Yeah. Who went? I think they had a tailgating deal cuz I saw pictures of Zack Cartek and Oh, did they? Oh, they were there. I wasn't going to fight that there anyway. 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. All right. First thing on the agenda is to approve the uh regular agenda as presented. Does anyone have any questions? Any changes or anything that you need pulled out of the agenda? I'll make a motion to approve the regular agenda. Okay, I will second that. I got a motion by Maggie Bass, seconded by Chuck Nikolai. If [snorts] there's no other comments, questions, all in favor say I. I. I. Any opposition? Okay. Passes. 5-0. Next on the agenda is the consent agenda. Is there any questions or any thoughts on uh any items in the consent agenda that you would like to address? No, I'll move it. Okay. Second. Okay. I got a motion by Rick Ser, second by Bruce Wolf. There's no other questions or comments. All in favor say I. I. Any opposition? Okay. Passes 5-0. Next on the agenda, we have the opportunity for the public to be heard on items not on the agenda. [snorts] And the only person on the list is the honorable uh Dennis Tits. Good evening, council. Mr. Mayor Dennis Tits, Lee Sour County Commissioner, Lee Seer, District 1. Just to give you a couple updates, we have our true taxation tomorrow as well. We had a preliminary uh levy of 5.4 after last Tuesday's meeting. We came up with some of our departments having extra money in our budget. So we agreed tenatively right now that we can get that down to 45 with uh using no reserves. We might be uh we might even be less than the four five depending on tomorrow but uh for sure I think we can say we're going to be at the highest would be four or five. Uh once again, we have an extra pay period this year, which is 3% of that. Uh every 11 years, our county ends up uh having an extra pay period. Um deer hunting again, uh going from right now, the way the legislature has it, it's uh going to be rifled statewide unless we have a public hearing on that and create an ordinance. Um, we are looking at uh doing a public hearing possibly in February. Getting a lot of lot of phone calls regarding this and I think you guys are if you're not aware of it is if we don't do anything we don't need a preliminary hearing and it's it goes to rifles in Lee Sewer County. If we want to create an [clears throat] excuse me if we want to create an ordinance um we have to have this public hearing and then hear from the public. But uh just because of deer hunting the way it was in November, I received a lot of phone calls and I encourage people one way or the other get a hold of your commissioner whether it's our county or Scott County or where you own land and uh voice your opinion because I I am listening to my constituents on that. And right now I would say it's more in favor of keeping it the same uh slugs around here in my on my behalf with my constituents. But then again, you know, my my area is more the metro where you know, you get over by Elleion and Jefferson, those people have a different take, I think. Um, just to keep you up to date, last Tuesday we supported a resolution for the city of New Prague for road improvement 10th Avenue. That's from uh Highway 19 to Casaw 29. So that stretch I'm sure you're familiar with. So hopefully we can get some money to make improvements to that road. Um I serve on the public safety committee for the county. Um, just one thing that's starting to we're seeing a concern is these motorized bikes in our uh our towns. I don't know if Chief Applin if you guys have an ordinance created. If you don't, I would highly encourage you guys to look at uh getting some type of ordinance. These these we we're getting a lot of people, even adults, getting hurt on these bikes. these bikes can go 20 25 miles an hour and it's uh it's a real concern and a lot of these kids are are not wearing a helmet either while doing that. So other than that, I think I'm good. Anyone have any questions for Commissioner Tits? No, thank you. It's nice to have you come in like that. Yeah. All right. Thanks. Thank you. [clears throat] Okay. Uh I did not have anyone else sign up for that segment. Uh, but I'll give anyone an offer if they would like to speak at this time for something not on the agenda. If not, we'll move on to the next item, public hearing. Uh, our truth and taxation hearing. Um, Josh, I should I make a motion to open the public hearing to get going? Uh, yes, you can. And then if you don't mind, I will have myself and staff do a presentation and then take comments from the public. Okay. I guess I'll take the motion. Okay, I'll second that. I have a motion by Rick Ser, second by Chuck Nikolai to open the public hearing. We will start the public hearing with uh presentation from the city and then we'll open the floor for comments. We have a vote. All in favor? Oh, all in favor? I thank you. All right. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Um, as you noted, this is our uh truth and taxation public hearing for uh 2025. Uh, first off, just to kind of go through our process of where we're at. Um, as you may remember, back on September 2nd, we approved a preliminary levy of 5,685,800. Um, which was about a 7% levy increase over uh the 2024 levy and would have had an average impact of we estimated 5.75% on the average residential uh homeowner here in New Craig. So, since that time, we have reduced uh the levy down a little over $82,000. Um, and the current levy tonight, as discussed at our last budget meeting, is $5,63. There's 5,63,735. Um, which is about a 5.46% increase over last year. Um, with uh an average impact of 3.88%. Of note for the council, since we had our last meeting, if you remember right, that average impact was about 4.12%. Um, Scott County uh did release updated uh net tax capacity numbers since that meeting, which is why um our net [clears throat] tax capacity actually has increased um in their uh in their numbers, which is why the average tax impact for residential properties has decreased um in our estimates here. So, just as a general breakout of um the various funds that are affected by the tax levy, the general fund, we are proposing a $4,428,735 levy. The EDA fund is proposing a $75,000 levy. Debt service is proposing an $831,865 levy. And our equipment fund is proposing a uh 268,130135. So that gets us to our total of uh 5,63,735. Generally across the G generally across the general fund, the general fund is looking at a uh expense increase of a little over $190,000. As you go through the various breakdowns of departments within the general fund, the administration is looking at a just under $30,000 increase which can mostly be explained by the addition of uh long-term financial planning for uh the coming year. The aquatic center is looking at a little over $33,000 and this is the estimate that we have from the school district. Um ambulance is up. Um but that is mostly due that is completely due to a change in accounting. The ambulance uh expenses used to be in their own fund and now they're under the general fund. So that's why that one's increased. Um building inspection we're seeing go down. Uh city attorney up slightly. Elections is up. Elections is up mostly because in 2025 we did not have any elections the city covered and we will have two of them in 2026. the state primary in August and then uh the general election in November. Um it is down about $25,000. Uh planning is down a little over $83,000 and police is up which mostly coming from uh labor increases as well as utility expenses being in a new facility. Um and uh streets is down a little over $90,000. Across the other funds, debt service, as we noted, is down almost $130,000. EDA is remaining the same for expenses. Uh equipment facility fund is up $268,000. And the total levy then, as I noted, is up a little over $290,000. Of note, the average household taxable value across New Prague is two $323,737. And at our current standing, the average increase in the city portion of property taxes for residents will be about 3.88%. So, I will pass it off to Ken now to kind of talk about what's happened in the community development department uh this past year as well as a look briefly at uh his budget. All right. Thank you. Um as Josh noted, I'll give an overview of the community development department. So, we'll start with kind of our building permit activity. We'll do a full overview in February as we normally do with our permit data uh once you have the full year in. But, uh notable things, we've only got four new single family home permits for the year, but uh combined with the Bohemia Flats multif family, uh apartment building, we obviously have 58 for the year. So, pretty good year for units that are just not in the single family category. A lot of it had to do with the fact that we just don't have a lot of um single family residential lots available. Uh we're right around 10 lots that are available for uh building on that are on the market. So that is kind of the primary reason for that. And we're obviously uh prepared and ready for more lots to be platted, but we just need a developer that can come in and uh make a proposal and get one in front of the council for approval. Um other buildings that were um new construction in town included a new building by Bevcom in the industrial park. Um and then um obviously under construction right now is Heartland Credit Union and then the POPS uh ultra performance stage over at city center. Uh other than that we had a lot of renovation of uh some commercial and industrial properties. Nisens Cornerbar 2 in the former Corner Bar location. and Wells Fargo did a remodel both interior and exterior uh Kubush Furniture and Flooring. Uh the Bros Hotel uh reopened with a new operator and uh Brickside 19 was kind of a big one uh taking over for the uh vacant uh prior um Smoke and Fire restaurant. So pretty busy with uh those type of uh activities um over the past year here. Um Josh, if you going to go to the next slide there. Uh for the uh remainder of our work uh as far as land use requests, we've been working on the unified development code uh for a little over a year. We will be back in early January uh for the council to look at the final final draft of that. We did have a public hearing with the planning commission um at their meeting in November. We just have a couple of things we'll be following up on with the planning commission here in December. Uh also began work on a park plan with the park board and then u just a smattering of different land use requests from eight variances, three condition use permits, three interim use permits, and then a couple of other code amendments uh to kind of round out the year. Uh in 2026, we're going to be moving forward uh with completion of that park plan. We did do a survey um that we uh had uh kind of wrapped up near uh the check out new Prague event being completed and then um annexation agreements are probably our biggest uh thing to tackle in 2020 with both uh Lansburg Township and Helena Township on our north side. And then we have some other minor projects from JSU upgrades, continue to do grant writing for a number of projects including one that we'll go over later in the agenda for that 10th Avenue project and then resonings to match the comp plan uh throughout town to make sure that we're in compliance uh with that. So, uh Josh did note the uh decrease in our departmental budgets for building and planning is largely due to um staff retirement and um uh uh we'll say experienced staff person of three years leaving. Um so bringing in people kind of on the uh lower end of our pay scale was what brought our uh expenses down for the community development department. So other than that, um that kind of rounds out why we're down uh for our expenses in community development. Okay. Thank you. Uh next I will have uh Chief Appan talk about the police department. [clears throat] Yeah. Thank you. for 2025. Um, our agency remained fully staffed, which is kind of a a pat on the back to our city for for what we've done here and the the environment and culture that we've created within the police department. I think it's a good place to work and people enjoy enjoy working here and certainly appreciate the support from the council. So, thank you for that. Um we're always continually looking at staffing and where um resources and assets can be better better utilized. So we'll continue to do that over over the next year or two years or moving into the future. Um one thing that we've we've been working on is securing some grant funding this year. Um as you can see we we secured a couple of grants. One was for the the city park or the cameras in the parks and then the the other flat cameras and then for the uh mainly the national police accreditation which will um it's standards that kind of measure our policies, our procedures, our forms, our documentations and and those things to bring us up to pace with the national standard. So, uh, we're excited to work on that and that that could be up to a a two to three year process as we work through those things. So, that'll be an ongoing ongoing process for us. Uh, we did assign one officer to the uh Tri County SWAT team. We would look to add another officer to that moving forward. Uh peer support is something that we're working on countywide and we have um assigned two officers to that team right now um which is different from a inter agency peer support team. This is a countywide team that can support other agencies in the event of a major incident because all of your resources then are allocated towards that incident where other agencies then can come in and support your officers. So, it's a really great program that we are we're working on countywide. Um, we have been integrated into the community. We are big into public public interaction, public service, public um we do volunteering. Um, our police association does an adopt a highway uh out uh west of town out by Union Hill where we go and clean up the ditches for a two-mile stretch. We do that in the spring and the fall. Um the association also provides uh donations to the after prom postgraduation things of that nature. So um being integrated into the community is really great to see our officers out there doing things that aren't necessarily crime related but they're building those relationships within our community. So we're excited to do that. And then obviously very excited about the new facility and the planning of that and working through that whole process. So that's been been a good process and we are looking forward to that. So I will uh I am working on a end of the year report for the council which I'll get hopefully after the first year when numbers come in for calls and things that um we can kind of give a final a year-end report so you can see where things fall. But as of this morning we were about a thousand calls ahead of where we were at this time last year. So, thank you, Tim. Yep. Um, next I will have Chief Rinda discuss the fire department. All right. So, our department is on pace to do about 275 calls this year, which is down slightly from last year. Um, this year we had two members retire. We hired two. Um they're about 75% to the finish line with their classes. Excited about both of them. Both of them are very energetic people that are uh been a great addition to the department. Um we don't see any retirements in 2026 that I know of. Um so I don't believe we'll be hiring anybody new in 2026. Um we had two houses to train in this last year, which was great because it's been probably about 5 years since we've had any houses that we could train in and burn. Um, so that was a nice addition to our training this year. Um, we did receive that new Chief's vehicle that we talked about. Uh, we purchased that with our fundraising money and then it got outfitted with uh money from the public safety funds and also the rural um, we put that into service here shortly. Uh, 2028 is preliminary when the department was slated to replace engine two. If you'll remember, we slated that for 2025. We pushed it to 2028. We've been having some conversations internally now at the uh department. Um we're doing yearly testing on all of our trucks, but um the truck