
Rendering of the proposed 11th St. underpass (MNDOT)
MOORHEAD, Minn. (KFGO) – More than a dozen Moorhead businesses are being displaced by MnDOT’s 11th Street Underpass project, which is scheduled to break ground next year. The new underpass will run under two busy railroad tracks with the goal of improving safety and mobility in Moorhead.
Mayor Shelly Carlson says the city is making every effort to assist the impacted businesses and she and the other City Council members want to see all of them find a new location in Moorhead.
But several of the business owners say they have moved or are in the process of moving to Fargo, and that the city of Moorhead has made little to no effort to help them stay.
Jen DeMaio owns Two Turtles Acupuncture Center. She says she was bound and determined to stay in Moorhead, where she’s been in business for about 18 years, but she said she couldn’t find any viable options. She said the only contact she had with anyone affiliated with the city was when she emailed the city’s economic development contractor, Downtown Moorhead Inc., to try and get help. She says they emailed her a couple of options that didn’t pan out and she never heard back.
“They are making these changes to bring business to downtown and revitalize our area, but I feel like in the process, as a small business owner, my business wasn’t considered important to the city. It was disheartening, to say the least,” DeMaio said.
Holland’s landscaping and garden store co-owner Sarah Liljestrand says she worked for three years to find a new location in Moorhead, where the company has done business for 50 years, but came up empty. She said never heard from anyone on the city council or otherwise associated with the city except for the first meeting they had three years ago when they were informed that they could either make a deal with MnDOT for a buy-out or eminent domain would be used in order to accommodate the project.
“After that they have not reached out to us or helped us in any way to stay in Moorhead. It was extremely frustrating and very sad,” Liljestrand said.
On the flip side, Liljestrand said, the city of Fargo has been enormously helpful in the company’s relocation efforts to the old Taco Shop plot on North University Drive.
Britta Trygstad owns a photography business called Britta the Photographer which she plans move to Fargo in March. She has operated her business out of Moorhead since 2015.
“I was absolutely hoping to stay in Moorhead. This is my home, this is where my kids go to school, it’s been really nice be able to drive two miles to work every day. When I started looking for a new place, there was nothing for a small business like mine. There just weren’t any choices, at all,” Trygstad said.
She said she was expecting the city of Moorhead to reach out to help her relocate, but no one ever did.
“For most towns the size of Moorhead, the small businesses are the heart of the city, and the fact that they were just like ‘yeah, you can just go,’ was really disappointing,” Trygstad said.
Another business impacted by the underpass project is FRS Works, formerly known as Fargo Rubber Stamp, which has done business in the F-M area since 1885. Attempts to contact owner Andrew Ponto were unsuccessful, but an auto-response to an email says the business is now closed.
Derrick LaPoint is the President and CEO of Downtown Moorhead Inc., which has contracted with the city to help the impacted businesses navigate the relocation.
“It’s a difficult situation any time we lose a business to Fargo – we absolutely want to help all of them find a home in Moorhead. I think for us it’s learning and continuing to have open dialog with these businesses to better serve their needs and see how we can best accommodate a new location for them,” he said.
LaPoint says other businesses have managed to find new homes in Moorhead, like Glass Doctor Auto, which recently found a new spot in the city’s Industrial Park.
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