Collaboration is a good thing!

September 4, 2017

Good community stewardship involves fighting waste, listening to concerns and looking for areas of collaboration across governmental lines. We have received some good news earlier this fall in regards to our Waste Water Treatment Plant and some possible State funding. We are still waiting for final confirmation on those opportunities. I wanted to share with my neighbors some of the other areas that your local leadership is working together to promote a strong and health community.

Joint Ventures:
The joint venture group is a formal committee that consists of the KM School, City of Kasson and the City of Mantorville. Each organization contributes financially to this group and the group makes capital expenditures, thereby avoiding duplication. Equipment that each organization would only utilize on an occasional basis can be purchased as a joint effort, thereby getting better leverage for our tax dollars. The group also looks to help build and maintain recreational infrastructure such as baseball game and practice fields. This summer the group updated basketball hoops and playing surfaces in both Mantorville and Kasson as well as funding repairs to fencing and field drainage. The group did meet a couple of weeks ago and we discussed the following items for possible future projects:

• Traveling Soccer squad field requirements
• New lighting for ball fields
• Additional new fencing needs

The group will meet again this fall where we will determine which of these projects will get a focus for the coming year as well as discuss new projects for the next couple of years. I would encourage anyone that has ideas to share with this group to send those ideas to myself or superintendent Matuska and we will make sure to have those ideas explored at our next meeting.

Coalition of Governments:
The elected officials from the County, City of Mantorville and City of Kasson along with the Kasson-Mantorville superintendent all try to meet informally about once a quarter to keep all the other groups “in-the-loop” on what each other are working on. This gives us a chance to level-set on the progress of mutual projects (like the Waste Water Treatment Plant) as well as shed light of areas that the other organizations are looking at and might be of interest to the other members as well. We have been calling this group “COG” ( Coalition of Governments). The COG had an opportunity to meet this past week, and there was a lot of interest in Mantorville projects. We are looking to complete the Mantorville to Kasson connection line project in September now after a slight equipment setback. The MPCA will still need to sign off on all the work and our plans, and once completed we can start to make plans for a switch over, followed by a decommissioning project for our current plant site.
Marigold Days:
The Road work by Casey's general store started last Wednesday and should be completed by this weekend. This along with several cold patches that have been applied to pot holes in the parade route should put us in a good position for our End of Summer parade. Marigold Days is this coming weekend and again there are a lot of events to entertain every age group. The complete schedule of events can be found at MarigoldDays.com and this year will include:

• Grand Parade
• Kiddie Parade
• Firemen Dance
• Saloon Dance
• Courtesy Transportation between Mantorville and Kasson
• Art Show
• Car Show
• Quilt Show
• Melodramas

And much more. I am looking forward to seeing everyone down town for this celebration and I hope to have the opportunity to have a conversation with many of you.

Yours in Service,

Chuck Bradford
Mayor, City of Mantorville
MayorBradford.BlogSpot.com