This transcript appears to be from a **Faribault City Council** meeting. I have corrected the phonetic misspellings (e.g., "Farbull" to "Faribault," "Jimuya" to "Doumbouya") and assigned speaker names based on the city official list and the context of the proceedings. [0:10] **Unknown Speaker:** ...radio over there. [0:21] **Mayor Thomas J. Spooner:** 6:00. There we go. 6:00. Let's call the Tuesday, July 8th, 2025 Faribault City Council meeting to order. First item on the tonight is roll call. Council member Barnes? [0:32] **Council Member Mandy Barnes:** Here. [0:33] **Mayor Thomas J. Spooner:** Doumbouya? [0:34] **Council Member Adama Youhn Doumbouya:** Here. [0:34] **Mayor Thomas J. Spooner:** Ross? [0:35] **Council Member Royal Ross:** Here. [0:36] **Mayor Thomas J. Spooner:** Rowan? [0:37] **Council Member John Rowan:** Here. [0:38] **Mayor Thomas J. Spooner:** van Sluis? [0:39] **Council Member Peter van Sluis:** Here. [0:40] **Mayor Thomas J. Spooner:** Thiele? [0:41] **Council Member Chuck Thiele:** Here. [0:42] **Mayor Thomas J. Spooner:** Mayor Spooner, here. And pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. [1:03] **Mayor Thomas J. Spooner:** All right. Item number two, would entertain a motion to approve the agenda. [1:09] **Council Member Peter van Sluis:** So moved. [1:10] **Council Member Chuck Thiele:** Second. [1:11] **Mayor Thomas J. Spooner:** That's van Sluis and Thiele. All those in favor signify by saying Aye. [1:16] **Council Members:** Aye. [1:18] **Mayor Thomas J. Spooner:** Motion passes. Presentations and introductions—that’s at the end, right? Yeah. Um, we're going to move on to approval of the minutes: June 24th, 2025; July 1st special city council meeting; and July 1st, 2025 special city council meeting closed session. Approval of the minutes? [1:42] **Council Member Chuck Thiele:** So moved. [1:43] **Mayor Thomas J. Spooner:** Second by Doumbouya. All those in favor signify by saying Aye. [1:49] **Council Members:** Aye. [1:50] **Mayor Thomas J. Spooner:** Motion passes. Item number five, request to be heard. Martha Brown, would you like to speak? [2:01] **Dr. Martha Brown:** Thank you, Mr. Mayor and honorable council members and staff. My name is Dr. Martha Brown. And as you know from your recent work session with Chief Sherwin, cleaning up or banning encampments for unhoused people does not work because it does not solve the problem of homelessness. People can lose their housing for a variety of reasons including job loss, evictions, substance abuse, and mental health. And entire families can be living in their cars. Unhoused people are people and they're human beings worthy of dignity and respect. [2:37] Many people in this community are just one accident or one paycheck away from disaster. So, we should have empathy for unhoused people and not treat them as garbage that needs to be cleaned up. I applaud and really appreciate the efforts of the Faribault Police to connect unhoused people in the encampments to resources, but there's more that we can do. [2:59] I'd like to propose the formation of a regional task force comprised of several former or current unhoused people, local service organizations, governmental agencies, and interested citizens who would be willing to explore and present alternatives to encampment cleanups. [3:19] If we all do our homework and approach homelessness with an open-minded heart, I'm confident we can find a more humane solution and one that is respectful and based on the unhoused community's needs. Heather will email you all some, if she hasn't already, some information that I gathered for resources. Um, and I do want to note that the National Alliance to End Homelessness says that government should not criminalize people for just being homeless. Um, and there are other principles that you can look at, but I'd like to just close with a personal story. The church I attended in Delray Beach, Florida, was run by Pastor Alexis, who was amazing. [4:05] And one day a week, same day every week, she went to the local park where a lot of Delray's homeless people were there showering and just hung out and just talked and ministered to that community. And as a result, we had a lot of homeless folks attend our church and we got to know them as people. We got to know them by names. We missed them and worried about them when they weren't there. And