Fergus Falls Forum

A Frazee teen with terminal cancer whose wish prompted volunteers to restore his Pontiac Fiero has died.

Tyler Shipman, 18, died Sunday night, according to a message on his CaringBridge site.

“Tyler lost his very brave and valiant fight with cancer and went home to be with his heavenly Father at approximately 7:45 tonight,” the message states.

Shipman suffered from a rare form of cancer called synovial sarcoma. After attempts to treat the cancer failed, he decided to step up efforts to restore his 1986 Fiero GT to mint condition.

He sought help on an online message board for Fiero fans, and about 20 people from across the country came together in November to restore the car.

The Wahpeton School District appointed Rick Jacobson as the new superintendent on Monday. According to board President, Deb Mauch, they chose him because of his experience, as well as his background in finance.

Wahpeton was forced to find a new superintendent after Mike Connell, who currently holds the position, announced that he would be retiring at the end of the school year, after serving the district for 21 years.

Jacobson accepted the offer on Monday, and the district issued a two-year contract on Tuesday. He will assume the role as superintendent on July 1, and receive a salary of $105,000.

Jacobson was selected out of a group of five finalists, after hearing input from staff, teachers, students, as well as administrators.

Wahpeton is located 25 miles west of Fergus Falls, and serves nearly 1,200 students in pre-kindergarten through 12th grade.

Residents in Otter Tail County, on average, spend $867 per month on shopping, $436 on house and home, $559 on health and family, $430 on transportation, $350 food and drink, and $164 on travel and leisure. While at first it may seem as if Otter Tail County residents are spending a lot, the area matches up closely with Fargo and Minneapolis with their spending.

SHOPPING

With shopping being the largest category we spend our money on (beating house and home by almost double!), we thought we should break down this category even more.

On average, residents spend $696 on general shopping, $65 on clothing, shoes, and other wear, $64 on hobbies, $26 on electronics, and $16 on office supplies.

For general shopping, the most popular stores in Fergus Falls include Mills Fleet Farm, Walmart, Target, and Kmart, with the average purchase size being $122. For clothing, shoes, and other wear, you wont see many citizens buying their items in Fergus Falls, however. With an average of $65 spent on this  category, it’s all pouring out to other communities. TJ Maxx, Eddie Bauer, and DSW, are some of the places residents of the area choose to buy their clothing.

HEALTH & FAMILY

With $559, on average, being spent on our health, as well as our families, this category comes in second for residents of the area.

$249 is spent per month on insurance, $148 on health-care, and $100 on childcare.  Other subcategories include $24 per month being spent on pets, $22 being spent on personal care, and $16 being donated to charity.

HOUSE & HOME

With $436 being spent on our house and home, its obvious that residents in the area take pride in taking care of their homes. $182 is spent monthly on utilities expenses, $147 on home improvement, $80 on our monthly phone bill, and $27 on home maintenance.

GETTING AROUND

$430 of our monthly budget is spent on getting around. Residents spend, on average, $179 per month on gas, with Holiday, Casey’s General Store, and M & H, being the place residents chose to make their gasoline purchases. Residents also spend $251 on auto expenses, per month, with people in the 90th percentile spending a whopping $680 on their auto expenses!

FOOD & DRINK

Trailing behind transportation, is the food & drink category. $350 of our monthly household budget is spent on this category, on average. According to the data, more residents are choosing to dine at home, rather than dine at a restaurant. $215 is being spent on groceries per month versus $135 being spent on dining out.  If we look further into the data, our dining out purchases go to Applebee’s, McDonald’s, and Subway.

TRAVEL & LEISURE

The smallest category that residents of the area spend their money on is travel & leisure. With $116 being spent on travel, $32 spent on cabal/satellite, and $16 being spent on other entertainment, residents spend roughly $164 per month on this category.  The majority of the residents in the area prefer to take cruises according to the data, while hotel stay is toward the bottom of the list.

WHAT ABOUT YOU?

Is this data consistent with your average budget? Use the nifty comment feature and let us know!

Data from Bundle.com, MSN Money, Citi Group, and Morningstar Financial. Latest data available was from October 2009.

The giant otter statue that resides in Grotto Park, on the east side of Fergus Falls, will be featured in an upcoming South by South West (SXSW) film called “World’s Largest”. The documentary features small towns across the United States who claim the “world’s largest” something.

“Our intention in making World’s Largest was to create a portrait of a changing place and time – small-town America at this moment”, says filmmaker Amy C. Elliott. “The result is a multilayered tapestry of dozens of first person accounts that are candid, poignant, funny and sad; peppered with the images of these often beautiful statues and the vanishing worlds they were built to represent.”

The people behind the film, ‘World’s Largest’, were in Fergus Falls several years ago, and filmed several residents in town, and even interview one of the artists behind the statue.

Other communities in the area were also featured in the film. The prairie chicken in Rothsay, the loon in Vergas, the pelican in Pelican Rapids, as well as a list of others were also featured.

The film will have its world premier during the SXSW Film Conference and Festival, which is being held March 12th through the 20th.

More information on the film, “World’s Largest”, can be found on their website, http://www.worldslargestdoc.com.

People who own property on Minnesota’s more than 10,000 lakes are facing higher fees to take out permits to control aquatic plants along their shorelines.

Three public hearings on proposed changes are set for later this month: Feb. 23 in Fergus Falls, Feb. 24 in Little Falls and Feb. 25 in Plymouth.

The Legislature directed the Department of Natural Resources to recover the costs of its aquatic plant management permit program through fees.

The DNR proposes to increase permit fees for aquatic plant control adjacent to privately owned lake shore from the current $35 to $90. It also proposes a new $100 fee for businesses that remove aquatic plants.

Another revision would prohibit control of lotus flowers in public waters.

