2010 Mayoral Goals

 

• Complete our Capital Improvement Plan

Our Comprehensive Plan outlines many long-range projects that will enhance our quality of life.  Some of the projects are potentially very exciting, some necessary, and most expensive.  During the last year, our elected and appointed officials, staff, and consultants have been identifying projects and evaluating their priority.  Priority of street and utility reconstruction, park improvements, economic development projects, as well as vehicle rotation and upgrades will all be rated and included in a five year schedule.  A Capital Improvement Plan (CIP) is a capital budgeting device that will help us transform ideas outlined in our comprehensive plan into tangible reality.  It will empower our Council, staff, and committees to use multi-year budget cycles to save for projects and capital expenditures.  A CIP will also enable us to co-ordinate our capital expenditures to ensure a consistent tax levy in years to come.

 

• Partner with Sibley East School District, St. Paul Lutheran School and Sibley County Public Health in a “Safe Routes to School” program application

Historically, the City of Arlington has been fortunate and privileged to host both public and private schools, and their very presence and long-term viability are imperative to the welfare of our community.  These schools and our city have many commonly held goals, the health of our children is but one. There has been a concerted effort in recent years by federal, state, city and school governments to improve the health of our young people.  As childhood obesity rates continue to rise, it is incumbent for all of us to fight this effort; one way our community can contribute to this goal is to provide safe pedestrian routes for our students.

 

“Safe Routes to School” is a state program, funded with federal money, designed to encourage students to walk and bike to school, and assure that they do so safely.  The program provides funding to communities for infrastructure improvements such as traffic control measures and new sidewalks/trails as well as non infrastructure programs such as educational materials and incentive rewards for participation. 

 

Last year, as part of a measure to evaluate the pedestrian friendliness of our community, the City of Arlington hosted a Walkable Community Workshop.  Sibley County Public Health and representatives from Sibley East School District were partners in making the event a success, and all entities are enthusiastic to use it as a springboard for this year’s joint application for “Safe Routes to School” funding.

 

• Connect our city parks with pedestrian pathways and collaborate for construction of a pedestrian trail to Sportsmen’s Park.

Six years ago, the City of Arlington initiated a sidewalk improvement plan.  The project has been hugely successful—steadily rebuilding sidewalks, starting with Main Street and radiating outward.  In 2008, it was realized we needed to reevaluate the plan to examine connectivity and continuity of the sidewalks in town.  In 2009 we assessed the pedestrian friendliness of our community and created a preliminary map of possible future pedestrian thoroughfares to connect our city parks.  Concurrent to this assessment, the Prairie Line Trail Committee had been contemplating rural trail grant applications.  Through cooperation with that group, and with the foresight of our County Board, two grant applications have been completed.  If awarded, the grant dollars, would, in part pay for the construction of a pedestrian trail from Arlington to Sportsmen’s Park, and money spent by the City of Arlington in city limits would qualify as a local match for that project.  We have much work to do:  identify the exact routes of pathways in town, examine possible funding sources, including TIF money, and further collaborate with Prairie Line Trail Committee and Sibley County to ensure grant application success.

 

• Assess the value of licensing only one solid waste carrier

Many cities in Minnesota license only one solid waste carrier to serve their residents and merchants.  Indeed Arlington for most of our history was served by a single carrier.  Currently our City Ordinance allows the licensing of three residential and six commercial waste carriers.  This allows our property owners limited autonomy in their choice, but the frequent truck traffic on our city streets adds to maintenance costs and raises some safety concerns. If the City chooses to issue only one license, proposals from any interested, qualified waste hauler would be reviewed with cost, experience, and customer service being a few of the many criteria to be evaluated.  The belief is that such a selection process would ensure lower costs and fair, consistent pricing for our residents and businesses, while possibly adding a small revenue source for our municipal government.

 

As we have recently learned, Waste Management has purchased the two other licensed carriers.  It is unclear whether this corporate consolidation will assist or hinder the examination of a single license system.  We had hoped to evaluate the possibilities over the next calendar year, but clearly the purchase will force us to accelerate our decision making.

 

• Open communication with adjacent ambulance services to examine areas for co-operation

In 2008, the City of Arlington proudly upgraded our ambulance service.  The City, Sibley Medical Center, Ambulance Director, and, most importantly, our ambulance service volunteers have worked closely to ensure success or our newly implemented system.  Successes of our new system are as evident as the documented life saving measures our part-time Advanced Life Support license has enabled us to offer, and as latent as the increased staff professionalism, the improved day-time coverage, and the realized potential of cooperation and sharing to provide emergency health care.

 

All parties involved in the service upgrade have grown to appreciate the inumerable possible enhancements to our patient care and cost savings that partnership with adjacent ambulance services could provide.  Currently, Sibley Medical Center has satellite clinics in Gaylord, Henderson, and Winthrop, and we will engage elected officials, ambulance volunteers, and city administrations from these cities as well as Sibley County to research opportunities for collaboration.  Sped by budget constraints, collaboration, cooperation, and sharing of services between municipalities have quickly become salient necessities.  A tenuous balance of open mindedness, trust, and acknowledged parochialism will be paramount in order to objectively and collectively explore avenues to maintain and augment our commonly offered services while diligently protecting our identities as distinct communities.