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Community Corner

Park Plaza Cooperative Celebrates with Open House Saturday

Members of Park Plaza Cooperative will hold their manufactured-home community's first annual meeting with a party and potluck.

Park Plaza Cooperative, Minnesota’s fifth cooperative manufactured-home park, will celebrate Saturday at an open house featuring a potluck-style lunch, a raffle, activities for children, and karaoke.

The party is set for noon on Saturday, April 2, at 1260 Onondaga St. NE, Fridley, in the garage on the Old Central Avenue NE side of Park Plaza Co-op.

Speakers at the event include Fridley Mayor Scott Lund, who said he is very supportive of the residents forming their own cooperative. Lund is in the manufactured home business himself: he owns Twin Cities Mobile and is financing one of the homes in Park Plaza.

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“Residents now have better control of their destiny because of the transfer of ownership," Lund said. With the addition of land ownership, the residents get a little bit larger piece of the rock in the pursuit of the American Dream, he added. 

Also set to speak at the event are Northcountry Cooperative Foundation (NCF) Executive Director Warren Kramer, Tony Geselle from Tree Top Kids (the organization supplying games and a big jumper house for the event), as well as other representatives from organizations that offer community programming and services. 

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Realizing the Dream
After over the past year, co-op board members  closed on the property last month, when they bought Park Plaza from the previous ownership group and its managing partner Phil Johnson, who was interested in selling the property as he nears retirement.

The property was Johnson’s second that he had sold to a cooperative, and he said he liked the idea of helping out a group of people realize the dream of owning their own community.  

With the help of Northcountry Cooperative Foundation (NCF), a non-profit organization that supports manufactured home cooperatives, Park Plaza Cooperative was able to secure loans from Resident Owned Communities (ROC) USA Capital*, which partnered with the Minnesota Housing Finance Agency (MHFA), who purchased a participation in the loan.  

Co-op's First Annual Meeting
The celebration on Saturday, in addition to being a party, will also be the cooperative’s first annual meeting. Toni Crocket, from New Concepts Management Company, will go over some logistical items, and all co-op members will register (and residents who want to join the Co-op may do so). The co-op members will also elect a permanent board of directors.  

Interim president of the board Natividad Seefeld said last week that surveys were sent out to all members asking those who were interested in running for the board to indicate they were doing so, and also whether they wanted to serve on a subcommittee such as a garden committee or a party planning committee.  

Meanwhile, the cooperative is pushing full steam ahead with establishing itself. “We have a lot of maintenance projects coming forward,” Seefeld said, such as lighting and water repair work. The park got two new homes placed a couple of weeks ago, which will provide more income for the park.  

More Co-ops Forming
Stephanie Karp of NCF said her organization was excited for the cooperative to purchase the property.

“The next step is improvements and building the community,” Karp said. “The main challenge is similar to challenges to any new business. That is, setting up sound policies, getting everyone on the same page, and figuring out how everyone can work together.”

Since there was such a push leading up to signing on the property, Karp said it’s important to maintain that momentum and keep the energy and spirits up as the co-op establishes itself in the first couple of years. 

NCF has signed up for helping the Park Plaza Cooperative for the next 30 years with technical assistance on how to manage and operate the cooperative. Meanwhile, NCF is working on another cooperative that is hoping to buy their manufactured home park in Brainerd, and is pursuing other prospects including one in the Twin Cities metro area and another in southern Minnesota. NCF is hoping to expand eventually into Iowa and Wisconsin as well, Karp said.

Party Preparations
Seefeld has been working for the past month to prepare for the party. She said she is taking Friday off to do a bunch of cooking. She plans to serve hot dogs, baked beans with hamburger, and cake, and will be giving away boxes of Cheerios that were donated by General Mills.  

“I’m hoping we have a good turnout,” Seefeld said.

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