Bradbury Township

Mille Lacs County, Minnesota

Mille Lacs News

Since 4/18/07

News

Monday April 19, 2010

Friday, December 7, 2007

Commissioners Fail     

Mille Lacs News Staff Writer

Coincidentally, Mille Lacs County adopted a new point system last spring to determine whether or not someone qualifies for tax abatement. A committee used this new point system to give Nexus 7 years of tax abatement. Commissioner Frank Courteau excused himself from participating in the committee which made the determination, due to his well-known bias favoring the multi-million dollar corporation that is relocating their convicted sex offenders into a residential community. It might have seemed unfair had the Pro-nexus Frank Courteau been on the finance committee which reviewed Nexus. However, when it came to the vote, Courteau was the one who eagerly made the motion - and fairplay being over-rated, he did not excuse himself from voting to give the sex offender institution 7 years of tax abatement, $253,000 of the tax payers' money.

At what was advertised as a "public hearing", citizens, many who had been researching Nexus for the past eight months arrived hoping to enlighten the commissioners as to the detriments of enabling Nexus to force itself into an unwelcoming and vulnerable residential neighborhood, thereby putting their taxpaying citizens at risk. Nexus had promised on more than one occasion to take their sex offenders elsewhere if Nexus did not receive property tax exemption from the State of Minnesota. Tax exemption was indeed denied but Nexus refused to leave. Citizens believed that Nexus, which has demonstrated a pattern of bullying, deception, and lies, is merely bluffing. Citizens believe that Nexus never planned to leave Onamia after the Brainerd opportunity fell apart. In a letter from Nexus CEO Jim D'Angelo, property tax abatement - from the city, the county, and the school became the bar necessary in order to keep Nexus' sex offenders in Onamia. The city jumped, the county leaped, but the school refused the directive. Still Nexus will not leave. Where would they go? Nobody wants these deviants except the Onamia City Council - and they don't have to live next to them.

Citizens came to the County Courthouse prepared to voice their opposition to giving Nexus more money via a tax abatement which had been based on false figures and vague numbers provided to the committee by Nexus. Chairman Phil Peterson violated citizens' due process by limiting their comments to only one minute, displaying open hostility towards Mille Lacs County residents who tried to protest Nexus in the particular forum which was designed for them to do exactly that - to express their opinions. These commissioners sided against constituents, choosing instead to promote a business, thereby setting a terrible precedent in the county.

In one minute's time, citizens attempted to correct errors which allowed Nexus to pass - by attempting to correct the obscure figures and false information supplied to the commissioners by Nexus. Truthful, factual information would most likely have disqualified the sex offender company from receiving the controversial tax abatement.

Citizens protested the value of the county's point system, noting that Nexus had been given the greatest number of points available on the issue of environment, when an EAW (Environmental Assessment Worksheet) or Environmental Impact Study had not yet been launched. The proposed building site is next to Lake Onamia and very near the Rum River, a protected scenic waterways Minnesota watershed river. Commissioners flatly refused to consider anything the citizens could offer in their allotted minute.

Chairman Phil Peterson and county board members Frank Courteau, Jack Edmonds, and Dave Tellinghuisen also flatly refused to consider anything which might block these sex offenders from relocating next to elderly widows and day care, ignoring any possibility of investigation into the citizens' claims. Nor would they honor the citizens' request for a continuance until their own representative Roger Tellinghuisen could be present.

Citizens tried to argue that by supporting Nexus, the commissioners are enabling sex offenders into a neighborhood which unanimously doesn't want them there. Citizens who live adjacent to the 38.81 acre building site adamantly oppose Nexus, yet their rights as property owners have been stripped away by their governments. Having already been run roughshod by the city of Onamia, they looked to the commissioners to right some of the wrongs done to them by the city.

But instead of being fair, the commissioners violated their own Pledge to Citizens. For instance, the location of the sex offender facility does not protect children and vulnerable adults but puts them at risk! Nexus does not deliver any services at all, let alone essential services. Prosecuting criminals? The sex offenders have already been convicted. From our perspective, Nexus only harms the public health and welfare. Wasting the tax payers money on a double-dipping company already built on tax payers' money.  What the county commissioners did to the citizens of Mille Lacs County at their so-called "public hearing" on December 4th is deplorable.

Wow!

This Nexus stuff is a conspiracy theorist's dream come true!

"I can't say enough about how grateful we are to the county for coming through with the tax exempt status," Larry Milton
April 18, 2007

"I will defer this question to Larry [Milton] as he spoke with Frank [Courteau] about this too. We are good to go with tax exempt status  from Mille Lacs County" former MLA Executive Director Kathe Dellacecca

May 10, 2007

keeping score

Nexus: $253,000

Citizens: Screwed again

in

Mille Lacs County

Mille Lacs County Santa preparing to throw the obsolete U.S. Constitution into the fireplace after giving a hefty Christmas gift of $253,000 to the "naughty" sex offender institution while ignoring the pleas of the "nice" taxpayers.

"Some people fear public listening more than death." Hannabelle

For failing to listen to the voices of

We The People,

The Mille Lacs Board of County Commissioners has earned its way into Hannabelle's Hall of Shame!

Mille Lacs County Commissioners bought the lies and paid for them with taxpayer money.

NEXUS

Pledge to Citizens

Mille Lacs County officials are dedicated to:

1. Delivering essential services in the most efficient ways possible.
2. Protecting children and vulnerable adults.
3. Prosecuting criminals.
4. Preserving the public's health and welfare.
5. Spending revenues prudently and wisely.
6. Maintaining and enhancing Mille Lacs County citizens' quality of life.

This is what our county commissioners pledged to We The People. Using a similar point system to see if they meet the standard we should demand in our elected public officials, we have graded their performance on the Nexus Done Deal.