Grants help Cloquet get things done

During Cloquet's taxation and budget hearing on Dec. 3, frustrated resident Shannon Kesner asked city councilors to think outside the box rather than raising taxes, sharing that her property taxes have gone up over $1,200 a year since she purchased her home in 2020.

"I know there's all kinds of funding sources out there," she said. "I implore you and others to take a look at all the different opportunities and see if something can help this."

There's good news for Kesner and other residents: City staff are tuned into grant opportunities and have had success finding funds to help with everything from affordable housing and broadband access to safer roads and water. Without the grant funding, projects either would not have been completed or would have pushed local taxes up even further.

According to records from city staff, over the past seven years the city of Cloquet has secured over $8.4 million in grant funding for public works projects, and $5 million for the Lake Superior waterline in state bond funding to be repaid by the state. Other economic development projects have received grants for $2.76 million since 2015.

The city also had a hand in more than $500,000 in business assistance grants in 2022-23, playing a direct role in obtaining state funds for projects at USG and Upper Lakes Foods. The city also supported - often acting as a conduit for outside funds - more than $10 million in various state and federal housing aid awards since 2017.

Public works director Caleb Peterson and assistant city engineer John Anderson apply for many of the public works grants, often with help from Holly Hansen, who also pursues economic development and housing grants as community development director for the city.

It's not easy money.

"Everybody sees these announcements from politicians talking about all this money for infrastructure that they've passed," Peterson said. "It doesn't show up at our doorstep. We have to find a project that meets their criteria, one that's eligible for us to apply for in a competitive process. It's not like, 'Oh, here's an extra million dollars a year to do street projects.' That's not how it functions."

Ward 4 councilor Kerry Kolodge has been on the city council since April 2012. He said city staff members have gotten pretty darn good at tapping into grant money, which will often allow the city to do more with a planned project than it could have. The city's public works department has scored large and small state grant dollars from various state agencies, including the Minnesota Department of Transportation, Minnesota Department of Heath, Minnesota Pollution Control Agency and others.

"The downside is you don't get grants for daily operations: to pay for police department raises or buy a dump truck," Kolodge said.

Bigger and better

Grant funds can and do allow the city to stretch its own dollars.

Instead of a simple mill and overlay on Cloquet Avenue in 2018, for example, a $1 million grant from the MnDOT's Local Road Improvement Program in 2018 allowed the city to also upgrade the street lighting and other streetscaping, and also make the downtown safer for pedestrians. A 2022 Small Cities Development Program grant for $483,649 paid to replace all the street lights in the city's historic West End, where not all the old lights worked anymore. Over $407,000 is coming from the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency to search for new potable water sources. Another MnDOT grant will cover $1.4 million out of a $1.8 million project starting next year to fix Armory Road and its various intersections.

During Tuesday's Cloquet City Council meeting, assistant public works director Ross Biebl shared the news of yet another grant for the city of Cloquet: $1.3 million in Legacy Funding for Pine Valley Recreation Area. The Cloquet park was one of 14 across Greater Minnesota that was selected. With its ski jumps and lighted trails, Pine Valley was eligible for the funding because it was designated a "regionally significant" park a year ago.

"We have the only ski jumps in the area, and all kinds of different activities go on there: Nordic skiing, jumping, snowshoeing, biking, hiking, running," Biebl said last year, explaining why the Cloquet park made the cut.

It's money that - along with already approved sales tax dollars - will help ensure the ski jumps are safe for decades to come, fix the parking lot, and replace and extend the trail lighting to other parts of the park.

Add in the promised $1 million donation from the Medich family for a new hybrid chalet-shelter building that will be constructed next to the parking lot, and Pine Valley will no longer be a "hidden" gem, Kolodge said.

"That park's going to get some much needed attention," Kolodge said. "It's an extra shot for us to not only take care of the things we have to take care of, but we'll have some money to take care of some of the amenities."

Peterson said the Pine Valley Legacy grant application included a 20-percent local match from the voter-approved sales tax dollars, which gave it a higher chance of success.

"The hope is to take the sales tax money as far as we can," Peterson said. "Honestly, the $2 million in sales tax wouldn't go very far - this one project would eat up the whole thing. Now we can keep making future applications using the sales tax as the local match."

Grants beget grants

Many of the grants awarded to the city lay the groundwork for future work and/or future grant opportunities.

After the second fatal crash at the intersection of Interstate 35, the frontage road and Minnesota Highway 33, the city received a grant to explore options to disconnect the frontage road. That study led to the state getting involved and the city's first and largest roundabout.

"We had five serious crashes over a certain number of years, and MnDOT stepped up to the plate," said Hansen, who started the grant process with previous city engineer Jim Prusak. "They got the funding from central office - part of that was Department of Public Safety funding," she said, pointing out there were different "pots of money" used. "Ultimately it became a fully paid-for safety project with no city share. At $2.2 million, it was a really big deal."

Hansen said it's not just a roundabout.

"It's a correctly sized roundabout with flashing advanced notification off the bridge there, and it's sized well for semis. It's a really nice setup we've got down there, and it solved a lot of problems," she said.

Peterson was excited about another groundwork-laying grant that Anderson worked on, which garnered $106,440 from the MPCA to do a citywide stormwater model and climate resiliency plan.

"Because we have this plan in place, it opens us up for future applications for infrastructure funding to address the issues that are cited in this plan," Peterson said.

The same goes for $427,500 the city got from the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources for its emerald ash borer response and tree inventory, and $407,500 from the MPCA for potable water test well drilling and analysis.

"Hopefully we're able to identify some future sources for water to feed the system, which could address both capacity needs and or someday eliminate the need for treatment systems," Peterson said, explaining the city received the MPCA grant because of the discovery of PFAS in one of its wells. "This is our first step. It's going to depend on what we find and not only what the quality is, but what the quantity of that water is."

Working with a broadband provider, the city of Cloquet provided $300,000 of federal Covid dollars, and helped the provider land a $4.8 million grant to cover a large area in the region. Cloquet's portion amounted to $1.8 million and made it possible to connect nearly 250 north Cloquet homes to high speed internet.

"We didn't do all of it, but we were certainly a player and a huge partner in the project and in the process," Hansen said.

Smaller grants can also lead to bigger future awards for needed actions, including numerous grants for studies spanning from transportation issues to housing. Hansen also cited "brownfield assessment grants" for $6,910 from the federal EPA at Brenny Dahl and Hotel Solem.

"It's grant money to the owner of that business that helps them look at contamination that may or may not be present within their properties," she said.

Hansen also wrote a $175,000 grant to help the Hotel Solem developers with getting asbestos and mold out of the historic downtown building, which is being redeveloped into market-rate apartments.

"We're actually leveraging state and federal programs to help fund development in the city," Hansen said.

The city doesn't have a paid grant writer: it's part of the job, especially for Peterson, Anderson and Hansen, who often collaborate when they're writing grants.

"We figure them out. And if, if it gets into transportation I lean into these guys," Hansen said.

Peterson said relying on grants is the world we live in now.

"Whether we like it or not, outside funding (99 percent of that is taxpayer funding, it's just not levied by property taxes) has become part of the job," he said. "If you don't actively go after it and monitor it, then the Cloquet residents won't benefit. It'll still get spent, it will just go to someone else."

Kolodge and other councilors appreciate the grant work.

"I'm really glad we've got the staff that's on top of these things," the Ward 4 councilor said. "The public should feel confident that we are looking, so everything doesn't always come back to the local taxpayers. I can't take the credit. It's the people that work for the city that have done all of it."