one such couple was Rodie and Lynn. They'd been together forever. [4:33] Rodie worked the boat ramp, helped people load and unload their boats onto their trailers all day long. Um, and we were devastated to hear that one night he was killed when he was hit by a train. But because of that community and connection we had established, we were able to grieve Rod's loss. He was really a great guy—and to provide support for his partner Lynn. So, I encourage the council to really consider what I have to say, do a little homework, and see if we can't do a better job at helping these folks. [5:11] **Mayor Thomas J. Spooner:** Thank you. Uh, we're going to take the information um that Heather's going to send out. We'll talk with staff and everything, and I'm sure at the next uh work session here shortly, we will take it under... you will hear from us. So, thank you for showing up tonight. [5:28] All right, on to item number six, consent agenda items 6A through 6I. Does anybody want anything? [5:36] **Council Member Royal Ross:** Mayor Spooner, I will make a motion to approve consent agenda items 6A through 6I. [5:44] **Council Member Peter van Sluis:** Second. [5:45] **Mayor Thomas J. Spooner:** Motion by Ross, second by van Sluis to approve consent agenda item 6A. All those in favor signify by saying Aye. [5:54] **Council Members:** Aye. [5:56] **Mayor Thomas J. Spooner:** All opposed? Motion passes. Public hearings, we have none tonight. [6:03] Items for discussion. Ordinance 2025-8, vacate a portion of the drainage and utility easement at 190 20th Street Northwest. Director David Wanberg will give us the report. [6:17] **David Wanberg (Director of Community & Economic Development):** Thank you, Mr. Mayor and Council. Earlier this year, you took action on several applications related to Malica Auto Body. Uh, one of those was actually a vacation of an existing drainage and utility easement. Unfortunately, the application missed one of the um drainage utility easements that needed to be vacated, um and that was caught before we went ahead and filed the paperwork and the plat for this. So, we do need to vacate that. Just as a reminder where this is located, it's really at the intersection of 20th Street and Second Avenue or Highway Three. Um, and the property that we're talking about and why this happened is, uh, Malica Auto Body purchased the property to the north—the house to the north—and there was a belief at the time that there weren't easements around that existing house. It turns out there actually was and the surveyor had missed that. So, um we're going back now and looking at vacating the easements on that former house lot. Um and with the plat that you've already approved, it has the necessary easements on it. We just need to vacate these easements because this is where the new building is going to sit. With that, the planning commission went ahead and recommended approval. So did the DRC and that was unanimous. So we are recommending approval of the vacation with the ordinance that you have before you tonight, 2025-8, um based on the criteria and findings in that ordinance. Happy to answer any questions you might have. [7:53] **Mayor Thomas J. Spooner:** Any questions for staff? [8:06] **Mayor Thomas J. Spooner:** I just have one oddball question. The address 190 20th Street? [8:13] **David Wanberg:** 20th Street. Correct. [8:14] **Mayor Thomas J. Spooner:** If this is on the second piece of property should not it...? [8:17] **David Wanberg:** You approved a plat that combined the two lots. So it's one lot. There's one lot. So it's no access off of Second. It's only off of 20th. [8:32] **Mayor Thomas J. Spooner:** Got it. Okay. [8:33] **Council Member Royal Ross:** Mayor Spooner. Yes. I'll make a motion to approve ordinance 2025-8. [8:41] **Council Member Mandy Barnes:** Second. [8:43] **Mayor Thomas J. Spooner:** Motion by Ross, second by Barnes. This is an ordinance, therefore, it is a roll call. Council member Barnes? [8:48] **Council Member Mandy Barnes:** Yes. [8:49] **Mayor Thomas J. Spooner:** Doumbouya? [8:50] **Council Member Adama Youhn Doumbouya:** Yeah. [8:51] **Mayor Thomas J. Spooner:** Ross? [8:52] **Council Member Royal Ross:** Aye. [8:53] **Mayor Thomas J. Spooner:** Rowan? [8:54] **Council Member John Rowan:** Aye. [8:55] **Mayor Thomas J. Spooner:** van Sluis? [8:56] **Council Member