New Moorhead City Councilmember Seljevold Discusses Priorities

Larry Seljevold spoke to us about what he hopes to achieve in the year remaining of Joel Paulsen's term.

MOORHEAD, Minn. – Larry Seljevold is the newly elected city council Member in the 3rd Ward.

He was first elected to the city council in 1998 and served one term.

Seljevold says during this term, he wants to focus on the things the city already has and make them better instead of thinking about growth.

“Just because the city is growing, I don’t think that necessarily means improvement. The example that I got is a suburb of Minneapolis that cannot grow all they can do is make the city better. And that’s what I want Moorhead to look at. What can we do to make it better within our current boundaries? Expansion is going to happen, but we also need to look at what we have,” Says  Seljevold.

He used parks and adding more swimming pools to make recreational areas more entertaining for kids and families as an example of how Moorhead can become a better city.

Seljevold adds creating those innovative areas will also improve the property values of the communities nearby.

“If you take a look at our parks, and let’s say our swimming pools. Swimming pool has been the same swimming pool for 50 years. The wading pools have been the same wading pools for 50 years. But you can add more structure to those things and make it more entertaining and get more kids out and that would make our parks better, improve the property value of homes around that park,” he says.

Seljevold says much of the growth in the communities has been around the schools and having the approval of the school bond is very important for Moorhead.

He hopes future projects go towards making what they already have better.