The city council unanimously approved the city’s 2026 levy and budget at the Monday, December 1 meeting after hearing from a number of residents who expressed frustration with the high cost of living and increasing taxes from both the city and the county.
“It’s getting tough to stay in this town,” said Les Helten, a Hastings resident who spoke at the meeting.
Helten was one of several who chaffed at the city’s new budget, citing both unnecessary costs throughout the city as well as the increasing water bills, which are set to jump another 10% on January 1 in order to pay for the second of three water treatment plants to treat city water for PFAS contamination.
The 2026 city budget is $71,134,822 with a tax rate of 60.104% an increase of 0.95%. That translates to an increase of $153 annually for the median home value of $331,600 for Hastings, and a total city property tax of $1949. The city’s levy increase has been lowered from September to 7.88%, down from 8.4%. Nearly half of that growth, 44% is attributed to growth in tax capacity.
Chris Eitemiller, Finance Manager for the city of Hastings presented the budget at the meeting, styling it as simply keeping the “lights on” for the city with “minimum new initiatives.”
Notable purchases and projects include $510,000 for a new roof on the public works building, the creation of a ninth city well at a cost of $1.5 million, a new city dump truck at a cost of $300,000 and LED lighting upgrades at Vets field at a cost of $150,000.
The largest expense, by far, however, is the second water treatment plant at an eyewatering $22,300,000, or more than 31% of the city’s total annual budget.
Despite the trepidation over contaminated water, residents continued to express their frustration with the high cost of living, including new water rate increases.
“What’s next year gonna be? This is not sustainable,” said Kevin Lorentz, another resident who spoke at the meeting.
Spiral Brewery THC
The city also approved Spiral Brewery to manufacture and sell THC seltzers in the taproom. According to Annie Fox, Co-owner of Spiral Brewery, the decision to move into THC seltzers was one of survival: “we need to diversity to survive. Craft beer is in a really bad place right now.”
Spiral, like so many other businesses, is stuck in the limbo of state licensing working under the Office of Cannabis Management’s timeline. Despite that ambiguity, the business is set to apply for state licensing when it opens next in order to be able to brew its own THC seltzers.
According to Fox, brewing THC seltzers “isn’t all that different from what we are doing right now,” with the company brewing its own seltzer then adding a THC tincture to the mix.
In the meantime, the taproom is set to begin selling retail THC seltzers from other manufactures in the coming months.
Carbone’s Lawsuit
City Administrator Dan Wietecha also addressed the ongoing lawsuit from Carbone’s Pizzeria regarding the city’s alleged improper ending of their lease at 1290 North Frontage Rd, where the central water treatment plant is set to be built when the city bought the property last year.
According to Wietecha, the city “disputes the substance of their claim,” and acted property when relocating both Stacy’s Stars and Carbone’s Pizzeria from the property last summer.
While Wietecha wasn’t able to provide further detail in the city’s dispute, he maintained that there still was a place for the business within Hastings: “We as a city still want to find a good home for Carbone’s Pizza. We want them here in town.”
PFAS Update
As usual, Wietecha provided a PFAS update at the first city council meeting of the month discussing the recent bonding committee visits to the city of Hastings, upcoming environmental studies and recent rankings for Hastings projects.
The city continues to work on a number of environmental studies that examines hydrogeology attempting to determine the origin of the PFAS contamination in Hastings well water and connect it to the 3M dumping sites in Washington County that formed the basis of 2018 3M settlement fund.
The city has already connected well #5 to those dumping sites and it is the belief of city officials that the PFAS contamination within Hastings water came from 3M via those dumping sites.
The city’s next round of environmental studies are set to be completed by the end of the year. While the city doesn’t “know what they will come up with,” they “could change the conversation with the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency” in allowing Hastings access to settlement funds.
Another new development is that Hastings second water treatment plant was recently ranked as the #1 drinking water project in the state of Minnesota in a draft of the Project Portfolio Management November monthly status report.
The third water treatment plant is tied for 17th place.
These rankings at least guarantee further low-interest loans for the city, like those used for the first water treatment plant, but bring new attention to the project especially for the upcoming legislative session where a bonding bill is expected.