|
Supervisors: |
Present: Mark Halls,
Keith Nygaard, Ralph Peterson; Absent: Gary Reents, Randy Anderson, |
|
SWCD Staff: |
Kelly Erickson, Kyle
Hanson, Luan Johnsrud Craig Bower and
Melissa Behrens NRCS |
|
Guests: |
Paul Gerde, Committee
member, Pope County Commissioner Tim James, MPCA |
Meeting Minutes:
1.
Call the meeting
to order at 7:30 a.m. Keith Nygaard, Chair.
2.
Motion by Ralph
Peterson to approve the agenda as presented.
Motion carried
3.
Ralph Peterson
noted correction to the meeting minutes as follows: page 3, Ralph and Gary to
conduct employee reviews and make recommendations to the board at the March 17,
2009 board meeting. Motion by Ralph
Peterson second by Mark Halls to accept the February 17, 2009 meeting minutes
as corrected. Motion carried.
4.
Financial
Report-February 2009 bills.
Discussed
moving some of the funds in the saving account to 1-3 months CDs for better
interest rates. Motion by Ralph Peterson
second by Mark Halls to move up to $150,000.00 to CDs with staggered maturity
rates if the interest rates were higher than the savings account. Second by Mark Halls. Motion carried.
Motion by
Ralph Peterson second my Mark Halls to accept the Treasurer’s Report as
presented. Motion Carried.
·
Profit &
Loss year to date report
·
Treasurer Report
·
Check Register,
Checking & Savings
5.
Old Business
Discussed 2009
Conservationist of the Year. Motion by
Mark Halls, second by Ralph Peterson to nominate Kim Kruger. Motion carried. Luan is to contact Kim’s wife Geri to ask for
help.
Luan will
email or send out the final annual Report to board members when its
completed. The financials for 2008 need
to be reviewed and added to the final report, plus the program reports for
those that Kim had administered.
6.
Reports-
o
Paul Gerde,
Paul explained that the Gravel Tax of $0.10 per yard
was to be discussed at the next Commissioner’s meeting. The money from this tax is split between the
Paul outlined the
Tim James, MPCA entered at 8:30 a.m.
o
Kelly Erickson,
Technician.
Kelly, Keith Nygaard, and Luan attended Day at the
Capitol February 24, 2009. They met with
Senator Joe Gimse and Rep. Paul Anderson.
Kelly is working on 15 potential tree plans and 150
acres of grass plans for 2009. Tree
pickup will be April 24th and 25th. April 24th is Arbor Day this year,
so it’s a fitting schedule. The
landscaping fabric was delivered Friday, March 13th. We paid $58.00 for each 50’ roll. We should have enough fabric for this
year.
Ralph Peterson and Gary Rents met with Kelly for the
personnel committee meeting. Kelly was
to provide a job description for his position to the committee and the
board. A copy of his duties is attached
to the minutes.
March 13, 2009 Kelly, Kyle and NRCS staff attended
FOYA (Federal Freedom of Information Act/privacy Act (PA) training. Luan will
take the training on line. FOYA deals
with sharing and providing client information.
Basically, only the land owner can request information from their file,
so it’s up to the landowner to deliver that information to vendors working on
their property/projects.
Kelly, Kyle and Luan will attend SWCD 101 training
with Pete Waller from BWSR March 19th. March 24th Kelly, Kyle and Luan
will attend WCA training in
The irrigation unit is up at Rosholt Farm and needs
electricity hooked up. The wells on the
perimeter will remain, one well in the middle of the field will remain
open. The remaining wells will be filled
with Bentonite. An estimate from
Voldness is round $800-1000 to fill the wells.
o
Kyle Hanson,
SWCD Wildlife Technician
Kyle presented 9
CWL-08 contracts for approval.
Ralph Peterson motioned to accept the 9 contracts as presented. Mark Halls second the motion. Motion carried. Discussed the impact of FOYA guidelines to
present contract information to the Board for discussion and approval. Staff is to review office policy and
procedure. Re-enrollments of CRP
contracts will not qualify for CWL funding; only new projects will receive CWL
incentive funding.