continues to pass. It has low mileage and so we're looking at possibly pushing that out even a little bit farther. Um just taking it year by year as as we do maintenance on it to make sure that, you know, right now it's not rusting. Um it passes the pump test every year and it's in good working condition. So looking at possibly pushing that out even a little bit further, maybe 2030 somewhere in that that area. Um when we do decide to build one, it is an 18month lead time currently. Um 2026, Scott County is getting a new CAD system, which is like their new 911 system essentially. Um it was supposed to be the end of 2025. That's a joint project they're doing with Henipin County. So looks like it's going to be the middle of 2026. So there'll be a lot of work with us around that and I'm sure with PD around that as well. Um all new software and everything else in our squads but pushing through that. [clears throat] Uh in 2025 the department had ISO inspection. Um what is that ISO inspection is uh it's a something that the insurance companies use to rate your department which is what they base your fire insurance on on your home. Um, that was a big deal for us, uh, because it's a lot of work to get to do that inspection. They basically, it's basically like a three-year audit. They take all your reporting data, training records, um, everything for the last three years and then you get a score. Um, so, and it doesn't just stop at the fire department. It uh, the water department, they look at the water department and they give the water department a score. They'd look at the um building inspections, fire inspections, and they give them a score. They look at the 911 center and they give them a score. And then in the end, the fire department gets a score. Um why do I bring this up? Because number one, we went from a four to a three, which is really good. There is no number ones in the state. So the top department in the state is a two and we're a three, which I think is exceptional for a volunteer department. Um and it also the scores we got from the other departments were huge. Um and the big thing for us what what they rate us on is our training. Um how many people we get on calls. So if we get a structure fire, do you get five people? Do you get 10 people? Do you get 14 people? Um, and New Prague is very fortunate because we have people that are showing up from work during the day and we're getting a lot of bodies compared to other towns around us and that is helping our score. Um, our equipment, um, they they strip down your truck. They basically open every door in your truck to see what you're carrying for equipment. We scored well on that as well. And then, you know, we strived from our last inspection to this inspection on things that we could train better on. And I think we did a good job of doing that. We were doing a good job then, but we're doing even a better job now. Um, so we were really thrilled with being able to rate go up a class and uh especially being a volunteer department, paid on call department. I thought that was really a a nice deal and hats off to the other departments and half hats off to the rest of the department for getting that done. So I you know they say you're going to save a little money in your homeowners insurance. I don't know if you are or not, but you told I would guess if it went the other way, you'd probably pay be' be paying more, right? [clears throat] Um, we also added an inflatable boat. Um, with our our search situation we had this summer, we we we found that we were we were missing an inflatable boat to be able to search ponds, creeks, go into these areas, ice rescues, things like that. U, we used we called Shockby down. brought theirs down and uh so we bought one with some of our fundraising money that we have on hand so that we have the boat now. It basically will encompass it'll be be able to cover every piece of water that we have in our area except for probably Cedar Lake. It'll be a little too small for Cedar Lake. It's a twoerson inflatable that you got to paddle, but it'll be good for ice rescues, water rescues, ponds, things like that. So, we're we're excited about that. Um and then we're continuing with the replacement of our old radios. If you remember, we've been doing it for a couple years now. Um, slated to do a few more this year. Currently working on some used radios that came up on an auction site. Um, hoping that we can get those for 20 to 40 cents on the dollar. That would save some more money. So, working on that right now. No more in the next couple days. Um, couple notables. Uh we still are seeing the state reimburse us for our training. If we bring in instructors and we pay the instructors, then the state reimbures the city for that payment. And also all of our new member training is reimbursed through the state as long as they get certified, which our members do get certified. So all the money that we pay for the new members to take the classes, we're getting the money back from the state. So that's that's nice. Uh looking into 2026, we did apply for uh DNR grant again. Um it's for gear. We'll see if we get it. We got it last year. Usually it's every other year, but we're hoping we can get some money from that. Um and then we're just a couple small changes on how we operate inside the department with uh uh with the new chief's vehicle. We have the old one that we're going to kind of use as a rescue truck. So for medicals and lift assist, we'll be running that first out of our station, which leads to less big trucks going down the road and maybe more more small trucks for some of those calls that we don't need the big trucks. So some just some small things like that. Other than that, that's pretty much what I got for 2025 and going into 2026. Thank you, Chief. Thank you. I will now pass it off to Matt Renda, uh, director of public works. Thanks, [clears throat] Josh. um some of the notables for the public works street department in 2025. Uh we continued our tree removal um throughout town for ash trees, but this year more included the 2025 CIP project, we had quite a few trees that went down in that uh area for um sidewalks and also just in placement right behind curbs that uh when we were doing the street project um they just uh were too large, overgrown into curb lines that they needed to be removed. uh for safety. Um also wanted to point out we do all tree removal from the beginning to the end. Um small trees, large trees, public works staff takes care of it. Um from the removal of the tree to as you can see in the top left picture, the stump grinding um all the way to dirt and seed. Um over five years ago, we were doing hiring out all the stump removal and then even some of the tall trees we weren't able to do and we were hiring that out. So um we've been able to do a lot of that all in all in hand now. Um we've been uh this year we assisted the golf course uh with pouring a concrete bunker. Um this will help the golf course uh store their sand material. Uh I think it is for their bunkers and then they also have some other sand that they use for top dressing. Uh I know the future plan at the golf course is to try to add more bunkers um as needed. Um we also, you know, when I took this position, I wanted to get out in the public more often. So I try to if [clears throat] I can make it work in our schedule uh any opportunity I get to talk to the public I do. So this year our main uh um interaction with the public was the new Prague High School put on a career day. This would be the second year we did it. I know a lot of staffs I think uh fire department, police department, um public works and the utility staff uh participated in that. So it was nice. I think we had roughly 400 kids go through uh 10th and 11th graders. Uh we were able to talk to them on my end uh about public works and uh after high school, what they could look uh to improve their application, what we do, um what they could look at in the future if that's the route they wanted to go. Um so it was very nice uh meeting with them. Um we also uh [clears throat] uh met with the daycare center which you can see on the bottom left picture uh daycare center uh located in town. Um there was roughly I mean we had anywhere from two-year-olds all the way up to I would say 10 year olds. Um we had some of the craziest questions you could ever uh I mean I got asked what my favorite food was. So I wasn't expecting that but um it was a great question I told the 2-year-old. So what was your answer? I I don't I don't want to comment. I mean I might ruin my grandma be upset with me and I'm not it might not be a check food or something. So we're gonna move on. Chuck. [laughter] Um, [clears throat] so that was really nice to meet with those kids. Uh, as you can see, like I said in the bottom left picture, we kind of talked to them about what we do in the public works and then also showed them a couple pieces of equipment. Um, and then the other, uh, actually Josh Tetsoff came with me to the library where we did reading in the park. Um, I showed off PC equipment and Josh read him a book. Um, so it was nice just getting out in the uh, public and interacting a little bit more. So, they kind of uh put a I always like to tell them it's better off seeing a face to uh who you're calling sometimes. So, um other projects we did uh we poured a large slab at Memorial Park baseball field uh also known as the DRS field. Um the picture you see the second from the top that would be just about a third of the slab that we were doing. So, it was a a large slab that we did completely in house. Uh, all the material was paid by um the baseball team in town. We did the labor. Uh, so they built a second check deck and I'm sorry, a German deck they call it. Um, turned out really nice. Uh, real similar to the one on the first baseline. Uh, sorry, third baseline. This one's on the first baseline. Um, the last thing, we screened over 600 yards of rock that came from city center. Um that was part of that contract where they removed the um the rock and then brought in dirt for uh future pops facility slash pond slash whatever we ended up using that lot for um all that rock will be used for um alleys um fixing utility lines um for many projects in town that I mean that's a lot of money we're able to save by not uh purchasing that um 2026 for the street department um budget wise You'll see a little while we put $5,000 in there for um a GIS sign program. We are under one right now with the simple signs. They are not supporting uh the program anymore. So, we're moving all the signs into Bolton Mink's sign program, which we have already all of our utilities that are underground. So, we're it's actually a um longterm it'll be a better thing to keep all of them put together. Um capital in 2026 is down from uh well down roughly $140,000 um to replace two pieces of equipment. And then moving on to the public works parks. Um on the bottom left picture you can see that's the parks building that we purchased roughly three years ago. Uh we p painted the east building. Um the west one will be done next year. Uh they also did some land or they're still doing it but snow stopped them but uh they started landscaping. Um it is looking really nice. Again that was all done in house. Uh we installed we did some work at a new batting cage at Foundry Hill Park. Um the new Prague baseball team donated the batting cage. We just did all the dirt work around it. um including the right U basketball pitcher on the right side that was that hoop was donated by the new Prague basketball association. We installed it uh at Memorial Park. They started a new dugouts uh which is turning out really nice. Uh I think they would have probably finished this week if it wasn't for the uh snow. But um all that's really left is a little little bit of fence work. Um, and then we'll have to go back there in spring and continue doing some line work, um, and some minor touch-ups, but it's a great addition to Memorial Park, and I think it'll be, uh, used even more having those dugouts out there. [clears throat] Uh, we planted roughly 40 trees around town. Uh, this is part of that grant we received, the Ashbor grant that we received four years ago that actually closed this year. Uh, we planted roughly 120 plus trees in the last three years. Um, so just because the grant's over, that doesn't mean we're going to stop planting trees. Before that, we were planting roughly 10 to 15 trees a year. Um, so right now, that's what we'll continue doing. Um, but there is a lot of maintenance to all that watering and, um, maintaining all those trees. So, uh, again, it's roughly two years after you plant the tree that there's still maintenance on them. So, um, we'll continue maintenance in 2026 and 2027 on those ones that were just planted this year. Um couple of items. Uh capital is down 30,000 in uh parks. Uh and then um utilities is up in all departments I think which is pretty common in 2026. So that's my recap for public works. Thank you. Thanks Matt. Um the other big department I guess that is uh touched on by the tax levy is the EDA department. Um just some updates. We do have the pending of pending sale of the last two lots in our industrial park to a local developer. We'll be discussing those later here tonight. Um we have uh Bevcom did build uh construct their building this year. Uh great great river energy uh out there did have a major expansion and then the EDA uh has been working on a strategic plan which it hopes to wrap up here in the next month or so. Uh looking at the grant we're awarded um a few years ago when the city hired a uh city planner within the community development department. One of that planner's main tasks uh was to kind of beef up our grant applications at the time. City was trying to do what they could but really um a lot of departments were kind of stretched to their means already. And so this person really at the time that person really picked it up and they do continue to do so. some of the grants that we were able to uh receive this year. Uh the Minnesota Chiefs of Police Association Community Partnership Grant um gave the city $2,000 to work on our community engagement. Uh the Minnesota City Participation Program, which is a first-time home buyers assistance program, the New Prague was allotted $150,000 and we were actually uh able to utilize over $140,000. Now, of note, this is only for the Lassour County side. Um on the Scott County side, Scott County actually covers participation for the northern half of New Craig. So um previously the southern half had been uncovered and so by the city participating, we are able to help first-time home buyers across the entire city now um try to utilize some uh buyer assistance. Uh the uh fire department uh was able to um get an armor grant to receive $40,000 for radios this last year. uh Minnesota Public Facility Authority uh granted the water department uh a little over $200,000 to replace lead service lines. Um Scott County cleanup and recycling, we received a little over $5,000 for citywide cleanup. Uh for the pond design at City Center, the city received $37,000 from Scott County Watershed. And then the US Department of Justice um awarded the city a cops grant um as Chief Applan noted uh to work towards national accreditation. So in total uh between the city and the residents uh we were able to bring in over $787,000 in grant money uh to the city this past year. So um that is the full presentation. I'm certainly open to questions um for myself andor staff regarding the budget. Um, otherwise, uh, being a public hearing, this would be the time that the public can comment on the budget and tax levy for the coming year. Okay, I'll open it up first for questions from the council. I have a couple, but go ahead. Go ahead, Bruce. No, you go ahead. Okay. Um, could could you explain again why we moved the ambulance fund into the general budget? Yeah. So initially kind of conversations were that the ambulance fund existed at its own standalone fund when we had our own ambulance department. Um kind of over the last number of years um that fund has continued to exist except it basically exists as a revenue source. We collect rent every month a little over $1,500 and we expense out very