by Dennis Dalman
editor@thenewsleaders.com
(This is Part 3 of a three-part series. Part 1 was published Jan. 8, Part 2 was published Jan. 15.)
October
A branch library of 12,500 square feet is out of the question for Sartell, according to a consensus of the city council. Requirements by the Great River Regional Library system require a facility of that size, in addition to other requirements. The only solution seems to be a compromise on the requirements. Council member David Peterson suggests meeting with GRRL as soon as possible because, in his opinion, the council has not been communicating enough with GRRL. “We’re both waiting for each other on the sidelines and nobody’s on the dance floor,” he told his fellow council members.
At the same meeting, the three council members who voted for a south site for a community center defend their choice as criticism mounts against the south site by those who favor a more-central site in the city. Too many conspiracy theories, unfair accusations and misinformation have surfaced, those council members claimed. The three members said they are proud of selecting the south site, with or without a library.
A group of library supporters known as Sartell Friends of the Library begin circulating a petition in person and online asking the city council to change its course concerning a library in Sartell. The petition calls for the council and the city administrator to work with library supporters to assure a library will be built with half-cent sales-tax money, with construction to begin in 2016.
Sartell High School performs the play Flowers for Algernon.
The “Mill Sculptures” are finally installed in various Sartell parks after months of planning, work, creation and negotiations with the city. The sculptures were made out of metal scraps and other machine parts from the defunct Sartell paper mills.
The city council votes unanimously to continue talks about what might someday lead to a library in Sartell. The talks would involve the Great River Regional Library system and Friends of the Library. At the same meeting, Murray Mack of HMA Architects presents a tentative plan for the south-site community center, which will not include a library. It will contain three gymnasiums, a walking track, locker rooms and showers, a senior center, a learning-innovation space and a community meeting area with kitchen.
The city hosts a virtual open house at city hall for the proposed community center so residents can see architectural plans for the facility. Comments range from positive for its recreational-community-senior-center uses to critical responses for the center’s lack of a library.
Residents, including many children, have a good time visiting with firefighters and police officers and seeing all the firefighting rigs during the annual open house at the Sartell-LeSauk Fire Department.
Kaitlyn Reichel, a first-grader at Pine Meadow Elementary School, is a finalist in the nationwide Uncle Ben’s Rice Cooking Contest. She was honored for a video showing her and her mother making stuffed poblano peppers.
The Sartell Lions Club celebrates its 50th birthday party at a banquet.
The city council releases a consensus statement that it is willing to keep meeting and discussing a possible Sartell library with the Great River Regional Library board, the Sartell Friends of the Library. The statement mentions the existing conditions and limitations in regard to a library as required by GRRL, but it adds there is hope the city and GRRL can come to an agreement about some kind of library service in the city once the GRRL finishes its assessment plan sometime early in 2016.
November
Spurred on by fantastic wins, both the boys and girls Sartell Sabre soccer teams enter the state tournament, but both fall in the quarter-finals, the girls’ team to Benilde-St. Margaret’s and the boys’ team to Breck. The girls end the season with a record of 14-5-2, the boys with 11-3-4.
About 50 supporters of a branch library in Sartell hold a demonstration in front of city hall a half hour before the Nov. 9 council meeting starts. Later, many of them go into the council chamber to emphasize their support for a library, and a few of them speak before the meeting begins. At the same meeting, the council votes 4-1 to possibly allocate sales-tax money for a Sartell library – but only after an assessment is completed by the Great River Regional Library board. Council member David Peterson votes against the motion because he thinks the council should not wait, that it should allocate money as soon as possible for a library.
The city council approves an application for a five-megawatt “solar garden” to be constructed in south Sartell.
After months of study, the Community Schools Planning Committee recommends to the school board that a new high school for grades 9-12 be built, and the creation of more space and new grade configurations for the other three schools in the city.
Four members of a group known as Grand View Poets of Sartell are honored with a slew of awards (more than two dozen of them) from the National Federation of State Poetry Society. The award-winners are Micki Blenkush, Sandy Bott, Dennis Herschbach and Mary Willette Hughes.
Nearly 500 people run for a Toys for Tots fundraiser in Sartell.
Sartell Sabre Girls Swim-and-Dive team takes fourth place at the state tournament.
December
On a 4-1 vote, the city council decides not to discuss the issue of a city library until a final assessment is completed by the Great River Regional Library system, which is expected sometime in 2016. Library enthusiasts, who have been urging the council for months to put a library front and center, accuse the council of buying for time to wear out opposition, of delaying any library talk until it’s too late, when all the sales-tax money has been spent on a community center without a library.
Greta Perske of Sartell, who received a bone-marrow transplant nearly 10 years ago, makes a guest appearance on the Ellen Degeneres Show, along with the man from Arkansas, who donated bone marrow – anonymously at first – to Perske when she was only 15 years old.
The city council gets bits and pieces of the community-center plans from those whom the city contracted with to get the project rolling. The center will still contain three gyms, locker rooms, a walking track, a senior-citizen area, a learning-innovation center, a community-meeting area but no library.
At its Dec. 14 meeting, the city council gives a go-ahead for a Sartell Community Center in the south side of the city. HMA Architects will begin the final planning and specifications for the center, and bids will be prepared by Strack Construction. The project is expected to get underway in the spring or summer of 2016.
A paid insert in the Sartell Newsleader, submitted by “Sartell Friends of the Community,” praises the council for its planning for a south-site community center.
At the Dec. 14 council meeting, some praise the new community center while others criticize it for its lack of a library. Library proponents for the past year have stressed repeatedly that the half-cent sales-tax ballot questions (twice) listed a library as a top priority and the council’s majority has snubbed those voters’ wishes, to the point where, in their opinion, any sort of a library will not be built.
Also at the Dec. 14 meeting, Mayor Sarah Jane Nicoll defends her and her council colleagues’ decision for a community center on a south site. Nicoll said she is tired of personal attacks against her and the council and said the idea she is against a library is “ridiculous.” She said she is in favor of some kind of library or library service but she will “probably always be against a 12,500 square-foot library that would cost all kinds of money.”
Bashir Hassan, 5, holds up his sign in support of a Sartell branch library.
This photo of well-wishers was placed on Facebook as a “Thank You” from the Kelly and Icoro Emmanuel family of Sartell. These neighbors visited the Emmanuel home one evening to tell them they are very much appreciated as honored neighbors in the neighborhood after they learned that two young people had put racist, obscene graffiti on two of the Emmanuels’ vehicles.
Greta Perske, center, appeared on The Ellen Degeneres Show on Dec. 8 with the man who donated bone marrow to save her life.
