Ottertail sets spring clean-up days

Now that spring has sprung, the city of Ottertail is urging residents to take advantage of the warm weather and clean up their properties.

At the April 5 meeting of the Ottertail City Council, Maintenance Supervisor Lee Sherman mentioned how in some smaller cities the council members go around town in the spring and talk to people about keeping up the appearance of their properties. Councilmember Don Patrick agreed to join Sherman in talking with local property owners.

One of their main objectives will be to inform residents about the city's upcoming clean-up days. Ottertail City Clean-up Days are set for June 1-2, with household hazardous waste collection on June 1. Additional information about the clean-up times will be printed in the next issue of the city newsletter.

"I think in a lot of cases people have very good intentions (of taking advantage of the city wide clean-up), but then pretty soon the date goes by and then they've missed it," said Sherman.

Councilmember Mike Windey added that it is advantageous for people to take part in the scheduled clean up.

"If they bring their trash in on the clean-up days, it's going to be a lot cheaper than if they have to haul it," he said.

If residents neglect to clean up their property in a timely manner, council members discussed the option of sending out reminder letters. A motion was approved to mail out letters to property owners identified by the maintenance staff and council representative.

MIR3 update

Ottertail City Clerk-Treasurer Elaine Hanson reported that the self-registration page will soon be set up for the MIR3 emergency notification system the city of Ottertail has decided to adopt. She suggested using the upcoming Ottertail Business Expo as an opportunity to help residents register themselves for the system.

Several enhancements have been added to the system since the time the city first became interested in it. One helpful new addition is the ability for the city to draw a circle on a map and have all of the people in that circle notified of an emergency such as a gas leak or something of that nature.

"There's going to be initiator training for the MIR3 system starting next week," Hanson informed the council.

No loft for Fire Hall

The city will no longer be building a storage loft in the fire hall building.

"Talking to the guys at the meeting last night, we decided to table it for now," said Ottertail Fire Chief Stuart Fleischauer. "At this time, we don't really feel that it's beneficial to the city or the fire department to put the loft in."

It was decided that the money the city was planning to spend on building the loft area could be better used for something else.