little basically utilities for that portion of the building. with both police and fire being in that building. Um I guess it would be my recommendation is maybe to look at closing that fund. Um because really all that's happening now is we're collecting a rent check and paying continuing to pay utilities out of it. And so it it seemed like an opportunity to kind of close up close up that fund. It didn't affect the tax levy at all. is in fact it helped it out a little bit because it's a um revenue generator at this point by a few thousand dollar a year um instead of being an expense, right? Um no, I and I'm glad that we were able to use it for some of the funding money and and I'm glad that you lowered the levy from seven down to 5.46%. But um but that ambulance fund in the past has been used to I mean we used I think 600,000 of it for the community center when we partnered with the school district that had grown that much and we had pulled it out. So I I worry when it gets intermingled sometimes that for these special projects that come up that are big but if we intermingle it with the um general fund that it's it's that those funds aren't there for us in the future. No understandable. So the the I believe there's a little over $200,000 in that if I remember right from our last conversation um that I had with Robin. And so the funds themselves are still sitting in that fund. That fund hasn't been closed out. We have just taken the small revenue and expenses year-toear and instead of directing them into that fund just directed them into a long-term so it won't grow fund. It'll sit at the 200. So it'll basically there'll be a small amount of interest I guess that'll grow on top of that. But yeah, it was growing by a couple thousand dollars a year, I guess, at that point. And then, um, in the EDA, um, the lots that we sold, where do those where does that money go to? So, the EDA has two funds under their department. The general EDA fund and then they've got an ED an EDA fund was created uh, I would assume 10 years ago when that industrial park phase was created that was going out. So, um, the sale of that will go back into that EDA industrial park fund. Okay. Um, well, the reason I asked that is is I always want to know what what the plan is and why we keep adding $75,000 because that could reduce the the 5.46% even a little bit more and get it closer to maybe even towards Lassour County even if we knocked off 1% and got it to 4.5. But I think there was monies available that we could have maybe saved another couple percentage points off of that 546. And I know at our last budget meeting I was outvoted, but um on on utilizing some of that money, but uh at one point I heard that it had been brought up in early um budget discussions that maybe it would be $50,000 this year. Um and now it's back up to 75. And I do you Robin, do you have what the EDA and those two funds has and if there's a plan for it? Um yeah. So yeah, while she's looking up that exact number of what's in those funds, um I think to this point with as the EDA compete completes their strategic plan, like that'll really give the EDA kind of more guidance and direction knowledge for the council as to kind of what we're looking at. I know to this point the $75,000 has kind of gone towards um a little bit of staff work as well as just some um general operations that the EDA partakes in and whether um BR& visits which we work with the county on or um various other visits as the EDA uh kind of follows their central tenants which seems which are to um create jobs within New Prague as well as add to the net tax capacity to help try to offset the res residents tax tax taxes. So, um, the EDA is really working to, I know even when I was hired, the city council discussed wanting to increase the commercial base and industrial base to try to reduce the tax load on residents. And to this point, that really is much of what the EDA seems to be working towards, especially through the strategic plan to help give direction for the next five years to try to help continue growing the commercial base in New Craig. So, just for ease, I um just looked back at the 2024 audit. Um both funds combined, EDA and EDA industrial park fund balances at the end of 2024 were 1,127,000. So, 1.1 million, but but we still feel like we need to give another $75,000 in this budget. I mean, that seems pretty substantial. Um, and don't get me wrong, I'm all for the EDA, but I just really I I'm really unaware of any new money that's going to be spent. And I bring this up every year. I if there was a good purpose for that $75,000, I think we should obviously fund it, but I think we could look at that since they're sitting on 1.1 million. Um, why we wouldn't use that 75 to bring down that levy again. So, a little closer to the rate of inflation. Yeah. So, I know especially that industrial park um purchase and K Ken can correct me if I'm wrong here since I he's our resident historian. Um that industrial park the current phase was really I believe very funded off of the ambulance fund if I remember correctly correct. And so I mean a lot as those lots have sold um that money has been put back into not only finishing kind of what they're doing out there. I know was it last year? Um we had a couple street stubs that we built out um to kind of finish the city's work on that particular piece of land. Um and then just kind of re selling those has kind of reimbursed the EDA for some of the money they spent. Now, um the EDA with through its central tenant hasn't been selling those at market rate, um but has been trying to sell them at a rate to uh businesses uh most of them very local in New Craig, but certainly more regional businesses um in total that uh as I said help kind of try to add to the tax base as well as job creation across the city. Um, I can say the EDA certainly has not sold or recommended sale to every single person that's asked. Um, even when there's been full asking price at times because they did not feel like the selling to just any business that came in was certainly a good value for the city as a whole. So to address the $75,000, most of that is reoccurring expenses at this point that that $75,000 um kind of handles year in year out. And I think the EDA um would hope to put that $1 million towards I would assume more capital investment, large project things that aren't necessarily reoccurring expenses year-over-year um instead of starting to dip into that to uh deal with deal with yearly expenses. But if that is a direction the EDA wishes to go or the city council wishes to see, that is certainly a direction that could happen. Well, unfortunately, I don't I'm pretty sure I don't have the the votes to to use that and bring down that levy any more than it the f than where it's at now. Um, but uh I was just curious for future uh reference and notes. Would that 1.1 million possibly be used to expand the industrial park? It that is certainly a possibility. Um I know that uh that as we've gone through that strategic planning process, the EDA and uh Mr. Mayor and Councilman Wolf can certainly speak to that. Um there are many options on the table of what the EDA may want to do whether it is another phase of the industrial park or trying to partner with a um private operation of somehow to make a project happen or even to look at [clears throat and cough] potential uh funding projects for other commercial projects. So that is it's all kind of up in the air and hopefully over the next few months the EDA will wrap up their strate strategic planning process and have more guidance on that. Is there room over there for to expand that? Uh expansion would generally be to the north. But isn't that I thought that was zoned. Is that still industrial? All guided industrial is Yeah. So far. Yes. Yeah. The land of the north isn't currently within city limits. Um but yeah, it is guided to be an expansion of industrial should the city andor a private developer wish to do that. Okay. But there would have to be some infrastructure done, right? Correct. I believe we could serve a a small portion on the south half of that particular property with sewer. Um but that would be and I know we're talking about it later tonight as well. Um there would be a need to expand out sanitary sewer to kind of open up the north half as well as just that general corner of town. [snorts] Any other questions? Nope. Those Bruce uh just a couple quick comments. I I noticed community engagement was discussed or mentioned or highlighted by a couple people. So I just congratulate and thank you for your different departments and efforts to being more involved in the community. I think that bodess well for our operation and our pride in our community and helps people understand the work that's being done in our town. So congratulations and thank your staff for all the work that they do. [snorts] Um, it occurs to me as I hear uh community development and some of the things that go on there and I I look at Ken sometimes this if people would understand the number of phone calls we get from EDA requests for information and community development or building permits that does not reflect at all any of your reports. There's just substantial amount of work that's being done in communications with our with our stakeholders and our residents that you don't see or people don't hear about, but I understand and and we see them and as council members EDA and things like that. So, thanks for the work that you did there as well. And certainly a big uh congratulations to the fire department for the ISO. That's such a a big achievement. And um I'd like to thank people from New Prey are above average. And I think that your work is really objective information to show that we are above average and you guys especially and we are very proud of the fire department and the work that they do. The volunteer efforts that you particularly all the fundraising and engagement that you do in the in the community really saves dollars for residents. So, it's there's a lot that we benefits we get from the fire department than just putting out fires. And so, thank thank you all for doing that, too. Um, just a couple quick comments. We spoke before about the ambulance fund that that was also kind of earmarked for um for next at least for the next year as part of the um contingency funding that we're trying to uh save money on for the police station that we're reserving funds for. So that's part that of that. But it's been discussed before too that that ambulance fund um was really is my understanding and I've never been told differently that it was really intended to be if we were to go back into a volunteer ambulance operation again. And um I think it's been discussed at least it's probably so obvious that we're never going to go back into that scenario again because the amount of cost to operate something like that and the requirements and standards to update it. So uh I don't recall any city council thinking that we're going to go back into it. So that funding u in my opinion should just be used to reduce the cost of the expense of the new ambulance garage for the new facility. um as long as we don't need for the contingency financing. So, um I'm kind of surprised. I guess I knew that that it was used for the for the wreck wreck area, but I didn't know that. But, uh I don't think as being a kind of a slush fund. Um in the EDA, I I did mention that before about possibly looking at reducing the levy. So, I I um I think it's certainly um fair to look at considering that, but I didn't mention that again because I do think we need to kind of go through the process of the strategic plan and figure out where we want to be as a city as far as our EDA efforts. Do we want to be putting more money into capital and buying things and developing them or or not and use those monies for other purposes um to try to encourage economic development? And I think that after we're done our plan, we'll have a be in a much better position to decide if we want to change the levy amount or keep it the same. And as you all know, a lot of that uh levy is to support the salary structure that of the staff that are assigned to it. Percentages of the staff's salary are allotted to the EDA as they are to other departments also. So So that's those are my comments. Okay. Rick, you have any questions or comments? Maggie? I'm good. Thank you. Okay. I I we're Josh and I and Chief Appan that were at a ambulance uh meeting today along with Chief Rinda and I think what did they say uh for an to add additional truck or start and it was like 1 point was what was it 1.8 million or something like that? Um so it's yeah I think it was yeah it was close to one and a half million if they wanted to add just one truck to their current fleet that they Right. But I think it goes to what you were saying, Bruce, that uh I just don't think it's financially uh a decision that should even go down with being with the cost of having a truck and then that's just the truck and then you got to get that personnel and the training that stuff. That'd be crazy. There's so many different companies out there that do it. Yeah. So, I don't have anything else. So, I guess right now I'm going to uh open the floor to uh anyone who wants to talk. I do have Brian if you want to lead the way. Uh Brian Paulson, 2064 Street Southwest. Uh mayor, members of council, um I just wanted to compliment the county on not dipping into reserves. I know that's something that I feel that this um board has kind of overspent and had to dip into our reserves to pay for some of our stuff this year and in next year. Um, you know, the community development, uh, mentioned about there only being 10 lots and not a lot of housing development. Um, but I personally don't think having 100 lots is going to increase that. I think it's the taxes. I think it's the the requirements that the city has levied on some of that stuff. Um, you look at the Eird development that got the tax abatement, it almost seems as if the only way people are going to build is if they get a relief from taxes, but then they're obviously not going to be paying for the city services that they're using. Um you know the last meeting mentioned that uh the tax you know rate was around I think it was 5%. Uh but the resident rate which is mentioned in there and in other times that you guys seem to be happy with was that it's 3.8% for residents. Uh that's the increase. It's around inflation. It really doesn't matter. It's what the city's growing at. It's average and it's the business. Business is almost double uh what the residential rate is. So you guys have the EDA that we're dumping $75,000 into, you know, and they're paying 7% this year. Last year it was a 10% increase on average, which I think the the business district was seeing around a 15% increase. So you guys are trying to get businesses in here by selling subsidized lots. You know, maybe it's lowering the tax rate. We don't have to be doing subsidized lots or giving tax abatements. It's just the the amount of the cost to move here. Um, you know, and now we're selling lots to developers. You know, it was mentioned at the EA meeting, these are subsidized lots. It's the city developing these than normally developers do, business parks or or housing residents. Now, what the city is doing. Um, and now we're selling it to developers so they can make profit. Um, you know, I just not sure if that kind of got through. Um, and then it talked about the the tax base, uh, you know, growing, uh, but our per tax or per capita taxes are going up. You know, when I lived in Shockby, the city was exploding. the taxes went down just because it grew so much. But here, you know, it's mentioned that the tax base is growing, but yet my taxes still are going up. Um, you know, and the tax capacity gets mentioned. I don't really care what the tax capacity is. I care what I pay for my taxes. They double the value of my house. They double the value of everybody's house in the city. Doesn't really matter to the residents. What matters is how much are they going to have to pay in taxes next year, you know? And then you guys will see the tax capacity down to 40% or something like that. And then you view it as, oh, now we can we can tax this this untaxed untapped potential and we can tax it more to get it up towards the 50%. Um, what really matters to me is the actual cost is coming out of my paycheck to pay for taxes. I don't care what my house is valued at. Um, the last thing is um kind of on the visioning list, which really wasn't talked about, but I know the police chief did mention those flat cameras. Now it's added to expand those. Um, I'd just like to see if we can actually figure out what it looks like to be successful for the flock cameras, which has never been addressed. Um, is it more calls? Is it less calls? You know, it was mentioned that there's vandalism at the park and the flock cameras would solve it. Well, a regular CCTV camera would solve it. It's not the the flock camera um concerns that I have that's would solve any vandalism at the parks. A regular [snorts] CCTV that the city owns would do the same thing. Um but yet that was used as an example of a flock success success story. Um yeah, when it really comes down to it, it's just it's uh it's the taxes and they continue to go up. