This transcription includes speaker identification based on the context provided. Please note that since the original text did not include timestamps, I have provided them in a sequential format starting from the beginning of the meeting. **[00:00:00] Mayor Mary Supple:** Way, oh, we should get started. Good evening, everyone. I would like to call to order this regular City Council meeting. It is June 25th, 2024, at 7 p.m. If you're able, please rise and join us for the Pledge of Allegiance. Thank you. Next, we'll move on to the Open Forum. If you're watching online and want to call in, you can call into the Open Forum by dialing 1-415-655-0001. Use webinar access code 2631 588 9446 and the password is 1234. For those of you that are here in attendance, please remember to state your name and address and you can write it down and you have three minutes to address the council. Is there anybody online at this point? Okay, so we'll go ahead with the people who are here in attendance. So first, I'd like to call Mary Best if you would like to come forward. Thank you. **[00:01:15] Mary Best:** Good evening. My name is Mary Best. I live— **[00:01:20] Mayor Mary Supple:** Speak into the mic, we can't hear you. **[00:01:22] Mary Best:** I'm Mary Best. I live at 67th and Elliot. I'm here tonight to request that the City Council reject the proposed parking ordinance that will eliminate or reduce parking requirements in all of Richfield. There's no urgency in this issue except perhaps a change in the City Council in November who may have a different view. This proposal includes too many changes that could adversely affect future residences and businesses that have not even been planned yet. I do not believe the City Council or the Planning Commission can divine rules that will cover all future circumstances. Is it not a far wiser course to move ahead with caution and perhaps incremental changes when necessary? Parking, or lack of, is already a contentious issue in Richfield. Ask any apartment resident living in one of our mega-complexes that don't provide enough parking for its own customers, and don't forget their neighbors who have no street parking in front of their houses left for their own use. Elimination or drastically reducing requirements seems premature. Richfield has a variance process already in place that allows for consideration of actual active projects. Variances provide flexibility and allow for exceptions. I know the staff has identified concerns; tonight's proposal does not address them. Staff documented off-street parking issues, access for emergency and maintenance vehicles, sidewalks, boulevards, ADA requirements, and biking issues—none of which are addressed by this ordinance. It seems like the proposed course forward is "wait and see if it's a problem, then we'll look at it." This approach also takes away the responsibility of the city and moves it to the residents to deal with. I've many times driven by the Richfield Post Office; all the parking places are full. I park in the street and go in, and there's no one in the post office. Their response? "I can't do anything about it; they're all enjoying a walk over at Wood Lake." Signs do not always deter people. It may seem far easier to authorize everything than it is to take it back once it does not work. Council Member O'Leary published a paper where he picked existing Richfield businesses claiming that they could not be built today because of our ordinance. Yes, they could. That's why the variance process was developed: to consider exceptions. I point to the new business, Swoop Optical, on the end of 66th and Elliot as a success story. We have a variance process; let's use it wisely. Please reject this proposed ordinance and take another look at what else might work better for Richfield. Thank you. **[00:04:15] Mayor Mary Supple:** Thank you. Next, we have Larry Ernster. **[00:04:20] Larry Ernster:** Good evening. My name is Larry Ernster. I'm at 6727 Elliot. I come here also tonight to request that the City Council reject the proposed parking ordinance that will eliminate or reduce parking restrictions. During this past year, this Council has changed ordinances to eliminate citizen participation and to silence our voices. Some recent examples: First, the City Council rezoned our single-family homes to low density to avoid the variance process. A duplex could have been built on any lot in Richfield with a variance; now no variance is required, and no citizen participation is allowed. Then the City Council eliminated the one-acre minimum for PUDs rather than issue a variance; the city changed the ordinance. Ordinances are rules that both citizens and the city must comply with. Stop changing ordinances to avoid dealing with your citizens. Then the City Council changed the ordinance to allow sacred communities and, I quote, "to avoid a frustrating and pointless public hearing process." In this case, the City Council endorsed first a state statute that home-ruled cities were not required to adopt. And tonight you are considering reducing or eliminating parking restrictions that are also not required by statute, not required by charter or by staff, but initiated by the City Council to eliminate the need for a variance and to further isolate its citizens from the workings of the city. Consider a project on its needs and merits and then conduct a variance if necessary. Tonight, reject the proposed parking reductions. Staff documented off-street parking issues, access for emergency and maintenance vehicles, sidewalks, boulevards, ADA requirements, and biking issues—none of which are addressed by the parking ordinance, only noted as concerns. If this ordinance is implemented, there is no upside to approving this ordinance, only downside. We have the variance process; let's use it. None of the proposed parking changes are urgent or necessary now. I ask the City Council: What is your vision for Richfield? Are you building another mini-Minneapolis? Do you want Richfield to mirror Uptown? Richfield is our