Anamoose, ND

I can hardly keep up with all the changes in Anamoose.  Yesterday Frieda Ehrman’s house was sold to a man from Wisconsin.  

Tottie Ziebarth’s house has been sold to Joe & Cheryl Linardon from California. They are here this week working on the house. 

Missy, Rick Lucas, & 2 children-Gavin & Katie-bought the Bertha Kuckich house & are busy painting, working on the yard, etc.  Gavin is showing the empty space where he just lost a tooth. 

Mr & Mrs William Wellstad from Arizona were here this past week or so working on their home, the former Ruth Helm house. 

Katie & Zach Fitzgerald & their 2 children-Cullen & Kaydence-have purchased the former Edgar Rath house & are just moving in.  Katie says everything is in boxes yet. 

I took this picture of Barb & Tony’s house a couple weeks ago when they added on a triple garage.  Ryan Bruner is carrying supplies from Heringer Lumber Yard which is conveniently located only 1/2 block away.

This past week the Catholic Church & rectory were re-roofed.  That is only 1 block from the lumber yard. 

Who would have ever thought a mock moose wedding would bring us national notoriety!  Saturday the Minot Daily News was at the wedding, & 2 days later Janice Buchholz received an email from a friend in Fairbanks, Alaska telling her she had read about us in the newspaper By going on the Internet we discovered our wedding made national news (AP) on MSNBC,  in the Chicago Tribune, Kansas City, Arizona Republic, Boston Globe, Fargo Forum, Grand Forks, Minneapolis & a few others.  This was truly a big ending to our 18 month Horizon’s program. 

With all the excitement of our Joe & Ana-moose Wedding Day celebration on Saturday, I forgot to blog about Ana joining Joe on the Civic Club Welcome sign, & then I had to wait as we had used up all our blog site allotment.  Wednesday evening Keith Reinowski, Midwest Graphics, and his helpers put up Ana.  She looks great there with her pink top and cute pony tail and cap. 

It’s a little early yet with this cold weather for garden vegetables.  But we had some vendors at our Farmer”s Market Monday evening.  We hold it Monday evenings as the VFW has Bingo at 8pm. 

I found a great idea when I visited the Gackle blog site.  Gackle, ND will be adding a Summer Arts Program “Capture the Coteau” to their Farmer’s Market.  They will “look at all the wild life and Flora which surrounds Gackle, study it, draw it, sculpt it, photograph it, and then use it to adorn banners, planters, benches, or what ever we can think of to help us beautify the town”.   Go to gackle.communityblogs.us   to learn more about this program and the grant they received. 

The Anamoose City Park on Main Street has taken on a new look.  Last week Kari Weninger painted the animals and Pam Heim painted the Joe-Ana-Moose Cut-out.  The Park Board planted flowers around the fountain and by the memorial. 

Pam Heim also painted designs on the two windows in the old grocery store.  It really looks nice as a couple weeks ago volunteers painted the front of the building.  (See article on “Things Look Brighter on Main Street”).  Click to enlarge pictures.

The Anamoose Senior Citizens is raffling off a queen sized quilt.  It has over 3000 peices in it.  Tickets can be purchased from any Senior Citizen members.  It will be raffled off on Sunday, September 21 when the Seniors have their annual fall fund raising meal. 

At present some of the seniors are quilting on the lap sized quilt. 

Another of our Horizon goals has come about.  Woody and Kathy Selzler purchased land next to them that was called “the stockyards”.  They have been getting rid of old buildings and trees, and put part of the land into a community garden.  Anamoose area residents can put in a garden at no cost.  USDA is offering free seeds for a study on new varieties.  If anyone is interested please contact Bonnie Dockter at 465-3088. 

We are getting excited as we get closer to Saturday, June 28th for Joe and Ana-Moose’s wedding.  That is the day we will add Ana to our Welcome sign.  Keith Reinowski, Midwest Graphics & Signs, is getting Ana ready for her big day.  And then there is Joe–like a typical male he just stands there waiting.  (See top banner)

We are selling black and blue T-shirts and pins to commemorate this special day.   T shirts come in small and medium youth; and medium, large and extra large adult sizes.  They are only $10.  The buttons sell for $2 each.  Pam Heim is our artist.  The proceeds go to our Anamoose Area Foundation Fund.  The Buttons and T-shirts are sold at the Bank, Lumber Yard and Senior Center, or you can contact me at 701-465-3476.

We had our informational public meeting Saturday on Home Rule.  Jerry Hjelmstad of the League of Cities explained to us how we would benefit from home rule.  He told us that 1/3rd of the ND communities now have home rule and 4 are in the process of setting it up.  The advantages of home rule are: 1.  Flexibility. 2.  More power for us community members as we can refer and initiate petitions.  3.  The city government will have the ability to add a sales tax.  One hundred twenty ND communities now have sales tax.  4.  The city government can combine mills and put them where needed. 

We will be voting on home rule at the regular election on June 10th.  Home rule is one of our goals in our strategic plan. 

Donna Anderson, our facilitator for the Horizons program, met with us yesterday.  We went through our Strategic Plan (again !) from start to finish, which is 18 pages of projects. 

