Perhaps the most notable event in Algona last year was the completion of city hall, which was rebuilt after it was determined the previous building no longer met the needs of the city.

It reopened in October, nearly two years after the original building was demolished, and two decades after discussions first began about replacing it, according to Curt Wiseman, Algona city administrator.

“The city had been looking at building a new city hall for well over 20 years,” he said. “They’d done a lot of studies and research and trying to decide where. They looked at a lot of different facilities.”

He said the prior city hall was in poor shape.

-Messenger file photo by Peter Kaspari
Jacob Tjaden, Algona community development director, poses in front of Algona City Hall recently. Tjaden was hired in August.

“It was well over 100 years old and had numerous structural problems and water and animals and whatnot,” Wiseman said. “So, basically, when I started — I came on here about three years ago — one of my main tasks was to get this project moving forward.”

FEH Design, of Des Moines, was the project’s architect, while Sande Construction, of Humboldt, was the contractor. Contractors from Algona assisted in the project as well.

City staff moved to a building next to the Algona POW Museum, which served as a temporary city hall until the new building was completed.

They moved into the new city hall building in October.

“It’s been a major improvement,” Wiseman said.

-Messenger file photo by Peter Kaspari
Curt Wiseman, Algona city administrator, looks over the newly-rebuilt City Council chambers. The city recently finished construction of a new City Hall after almost two years.

He called it “very professional” and said the building works for what the staff needs.

“There’s a lot more space,” he said. “There are dedicated offices for each individual. A lot bigger council chambers, and the ability to hold other meetings in that council chamber too.”

Wiseman said the new council chambers have a dividing wall that can make the room smaller or larger depending on the size of the meeting.

“It just lends a level of professionalism all the way across,” he said. “And we can much better serve the residents of the city of Algona than we could before.”

The rebuild also meant new spaces for city staff, two of whom were hired within the past year.

One of the new hires is Jacob Tjaden, the city’s community development director.

Tjaden is originally from Titonka, and joined the Algona city staff in mid-August.

He is the first occupant of the position, which was originally a shared position with the deputy city clerk.

“The city decided to make that a dedicated full-time position,” he said of his job, and added that shows the city recognized the importance of having a full-time person to work in community development.

He described his job as having two major responsibilities; one of them is economic development, “working with our existing businesses, business retention and expansion.”

“I want to encourage that, as well as being the point of contact and resource for businesses looking to locate here or people looking to start a business,” Tjaden said.

The other role he serves is that of city planner.

“What’s our long-term goals for the community?” he asked.

The other recent hire for the city of Algona is Shelby Curry, the city’s recreation director.

Curry was hired in May 2018.

She said her duties include running the aquatic center — which includes being in charge of hiring all the staff — youth and adult recreation activities as well as some other roles.

“Along with that, there are a few other activities or events the city hosts that I’m in charge of,” she said, which includes the town’s annual 5K/10K run, Tornado Alley.

Curry also helps run a program for people with special needs.

Before she came to Algona, Curry was a physical education and health teacher.

“My husband’s family is actually from the (Algona) area,” she said. “Where I was teaching, it was a long-distance living situation. We needed to take a position that got me closer to my family.”

The two positions are similar.

“Being a P.E. teacher, you work a lot with sports and recreational activities,” she said. “This job, that’s the epitome of what I’m doing; running recreation programs through the city to keep people moving and active.”

In addition to hiring new city staff, Algona is making plans for the future as well.

Tjaden said he’s recently taken part in a downtown meeting with various city and county officials, as well as local business owners, to determine how they can plan for future and current businesses.

“How do we support our existing businesses and our existing quality of life, and then how do we enhance that and take it up to the next level,” Tjaden said. “Algona’s a really nice community. It has a lot of great things going for it, has a lot of assets.”

In terms of businesses, Tjaden said Iowa is lucky that it has such a low unemployment rate. But at the same time, it’s a double-edged sword because that means there aren’t people available for jobs that are actually open.

“You also want people if a business wants to expand or a new company wants to open up,” he said. “You want to have workers available. You want to keep that (unemployment) low, but it’s a happy medium.”

He said he wants to help Algona grow and provide opportunities for expansion, work and retention and recruitment.

The Algona Public Library is also looking to grow in 2019.

For the past few years, a fundraising effort has been underway to raise money for a remodeling project.

The hope is to make a number of changes to the library, including expanding the youth department and making the shelves compliant with the Americans With Disabilities Act, according to Director Mara Strickler.

She said the project is very close to getting started, with the library waiting to hear back from a couple funding sources “before a final announcement.”

“We do plan on beginning construction in 2019,” she said. “It’s just figuring out if it’s going to be this fiscal year or if we’re going to have to wait until July 1 to get started.”

Knowing the project is so close to getting started has her excited, but it’s also a bit of cautious optimism.

“We are really looking forward to the positive changes that it’s going to bring to Algona and Kossuth County,” she said. “That said, there are still enough unknowns about exactly when we’re going to be able to start construction, and some of those details, we’re really focused on those, rather than looking forward to the end result.”

“We’re trying to tackle each thing as it comes along.”

Strickler said the library is also looking for locations to host its summer programming. It won’t be interrupted due to construction, but she said library staff are working with other locations throughout the city to see where that programming will be held.

Besides the remodel, Strickler said the library recently partnered with Kossuth County Regional Health Center to offer Spanish classes.

“Given some of the population changes seen in Algona and Kossuth County, we thought it was important to offer the opportunity for folks to be able to practice their Spanish skills,” Strickler said. “We’ve seen an increase in patrons who are Spanish-speaking and we thought that other employers might be experiencing something similar, as well as educators, churches, etcetera.”

She added there’s a possibility that the library will add a conversational English class as well, but that’ll depend on interest within the community.

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