urban hometown. Reject the proposed ordinance. Thank you. **[00:07:10] Mayor Mary Supple:** Thank you. Next, we have Kathleen Balaban. **[00:07:15] Kathleen Balaban:** I saw on my speech card that I wanted to talk about records, which I will real quickly. I'm an avid user of data requests from the city, and I recently was informed that I was having problems getting the information I was requesting. According to the statutes, it's public, and I was getting problems getting it—longtime waits. I was recently informed that the city is obligated to give the data request a turnaround time of 10 business days if an employee is asking about their own data. If I'm a citizen asking for data and not an employee, you have no time limits; none are established. So I'm waiting at times months for data that's available. I'm asking this Council to set a time frame that's reasonable according to statute for the turnaround for a citizen. I need to know when I'm going to get this information. So I'm asking that; that's the first question. The second one was the agenda on the police thing that's in here for staff report number 92. This is consistent type of information that I get when I look at this stuff. It goes on and on and on. We're going to do this in 48 hours to 64 hours, 96 to 104 hours. Yeah, it has a COLA of 3%, 8% market adjustment; it's got this, that, and the other thing. And I appreciate the Police Department, I really do. Thank you very much. But what it doesn't say is—this is the part that always catches me and that I think the City Council should be speaking with the staff to correct—it says here all up and down on this agenda: 3% wage increase. We got union workers, we got regular workers, we got this, we got that. It goes into all kinds of projects, and then when it gets down to here, "Financial Impact," you know what it says? "Wage increases as specified above for the different contracts and nominal adjustments to special assessment pay." Where's the dollars and cents, folks? Where's the budget hit? Okay, you guys are going to say yes to this because we need it, but the citizens don't have any data here about how much it's going to cost us, even though they're important to us. This kind of reporting, this kind of agenda-ting, and this kind of lack of documentation keeping the citizens in the dark is questionable at best, actually maybe even a little bit illegal. But more importantly, please do a better job at informing us of what you're doing and how you're doing it. Thank you. **[00:10:10] Mayor Mary Supple:** Thank you. Is there anyone else that wishes to speak that's here present? Is there anyone else that's online? All right, well thank you to everyone who participated in the Open Forum. Next, we'll move on to the approval of the minutes of the City Council work session of May 28th, 2024, the joint Council and Transportation Commission meeting of June 5th, 2024, and the City Council meeting of June 11th, 2024. **[00:10:40] Council Member Sean Hayford Oleary:** Move approval. **[00:10:41] Council Member Sharon Christensen:** Second. **[00:10:42] Mayor Mary Supple:** It's been moved and seconded to approve all three sets of minutes. Are there any comments or questions? All right, all in favor of approving those three sets of minutes please say aye. **[00:10:55] Council Members (In Unison):** Aye. **[00:10:56] Mayor Mary Supple:** All opposed? All right, we've approved those minutes. Next, we have the exciting job of honoring the 2024 Gene and Mary Jacobson Citizen of the Year, and so I'm going to call up Human Rights Commissioner Carol Kelly to present the award and tell us all about our award winner. Thank you. **[00:11:15] Carol Kelly (Human Rights Commission):** Thank you very much, Mayor Supple. Hi, my name is Carol and I am a commissioner on the Richfield Human Rights Commission. This year we've selected an outstanding Citizen of the Year, and we've done so every year since 1971 in honor of Gene and Mary Jacobson and their commitment to our community. This award is given to a person, family, group, organization, or business who lives and works in Richfield and whose actions demonstrate an awareness and commitment to the attitudes and practices that foster human understanding, tolerance, and the spirit of human relations. Excuse me, I want to welcome Kim Jacobson, the son of Gene and Mary, to present this year's award. **[00:12:05] Kim Jacobson:** Madam Mayor, Council members, Chief—thank you for having me again. It's been 10 years since my sister passed away and passed the mantle to me. Gene and Mary were big advocates of the Richfield community. They lived here for 40 years and raised three children. In that time, my dad was heavily involved along with many other council members on the improvements that we now see across Richfield, and my mom was a big advocate of the Richfield Wood Lake Nature Center. I am grateful to be here still, and I'm going to give this award now to Scott Ramsey. **[00:12:55] Scott Ramsey:** Wow, thank you so much. This is quite an honor and very unexpected. I have worked at Wood Lake Nature Center for 28 years, and when Britney had called me to say, "Scott, guess what, you've been nominated for this award and you've won it," I was totally shocked. I was totally taken aback and I said, "Really? What an honor, I'm totally honored. Why? Why did I get it? What does it mean?" And she said, "Well, for all of the service that you've done for the community at Wood Lake Nature Center." And here I always thought I was just doing my job as a public servant. I have tried to open doors and make all of Wood Lake and all of our parks available to everybody—of all abilities, all ages, all genders, all races. To me, there's only one race: the human race. All ethnicities. I try to make people feel very comfortable there, not only students and visitors, but we have a very strong volunteer program there. I've worked with many, many volunteers of all ages, from 12 years old and up. And I must say, at certain times, people of differing abilities have