Midco coming to Frazee in June

By Robert Williams

Editor

The Frazee Economic Development Authority met Tuesday, Feb. 27, with two new city council liaisons in Andrea Froeber and Mark Kemper, along with new economic development consultant Karen Pifher of Creating Community Consulting (CCC). 

A key conversation of the 77-minute meeting was spent discussing the EDA’s biggest asset and liability, the mostly-empty downtown retail commercial space.

Pifher has met with four different businesses that are interested in potentially going into the building, with three of those four having similar reasons not to—in that they want the interior space completed.

Pifher is also working on a date to complete a tour with Apple Tree Dental (www.appletreedental.org). The company was founded in 1985 in Minnesota with successful replications in North Carolina, Louisiana, and California. Apple Tree currently operates nine Centers for Dental Health in Minnesota. A potential 10th would be in the retail space closest to Seip Drug in downtown Frazee. A location in Detroit Lakes is also being considered.

“We’re continuing to move the conversation forward and trying to get them here, if we possibly can,” Pifher said. “The other three businesses have all stated they want a walk-in, ready building. None of these businesses want to move here and wait 3-6 months to build out something. They want something ready.”

Pifher, City Administrator Stephanie Poegel and Public Works Supervisor Larry Stephenson visited the spaces and identified what needs to be done to upfit the building.

Poegel met with the building inspector and the group is working on drawings and a cost estimate on what is needed.

“I have some businesses that said if it was finished I would probably look at it, but I need something today and I don’t want to deal with upfitting,” said Pifher. “I think if we can get it finished I can get people recruited to be in there.”

Unlike Apple Tree, which would have specific needs, like proper electric and water hookups for dental stations, the remaining interested businesses are of a basic retail type that would allow for a common completion of the remaining spaces to accommodate their needs.

“Most of the businesses we’re talking about are retail where they don’t need additional water sources; they just need a bathroom pretty much,” said Pifher.

She also noted that the empty spaces being unfinished is the major drawback to businesses looking to move into the space.

“It is more of a hindrance to not have it finished than it would be to have it finished and try to find a vendor to go in there,” Pifher said. 

Opportunity to revitalize Main Street

The downtown retail building is just a part of the EDA’s plan to revitalize Main Street. Pifher’s research noted there are 108 businesses in the Frazee zip code. Obviously, most of those businesses are not on Main Street.

“There are a ton of businesses; they’re just in a lot of different places,” she said.

Pifher and her company have made Main Street a top priority and are looking at ways to shake up the status quo and get businesses interested in downtown Frazee again.

“There is an opportunity to rehab Main Street and be able to bring it back to life again,” said Pifher.

CCC has completed a business survey and Pifher discussed the preliminary responses from 17 local shop owners with a goal of finalizing the survey after 30 responses. Once completed, a report will be submitted showing what experiences were rated across all factors including what is going well and what has been presented as opportunities for improvement.

Early responses were concentrated on businesses not feeling supported by the community or the city.

“I don’t think that is surprising to anybody,” said Pifher.

Another aspect that needs improvement is communications between business owners and potential resources. Pifher is working on improving those means of communication and bringing supportive resources and marketing campaigns together to promote development in the community.

Pifher also wants to bring the EDA and the Community Club together in supportive roles.

A listening session was held at the recent Wannigan Park open house to share ideas. There were also seven board member nominees for the club board for their annual elections at the March meeting (www.frazeecommunityclub.com).

Midco groundbreaking

Midcontinent Communications (Midco) will break ground in Frazee during a ceremony on Thursday, June 6.

The Frazee City Council approved a franchise agreement with Midco last December to allow the company to operate cable television and internet systems in the city, and run cable on and through city-owned right-of-way.

Midco vice president Justin Forde attended the Frazee City Council meeting last June to seek permission for his company to construct a state-of-the-art fiber network in the community to provide broadband internet, phone and television access.

“This system would open with five-gigabit symmetrical speeds to every address, which is as fast as anybody else is doing in the country and perhaps the fastest,” Forde said. “In the not too distant future, we’ve already made a $500 million commitment for 10-gig speeds that will probably start launching in 2025 and throughout our Midco network by 2030.”

Over the past year, Midco has been installing fiber in Detroit Lakes and is now offering services to customers. Plans are to extend those services to Frazee and down Highway 10.