By Robert Williams

Editor

Two sitting council members and two new candidates discussed issues Monday, Oct. 5, at the League of Women Voters Candidate Forum at the Event Center. The winners of the election will begin their four-year terms in January.

Andrea Froeber is running for reelection. She grew up in Bloomington and graduated from Moorhead State University. She and her husband moved to Frazee six years ago.

Froeber worked for the City of Eagan doing building inspections, working with planning and zoning and code enforcement and at the City of Apple Valley in streets, public works, parks & recreation, engineering and maintenance.

Upon moving to Frazee, she worked in the city office for 18 months.

“Then I decided I wanted to run for city council and you can’t do both,” she said.

The other sitting council member, Jim Rader, has lived in Frazee 30 years with his extended family being area residents for the past 130 years. 

Rader has taught and coached at Frazee schools for the past 34 years.

“I believe I have the experience to do the job and everybody that knows me knows I care about this community,” he said.

Peggy Moltzan has lived in Frazee for 40+ years and raised two children here and has six grandchildren. 

“I actually love Frazee, even though some of you don’t,” she said. 

Moltzan described her time spent here and her family connections as the main reason for her affection for the town.

Moltzan is a retired Training Facilitator with the United States Postal Service.

She believes more summer markets and an Octoberfest-like celebration would be beneficial to Frazee, especially in bringing the youth and elderly together to work with each other.

“We don’t have a lot of togetherness in Frazee; I think we should,” she said.

Ryan Majerus’ is a Glyndon native and earned bachelor’s degrees in communication and philosophy from the University of North Dakota with minors in ethics and leadership. He moved to Frazee in October of 2025 and that timing led to one of his major platforms – safety.

He related how when he first moved to Frazee there was a shooting and a stabbing in the first month.

“I want to make sure this is a community that people feel safe around,” he said. 

Majerus is currently a special education teacher for Lakes Country Service Cooperative and is pursuing his Master of Arts degree in special education and teaching at Western Governors University.

Majerus outlined better communication as a means of helping Frazee expand and be a better place to live.

“I feel there should be more transparency on what is going on in the City of Frazee,” he said. “For example, when I moved here, I had no idea what was going on until things were posted in the paper. There was really no communication to the people. There was no sense of that.”

Froeber described future growth in Frazee through her work with the Economic Development Authority (EDA) and that board constantly researching and pursuing opportunities. Earlier in the day, she hosted three social media representatives on an electric bike tour of Frazee, its trails, Wannigan Regional Park and restaurants downtown. The bloggers were participants in the recent Travel Blog Exchange (TBEX) annual summit in Fargo.

When asked about supporting local businesses, Rader stated that support needs to be across the board.

“We often times focus on the new ones and we give all the attention to try and pull in new businesses, but we need to make sure that we keep the businesses that are in town doing well also,” he said.

Rader pointed out one thing that helps new and old businesses alike, lower taxes. Part of that happening is from his work with fellow Council member Mark Kemper on the finance and budget committee.

“We have introduced at the last council meeting one of the lowest levy increases in the area,” he said. “I think that is something that is going to be beneficial to new businesses coming to town and those that have been here for a long time.”

Each candidate was asked what the most important issue was facing Frazee today.

Froeber – Housing, including for seniors, and maintaining an attractive business environment

Majerus – Communication and sincerity, and the housing crisis in Frazee

Moltzan – Making the community better for all residents and working together

Rader – Quality housing and more variety in types of housing, decreasing taxes

Other questions from the crowd reiterated the importance of cleaning up the town.

Moltzan stated visitors to Frazee coming into town on main thoroughfares get an eyeful.

“The first thing they see are homes that don’t take care of their yards, don’t pick up things in their yards and leave things everywhere,” she said. “Broken windows, porch screens, I know this sounds like I’m nitpicking but I’m really not. This is what they see when they get to our town.”

Majerus stressed implementation of strategies to deal with ordinance breakers, along with increased communication to get to the specifics of the issues and possible solutions.

Rader and Froeber have both been avid proponents of increased ordinance enforcement during their time on the council and supporting law enforcement.

Froeber closed with Frazee’s strongest attraction being its trails and parks and how she spearheaded new signage and maintenance at Hank Ludtke Park and that conversations she had in her first campaign were to continue the work of improving Frazee’s outdoor amenities.

Majerus closed by continuing his safety discussions, notably the need to enforce leash laws and relating his personal experience of walking his Airedale Terrier and coming under attack from loose dogs.

“There is a lack of implementation and accountability,” he said. “There are reasons why these tools and things are set up. It’s for people’s safety and if we don’t follow through and we don’t implement, we’re not giving a good message to everyone else.”

Moltzan agreed Frazee needs more safety, stating how she used to walk around town and downtown, because she does not feel safe walking around alone.

Rader concentrated his final remarks on positive aspects, highlighting the Fire Department earning one of the highest ratings a volunteer department can receive.

“Not only does that make you safer in your homes but that actually saves residents on their property insurance rates, as well,” he said. 

Candidate Tyler King was not in attendance Monday and did not respond to communications from the LOWV about the event, according to moderator Cindy Bruflodt.

The full hour-long session is available on the CornerStone Facebook page and will be posted on YouTube channel Lakes Area League & Friends in a couple days.