Apple Valley City Council Approves Grant Agreements, Maintenance Workers Contract

Apple Valley Mayor Mary Hamann-Roland wasn’t at Thursday’s brief City Council meeting—she was serving on the nominating committee for the Metropolitan Council—but the four remaining City Council members approved agreements for two grants and a contract for city maintenance employees.

The council has heard and discussed the two grants—a $60,000 Cedar Avenue pre-development grant and a $50,000 grant for analysis of the Hanson Concrete site—several times, council member and acting mayor Tom Goodwin said.

The Metropolitan Council will match the grants at 25 percent each, $15,000 and $12,500, respectively.

“We’re all set to go,” Goodwin said.

The Cedar Avenue grant would allow the city to hire a consultant to study how the areas within half a mile of the corridor could be affected by construction along Cedar, according to a city memo. The funds must be used by the end of 2011.

Community Development Director Bruce Nordquist said the grant is available to help businesses disrupted by the construction with marketing problems.

The second grant will pay for a consultant to look at the Hanson Concrete site at Johnny Cake Ridge Road and County Hwy 42 to evaluate potential future use of the 80 acres of land there. Apple Valley’s 2030 Comprehensive Plan designated the site for industrial use.

Apple Valley’s City Council also unanimously approved a one-year contract for city maintenance employees with the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Local 479.

The contract, which covers 2011, includes a 1-percent wage increase, double pay for holiday work hours and adjustments to the city’s health insurance contributions to employees.

At Thursday’s meeting, the council also approved a wine and 3.2-percent malt liquor license for Spoon, an Asian fusion restaurant that has been open in Apple Valley’s Granada shopping center since January.