Community Corner

Rosemount Mayor Delivers 2011 'State of the City'

Mayor Droste said he believes city is well positioned to take advantage of an economic upswing.

Editors note: Rosemount Mayor Bill Droste delivered his "State of the City" address Friday afternoon at Rosemount's Steeple Center.  As a public service, we are publishing his complete speech, based on a version provided by the City of Rosemount.

I thank the staff and members of the Dakota County Regional Chamber of Commerce for organizing this event, as they have annually. And I’m very pleased that they have joined this year with the Rosemount Rotary Club. I think often about the assets we have in Rosemount. And some of the most important are civic and volunteer groups like yours. By combining your personal interests and strengths, you enhance our community. You take on challenges that might go unmet without your help. You aid the functions of government without adding to government.

The Chamber and the Rotary are joined in benefiting the community by other groups: the Lions Club, Veteran groups, the Seniors, the Arts Council, and the Historical Society. We are always in the debt of the citizens who work on our community celebrations, Leprechaun Days and the Haunted Trail.

There’s another group that we haven’t talked about much, because we haven’t wanted to mislead people into thinking it is an effort dominated by government. But it recently got some well-deserved attention. The bestows annual awards for innovation at the local level. And this month, one of the awards went to one of the efforts of our Rosemount Community Leaders group. The Community Leaders are composed of church, educational, and civic group leaders, and of representatives of the City. We meet monthly to discuss ways to help the young people of Rosemount.

Last fall, through the work of the , the Community Leaders group spurred creation of an effort to bring the community together and support literacy. The “One Book, One Rosemount” campaign was an excellent model of using existing resources of government with a good deal of volunteer help and financial support from public-spirited businesses like Taco Johns and SKB Environmental. Non-profits like the Historical Society and Lighthouse Christian Church also had major roles.

We didn’t win the award for inventing the idea. We were not the first community to attempt a “One Book” campaign. The reason we won the award was the way public and private interests worked together to achieve success for the betterment of the community.

The key to this campaign and many of our efforts to maintain the hometown feel of Rosemount is to support the development of the potential of our young people. We do that in many ways. We work with our schools on various initiatives. We’ve had a successful first year for the . It advises the City Council and gives a voice to the next generation.

On the City Council itself, we take great joy in recognizing achievements of young people. I especially would like to acknowledge the high number of Eagle Scouts in Rosemount the last few years: 11 in 2010 alone. It shows that we have dedicated parents, committed to teaching young people the life lessons that are important for children to experience including an understanding of the outdoors.

Another group, the Rosemount Marching Band, deserves special recognition. To be the best marching band in Minnesota the past five years and to rank continually in the top ten when competing in the Midwest Classic is a tremendous achievement. No matter what you do in life, working on large teams takes exceptional skills. To achieve this repeatedly demonstrates the quality of the program and teachers.

And we all enjoyed the success last year of the Irish football team, battling its way to the state championship game. We and our youth are also fortunate to have a broad religious community that in many ways, often silently, can offer support services reaching out to members and families during good times and bad.

As we look back on the events of the past year, we see the benefits of these efforts and partnerships. And we see the opportunity to do more. Last year at this time, we were celebrating the safe return of members of the National Guard’s Red Bull division, headquartered here in Rosemount. That gave further impetus to our efforts to win designation for Rosemount as a Yellow Ribbon community, with systematic support for military families while a loved one is away in service, and continued support for members of the military when they return. Citizens working on this initiative are meeting monthly at City Hall, and they would welcome more helping hands.

One of the reasons I’m interested to speak with a group like this is to hear opinions on how the economy is doing. By a strict definition, we are in the 21st month of a recovery. But you have to squint hard to see the evidence of that, especially in local government. The National League of Cities says that economic recovery for state and local governments typically lags the economy as a whole by 12-to-18 months. At the city level in Minnesota, our dependence on property taxes, and the deflating of the real estate market, have made conditions very challenging.

During 2010, the City Council looked closely at the cost of government. We sought and found ways to reduce costs, and in some cases to reduce services, so we could lower the amount of taxes we levy on property owners for the second straight year. We were helped by the fact that overall market values in Rosemount remained fairly solid. We didn’t have the extreme boom as in some parts of the country, so we’ve been spared some of the bust in values and economic activity.

Even with the softness of the economy, and the reports about data that show weakness in housing and business expansion, Rosemount is doing better. We ended 2010 with some positive numbers in key indicators. We added 80 housing units during the year. We posted $32.2 million in new construction. Those trends help to offset declines in values for existing property. And it’s good news for taxpayers.

We were able to benefit last year from some stimulus funding. And so as you drove here today, you had a smoother ride along Highway 3, and perhaps an easier time getting through the 145th Street intersection. Business will benefit in the future from the growth opportunities made available by improvements to Akron Avenue, opening new areas for development. And the City’s large existing investment in its street system is protected by our annual maintenance and improvement projects.

We continue a strong commitment to public safety. in most categories in Rosemount last year – down 18 percent overall. We thank the personnel who work to keep us safe. as Rosemount’s Firefighter and Police Officer of the Year: Fire Captain Mike Reis and Police Officer Ryan Coughlin. Earlier, Officer Coughlin was named the City Employee of the Year.

