Small town, Big picture

At the moment, you can’t build a wind turbine inside Northfield’s city limits. Our ordinances say nothing about turbines; our current ordinances presume that if a use is not listed as permitted, it is not allowed. Today’s Northfield News has a story Carleton may add second turbine about the Council action on Monday directing city […]

The New York Times published a piece on Friday which is the best news I’ve read in a long time.   Coffee, it seems, has some mental health benefits beyond making me worth talking to every morning (afternoon, evening): the subjects who had reported drinking three to five cups of coffee daily were 65 percent less […]

Over on Locally Grown, I’ve been named Blogger of the Week! Thanks to Griff, Ross and Tracy. I feel slightly uncomfortable being named Blogger of the Week since I think of myself as a weak blogger.   I’m afraid I don’t want to share my personal life with the world, so I limit what I’m willing […]

Next week is a busy week for the Council – Monday, January 26 there is NIMS training at 6 pm before the Council Meeting/Worksession.  What, you may ask, is NIMS?  NIMS stands for National Incident Management System and it is a FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency) program “provides a consistent nationwide template to establish Federal, […]

The Northfield Zoning Board of Appeals/Planning Commission had two applications from Northfield Hospital (yes, that means one city entity reviews the plans of another) on their Tuesday agenda.  The Zoning Board of Appeals, which reviews requests for variances and other quasi-judicial matters, was asked to grant a variance to allow a greater number of parking […]

Bravo to new Mayor Mary Rossing for a fine first Council meeting, conducted with grace and good humor.     I hope I and the other Council members help you do your job well and build confidence in Northfield government

I’m glad the Northfield News is keeping tabs on us new Council members in Keeping Their Campaign Promises? because I think we all said we wanted greater transparency, accountability and integrity in Northfield government. Still, the new Council has met as a group only twice.  My goals for the Council are largely process goals – […]

I do have great expectations for the new Council, although perhaps not quite of Dickensian proportions, after our shared expectations retreat on Friday, January 2. The incoming Council plus Interim City Administrator Joel Walinski met for 6 hours and discussed our expectations for the Council and especially how we could and would make decisions effectively […]

I took a break from blogging after the election and have been doing my homework offline to get ready for the new year and taking my seat on the City Council. Here’s a quick look at current and upcoming events and issues: December 18: Gov. Pawlenty announced the “unallotments” of local government aid (usally known […]

I’m excited about being part of a very different Northfield City Council in 2009 – more women,  younger representatives with many connections in the Northfield community, a wide range of skills and expertise and, especially, a deep commitment to making the Council work hard and work well. But this would not have been possible without […]