City Notes: Charles City continues to face water issues

By Charles City Mayor Jim Erb

As we reach the beginning of summer, we continue to expand our community offerings.  As part of the Charles City Challenge Whitewater Weekend and the Charles City BBQ Challenge, a variety of other events were added. The weather has allowed us to go forward with Party in the Park and the Charles City Family Bike Ride.

Now, we have another big four-day Fourth of July Celebration on the immediate horizon.  All that’s missing is a fresh group of volunteers to make things go smoothly.  If you’re interested in helping out, just give the Chamber and/or Revitalization a call.

Thank you very much volunteers. You make Charles City a great place to live!

As has been previously reported, CGS Holding (Mitas Tire) has been acquired by Trelleborg Group. The local operation of Mitas will be integrated into the Trelleborg Wheel Systems business area.  Charles City looks forward to continuing the excellent working relationships we have had that have been in place with our existing industries for many years.  In particular, we look forward to helping with the identification of future workforce members.

Now for some issues that are going to require a bit of doing. Simply Essentials of Overland Park, Kan., has purchased the former All States Quality Foods site and is in the process of renovating the plant with a focus on sustainability. That leaves several issues that are presently being discussed including the need to improve our wastewater plant’s capacity, so as to allow us to meet state standards.

There undoubtedly will be further discussions about traffic management as it affects city planning. Given the fact that two shifts and a total of 490 jobs are part of this proposal, a substantial community impact will be felt.

The wastewater plant operation was already on our city planning radar before Simply Essentials appeared. That is due to the fact that Iowa has in place a plan called Iowa’s Nutrient Reduction Strategy. The goal is to put together a joint effort that will show meaningful and measurable progress (a 45 percent drop in nitrogen and phosphorous levels). Some 20 practices are suggested for farmers to consider in meeting these goals.

All of this is voluntary but if the goals are not met, city wastewater plants undoubtedly will be expected to help fill the gaps. In short, most cities are facing some fairly major requirements without much room to maneuver in meeting these aggressive goals.  A number of grants have been  written and obtained, but they will not pay for all of the work.

Although the plan is supposed to be voluntary, that will only work if the parties can establish that they are making serious progress. Thus cities, counties, farmers (both landlords and tenants) and their organizations, together with state entities need to identify the total costs in question and their allocation and then establish serious timelines for accomplishing these efforts.

There also should be serious support for making these practices sustainable and be of sufficient scale to make them credible as a solution of these problems.  Part of the solution needs to come from the state Legislature putting a serious set of “carrots and sticks” together to motivate consensus.

On another flooding topic, there recently was an online petition that renewed a request previously made for “fixing” Sportsmen’s Park flooding.  School Board Vice President, Jason Walker responded with a statement that made clear that the school district had conducted a thorough review of the options and had not identified a viable solution at the Sportsmen’s Park site.

The fact is the baseball diamond is below the Cedar River level.

Naturally, as Mayor, I would be happy to participate in any way I can, but any discussion would undoubtedly have to include the school district since they have the primary interest here.

Last, there is another “water issue” that has proven to be very difficult for the community to address.  The city has three swimming pools located within the city limits  (one owned by the city at Lions Field), a second located at the Family YMCA and a third located at the present Middle School.

The school pool has been drained.

The three parties need to put their heads together and propose a solution for serving the needs of the community over the long haul that everyone can support. At the moment, I don’t believe a solution is in sight, and I would be surprised if the Park and Recreation Board, the Charles City Community School Board, and the Family YMCA Board of Directors have any process in place for identifying a realistic solution to meet our community needs.

If they can’t address these pool issues, I question whether they will be able to assign meaningful planning priorities for other community needs. Picking low hanging fruit may make people feel better, but it won’t replace a swimming pool or build a community center or any other substantial priority.

You can reach Charles City Mayor James Erb at 641-228-6956 or via email at mayor@cityofcharlescity.org.

— 20160623