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$300,000 outhouse causing a stink
CRANE LAKE— The $300,000 outhouse being built at a public boat launch here is creating a stink across the state, after the Minneapolis Star Tribune picked up on the story last week. The story first …
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$300,000 outhouse causing a stink
CRANE LAKE— The $300,000 outhouse being built at a public boat launch here is creating a stink across the state, after the Minneapolis Star Tribune picked up on the story last week. The story first appeared in an investigation published by the Timberjay in April.
Top Republican activists are already licking their chops at the prospect of political attack ads across the state featuring the expensive toilet, which was part of an earmark added to a 2013 spending bill by Rep. David Dill, DFL-Crane Lake.
GOP activist Michael Brodkorb suggested in a Star Tribune blog this week that the story adds the north woods john to the list of the state’s most infamous bathrooms, “second only to the men’s restroom at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport visited in 2007 by then-U.S. Sen. Larry Craig.”
While the cost of the outhouse upgrade itself is $300,000, that expense is actually dwarfed by the cost of running a sewer line to the public landing, which isn’t currently served by Crane Lake’s Water and Sanitary District. While other residences along the line could hook up to the so-called Handberg Road sewer extension in the future, it’s not clear how many will do so. The Crane Lake sewer board is in the process of conducting a comprehensive assessment review to determine if any of the dozen or so individual sewage treatment systems along the road are failing. The University of Minnesota consultant assisting with that effort has been critical of the sewer board’s decision to install the line to the boat landing before the review has been completed. “Usually you determine the need first before you install the pipeline,” said Sara Heger, an on-site sewage program specialist with the U of M’s extension service who is leading the review. Construction on the sewer line got underway last month.
The backwards timing and enormous cost of the project will fuel the GOP’s favorite storyline— that DFL lawmakers are too eager to engage in wasteful pork barrel spending.
Brodkorb said the GOP will keep Crane Lake’s outhouse in the spotlight. “With all 201 members of the Minnesota Legislature facing re-election in 2016, the campaign mailings featuring Crane Lake’s new “modern restroom” will come,” he wrote this week. “A $300,000 outhouse makeover will not simply be flushed away in an election year.”
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snowshoe2
Its really sad when for $245 a year we get the same service that $300,000 initial cost of this project will cost plus costs up to $5000 dollars a year for sewage fees and than add on maintenance.
Time for a couple of local legislatures to give up their leadership roles.They may have done a lot of good for there area in the past but now they are wandering off coarse.
Wednesday, July 1, 2015 Report this
I don't guess I'm with Dill on this one. Reminds me of the double-dipping on the snowmobile gambling business. And poor Sherrie Erickson to the hit for acting within the law. As I understand it, the city of Virginia has been extremely pleased with her job performance, but not some big shots with the city of Orr or Nett Lake.
Friday, July 3, 2015 Report this