Council will hold special meeting Jan. 13 on Reasoner Dam with area officials

By PHIL MONSON
The Humboldt City Council has scheduled a special meeting for Monday, Jan. 13, 2 p.m., to discuss the possibility of taking ownership of the Reasoner Dam.

The council approved holding a special meeting at their regular monthly meeting on Monday night, Jan. 6.

The Humboldt County Conservation Board has given the city until March 19 to determine if it is feasible for the city to assume ownership of the over 100-year-old dam, to allow a local group to develop the dam and the area north of the dam, known as Lake Nokomis.

Gary Jensen of the River Development Group was at the meeting and stated the Monday’s date and time was suitable for his group. Councilman John Sleiter asked about the actual discussion to take place.

“What kind of discussion are we actually going to have?” Sleiter asked.

“Based on your guys’ comments last month, it’s more so about our potential ownership or how we were going to evaluate the offer from the conservation board. It's up to you guys if that is the direction you want to go. There’s a ton of hurdles going that way but it is ultimately up to you guys,” Humboldt City Administrator Cole Bockelmann said.

“I’ve said this before. It just gripes me. The county hasn’t done anything for five years. They haven’t come up with anything. Anything. Concrete. It just bugs me that they throw it over to us,” Sleiter said.

“This is what we’ve tried to get from day one with the conservation board,” Jensen said. “A sit-down, question and answer session where we can help each other with answers.”

“We’ve been trying to get something as simple as this for five years,” Jensen said.

“Two months ago we talked about selling you guys (River Development Group) property or leasing you property so you guys could take ownership of the dam or at least be in charge of it with insurance,” Sleiter said. “I don’t see us owning the dam.”

“The county owns the dam. They kicked it down the road for 20 years. That’s just my opinion,” Sleiter said.

“I don’t think it’s going to be fiscally or financially…” Councilman Kirk Whittlesey said, before Councilman Joel Goodell interjected his thoughts.

“Are we going to talk about it now?” Goodell asked.

“We are voting on it now. You can have comments before the vote,” Sleiter said.

“It seems like we are already discussing it already,” Goodell said.

“Joel, they are just stating their position,” Humboldt Mayor Dan Scholl said.

“I think it’s a fiscal liability that we just don’t need,” Whittlesey said. “We have enough other stuff to deal with.”

Scholl and the council members asked Bockelmann to come up with cost figures on what ownership of the dam would look like along with other scenarios resulting from owner-ship.

“Depending on how our vote would go that day you would clearly be able to understand our financial position on this,” Scholl said, speaking to Jensen.

“Monday’s meeting will be more information for both of us. We’ll beat it around and see where the good and the bad is with this,” Jensen said.

“I think Cole should be able to provide some solid numbers, Gary, so I would think the council should be able to make a decision at Monday’s meeting if it is financially possible,” Scholl said.

Councilman Matt Dominick asked Bockelmann to have financial liability information available from the city legal counsel.

“You could structure a purchase agreement however you want it, with a revisionary writ, but I wouldn’t recommend that for a variety of reasons,” Bockelmann said. “Then you need the conservation board and the supervisors board to agree to that.”

“I would recommend inviting one or both of those to the meeting, too,” Bockelmann said. “If you are looking at strictly the city portion, the fiscal portion is almost impossible to overcome. You need other partnerships to make that go.”

“The county has triple the taxable value that we have. It’s not a revenue-generating item and I don’t know how you would pay to maintain that, even after an initial capital improvement project that may be fully funded,” Bockelmann said. “The burden is always ours.”

“I can work with our city attorney and see what the transaction would look like,” Bockelmann said. “I’ll reach out to the supervisors and the conservation board to attend the meeting.”

Read the full story in this week's issue of the Humboldt Independent!