Jill Schramm/MDN Minot City Council member and mayoral candidate Rob Fuller speaks at a Minot City Council meeting July 21. At the right is council member Scott Samuelson.

If elected as Minot’s next mayor, Rob Fuller intends to portray Minot as a welcoming community and great place to visit or start a business.

“But we need to cut taxes and we need to cut regulations so people want to move here and live here, because right now, in the high tax, high regulation environment, we’re pretty much stagnant, and our population has been going backwards. We’re the only major city in North Dakota over the last five years, that’s lost population,” he said.

Fuller is one of four candidates seeking the mayor’s position in the Aug. 5 election. Other candidates are Mark Jantzer, Paul Pitner and Josiah Roise.

Currently in his first term on city council, Fuller said he feels he can contribute more as mayor because the mayor meets weekly with the city manager to share the community’s input and discuss the direction of the city. The mayor’s position carries the weight of speaking for the council and being able to drive change, he said.

“It’s about planning and starting to set the points that you want to get to over time, and to turn the city and change from the high tax, high regulation environment we’re in now to start to ease that a little bit,” Fuller said.

He said he would bring the fiscal conservatism developed from his 20 years in banking and business ownership to the position, as well as a fresh approach to issues and a focus on government accountability.

“We need to start holding some of our city employees accountable for some of the things they’re doing, saying – or some of the things that they’re maybe holding up because we have an ordinance in place that makes it more difficult for them,” Fuller said. Changing an ordinance to make it easier for staff to accomplish what needs to be done provides a better direction, he said.

Fuller, 52, currently isn’t engaged in business, choosing to spend some time with family after closing Spartan Firearms last year.

Fuller has taxes owing on his Spartan Firearms building, located between Minot and Burlington. He said the building is for sale and has generated interest by buyers. On the advice of his banker, he said, the plan is to fully pay the taxes once a sale is completed. The overdue taxes on two missed payments, before interest and penalty, is $12,924, according to Ward County information.

“A lot of times in commercial real estate sales and agricultural real estate sales, the taxes are paid when the property sells,” Fuller said. “It’ll all get paid. I’ve calculated out what it’s going to cost me to pay it late, and I’m OK with that. So, it was a business decision.”

In addition to examining tax levels and regulations, Minot needs to assess its economic development programs to determine their effectiveness before putting more money into them, Fuller said.

“The economic development ideas that they’ve had are valid, but I think we need to address or look at how we’re implementing those dollars because – we’ll all agree – Minot is not a growing community. To get businesses to come here, there’s two things that a community or a local government can do. You can drive down taxes and you can drive down regulations. And once you do those two things, business will flood to Minot,” Fuller said.

He said his objection to programs such as Facade Improvement and Renaissance Zone is they are not open to all businesses or property owners.

“We’re picking winners and losers, as we always say, and that isn’t fair to the rest of the businesses,” he said.

An additional concern is businesses that close when the tax breaks run out, he said. Also, some property owners are using the building improvements gained through economic development programs as a reason for increased rents that can displace current renters, he said.

Fuller said he’s concerned the city has a staff person tasked with economic development while also paying Minot Area Chamber EDC to provide that function, along with using sales tax dollars for additional economic development projects. He’s concerned about the MAGIC Fund sitting on $8 million with no primary sector demand for the money.

Fuller has proposed reallocating the first penny of city sales tax, which the Minot City Council agreed to consider in directing staff to prepare a draft. The first penny now goes to economic development, flood control, infrastructure improvements and property tax relief. Fuller would redirect all but the flood control portion to first responders, allowing economic development efforts to use existing reserves while providing roughly $6.5 million a year for the fire and police departments in an effort to alleviate pressure on property taxes.

The other way to reduce property taxes is to make strategic cuts to the overall city budget, Fuller said.

That doesn’t mean cuts to personnel, but it may mean less consulting or other types of spending, he said.

Since moving back to Minot in 2012, he said, he has been stunned by the amount of money the city spends on flood control and believes the city was fiscally irresponsible to get into it that deep.

“Flood control, while it’s necessary, I think we spent too much on it because we could have used those dollars for other things in our community,” Fuller said.

He said the city set aside nearly $19 million from sales tax last year to ensure money on hand to cover flood control bond payments, which vary from year to year. The city is paying about $9 million this year and is budgeting $5.2 million for next year.

Fuller added he wants to see more community engagement in their government.

“I want the community to feel that we are listening to them. I want them to come in and tell us, and then I want them to see the results of us doing what they tell us to do. That is how you get the community to re-engage. Because there’s an apathy out there right now,” he said.

He added he isn’t concerned about conflicts resulting from different views from the public or on the council itself.

“That’s what leadership is. It’s the ability to take people that don’t always agree and don’t always see the same vision, to work together towards that common vision,” Fuller said. “It’s just about sitting down and having the conversations.

“This is our home. Let’s all sit down and work together to make it what the community wants. It isn’t about what you want. It isn’t about what I want,” he said. “It’s the community. What does the community tell us they want? And that’s what we should be working toward, and there will always be disagreements. That’s how city government is. But again, I think an effective leader can bring those people together to work for a common interest, which is the betterment of Minot.”