been kind of a challenge, but I always took that challenge up because I really believed that they should be able to offer their abilities and have an input, because everybody is a part of the fabric of our community, and Wood Lake and all of our parks are community institutions. So I want to thank the City of Richfield for supporting all the park system and also, of course, Wood Lake Nature Center. I thank the Human Rights Commission for honoring me with this award. It's very gratifying to be recognized when I just felt it was a part of my job to make everybody feel welcome at Wood Lake, and it was my pleasure to do so. I've loved working there. This is a great city, a great community, and we're only as great as the citizens who come and support it. So thank you so very much. **[00:15:35] Mayor Mary Supple:** We've had a request that if there's anyone here to celebrate Scott's award, if they'd come up front and have a group picture to honor him. And then we probably have a few more words of congratulations. *[Break for photos]* **[00:16:30] Mayor Mary Supple:** Thank you so much to everyone who nominated Mr. Ramsey. I would like a point of personal privilege—since before I retired, I taught at the Richfield Public Schools and there were many days when we were out at Wood Lake Nature Center with Scott. It was a pleasure to watch him with the kids, whether they were out there building shelters and trying to see if they would have survived in the winter if the bus ran off the road and different things like that. He taught them all kinds of things and it was fun. Time after time, you'd always see Scott working with the kids, and so I just think this is a very well-deserved award. So thank you so much for all that you've done over the years, and we wish you well. Is there anybody else that wishes to say anything? All right, thank you again. Next, we would like to welcome Hennepin County Commissioner Debbie Goettel, who is going to present an update on the work being done by Hennepin County. Welcome, Commissioner Goettel. **[00:17:35] Commissioner Debbie Goettel:** Thank you. Am I driving over here or is somebody else over there? I am? Okay, I'll use this. Thank you, Mayor Supple, and thank you, Council members and the city staff here at Richfield. It's always a pleasure to come home; this definitely feels like home. I'm Debbie Goettel, the Hennepin County Commissioner. For those in the general public who are listening, I just want to let people know what the district is: the district is the city of Richfield, Bloomington, Prairie south of Cross Town, and now a small piece of Southwest Minneapolis. That changed after redistricting. You know, while you here at the City Council understand what Hennepin County Commissioners do, a lot of folks don't. Hennepin County kind of flies under the radar despite our far-reaching investments and impact in the dollars that we spend. In Minnesota, Hennepin County is the second largest government after the State of Minnesota, and the largest local government statewide. Seven commissioners make up the board, and they function much like the council does here. We steward $2.7 billion annually for the budget across Human Services, Public Health, Public Safety, Public Works, jails, courts, elections, libraries, and a lot more. Disparity reduction is the driving principle that is embedded in all that the work we do, as well as our budget and how we spend our county dollars. Through our Housing and Redevelopment Authority, the HRA, we also steward considerable investments in housing and economic development. We do this on behalf of 1.3 million diverse residents; that's about one in five Minnesotans who call Hennepin County home. As the second largest government in the state, we can offer considerable weight in advocating for our municipal and local partners for things we want to see passed into state law. Some of the issues are up here, like the Extended Producer Responsibility, Anti-Displacement, the increase in homeless funding, the African American Family Preservation Act, and tenants' rights. We also want to thank the City of Richfield for being a great partner. You share your legislative agenda with us every year, we share ours, and we make sure that we're working together to pass things that help us both. I really want to say thank you for that and thank you for letting us help you, because we all work better together. Affordable housing creation and supports are some of the most important investments we make in increasing the quality of life for all Hennepin County residents. This is a "County Housing First" model. In 2023, we invested $191 million, with this line of business contributing over half of those dollars out of our General Fund. In May and June of this year alone, the County and the HRA board approved funding awards totaling $20.3 million, which will create and preserve 1,600 units of affordable housing in our communities. We're seeing this at a very large scale process; this is really ramping up. These are "first dollars in," which helps developers secure financing for these projects and has a huge impact. And now I want to talk about some really good news. We're also making huge impacts on supporting our unsheltered homeless community. This is the first time you're hearing me say this, right? Because this is the first time we've really seen this: we're helping them attain housing, and numbers are moving in all the right directions. For several months now, in our family shelters, the outflow of people—those being sheltered and finding homes—is exceeding those coming into our shelters. So much so that since January, we have shrunk the total family shelter rooms by more than 40%, closing over 200 units. So that's quite an accomplishment. This is due to our enhanced funding in the 2024 homeless prevention efforts at eviction court and nimble triage of new homeless families with our partner sites and our organizations and our nonprofits. So how do we do this? Each program participant is paired with a case manager who