Kalona has meeting that almost wasn’t

By Mary Zielinski
The Kalona council’s regular meeting Monday almost wasn’t. Meeting time is 7:30 p.m., but by 7:55 p.m. there were only two council members present. At that point, a call was made to council member Steve Lafaurie in California and he participated via conference call.
Other than minutes and bill approval, the main item was a Public Hearing for the re-zoning application from Grace Schumann and Ken Herington to re-zone their respective business properties on C Avenue from R-3 to C-3. There were no objections and following the brief hearing, the council approved an ordinance amending the Kalona Zoning Ordinace to change the designation.
The change was also recommended by the city’s Planning & Zoning Commission.
The other item of business, approval MMS Consultants, Inc. professional service agreement fee of $212,800 was tabled to the next meeting. MMS has done the downtown revitalization plan for Kalona, a project that will take the city to the bid stage for the work, most of which is expected to be done next year. The downtown revitalizaition committee was to meet at 4 p.m. Tuesday.
Following the regular meeting, the council had a brief work session.