EAST GRAND FORKS — The East Grand Forks City Council hopes to create master planning for its industrial park as one of its top goals in 2024.
Over the past month, East Grand Forks city staff, City Council members and Mayor Steve Gander have met to discuss current, past and future priorities at strategic planning meetings. During two meetings, city staff provided updates on the department's priorities and plans, and City Council members provided feedback and offered their own ideas.
From those meetings, the council decided on strategic economic development planning, which includes searching for a new director of economic development and master planning for the industrial park, and knowing that cannabis policy would be a top priority in the coming year.
The future of the East Grand Forks industrial park
As part of a larger economic development planning initiative, the city wants to create a master plan for its industrial park. The industrial park is the area east of Fifth Avenue NE and located mainly between Interstate 2 and 10th Street NE.
In the past, the city and the Grand Forks-East Grand Forks Metropolitan Planning Organization have considered road and transportation plans for the area, but a comprehensive look at the area has not been done.
“I think this is the right way to go,” Councilman Brian Larson said. “It's hard to believe there will be any new businesses until the infrastructure is improved a little bit. It's very difficult to attract anyone to that area right now.”
The plan will initially be implemented by city staff working to combine previous transportation studies, current city data on the area and input from local businesses into one plan. Driving this plan is the goal of helping existing businesses succeed before new businesses grow in the area.
This assistance can take many forms and timelines. The biggest issues facing industrial growth in East Grand Forks are public infrastructure and available land – the City Council, city staff, and members of the East Grand Forks business community agreed that the lack and quality of public infrastructure, such as roads and utilities, and the overall lack of land within The city, hinders the city.
“From a planning standpoint… you don't really have a lot of properties in the city limits that aren't already demarcated,” Community Development Director Nancy Ellis said.
Ellis said the city's only option for more industrial and commercial space is to annex the land. According to City Manager Reid Huttunen, they hope to have a framework for the plan by the summer.
New director of economic development
Another priority for the city is the transition of the city's Economic Development Authority to a new director. Director Paul Gorty will retire later this year, and the city is in talks about what the next director's role will look like and what the director and EDA should do moving forward.
Related to this conversation is how this role and EDA should evolve, and what its role is in the city's economy. It also means whether the new manager should have a marketing background and focus or another set of skills.
“The first step in marketing should be to take stock of who we are, what do we have to offer? What do we hold dear? What do we value? What attributes do we have that are perhaps very wonderful but perhaps underutilized?,” Mayor Gander said.
Council and staff also discussed whether the city should centralize communications operations or whether the city should continue to do so department by department, as is currently done. The last time the city revisited this issue was about eight years ago, when a citywide marketing plan was created. That's where its current “Life Connected” brand originated, but the city never fully implemented it, Huttunen said.
“I would say the gap was that all of us, as employees, handed us this new logo and folder and said, ‘This is the new marketing plan,’ and that was the end of it. There was no execution,” Huttunen said. “This is not any fault.” person. There's no one on city staff with that skill set (marketing and communications), so it kind of ended there. (The plan) is still on my shelves covered in dust.”
The council's consensus was to avoid doing what he did last time, because it would likely produce the same result — a plan the city rarely uses. Next, the council will finalize whether the next EDA director should focus on marketing, perhaps restructuring city websites to better serve the city's marketing and communications needs.
Segmentation and organization of new cannabis businesses
Although cannabis has been legal in Minnesota since August, the process of implementing rules and regulations for legal sales is still in its infancy. The state of Minnesota, which still does not have an official director of the Office of Cannabis Management, is ramping up efforts, but local governments have yet to get much guidance on how to effectively regulate cannabis.
At present, East Grand Forks has imposed a ban on the sale, distribution and manufacturing of cannabis within the city. However, that moratorium will expire at the end of the year due to state law. Under current law, the city would have to allow at least one company to operate within its jurisdiction.
The Council wants to form a working group to discuss and study it further.
“We need to form a task force, and I think we should form this task force last week,” Councilman Ben Pokrzywinski said. “Personally, I don't know if I would want it anywhere other than downtown, because I don't want college kids driving through neighborhoods to some outlying location to visit businesses.”
Legalizing cannabis also means the city has to create zoning rules for the manner and manner in which these new businesses can exist and operate. While the state will handle much of the permitting, local government units are charged with the process of fitting it into their own zoning laws. Questions remain about what local regulations can and cannot exist.
