Have you considered building a home in Manning?!?!

Carroll Daily Times Herald, Rebecca McKinsey

Manning is offering a new incentive for anyone looking to build a house who chooses to do so there.
The city’s Economic Development Agency, which comprises representatives both from city government and the gas and light utilities, is offering 11 developed lots for sale in south Manning.
The lots are being sold for $15,000, and buyers are required to begin building within one year and have the house completed in two years. They can work with local or out-of-city contractors to complete the homes. Once each house is completed and is owner-occupied, the city will reimburse the homeowner $7,500.
The lots are located in the Rasmussen subdivision in the south of Manning. The city and utility companies purchased the lots — four south of Iowa Drive and seven south of Pleasant Drive — from Jerry Rasmussen in 2016.
“And now we’re turning around and selling them for cheap, because we want to spur development,” Manning City Administrator Dawn Rohe said.
The city also purchased nine undeveloped lots and might look at developing them down the road, she added.
In Manning and throughout Carroll County, housing has become an economic-development issue, Rohe said.
“If there is no housing available around us, we can’t grow our businesses,” she said.
One of the lots is already spoken for, and a variety of people who live both in and outside of Manning have expressed interest in them in the past several days, Rohe said.
“There are people (from outside Manning) looking to build who believe Manning is a good town to build in — it’s growing, and they want a smaller town that’s going to be around a long time,” she said. “And there are people who have lived here in a starter home and are ready for the next step.”
The decision to make the lots available for purchase stems in part from the results of the Carroll Area Development Corporation’s 2016 housing study of Carroll County. The study’s Manning-specific results noted that the city lacks homes for sale for more than $100,000.
A local housing task force formed in Manning further surveyed the city’s residents, obtaining 17 responses indicating interest in building a home within five years.
The task force proposed building spec homes in the $200,000 range, but the idea didn’t come together. However, the lots became available around the same time, Rohe said.
“The city and utilities saw this as an opportunity to help spur development in an area that has been otherwise stagnant for some time and help meet needs identified in the housing study,” she said.
She added that the CADC housing study helped focus Manning’s efforts to improve housing offerings.
To anyone thinking about living in Manning?
“Welcome,” Rohe said. “Come build a house.”

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Future valued Manning employees or entrepreneurs????

Carroll Broadcasting Company

One team of IKM-Manning junior high girls and another team of high school boys will be joining 46 other Iowa STEM teams in competing at the FIRST Tech Challenge (FTC) State Championship competition this weekend in Coralville. These teams had to compete against the top 24 teams in western Iowa to win a spot at the University of Iowa sponsored event. The junior girls’ team of Macie Doyel, Jessica Thomssen, Tina Thomssen, Bailey Cantrell and Sierra Ferry landed in sixth place at that competition after 30 matches. They qualified in the eighth position to advance to the state competition. The high school boys’ team of Zachary Spoelstra and Grant Behrens finished in 14th place overall in the qualifying round to advance into 15th position at state. The top 14 teams from the State Championships on Friday, Feb. 24 and Saturday, Feb. 25 will advance to the North Super Regional Competition, March 30 through April 1 at the US Cellular/DoubleTree Convention Center in Cedar Rapids. This coming Saturday’s event in Coralville will be live streamed and can be accessed by following the link included below. The IKM-Manning student’s participation in this event is made possible by funds provided through IKM-Manning GALA donations.

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Carroll Broadcasting Company

Regional Director of the Western Iowa Tech Community College Small Business Development Center (SBDC) in Sioux City, Todd Rausch, has announced that Char-Mac Assisted Living and founder, Jeanine Chartier, have been named Iowa’s SBDC Business of the Month for February. The SBDC advisory board selects an outstanding small business from across the state for this honor, and Rausch said Chartier was selected because of her rare combination of compassion, skill and tenacity combined with a fierce advocacy for the elderly. She is “A savvy, caring entrepreneur who has helped improve the quality of life in three Northwest Iowa communities while taking the time to mentor others,” Rausch said. Char-Mac’s three assisted living facilities are located in Manning, Lawton and Holstein and employ a total of more than 100 people.

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Carroll Broadcasting Company

Co-chairs of the third annual IKM-Manning GALA, Megan Reis and Jeanne Stadtlander, are excited to be working on the education fundraiser that has grown over the previous two years. Stadtlander said she and Rose Miller discussed an event that they hoped would mirror the success of another popular Carroll County annual fundraiser.

The March 25th GALA will feature Dueling Pianos entertainment, a dinner catered by the Irwin Locker, live and silent auctions, and new this year, a raffle. Reis says the proceeds are used to help fund 21st Century skills programs at IKM-Manning Community School.

Stadtlander said the GALA has raised $50,000 the first year and $60,000 the second, but they aren’t focusing on monetary goals as much as relationships.