Paul Gerde left the meeting at 8:50 a.m.
Envirothon will be held May 8th. The theme this year is ‘Biodiversity in a
Changing World’. This year, the teams
will be from the old Area II SWCD. In
2010, the new Area II will receive any remaining funding and coordinate
Envirothon activites.
Working Lands Initiative has arranged for two
demonstration days for the cattle grazing component. They are
August 19th for agencies and August 20th for the
public. The other component, goat
grazing and timber harvest to remove buckthorn and other invasive trees/shrubs
will meet March 23rd to review their program.
Kyle and Kelly will attend the Chippewa River
Watershed Project annual meeting Thursday, March 19th in Starbuck.
DNR is hosting an Ag Practices in Shoreland Areas
April 15th in Frazee. Kyle
will attend this seminar.
Luan Johnsrud, Office Manager
SWCD received notice from NRCS that they will no
longer host our web site. Luan is to
check out options to web hosting including Scott Bush at
Previous advertisements said that Pope SWCD worked
with Prairie Lakes Co-op for their Recycle day.
Luan is to contact
Motion by Ralph Peterson second the motion by Mark
Halls for Luan to attend a Sales and Use Tax training in
The theme for 2009 Poster contest is “DigIt! The
Secrets of Soil”. A Minnewaska Area
middle school teacher had informed Keith Nygaard that they would be very busy
the rest of the 2009 school year.
Therefore, Luan should contact schools ASAP to make arrangements to
promote the Poster Contest and make classroom presentations.
o
Craig Bower,
NRCS
Report attached.
Discussed FOIA guidelines.
There may be money left in the old JP7 for engineering. Every county is supposed to receive $10,000.00
to be used for engineering fees.
o
Grant
Herfindahl, FSA no report
o
Ralph Peterson,
No report for WesMin RC & D.
Glacial Trail will host the Model T tour September 4,
5, & 6, 2009. The tour will begin in
The Area II re-organization meeting was held March 5th
at Lakeside Ballroom in Glenwood. Ralph
acted at the chairman for the event. The
next meeting will be held June 4th at
o
Personnel
Committee Report
Personnel committee members, Ralph Peterson and Gary
Reents, met with Kelly Erickson to conduct his annual review. Kyle started in September 2008 and Luan
started January 26, 2009, so they were not included in the 2009 review
process. Kelly was instructed to add WCA
to his job description for his position.
Motion by Ralph Peterson second by Mark Halls to upgrade Kelly to grade
6 step 2 ($35,443.00) retroactive to January 1, 2009. Motion carried.
Discussed Kyle’s position. Currently he is 100% grant
funded. To allow Kyle to split his time
between grant and SWCD duties, staff will contact BWSR, the grant funding
source. With written BWSR approval, staff will bring back a printed Resolution
with the appropriate language to split Kyle’s time between Farm Bill Technician
and approximately 100 hours for SWCD duties.
7.
New Business
o
Tim James, MPCA,
Presentation
MPCA requested that Pope SWCD act as the fiscal agent
for a Water Quality study for 8 lakes in
o
Discuss
Seasonal Staffing
Applications for the Cooperative Weed Management
Internship position are coming in. Luan
will contact Barry Bouwman to assist with reviewing the applications and make
recommendations for the personnel committee to review. Interviews will begin at 4:00 p.m Thursday,
March 27th. SWCD staff is
hoping that the intern will be able to begin in mid-April so that they can
assist Kelly with tree planting.
However, if they are unable to do so, Kyle is to document any time that
the works with general SWCD projects.
o
Public Water
Testing
The clinics held in April 2008 and during the Pope
county fair were well received. Luan is
to look for the brochure, update as needed and schedule the water testing
clinics for 2009.
o
Atwater-Cosmos-Grove
City Community Education is hosting a Stormwater 101 seminar March 25th. Motion by Mark Halls, second the motion by
Ralph Peterson for Kyle to attend the seminar.
Motion carried.
8.
Motion by Ralph Peterson, second the motion by
Mark Halls to adjourn the meeting.
Motion carried. Meeting adjourned
at 10:30