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FAIRMONT-- On Tuesday the Martin County Board of Commissioners heard a presentation from the Minnesota Department of Transportation (MnDOT) on the District Seven 10 year Capital Highway Investment Plan (CHIP).
In addition to giving a general overview of projects and funding sources, a few local projects were touched on, including the Truman sidewalk project, which is being funded in part through MnDOT's Local Partnership Program.
"We do keep about $700,000 a year for locally-led projects in the trunk highway right of way," Sam Parker explained. "We appreciate Kevin (Peyman) and the county's work in managing the work with the city of Truman."
He said that Truman got engineering funds and construction funds through the program from MnDOT.
Forrest Hasty added that MnDOT worked directly with the city of Truman, which had reached out with questions about the Local Partnership Program.
"I'm glad they took advantage of it," he said.
They spoke about some other projects happening in surrounding communities, including Worthington and Mankato and some others that are coming up.
Commissioner Billeye Rabbe said she thought that Highway 15 south of Fairmont was supposed to be worked on next year.
"Right now we don't have a project on 15. It is on the radar though," Hasty said.
"We don't have the revenue to take care of all of the needs in the system... like counties, we're leveraging all of the funding we can get from outside sources," Parker said.
Commissioner Richard Koons said he remembers Highway 15 being slated for 2030.
"But I've played this game for a long time here and it's always five years more than what they tell you," Koons said.
Rabbe said she thinks the road condition now is poor.
At the conclusion of the presentation, Rabbe said the board didn't intend to beat up on them but pointed out that Parker and Hasty were their voice to the state.
"Don't take offense that we're bringing up issues that relate to Martin County because that's our job," she said.
Also on Tuesday, the board heard from Danielle Hayter-Johnson, a Community Economic Development Association (CEDA) Specialist who talked about a new initiative to help boost childcare providers.
"Last night the EDA board approved to move forward with a grant proposal," Hayter-Johnson said. "It is from SMIF, it's an early care and education grant for $20,000 to establish a one-year Martin County childcare grant pilot program."
She added that the pilot would provide direct grants to licensed Martin County childcare providers, up to $5,000 each based on eligible project costs and demonstrated needs.
"Why does this matter? Martin County continues to experience a significant childcare shortage and we've heard directly from providers that the cost of maintaining licensed care can be a barrier. This pilot is designed to help preserve the providers and childcare capacity that we have and not just solely focused on creating new slots."
She added that it's a new program for Martin County and that they estimate that it could directly impact 50 children and 75 parents/caregivers. The board passed a unanimous motion to go through with the grant application.
Finally, Chief Deputy Sheriff, Matt Owens, spoke to the board about some educational events that his office does.
The first, he said, is part of Farm Safety Day at Heritage Acres. This year there were 295 fourth graders from all over the county.
"Part of that is gun safety. Our office has been out there for the last four years or so talking to fourth graders about gun safety," Owens said.
He also said that they have a group of trainers on staff that train some area schools and businesses on active threat trainings.
"That's something that the community utilizes the sheriff's office for," Owens said.
In other business:
-- The board approved a real estate purchase agreement for the property and building facility located at 120 Ash Street East in Trimont, in the amount of $540,000, to be used as the Martin County Highway Department Trimont Maintenance Shop/Garage.
-- The board approved a proposal from Kahler Electric in the amount of $14,250 for fusion/hook up of fiber and network switches at the 1200 North State Street facility.
-- The board approved the purchase of three HPE networking switches and associated fiber optic transceivers for the Highway facility, State Street garage and office building from Marco in the amount of $17,306.