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. Anyone else want to address the council on this public hearing? Okay. Thanks. Um, obviously New Prague is unique or Dennis Tates Lee Sewer County is unique with uh us being in Lee Sewer and Scott County. And Chief Applin, you said you got budgeted a officer for the task force. And is he going to be [clears throat] hubbed in Scott County or sewer? Tri County SWAT Tri County force. Okay. for the SWAT team. All right. I misunderstood. I just was gonna say if it was the drug task force. Is that something that might be in the mix in the future? Potentially. Yeah. I I think uh something like that would be good for the community just because of all the the drugs that are out there. And we could go on. You just pick up a newspaper, read the watch the news. It's uh something that would be very beneficial I think in the future. Thank you. Any other comments in the public hearing? Okay. If not, I guess I'll make a motion to close the public hearing. Second. Second by Rick Siler. There's no other comments from the council. All in favor say I. I. Any [clears throat] opposition? Okay. Passes 5-0. Thank you everyone for their presentations and uh Brian your comments. Next uh on the agenda, city engineer. Oh, Mr. Mayor, before we jump in that, I'll just say of note for anyone who may be watching, um uh no budgets were approved tonight. That will happen at our next meeting on December 15th. Yeah. Okay. Thank you. All right. Thank you everybody. So, uh first item on your agenda for me is the uh city engineers project update. um see if there are any questions on that from me. Uh one thing I'll note, the uh lead service lines um the draft IUP that was published in uh November does include just over a million dollars for city of New Craig for completion of lead services next year. So anticipation that makes it into the final um IUP, then that will take care of the rest of the lead services. Um that is a grant program too. So um just thought I'd mention that. So once that comes through, uh we do have a contract that we got approved by the utilities to start that work on that immediately for design and the construction next year. So uh so uh if there are any questions on the project update, I'll move into the next item, which is the feasibility report for the 2026 street improvement project. Um oftentimes when I've done this uh portion presenting the report, I bring up PowerPoint. Um, I end up doing it two meetings in a row. So, today I figure I'd just kind of talk my way through it. Um, and then, uh, when we do the actual public hearing, we'll we'll go through that uh, presentation. So, uh, 2026, uh, street improvement project includes, uh, 10th Avenue Southeast from, uh, uh, CASA 29 on the south end all the way up to First Street uh, southeast on the north side. Um this project was at one time proposed for improvement in 2024 and then got delayed um as [clears throat] external um funding sources were were reviewed. Um with that said, the project uh is now proposed for next year. Um there are uh improvements that are proposed under three different options. Um common to all three options is the the uh construction of a mini roundabout at Third Street Southeast. Um this also includes a portion of uh mill and overlay east of the intersection. Um uh also common to all three improvements is uh the resurfacing of the the black top trail, the batuminous trail on the west side of the roadway. Um and uh crosswalk improvements at Fifth Street, 9th Street, and 12th Street um southeast. Those are all kind those are all shown in the figures um within the report. Uh but again those are just the common improvements. Um with that said there are three different options that are being considered with this project. Um option one is um essentially a resurfacing of the entire roadway and then uh restriping it back to its current condition which is uh three lanes um with a center turn lane and then northbound and southbound lanes. Uh a second option being considered is the uh installation of uh a center median uh vegetated median. Um and those would be in the areas that are part of the the center turn lane um that are uh striped or cross-hatched. So those are basically the non non-drivable portions of the roadway. Um and then the third option is a new option and that's the conversion from a three-lane configuration into a two-lane configuration um south of Third Street Southeast. um the roadway at 44 feet wide um can accommodate any of those usages as a two-lane roadway. It would certainly be narrow in that in most cases, but uh um for three lanes. Um it's about 14 ft down the middle with the the the balance on either side. um the two-lane configurations about 12 foot lane each each side plus the potential to add um shoulders with parking lanes or parking abilities on that roadway that uh aren't currently there. Um another difference with the the third option, the two-lane configuration, we are um proposing uh curb bumpouts at the pedestrian crossings at Fifth Street, 9th Street, 12th Street. So that would reduce the crossing width from uh that 44 feet down to about 28 feet. Um that's kind of the the um the gist of the three options as far as the improvements being proposed. Um with all three options, I will say the the the curb and gutter will predominantly get left in place. Um with most of the work just happening to the pavement itself and how it's kind of just finished. Um the curb the center median islands would be the um the biggest change I guess if that option was to proceed. Um, so with that said, uh, uh, option one, which is, uh, essentially, uh, putting the roadway back to its current condition with the exception of the, um, third street improvements with a mini roundabout, um, and then the, uh, crosswalk improvements, which I should should add, the crosswalk improvements do the do include, um, an RRB, uh, the flashing beacons, um, at each of those three intersections um, with a estimated construction cost of $920,000 um or project cost of around 1.2 million. Um option two which is the uh similar lane configuration but the installation of uh center median um I will note the center median in this cost is a a mulched median so that uh trees or vegetation could be planted separately um would have a construction cost of 1.14 million project cost of 1.482 482 million. Um and then the third option which is the conversion to a two-lane uh configuration. Um construction cost of $970,000 with a project related cost. I'm sorry, total project cost of uh 1.261 million. Um funding for the project would come through uh uh primarily three sources. Um one is through assessments which is approximately $180,000. Uh we are proposing assessments to benefiting pro properties on the project. I will note that most that $180,000 is city property. So we do assess city property similarly would for a a local properties just doesn't actually go further towards uh assessment after the assessment hearing. So just the um the public pro or sorry the private properties that are on there would would uh actually receive assessment. Um that's a share of both residential and commercial properties. uh commercial on the north side and and residential on the south side. Most properties will not be assessed with this project um because they are rearfacing on on 10th Avenue Southeast. So just the handful of corner properties u would be included with that. Um and then some town homes that are also uh in that uh meeting the assessment uh parameters. Um additional funding sources include um u municipal state aid system funding. Uh this is a an MSA road. Uh does connect uh two primary routes with highway 20 highway 19 and then highway 29 the south side also county 29. Um and the the balance being made up with the uh local funding. Um the local funding is primarily for the the mini roundabout and also for the trail improvements um which um are otherwise not uh fundable through those through the state aid program. Um later in your uh meeting tonight, there is an application to the local road improvement program. Um if that um funding was successful, that'd be put towards funding that mini roundabout um also towards the the crosswalk improvements. Um and uh those are the kind of the the primary places where that funding will go to. So it also include a reduction in in some of your state aid funding that would be required to complete the project. Um, so with that said, that's kind of my my general overview of the project. Um, I do a full feasibility report in your um packet. If uh council accepts the feasibility report, we would move into a public hearing u which would occur um as soon as two weeks from today. So, uh that would be where we'd go through the presentation and and present this project uh further to the public. U we have had a neighborhood meeting that was connected on the 20th of November. Um we did have I believe four households show up for it. So pretty quiet compared to how many people received notice for it but uh it was um any of these these properties were also presented this project two years ago. So there's probably some familiarity with it. So um uh with that said I guess I'll see if there any questions for me. So when do we actually pick the option? Yeah. So there are recommended options. Um, I don't know if anybody from staff wants to talk about that. Yes. So, we went over all three options internally as staff and then we also brought it up at um the neighborhood meeting. Um overall I think uh staff and even the neighborhood agreed that uh turning into two-lane road with 11 foot parking on each side uh with bumpouts and um crosswalk blankier blinkies at the four sorry fifth 9th and 12th. Sorry I'm making sure I had all the streets was the best route to go. one costwise but uh I've said when we go into these projects um we look at two aspects is how do we make it safer for pedestrian crossing and how do we make it safer um for vehicle traffic. So u staff and um also uh the couple residents that were here agree that number one option is not an option like in our eyes we don't feel like that does enough to address the public uh safety when it comes to pedestrian crossing. we're pretty much just putting their street back to way it was and adding some flashes is just not enough. Um, so then he leaves it down to option two and three in our mind. Um, so I think the medians could be a decent option. The problem I have with the medians is uh the maintenance part of it. Um, it is a yearly maintenance when you put wood chips, flowers, trees, shrubs, and now you're also closing down a road um or closing down a lane for multiple hours every single time you do any kind of maintenance. That's sanitary cleaning too. That's storm cleaning. Um and then again maintenance on the median. So uh internally and even uh the public did not think that was a a good option to be closing down streets. I will say a lot of these streets that you see medians and even talking to Chris a lot of them that he sees in Mano they're four lanes. There's two lanes on going eastbound, two lanes going westbound. So you can close the lane very easy to do any kind of maintenance on these where 10th Avenue does not give you that option. So then we obviously looked at the third option and we believe uh pretty much copying what you have to the north of Main Street. So 10th Avenue Northeast um is what you pretty much are taking that and you're moving that to the south. So 10th Avenue is a two-lane road that has parking lanes on each side which I would say parking on 10th Avenue Northeast is absolutely needed. Um but it still gives the public an option to park. Uh and then it also gives us the option to do maintenance at the same time on that street. Um, also that gives you the option of getting the bumpouts, which I think uh even the ped uh residents here um thought was the best option instead of having your kids cross 40 feet 44 feet of the street to get across the street. Uh now you're where you do the mediums, you're giving the kids that option to cross 14t of the lane and then now you're in the middle of the road. Now you're in the median. Now you have another 14t to cross. So you're still crossing 44 feet of road. Um where option three now is with bumpouts. So you are pushed out on each side 11 feet. So now you're only crossing the street roughly 28 feet. Um again as a parent right now I will not let my kids cross 10th Avenue. They know if they are out even my older kid they are not allowed to cross 10th Avenue. 10th Avenue in my mind is not safe to cross the street. Um so option one adding crosswalks or blinkies. Do I I ask myself would I let my kids cross that street with blinkies? Absolutely not. I still don't think that's a safe route and even the residents that came did not think that was enough. Um, then I go into the meetings. Do I would I allow my kids to cross in a meeting? I would. Uh, I just don't think it still addresses the maintenance part of things. Um, and then I go to option three. I think when you code a main street and you have these bumpouts and you have these where you're out in public or out farther in the street where you can see both directions, um you personally feel safer when you can see more vehicles coming because you're out past the parking lanes. You're out um I'm going to say halfway into the street, which you're not. You can visibly see more traffic coming where you know you can get across even at a younger age. Um so internally staff uh residents that came to the meeting all believe that option three is the best route. So that's where we came up with that option. I know I rambled on for a long a lot there. Um but I will tell you 10th Avenue has been a hot topic for years and years and years especially over the last five years. I bet you 10 calls a month or 10 calls throughout the summer of how 10th Avenue is not safe for pedestrians. traffic is f uh um traffic is uh too high and again that's also a reason why I believe shrinking um the lanes or moving the lanes right next to each other. Uh so now you have 14 ft of traffic on each lane that are right next to each other instead of spread out where now you have a median where now you have people you know taking turns sharper because they just turn in they just drive into the center lane which is a turn lane. Um, so I think it eliminates or helps pedestrian crossing. It also helps um slowing down traffic, I guess. And I will say too, Sean, we did debate internally for quite a while. Matt knows that. I've been pushing on Matt for a while. Um, coming from the city planning world myself before getting into administration. Uh, we were renowned for every community I worked in for being told we overplan things and spend too much money and make things too pretty. And I will say that I still certainly prefer medians over uh bumpouts and whatnot. I think they look nicer. I think they do the job of slowing people down very well. As we talked out these medians, I started to see that I don't know if medians would be right for here. Um he talked about maintenance and shutting lanes down. Like I I never thought of that. Usually you do see medians though where there lane [clears