9/13/2006 by Richard Thomas

International Falls soon will see construction along a 3,300-foot stretch of the Rainy River. The 70-acre site east of downtown may include a homeland security center, vacation log homes, and a hotel and convention center.

In July, Boise Cascade, LLC sold the land — one of the last undeveloped waterfronts in the city — to Ultimate Development LLC for $1.4 million.

In turn, Ultimate Development sold 11 of the acres to the city for $300,000.

The site is one of three in International Falls under consideration by the Department of Homeland Security for a new U.S. Border Patrol facility.

Ultimate Development is co-owned by Kathryn Volin and Kristen Reiser, who operates a food manufacturing and baking company in Wisconsin. Her father-in-law is William Reiser, Ultimate Development’s chief executive. He partnered with Volin in previous real estate deals and brought to her attention land she bought and is developing in Horseshoe Bend, ID. That purchase set the stage for the July acquisition by Volin and Kristen Reiser in International Falls.

Volin also is president and sole owner of Ultimate Log & Custom Homes LCC. Her company has begun a $29 million waterfront development in Horseshoe Bend on a former Boise Cascade mill site.

She said Boise Cascade executives invited her to look at the Falls property after they closed the Horseshoe Bend deal in March 2005.

Volin has partial or full ownership in six companies. She is the founder and president of Communication Concepts International, Inc., a Minneapolis firm that trains businesspeople. She also has a small development of single-family homes in Woodbury, MN, a project she said “has been a very expensive experience. Minnesota’s market is nothing compared to Idaho.”

She views International Falls as “a terrific market for bringing in new jobs,” crediting Falls Mayor Shawn Mason for bringing the buyer and seller together. “She desperately wanted it to happen,” Volin said.

Mayor Mason explains it simply: “The property is key to the city’s future.”

She said the city plans to sell part of its 11 acres to another developer, noting tourism is International Falls’s No. 2 industry, behind the Boise Cascade paper mill. “(Tourism) could be even stronger,” she said.

Mason said she’s grateful to have a developer that solicits the city’s input. “I shudder to think if it were a developer that would sit on the land and wait for the value to go up, then sell it in 10 years,” she said.

Several companies have expressed interest to Volin in developing the property. She doesn’t have a timeline, noting it depends partly upon Homeland Security’s decision.

Planning groups in the Falls previously had approached Boise Cascade about the land, said Paul Nevanen, director of Koochiching Economic Development Authority.

He envisions mixed use development that would “mirror what’s across the river” in Fort Frances, Ontario, including public access for boat landing, docks, picnic area, and space for festivals and events.Bob Anderson, Boise Cascade’s public affairs manager, acknowledged the numerous city requests that the company sell land it no longer was using to store wood and bark, but was holding for a possible mill expansion.

When Madison Dearborn Partners bought Boise Cascade’s paper and wood products manufacturing businesses in 2004, the new owners decided to sell non-core business assets.The land went on the market in Spring 2005, Anderson said. “We had a lot of calls,” he said, though fewer than a half dozen generated serious offers.

Nevanen believes a casino would be ideal given U.S. traffic passing through the Falls into Canada. Both Nevanen and Mayor Mason doubt that’s realistic given that area tribes have pledged not to build casinos on non-Indian land.

Volin cited one possible “loophole:” A floating casino could be sited on international territory, though there currently are no offers.

The Government Services Administration will make the Homeland Security decision on a Falls site, said Assistant Chief Lonny Schweitzer of the U.S. Border Patrol. Homeland Security plans to upgrade Border Patrol operations in International Falls, Duluth, and Grand Marais, all built in the early 1960s, he said. Since Sept. 11, 2001 the number of Border Patrol agents in the area assigned to the Canadian border has tripled, he said.

U.S. Sen. Mark Dayton, D-MN, who favors increasing security in the area, has introduced a federal bill that would add 236 agents in 13 states along the northern border.

While Homeland Security is required to increase the number of agents along the northern border by 20 percent each year, Dayton said there are 44 fewer agents today than in 2004.

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