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A fireside chat

Marshall mayor and city administrator discuss infrastructure, economy

Photo by Deb Gau Moderator Heath Radke, not shown, Marshall Mayor Bob Byrnes and Marshall City Administrator Sharon Hanson talk about Marshall’s future during a “fireside chat” Friday morning at the Marshall Adult Community Center.

MARSHALL — Supporting the city of Marshall is about a lot more than just what’s within city limits, Marshall Mayor Bob Byrnes said. He thought the city has kept to a vision of being a regional center.

As the city approaches its 150th anniversary next year, he said, “I would hope the legacy is Marshall is a regional community that serves southwest Minnesota.”

Byrnes’ comments came as part of a “fireside chat” held with local residents at the Adult Community Center on Friday. Byrnes and Marshall City Administrator Sharon Hanson took questions from the audience and spoke about Marshall’s past, present and future.

The chat was also a chance for the two officials to give members of the public a little more background about themselves. Although he’s originally from Iowa, Byrnes has a long history in Marshall. He came to town in 1979, when he took a job posting with the University of Minnesota Extension. Byrnes was elected to the city council in 1986, and has served as mayor since 1992.

Hanson is originally from Comfrey, and worked in positions dealing with water quality and watershed controls, public health and health and safety, before serving as Pipestone County Administrator and ultimately becoming Marshall City Administrator. Hanson said her past work experiences are still valuable as a city administrator. “You know what it’s like in the real world,” she said.

As a community, Marshall has seen a lot of change over the past 26 years, Byrnes said. Some of it came very early on in his time as mayor, like flooding in 1993.

“I probably shouldn’t use the term ‘watershed,’ but it was a watershed year,” he said. The flooding exposed vulnerabilities in Marshall’s flood diversion systems. Although those problems had been known since the 1960s, planned updates to the flood controls had never been funded.

“I made 13 trips out to Washington,” to help lobby for that funding, Byrnes said. Since the 1990s, Marshall has also built systems of flood retention ponds and other precautions.

“It took a big investment, but we are in much better shape,” Byrnes said.

Water control was a big question for Marshall’s present as well as its past. Hanson and Byrnes talked about possible flooding from this winter’s deep snows.

“We have concerns today,” Byrnes said. The National Weather Service has reported a greater than 50 percent chance of the Redwood River reaching flood stage this spring. However, Byrnes said, “we are fairly well protected.”

Hanson said city staff are “definitely monitoring” water flow, and have mapped out areas of neighborhood flooding from last summer’s extreme rains. The information can help the city in future sewer and street reconstructions, she said.

Hanson said the extreme winter weather could be costly for city snow removal. The city will also need to consider investing in replacement equipment, she said.

Hanson and Byrnes said keeping a strong economy was a goal for Marshall’s future.

“We want to be the employer of choice,” Byrnes said. Part of reaching that goal, he said, would be communicating with local industries and being able to offer shovel-ready land and resources for development. Byrnes said the city has stayed in touch with tru Shrimp, in hopes that the business will bring some development to Marshall in the future.

“Tru Shrimp is in the formative stages,” Byrnes said, with its first shrimp production facility now planned in Madison, S.D.

Byrnes said the retail environment has also changed in Marshall over time, but there have been some major new developments.

“We’re really excited to have Hobby Lobby come to Marshall,” in the former Kmart location, he said.

“I think a lot about development for the city of Marshall,” Hanson said. Besides attracting new businesses and residents to the community, development has benefits like increasing the city’s tax base. That will help to keep tax rates as level, she said.

Keeping southwest Minnesota strong as a whole is an important goal for Marshall, Byrnes and Hanson said.

“We know half of the people who work in Marshall don’t live in Marshall,” Byrnes said. However, he said over the years the city has stayed true to its vision of being a regional center.

Hanson said updating the city’s comprehensive plans, and continuing to find the right organizational structure, were also goals for the city.

The city’s building department reorganized not long after Hanson became city administrator, and she said the community seems to feel better about the new structure.

“We’ve improved in that area,” Hanson said, but there might be other improvements city staff can make in other areas too. “We know you need to keep working on it. You can’t let it rest.”

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