We have accomplished many things, such as:  more meals on Sundays, a Welcome package for people moving into Anamoose, a Farmer’s Market planned to start in June, empty lots and homes identified and listed, a blog site set us and Anamoose web site continued, 12 people took an Excel Computer class, people informed of happenings in Anamoose by a monthly calendar, Christmas letter sent out that promoted Anamoose, Ana-Day planned for Saturday, June 28th, Blood Pressure Clinics being held once  month at the Anamoose Senior Center, Home Rule Charter set up ready for voting on in June, and an Anamoose Foundation Fund started with our money from Horizons.  We are working on many more projects that hopefully I will be able to blog on in the future. 

Pictured are Mardell Helm, Donna Anderson, Dennis Zimmerman, Alyce Heer, and Shirley Nitz. 

Even though there is still snow on the ground we are thinking of gardening.  As a result of the Horizon Program a Farmers Market will be started June 1st.  It will be in the Anamoose Park from 6 to 8 pm every Monday evening.  So if you are interested in selling homemade crafts, baked goods, or fresh fruit and vegetables contact Bonnie at 465-3088 or email her at bonniedockter@yahoo.com  Or you can plan to come to buy a little of everything and visit with friends.  Let the kids play at the playground while you shop.  We hope to make this a fun evening out for everyone. 

Wednesday was the first time the Baptists were out for blood—the Anamoose Blood Drive, that is!  The United Community Baptist Church of Anamoose held a blood drive at the Senior Center.  Darlene Frueh said they got 29 units, which Rich Larcombe of United Blood Services said was very good.  The Anamoose Senior Citizens will hold their annual blood drive in June.

Then last night our Anamoose Area Endowment committee met at the Senior Center.  Amy Warnke, ND Community Foundation Development Director, helped us finalize our brochure, guidelines, mission statement, and letters to be sent out to potential donors.  We will be starting visiting in March.

We crammed a lot of planning into one and a half hours when our Steering Committee met yesterday at the cafe.  We worked through our Strategic Plan. 

Under the category of  Improve Business Climate in Anamoose we have 7 strategies.  Under the category of Adequate and Affordable Housing we have 4 strategies.  With  our Communications category we are working on 7 strategies.  We just put together a Welcome package (see previous blog by Mardi)  Our goal to Promote Tourism has 7 strategies.  The biggest projects under tourism are putting together a brochure, and planning for the wedding of Joe and Ana-Moose on Saturday, June 28th.   You will hear alot more about the wedding in our future blogs.  Developing Future Leaders has 3 strategies for youth and adults alike.  The goal of a Clean Anamoose Community includes everything from old buildings, signs, cars, our park, to diseased trees.  We couldn’t forget the elderly in our plan where we have 7 strategies.  And on the opposite end of the spectrum we want to keep our young people in Anamoose by including them in our plans. 

Under the category of Home Rule, we have put together a Home Rule Charter that will be distributed to all households, a public meeting will be held, and a vote will be held in June. 

And finally, we are setting up a Community Endowment Foundation that will be started with our $10,000 from the Horizons program. 

We have a lot to do yet!

Pictures left to right are: Mardell Helm, Alyce Heer, Dennis Zimmerman, Bill Goodwin, Joe Weninger, Bonnie Dockter, and Shirley Nitz.

I hear there is a wedding coming up in Anamoose between Joe and Ana this summer - that will be the talk of the town!  I see that Joe Moose is now on the banner for your blog also - congrats on being the first to make a change in the banner.  Looks great!

Lynette Flage, ND Horizons Director 

Our Anamoose Area Community Foundation met last night with Kevin Dvorak, ND Community Foundation president, for an organizational meeting.  We started planning on how to get our $25,000 goal for the  year.  Our $10,000 that we will be getting from the Horizons program is a good start. 

From left around the back of the table are:  Kevin Dvorak, Brent Weninger, Rose Weninger, Joe Weninger, Bill Goodwin (behind), Calvin Buxa, Dennis Zimmerman, Shirley Nitz. 

This morning we were discussing the Anamoose Foundation over coffee at the cafe.  Suddenly one woman got up, got her checkbook, and made out a donation.   That made my day!

Pat McIntosh (left) from Castle Rock, WA, sent us our first donation of $25 for our Anamoose Endowment fund.  Dorothy Leier (right) sent her aunt one of our christmas letters that tells how we are putting our $10,000 that we will receive from the Horizon’s program.  The letter is on our Anamoose web site, http://www.anamoose.com/   The endowment fund will provide us with a method of receiving funds/donations to benefit projects in Anamoose. 

A couple weeks ago 8 of us met to began organizing a Home Rule Charter for Anamoose.  The members of the committee(Double click on picture) are Angie Kesler, Lois Rott, Dennis Zimmerman,Steve Heim, Jeff Lemer, Brent Weniger, Duaine Dockter,  and I(talking picture).  They looked relaxed, but we had just finished a couple of hours reviewing a Sample Home Rule Charter and comparing it to Drake and Velva’s Charters.

I took the following quote from the ND League of Cities Handbook on Home Rule, August, 2007.  “Home Rule is a granting of certain powers to cities by the state legislature to allow cities more opportunity to make decisions about those issues that affect them.”

 A Home Rule Charter would allow the city board to budget more effectively and also allow for a city sales tax should this be approved by the voters. 

Friday I was told by Bill Goodwin, McHenry County Commissioner, that Anamoose has not renewed the sherriff contract with the county.  I contacted Joe Weninger (picture), Anamoose City Council member, about this.  He replied,”The funding isn’t available to be able to support the deputy contract.  The tax dollars we take in basically support ouor street lighting-and that’s about it.”

The next Home Rule committee meeting will be Thursday, January 10 with Jerry Hjelmstad, lawyer for the League of Cities.