Keith Olson gave our invocation. President Katie welcomed Sunrise Rotarian Dawn Saxton and Dawn announced her club was holding a raffle that offers many Fergus Falls based prizes, including a two-night stay at the Mill Hotel and dinner for two at Union Avenue Bar & Eatery. Only 420 tickets will be sold and they are available at $20, with the drawing to be held on October 30th. Katie then thanked Dean Monke for putting together the student guest schedule for the year and also announced that Hal Leland needed to focus on this health and would not be attending Rotary for a while.
Wally Cole fined himself for incorrectly placing the U.S. and Canadian flags as he moved them to their proper location. Mark Bring contributed for missing a few meetings. Buzz Lundeen bragged about all the honors Victor Lundeen Company received from The Daily Journal "Best of" edition this year, including best bookstore, best gift store and best downtown retail store. Keith Olson was pleased with the "packed house" for the Men of Note concert at OLV the previous Sunday, which included a tribute to one-time member Allan Magnuson. Dean Monke reported the aforementioned concert was wonderful and bragged about Dawn who was one of six painters at the Habitat for Humanity build that applied two coats of paint on 2,300 square feet in less than eight hours. Deb Maertens also expressed appreciation for Dawn who is serving as Sara's club counselor; Deb reported that last weekend she had been in North Dakota watching grandchildren's football games and then went down to the Twin Cities to see a grandson walkout onto the field at a Twins game on Sunday.
Buzz Lundeen introduced our speaker, Len Taylor, who is now in his 34th year working for the City of Fergus Falls, having started back in 1993. Len was born and raised in Los Alamos and found his way to our area when he worked at Inspiration Bible Camp in 1983, recalling that Jamie Larson was one of his little charges at the time. Those assembled received a comprehensive review of public service projects that have recently been completed, are still in process or are planned for next year. The Pebble Lake campground was redone over the past two years and will open for its first full season next spring. To date, the City has received $60,000 in registration fees, which is behind projections; the campground will be open through October. The Aquatic Center has now seen two years of use and had 27,000 visitors this summer, 8000 more than the 2025 summer, with people registering from 38 states. (It may have helped that we had 17 or 18 90º+ days.) The first of three phases of upgrades to Wright Park have been completed, at the impetus of two Council members and a gift from Bimbo Bakery; it is committed to give $6,000 to support each of the next two phases of the project over the next two years. The tennis courts at Athletic Park have been transitioned into a simulated roadway for bicyclists to enjoy. The pickleball courts at Broadway Park are well used in this, their second season, with some thought being given to adding additional courts out at DeLagoon. A grant was obtained to enhance the mountain bike trail at River Park and Len described it as now being a challenging course. As to the top of City Hall, the bell nearly came off a year ago and Scott DeMartelaere at Design Intent Architects has put together a redesign to support the structure; a grant was obtained from Minnesota's Historic Preservation Council and bid opening to do the necessary work is actually occurring today. For historical buffs, the structure dates back to 1927.
Len told us that Lynn Olson at City Hall is looking for election judge volunteers and the Charter Commission is looking for members.
We were then told about the 14 projects going on right now: 1) the three roundabouts on each side of the Highway 210 overpass opened two Monday's ago and the new bridge was described as having nice architectural features and will have the City's name on both sides of it; 2) the Lake Alice grit chambers on its northern corners is almost finished; it is not known how often they will have to be cleaned out; 3) Otter Tail Valley Rail signal replacement; 4) the Cavour Ave. and alleyway improvements; the City will also be considering removing the elevation from one of the two city parking lots east of Trilogy Realty; 5) the Junius reconstruction will be finished this year; 6) landfill demolition with an expanded area that has a five-year cell life; there is about 70 years of capacity left on the sight; 7) Cleveland Avenue reconstruction, with the waterline underneath it upsized from six to eight inches; 8) Douglas Avenue improvements; 10) DeLagoon Park road improvements, with $5.2 million spent or to be spent to enhance the park; 11) Phase 1 (of 7) to replace lead service lines, with 1000 of such lines to replaced over the life span of the project, as mandated by the State; there will have to be a hole cut in a home's basement and a hole to bore in, with plastic piping to be used from the watermain to a home's water meter; 12) Vine St. mill and overlay project; 13) sealcoating; and 14) the dairy property multi-use path, which is waiting for state approval for two railroad crossings. Projects on the drawing board for next year include work on Channing (it also may be widened) and redoing Union Ave. from Vernon to Gustavus.