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Luverne’s utility questionLuverne, Minnesota · City Question No. 1, November 3, 2026

Result, rejected

Voters rejected the charter amendment. This proposal does not create a utility commission. 673 yes (31.40%), 1,470 no (68.60%), all four precincts reporting, in unofficial results reported through November 6, 2026 at 9:58 a.m. Central. Minnesota Secretary of State

This guide was written before the vote and is kept as written. City and school district boards canvass local results November 6 to 13. The State Canvassing Board meets November 19.

Luverne, Minnesota · November 3, 2026

What Luverne voters decided about the city utilities

A short guide to City Question No. 1, with a source on every fact. Updated November 5, 2026.

Luverne's city council runs the electric utility, and the water and wastewater systems too. On November 3, voters decided against handing that job to a new five-member commission.

Key facts

What are residents deciding?

Whether to amend the city charter so a new Municipal Services Commission, not the city council, manages the city’s electric, water, and wastewater utilities and sets their rates.

The city keeps owning the utilities either way. The question is who runs them.

The charter is the city's constitution, so this is a bigger change than an ordinance.Amendment text

What do yes and no mean?

A yes vote

Creates the commission. It would take over rate-setting and day-to-day management from the council, and provide a general manager, either by contract or direct employment, to run the utilities.

A no vote

Keeps the current system. The city council keeps setting rates and supervising the utilities, and the city administrator keeps managing them.

The amendment passes if at least 51% of the votes cast on the question are yes.MN Revisor of Statutes

Read the full ballot question

City Question No. 1. Charter Amendment: Create New Independent Commission to Govern City Utilities

Shall the Luverne City Charter be amended to establish a new governing structure with a new layer of city government for the City's electric, water, and wastewater utilities by (1) creating a new five-member independent policymaking body to be called the Municipal Services Commission to consist of three elected members who must be City residents, one appointed representative of a large utility customer who need not be a City resident, and either a sitting Council Member or the City Administrator; (2) creating a new employment structure under which the Commission would employ a General Manager to supervise and manage the Commission's operations and employees and existing City staff with responsibilities for the City's utilities would be transferred to the authority of the Commission; and (3) transferring most of the City Council's existing responsibilities for the management, operation, and supervision of the City's utilities, including the authority to set utility rates, to the new Commission?

This is the wording the council adopted on August 10, 2026 (Resolution 24-26, Exhibit B). The petition committee disputes the phrase “a new layer of city government.”City of Luverne LegistarCharter Amendment Committee

What does the charter amendment change, and what stays the same?

Rates, management, and utility staff would move to the commission. Ownership and existing obligations stay with the city.

  • Would change: the commission sets rates, provides a general manager, and becomes the employer of utility staff.Amendment § 3
  • Would stay: the city owns the utilities, and existing bonds and contracts remain the city's obligations. The commission would handle utility operations and contracts within the authority the amendment grants. The council keeps approval over specified matters, including new bonds, real-estate deals, and contracts longer than ten years. A second clause also keeps some contract and franchise authority with the council, and the two overlap.§ 4(b)§ 3(b)§ 3(f)
  • Not right away: the elected seats are filled at the next general election after adoption, which would be November 2028. Until then, the council keeps running the utilities.§ 4(a)

Who would make the decisions?

Five commissioners. Three are elected residents, one represents the city, and one is a council-appointed representative of a large utility customer.

Who runs the electric, water, and wastewater utilities today, and who would if the amendment passes. The city owns the utilities in both cases.

Today

  1. Luverne voters
    elect
  2. City council
    Sets utility rates and supervises the utilities
    directs
  3. City administrator
    Also serves as general manager of Luverne Municipal Utilities
    runs
  4. The utilities

City administration page

If the amendment passes

  1. Municipal Services Commission, 5 members
    Sets utility rates and oversees operations
    oversees
  2. General manager
    Hired or contracted by the commission
    runs
  3. The utilities

Who chooses each commission seat

  • 3 seats, elected residents
    Selected by
    Luverne voters
    Term
    Four years, staggered
  • 1 seat, city representative
    Selected by
    The city administrator, unless the council appoints one of its own members instead
    Term
    One year if a council member holds it. The charter text sets no term for the administrator
  • 1 seat, large-customer representative
    Selected by
    Appointed by the council
    Term
    Three years

Amendment § 2(a)–(d)§ 2(c)–(d)§ 3(a)

Any commission action takes three votes, so each member, including the large-customer representative, has one vote and no veto.§ 2(i) The commission sets rates, but the formula for payments from the utilities to other city funds must be approved by both the commission and the council. Neither can set it alone.§ 3(i)

Once created, the commission could be abolished only by another charter amendment.§ 1(c)Minn. Stat. § 410.12

What changes covers the seats, terms, and the payment rule in detail.

What would it mean for my bills and taxes?

The amendment itself sets no dollar amount. The effect depends on choices the commission and council would make later.

The main argument is about money the electric utility sends to other city funds. Those transfers were $624,330 in 2024 and $261,675 in 2025.2024 audit, p. 512025 audit, p. 49 If they shrank, the city would choose between raising property taxes, cutting spending, or using reserves. If the savings reached customers, electric bills would fall.

The amendment covers electric, water, and wastewater. The dollar figures and the household scenario in this guide cover the electric utility only. Water and wastewater transfers are not modeled.

Bills and city money has a household scenario. Enter your home value and electricity use to see both sides.

Why I put this together

My name is Dan Swenson. I'm an attorney and serve on the City Council of Nowthen, a small city in Anoka County. This website is my own project, not a city publication.

I originally built it for residents of my own city. Our budgets, tax levies, and road spending are public records, but the information is scattered across PDFs and meeting packets. I wanted people to be able to look up where the money comes from and where it goes without spending their evenings digging through all of that. That is still most of what this site is about.

Read the rest of the note

When I heard about Luverne's charter amendment this summer, I got interested. I wanted to understand how much money the electric utility sends to the city, who decides those amounts, and what changing that arrangement could mean for electric bills and property taxes. So I pulled the audits, amendment text, council resolutions, and utility reports and started working through the numbers. Those records are collected here so you can read them too.

Once I had done the work, I figured Luverne residents might find it useful. Rather than leave it sitting on my computer, I added it here.

Nobody asked me to do this, and nobody is paying me for it. I enjoy digging through public records, figuring out how things work, and organizing what I find into something other people can use. This is a hobby, and this particular issue caught my attention.

I have also included a separate article with my own analysis and opinion, labeled “Dan's analysis.” The other pages are there to explain the proposal, lay out the financial information, and show how the calculations work. You do not have to agree with my conclusions to make use of the research.

I've included links to the underlying records and explanations of the assumptions behind the calculations. The sources page also lists questions I have not been able to resolve. Public records do not answer everything, and I want readers to be able to distinguish what is documented from what is calculated, assumed, or still unknown.

If you find a mistake, let me know. Verified corrections are posted on the sources page. The point is to make the information easier to check, not to ask you to take my word for it.