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YMC Board approves absorption of County Ditch 4

GRANITE FALLS — The Yellow Medicine County Board voted unanimously Tuesday to approve the absorption of County Ditch 4 into the county system, along with the accompanying redistribution costs.

The action was taken after the final public hearing for the establishment of County Ditch 4 and for the redetermination of benefits for County Ditch 2.

A section of a private ditch in the southeast corner of the county spanning Sioux Agency Township was being brought into the public/county system, and a redistribution of expenses related to the upkeep of the entire section was at stake.

“Culverts will be replaced,” Jim Weidemann said. Appropriate-width buffer zones were also assured. If all the paperwork fell into place, the project would be completed this fall.

Weidemann also explained the redetermination of the $25,000 costs involved. Ditch 58 would take $12,900 of it. Ditch 4 was assigned $11,400 and Ditch 2 would get about 3 percent or $700, he said. These calculations were based on a redetermination of benefits to each branch of the system.

Joining Weidemann were three ditch viewers that had been out to survey the ditch area: Aaron Thompson, Steve Johnson and Bob Balfany.

Bill Helget of Bolton & Menk Engineering gave a map presentation to show the various branches and the private ditch location. Helget shared more data related to the drainage system including that this combination would eliminate the problem of one of the branches not providing adequate drainage.

Under other business, Minnesota Machinery Museum directors Laurie Johnson and Tom Oftedahl appeared before the board to say that they had a second quote for the roofing project and were requesting funding to select one and get the roof on that county-owned building fixed.

Oftedahl said the quotes were not exactly equal. One quote had higher quality materials and an engineer’s fee whereas the other did not, which is why the second was less than the first.

The board voted 4-1 in favor of giving the museum $85,000 toward the roof replacement and let it add donations to it to fund the quote of its choice.

The records department received permission to proceed with Phase 2 of imaging and archival of recording books and additional appropriation request. The board was informed the company creating the county’s archives doesn’t have any competition in their field and that it was a necessity to back up their single-copy record books. Once digitized, they could also be accessible by the public.

Additionally, the funds required for the service were already earmarked from fees collected from the county’s own records services.

“The Recorders’ Technology Fund has $44,000 in it,” Janel Timm said. “Ten dollars of every recording fee goes into this fund. And, $14,746 is budgeted for the maintenance of software, the Compass (program) and so forth.”

As much as Johnson would have liked it if the funds for this project were coming from a grant, there was nothing standing in the way of the board approving Phase 2, which it did unanimously.

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