SOLON — City Administrator Cami Rasmussen and Public Works Director Scott Kleppe provided an update on city projects and happenings to the patrons of Solon Senior Dining Wednesday, June 28 at the Solon Methodist Church.
Bingo at Beef Days
Bingo will be from 6-10:00 p.m. on Friday, July 21 and Noon-10:00 p.m. Saturday, July 22.
A new restaurant opens on Main St.
Uncle Sang’s Sushi & Kitchen, offering Japanese and Vietnamese cuisine was slated for a ‘soft opening’ Saturday, July 2. Rasmussen said all city permits were in-place and the owner had been waiting on the State’s approvals (liquor license, for example). Editor’s note: per postings on social media, Uncle Sang’s is open for business. And we’ll try to get a new business feature in the Economist soon.
Solon Beef Days
Don Ellis (2023 Solon Senior Citizen of the Year) will return as the Grand Marshal for the parade (10:00 a.m. Saturday), but with a twist. “We’re going to do something special,” she said. “The groups who were the founders of Beef Days are going to be our Grand Marshals.” She noted the Jaycees are no longer active, but the Solon (Tri-Township) Fire Department, the Optimists Club, and the American Legion are, and representatives from these organizations, and the original founding Beef Days Committee will be present. “It’s going to be an awesome, awesome parade, as usual.”
Infrastructure and wastewater plant updates
“We’re still seeing growth, some new homes are being constructed,” Kleppe said adding the City had started on a new (sewer) lift station generator that morning. “We just installed a merry-go-round, finally, at Randal Park. We’ve been waiting on that going on three years.” Kleppe explained the manufacturer initially sent the wrong pieces leading to a six-month wait for the correct parts. “Then something else was wrong. It’s been a very trying time with that.”
Kleppe said the City would be doing some curb and gutter work yet this year on Third and Fourth streets between S. Dubuque St. and S. Iowa St. “We believe we are also going to do the east side of Main St. between Hwy. 1 and Cedar St. That might get pulled but for right now it’s tentatively slated to have some work done to it.”
The City has had a problem with one of its wells, Kleppe said. “Our Lead Operator, Dave Richards, has been working hard trying to rectify that.” Kleppe explained on Memorial Day the well went out-of-service due to the well pipe breaking (the well is 350’ deep, he noted) and dropping the pump to the bottom. Kleppe said they were unable to retrieve it and quickly installed a temporary pump and piping to get the well back up and running. Doing so, however, dropped the pumping rate from the well due to the physics of pumps.
“Of course, it’s a really busy time of year (for water usage) right now. Everybody is trying to water their grass to keep it from burning up, new construction is laying sod, we’ve just had record-breaking water usage, upwards of half-a-million gallons of water per day.” Typically, he said, the City uses around 200,000 gallons per day. But, with the recent dry spell, “it’s been really bad for us, still a dire situation for us, we’re waiting on the weather to break and our consumption to go down so we can take the well back out of service for about a week and try to ‘fish’ what’s down there out and put new back in.”
Kleppe addressed the wastewater plant saying they were waiting on design work for the new facility, which he said is necessary to meet new Dept. of Natural Resources (DNR) water quality guidelines for the removal of contaminants in the water discharged out of the plant. “We’re going to have to meet those new guidelines, and the deadline for that will come before the new plant is in the works, but the DNR will allow us to forgo that as long as we’re actively working diligently on a new plant.
The new limits, he said, include phosphorous levels. Phosphorous is commonly found in soap, detergents, and fertilizers. “We cannot do anything with what runs off of peoples’ grass into the stream,” Kleppe said, “but what the DNR is going after is all of those soaps, and detergents…things that have phosphates that go down the drain. We’ve got to effectively remove that.” The current plant puts out about three parts phosphorus while the new requirements call for one, or less. “We just could not meet it with this (current) type of plant. We’re going to have to construct something new that will handle the treatment (of the wastewater) for that.”
Ammonia is also being targeted by the DNR. However, Kleppe said the City is currently doing well at mitigating ammonia levels to where it is often a ‘non-detect’ in the discharge. Bacteria is also under higher scrutiny and limits. Currently the City uses chlorine gas to kill bacteria in the wastewater. Chlorine is a hazardous material and Kleppe said they are looking at an ultra-violet (UV) method to kill bacteria and meet the new limits without the obvious health and safety risks, and in a more efficient manner as once treated with chlorine, the chlorine itself then must be removed (with another chemical) before discharge. “Ultra-violet disinfection is the future,” he said.
Kleppe said a definitive location for the new wastewater plant had not been acquired as of yet. “These are all the preliminary stages that we’re working through.
While East 5th St.’s major reconstruction project was finished last fall, Rasmussen said there were still a few ‘clean up’ items left to complete including seeding, which has been on-hold due to the weather and water situation.
“We’re trying to be good stewards and not waste water in that aspect so we’re going to wait until fall, hopefully the weather breaks and we’ll go through and re-seed that whole area one more time,” said Kleppe.
