Willmar City Council approved the preliminary levy and budget for 2023, which was presented by Mayor Marv Calvin, at its Sept. 19 meeting. This amount may decrease before the final levy is approved after the Truth-in-Taxation public hearing Dec. 5, 2022, but it cannot increase.
At Monday’s Willmar City Council meeting, the proposed Lakeland Drive Northeast project was nearly derailed by the possibility of not holding the public hearing for creation of a tax increment financing district. The council later agreed to conduct the hearing as a delay would have made the project financially unfeasible for the developer. He has financing with a locked-in interest rate, but the project needs to begin this fall.
Zack Thelen-Liebl, who was born and raised in Willmar, is celebrating the publication of his first novel, "Chasing Shadows: Genesis," under the pen name Zachariah Jones. It has been a dream of Thelen-Liebl to be a published author, and he is already working on the second and third book of the trilogy while he prepares to be deployed for a year with his National Guard unit.
The assessment hearing for Willmar's 2022 street improvement projects began during the Aug. 15 meeting of the Willmar City Council and was continued to the Tuesday, Sept. 6, meeting. The council on Tuesday will continue the hearing during a special council meeting Oct. 11.