The Hovland residents who recently petitioned successfully for the creation of a subordinate service district (SSD) that would provide snowplowing services on portions of several roads west of the Arrowhead Trail may not be too happy to find out that the county board is already looking into the possibility of dissolving it.
The proposed district includes portions of the Irish Creek Road, Powers Lake Road, Tom Lake Road, Wilderness Trail, and Brumbaugh Road. After a public hearing in November the county board approved the creation of the SSD effective December 30.
Opposition to SSD
On December 11, longtime Hovland residents Virginia and C. Duane Johnson appealed to the county board, saying that they felt it was unfair for property owners who only use their roads in the summertime to have to share the cost of snowplowing.
Mrs. Johnson pointed out that when people in remote areas of the county get permits from the Planning & Zoning Department, they are required to sign a document saying they will not ask the county to provide services such as snowplowing.
According to Planning & Zoning Director Tim Nelson, these “no service zones” where snowplowing, fire department, and school bus services are not provided are meant to protect the county when people move into remote areas. The agreements the property owners must sign do not prohibit the county from providing services to those areas and they do not prohibit the formation of SSDs in which the residents bear the cost of the services. The residents acknowledge that services will not be provided at the expense of the public.
Mrs. Johnson said that some of the people who signed the petition requesting the SSD had agreed not to ask the county for services. “It’s a remote area, and those people knew that when they built,” she said. She argued that the county’s involvement in organizing and administering the SSD and the services provided under it amounts to the county providing a service.
Mrs. Johnson said the public hearing to discuss the possibility of the SSD was held in November after a lot of the summer residents were gone for the winter.
Commissioner Jan Hall said she agreed with the Johnsons.
Options
Commissioner Bruce Johnson asked County Auditor- Treasurer Braidy Powers if they could have a lower rate for people who only use their properties in the summer. The Johnsons indicated that having to pay even a small fee for snowplowing could be a financial hardship for older people on fixed incomes. Powers suggested that they ask the county attorney’s office about the possibility of having a lower rate for summer-only users.
Minnesota Statute 375B.10 and 375B.11 outline procedures for dissolving SSDs either by special election or by resolution of the county board. A special election can either be called by the county board or by a petition signed by at least 10 percent of the qualified voters in the SSD. Property owners wanting to circulate a petition could access the mailing addresses of the other property owners in the SSD in either the assessor’s or auditor’s office at the courthouse.
Further discussion
The board picked up the issue again at its December 18 meeting.
Commissioner Jan Hall had heard from some of her constituents who did not want to be assessed for snowplowing to their properties. Although affected property owners had been notified by mail of the possibility of an SSD and of the hearing, Hall said some of them “didn’t think the county was serious.”
County Engineer David Betts weighed in on Mrs. Johnson’s contention that being paid to organize the SSD constituted providing a county service. “I do not see this as a county service,” he said. The work that would be done would be paid for by the property owners along the route rather than by all Cook County property taxpayers.
Regarding the possibility of charging a lower rate for summer only users, Betts said that having raw land with no structures on it did not mean that people couldn’t still enjoy their property in the wintertime. “If you treat everybody the same,” he said, “you’re never going to get into trouble.”
One option the board discussed would be to send out a questionnaire to all property owners in the SSD to find out what percentage do and do not want the SSD and taking action depending on their findings.
The plan
Commissioner Jim Johnson suggested continuing with the SSD as previously decided, saying that until they go through a winter, people wouldn’t even know how much their assessment might be.
The first year, property owners will be assessed a set-up fee that Highway Maintenance Supervisor Russell Klegstad thought would be about $100, and the cost each year will depend on how many times the roads need to be plowed.
Klegstad said the property owners who have been doing the plowing on their own did not base their decision to plow on a certain snowfall depth — sometimes they wouldn’t plow until six inches had fallen if it was light, fluffy snow. Since a contractor would agree to plow every time a snowfall reached a certain depth, Klegstad said, property owners in support of the SSD might not feel as favorable toward it if they ended up paying for more plowings than they used to.
Engineer Betts suggested that they consider not even going through the bid process for this winter since by the time everything is in place, the winter would be almost over Commissioner Johnson said, “It does seem like we’re being pushed on that timeline.”
The board decided to refrain from changing the plan they had already put into place. The SSD will go into effect December 30 and the Highway Department will advertise for bids the first week of January. They did not discard the possibility of dissolving the SSD later if that’s what a majority of property owners wanted.
No-service zones
The Cook County Zoning Ordinance addresses the fact that people in “no-service zones” should not expect services such as snowplowing to be provided at the expense of the public.
Excerpt from Article 3, Section 3.03:
B.1. Any access to said property shall be maintained without public expense, except insofar as maintenance at public expense is already provided or may be provided in the sole discretion of the governing board having authority to provide such public maintenance.
B.3. An agreement shall be signed by the owner and filed with the administrator, who shall record the same with the county recorder, waiving the services and rights described above and agreeing to accept the responsibilities and burdens outlined above, which shall be binding on the owner, his heirs, successors, assigns, employees and agents.
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