throat] traffic. And the other one that got me is I always envisioned if we put medians down tenth, we'd put large trees or bushes, stuff that we wouldn't have to necessarily even maintain a whole lot. But knowing that in Minnesota we uh use a little more salt than most other states, I would just be terrified that we'd have this big stately tree grow for 15 years and then eventually it succumbs to salt and we got to chop it down and start back over again. And so I think if we were willing to spend money on elevated medians, I think that'd probably negate a lot of that. But that's basically where you're lifting that whole median up three feet and getting it out of the path of any incoming salt. But I know that that would certainly add cost. Um, and I think so in this situation, I will say even though I pushed back hard and am still a fan of tree medians, I just don't know if in this particular situation if it entirely fits Well, I can tell you from Main Street that people are not happy with bumpouts. Um, and [clears throat] while it might slow a few people down, it certainly doesn't slow everybody down. And um, as a guy that's come out right here out of a meeting and with things going on, dance studios letting out and uh, 105 having a a private party or something and all the cars are parked there, it's hard to see. Um and and especially coming out on the other side of on uh uh by Mil Pond and um uh Kubish Furniture there. It's uh extremely hard to to see that uh approach too. And I often hear from people that don't like the bumpouts, but um I guess I didn't realize the median was not going to be an elevated one. I thought that would be that's kind of how I envision it because I see it in Yeah, it would be. I mean Plymouth and Woodberry and wherever else and it just it does add some quality to something that I think that New Prague doesn't have right now in the sense of a treeine or a boulevard essentially. Um, I thought this might be a good road for it. But, you know, I mean, if I know we only heard from four people, but um, uh, and as a guy that likes to normally keep cost down, this is something that I would think would be a enhancement to a main drag in New Prague. I I I do wonder if there comes a day in the future where maybe traffic gets to a point where we have to acquire some rightaway and expand the road out to four lanes if that would be the prime opportunity then to look at adding that median into the middle of it. Well, I would hope that the fact that the majority of that doesn't on one side is basically drainage ditch and and holding ponds. Um, so it'd be hard to I I just don't see a need for four lanes there because with additional parking because there's really no businesses there. Now you go on the other side of 10, you got the new uh uh soccer fields at the church and then you have uh some a large uh multi- family uh units that you utilize that parking as well. And you have businesses, a bank, a dental office, and retail grill. I I was thinking like future future where like [snorts] if like you start to get development on the other side of 29 and so nothing that's going to happen overnight certainly. Um when I say future I'm thinking 20 30 years down the road if south of 29 starts to develop and you just get more traffic that's swinging up through there. Yeah. Um [clears throat] well is there I mean I guess I envision that we might be able to see some type of mockup of the different versions and what a median might look like. I didn't see that in here. Yeah, they're in the packet. Yeah. I mean, what we presented is is dimensional a more 3D landscape, not the flat. Yeah. You know, here's where it's going to be. Something that was architecturally drawn that you could see with trees, to Josh's point, that are [snorts] growing up in the middle of the median, and it's more of a a boulevard. Uh yeah. And and uh for the purpose of this report, we're we're kind of keeping it more simple. I guess it's always something that can be produced. Um it's uh something I have done for another community is looking at a center median configuration. Um and you did do an architectural correct. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So that was in a recess is a reconstruction situation. So you're looking at with with this project kind of evolving from a maintenance project into what else can we do to slow down traffic, enhance safety. um because this project kind of evolved from a a a pavement condition is starting to uh unravel, get in worse condition. What can we do to uh improve that pavement surface ball while also try to institute some additional um safety measures and and and traffic calming um devices? So, uh looking at from that side is is a relatively we had we had fewer options, I guess, to work with. If we're looking this in a in a full new construction or reconstruction situation, um it'd be likely a center a a smaller center median and wider lanes on each side. So you can you can take care of the maintenance needs and have two lanes of traffic if there's a a a truck parked on the inside or something like that. So um with just fewer options on this one right here is is more just uh put forth as a two-dimensional type of uh presentation. um similar what we presented two years ago I guess which um when we initially proposed in this was mostly just an update of what we had looked at two years so we weren't looking at you know kind of the bigger stuff at that time that was all I had wait till a public hearing maybe other people will weigh in by that time so Tim regarding speed on the north of the stoplight you know with the the two lane and there's no turn lanes. Does that in your opinion seem to make it uh people a little bit drive a little bit slower or I mean have you seen that or I mean is or is it just I know we've done some it depends on the season in the summer with the soccer fields and things up there now. So that area can get a little congested at times too now with the parking and things up there. But I I think with that curve right there, it tends to slow people down a little bit. Whereas 10th Avenue is almost more of a straight shot. There's two straight shots with the one curve. So that anytime you get a straight road that intends to increase speeds because nobody has to turn or do anything. So I guess to answer your question, north of the light, have we seen a major problem with speed there? No. Okay. I know what slows me down on that road is the flashing speedometer that tells you if you're going 37 and a 35, you know. So, I don't know what those signs cost, but I mean if we ran into a problem, maybe there was something we could put another one we put up. Yeah. Yeah. [snorts] Yeah. I mean, that could be consideration either temporary or permanent measures. Yeah. those we didn't look into it specifically and I I couldn't tell you the cost are off hand but um the RFB installations um uh the ones we are proposing right now is slightly different than have been installed previously. So what we were looking at with especially with three of them um is a solar wireless installation still with push button actuation. So you still push the button to go across um but would not have all the wiring and other stuff involved but those are estimated about $35,000 a piece. So, um, what you're referring to is certainly be less than that, but, uh, um, but, uh, just give you an idea of what what those those will cost for the R installations. We're requesting a little bit more than that in the grant application because we're also including the cost of the the crosswalks, the pedestrian, the sidewalk portion, and and those kinds of things. Any other questions? So then as a council, do we have to um request that public hearing be published? Well, we have to do the Yes, it'll be part of the resolution. Okay. Um that would be letter B. But Bruce, you comment. Just a quick question. The mini roundabout is that in all the all the options? It is. Yeah. mini roundabout is um kind of the baseline of of uh staff recommendations and and we have looked at that uh as kind of um yeah the minimum I guess for for trying to um reduce speeds and and hopefully do a little bit of traffic calming. So if you do have the first three blocks of the roadway um about a quarter of the roadway would have that um traffic device that would help slow down traffic. So that's uh that's a hope and it also kind of separates the the residential and commercial area. So, it does provide a little bit of a a visual separation between those areas. And and I remember we first started talking about that there in the first place just um because when the Main Street project was going on, it was almost impossible. And I'm I'm sure Sean experienced it too. Turning left off of third there um just Yeah. with all that traffic coming and the speed as they kind of come around that slight turn um that mini roundabout would help people navigate off of Third Street right there. Yeah. the uh the mini roundabouts to be fundable through MDOT requires a city or a traffic study, but there's other reasons why for not to look for Mandot money for that. Yeah. So, uh if you use your your So, there there's there's a couple Well, the main reason is if you do decide to use state aid funding towards it, you do have to complete either a roundabout justification report or a a full uh intersection control study. Um it's about 20 to $25,000 cost to complete that. Um traffic counts all evolving into a into a study of report. Um the the conversation I've had with staff is that that 20 $25,000 comes out what could would come out of the state aid funding. Um you'd be your state aid funding towards uh the road improvements. Um but um just as much as you can use it there, you could also use that money towards future state aid projects. So it's kind of just a a reallocation of when you use your general fund versus your your state aid funding. So the money doesn't go away. You'd eventually be using that state aid funding towards a future project. So the only way you can use that funding um though would be required to uh to complete those reports. So what's a cost to do a mini roundabout? Uh about $140,000 is the cost we have in this project for the construction of the mini roundabout on its own. So that money would come out of the general fund then. Uh yeah, essentially it' be coming off of um uh well, we do also have the the assessments which could be used towards it, but yeah, I mean it'd be generally come out your your your general fund then. I'm not [clears throat] advocating one way or the other, but just if we did the $25,000 studies, a slam dunk, we could use the uh other funds for to do that. Yeah. So, [snorts] it is there's a tradeoff there. Sure. That um we could use it. just so I understand what the decision that we need to make on it is. Um, then you mentioned four people attended. Out of how many people? Uh, I want to say we probably sent 80 to 100 letters. I don't have the exact number. It's a pretty long list. A lot of people are are near the project or if they're in the town home type areas, if their access comes off, it might be three people directly on the project, but we mailed out everybody in the smaller development. So, um, it's it's is a pretty long list. So, so when we talk about the public made comments, are you referring to the four people that supported eight people, five uh five residents supported one plan versus the other? Okay. So, every Okay. I mean, I I've also talked to many residents on the phone um that could not attend the meeting. So, I'm just taking overall um giving them the feedback of uh what the options were. And I will tell you, every person said they did not want to see medians and they didn't feel like option ones did anything to address the pedestrian concerns and they all thought the third option was the the best option. Yeah, that's the difficulty we hear like get all the time is you hear from eight people out of a hundred. Is that a representative of the hundred or is that engaged people that are doing that? No, you're 100% I but I can only give you the But I I do get what you're saying. But I will tell you um I'm not I agree with Sean. I'm sure there's a lot of plenty of people that do not like the bump boats on Main Street consensus of people I've talked to absolutely love the bump boats on Main Street. So just opposite complete opposite end of uh they absolutely love that they're out there where they can actually see people. So I I there is both both ways is all I'm getting at. But in their in their defense, and I I hear the same complaints, it they don't like the bumpouts because of parking and turning. Um which you really wouldn't have that issue on this one because you're not there's nobody parking on this really to speak of. Like I said, I don't anticipate a lot of parking on 10th Avenue. So the bumpouts would affect parking really. They would not in the turn lanes. We don't have a lot of turns going on it. There's only four, five, six when it comes to the bumpout. I'm sorry. Sorry. Yeah. Yeah. It would be that fifth, ninth. I mean, we don't have the kind of buildings we have on Main Street. So, so there different considerations. Excellent. But I go with your I don't disagree, but I I I will say, Bruce, just along in terms of turnout, this is an interesting project being that 10th Avenue as a minor arterial Ken major um affects probably more people than we have affected in recent street projects, but because nobody backs up to it, we have very few assessments. And so most people there's a lot less people that are going to feel like they need to comment on it because they're not necessarily their wallet's not getting directly hit with the assess. Well, the 100 is the 300 ft letters. Okay. So, okay. I see the number of accessessible people or how many? I don't recall, but I want to say it was maybe about 13 residential properties. It wasn't much. So that I think I've asked this before so I apologize but how much of this project is coming out of general levy funds? So if with three options um I'm just going to use a round number about $1.2 million total project cost. $200,000 is identified as general levy and $180,000 out of assessments. I will say because the assessments are largely on city properties. The city properties would likely go to the general fund. So this the you're not going to assess yourself $150,000. Um so you'd have to make that up with with additional funding. So that would probably actually come out with a general levy. Um so this is an unusual project. Usually we don't have that many and I probably should express that better in the report now I think about it. So uh most cases we do if we have an assessment on a city property it's a park or something like that but it's not uh 75% of the assessment like it is on this one. So about 350 probably closer to 350 would Yeah. And and that of note is later we're talking about our grant application to try to cover our 350 part that that would come out as if if we were able to get the grant application here our next item or two items. No, but that wouldn't cover the whole 350 that grant application. I believe it was 400 is what we're looking for. Oh, okay. I thought some of it wasn't didn't qualify for it. Okay. Yeah. At this point, if he did if he did receive funding through the the the local road improvement program, um you would have to then complete that study like we referred to because then you would be using state aid funds because LRIP is administered through state aid. So, you would have to go through that process. But, um the only thing that would be nonfundable at that point be the trail improvements because the trail is not meet um the design standard for um a multi-use trail. It's not 10 ft wide. So without doing a full rehabilitation and reconstruction of the trail, um that would be that would probably be the the last item that would be likely under the general portion um of the project. So um that'll always hang out there. There'll always be a general contribution no matter what, but that'll likely be the only thing that you would be able to use your funding for. The median that we were talking about, um how long was that? How how would that run the whole length of that or uh not quite. Um it's a little easy to refer