Peter van Sluis:** Aye. [8:57] **Mayor Thomas J. Spooner:** Thiele? [8:58] **Council Member Chuck Thiele:** Aye. [8:59] **Mayor Thomas J. Spooner:** Mayor Spooner, Aye. Back in two weeks for the second reading. [9:06] **Jessica Kinser (City Administrator):** Actually, Mr. Mayor, we will have a special meeting before the work session and we'll take care of the second reading at that meeting. [9:11] **Mayor Thomas J. Spooner:** Yep. All right, perfect. That'll be easy. Uh bids? We have none. Boards, commission reports and announcements. [9:23] **Jessica Kinser (City Administrator):** Yeah. Um I will ask uh Rochelle Anderholm-Parsch, who is our new Parks and Rec Director on her second day of the job, to come up and introduce herself. And as she's walking up here, I'll let you know that um we are having a public open house for her at Buckham West from 3:30 to 5:30 on the 22nd. So, we'll have a regular council meeting at 6 p.m. um but hopefully you'll be able to stop by and meet Rochelle and talk a little bit more. Um there's been a lot of uh questions and curiosity from community members about her. [10:07] **Rochelle Anderholm-Parsch (Parks and Recreation Director):** So, well, welcome Mayor, Council. Um, thank you um for this opportunity and um Jessica for the introduction. I appreciate it and just wanted to take an opportunity to say hi and I'm hoping to speak with you all as I get used to things. It's officially my second day and um I was pretty thrilled that my computer started to work, so small steps at this point. Um but yeah, just a little bit about me and maybe you guys know a little bit about this, but um I grew up in Alexandria, Minnesota. Lived there um all the way through, went to Fargo, North Dakota, got a degree in parks, moved out to the West Coast and lived on the West Coast for 20 years. We just moved back about two years ago to be closer to family here. So, we wanted to get back home and really, really looking forward to this opportunity. I know I have big shoes to fill, so I'm hoping I can build on what Paul did, which is a lot of really great things. Starting to set up meetings. I'm hoping to meet with the parks board and, you know, figure that out. [10:55] **Mayor Thomas J. Spooner:** Welcome, welcome aboard. You have some other announcements? [10:59] **Jessica Kinser (City Administrator):** Um just as a reminder, tomorrow night is our monthly Council Chat at 6 pm and it's going to be at the airport. So we're going to have some information for people coming out about what happens at the airport because it's often a place that people don't visit. And then just a few more things to talk about related to um our our taxi lane project that uh you all had approved here recently. Um so please please join us for that. Um it will not be sit-down presentation style; it'll kind of be more up and mingle, come and go like we did for the the dam discussion. Um and then the other reminder—Dave mentioned the special meeting on the 15th. The other reminder: uh, we'll have an agenda coming out next week for a joint work session with the Housing and Redevelopment Authority here in this room, um July 21st at 5:00 p.m. And so, uh, we'll we'll have a lot of information in that packet, which will help direct kind of the the scope of that meeting. So, that's all I have. [12:01] **Mayor Thomas J. Spooner:** Tomorrow night, 6 pm, correct? [12:02] **Jessica Kinser (City Administrator):** Tomorrow night, 6 pm. [12:04] **Council Member Royal Ross:** Administrator, I'm sorry, I missed the time for Rochelle's welcome. [12:15] **Jessica Kinser (City Administrator):** 3:30 to 5:30. [12:17] **Council Member Mandy Barnes:** I'm going to promote Paradise Theater. Um, the play *Assassins* is starting July 11th and also Concert in the Park is Thursday, July 10th at 7 p.m. [12:35] **Mayor Thomas J. Spooner:** Anybody else? [12:42] **Council Member Adama Youhn Doumbouya:** Make a motion to adjourn. [12:44] **Council Member Peter van Sluis:** Second. [12:46] **Mayor Thomas J. Spooner:** Motion by Doumbouya, second by van Sluis to adjourn. All those in favor say Aye. [12:51] **Council Members:** Aye. [12:52] **Mayor Thomas J. Spooner:** All opposed? Motion passes. We are adjourned. [12:59] **Unknown Speaker:** Something about the Rice County Fair. That's what I was hoping. What did he say? Using our TV sometimes, which is to...