provides holistic supports and resources to help them sustainably secure housing. That same person is throughout the whole process handling all aspects of needs, even other than housing. This has come to a great success that we've had: making sure that they have one point of contact for all their needs. They're handed off but then checked back with; it's always the same person. If they run into an issue after they're homed, they can call back to that same person who will advocate for them. 94% of the individuals housed through this program have yet to return to homelessness; that's stable over one year. In May, we reached a milestone of 1,000 individuals housed. It's quite an accomplishment. With the pandemic in the rearview mirror now, we're still working towards spending down the County's dollars, which was $247 million awarded from the ARPA dollars from the federal government. As of May of this year, more than $173 million has gone out the door to help pay for programming that has helped our residents emerge stronger and more resilient. The remainder is allocated and will be spent by the end of the year; it's already programmed. Regarding our mental health issues around Hennepin County, we're working really hard on many fronts to mitigate and build out the mental health supports across our entire Continuum of Care. We're proud of our police-embedded social worker program. Richfield is intimately involved and was an early adopter from the very beginning—you started with a pilot. Thank you; you folks are very progressive. You were one of our trials. We can always count on you when we want to try something new, so I appreciate that. This has become an essential new response method, serving municipalities now with 45 social workers total. I know you guys share one, too, don't you, with Edina? Now, I believe you have more, so I appreciate that. In 2023 alone, Richfield Police made 187 referrals to the embedded social worker and 54 referrals to other social services. In 2023, we launched a $1.7 million mental health awareness community campaign aimed at normalizing mental health conversations and reducing the stigma through education and connections. The call to "Truly See Mental Health" earned more than 200 million total impressions, ensuring people are reached multiple times in various ways. The "See Mental Health" team participated in 36 community events, engaging more than 8,000 people in person across our county. According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), more than four in ten students feel persistently sad or hopeless; one in three experience poor mental health. Our school-based mental health partnerships are helping to turn this around. This is doing true prevention work. As reported by the MinnPost in January, researchers believe school-based mental health services have resulted in 260 fewer self-reported suicide attempts by Hennepin County students in grades 6 through 12 from 2004 to 2024. I'm proud of that work. We are providing services to 6,600 students yearly, and this program is in every district in every public school in this county. It saddens me to read the papers recently where, in other counties, school districts are actually cutting these programs because of their school budgets. I'm glad we're able to help hold this up; it's very important. Elevate Hennepin is a resource hub. I know that many of you know about this. It's connecting our local entrepreneurs to expert advisers at no cost—yes, these are free services on a wide range of topics—and is just a piece of a broader strategy we're growing to support entrepreneurs and businesses at every stage. Richfield is closely aligned with this program, and thank you for your support in that. Thousands of businesses have used Elevate Hennepin, including more than 2,700 who have accessed over 31,000 hours of no-cost one-on-one consulting or cohort learning opportunities. This translated to 133 businesses having accessed $25 million in financing through our advisor network, impacting over 500 jobs, some in this community. To help augment this work, I'm excited to announce that Hennepin is adding $20 million to our established capital fund that we established in 2021. This will make more financing available to business owners in early 2025. This will leverage direct loans and technical support areas to help businesses across Hennepin County. These are examples of how we're continuing to nurture an idea born out of the pandemic. We're also excited about the Southdale project. It's finally coming to pass after many starts and stops; thank you for your patience. After years of planning, funds were included in the 2024 proposed budget to proceed with new construction. We're proud to say today the Hennepin County Board approved first funds for architectural and engineering services to begin. Construction will begin next year. This is going to be a zero-net-energy building with the extra funds that we added to this project. This is roughly $6.5 million out of $107 million capital investments; this will fund one of the most advanced and visited libraries in our county system. So, congratulations. I know that it's in Edina, but it serves Richfield, and I know Richfield really loves this library and uses it a lot. And now for an Augsburg Park update: You will get a further update from Hennepin County that will be in here soon to talk to you, but it will be closed for planned interior and exterior work beginning Sunday, July 14th, and expected to open early spring in 2025. The project will include new carpet and paint throughout the building, new furniture, interior modifications, upgrades to restrooms and windows, additional studying rooms, and updated meeting rooms. The exterior preservation will have updates to the building infrastructure and stormwater management, some green space, and reconfiguration of the parking lot. So, look forward to hearing more from that from Hennepin County. I want to move on to climate change now for something completely different. It's all about trees. This