Northern Township Board Explains Why They Feel Incorporation is Best for Residents

In mid-April, the Northern Township Board issued their notice to incorporate into a city to neighboring townships and cities. The City of Bemidji quickly responded with a resolution to rescind that notice to incorporate and to also re-enter wastewater negotiations. Board members of Northern Township feel that too much of the Township has been picked apart over the last few decades.

“About almost a quarter of the township has been annexed over time, and at some point, we felt like our township had to set our boundaries to survive.” says Jess Frenzel, Chairman of Northern Township Board.

Minnesota Townships don’t incorporate into cities very often. Empire Township being the last to do so in 2023, and Credit River before them in 2021. Northern Township however feels they already operate very much like a city.

“We have businesses here; we have roads that service thoroughfares; we provide planning and zoning independently; we feel like we offer competitive tax rates for what the services that we offer to that we feel are fair to our residents; and we feel like that the studies and the analysis that we’ve done with our economic experts, that’s not going to change or change very insignificantly.” adds Frenzel.

The Township Board has had several meetings with residents of the Township regarding Incorporation in the past. The Board says during their November meeting back in 2022, there was overwhelming support from residents for the Township to incorporate into a city.

“Everybody has some different viewpoints on set, but the vast majority of our residents feel like this is where it is.” says Frenzel, “At our past meetings, we didn’t have people who held up their hand saying that they were for any type of annexation, but they felt they wanted to stay where they are.”

The City of Bemidji however feels differently. Not too long after Northern Township issued their notice to incorporate, the Bemidji City Council served the Township with a formal notice of intent to annex a portion of the township land surrounding Lake Bemidji. Saying the City of Bemidji can already offer the services that the Township wants to provide, and it would be a waste of federal dollars for the Township to do so.

It takes special personnel that are highly skilled and talented to run these facilities and to do so in environmentally responsible way.” say Jorge Prince, Bemidji Mayor, “When I think about what’s best for our community, what’s best for our lake; I have a hard time believing that it’s not the city of Bemidji providing those services.”

“I don’t think they’ve been shy that they think that they can serve our residents better and that the services they offer are relevant to our people, but our residents get what they need and the stuff that they do need right now, we’re able to offer them.” says Frenzel, “Such as our sewer project, we can offer that at a rate with the grants we’ve attained and the plans that we have. We feel like we can offer that at a discounted rate, even below what the city can offer their services to them for.”

The Northern Township Board sent a letter to the Bemidji City Council in response to their Notice to Annex, which has been a topic of discussion between the two for several years, and the Township hopes this will soon come to an end.

“We need resolution; we need to have this done with and we need to start governing as we want to govern.” adds Frenzel, “We need to have some stability with who we are and we need to plan for our future. The only way to do that is by creating our borders. We know our tax base. We know where our future growth is. We can plan on planning zones for commercial, residential, what we need. The only way to do that is to get some finality in to have these borders. That’s what we’re looking for, is we’re looking for stability; we’re looking for finality.”

If you have been following this story for the last few weeks, we want to know your opinion. Are you for Northern Township’s Incorporation to become a city, or do you wish Northern Township to remain a township? We have a poll going on our Facebook page that you can vote on here.