Houghton County’s commission leadership will remain unchanged for the next year.
The current chair of the board Tom Tikkanen will retain his role for the next two years, and the vice chair Roy Britz will hold the title for another year.
Commissioners additionally kept county representatives for Upper Peninsula – Michigan Works!, the Copper Country Mental Health Board, and the Western Upper Peninsula Health Department. There were no changes to the commission’s rules of order for the coming year.
Building department director Todd LaRoux shared with the commission an outlook of approved permits in the past several years.
After 2020 the county approved twice as many permits for new residential homes than the previous four years. Since 2017 Houghton County has gradually approved more permits annually. In that same time, estimated construction costs for those permits have also increased. In 2017 the county approved 316 building permits, including 52 new homes, for an estimated construction cost of just below 29 million dollars.
In 2020, during the pandemic, 293 permits were approved for an estimated cost of 33 million dollars. In 2021 the estimated construction cost for 392 permits rose by 13 million dollars. Last year Houghton County approved 450 building permits, including 111 new homes, for an estimated construction cost of 75,343,269 dollars.
The cost per permit in 2017 was around 91,000 dollars, in 2020 the average construction cost per approved permit was 113,000. Last year the average building permit’s construction cost was estimated at 167,429.