There will also be sewer improvements in the downtown area. Currently businesses such as Buff’s, the Legion, the hardware store, and El Sol are all hooked onto one sewer line, that crosses Hwy. 1 toward the northeast. “They’re starting to have problems with the sewage, the City recognizes that, and the City recognizes the impact of those businesses on us and everybody else in the community, how important that they are, and we are going to run a sewer line up that alley that they can all tie into individually,” Kleppe said.
And in addition, a nearly half-million-dollar watermain project has gone out for bids to replace old, under-sized (per current standards) eight-inch diameter, which reduces to four-inch diameter, ductile iron pipe along the north side of Elm St. between Chabal and Iowa. Kleppe said federal COVID-relief funds disbursed to the City for infrastructure improvements has been set aside for this project. “It’s going to increase water pressure and provide more water flow for fire protection,” he added. “When it happens, it’s going to go boom-boom-boom and we’re going to get going. It’ll be a busy time.”
What’s going on with the hardware store?
“We’ve got a little construction project going on,” said Rasmussen. “The tornado, as we all watched (live on KCRG TV-9’s Solon CityCam), tore the roof off and in the repair process, they saw that there is some pulling away of the front wall from the original brick and that’s why it’s been a construction zone. It was kind-of unexpected and we’re working closely with Tom Trump and his contractor to figure out the plan to repair the brick.”
What will need to happen, Kleppe explained, is that the first (outermost) of three layers of brick will have to be removed. The second layer, close to the top, will also need to be removed however the extent was not yet known. “We’re just trying to give Tom and his contractor time to figure this out and we’re trying to keep that area safe in case there would be any debris falling. It’s going to be that way for probably most of the summer,” said Rasmussen. Scaffolding will be erected to further protect the site.
Because of this the Legion and bingo tents will likely need to be relocated from their traditional spots during Beef Days.
A look at the downtown business district brings recommendations
In late May the Iowa Resource Center from the Iowa Economic Development Authority sent a team headed up by Robin Bostrom, Business Specialist, Main Street Iowa, to Solon to conduct two days of interviews and meetings with business owners and representatives of the City. Included was a walking tour of the downtown business district with the mission of providing recommendations on ways to spruce up the downtown area making it more attractive, particularly in the vicinity of Hwy. 1 and Main St. as that is considered a ‘gateway’ into the heart of the city.
Tuesday, May 30 was spent in meetings to learn about Solon and hear from residents about what makes Solon a desirable place to be, what Solon lacks, and what could be improved on followed by the walking tour. “They popped into businesses to get a feel for our Main St. dynamics,” said Rasmussen. “They were here late into the night and then they had a presentation for us the next day (Wednesday, May 31).” The presentation summarized the discussions and comments, and offered suggestions for what could make the downtown area better.
“Solon is already doing a lot of things that they typically recommend to other communities who are maybe trying to figure out how to improve their Main Street and their economic personalities,” she said. The report states the downtown area has ‘ample parking’ with a total of 640 existing or nearly complete spaces available. It does note, “A common complaint is the ability to park right next to or adjacent from a downtown destination.” Limiting the time people can park in ‘prime spots’ to two-hour and 15-minute limits, the report says, would reduce congestion during peak times. A need for off-street parking for downtown residents was also mentioned.
The report calls for more pedestrian amenities in the downtown area – way finding signage, more downtown festivals, and benches and bike racks; suggests a ‘community campus pedestrian area converting North Iowa Street in front of City Hall and the former fire station into a mini-ped mall; establishing a ‘community market’ between Sam’s Main Street Market and Big Grove that could be used for parking or for events such as the Farmers’ Market; a new Sam’s building with the grocery store on the ground level and residential or small commercial space on a second floor; establishing a bed and breakfast district, and freshening up the Legion-Hardware Store-El Sol building fronts.
The report also recommended, from conversations with business owners, reestablishing an economic development group.
The full 34-page report produced by MSA Professional Services can be read online at solon-iowa.com/DocumentCenter/View/579/Downtown-Vision-Plan?bidId=.
“Their challenge,” Rasmussen said, “was that most of what they would typically recommend, we’re already doing. So what could we do next? But basically, they thought that we have an awesome community, and I pretty much agree with them. I think we are pretty awesome. Their main challenge was to not be satisfied with ‘good.’ Don’t be still, keep pushing, keep looking, keep pressing. We’ve got a lot of good things going on and we’re the envy of a lot of other Iowa communities, but don’t be satisfied with good.”
Another consistent point, Rasmussen said, was the desire to maintain Solon’s ‘smalltown feel,’ which she said would continue to be a challenge as the community continues to grow. “We’re going to continue to grow. It’s inevitable.”
Rasmussen typically attends Senior Dining the last Wednesday of each month. Senior Dining meets Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays with reservations required by calling 319-624-2251.
City Administrator Cami Rasmussen.