2024 has been a busy year for the City of Litchfield with several projects taking place and other issues being addressed. One of the on-going projects will be improvements to the wastewater treatment facility.
Mayor Ron Dingmann says the facility has been operating at full capacity with First District Association’s expansion and the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency has more stringent permit limits, so the City, FDA and MPCA have been working together to establish a plan to keep the them compliant. He says a facility plan has been adopted, and FDA is building a pretreatment facility.
Mayor Dingmann says the Litchfield Area Recreation Center has been another big project with ground being broken this past fall and the facility – along with improvements to the Civic Arena next door – should be completed in the fall of 2025. He says an improvement project was completed at the Litchfield Public Library this year, as well as a rehabilitation project at the airport terminal building.
Mayor Dingmann says the City will be selling the golf club house to Parlil Holdings on a contract-for-deed on May 15th of 2025, and a street improvement project will begin in 2025 for Johnson Drive and 260th Street. He says the sale of cannabis has been another big issue for the City of Litchfield this past year, and the City will defer registration and enforcement to Meeker County, and amended the city ordinance to allow sales in B4 districts with a 700-foot school buffer zone.
After 22 years in the Minnesota House of Representatives, Dean Urdahl will be officially retired on January 5th. His eleven terms in the State Legislature have resulted in numerous local and state projects being accomplished.
Urdahl says he served on the Capital Investment Committee for 20 years – two of those years as chair when Republicans were in the majority – and he was able to get many projects included in the bonding bills – mainly for water and wastewater projects – for the small towns he represented, but also big projects such as $6-million for the Litchfield Area Recreation Center, and $10-million for the wastewater expansion project at First District Association which did not get signed into law this past session as the Senate did not get it passed in time for the midnight deadline, but he’s confident it will pass in the 2025 session. He says he was also instrumental in the huge preservation project for the State Capitol Building.
Urdahl says he worked for 7 years on a bill to get civics as a requirement for course credit for high school juniors and seniors and it finally passed, so it will be a requirement for graduation as of 2026. He says he also tried to get a state park located in his district, and eventually Green Leaf – in southern Meeker County – was designated as a state recreation area. He says he’d like to thank the people in this area for the opportunity he’s had to represent them these past 22 years.
Urdahl says his wife, Karen, encouraged him to retire at the end of his current term, and he agreed that it was time. He says they will spend time traveling and attending the events of their grandchildren, and he will also continue writing and hopes to produce another film this summer.
On Wednesday morning at 8:53, the Stearns County Sheriff’s Office received a call regarding an over-turned semi and trailer on Mapleview Road, just north of the T-intersection of County Road 40. Upon arrival, deputies located a 2018 Kenworth semi-truck with a tanker trailer tipped on its passenger side in the west ditch of Mapleview Road.
The truck was registered to Krain Transportation of Freeport. Approximately 55,000 pounds, or 6400 gallons of milk, were loaded in the tanker trailer, some of which were leaking out the top hatch. Deputies identified and spoke to the driver – 24-year-old Joshua Kulzer of Melrose. Kulzer said he was driving southbound on Mapleview Road when the tires of the tanker trailer got too close to the shoulder of the road. The tires caught the softer portion of the shoulder and pulled the rest of the truck off the roadway and it eventually over-turned. Kulzer was not injured. Albany Fire & Rescue assisted at the scene.
