Just five days before the first day of spring, Latham Hetland still had to bundle up to get to work. It was five degrees below zero when he began his day, which he splits between his job as a loan officer at the bank and his job at city hall as mayor of the rural Minnesota community of New York Mills.

Even in the bone-chilling cold, Hetland has a deep affection for the small city where he was born and raised. 

“It’s the greatest city in the entire world, hands down,” he said. “It’s exciting to be a growing rural community in Minnesota. Not too many communities can say that. We’re also getting younger.”

About 1,400 people live in New York Mills. The city’s manufacturing base bolsters the economy due to the roughly 650 jobs offered at the headquarters for Lund Boats. And the city’s school district is one of the strongest in the state. New York Mills has also received national recognition for hosting The Great American Think-Off. The exhibition draws in people from across the country who gather to debate and discuss profound questions like: Is freedom of speech worth the cost and does technology free us or trap us? 

“I think we’re a pretty progressive small town doing a lot of good stuff,” said Hetland, who joined the city council in 2016 when he was just 20 years old. “I think the communities in my area are always willing to try new things and try to get to the next step, working together to grow. We just have a really limited capacity to do that.”

Like many small town officials, Hetland and the municipal team have to wear many hats. A small town doesn’t mean fewer responsibilities, just fewer people to divide the work. The limited capacity can be a significant barrier to new projects but that didn’t stop Hetland and his team from pursuing a municipal energy project to save money and reduce the town’s utility costs.

Despite the barriers, they found a way to push the project through to completion while supporting not just New York Mills, but other neighboring communities facing similar challenges. 

“The capacity for us to do the research and apply for the grants and get that information, it’s just not there,” Hetland said. “We wouldn’t be able to do that alone. We’re over capacity as it is.”

West Central Initiative (WCI), a regional planning organization, stepped up to provide Hetland’s team with the extra support they needed to implement their plan. WCI collaborated with New York Mills and nine other communities to form a municipal solar cohort. Often, small municipalities do not have the funds to pay for upfront costs or enough staff experience to apply for and manage utility rebates and federal tax credits. Working together helped the coalition leverage their combined capacity and expertise to access financial incentives for rooftop solar arrays on their municipal buildings, reducing their utility costs. 

WCI hired staff to provide technical assistance and expertise on federal tax credits and worked with a partner organization to bid out the bundle of projects. One installer completed all 10 projects. With support from WCI, the communities applied for the federal Investment Tax Credit. The tax credit covers about 30% of project costs, and the rebate covers about 50% of project costs. Since the tax credit is a reimbursement for funds that need to be paid up front, WCI also offered zero-interest bridge loans to the communities in the cohort that needed it.

“This one was really cool for us because when WCI explained it to us, they said they wanted to add solar to our city without costing the city any money. That just seemed way too good to be true,” Hetland said. “We went to the first cohort meeting and they provided the numbers and I was like, ‘This is a real thing. That’s super cool.’ From there on, WCI did such a good job of navigating that process for us and with us and helping me explain it to my council. It was such a seamless process for us.”

The 10 communities in the first cohort are expected to save a total of $1,487,724 over 30 years. And New York Mills is considering adding more solar at its new water treatment facility or possibly on its multiuse building. Other businesses in town, including the bank, are also jumping on board and exploring solar. 

“We just didn’t know the possibilities until I spent the last couple years learning more about it, which has been great,” Hetland said. “Environmentally, it’s important. But people like it when we spend less money. Any sort of sustainable energy that could help us in the future we should be looking at for as many projects as we can.”