Scott West Mows Down Three Foes
Scott County Financial Statement
BPHS Basketball Teams Staying Busy Pages 14, 15
Pages 10-12
Page 15
ONE HUNDRED AND THIRTY-FOURTH YEAR
BELLE PLAINE, MINNESOTA, DECEMBER 16, 2015
75¢ SINGLE COPY
NUMBER 51
Council Brings on New Member; Salutes BPHS Volleyball Team
Tricia Malecha (right) of Belle Plaine used Facebook to help collect about 200 new or gentlyused purses filled with personal care products and other gifts for women. She dropped off the purses and gifts Friday (Dec. 11) at Southern Valley Alliance for Battered Women. Malecha is pictured with Mary Ann Bigaouette, Southern Valley’s executive director.
B.P. Woman Ignites Impressive Drive to Help Area Women
Tricia Malecha has learned the power of social media when it comes to bring in donations for a good cause. The Belle Plaine woman helped generate about 200 purses filled with personal care items and other gifts for women and moms. The purses were dropped off Friday (Dec. 11) at Southern Valley Alliance for Battered Women in Belle Plaine. Malecha used Facebook as a means to advertise the holiday drive. She had collection boxes at State Bank of Belle Plaine, her workplace (Matt Saxe Chevrolet-Buick) and Prior Lake Library. Her aunt, Leeann Busch in Jordan also accepted drop-offs. In late-October, Malecha posted notice of her project on several Facebook pages. Within a few days, she was overwhelmed with donated new and gently-used purses, personal care items and other women’s products. Malecha has made the rounds to the drop-off sites
collecting. Her small apartment is filled with the purses and other items.
Stopped Counting at 117
“I expected to get maybe 30. I stopped counting around 117,” she said Friday afternoon (Dec. 11). Malecha brought several large containers to the Southern Valley offices in Belle Plaine. “I planned to be done picking them up around Nov. 22 but they’re still coming in. We ended up with about 200 of them.” Malecha wanted to help women and moms who need a new purse. Each is filled with items for women, moms and young children can use, items they might not have when re-establishing a household. “Somebody is going to have their day made,” said Mary Ann Bigaouette, Southern Valley’s executive director. “A new purse gives you that feeling of something special.
Malecha established the dropoff sites because the immediate response was overwhelming. As a mother of three, she didn’t have the time to be driving all over picking up purses and other donated items. It didn’t take long for Malecha’s apartment to be filled with donated purses and other gifts. She waits for her daughters to go to bed to work on matching up purses with the various gifts that include gift certificates for cupcakes and new toothbrushes from Strait Smiles in Belle Plaine. “My kitchen and living room are filled with the stuff. The back of my van is full,” Malecha said. Bigaouette said the gifts are appreciated because many of the donated gifts Southern Valley Alliance receives this time of year are intended for children. Southern Valley will be distributing gifts to women and children this week. “We don’t want to forget mom,” Bigaouette said.
Fighting Emphysema, B.P. Pastor Hoping for the Best He’s Heading to Florida for Experimental Treatment
During an eight-week recuperation from heart surgery in 2000, Don Genereux began the journey that took him to seminary, ordination and eventually a call to a church in Belle Plaine. Genereux’s next journey will be to Florida for a treatment the pastor of First Presbyterian Church of Belle Plaine hopes will extend his life and improve its quality. He’ll undergo an experimental treatment, one Genereux has faith will help. He suffers from emphysema, one of the many diseases included in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). An oxygen tank is his constant companion. The 68-yearold Genereux admits he was a long-time smoker, swiping
Don Genereux, pastor at First Presbyterian Church of Belle Plaine, is fighting emphysema. He’s hoping an experimental treatment using his own stem cells will regrow healthy lung tissue. cigarettes from his father when since I was 15. It was one for they would roll loose tobacco dad, one for me; one for dad, into thin, filter-less smokes. two for me,” he said. “It (the He quit smoking when doctors B.P. Pastor told him he needed bypass heart surgery in 2001. (continued on page 4) “I’d been a chronic smoker
by Dan Ruud The Belle Plaine City Council welcomed aboard a new member, recognized a state high school championship team and addressed its regular bimonthly agenda all in the span of a halfhour last Wednesday night at city hall The new member is Henry Pressley Jr., who the council appointed to fill the seat of Scott Schneider, who resigned last month because he was moving to Shakopee. Schneider had over three years remaining on his four-year term. The city has the option of retaining Pressley for the remaining three years of the term or holding an election next year (most likely November’s General Election) for what then would be for the final two years of the term. The council has not yet made a final decision. Mayor Mike Pingalore administered the oath of office to Pressley, who served on the city’s planning and zoning commission for 12 years and was its chair when he applied for the open city council seat. Pressley will also take Schneider’s place on the following organizations: Cable Vision
