Photo by Deb Gau The band shell at Marshall’s Liberty Park is in need of some serious renovations, city staff said this week.

MARSHALL — In the summer, it’s a gathering place for concerts and community events. But the band shell at Marshall’s Liberty Park needs work, city staff said this week.

“The band shell is deteriorating, and needs some serious improvements,” Marshall Parks and Recreation Superintendent Preston Stensrud told Marshall City Council members on Tuesday. A structural engineer’s report from 2021 found that the band shell’s wooden support structures were pushing off the foundation, and other deficiencies, he said.

Stensrud said the parks department plans to apply for an Outdoor Recreation Grant through the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources to help pay to renovate the band shell. The council approved a request to have architectural firm Widseth provide prepare a grant application for the band shell project.

“We do know it’s going to be very costly,” Stensrud said of renovating the band shell.

He said the structural engineer thought it would cost $400,000 to $450,000 to make improvements including waterproofing the band shell structure and installing new stucco.

“We don’t have money in this year’s budget for the band shell. But if awarded this grant, the funds are available until 2026 in June,” Stensrud said.

The city also tentatively had funding for the band shell in its 2025 capital improvement plan.

“So this (grant) will either allow us to have some matching dollars to go with that funding to do more work, or potentially save us some funds,” Stensrud said.

The maximum eligible award amount for the Outdoor Recreation Grant would be $350,000. The grant would also require a 50/50 local match.

In the past, Widseth’s efforts have helped Marshall get grant funding to make improvements at city parks, Stensrud said.

“The last two years, we’ve utilized Widseth’s services, and they had a 100% success rate in obtaining grant dollars. Two or maybe three years prior, we tried to do it all in-house, and we weren’t successful at all,” he said.

The cost of the grant application services would be $15,800, which would come from Community Services. Stensrud said the Community Services department budgets money for grant writing services.

The proposal to apply for grant funding for the band shell had support from council members.

“At least a couple of community members who are significantly interested in this have brought their concerns to me, about what is the future of the band shell,” said council member Craig Schafer. “Hopefully, we would at least restore what we have.”

Council members voted to approve Widseth’s proposal for grant application services.

“I definitely think we need to proceed and apply for the grant money. I don’t think we as a city want to lose that (band shell),” Schafer said.