10/27/2024
My vision for the City of Oronoco and where I intend to focus my efforts:
- Smart growth. Density focused along 100th Street especially near the intersection with Highway 52 - making sure that growth stays in sync with the availability of city services and amenities.
- Make sure growth is amenable to pedestrian based traffic - our community should be walkable and bike-able.
- We need all facets of development: residential, commercial, and industrial. Having too much residential creates a lack of amenities and too much commercial and industrial means unprofitable businesses.
- There should be higher-density residential development in areas of the city where it makes sense. Focus should be on areas where existing infrastructure is in place or minimal upgrades would be necessary and where increased traffic would be tolerable. Each unit of infrastructure installed is a unit of infrastructure that will have to be fixed or replaced in the future at a much higher cost.
- Invest in downtown - there should be a reason for someone to go downtown any night and any weekend.
- We should have the best parks in SE MN and we need to promote our location on the Zumbro River.
- We should be a community open to all ages, incomes, beliefs, and family shapes. People should not be deterred from living in Oronoco based on attributes outside of their control.
- We should not be limited by existing zoning. Things change - sometimes variances make sense - especially those that do not deviate too far from the original zoning.
- Focus property taxes generated from new development into updating city services and amenities.
- Ensure non-residential properties are appraised at intervals to ensure assessments stay in sync with changing property values.
- Use TIF (tax-increment financing) to attract desirable development. We should use it wisely but we need to understand it’s a valuable tool that cities have to encourage investment. It is unfortunate that the existing use of TIF was mischaracterized at the candidate forum. Oronoco is competing with Rochester and other cities for all types of development. If TIF can sway desirable development to come to Oronoco, we should not hesitate to use it.
- New developments - and change in general - can be contentious for a community. If elected, I will make some decisions that some of you will not agree with. However, I will strive to be transparent in the rationale for my decisions. A response of ‘no comment’ is not acceptable.
- A city council residents trust and businesses want to work with. I will follow the advice of the city attorney and will not violate the Open Meeting Law.
- Make city business more easily consumable across city departments and committees. If content is not easily accessible, offered in a consistent manner, and presented in a clear manner, people won’t engage and that leads to misinformation.
- Enshrine in city code a public comment period for all regular city council meetings. It’s unfortunate that we have to even consider this.
