Last week, the Orrock town board held a pre-meeting sendoff party for departing board members Eric Peterson and Corrie Silverberg and for former clerk (now deputy clerk) Brenda Kimberly-Maas. 

New Board Member Appointed

The board decided back in December to appoint a new member to the board, rather than hold a special election. They advertised for the position by mailing postcards to all Orrock residents. Four applicants applied for the position. Chairperson Bryan Adams said all the candidates were excellent. Supervisor Bob Hassett moved to appoint Janine Arnold as the interim supervisor, and she was accepted by all board members except Supervisor Gregg Felber, who chose to abstain.

Arnold accepted the position on the spot, and the board took a break to swear in the new supervisor and let her participate in the remainder of the meeting.

SCAT Donation

The Sherburne County Association of Townships (SCAT) is making a donation to the Sherburne County History Center. SCAT meetings are normally held at the history center, but since the COVID-19 pandemic began that has not been the case. As a result, the Sherburne County History Center is short on funding, since it has not been receiving money for hosting events. In an effort to help, SCAT has been asking member townships to pay their normal dues that would normally be used towards reserving the event space, in spite of not attending in person.

The board had no problem making the donation, since it is money that is normally earmarked for the same purpose.

E911 Posts Purchased

The board moved to purchase 70 E911 (fire number) posts to use within the township. E911 numbers are reflective signs placed at the ends of driveways clearly displaying the house number. They are helpful in case of an emergency when first responders need to quickly find a home. There is no law stating that the township needs to supply these signs or the posts, but they have set a precedent to supply each new home with one of each, since they are so helpful to first responders. Replacement signs and posts are available for purchase from the township.

Town Hall Hours

Since Chris Weber became the new town clerk, she has been spending more daytime hours at the town hall. Because of this, she asked the board members if they would like to officially list town hall business hours. At the time of the meeting, there were no official hours, but Weber said she was happy to pick up the phone if it rang while she was working there. 

Kimberly-Maas and Supervisor Paul Ellinger pointed out the downsides to advertising hours. They were worried Weber would end up spending all her time on the phone and needing to work longer hours as a result. They weren’t opposed to the idea, but they wanted to advertise for only one or two days in the week, and reevaluate after a while. 

Supervisor Felber noted that one of the biggest complaints the board receives from township citizens is the lack of published hours, and so he was in favor of posting hours for at least one or two days per week.

In the end, Weber and the board agreed to hold official town hall hours on Wednesdays from 9 a.m. to noon.

Roads

As in the words of another Patriot reporter, Mark Kolbinger, it wouldn’t be a township meeting without discussion of roads. For the benefit of the new board members, Town Engineer Mike Nielsen discussed how roads were evaluated for maintenance and repair.

According to Nielsen, the roads are evaluated based on the number of visible cracks and distresses on the pavement. Based on how much wear the engineer can see, the road is given a score between 1-100, with a low score indicating more wear.

Any road with a score above 80 is good to go without needing any maintenance. Roads scoring between 50-80 will receive an overlay, to preserve it longer. Once the score drops to between 30-50, the engineer won’t do anything – the road is far enough gone that overlays and basic maintenance won’t help any more, but not quite far enough gone that it’s time to begin the costly process of resurfacing. Once the score falls below 30, then the engineer will resurface the road.

Nielsen said the overall score for the township roads was 79, so in decent shape but maybe needing some overlays in the near future on some roads.

He told the new board members that the most important thing for them to remember was to not spend money on roads that were too far gone (in the 30-50 score range.) The repairs would not extend the life of the road long enough to be worth the work or the money.

Supervisor Adams ended the road discussion by thanking Town Contractor Daryl Waletzko for the good work he did with plowing and sanding the roads, noting that there were relatively few complaints from residents so far this season. The board is still discussing purchasing an ice breaker with Waletzko.

Reorganizational Meeting

After the regular meeting, the board held its reorganizational meeting. Members were assigned to various committees, and the board set a wage for members and for the clerk. 

In other news, the board: 

• Moved to again participate in the annual Big Lake Recycle Day.

• Moved to purchase a portable cabinet to hold new A/V equipment, which can be moved and locked away when needed.

• Decided to change their meeting dates to the fourth Wednesday of each month, rather than the third.

•  Named the Patriot and Elk River Star News as their official papers, since they had citizens in the range of both papers.