemistic cachet as “Hiking the Appalachian Trail” and be a boost for local tourism?
Northfield’s Convention and Visitors Bureau (CVB) launched a tourism campaign earlier today, hoping that its similarly catchy 8-syllable phrase will convey to out-of-towners that the Carleton Arb in summer is the perfect place for a little sex alfresco, with plenty of nearby restaurants and pubs in downtown Northfield to enhance one’s visit before and aft.
“Since the media is going crazy over this development right now, I thought we’d strike while our irons are hot,” said CVB Executive Director Red Ruffensor who created the campaign.
David Hvistendahl has a new weekly show on KYMN Radio called Law Review. For this week’s show, he and associate attorney Britt Ackerman, discuss, among other things, legal matters involving former Northfield City Administrator Al Roder. They revealed that Roder’s former home in Northfield is now in foreclosure. And they confirmed with the Goodhue County attorney’s office that the investigation of Roder is still open. The connection? “Follow the money…” they say. For background, see these Oct. 2008 Northfield News articles:
… encouraging EVERY kid in Northfield to come down to central park at 2 o’clock tomorrow in order to raise money for ASM4P and that there will be a grill out, tie-dying, a dunk tank, henna tattoos, bracelets, break dancing, music, a rally march, and then a concert at The Key at 5 o’clock. All the money we raise goes directly to Gunnar. News and media will be there and we want 1000 kids to show up so invite/kidnap all of your friends and bring them with!
Right: I was riding my bike around downtown this morning taking photos for a blog post about all this when I got busted for, um, riding my bike on the sidewalk. Unlike last month’s citation, I didn’t swear. See Ross, I’m learning.
Severe storms with strong/violent straight-line winds are raging across southern Minnesota. This first batch of severe storms will probably pass off just south of the Twin Cities, affecting the far southern suburbs like Faribault, Waseca and even Northfield.
Dundas Mayor Glenn Switzer sent me this photo of last week’s Dundas Historical Society planning meeting where the musical line-up was being finalized for this weekend’s Celebrate Dundas community celebration. (See the PDF poster.)
The JuneBug Festival of Music gets going in downtown Northfield this week on Wed. eve and runs through Saturday. (Click the thumbnail of the left for the PDF poster.)
Throughout the four days of JuneBug ‘09, Twitter will be used to announce upcoming acts and their venues, 30 minutes prior to each performance. So follow JuneBug on Twitter.
The Friday Memo, written by Northfield City Administrator Joel Walinski and many of the department directors, managers, and supervisors, summarizes many of the staff activities for the week.
The Friday memos are published and archived in PDF form at the bottom of Joel Walinski’s web page. Friday’s memo and accompanying documents can be found on the memo page for the week.
Note: City Council special meeting and work session tonight. Agenda items include recommendations from the Safety Center Task Force and a joint meeting with the EDA regarding the Master Plan for Business Park(s).
You can view all City meetings here on the City calendar.
I dabbled with geocaching about 8 years ago when I bought an attachment for my old Palm V. With Robbie and I both owning a G1 now (AKA Google Android phone), I’m starting to get back into it.
Once I learned how to how to download waypoints from Geocaching.com to my PC (a current bug prevents downloading via the G1’s browser) and then import them into a $10 app called Geodroid, things got a lot easier.
I failed to find one called In the Arb with a difficulty rating of 3 (left photo: a Google map of my tracks on the G1; see the actual map of my tracks here). So I tried an easier one, Geese Island Hunt, and put an AhaDiscounts card in it (right photo).
If your business or organization has a blog or uses Twitter, you can purchase a space above for your RSS feed to display the headlines of your latest news items. See our Advertising page for more.
Our guest this week was Ray Cox, member of the Northfield Safety Center Task Force (SCTF), discussing you-know-what. I’ve turned off comments on this post. Join the discussion on the April SCTF blog post where there are 40+ comments to-date. 
I waved Dianne Kyte, a realtor with Coldwell Banker South Metro, over to my corner office at GBM yesterday morning to ask her for an update on the status of the residential condo building at The Crossing where she lives. She confirmed that Highland Bank has taken over ownership of it from the developer, Mendota Homes. (The bank foreclosed on the property 6 months ago.) 
David Hvistendahl has a new weekly show on KYMN Radio called Law Review. For this week’s show, he and associate attorney Britt Ackerman, discuss, among other things, legal matters involving former Northfield City Administrator Al Roder. They revealed that Roder’s former home in Northfield is now in foreclosure. And they confirmed with the Goodhue County attorney’s office that the investigation of Roder is still open. The connection? “Follow the money…” they say. For background, see these Oct. 2008 Northfield News articles:
Our guest this week was Northfield Economic Development Authority (EDA) President Rick Estenson, talking about… I’m actually not sure since I couldn’t be there and I’ve not yet listened to the show. My guess the topics were: business parks development and the proposals for Master Planning Services.
This article in the NY Times last week caught my eye: If All Doctors Had More Time to Listen. Are there are any doctors in the Northfield area who are practicing this way?
The Friday memos are published and archived in PDF form at the bottom of Joel Walinski’s 
Could “Walking the Carleton College Arb” have the same euphemistic cachet as “Hiking the Appalachian Trail” and be a boost for local tourism? 
We use RSS feeds to display the two most recent blog post headlines from each of the sponsors below. 
