State of The City 2015

January 04, 2015

 

Happy New Years Everyone! 2014 was a busy year for the City. The city is currently looking for someone to take over our Waste Water Managers position that opened up when Dave Leth retired at the end of the year. We also hired a new part time assistant clerk and had two council members that chose to retire. The park board built the new Dog Park and AT&T took the first step in the construction process and pulled a building permit for the equipment building for the “cell tower” that will generate revenue for the city. The city completed the long awaited 7^th street project as well as some drainage projects in the North West  portion of town. The City of Mantorville hosted the League of Minnesota Cities (LMC) regional meeting last fall and I was able to share with the league some of our cities successes as well as hear additional ideas that we maybe able to employ here. The Mantorville EDA is currently in the final stages of our branding project, an effort that will help promote Mantorville and draw people to our community. Thanks to one of our Eagle scouts the city has a nice new flag pole display and now has a home for both our Fire Department flag as well as an Missing In Action flag, Thanks Anthony. January of last year we saw three other young men reach the rank of Eagle Scout as well, Mr. Asche, Mr. Brent and Mr. Ness, congratulations to all four of you on your achievement.

The City of Mantorville held its “AA-“ S&P rating with a note of “No Change Expected” after a review of our financial standing and account balances. Mantorville is on solid financial grounds and is poised to be in a very strong position going forward.

Keeping the promise

The City is allowed to charge up to 1% of the taxable market value of a home. If the City were to charge the entire 1%, our “advertised levy rate” would be “100%” of that 1%. In other words a house with a taxable market value of  $100,000 would be tax by the City in the amount of $1,000. In 2014 the City Council lower our rate below the rate off any of the previous three years. The City passed a “1%” levy DECREASE. The City Council chose to freeze the levy at last years rate for 2015. This means that for the last four years, Mantorville has not raised our tax rate. In order to put this figure in perspective, I have included a table below that illustrates the tax levy amounts and levy rates for the last seven years.

Tax Year	Levy Amount	Levy Rate
2009	$406,611	56%
2010	$414,743	57%
2011	$423,037	63%
2012	$427,268	73%
2013	$427,268	73%
2014	$422,995	72%
2015	$424,525	72%

                                   Historical Tax Levy information for Mantorville

The City was able to freeze our tax levy for this year while at the same time finalizing plans for the large sewer project to begin.

Waste Water Treatment Project

The City is looking forward to the construction of the new waste water line between Kasson and Mantorville. This project has been in the works for several years now and the City is hopeful we can break ground this summer. More information is available on my blog in the May 6 and March 1 2013 articles. My blog is located at www.MayorBradford.BlogSpot.Com. The project is estimated to cost around $2 million dollars.

City Hall Updates

The City Hall and Fire Hall building is in need of some fixes and updates. We are currently in the process of determining what amount of work we can do internally and what work needs to be hired out. The city is planning on looking at this project for 2015, but may have to push it to 2016 depending on other pressing project needs during the construction season this year.

The Best is Yet to Come

The New Year brings new opportunities, new challenges and new friends. As we say good-bye to 2014 and hello to 2015, we are optimistic about what the future brings for the City and our citizens. We look forward to completing our planned projects and making plans for the projects that are still on the drawing board. On behalf of the City and myself, let me extend a heartfelt “Thank You” to everyone that attended a City meeting this past year, wrote a letter to the council and provided recommendation or guidance during our decision process. Your input is more valuable than you know and we truly do appreciate your time and efforts. I also wanted to say thank you to all of our neighbors that have volunteered either in a formal way on one of our subcommittees or in an informal way on one of our projects, so much of the character of Mantorville would be very different without your contributions, THANK YOU!

Yours in service,

Chuck Bradford,

Mayor - City of Mantorville
MayorBradford.BlogSpot.com