Litchfield’s First District seeks $10 million grant for dairy wastewater pretreatment to meet MPCA compliance

Representative Scott Van Binsbergen and Bob Hoffman, CEO of First District Cooperative, explained a proposed grant of $10,000,000 to the Public Facilities Authority to build a pretreatment wastewater system adjacent to Litchfield’s public treatment plant.

Hoffman said the cooperative processes roughly 7.5–8.5 million pounds of milk a day and that the plant’s expansion (driven by product demand and regulatory compliance) created flows and effluent characteristics the city’s treatment plant cannot fully accept. He said the cooperative and farmers previously invested about $46 million in wastewater infrastructure. Under recent negotiations with the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency, First District agreed to construct a pretreatment facility to meet a compliance schedule; Hoffman said the cooperative lacks borrowing capacity and that general‑obligation bond financing is not viable because the pretreatment plant will be owned and operated by the cooperative on city land.

Hoffman said without the pretreatment project the plant could be forced to curtail production, which would affect farmers who supply milk to the facility and downstream product supply chains. Representative Van Binsbergen said the request follows prior efforts and that the cooperative supplies a significant share of Minnesota milk and employs hundreds in the region.

Committee members asked about precedent for state funding to support private companies or cooperatives. Former Representative Dean Erdahl and others noted prior instances where state capital funds have been provided to private or cooperative enterprises under specific structures. The committee asked for follow‑up information on financing structure and precedent.