directly links to our climate change goals and our sequestration goals at Hennepin County. Our goal is to plant 1 million trees by 2030 in collaboration with our local partners. Thank you; you're one of those local partners who takes advantage of this. We estimate that 472,000 trees will have been planted by the end of 2024. Some really great things I want to highlight in the program: Hennepin County just received $10 million in federal forestry funds to remove and replace diseased trees on owner-occupied lower-income housing in federally designated community opportunity zones/census tracts, which include a portion of Richfield. $500,000 is made available annually through our Healthy Tree Canopy grant program to cities, schools, and affordable housing providers and nonprofits. We have a wholesale tree purchasing program and opportunities for cities to take part in that, and the County's first-ever Urban Tree carbon offset sales program just launched in 2023. So lots going on on that side besides our zero-waste initiative. Lastly, in partnership with the Public Works Department here in Richfield—I want to thank Director Kristin Asher—we wanted to include a map and list of some of the future infrastructure projects on the horizon. I won't go through all of them because I know you know them and I know they're up on your website as well as ours. I just want to extend a big thanks for the collaboration between Richfield and Hennepin in making these improvements possible, and I really appreciate the communication. If we drop the ball on something, we can pick it back up. It's a really great communication line with the city here. All these projects are easily found on Hennepin County's website GIS web maps. Finally, I just want to say, Mayor Supple, I want to say a big thanks for all the work that you have done as a city partner with us, and I always look forward to coming home and having these conversations. So I'm happy to stand for any comments or questions. Thank you. **[00:30:15] Mayor Mary Supple:** Thank you so much. Are there any comments or questions that anybody has? Council Member Hayford Oleary. **[00:30:20] Council Member Sean Hayford Oleary:** So, my question and comment—the Penn Avenue project. Of course, since Simon Troutman is not here, I have to say how excited he probably will be since that continues to be a priority for him on the west side, but it's a priority for all of us, of course. Do you know if the project is the entire length or is it only part of the length like the Nicolet project? Will it be all the way from 62 to 77th? **[00:30:45] Commissioner Debbie Goettel:** My understanding is that it’s all the way from Cross Town down through there. They are revisiting that and because of the infrastructure dollars and because of the work at the state level to put in those extra taxes for transportation, that project is likely to move up on the list. One of the other things that I've asked the County to do is—we do scoring, that's how we get these projects up the list—but one of the things that's lacking in the scoring is the infrastructure under the road. We know that there are huge limitations in parts of Penn Avenue to do redevelopment for businesses because of the size of the water line there, and I have asked us as we revisit how we grade projects to look at that as part of that, because that really matters and it really stifles the economic development that we could be doing just because the infrastructure is aged. **[00:31:35] Council Member Sean Hayford Oleary:** And then I also want to say obviously we're grateful for the funding aspect and that's why we really depend on you, of advocating for Richfield making sure these projects are funded. But I also just want to share, having been involved in the public process of street design, how much Hennepin County has improved in the last decade. Hennepin County roads have gone from being the worst roads in the community—not in terms of pavement quality, but in terms of being a wall of fast-moving cars—to actual good main streets. It’s not perfect, but it is so much farther along. It is so much more inclusive of a street design than it ever has been before. I'm seeing that in Minneapolis on Lyndale Avenue; I'm seeing it in Richfield on Nicolet Avenue. Truly the things on 66th Street where we were pushing hard against County staff 10 years ago are now the way they do business as a matter of course. I know it's pressure from electeds that have helped make that change in addition to staff changes. So I'm just so grateful for that because you're truly becoming the best streets in communities like Richfield. **[00:32:35] Commissioner Debbie Goettel:** Well, I'm the one who carried the "Complete and Green Streets" to bring this back to the residents, and it was because the cities were wanting it too. We all came together to make some of those changes. I agree with you; I want safer streets and I definitely want traffic to slow down. We're really working hard to get to that zero fatality, zero injury goal. **[00:32:55] Council Member Sean Hayford Oleary:** One additional comment I will make as you continue to look at improving streets: I do know the cost participation policy of Hennepin County continues to be an issue for us in the City of Richfield. Of course, we're very excited to see these streets come through, but they do come with big bills for the locals. Unfortunately, the way it's worked in the past is that often those features that the County now supports, like protected bike lanes, actually increase the share the city is responsible for. So I would certainly, in general, love to see the County pick up more of the tab, but especially that those good features like pedestrian lighting, trees, and protected bike lanes don't cause a bigger bill for the city than they would with a more conventional approach. **[00:33:40] Commissioner Debbie Goettel:** Well, and that's a conversation that we need to have about the true disparities. When you look at the city of Richfield, it's surrounded by state