ABOVE: A rendering of the proposed Martin County Public Safety and Justice Center, provided by Wold Architects and Engineers.

FAIRMONT– The Martin County Board of Commissioners on Tuesday officially approved the option to purchase land to construct the new Public Safety and Justice Center on. The board was also provided an updated plan and cost for the facility and adopted the 2025 budget and levy with that in mind.

The property is known as the “Siems Site” and covers Lots 1, 2 and 3, Block 1, known as George Loewenberg Addition in the city of Fairmont. The cost of the land is $556,000.

Commissioner Jaime Bleess said the core committee had a meeting about the property on Monday of this week to go over the zoning and agreements between the city of Fairmont and the county and that he did not detect any “red flags.” He made a motion to purchase the site.

County Attorney Taylor McGowan added that the county has been in conversation with the city of Fairmont on vacating the road way for access to the parcel.

“I think we came away from the meeting with the impression of making the site work is in itself workable,” McGowan said.

The board had previously discussed purchasing the site at its Nov. 19 meeting but delayed the decision a month with the hope that it would receive an agreement from the city of Fairmont that its police department would be housed within the new facility. While no official agreement has come through, board members previously said the city indicates it will sign the agreement.

“We’ve been working on this a long time and have spent a fair amount of money on it. We don’t want this site to get away from us. Letting this get away, we’d have to start all over and the design money would have to be invested again on another site,” said Commissioner Steve Flohrs.

The motion to purchase the property passed unanimously. McGowan said the county will provide notice to the property owners, who will then need to get the abstract to the county so it can proceed with the next steps.

“This has been a long time coming,” said Flohrs.

Jonathan Loose with Wold Architects and Engineers was also present to give an update on the initial designs and project summary for the Martin County Public Safety and Justice Center. He started out by saying he was happy to hear the board just agreed to take the next steps by purchasing the site.

“Our goal is to get approval to complete construction documents and go out for bid this spring,” Loose said.

He shared with the board several renderings of the current design for the building. He also went over the floor plans for the facility which will include a jail, garage and storage space, Martin County Sheriff’s Office, space for the Fairmont Police Department, courts, probation, administration and other offices and work stations.

“I think that there’s a lot of goals that we’ve met as a part of this facility,” Loose said. “We’ve got it to the point where I think we know the sizes of all of the spaces and where they’re all going to be… we’re really at the point where we want to start making this available for contractors to be able to build off of.”

He said again that the design per se is completed, but the contract documents still need to be completed.

Speaking about the site plan, Loose said there have been quite a few discussions already but that the county will be looking to vacate a portion of the currently plated Loewenberg Drive and then create entrances off of State Street and Margaret Street on the south.

Next, Loose talked about the current cost of the facility, which has greatly fluctuated over the past few years with various designs and inflation. While the goal was to hit an overall $50 million budget, he said that the square footage is up slightly, around 78,000, mostly in garage space. That, along with inflation has caused the facility to carry an overall project cost of $54 million with $45 million in construction costs.

“I realize our goal was to hit the $50 million but we’ve met with the core group and have really talked through all of the different strategies we’ve taken to mitigate the increase in cost and if people recall, back in 2007 I think a 70 bed jail was at $20 million. This is just the nature of inflation, unfortunately,” Loose said.

He added that the construction amount is “the middle of the pack” for what they’re hoping for on bid day but that there will likely be some lower and higher bids that come in.

Commissioner Elliot Belgard said, “I’ve watched this for a long, long time. We looked at the numbers and we waited… if in fact this does not go through at this time I guarantee in five years it will come up again and probably be $90 million. We’ve done the work and it’s time to do it.”

After the presentation, Loose reiterated that the goal is to complete construction documents and go out for bid in the spring. A motion was made to approve and authorize Wold to move ahead with final design for the proposed project. The motion passed unanimously.

On Tuesday the board also considered adopting the 2025 budget and levy. The board had previously held its Truth in Taxation meeting on Dec. 3. Prior to that, in September, it set the proposed levy at a 15.66 percent increase.

Auditor/Treasurer Michael Forstner said that the board could drop the levy to a 12.49 percent increase partially by decreasing the proposed debt service amount for the Justice Center facility in 2025.

Some figures were shared on the property tax impact to residents at a 12.49 percent levy increase versus a 15.66 percent levy increase.

Bleess said he wanted to discuss what was talked about on Monday during the core committee meeting regarding what a 12.49 percent increase includes concerning the debt service. At the 12.49 percent levy increase, $1.8 million will go toward the county contribution of the project.

“I think it’s also important to note what we learned from Northland Securities yesterday regarding when these payments will be due,” Bleess said.

George Eilertson of Northland Securities said that the bonds are structured in such a way that if the county levies in 2024 for collection in 2025, that money will go toward a county contribution to reduce the principle amount of the bonds, not needed for any bond payments due in 2025.

“We would be looking at this time next year that you would be working a figure into your budget for certifying 25, collecting 26. That would be going toward bond payments,” Eilertson explained.

The way it’s structured, there would be a higher levy increase the next two years but by the time the facility is finished in 2027, there would be an opportunity for the levy to be back down to a five percent increase.

“The more we approve now will be easier on the oncoming commissioners,” said Bleess. “I’m comfortable putting the foot on the gas this year so that it’s not so hard on the incoming group next year.”

He pointed out the board had just made a big decision on the project by approving the land purchase.

However, while Commissioner Steve Flohrs said he agreed, he also said received a call recently from a Martin County resident who said they were being “taxed to death,” and didn’t know how they could continue living here and paying taxes. He said he was hoping to keep the levy increase lower, closer to 12 percent.

County Assessor Mike Sheplee added that the tax difference on a 12.49 percent increase versus a 15.66 percent increase really is not that significant. He said that when owners of farm land have come to him saying it’s too much money and then are shown the actual number of how much it will cost per acre they’ve been okay.

Despite going off the board at the end of this year, Belgard said he wanted to see the project go through and didn’t want to kick the can down the road before building the facility would really be too much money.

“We’ve gone too far now,” Belgard said.

Bleess made a motion to set the levy at a 12.49 percent increase. Belgard seconded the motion and the motion passed 4-1 with Koons opposed.

In other business, the board:

— Approved a contract with the city of Northrop for police services at a yearly rate of $10,500, adjusted annually.

— Set a public hearing for 10 a.m. on Jan. 21 to consider tax abatement for Cade Ekstrom on construction of a single family home.

— Set a public hearing for 10:05 a.m. on Jan. 21 to discuss proposed county fees.

— Received a clean, unmodified 2023 audit from the Office of the State Auditor of Minnesota.

— Approved a two year lease agreement for the County Attorney’s Office at a 10 percent increase.