Jamestown mayor plans to ask City Council to withdraw from agreement to provide library services

Masaki Ova, The Jamestown Sun, N.D.
Updated ·5 min read

Sep. 3—JAMESTOWN — Mayor Dwaine Heinrich plans to ask the Jamestown City Council at its meeting in October to approve a resolution notifying Stutsman County that the city of Jamestown intends to allow the memorandum of agreement to provide joint library services to expire and to begin the dissolution process.

Heinrich said the big flaw in the memorandum of agreement is that it does not include language of the financial contributions to the James River Valley Library System by the city and the county.

During the mayor's report, Heinrich told the City Council on Tuesday, Sept. 3, that the city of Jamestown has a seven-year agreement with Stutsman County. The City Council and the Stutsman County Commission have both approved one-year extensions to the memorandum of agreement for the past three years.

The memorandum of agreement will automatically extend another five years in March if the city or Stutsman County doesn't provide a notice of intent to withdraw.

"If either party is going to leave, you have to notify them two years in advance," Heinrich said.

The city of Jamestown and Stutsman County have provided joint library services under a memorandum of agreement after voters approved a measure in 2008 to combine them.

He said the city's contribution is still 15 mills but the county's contribution is less than half of what it was when both parties entered into the agreement.

"They have reduced their share without any discussions with the city over that," Heinrich said. " ... I think we all recognize you cannot have a partnership and have one partner decide that we are unilaterally going to decide to reduce our funding by 50% for the partnership."

After voters approved the measure in 2008, Heinrich said the City Council passed a resolution to enter into a memorandum of agreement with Stutsman County to establish the joint library board. He said the resolution stipulated that the funding would remain the same, which was 15 city mills and 4 county mills. He said the city and county mills are not of equal value.

The state statutes that govern the creation of a joint library board stipulate that the memorandum of agreement should indicate the funding share by each party, Heinrich said in an email to The Jamestown Sun on Wednesday, Sept. 4.

"In this case even though the resolution did contain the funding language the actual MOA entered into by the city and county is silent on funding," he said.

The City Council in a 4-0 vote approved allowing the city of Jamestown to join with the cities of Bismarck and Minot to establish a regional storage facility for food-grade carbon dioxide.

The city will enter into a joint powers agreement with Bismarck and Minot. City Engineer Travis Dillman said the agreement will need to include an exit clause. Once the joint powers agreement is drafted, the city attorney will need to review it, he said.

It will cost the city about $205,000 to have 30 tons of carbon-dioxide storage at the regional facility. The regional storage would have a capacity to store up to 200 tons of carbon dioxide with Bismarck getting 100 tons and Minot with 60 tons.

Thirty tons of food-grade carbon dioxide is used monthly by the city's water treatment plant.

Food-grade carbon dioxide is used to treat drinking water.

Having enough carbon dioxide as pH stabilizer for the water department has been an issue for a few years, Tyler Michel, public works director, said at the Jamestown Public Works Committee in August. The main supplier for the state is out of Beulah, North Dakota, which will randomly shut the plant down on short notice when cities are running low on food-grade carbon dioxide.

An unstable market for food-grade carbon dioxide makes it more expensive for water treatment plants in North Dakota to treat drinking water, The Jamestown Sun reported in October 2022. Moving to alternative options could also be costly. Water treatment plants across the state see an increase in the cost to purchase food-grade carbon dioxide when a shutdown happens, The Jamestown Sun reported.

In 2022, the cities and organizations affected by the carbon dioxide market instability requested a collaborative effort between the North Dakota Department of Environmental Quality, the Environmental Protection Agency, the North Dakota National League of Cities and the American Water Works Association to bring awareness to the situation and how it affects the water treatment processes and costs. They requested funding from the state for a National Science Foundation-approved food-safe carbon dioxide facility or a state-owned facility for the purpose of storing a constant carbon dioxide supply to treat drinking water in the state and to provide access and transport of the product to water treatment facilities.

In other business, the City Council unanimously approved:

* the appointment of Denise Waldie to the James River Valley Library System Board of Directors. The position is a joint city and county appointment. The Stutsman County Commission approved Waldie's appointment in August.

*

awarding a bid for the demotion of city-owned buildings at 1100 Railroad Drive to Junkman & Son in the amount of $140,500. The city plans to demolish buildings along Railroad Drive East and repair a 265-by-65-foot building to be used for storage by various departments. The property along Railroad Drive East includes multiple buildings and is where LeFevre Sales was formerly located.