to. It is shown in the figures, but it's essentially if you go if you're on 10th Avenue Southeast and it has the cross-hatching where there's not a turn lane uh actually marked. Um that's where the the bump the um center island would be. So it just be kind of taking all the it's basically dead pavement. It's it's unusual pavement. It's not doesn't serve any purpose. So um removal of it and installation of the island wouldn't affect traffic um in any way. So that's where we identified those to go. And then uh also looking at the crosswalks to make sure those are also used as refuge where possible. Well, and the reason I asked that is because I was going to ask Matt um what how many man hours or how long do you think that would take to clean out on a monthly basis or Yeah, they will definitely be a budgetary item if there's medians because you have to wood chip that every at least every other year and then um staffing to maintain them. Uh I've never ran the dollar figures but just I I know I didn't mean to put you on the spot. No, just kind of a guess. Yeah, it's a maintenance. I mean, yeah. Would it be a half a day that that side of the one side of the road would it be closed or would it be an hour, you know, or um when you're doing watering of all the the plants, whatever you decide to put in there wood chipping that the medians um multiple days to wood chip all that. Of note, Sean, it's uh medians, you can see exactly where they're at. It's page 127 of the packet. Um starts the first I think it's two pages there. of what the medians are. It's the blue. So, it's it's not all of it. It's a lot of it. Yeah. But, yeah, it basically takes out the the blue portions on turn lanes only. [clears throat] Yeah, I'm having trouble loading those pictures. That's why I didn't And it skips. I was trying to get through some of them. It It like jumps through out of there, but Okay. So, what does an architectural design look? I know we heard from five people that like the bumpouts, but I think if people, especially within those, and that's a pretty large development of houses, um, if they saw what that architecturally would look like or both of them and compared the two, I would think that they'd want to beautify that road a little bit more. But um maybe I'm wrong, but what does something like that cost? Uh I want to say I mean what other city? You just said you just did one for a city. Oh no. Yeah, I'm sorry. We did one in um in New and so is for a five five block segment um where we were looking at uh reconstruction of 60 foot wide road and narrowing. So a little bit different situation, but uh um I believe we is about $5,000 type of range if you're looking for a general idea. Um it can it can kind of depend on what level you do it. when we did uh you know we did Main Street we did a threedimensional fly through of the project which is maybe a little more extensive than what you're looking for but um there are some some tools that can kind of do a more simple simple models of uh basically integrating Google Earth into what you're working with and trying to do some sort of a model with that. So um that's probably a rough range but I would probably say it's around $5,000 to do the the pretty stuff I guess if we'll put it that way. Well, I'm just wondering moving forward if we shouldn't look at doing that. If it's a $1.1 million project, $5,000 isn't a whole lot to to let people visualize, especially if they're being assessed for it. Um, and have to stare at it out their back door, front door every day. So, would they be assessed for that part of it though? Uh, no. The assessment would just be kind of part of our general assessment schedules. It could it'd kind of be like sidewalks like whether we put them in or not, it's going to be property owners wouldn't be assessed for the median. But but I think what he's saying is yeah, spending the 1.1, it's worth looking at, right, Sean? I'm just saying that $5,000 to have an architectural design on some big project like this is a million-doll project. Um, might help other than just kind of the flat. This is where a median would go because what was in my mind was already an elevated one because I see them in other cities all over the metro area. But there and they seem to be elevated, but all of a sudden come to find that you weren't even talking about an elevated one. You were talking about Yeah. And I I do need to be I'm going to maybe cautious is the wrong word here, but the cost estimates we provided is installation of a a barrier curb on the inside um and then uh mulching on the inside of the curb. um if you get it to the point of adding essentially a structural element with a taller retainment um the cost will be quite a bit higher than than I presented. So um if it uh gets to that level um even just looking at Main Street when we had some structural curve on that they're $120 a foot or whatever pricing that was is quite a bit higher um for each side. So, right. Uh, so if if it was to look at uh something um to that higher level, it certainly adjusts costs and would have to be kind of rerun as far as what that would be. Um or it' be looking at certain areas where it's not the same throughout. So, you know, it had a common development the whole way through. Now, you know, one thing that we had to present the um the three-lane configuration with the islands as wherever there's um that dead space or unused space. Um, you could also look at something that's in between where you don't run the median the whole length or just look at intersections or something that's a little bit more of a I guess a compromise or something in between to kind of save on cost. So, um, there's always somewhere in between. So, if one's 1.2, that one's 1.4, there's probably a $1.3 million option that would would hit some of the some of those areas and accomplish some of those goals as well. Um, this traffic this road does get 4,000 vehicles per day. So, um that was kind of one of the main main concerns as far as maintenance is if you do shut down a road that gets 4,000 vehicles per day. Um you are shut down a lane direction um each time you do that for for potentially good a good amount of time. So, um but uh um with that said, I guess yeah, there there could always be somewhere between like I mentioned um option one and option two could be a one and a half in there somewhere. [snorts] Well, I [clears throat] I'm prepared to move it for the public hearing and maybe we'll hear from more people and maybe I'm wrong with the wanting a little beautifification on a major road here. But um which we'll get some costs put together too, Sean, because I think you'll be shocked on how much I mean when it comes to Main Street, how much we beautify Main Street. We've had add had to add added staff just due to that Main Street project. So I mean I I'm totally fine with whatever route the council wants to go, but there are budgetary items in the future that will I mean, like he said, this is this is only wood chipped meetings. That's not plantings yet. So, there's even a more of a cost to the plantings of that meeting. So, I just want to make sure everything's out there. So, when I bring a budgetary item in the future to maintain these, it's like, whoa, I didn't know that. Oh, no. There's going to be there's going to be cost to this. No. So, I'll try to put some rough numbers so you can see what that's going to look like, too, before we make that decision. Okay, I'll make resolution um um 25-12-01-02 for approval. Okay, second. I've got a motion by Rick Ser, second by Bruce Wolf uh on approval of resolution 25-12-01-02. Any other comments, questions? I just want to clarify when is the public meeting. Yeah. And so that's probably worth mentioning here. So if there is a desire to do something above what I have in the report um two weeks from today is when we have the public hearing that resolution. So and then that's going to be approved at that point. Accepting accepting the feasibility report and then you usually order the project and then we order the project. Um you could say we want to proceed with option one, two or three or you can say we're just ordering the project with the option to be determined. So, with with this project specifically as more of a maintenance type of project, we aren't looking for a bid opening in February like we normally are for a big project. Okay. Um, so this is more getting into we're going to start construction in mid June and be done by the end of the summer type of deal. Um, so, uh, with that said, uh, public hearing could still occur as scheduled, but if you are wanting anything above what we have in this report, there wouldn't be enough time to put that together before Tuesday next week, I guess. Right. But we would it would allow the council to hear from correct people during that on which option they might prefer. I mean we've heard from four already but um and um you know they might not be visualizing things the way that the some other people were then on the project. Correct. Yes. We would still have time then to decide. We wouldn't have to decide that night. I would hope too if we get 4,000 people driving. Is that the weekly count? That's an average uh daily count traffic that we hopefully get a little more feedback at the public hearing [clears throat] from some people that you drive it. Okay. Any other questions, concerns? So, if not, all in favor of the motion say I. I. Any opposition? Okay. Passes 5-0. Thanks, Chris. Thanks, man. Thank you, Chris. I've got a question real quick, Josh, before we move on. Yeah. You've got um resolution um 12 252013 um and it is the you've got 1203 amended official city schedule on one list here and then you've got another one down here down. So, so we just approved O number 7B 02, right? We've got 03 is in 10 and then 04 is in 10 and05 is in 10. Okay. And is this just a different 03 then or what 03? Or is there Oh, you're talking about the actual Oh, this is the correct 03. So, we just did O2. So, now we're moving on to 03. All right. And you've got it down here. You've got it as is that this? So, so, so it is this amending official fee schedule. That's what we're on. Which companies not too bad. It's not. Yeah. Right. I I did the O2 already. Well, this my computer. This is like the presentation of what this resolution is going to be. All right. So, this isn't even necessary. It is. We will need the approval. No, mine is a picture to another. Okay. Uh item eight, ordinance for introduction. We have none. Order. [clears throat] Item nine, ordinances for adoption. None. So we're at item uh line 10. Item 10, resolutions. [snorts] So uh who's going to take the uh amending official fee city fee schedule? Are you taking that? Can well actually we have John Peterson here. Oh, okay. a presentation. I'll put up your power. Okay. [sighs] Okay. Thanks, Ken. Thank you, Mayor Council. John Peterson from Boldmain. Oh, there it is. Moved. Um, what we really did was a cost of service on this uh on the trunk system. in on the on a connection charge and maybe pop to the next one, Ken. And what we looked at is with you you were talking about development and things like that. There's going to be trunk sewer services required that that was covered in a feasibility report we put together in 24. Uh but you're not at this point, I believe, really collecting funds about how to how to fund that collection system improvements. And so that's what the truck system is is aimed at addressing. The SW connection charge is you already have a connection charge now. And what I really did is would go back to evaluate whether that was covering your cost of treatment right now for new users, new new connections, right? Not not the development people actually connect to the and start sending waste water down to the plant and so they become users of the plant. And so that's what that sewer connection charge. And so what we really doing is trying to evaluate what the what your cost is in those so then you can start to make decisions about how to how to collect those fees. Okay. The in the trunk charge system for the trunk sewer, right? We use the 24 sanitary sewer feasibility study. They identified six different areas that you were looking at how to serve. Uh in that it defined those capital costs that would be coming when those have to get served. uh define the service areas that we're talking about and and then we take that [clears throat] information we allocate it out across to those developments. So I think the next one this is straight out of that feasibility study you saw that a year and a half ago or whenever and we just want to give you a visual. So there were six areas that are outside the existing collection system boundaries inside the city that you're looking to develop. Um and that's where we develop these costs. Okay. So that total total capital to serve all six of those areas was 30 almost 37 million. That includes some contingency because we didn't know exactly when it's coming and maybe there's some details that get lost along the way. You know from a you know 10,000 ft picture to where they actually go to put it in. We include a little money to to cover any issues that are taken in the existing system. We didn't identify any particular problems, but there may be issues been what they develop or fixing a lift station that needed to be upgraded or something like that. Those are just there to kind of help you build some cushion into that process, right? 4,615 acres in those six areas. When you divide that out, right, the four you get a cost of eight just over $8,000 an acre that you develop to provide trunk sewer to all those areas. It it ranges by area from about six grand an acre to maybe 16 grand an acre in those six areas. But we kind of lumped it for this purpose. We pulled that all together and put it in one to to kind of a more holistic view of how to fund the whole thing. We then allocated uh 25% of that to other ways of financing other than getting it from development costs, right? And that was just a way of saying, well, you're going to have to fund some of that along the way. You may not you're not going to get all those development costs given to you up front. You're going to have to come up with some other way to do that financing. That's a financing question, not a cost of service. Right. Um, that got us down to a net recommended trunk charge of six, just over 6,000 an acre. Okay. Uh, I did a little looking around you. There's a wide variation in cities about how they fund trunk sewers, right? Uh, the best example I found was actually in Shakipi where they were charging $3,300 an acre uh, for trunk and then they had lateral charges. They did vary that by the service area, but it ranged from $250 an acre to over 6,000. So that would get you up to about $9,000 an acre for some of those areas to develop. So that that was in the ballpark. Other places don't do any of that. They they somehow extract it through ad um development agreements and things like that. I I don't actually know how they get the money out of them, but they they have to find a way to fund all those trunk sewers, right? Um, I'd say this as you get further away from the metro, there's a lot less likelihood they're charging developers this kind of trunk. They're still getting that somewhere, but they don't have a they don't have a very well-developed um trunk charge system. Okay. Um, so that's what we came up with on the trunk sewer charge. And again, it just get you a starting point for how you start to uh build a fund that you work out with your finance people how that all works. But that's what your cost is in in developing that system. So when you see development coming, it's not coming. Uh there's work to do, right? And and some somebody's got to help start getting that paid for. That's what this is aimed at doing in the sewer connection charge. That's more focused on the treatment facility that you know we upgraded that upgraded back in 2011. So it's longer ago than you think. Um your total cost then was 32 million. capital that's got paid up front. We're 1.4 of that got paid by the Cedar Lake area water and sewer through that whole process we went through to get their cost allocated to them. Uh and most I put that in there so that everybody