Those individuals deserve a lot of thanks. But we should not forget the work City employees perform every day. They maintain our streets – and what a challenge that has been during this winter. I’m proud that I’ve heard from a number of constituents who said our streets were in great shape compared with those in some communities.

Those same workers will be maintaining streets and parks as the weather warms up. Others in City government handle tasks ranging from managing our water system to keeping the financial books straight. Our staff has carried out the decisions of the Council that were rewarded last year with another increase in the credit rating of the City.

We are committed to being good stewards of the money that taxpayers entrust to us. Here are a couple of basic examples. Our borrowing, measured by what’s called “total primary government debt,” is 21 percent below what it was five years ago. You may notice an uptick in the last year. That’s because – strange as it may seem – to pay off some of the old bonds, we had to issue new, temporary refunding bonds. In effect, we have to count some of our debt twice. But those temporary bonds will be off the books by next year, and the debt total will continue down.

The number of full-time City employees rose during the last five years ... partly a reflection of a time when Rosemount grew by 770 households, a ten percent increase. But we reversed that trend last year through a job consolidation, and unfortunately, a layoff.

We also offer our thanks to the businesspeople of Rosemount. Even with the economic issues they’ve faced in the last few years, they have chosen to expand their businesses here, and to bring new businesses to the community. They show the optimism that has made our community and our country great.

So where do we stand near the beginning of 2011? We can answer that in part using the data becoming . I might note that Rosemount residents had the second highest rate in Dakota County for returning the Census forms that came to our homes last spring. Recently Dakota County planner Jane Vanderpoel shared these figures with my colleagues and me in the Mayors/Managers group.

(To see the census information, read the PDF file attached to this story)

Clearly, ours is a growing community, well-positioned for the future. It’s the mission of the Rosemount City Council to take advantage of those strengths and to address as best we can … with the resources that are available … the areas that need improvement.

We are in the process of determining our goals for the City in the year ahead. That work is still underway. But I can share a few details with you in one of the most important areas to our community: the strategies we will use to pursue economic development in Rosemount.

We are working to establish a policy for enhanced incentives that will attract industries to our Business Park. We will take advantage of areas there that were designated by the state as “shovel ready” for development. The strategy will build on our existing infrastructure and find ways to improve it.

We continue to work on opportunities for the site where we meet today. We provided the land for a wonderful library and we are preserving a historic building for this community space, which opened six months ago after some needed repairs and upgrades. We see increasing success in attracting groups to use the building, and still keep in sight the long-range goal to provide a venue for cultural and arts activities.

Now we look to the area to the north for the best public purpose. A potential use would be to meet needs for more senior housing in Rosemount.

We are participating actively with the regional authority for economic development that is being formed. And we continue to work with other agencies to promote broadband expansion throughout Dakota County.

We continue to build new contacts through the International Council of Shopping Centers, which is an association of retail professionals, and the Industrial Asset Management Council, which is a group for commercial real estate experts.

We will pursue the opportunities revealed by the market study the Port Authority commissioned showing demand for hotel space in Rosemount.

We will finish the cleanup of the Genz-Ryan site to market it through the efforts of a commercial broker.

And we will continue to work toward accelerating the construction for a Downtown park-and-ride, currently funded for 2013 and 2014.

We will study the feasibility of extending Connemara Trail to Akron Avenue to promote both residential and commercial development.

One of the most important partnerships that will determine the future of Rosemount is our work with the University of Minnesota as it plans for development of UMore Park.

There are four major initiatives: the AUAR, which is an environmental study for site as a whole; the review of potential pollution to remove uncertainty once and for all about what was left behind by the ammo plant; the 8 million-dollar wind turbine, which could lead to nearby spinoff business opportunities; and .

We will also continue to work with the “U” for development of a business park on the property near Highway 52, while we seek funding for a new interchange at 52 and County Road 42.

We are strongly committed to working with existing businesses to strengthen them and encourage their growth to produce jobs. It’s almost always easier to keep a business than to replace it. Unfortunately, it’s not always possible. But we encourage businesses to partner with the City for our mutual benefit.

We are also firmly committed to find efficient ways to reduce the City’s costs in a sustainable manner. One way to do that is through partnerships with government agencies. We have dozens of existing arrangements for everything from sealcoating streets, to providing fire mutual aid, to answering 911 calls.

Mayors and city administrators meet regularly to find new partnerships to help us grow and be more competitive, helping us attract new jobs and residents.

And finally, a key to how we make Rosemount attractive to new business and residents. Although it’s early in the year … and we have not formally started the next budgeting cycle, I have some good news for the home and business owners who pay for City government. Through efficiencies and hard decisions about the level of city services we provide, we expect to reduce our levy to run City operations for the third year in a row.

For all these reasons, I can say to you that the state of Rosemount is good, and we are well-positioned to expand as the economy slowly improves. We have a prudent level of debt and we have the infrastructure in place to support growth. We will work to preserve the small-town elements, the open space, and the great neighborhoods of Rosemount as we plan for our future.

Thank you.


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