Community SAUK C ENT RE
CHRISTMAS DINNER If you will be alone for the holidays, your family is not able to be with you, or you would like the company of others for your Christmas meal - please join us!
MONDAY, DECEMBER 25TH AMERICAN LEGION Social Gathering begins at 11:30 am, Meal will be served at 12:00 noon. Please call by Monday, December 18th for dining in, delivery, or take-outs. Contact Cindy 320-309-7592 The Christmas Dinner is funded by the Community!
NUMBER 27 • VOLUME 157
Herald Sauk Centre
THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 30, 2023
WWW.STAR-PUB.COM
Sauk Centre School District receives clean audit Report presented at Nov. 20 meeting by BerganKDV BY TIM HENNAGIR AND BEN SONNEK STAFF WRITER
Independent financial auditors have given the Sauk Centre School District a “clean” or unmodified opinion on its 2022-23 annual audit of basic financial statements. A clean audit means the district’s financial statements are prepared using nationally accepted accounting principles and do not contain material misstatements and are fairly presented. Nancy Schulzetenberg, an engagement partner with the St. Cloud office of BerganKDV, presented the audit at a Nov. 20 school board meeting in the Sauk Centre High School Media Center in Sauk Centre. School districts, charter schools, and educational cooperatives are required to have an annual independent financial audit each year. “An unmodified or clean opinion is the best we can offer,” Schulzetenberg said. “We have just one internal control finding, a lack of segregation of accounting duties, which isn’t new for Sauk Centre.” The district’s average daily membership, or students that live within its boundaries increased from 1,110 students to 1,160 students, Schulzetenberg said. Regarding general education aid, Sauk Centre received a 2% increase in 2023 and will receive a 4% increase in 2024, then drop back to an estimated 2% in 2025.
School board page 3
Community
mainstay for 20 years Tom said. “It’s wonderful to be able to
do that. We’ve got the room, Jitters Java Café celebrates milestone letso gopeople for it.” BY JAN LEFEBVRE STAFF WRITER
When Kathy and Tom Oschwald remodeled an old gas station into a café and coffee shop two decades ago on Main Street, they also created a cozy gathering space for area residents. Twenty years after first opening Jitters Java Café, the Oschwalds said it is the community atmosphere of their business that they are most proud of. “People meet here all the time, and I like that,” Kathy said. “It’s especially apparent at Christmas time. You’ll see Christmas presents exchanged — and there are birthday presents exchanged throughout the year. You get to know so many people; some come in every day.”
Tom agreed. “For me, that’s the best part of the business,” he said. “These people are our friends. Some have been coming since the day we opened.” Patrons include college kids home on break and meeting up with old classmates, business people or students working on laptops, groups of friends having lunch, retirees gathering with their daily breakfast or coffee gang, high school kids grabbing a beverage and treat on their way to school and many people picking up their morning caffeine. “We are so fortunate that we have a big enough building so that we don’t have to chase people out who are working on laptops or want to stay awhile,”
With three major roadways crossing Sauk Centre, Jitters also sees new customers daily. “We have a large number of people every day who I don’t know because they are just coming through,” Tom said. “We also have people from towns around here who are just finding us now and asking, ‘How long have you been here?’ We tell them, ‘We’ve been here for 20 years.’” Throughout those years, Jitters has consistently received high ratings from customers for its menu items and coffee, which has filled a specific niche since the business first opened. “We decided from the start that we
PHOTO BY MARK KLAPHAKE
Tom and Kathy Oschwald get ready for morning customers Nov. 27 inside Jitters Java Café. The couple started the Sauk Centre business 20 years ago.
Jitters page 3
Addressing community needs
Depot Feeds demolished
Boost Up committee creates task teams based on survey results BY HANS LAMMEMAN STAFF WRITER
PHOTO BY BEN SONNEK
Demolition begins on the former Depot Feeds building Nov. 28 on Main Street in Sauk Centre. The building was demolished for the addition of transmission lines to feed a new Sauk Centre Public Utilities substation, which is planned to be operational in 2026; the excess property is being looked at by the city for future use.
After three months of surveying residents and visitors, Boost Up Sauk Centre leaders combed through responses and narrowed the data into five primary focus areas for the next phase of the community improvement project. During a Nov. 6 meeting at First Lutheran Church in Sauk Centre, Sauk Centre Area Community Foundation Director Sara Carlson and Boost Up Sauk Centre steering committee members used the information from more than 770 survey responses to create task teams for the most pressing issues that came up in the data.
Depot Feeds page 2
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Boost Up page 4
PUBLIC NOTICES • Mortgage Foreclosure - 7 • City of Sauk Centre Winter Parking Rules Notice - pg. 7 • Probate Notice - Swezey - pg. 7 $
1.50