roads, federal roads, and then a lot of County roads through it—disproportionate to some of the other communities with much larger budgets. We really need to look at this through a new lens, and I think there's opportunities to look at that in the next years. **[00:34:00] Mayor Mary Supple:** Well, first of all, thank you so much for coming and presenting. It was a lot of really great information. I was so thrilled when you said that 94% of the people that you found shelter for are still in shelter and they're not unhoused. That's a remarkable accomplishment, and I appreciate all the support that the County has been giving to help finding secure housing for people because that makes a big difference to everyone involved. I also was very thrilled to hear that you're going to be supporting the school-based mental health services. As a former teacher, I understand how important that is, and I think after the pandemic, there's still a lot of residual trauma going on. Investing in the kids helps people to heal but also prevents problems later on. Finally, the Elevate Hennepin program—I have been hearing wonderful things from our business community. It was really great to see the participation from people here in Richfield in that program. I also would like to lift up the social worker program. Later on in the agenda, we're going to go through one of the items to approve an amended agreement for two full-time senior social workers—one embedded and one on the Alternative Response Team. I really appreciate your leadership because that's a way that we can support the residents of our community and also support our public safety officers. There's a big difference between somebody who's in a mental health crisis and somebody who's, say, robbing a bank. We need to have the resources that are appropriate for each one. **[00:36:10] Commissioner Debbie Goettel:** We're fully supportive of that. We know that besides the police, there are other places with our fire departments and community response folks that we could be working on together more. I did want to add, though—the homeless issue in Richfield, which I see as a growing issue, I'm concerned about it. When I call and talk to dispatch, I find out that people have been out there numerous times. Thank you, Public Safety, for going out there and doing that. Because of that, I'm going to be calling in our homeless team. I saw a family with children that was very disturbing on Penn and Cross Town. If you see folks, I can call a specialty team and they will be out and have contact with those folks every single day until they can get them into services. Let us help you some with the services that we have. Thank you. **[00:37:15] Mayor Mary Supple:** Thank you so much. Next, we'll move on to approval of the agenda. **[00:37:20] Council Member Sean Hayford Oleary:** Move approval. **[00:37:21] Council Member Sharon Christensen:** Second. **[00:37:22] Mayor Mary Supple:** It's been moved and seconded to approve the agenda. Is there any discussion? All in favor of approving the agenda please say aye. **[00:37:28] Council Members (In Unison):** Aye. **[00:37:29] Mayor Mary Supple:** All opposed? All right, we have approved the agenda. Next, we'll move on to the Consent Calendar. City Manager Rodriguez. **[00:37:35] City Manager Katie Rodriguez:** Thank you, Mayor. The Consent Calendar contains several separate items which are acted upon by the City Council in one motion. Once the Consent Calendar has been approved, the individual items and recommended actions have also been approved. On tonight's Consent Calendar: Item A, consider the approval of an amended agreement with Hennepin County for two full-time senior social workers; Item B, consider the approval of an agreement for prosecution services with HJ Law; Item C, consider the adoption of a resolution adopting the Hennepin County All-Hazard Mitigation Plan; Item D, consider a resolution extending ARPA funding contract with VEAP; Item E, consider adoption of a resolution approving a Joint Powers Agreement with the city of Edina for speed limits on shared local streets; Item F, consider adoption of a resolution approving a Memorandum of Understanding with the City of Minneapolis for speed limits on shared local streets; Item G, consider a resolution regarding the Climate Pollution Reduction Grant partnership; Item H, first reading of a transitory ordinance providing funding for certain capital improvements from the Liquor Contribution Special Revenue Fund. I submit these items for your consideration. **[00:39:15] Council Member Sharon Christensen:** So moved. **[00:39:16] Council Member Sean Hayford Oleary:** Second. **[00:39:17] Mayor Mary Supple:** It's been moved and seconded to approve the Consent Calendar. Is there any discussion? I would like to say I was really pleased that Commissioner Goettel happened to be here tonight when we were talking about what the County's doing, because I think this embedded social worker program has been fabulous and I'm really looking forward to the Alternative Response Team. Any other things that anybody would like to discuss? All in favor of approving the Consent Calendar please say aye. **[00:39:45] Council Members (In Unison):** Aye. **[00:39:46] Mayor Mary Supple:** All opposed? All right, we have approved the Consent Calendar. Item 6 is to consider a first reading of an ordinance amendment adjusting parking requirements, and I'm going to turn it over to Council Member Hayford Oleary. **[00:40:00] Council Member Sean Hayford Oleary:** At its April 25th, 2023, work session on policy topic priorities, the Council directed staff to examine parking requirements to address a few longstanding issues. A joint work session was held with the Planning Commission and City Council on February 26th, 2024. The attached ordinance is a result of that direction. In short, the ordinance updates the city parking requirements in a few ways: first, it reduces the requirements for a class 3 restaurant; it creates a requirement for libraries, museums, and