Charles Crane/MDN Alderman Mike Blessum discusses concerns with one of the bills before the North Dakota Legislature during a special Minot City Council meeting at City Hall on Friday.

The Minot City Council held a special meeting on Friday to review the current status of a number of bills being considered by the state Legislature.

Minot Mayor Tom Ross was present, along with a quorum of City Council members including President Mark Jantzer, Vice President Lisa Olson and Alderman Mike Blessum. Aldermen Rob Fuller, Scott Samuelson and Paul Pitner were unable to attend the meeting.

The presentation was delivered by consultant Shane Goettle, who has been sitting in on the 69th Legislative Assembly in Bismarck.

While a majority of the bills in question pertained to a variety of efforts to address property taxes and caps on local tax levies, Jantzer suggested the council take a wait and see approach until the Legislature paired them down after crossover between the House and the Senate.

City Manager Harold Stewart was in agreement, noting there were several competing bills seeking incompatible outcomes such as replacing traditional value-based property tax with a square footage tax for residential properties.

That said, during discussion of House Bill 1353, one of the bills seeking to apply caps to increases of local property tax levies, Blessum sought to clarify the intent behind a recent vote by the council to sign a letter opposing such efforts.

“I hope you understand there was no action taken by the City of Minot that contemplated whatsoever that we would not follow the law, should it become law. That has become a little of a scuttlebutt down there, and that was not at all contemplated at all,” Blessum said.

Goettle said he had heard talk in Bismarck and there “had been some confusion about what the vote was,” but that he would represent it factually and accurately to address any misinterpretations.

House Bill 1141 was highlighted as an area of concern by Blessum, which seeks to prohibit state or political subdivisions from using public funds to support or endorse private organizations that have previously endorsed candidates or ballot measures within the past 10 years.

Blessum said if the bill was retroactive, it could prevent the City from engaging with the Minot Area Chamber EDC due to its public and financial support for opposition efforts against Measure 4 which was on the ballot in November’s general election. Goettle said the question around whether the bill would be retroactive or prospective would likely come up during the House Industry, Business and Labor committee hearing on Monday.

“I would expect there would be issues of if it is fair to go back in time when people didn’t know about this. That’s the argument for the prospective, and I expect that will be a part of the debate,” Goettle said.

The council also discussed concerns around House Bill 1239, which would provide protections for digital asset mining operations from local noise regulations and zoning changes. Stewart said the bill would open the door for a company to operate a blockchain mining server farm in a residential area, leaving the local government with no recourse to address complaints from the public.

“From what I’ve seen they drop a railroad container, it’s not a 200,000-square-foot, and hook it up to power with the servers in the middle of it running. According to this they can go into a residential area right next to somebody, and drop a storage container with a generator and run it, and we’re circumvented by state law of doing anything about that,” Stewart said.

Goettle recommended City Finance Director David Lakefield testify in favor of Senate Bill 2323, which would create a new energy impact grant fund and adjust the allocation of the tax revenues distributed to cities who incurred debt during the Bakken Oil Boom. The bill would appropriate $20 million per fiscal year to the three hub cities, of which Minot would receive 10.46% or around $2 million. Goettle asked Lakefield to provide information on debt incurred by the City which would be considered growth related to present when he testifies.