When the National Weather Service issued a Blizzard Warning for the Fergus Falls area, conditions weren’t looking favorable. Just a week ago, the Fergus Falls area was enjoying temperatures in the low-to-mid thirties. That changed over night.

This storm not only canceled schools, but businesses were forced to close as well. For instance, the Fergus Falls Medical Group closed at noon, and the West Ridge Mall closed at 5:00PM.

Conditions only worsened when the day continued. Eventually, the Otter Tail County Sheriff’s Department issued a statement advising no travel throughout Otter Tail County.

LOOKING FORWARD

While temperatures this week will be considerably cooler than a week ago, we shouldn’t have to worry about any winter storms making their way into our area. Highs for this week will be in the low teens, with lows being just below zero.

Forget the economic downturn. Perham, a short drive north-east of Fergus Falls, is currently reviewing a 5-year-plan, which includes a dozen capital improvement projects, that totals $13.7 million.

The capital improvement plan was reviewed by the Perham City Council on January 11th, along with one of the city engineers, Jade Berube.

The largest project on the list is a two-phase expansion of the City’s waste-water treatment facility, which will cost roughly $5.6 million. The first phase of that expansion will include upgrades of the current facility, as well as equipment, sometime in 2011, which will cost just over $2.1 million. In 2012, a new aeration pond is set to be put in with an estimated cost of nearly $3.5 million.

Replacement of Fifth Avenue is another one of the big projects in Perham’s 5-year-plan. That will include total replacement of Fifth Avenue, as well as curb and gutters, sidewalks, a water main, and a storm sewer. That project has a price tag of $731,000.

With downtown areas being the heart of many smaller community’s retail scene, it’s no surprise that the City of Perham also has plans for improvement in their downtown area. Concrete gutters will be installed and improved parking lots, which are used for parking and delivery of goods, are included in Perham’s downtown improvement plans, which will cost the City roughly $215,000. The City would pay just over half of that, with $105,000 being assessed to property owners.

In addition, Perham’s airport is set to benefit from $350,000 in state funding. The City is planning on reconstructing the runway, which will be a complete upgrade of the 16-year-old runway. That is scheduled for 2011. Total costs for the airport upgrades are $550,000, with the City covering the remaining $200,000.

In addition to the projects listed above, Perham is also planning on the following:

• Improvement of Second Avenue Southwest
• Utility upgrades on Third Avenue Southwest
• Various improvements to Third Street Southwest (Hospital) Street
• Northeast Industrial Park Utility and Street Improvements
• City sewer upgrades on Fifth Street Northwest
• Reconstruction of Fourth Street and Fifth Avenue Northwest

Perham is also looking past its 5-year-plan, and into 2015 to 2019. In those upcoming years, industrial park additions, street and utility improvements, as well as airport enhancements are all in the horizon for the growing community, of just under 3,000.

Keith Urban, Kid Rock, and Kenny Chesney will be headlining this years WE Fest country music festival in Detroit Lakes, Minn. this year.

32 Below, based out of Fargo, will kick off the event on August 5th, and Rand Houser, Gloriana, Montgomery Gentry, and Urban will follow.

On August 6th, the group Troubadour starts, and then will be followed by Eric Church, Blake Shelton, Jason Aldean, and Kid Rock.

The final day of the country music festival, August 7th, will begin with Hitchville, who will be followed by Joe Nichols, Gretchen Wilson, Dierks Bentley, and then Kenny Chesney.

Single-day tickets are available for $49, while they last, or three day tickets are available for $99 as well. Festival and camping tickets cost up to $1,000, but includes elevated seating with hospitality. More information about purchasing tickets, or the event in general, is available on wefest.com, or by calling (800) 493-3378.

The first WE Fest was held in 1983, and on average, over 50,000 people attend over the duration of the event. In 2007, a record attendance record was set, with over 83,000 people.

With temperatures in the 30’s this past week, Fergus Falls residents surely have enjoyed the weather. However, reality will kick back in this weekend after we welcome winter back from its short vacation.

According to the National Weather Service of Grand Forks, a major snow and freezing rain storm will makes its way into the area late Friday night, and early Saturday morning. The storm will move from the southern Red River Valley into Minnesota, and will mainly effect west central/north west Minnesota.

The immediate Fergus Falls area is expected to get anywhere between 6 to 12 inches of snow. When the snow is over with, blowing and drifting snow will also several impact any travel Sunday night and well into the day on Monday.

While it’s too early to determine exact measurements, due to fluctuating temperature forecasts, Fergus Falls could get up to a half-inch layer of ice as well.

As always you can trust Fergus Forum to have the latest weather information, as well as up-to-the-minute weather-related delays and cancellations.

Conan O’Brien is considering everything from a talk show on Jewish Life TV to starring in a Pink Visual porno dubbed “Conan the Bangbarian”. Jokes aside, he is also considering working at a Fargo hip-hop radio station, Y94.

As soon as word got out that Conan O’Brien and NBC were in argument over the “Tonight Show”, the comedian started to get job offers from around the country.

If O’Brien accepts Y94’s position, he would be a sidekick to hosts Rat, Zero, and Megan on the station’s “Morning Playhouse” program.

The Fargo pop station offered him a position on its “Morning Playhouse” program as a sidekick to hosts Rat, Zero and Megan.

On the Monday night episode of the “Tonight Show”, O’Brien said “I could do that”, when he was talking about the Y94 job offer.

Fans of O’Brien can vote on which job offer he should pursue on the the Tonight Show’s website at www.tonightshowwithconanobrien.com.

Fans can vote on which offer he should pursue on www.tonightshowwithconanobrien.com.

At 4:00 PM on Tuesday, Y94’s job offer was second to Pink Visual’s “Conan the Bangbarian” movie.