art galleries; it expands the Council's flexibility in relation to non-driving populations; and it adjusts the parking requirement for multi-family housing to be consistent across all zoning districts at 1.25. They also note in the staff report that staff from several departments have concerns. While on-street parking is not a problem in theory, there are concerns with the design of some rights-of-way that lead to safety issues, specifically a lack of sidewalks to replace on-street walking/biking space. Staff recommends retaining and expanding the current discretionary language allowing a reduction to 1.25 stalls and including roadway width and orientation as factors to be considered. The other update is to revise the parking maximum for multi-family only. The Planning Commission recommended approval of the ordinance as presented and recommended that the Council consider additional study of the city's sidewalk policy and funding. Staff agrees there is a direct nexus between sidewalks and parking, which is why we continue to recommend that the discretionary language be retained. However, the ordinance reflects the direction provided at the work session by the Planning Commission and does not include this discretionary language. Does staff have anything to add? **[00:42:20] Melissa Poehlman (Community Development Director):** Thank you, Council member. If you'd like, I could address some of the comments that came up earlier as part of the Open Forum just as a matter of clarification. I did want to say that we are not proposing to eliminate any parking requirements. There will still be parking requirements for every use. In terms of variances, there's a lot of confusion. A variance is for a very unique situation; it is specifically stated that it is not for a situation that applies holistically to other similar uses. We would not want to be, nor be allowed by statute, to consider a variance related to parking on each and every multi-family development. We want to set standards that apply to our developments in general. Truly unique circumstances—not for each and every application. That is a very common misconception. And one other thing: the Council's goal is to create an environment that fosters affordable housing and a clear development process. Uncertainty in the development process increases costs for developers and often the city. It actually discourages development. We want to set standards that are generally applicable throughout the community. **[00:44:00] Council Member Sean Hayford Oleary:** I'm a little bit confused about the comments about discretionary language because what is proposed before us is a minimum of 1.25, which is already common throughout the community in mixed-use districts, I believe. Is it staff's preference that it be 1.5 but you have these additional considerations? **[00:44:20] Melissa Poehlman:** Thank you for the question. Staff's preference would be that right now in the MR2 district, the requirement is two stalls per unit with a reduction to 1.5. In the higher density MR3, it is 1.5 with a reduction to 1.25. Staff's preference would be that we would be consistent at the 1.5 with the reduction to 1.25, so long as factors would warrant—so there weren't things like abnormally narrow streets or building orientations that would make it difficult to plow snow. **[00:45:00] Council Member Sean Hayford Oleary:** I want to hear more about the concerns. To me, it seems like the tail wagging the dog to try to address this through land-use policy as opposed to the rules of parking on the street, which we can enforce and sign for. I'm also particularly confused why we'd want a higher requirement for MR2 and MR3 than we do for mixed-use when they seem pretty similar. The vast majority of sites likely to turn over to higher density are already in this 1.25 mixed-use zone. What would be the basis of wanting more parking specifically for this one type of multi-family? **[00:45:40] Melissa Poehlman:** The thinking here is that when you have the mix of commercial, those commercial are going to turn over at a different time than you would need them for the multi-family, so it would free up some additional space. That's the thinking behind it. **[00:45:55] Council Member Sean Hayford Oleary:** But we do have plenty of stand-alone mixed-use buildings that are just residential in that zone, correct? For example, all the stuff around 64th and Lyndale, like the Henley or the Riley? **[00:46:10] Melissa Poehlman:** I would have to go back and look at exactly what those ratios were. Regarding the Henley and the Riley—those are actually spots where we do have some trouble in the winter where the road is a little more narrow. We have had to put restrictions. Speaking for Public Works, Public Safety, and Fire service, that's a lot of staff time on the back end to try to figure that out. I think their preference would have been if we could have said, "This is a narrow road, let's think about how we want to apply a 1.25." **[00:46:55] Mayor Mary Supple:** I had a question on the staff report here. It says the recommendation was to revise the parking maximum for multi-family only to ensure the flexibility needed to secure funding. Can you explain what that concern is about the maximum and how it interplays with funding? **[00:47:15] Melissa Poehlman:** Thank you for the question. By reducing the parking minimum, our parking maximums are set based on a percentage. We are concerned that there could be cases where a development could not get to 1.5, which we have run into where financing or underwriting has required at least 1.5 stalls for that development to get funded. We're trying to make sure that there is still the flexibility in our maximums to allow a project to get there if needed. **[00:47:50] Mayor Mary Supple:** I think I would be in support of making sure we have maximums that allow that flexibility. I also would like to hear more about what the concerns were from the other departments, which is why I'm going to be asking that we postpone the