(Spirit Lake)– The Dickinson County Board of Supervisors Tuesday reviewed a written summary on the series of meetings on the courthouse held in March. The sessions were facilitated by Vern Ryan, a Professor of Sociology at Iowa State University.
Ryan makes no recommendations to the supervisors. Instead, he points out several observations. In his report, Ryan says it’s evident there was a lot of misinformation based on comments that were made at the meetings. He said there was atleast one person at each meeting that called for compromise. And, Ryan says, based on the bond issue results and how they break down geographically, there is NOT a north versus south issue. Ryan adds support for the courthouse has dwindled since the first bond issue attempt; and that remodeling, location and money are the overriding issues that need to be addressed. Ryan also recommended the county not wait for the state to do something on the issue of regionalizing before deciding on what to do about the courthouse.
Ryan will be back in Spirit Lake for a public meeting at 6:30 p.m. June 11th. The supervisors and Dickinson County Extension Educator Corey Petersen, who presented the report, will meet on a conference call next week to work out details of that meeting.