knows that that got we got that taken care of. Um so that gave you a net investment, but you're also financing that out to the year uh 2038. So your total debt service on that facility is over 50 million by the time you're done which is getting paid now uh more than likely through your rate system as I recall we didn't look we haven't looked at that yet but that was next on the docket to go after to go look at rate somebody's paying that now and so in essence your existing users are carrying that load for the future users that are coming right and I think if we go to the next um because remember in your this is just a kind of a It's got a two-phase. You had two phases at the plant up to 2.5 MGD. Um, some of the plant's ready for that, some of it's not. Uh, we allocated all those costs out based on future versus existing. Just so we did all that due diligence is what I really want to say. Maybe the next one can I think has got one of the one of the interesting parts we get out of that is um because the plant runs more efficiently than uh was was uh assumed during design. We believe you can expand you can take 21 almost 22,000 people into the facility. Okay, it's got that capacity that that's a lot more than what you've got right now. Uh um so you want to be able to hand you know get everybody involved in carrying that cost for them, right? We didn't at the time we did it, it was more like uh 18,000 people was the actual population number, something like that. So um it's a little more efficient. You're you're not you're going to have to do some work. 15 years old, there'll be work that needs to be required there. You will eventually get a new permit from the MPCA, but don't hold your breath because they're taking their time. that might trigger some improvements, but they'll give you time to do that. My point here is you're not looking at another big expansion in the near future there unless something else drives it. So, you want to find a way to try to recover that cost that you've got being sunk into it. And that's what the goal of this was. We we we take that down to a number of equivalent residential units, right? So that each connection pays for its share. I think we go to the next one, Ken. Oh, yeah. This was just more of how how we how we allocated cost to different phases of this. Okay, again more of a due diligence. We knew there were stricter effluent standards. Uh this was all done much of this work and doing this allocation was done when we worked out the cost with Cedar Lake. So um I think we can when you So what that comes down to is this number the 6,645 that's your actual cost of treatment per uh residential unit. Okay. Right now you're charging in a connection that 7,150 in in that system somehow and I don't know anybody can explain how how this come this number comes about. It it claims that you know 1,200 of that is going to trunk charges and the rest is going to treatment. I don't know where that number came from. Even when we did rate studies in the past, that that number was all we just kind of carried it along. U because I don't think you're going putting that into a fund now separate for trunk. We we do have a trunk fund. You have a trunk fund. So it must be going in there somehow. Yes. Yes. From from building permits. Yes. From building permits. Mhm. And they get this charge sent to them. Correct. Gotcha. Okay. So what it tells you is you're probably slightly undercharging on for the cost of treatment right now. Okay. Um, [clears throat] you're you're probably also not collecting up in trunk charges to fund these future trunk um improvements that are needed and and and that's really what we got out of doing this this this study. Okay. Uh that might be all I've got is Ken or I think to to kind of boil it down when when we were um completing the comp plan which also has the I'll just put up the map here earlier that we had um which is full buildout. You know you're talking 50 plus years from now. This is, you know, when new Prague gets to the 21 22,000 people, if we ever get there, but that's assuming full buildout, you know, kind of the ultimate build out of New Prague, we'll call it 50 years from now. wanted to make sure that are we charging developers and the end users enough money to cover our costs to build the trunk lines which is the area on that map you know that large uh future development area so that current users are not having to fund that you know people that are you know been living here already have a business here we don't want them paying for the growth that's what this study was really to to accommodate that the growth is paying for itself. So that was where we looked at. Right now we don't have a trunk charge. We do have one for water. We've never had one for sanitary sewer for a service area charge. Uh service area charge. So at the time that a developer comes in, they have been paying nothing in that trunk charge. it's been getting put on the back of basically the building permit um time period when you know this $1,200 per single family home was being um charged to that builder, that homeowner, however you want to look at that. So, this is putting more money up front on the developer to, you know, put that into this fund that if there's a trunk line that needs to get built. Uh, one thing I think Josh mentioned at maybe our last budget meeting was, you know, Alton Avenue, for example, that's going to need a trunk line. Um, we got to figure out a way to to pay for that, get that done. Um, these trunk charges, area charges will go into a pot of money that will be used for that. We do have what about 1.2 2 million in there currently that we're collecting from the uh building permit that out of that 1,200 uh portion. But uh instead of again at the time of the the building permit, we'll collect an area charge up front. So that that is a change. Um and then as John noted on here, um the treatment charges at 5,900 that would bump up to about 6,600 per uh equivalent residential unit. So, we hadn't changed our fees for 20 thou or since 2007 for any of these connection charges. And as John said, um even prior to my time been with the city since 2004, I don't know where these breakout of how much went to the trunk fund, how much went to the um um treatment charge. We don't know where that came from. That predates any of us uh from being here. So, this is to look at that, make sure that we're being equitable to the developers. uh existing uh rate payers and then obviously people that are building a new building to make sure that it is covering what what they're uh needing to cover again so that growth is paying its way. That's really the key thing to remember here. I don't know, Matt, if you have anything to add to that as well, but um it's a lot of information that I think uh John had to boil down for us, but really what we're trying to get is an updated figure that we could put on the fee schedule. And again, um that change I'm just going to put up the fee schedule here quickly since that kind of ties right into the um item that we need action on for the resolution here. But this is probably the best way we can explain it. I'll zoom in here. $5 flush charge right there. [laughter] So again, that's just for you, Rick. So, based on Bolton Mink's uh review of their um study from 2024, we'd be looking to um basically it looks like a reduction in our um sewer connection charge at the time of the building permit from 7150 per residential equivalency unit um down to 66.45. That is for the treatment. Um it is technically an increase from the current breakdown that was about 5,500 5,900 excuse me that John had in his PowerPoint. And then the new fee is the um 6,10 per acre. Um that would be added at the time of platting or at the time of uh the development. Um and that would go along with the 2814 an acre that we get for water. Um, not to confuse the issue too much uh either, but um we also have an $1,800 uh per residential unit charge for water. So, we already had it broken out for the water side of it. We never had it broken out for area charges and connection charges for sewers. So, that's what we're we're accomplishing uh by finally having this uh analysis and study done based on that growth plan. So, so you're talking about increasing it about 5,500 bucks. Yes. At the end. At the end. At the end. I mean, if you if you lower the one from 7150 to 64. Yeah. So, how would And then you have 6,10 you're adding. That's a new fee. So, how would it impact a typical single family home? quarter acre lot is is about $1,000 more per single family home in sanitary sewer charges. That is kind of the bottom line of what what you're looking at here. What's that? Because the one per correct. Yep. And and again, that recognizes that we haven't raised our fee since 2007 for any of these connection charges. We just didn't have the information to be able to do that. We don't if you don't go ahead and do something like that, that money is coming from somewhere to build those facilities. It could be you could try to get it out of rates. You could get it some other places, but they're gonna that money, you know, you got to build that trunk sewer system somewhere. Robin just corrected me. We actually have about two million in our trunk fund currently. But when we're talking at was it 37 million for trunk buildout? I mean, well, we got to collect that overtime. Just to understand the math. If you if we if we did this whole service area at one time, it's going to cost about 36 million9. You've allotted 75% of that to the charges. If everyone paid their charges, we'd have 75% of that. And we'd have to come up with about $9 million. And we've got $2 million, but we're short $7 million to do this. and I'll be dead before we do all that development probably, but that's a lot of development. One of the thoughts I had as I put the, you know, developed a whole spreadsheet model that Ken's going to get when we're all done here and then he can play with it. But, uh, the idea was that's that number is I kind of pulled that out of the air, right? If if you find it needs to be more or less as time goes. My point was I think you needed something up front because you're not going to get it all at once. So you need to think you're going to be putting some money towards this to start that's out of that fund or some other way to do it. That's there may be other options but just but we have to come up with the 25 there could be grants out there at some point. I was saying I I do know there's grants. I remember um three four years ago now I very early after we got here I know I was in connection with someone from the national EDA that did say there are grants available um for projects such as this um like multiple millions of dollars if we can get together a good package and so I don't again that was three or four years ago so who knows you you have to actually have a de a land that you are going to develop to to get yeah so I believe yeah some of that money was based around like you are you actually creating jobs or like developing land not just throw it in the ground and nothing's there but there are certainly grants available for that and I would [clears throat] assume this becomes a working project every every four or five years we're we're updating this um based on new costs or if how we want to fund it, maybe it changes off of that 75%. Um, so move this up and down. So I I certainly would highly recommend us not waiting another 20 years to do this again. So the the trunk charge is that that's per acre. Per acre. Correct. So if you don't make accommodations for apartment buildings or high density use or no that's where you get the treatment um at that the treatment charge at that point at the time of the building permit that would recognize that you have you know in on a one let's say it was one acre of land and you had 50 apartment units that's where you're going to corre collect [clears throat] 50 residential equivalence units on that one acre because it's an apartment right on the flip side if it was four residential lots you're going to have a heck of a lot less treatment to do for four residential homes. So, that's where you always true it up kind of at the end with what's your actual end user here just to get the sewer to the lot. That's where you get the per acre to pay for the trunk line just to get it there so they have access to it. No, I but yeah. Okay. I I probably need more time to think through that. You're adding more value by bringing a trunk line to an apartment building than you are to a house. Well, so I' I'd add when when we built the model and we took the numbers out of the study and added 20%, some of that was to account for the fact that maybe it doesn't develop the way, you know, when we did the study in 24. There were assumptions on how that was going to develop. Maybe you change that. Maybe it goes up or down. We think that'll build enough flexibility in there to make those adjustments, which is why you then need to review it every few years to see how that's working. Sorry, it's a little bit gray, but so so I noticed we got into this Bruce. Um, uh, John's recommending a flat $6,000 an acre. Um, we looked at it like there, if you look at the various colors on that map, like the various colors have various costs. Some of the colors are cheaper, some of the colors more expensive. Um, and I know talking through with Ken, there are cities who may try to incentivize like, you know what, we really want people to grow in the yellow, so maybe we'll lower the per acre cost in the yellow and raise the per acre cost everywhere else. Um, but yes, it'll shock up you well, but when I see that variation by area, I assume that was some of what they were doing or just that was the raw cost. it was I I don't there's certain a ton that we can play with in this on from even from an EDA perspective on encouraging growth in certain areas towns right but I think you're kind of thinking of a zero sum situation there and I'm just mindful or concerned about the 25% no fair and um no matter what your zoning is the cost of getting the front line is the same oh yes I agree so But like you said, the value in it is going to increase if you had like an apartment building, right? And that's where where on one acre of land, if you had a 50-unit apartment building, you might get 300,000 in connection fees, single family homes, you might get, you know, 20,000. So that's where you're you're getting that back. But again, to your point, Bruce, you don't know or John's point, you don't know right now today what is going to be at any given area it's made assumptions based on our comp plan and land use and uh that study but a lot of that can change how do you feel our under this scenario how our fees compare with other communities well John kind of touched on that it's all over the board I think because we have a $30 million treatment plant and we have the need for trunk lines you kind of have to charge what will work for new prag to cover that buildout unless you do want to put some in the back of the taxpayers which is do you raise or lower that 25%. You know, I think that's where you're saying you can play around with that. I think you don't want to have it be too high because then you will price yourself out of the development and I'm cog cognizant of that happening. Um again, we don't have a lot of lots and you know developer hearing $1,000 more per ultimate cost probably that'll get passed down to the homeowner. That's not nothing. That is a thousand dollars. But do we want to have the homeowner pay that or developer pay that or again your rateayers? Righters. So taxpayers. There is a cost for growth. No question about that. Just who is going to pay that? And I would think generally speaking, we'd rather not have homeowner on First Street down the block here pay for the development. um that they could care less one or the other if it's happening. I I get what you what you all said, but are we close to Jordan? Are we under Prair Lake? Are we uh Bell Plains the [snorts] same? Or everybody [clears throat] does it so differently. It's hard to get a a apples to apples comparison is what I'm telling you. Even on building permits, it's hard to get Well, I'm just concerned. that maybe we can