Each year the committee selects an IKM-Manning district community to host the event. The first year was in Manning and the second in Manilla. This year, the GALA will be held at the Irwin Community Center. Reis says that even if people can’t come to Irwin on March 25, there are other ways they can support the GALA.
Other ways community members can show their support of the GALA’s efforts is by donating an auction item, becoming a business partner, sponsoring a STEM Festival or by become a supporter with contribution levels from $1 to $2,500 or more. GALA tickets are $25 per person, with a break for a $500 or more sponsorship level. These can be purchased from any GALA committee member, a listing of which is included below. Raffle tickets are one for $10 or three for $25 and are available at the Manning Pharmacy and the Manilla Times. More information from Reis and Stadtlander is also included below.

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No Joke - Mr and Mrs Peacock #ExperienceManning at the German Hausbarn Heritage park!!

On Mr. Peacock's latest adventure, they discovered a hidden treasure of a old German Hausbarn The Hausbarn is near the small town of Manning Iowa, Iowa. Learn all about this this house/barn all-in-one and how the people back in the 1600's used to live from Mr. Peacock & Mrs. Peacock in their latest adventure.

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Carroll Daily Times Herald, Rebecca McKinsey

Area businesses have the chance this week to put themselves on the map — literally.A free workshop being offered in Manning will assist business owners with improving their online presence — making it easier for potential customers to find them with a Google search.
Manning-area organizers are joining with Google to offer the workshop, which will show business owners how to put their business information on maps and elsewhere online. The event will be held from 5:30–7 p.m. Wednesday at the Timmerman Shelter House on Park Avenue in Manning.
“Businesses that have complete business information online are twice as likely to be considered by reputable customers,” states a news release about the workshop.
Those participating in the hands-on workshop are encouraged to bring a laptop or smartphone with them if possible.
The event is being co-sponsored by the City of Manning, Main Street Manning, the Manning Chamber of Commerce, the Iowa Small Business Development Center and Google.
Snacks will be provided and there is no cost to participate in the workshop, but organizers ask participants to register in advance by emailing mainstreetmanning@mmctsu.com or calling 712-655-6246.

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Carroll Daily Times Herald, Rebecca McKinsey

Before long, visitors to Manning’s Trestle Park might lock their bikes on a colorful steel bike rack mimicking the design of an iconic Manning structure and sit down on an attached bench to peruse a book or newspaper.
That public art project is one of several designed and proposed by Iowa State University students that Manning might move forward with implementing.
Through one of the city’s frequent partnerships with Iowa State University, Manning solicited public art designs from ISU students in an interdisciplinary class taught by Department of Architecture lecturer Reinaldo Correa. After a meeting Saturday with Correa, city and economic-development representatives narrowed down the proposed designs in their continued quest to choose at least three, if not more, of the projects to be constructed in Manning. They plan to raise funds or seek out grants to complete as many of the projects as possible, said Ron Reischl, chair of Main Street Manning’s Business Improvement Committee.
The class was tasked with designing public art, signage or structures for three areas — at the Trestle Park planned at the north edge of Manning, at the entrance to the city’s German Hausbarn and the Carroll County Freedom Rock and along Highway 141 by the city’s Little League baseball fields. Students visited Manning in September before crafting their designs.
Many of the projects students proposed were interactive — including a metal sculpture that incorporates monkey bars, a sculpture kids can walk through that mimics the image of grasses blown by the wind and a tree-like sculpture that catches the wind in its “leaves” as children spin it, merry-go-round style, to create natural music.
One design depicts a fire pit at Trestle Park, incorporating bricks from Main Street and a protective metal grate designed to resemble Iowa’s prairie grasses.
One of Manning’s finalists for the artwork along Highway 141 was designed by student Tara Kraft and features four steel columns, one to represent each of Manning’s popular attractions — the water tower, the railroad trestle, the German Hausbarn and Trinity Church. LED lights inside the tower-like structures would light them up at night.
Students offered a variety of sign ideas for advertising the Hausbarn and Freedom Rock as well, ranging from one featuring a soldier and firefighter to a pyramid-like structure announcing the attractions.
The assignment allowed students to move past computer work and see how their work might be implemented in the real world, Correa said.
“Coming up with these ideas and seeing they can become a physical thing is very rewarding,” he said. “As they’re transitioning from academia to the professional world, it’s a story future employers would be very captivated to hear.”
Once Manning selects several projects to pursue, the city and Correa might work with the students whose designs are chosen to complete more extensive design work, Correa said.
In addition to hoping to complete projects in each of the three proposed places, Manning officials also are looking at ways to incorporate other student designs throughout the city, such as at the hospital green space or in “parklets” that are being considered for Main Street, Reischl said.
The collaboration with this ISU class has been vital in Manning’s economic-development efforts, he added.
“To include artwork and add culture to our effort of improving quality of life will encourage people, especially younger generations with children, to consider Manning as a place to live,” Reischl said.

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