County buys one property, makes offer on another for law enforcement center project

By Bob Steenson, bsteenson@charlescitypress.com 

Progress continues on the many different pieces of a puzzle that will come together in the form of a new Floyd County law enforcement center and updates to the county courthouse.

County supervisors at a special meeting Monday morning tentatively agreed to the purchase of one piece of residential property that will be needed to make way for the law enforcement center to be built next to the courthouse, and also made the first formal offer for the second residential property.

The supervisors, with Supervisor Mark Kuhn absent, voted to go into closed session to discuss the purchase of 111 S. Jackson St. with the property owner, Paige Cerwinske, who attended the closed session.

The Iowa Open Meetings Law allows a government body to close a public meeting for a number of specific reasons, including, “To discuss the purchase or sale of particular real estate only where premature disclosure could be reasonably expected to increase the price the governmental body would have to pay for that property or reduce the price the governmental body would receive for that property.”

After the meeting was reopened to the public, the board agreed to authorize Assistant County Attorney Randy Tilton to prepare an offer to purchase 111 S. Jackson St. for $133,000. The property had been appraised at $74,000.

Supervisor Chairwoman Linda Tjaden said after the motion was approved, “I do want to make a statement.”

Addressing Cerwinske, Tjaden said, “Paige, we appreciate you being here. I know this has been a difficult thing to have to go through, and we really appreciate being able to negotiate as we have, to be able to purchase and acquire your property.

“We do wish you the best. …. I really hope that it works well for you, I really do. So I just want to shake your hand. Thank you so much,” Tjaden said.

Supervisor Doug Kamm remarked, “Amen. Thank you, thank you.”

The supervisors also formally accepted the appraisal for 101 S. Jackson St., which is owned by a brother and sister who live out of the area, at $36,000, and set that as the fair market value for negotiation purposes.

The supervisors had discussed this property at a closed session last week, and were waiting a 10-day period between when the appraisal was mailed to the property owners and negotiations could begin.

The board approved offering the owners $47,000 for the property, plus $10,000 for moving expenses, and giving them until the close of business on Aug. 13 to make a decision.

In other law enforcement center and courthouse update news, Tjaden said she had met with the county dispatchers, who are currently located in the Charles City City Hall, under the management of the police chief, regarding their move to the law enforcement center.

Tjaden said a number of decisions will need to be made to transfer the employees from the city payroll to the county payroll. The county currently reimburses the city for the dispatch costs.

Tjaden said she wanted to make sure that the dispatchers are involved in the decision process as it goes along, including providing input on how the new dispatch center should be designed.

She said the projects architects, Prochaska & Associates, of Omaha, Nebraska, are taking courthouse change suggestions from department heads and seeing how they would fit into the courthouse update plan, including how it would affect costs on the up-to $13.5 million project.

Tjaden also said she plans to attend a Charles City Planning and Zoning Committee meeting near the end of this month to begin the work on closing South Jackson Street between Gilbert Street and Court Street, which will also be needed for the project.

In other action, the board:

• Appointed Vickie Zobel of Charles City to the Floyd County Board of Adjustment, to fill the unexpired term of Angela Ruzicka, who resigned in June. The term will go to Dec. 31, 2021.

• Approved the addition of one clerk position in the county Treasurer’s Office, to replace a deputy position that had been held by Judy Hughes, who retired. The county has a policy of reducing the number of deputy positions in each department to one through attrition as deputies leave or retire.

The Treasurer’s Office will go from three deputies and two clerks to two deputies and three clerks. Sherry Lynne Carolan has been hired to fill the new clerk position.