talk about later, but if a person's building a house in Jordan in New or Bell Plane or whatever, it how much is the variance between someone buying a building house in New Right. Uh it's been a couple years since we did that exact breakout that you're talking about. We could we could update that and look at that. Um, with this I know I can tell you right now we're going to be $1,000 more per home roughly on average than where we were today before but but I couldn't tell you right now today without running the numbers again how we compare to a Jordan or Bell plane for that single family home but definitely can do that. Sure. And there's other factors too. Their tax rate is higher than ours in some some of the communities around us. So that would be a factor too. And well and their water treatment plant might not be as sophisticated as ours or they might have to build a new one. So they're at a different stage of where they're y but isn't aren't they all med council uh Jordan is I think and Jordan is not Jordan Prior Lake and Shaka PR right is Elco Elco's not Montgomery is not plain's not Montgomery's not we are we have a very mixture and this is that perfect example I know this not you always want to compare yourself to like what is other cities doing but It's really how does it fit New Prague best. And again, I I think anyone can check rates. Our rates are higher than other cities because we already took that leap of replacing our waste treatment plant. I I have a hard time raising rates that we do every year, the 3 to 5% that we are adding on to that to already our our residents that are paying for wastewater and adding a trunk adding not a trunk charge, but adding that on to the rates to pay for these trunks. I have a hard time doing that part of it just with our rates where they're at right now. I mean, that's just my opinion. And again, I think me and Ken talked about this right away. How does this affect a developer coming in? I mean, you never you never want to scare any developments coming in. I think that's where we're working with John and Ken and myself. We This is what we felt like was a really good meshing of all of them. Not saying it can't get tweaked, but I felt like this is a perfect mixture of um you never want to see rate sale go up, but still making sure your trunks are being covered in the future because we are at that point where we there's not a lot of development left that I can feed certain areas. And we are getting to that point where we're almost not maxed though because there are areas that we can feed, but we are getting close to that point where we can't grow anymore. Yeah. and the only way to pay for it would be on the backs of existing taxpayers which I don't think anybody wants to have that happen. I I can share this too. Out of those communities you just mentioned, Bell Plane, Jordan, Montgomery, I believe Bell, I know Bell Plane is expanding that facility. They have a cost. Jordan is also Montgomery needs to, but they are waiting, but they have another cost coming. So when you go do that comparison where I'm really counseling is you got to kind of know where they're at in the terms of their I think what what you made mention you don't know where they're at in terms of that cycle or their permitting or all the other stuff. So I'm not it just is everybody's at a different spot. I think Bruce Rhymer kind of mentioned that at the um presentation for the utility um funds as well that like for water same thing. You don't know who's built the water treatment plant, who hasn't, and how do your rates fall. So, you do need to Yeah, we shouldn't wait till, you know, 18 years again to redo this, but we need to do that every, you know, two to three years probably. Okay, any other questions? Okay. I will make a motion to approve resolution 2520103 adopting an amended official 2025 fee schedule. And I'll second. Okay. I got a motion by Maggie Bass, second by Sean Ryan to adopt resolution 25-12-1-3. Any other comments, questions? If not, all in favor say I. I. Any opposition? Okay. Passes 5-0. Thank you, John. Oh, no. Thanks, John. Uh, who's going to take the next one? Uh, the grant application. Yeah, I'll provide you an overview of that. Um, as uh Chris Kudson mentioned earlier, uh, with the, uh, 2026 CIP project, the application and resolution we need, uh, to make to the, uh, local road improvement program, um, is what we have in front of you here tonight. Um, Commissioner um, Titz did mention that Lassour County approved a supporting resolution as well at their meeting on uh, November 25th, basically supporting that 10th Avenue connects to a county road. Um, and they support any work we would do to slow traffic and provide um, safer route of passage between the state highway and their county road. Um, as Chris said is about a $1.2 million overall cost. We are looking at the grant application to cover approximately 400,000 of that again to cover the roundabout, cover the bumpouts and cover the U RFBs. This could include cost for the median as well, but it has to be related to safety and those types of improvements. We can't just be purely aesthetic. So, um that is where we came up uh with this application. This time we had applied back in 2023 for the full um overlay and uh everything, but uh we're directed to focus on the safety improvements. So that's why we reduced it down to 400,000, but that would cut our local um amount that we'd have to pay. So we're hopeful we can get the 400,000 um or at least most of that. uh we would be grateful for any anything they could offer for this program or through this program as a roadway of regional significance. So look for your support here tonight to get that application turned in. It is open-ended enough um to kind of answer Sean's question of are we locked into one design with this application or not because we don't know where we're going to be with that and the answer is no. we will apply with these three options being considered and however it turns out we will um uh obviously fit the the project with whatever funding we're able to obtain. Okay, any questions for Ken regarding uh doing this grant application? If not, I guess I'll make a motion to approve resolution 25-12-01-04 supporting uh the grant application. Second. I got a second by Rex Syler. Any other questions or comments? All in favor say I. I. I. Any opposition? Okay, it passes 5-0. Thank you. Next, uh Ken, I assume you're going to take care of this one. Uh I will. Josh, one of you to Josh can help me out, too. Unless Josh, you want to take it? Yeah, I'll take it. Two rock, paper, scissors or something. Yeah, [laughter] we could do that. On November 19th, the EDA did hold a public hearing for the um sale of the two remaining lots in the EDA to Aventus Investments LLC, which is a group of local investors including Jake to St. Hubert, Dale Creed Francis, and Austin Revel among others that are included in that uh Inventus Investments LLC um entity. Um they are offering and uh the EDA approved moving forward with a full price uh offer of 225 a square foot for those um lots, which is what we had uh our market study and uh appraisal at. So they are offering full value. They would construct a 30,000 square foot building to house a Guns or Us uh new business entity on lot five, which is closest to Bricks Boat Works. And then um the other lot, lot four, would have a 20,000 foot building uh with a uh tenant uh main tenant being Steelhead Outdoors. It's kind of a safe manufacturer for guns and other uh valuables and homes. The um big lure of their company is that they are uh basically they can be taken down and moved without a moving company in more manageable um components and move from one home to another. They also do built-in home the only American and the only Americanmade as well uh for that. So, um they are currently in Shakapei and would be bringing their employment or their employees down here to New Prague and looking at expanding um into that building and uh the lease agreement that they have would also allow them potentially to um acquire the entire building and um take over the 20,000 square foot but and uh phase one they would be taking uh approximately 50% of that at 10,000 square foot. So per the EDA uh enabling resolution uh any of their actions must be approved uh by the city council and this resolution would approve those actions taken by the EDA so that uh we can move forward with the closing and ultimately the construction of those two buildings on the property and they would have to start construction within one year of the date of the closing which we would anticipate sometime um by February of 2026. six. Okay. Any questions? Yeah. So, what are they actually doing? Um [snorts] what is the business again in the uh one of the two buildings is a 30,000 foot uh warehouse uh for guns us.com which is a new company they're starting up to provide basically uh wholesaling of uh firearms ammunition and other items to local firearm um shops such as 2F byC but they would intend to have that be national u supplier for them uh smaller gun shops and then Um the second building would be for steel head outdoors and another to be determined tenant at 20,000 square feet. So two buildings and um each on a different lot. Does Guns RS are they taking the whole building? They will eventually take the full building. They said upon startup they probably won't need the full 30,000. So there could be another tenant in there. Right. But um not retail though. Or is there uh No, they would not do any retailing. What about a second tenant? Uh, it would be open to any use that would fit within our zoning requirements of the I1 light industrial district. But we do allow some retail certain percentage of a square foot if I remember right. Yeah. Up to 30,000 or uh 30% of a building. Correct. Up to 5,000 square foot maximum for retailing. Yeah. So, Guns R Us, Sean, what I understand is that they will have an online presence. um a large part of their business will be in um purchasing and selling used guns and they will be in FFL. So they will have a federal firearms license to do that legally. Yeah, I'm not opposed to the firearm part of it at all. I'm just trying to think of what other businesses could possibly go in there and um and and I'm just thinking not my personal thoughts, but what some of the other people will with um another gun um another large gun um and potentially secondary and maybe even a third one in the safe area that um just having a large presence with that. I know it's an intentious issue right now. I'm a gun owner, including hunting rifles and shotguns and and uh uh and uh small caliber pistols and whatnot, too. So, I I I I don't have a problem with the this business. I'm just trying to think and I guess it meets all the requirements. My two things that I didn't like of the public meeting is at 7:30 on a Wednesday. Um, and I don't know if that gives enough people time to to share their thoughts, which um is a little bit of a concern for me, but um and I don't how did it prove how did it make the agenda which is online? How it says resolution approving certain actions by the new PREA EDA authority? Yeah, we have the full the full memo and resolutions uh purchase agreements and all related documents are in the packet for the council packet. No, I know, but I'm I it seems a little disingenuous if pe more people might have weighed in with me if they looked at the agenda uh coming out on Friday or over the weekend or on Wednesday um and might have voiced some some thoughts on the issue for me. But it doesn't really say that in the agenda. It just says certain actions. It seems like we're almost trying to hide something. I know guns can be contentious and I again personally I support gun rights, but [clears throat] you might see where if it said we're going to put guns are us in here are going to discuss it, the action is going to be guns are us coming into the industrial complex, right? We might have all heard a little bit more from some people that are against it, you know. No. And I I think I mean as as with most of our stuff, we work with our attorney's office on on drafting a lot of this stuff and it's kind of we we don't try to treat any one use different than any others and so we we treat it the exact same way that any other time the EDA sold land to any others um kind of and how that's gone forward. So I don't remember using the word certain actions. it more usually it was more specific that it was going to be Hunzel Builders or it was going to be uh we're looking at um um what's the other business or whatever. Yeah, that's a good I know every resolution we've had has been the exact same title as it. [clears throat] Yeah, I think uh you know from an EDA standpoint I think it serves the objective of of what we're trying to accomplish, bringing businesses in and with Yeah, I'm not opposed to it at all. I'm just saying. No, but I'm just saying with that steel head, there's going to be what additional 10,000 available. Correct. And we, you know, I think Ken, you mentioned at the EDA meeting that there is always inquiries of something looking for warehouse space, you know, so you know, might serve a dual purpose in in that. No, I agree. But can you see that there is going to be certain people that are anti-gun that might be opposed to something like this? And I just, you know, I wanted to be fully upfront when I'm sure a lot of people didn't know when the public hearing is at 7:30 on a Wednesday andor it just says certain actions by the new Prague Economic instead of saying for the sale of this property or this lot to Guns R Us. But the sale isn't to Guns R. It's to you know what I mean. So let them know what it is. I'm just I'm not opposed to it. I'm for it. I'm going to vote yes for it. I'm just saying I could see a certain percentage of the people that are against it and that that's really not that's not fair to all the people in Industrial Park. We don't advertise, oh why do we need another pump company in New PR? We don't tell people ahead of times, hey, do you guys like pump companies because we have two here already and um you know if they qualify and if they're qualifying buyers, it's there there's certain things that are excluded, but if they're not excluded, we can't again I I agree with you and I'm I'm supportive of gun rights and whatever else. I I have no problem with the business at all. I'm just saying guns are much more contentious of an issue right to the general public than pumps are and and it just seemed a little disingenous to have certain actions and we don't have to argue it anymore. I just wish it would have been a little more clear-cut. there might have been a certain segment of the population that I don't rep that I don't align with that might have wanted to speak at that right that's all I was right but the EDA meetings have been at 7:30 on that morning for years and years the development of the industrial park has taken so long it's another slowmoving train if people are aware um it's not it's not new no matter of fact it's it's the end of the train here so Agree. And nobody's going to care about a pump. Yeah. Place ord place. I'll make a motion to approve resolution 25120105 uh approving certain actions by the new Prague Economic Development Authority. Second. Yeah. I got a motion by Maggie Bass, second by Rick Syler. Any other comments? If not, all in favor say I. I. Any opposition? Okay. Passes. 5-0. General business. We have none. Okay. miscellaneous. Uh just of note, uh we got our annual update from the mosquito control district for the 2025 season. So I had that included in your packet if you would like a little light reading. Okay. Anything else to add, Josh? Uh I have nothing else. Okay. Rick, do you have anything to add? Nothing. Bruce? No. Maggie? No. Sean? I do not. Anyone on the table over there? Doesn't look like it. Mitch, you good? All right, Patrick, you good, too? All right, I guess I'll make a motion to adjurnn. Second. Second by [clears throat] Rick Syler. All in favor of adjournment, say I. I. I. Any opposition? Okay, passes 5-0. Thank you everyone for being so patient with us tonight. Sure. Do is any is this black? They gave me a stamps. I I I only need a stamp because then that way if he freaked