DEED Awards Fergus Falls $640,000 in Energy Transition Grants
The Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development (DEED) today announced nearly $1.4 million in grant funding to support economic development in two Minnesota towns where fossil fuel power plants recently closed.
Granite Falls ($750,000) and Fergus Falls ($640,250) were the two to receive the grants from DEED’s Community Energy Transition Grant program, which helps communities around Minnesota plan for and manage the economic and social impact of a local power plant’s closure.
Fergus Falls plans to use grant funding to purchase an industrial site along the Otter Tail River near downtown Fergus Falls in order to demolish the existing buildings and remediate the site for redevelopment as multi-phased workforce housing. Over the years, and despite its location in a dense residential neighborhood, the 8-acre site has been a foundry, lumber yard and retail center and now sits as industrial storage. A coal-fired power plant further east down the Otter Tail River closed in 2021, changing the city’s economic landscape and necessitating a shift in development priorities to include support for workforce housing.
The Energy Transition Grant Program helps communities address the impact of a power plant’s closure as the state moves toward renewable energy sources. The program provides funding for towns to research, plan and implement activities designed to:
- assist workers at the plant find new employment, including worker retraining and developing small business start-up skills;
- increase the community’s property tax base;
- develop alternative economic development strategies to attract new employers to the community; and/or
- produce site readiness plans, land use studies and long-term economic planning and impact studies.
It also activates Minnesota’s Environmental Quality Board to reimburse some costs associated with helping communities address regulatory issues, provide consultation on technical and regulatory challenges and educate the community on transitions.