A special meeting will be held at 7 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 12, to review any new findings on the Municipal Liquor Store building. A council meeting will follow that to make any decisions about the future of the building. As of their Nov. 5 meeting, only one bid had been received on repairing the now exterior wall of the Muni (now that the adjoining building has been torn down). They hope to have more bids and more information by Thursday?Äôs meeting so that decisions can be made to proceed either to repair and re-open the Muni, or to take down the rest of the building. This meeting is open to the public.
Evan Carlson of IPS came to the Nov. 5 meeting to present information on a possible solar garden to be constructed in South Haven. The St. Paul-based firm has located two parcels of farm land for the project, one inside city limits and the other outside. They will process paperwork for both sites, but ultimately choose only one if all is approved. (The biggest hurdle is Xcel Energy.) He spoke at length about the project, but at this point only needed a physical address for the property inside city limits, for the application to Xcel. The council will see what they can do to get an address for him. Their plan is to build a 2-Megawatt bank of solar panels that could cost $4 million to construct. There is no cost or benefit to the city for this project, unless they ?Äúsubscribe?Äù to the power produced by the solar garden. The land would remain zoned agricultural, and there should be no harm to the land itself.
City staff were given a 2.5-percent pay increase: city clerk Carol Banken and public works director Dan Dawson.
Fire Chief Laney did not have the exact number of calls this month. He reported that the new airpacks are in. The council voted unanimously to raise firefighters retirement from $1200 to $1300; there are sufficient funds to cover this.
A resident in town had complaints from a neighbor about loud music; now they play it loudly day and night, and there are several complaints. The city will send a notification letter, and follow through with fines if needed.
The next meeting of the council is Thursday, Nov. 12, after the public meeting; the next regular meeting will be at 7 p.m. Tuesday,
Dec. 1.