By Dave Baumeister, County Correspondent
SIOUX FALLS – Due to another unexpected delay, the Minnehaha County Commission had to meet at Carnegie Town Hall again this week for their regular meeting.
Although they had originally planned to be in their new chambers on the third floor of the Minnehaha County Administration Building, they continued to be guests of the city of Sioux Falls.
But while this meeting saw the return of all five commissioners, there was nothing too controversial discussed.
The only issue with any contention was the appeal of a planning and zoning conditional use permit from June 27.
At that time, there was no opposition to the issue, and it was unanimously approved by the planning board.
However, after that time, a neighbor’s appeal brought the matter before the county commission.
Land near Highway 115 and 250th Street owned by Elizabeth Rogers-Stoel, and managed by her husband Dustin Stoel, which is zoned A-1 Agricultural was looking for the CUP in order to operate a colostrum storage facility on land behind the Baltic Corner Bar, which they also own and is already zoned commercial.
Dustin Stoel, who works for Alta Genetics, a cattle reproduction group, plans to bring in two refrigerator units to be a central storage facility for the colostrum.
Colostrum is the first breast milk to come in for cows after they give birth and is extremely high in nutrients and antibodies. Stoel said his company wanted to use the area for storage as it is close to the 1-29 corridor.
While Stoel wasn’t exactly sure of the entire process, he said the milk would be shipped to Canada. According to the Alta website, their “sister company” turns the colostrum into a powder that can be used to enrich or replace maternal colostrum for calves.
In the appeal of the planning commission’s June decision, neighbor Mark Rogers, who said he was the former husband of the landowner, was not totally against the project, but said in his appeal letter, that he was looking for Stoel to put in more trees between the properties, and that he wanted the refrigerator units to be painted a “neutral color.”
Rogers said the trees would act as a buffer for any noise from the refrigerator fans.
But in his rebuttal, Stoel wondered about that, as he said, “I struggle to believe he could hear (unit fans),” as he explained the current noise from the bar was already louder than any noise the fans could make.
In the end, the commission voted 4-1, with Commissioner Jeff Barth voting no, to uphold the decision of the planning commission with one change to the requirements for the permit.
They approved the site plan for the two units, but it was added that any futher changes would have to also be approved before they could happen.
Commissioner Dean Karsky said he was worried that without that caveat, there might be the “creep” of more units being added.
No complaint CAFO
A second zoning matter became a testament to how rural neighbors can work together to make things happen.
At the same June 27 planning commission meeting, Nick Siemonsma was granted a conditional use permit for a 2,400 hog CAFO on land located five miles east of Dell Rapids.
This time, though, the petitioner didn’t have as easy a time getting original approval, as several people spoke against the operation, according to county planner Mason Steffen.
The planning commission did grant the permit, but only by a 3-2 vote.
However, since June, Siemonsma said he met with all his neighbors, and they discussed the concerns to the point that even though an appeal to deny the CUP had been made, they dropped their objections, and no one spoke against Siemonsma’s project.
The commission approved that permit 5-0.
2023 budget
Commissioners also approved the provisional 2023 county budget this week.
The budget, which currently stands at $113.8 million, will not be up for final adoption until Sept. 27.
In the meantime, there will be another budget hearing on Sept. 9 and a final chance for input on Sept. 20.
This budget does call for the use of $2.6 million in opt-out money that was approved in 2019.
