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July 27, 2010

Red Barn Retreats gets OK for overnight stays

Has been open for year but handicapped

By Robb Murray Free Press Staff Writer

GARDEN CITY — Two years after beginning the journey, Marty Leenhouts finally has the retreat center he’d planned for.

Red Barn Retreats received approval at Tuesday’s Blue Earth County Board meeting to let people not only come to the barn to quilt, scrapbook or learn woodcarving, but also spend the night on-site at the end of the day.

The retreat has operated for a year without the spend-the-night feature, and that has made it difficult to attract business.

“It hurt us big time this past year,” he said. “We lost an untold amount of business.”

But Leenhouts says now he expects business to improve.

A weekend at Red Barn Retreats would cost a group $640 for the entire weekend. Smaller groups can rent the facility at a rate of $75 per person.

The 4,000-square-foot facility features a 40-feet-by-40-feet meeting room, a large-screen projector, bathrooms, a full kitchen and a shop area where Leenhouts teaches woodcarving.

Last year, the county granted the retreat center permission to operate but not to have people spend the night. Since then, Leenhouts has worked with the county to figure out a way to get change-of-use permission of the Red Barn property.

He found it in something called “organized group camps.” The permit approved Tuesday is a first for the county.

“There is no definition of ‘organized group camp’ in the County Code of Ordinances,” government documents say.

Now he’s hoping any scout group, quilting circle or scrapbooking club that needs a weekend getaway will call.

Leenhouts said he plans to meet with county officials next month to discuss the delay in his conditional-use permit approval.

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