At the July 13 meeting, the Rushford council unanimously acknowledged a plan for a cooperative pathway for the redevelopment of the former Farmers Win Cooperative site.
According to City Administrator Hayden Stensgard, there is a group interested in being in a partnership with the redevelopment. Currently, Rushford’s Economic Development Authority (EDA) has been heading up the process to redevelopment, including being the authorizing agent for funds currently available. This new plan allows for the establishing of a simple non-profit for maintaining and managing the site and seeking funding for its redevelopment. This group would eventually take over this role from the EDA. The group plans four sessions to brainstorm ideas as they find their footing. The city still expects improvement requests to be brought to the EDA.
“This is the best way to pass something off to a group,” said Mayor Leigh Volkman, a member of the EDA. “We didn’t want to throw it at them at once. It would be nice to give them a little time to get things in place and then they can start fundraising and such. The transitional situation was probably the simplest way to go.”
“It’s not easy, as we know. It seems like we were losing interest because of the establishment part. They’re working towards 501c3, but until you can get that going, we also want to keep these people involved, so there is some excitement down there. I mean, it does stall out because some of that stuff takes time,” added Volkman. ”
Stensgard noted citizens will continue to see continued work down at the site this summer and fall. He will help the group, as a liaison from the city, with the administrative side of things.
The council also approved a letter of termination with city of Houston Ambulance Service. The April 2026 agreement covered additional mutual aid, above and beyond mutual aid townships and cities provide each other, and was not reviewed and approved by the city council. After speaking with the city attorney, Stensgard noted the best course to streamline the process and legal review is using the 90-day notice of termination clause within the agreement.
“The goal is to rework it with both parties. It was a step that was missed in the process,” said Stensgard. “I just found out about it about two weeks ago. We always have the ability to retroactively approve, but there are a few things I would like to look into.”
Two of the concerns include Rushford’s current on-call pay platform and how that would affect the city and those called in for mutual aid shifts in Houston and ensuring this process does not pull needed staff from service in Rushford.
“We can’t afford to lose ours for staffing another,” pointed out Volkman.
Another agenda item reviewed focused on a building addition to the Public Works site east of Highway 43. Discussed various times in recent years, the department sought and received a quote for a 12-foot by 48-foot addition to the current garage and maintenance building in the amount of $59,000 from Howe Construction. It will also see the residing of the current building to match the new addition and garage doors for through traffic. The goal of the project is to mitigate safety and efficiency issues, remedied by the ability to pull-through the building and load/unload equipment.
The department routinely allocates $15,000 per year, according to Stensgard, and hasn’t spent it the last few years. At this time, there are no other plans for using these funds. Doing the project does also allow enough time to build back funds before the next project.
“This has been something they planned previously and there are available funds for something like this,” said Stensgard. “From what I understand, previously quotes were substantially higher.”
The council opted to sit on the quote and take some time to review past quotes to ensure nothing is missed. It will be addressed at the next meeting.
During reports, Stensgard shared that the city has officially received notice of being re-enrolled into the Medicare program for ambulance service reimbursements. This will allow the city to move forward with recapturing outstanding bills.
“Half of the battle is over, I would say. It’s was a painstaking process, but good news to have on a Monday morning,” said Stensgard.
The city is anticipating an audit review coming soon. This will aid the council in preparing for budget discussions beginning next month. The city will certify the preliminary budget and levy in September.
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