To the editor:

Monday night, Jan. 10, the North Branch City Council proved by a 3-2 vote that poor planning continues here. A few years ago, we had a business named Auto Care where the Dairy Queen now sits. There was also a couple of homes where Dominoís Pizza sits. Well the council, at that time, decided they were going to improve the ìGatewayî to the city and these buildings had to go. If the owners didnít take the cityís offer, the properties would be taken by eminent domain.
The vision for the city was a motel, an upscale restaurant, etc. At least thatís what we were told. After months of council and some members of the city staff making th lives of the homeowners and business tenants miserable, they moved.

Auto Care was given the option of purchasing property in the industrial park, moving out of town, or closing. They moved to the outskirts of town because of cost and were continually harassed by the city for improvements and finally after losing his workforce and customers, the business owner filed bankruptcy.
Well as you see, the only business in the ìGatewayî that was to plan was the motel. Fast food took over and that was the ìGatewayî impression of our town.
After all of the above, Monday night the council approved - guess what ñ an auto body business in that area.

The excuse was because it hadnít been rezoned. Are there ways around this? Yes. After making mistake after mistake in city planning over the past 10 years, they had the chance to correct some mistakes.

So was it necessary to take the original auto business out, put his young family in debt for years ñ for what?

In the past 10 years since Branch and North Branch merged ñ nothing has changed on the council, except the faces.

Votes for (the auto business approval) Mayor Karsky, Kathy Blomquist and Larry Erickson; votes against it: Amy Oehlers and Theresa Furman.

Barbara Burrington
North Branch

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