Mayor Mike Pingalore, right, administered the oath of office to new City Council Member Henry Pressley Jr. last Wednesday night. Policy Board, Design Committee, Economic Development Authority, Finance Ways and Means, Highway 169 Coalition, Housing and Redevelopment Authority, Planning and Zoning, Public Safety/alternate, Public Works/alternate and Scott County Transit. Not long after Pressley received the oath of office, the Belle Plaine High School volleyball team made an extremely rare appearance in the council
chambers at the request of the council. Players for the state Class 2A championship team were recognized for their achievement last month in St. Paul. Pingalore thanked them for their outstanding representation of the community and presented certificates of merit to the players. *Unanimously renewed a
Council
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Belle Plaine School Board OKs Reduced Levy for 2016
Belle Plaine School Board Director Matt Lenz walked away from his final school board meeting not surprised no citizens attended the annual truthin-taxation hearing. After eight years on the board, departing board members Lenz and Mike Ludvik have grown to learn a property tax levy that is primarily driven by state formula doesn’t bring out a crowd. Especially when the school district’s share of property taxes are going down. Monday (Dec. 14), the school board approved a reduced property tax levy for 2016. The Belle Plaine School District will collect $4,741,411.42 in 2016. That’s $62,045.09 less in property taxes – a 1.29 percent decrease -- from 2015. While its important to note the overwhelming majority of the district’s overall $20 million budget comes from the state in the form of per-student aid, the school board is reducing its share of property owners’ tax burden. That’s a far better picture than the preliminary property tax levy the district painted earlier in the fall. It anticipated increasing its levy by about 9 percent, based on the preliminary levy set in September. But that number was based on incomplete information the district awaited from the Minnesota Department of Education. Once the district received all the information it needed from the state, reducing the levy was easy. “We really don’t control that much of it. Most of it is set by formula,” Lenz said. The reduction in the property
tax levy is primarily the result of reduced debt the district is carrying. The general fund levy is increasing by $28,827.19 (1.27 percent). But the debt service is down by over $91,200 – a decrease of 2.91 percent. The most noteworthy information from the annual hearing is the market value of property in the Belle Plaine School District continues to rebound from the recession. Assessors in Scott, Carver, Sibley and Le Sueur counties estimate the property
in the district was worth $967.8 million – an increase of about 8.8 percent from 2013 to 2014.
Contract Approved
With the Belle Plaine Education Association having ratified its contract with the school board, directors unanimously approved the district’s largest operating expense for the 2015-
School Board
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B.P. Librarian Melissa Smith Accepts Job in Prior Lake The Scott County Library System announced Friday the appointment of Melissa Smith as branch manager of the Prior Lake Library, effective Jan. 5. Smith, who lives in Prior Lake and looks forward to a much shorter commute, has been the branch manager for Belle Plaine only since February, at which time she took over for longtime Belle Plaine Librarian Georgine Gansen, who retired. Scott County Library Director Jake Grussing said Smith is a “great fit” for the Prior Lake position. “Melissa is a skilled librarian, a gifted manager, and has demonstrated a commitment to bringing the community to the library and the library to the community. I am especially pleased with her enthusiasm for creating exceptional experiences for every person who walks in the door,” Grussing said. Smith said her departure to Prior Lake “is in no way a reflection on Belle Plaine or Jor-
dan.” “This was my first opportunity to be a branch manager and it’s been very fulfilling. But I’m very excited about the Prior Lake offer and I’ve accepted.” Smith will replace Hilary Toren, who has been the head of the Prior Lake Library for some 20 years,
Librarian
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One Friday Left Holy Family Christmas Silent for Santa House Auction and Bake Sale Sunday The Santa House, located on the vacant lot at the intersection of Main and Meridian streets downtown, will house Santa one more time this holiday season. He will be there from 5:307:30 p.m. this Friday.
Holy Family Academy in Belle Plaine will hold its annual Christmas Silent Auction and Bake Sale 6:30 p.m. on Sunday, Dec. 20 at the Belle Plaine Performing Arts Center located in the Belle Plaine District Cen-
ter. The Silent Auction starts at 5:30 p.m. Christmas music will be provided by Holy Family Academy students and alumni. The public is invited. Admission and refreshments are free.