(Spirit Lake)– The Spirit Lake city council Tuesday awarded a bid on another portion of the East Entryway project. This one is to widen the Highways nine and 71 bridge. The council awarded the low bid of 182,268-dollars submitted by Christianson Brothers Construction. It came in over the engineer’s estimate of 121,264-dollars. But the engineer on the project, Brad Beck of Beck Excavating, told the council the overall cost of the project will still come in about 25-thousand dollars below the original estimate. The council recently awarded a bid of 386-thousand dollars to Cedar Valley Corporation for the rest of the project.
The council also Tuesday adopted an Urban Revitalization Plan that covers most of the downtown area. It allows business owners in the affected area to apply for a tax abatement to assist in making improvements to existing structures or building new ones.
They also approved a franchise agreement with MediaCom. City Administrator Pete Hegeman told the council it won’t interfere with a 28E Agreement with other cities looking into the feasibility of starting up a municipal system.
The council adopted a revised ordinance allowing the operation of snowmobiles and A-T-V’s on city streets. But the machines still will not be allowed to park on city streets or city-owned parking lots.
The Spirit Lake city council was presented with a review of the city’s liability insurance for the upcoming year; set January 27th as the date for a public hearing to voluntarily annex land into the city owned by Dean Shirley Stover; and decided to apply for a USTEP grant through the Department of Transportation for the Polaris entrance project.
Following a closed session, the council reconvened in open session at voted to enter into negotiations to purchase the former Allian Energy Operations Center in downtown Spirit Lake. The city is eyeing the site as a possible new location for the police department.
