03-30-2011 EDAMEDA Board Meeting
Main Conference Room — City Center
11:30 AM Wednesday, March 30th, 2011
Members present in bold.
MEETING MINUTES
Members
Tim Ulrich Steve Jansick Mike Retterath Daron Vanderheiden
Chad Czmowski Mary Christianson Mike McGraw
Staff
Miles Seppelt, EDA Director
Colin Heintzeman, EDA Assistant
Jeremy Carter, City Administrator
Liaison
Bill Corby, Chamber President
Call to order
EDA President Tim Ulrich called the meeting to order at 11:34 AM
II. Approve Agenda — No Action
III. Review meeting minutes:
A. February 23rd Board of Directors
M IS /P: Jansick, Christianson to approve the minutes as written. Passed unanimously.
B. February 17th Finance Team
M IS /P: Jansick, Czmowski to approve the February Finance Team minutes as written. Passed
unanimously.
IV. Review February EDA Financial Statements
■ Cash available in operations is $105,503
■ $56,736 is reserved (proceeds from Warrior land sale) and $37,436 is unreserved.
■ The Economic Development Loan fund has $416,645 in cash available.
■ Total assets in the Economic Development Loan fund are $927,997.
■ Downtown revolving loan fund has $400,609 in cash available, loans totaling $628,849 and
$201,329 in capital assets (Cenex & Wright property)
■ Loan repayments totaled $9,967 for the month.
■ MIF Loan fund has $44,176 in cash available and loans receivable of $471,037 (NuCrane)
■ A total of $5,640 in MIF loan repayments came in during the month.
M IS /P: Retterath, Vanderheiden to approve the financial report as presented. Passed unanimously.
V. Director's Report:
A. County Project — hopefully will be moving forward in early summer
B. "Shovel Ready" certification for Energy Park - Application turned in to DEED.
C. BDPI Grant Application — APPROVED for the full $250,000 that was requested.
D. Meeting with Governor Dayton — went very well, DEED was well pleased.
E. Federal grant status (Industrial Park): $238,955 remaining — Final payment request to be sent in
to Federal government this week.
F. McLeod County Solid Waste request — The EDA received a letter from McLeod County Solid
Waste requesting the donation of the southern half of the 3.09 acre lot that abuts the MCSW site.
The Finance Team noted there were other potential uses for the site and declined to take action.
G. Media Plan (Mayor) — staff noted that the Mayor was spearheading a plant o develop a "media
plan" to promote the city for economic development. This was discussed.
VI. Depot renovation/ Farmers Market
Discussion was held on the potential redevelopment of the Depot site owned by McLeod County Rail
Authority and EDA participation in such a project. Key discussion points:
■ This essentially is the last site downtown that needs to be redeveloped.
■ It represents the eastern "gateway" of the downtown and is a highly visible location.
■ The Depot is the last remaining major project from the Downtown Revitalization Master Plan.
■ There is a willingness by the owner and other private parties to have the site redeveloped.
■ It most likely will take EDA involvement to move this project to a successful conclusion.
■ It fits with one of the FDA's long standing priorities: downtown redevelopment.
■ The EDA had previously been ready to make a substantial investment to complete a Farmer's
Market pavilion — this would be an opportunity to potentially take care of several long- standing
issues with one project.
■ It was concluded that the first step would be to develop a site plan.
M IS /P: Jansick, Retterath to authorize the use of the FDA's "professional services" budget line item to
have a site plan put together for the Depot redevelopment. Passed unanimously.
VII. Business Incubator / Spec Building — Grant Opportunity
Staff noted that the publicity surrounding layoffs at HTI might provide a "window of opportunity" to apply
for a grant from the Department of Commerce, Economic Development Administration to potentially
secure some funding for a business incubator / industrial spec building. Although Hutchinson would not
qualify under normal circumstances staff may be able to apply under "special conditions" in order to
request the federal grant.
After discussion, the EDA Board recommended that staff begin work immediately to develop an
application.
VIII. Other Business — None.
IX. Chamber update— MARCH 2011
A. Email Marketing /Constant Contact — Tuesday, April 5, 8:30 — 12:00, Police Emergency
Operation Center, FREE to members
B. Business After Hours — April 14, NuCrane Mfg., 4:00 — 6:00 pm
C. Bring It Home Business Expo — Saturday, April 16, 9:00 — 4:00, McLeod County
Fairgrounds, 65 local businesses registered
D. Microsoft Community Connections — Wednesday, April 20, 8:00 — 11:00 am, Technology for
your business, FREE to members
X. Set Next Meeting —April 27th
XI. Adjourn
With no further business to attend to, the meeting was adjourned at 12:27 PM.
Respectfully Submitted,
Colin Heintzeman
EDA Assistant