The recent Orrock Town Board meeting saw the audience and the board once again engaging in debate over the town hall expansion project. 

Anne Felber spoke at the open forum part of the meeting with concerns over the special meeting for the town hall project. At the annual meeting, the electorate opted to hold a special meeting of the electorate in order to decide on how to move forward with the town hall expansion project. 

The project was planned to be funded by APRA funds, but some of the voting body thought the money might be put to better use in another area, especially with uncertainty regarding construction materials. 

Anne Felber spoke because she saw on the agenda that the board was going to discuss this meeting again, and voiced her desire for the meeting to take place as previously discussed.

Clerk Chris Weber informed the board and the audience that the reason for the discussion was because the electorate could not call for a special meeting in the way it did, legally speaking. The board opted to call for the meeting in the way that the electorate had specified. 

This meeting will take place June 15, after the board receives bids for the work to be done. 

The board discussed among themselves some of the issues that were brought up at the annual meeting. Supervisor Gregg Felber was concerned that it would be more prudent to simply build a brand new town hall rather than try to expand the current one. 

Board Chair Bryan Adams said the ARPA funding provided a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to get the town hall that Orrock needs without having to raise taxes to pay for it. 

The board agreed that it was important to receive bids for the work and to hear from the voters before moving forward. 

Roads

Road work was awarded to OMG Midwest Inc. (dba Minnesota Paving and Materials). OMG had the lowest bid the township received, and is the same company that did work for the township for the last three years. 

Supervisor Felber raised concerns over the way the shoulders were done last year, and engineer Kevin Kruger assured the board that he would be keeping a closer eye on the work this year to make sure the work was up to township standards. Felber chose to abstain from the motion, as he did not like the work that was done previously. 

The spring road tour was set for April 20, beginning at the town hall at 9 a.m.

At the time of the meeting, the tree trimmer had yet to clean up the mess created due to late trimming. The board was sent a bill for the work, but they opted to withhold $7,400 until the mess had been cleaned up. The board members were highly dissatisfied with the work done, as it seemed unlikely that company would be hired again in the future.

The board authorized town handyman Daryl Waletzko to purchase road signs for the township. He stated there was a need for seven ton weight limit signs, stop signs, and speed signs. 

Waletzko informed the board that he and his team had some difficulty snow plowing this year, due to vehicles, mailboxes, and trash cans being on or too close to the road. He hoped that the township would approve bringing in swing away mailboxes, and this would help him greatly. 

In Other Business,the Board:

• Approved an IUP for a home business for local residents, the Schniedermans;

• Set a public hearing for April 27 to vacate a non-existent road in the state forest (this was drawn up to become a road about 150 years ago, but it never did become a road);

• Discussed the possible complications resulting from redistricting;

• Sent a suggested agreement to the Trail Association for the use of the trail shed as a polling location, in case the town hall expansions are not completed before elections begin.