discussion just so that we have more time and all council members present. I do like the idea of being able to have some discretion and not locking ourselves in. I'd like more information and discussion about that proposal. So, Council Member Christensen, did you have any questions? **[00:48:30] Council Member Sharon Christensen:** No, I do agree with the request for postponing to make sure that all the council members be fully aware of what the proposal is. **[00:48:40] Mayor Mary Supple:** At this point, I would like to move that we postpone discussion of this item time certain to the next meeting. **[00:48:50] Council Member Sharon Christensen:** Second. **[00:48:51] Mayor Mary Supple:** It's been moved and seconded. Any discussion? **[00:48:55] Council Member Sean Hayford Oleary:** I don't feel super strongly. I think this is the first reading, I'm not clear what we're going to accomplish with that, but since there is some controversy here, I think it's fine. I really appreciated Director Poehlman's response about reducing bias by having clear standards, and that's part of the reason why I don't want to see us go back on this discretionary language. It is clearer and more legally defensible when we have clear standards and we limit the amount of "squishy" decision-making. People have perceptions about those people who are going to live there or leave their cars in the street. As much as we can set clear, fair rules, the better decision-making we have. **[00:49:50] Mayor Mary Supple:** Thank you. One other staff request: is it possible to have two sets of alternate language so we can compare one which would include the discretion and one which is the current language? Also, it would be helpful to clearly show where the MR2 and MR3 areas are versus the mixed-use areas on a map. **[00:50:15] Melissa Poehlman:** Mayor Supple, we can prepare a second version of the ordinance and a zoning map for that. **[00:50:25] Mayor Mary Supple:** All in favor of postponement please say aye. **[00:50:28] Council Members (In Unison):** Aye. **[00:50:29] Mayor Mary Supple:** All opposed? All right, we've postponed action on this item until our next meeting. Next, we'll move on to Item 7, which is the summary of the City Manager's annual performance evaluation. Each year the City Council conducts a review of the City Manager's performance. On behalf of the full Council, this is a summary: We believe that City Manager Rodriguez has been doing a great job. We appreciate her communication, responsiveness, and commitment to equity as she coordinated several complex projects like the compensation and classification study, Charter amendments, speed limit changes, and our legislative agenda. We support her continued focus on the Strategic Plan and work to strengthen internal organizational infrastructure. At this time, I would like to move to approve the resolution amending the City Manager's employment agreement with the city reflecting a salary adjustment. **[00:51:35] Council Member Sharon Christensen:** Second. **[00:51:36] Mayor Mary Supple:** It's been moved and seconded. All in favor please say aye. **[00:51:40] Council Members (In Unison):** Aye. **[00:51:41] Mayor Mary Supple:** All opposed? And we have approved the resolution. Thank you. Next, we'll move on to Item 8, consider the adoption of a resolution approving the contract with Law Enforcement Labor Services (LELS) for the period of January 1st, 2024 through December 31st, 2025. Council Member Christensen. **[00:52:00] Council Member Sharon Christensen:** Yes, thank you, Mayor. The city staff has completed labor negotiations with Law Enforcement Labor Services. The provisions of the two-year contract provide the following: increase in vacation sell-back from 48 to 64 hours; increase total annual holiday leave from 96 to 104 hours for the additional Juneteenth holiday; include the same employer-provided health and dental insurance contributions as given to the non-represented employee groups; increase the monthly payment for those employees in special assignments from $275 to $300 a month; adjusting the special pay for K9 handlers; and wage adjustments to include a 3% COLA and an 8% market adjustment in 2024, and a 3% COLA and a 1% market adjustment in 2025. In order to reduce the step increases, the starting steps were increased by a greater percentage. Does the staff wish to enter anything else? **[00:53:15] City Manager Katie Rodriguez:** I do. We had always planned tonight to share the dollar impact of the contract. I wanted to remind everyone that we did a very high-level estimate months ago. When we estimated the officers' salaries as part of that decision, we estimated it would be about a $300,000 increase over the budgeted 3%. We calculated that for 2024, it would be an additional $50,000; however, there have been vacancies, so that mostly erases that. The impact for 2025 we estimate to be $285,000. I really feel like this contract will help us with recruitment and retention. I want to thank the negotiating team and Sack Thongvanh for all his work. **[00:54:20] Sack Thongvanh (Assistant City Manager):** Mayor, Council members, I just wanted to take this opportunity to thank LELS, also their business agent and the officer stewards. Ten years ago, you might have seen four or five openings for police officers on the league site; now you'll have seven or eight pages of openings throughout Minnesota. One of the things that I think the city of Richfield is a little sheltered from is the professional environment that Chief Henthorne has developed here. I also wanted to take this opportunity to thank our HR manager, Jamie Haefner, who was also involved in this process. **[00:55:10] Mayor Mary Supple:** Thank you. Is there a motion? **[00:55:15] Council Member Sharon Christensen:** I move to adopt a resolution approving the provisions of the 2024-2025 labor agreement with the LELS bargaining unit and authorize the City Manager to execute the agreement. **[00:55:30] Council Member Sean Hayford Oleary:** Second. **[00:55:31] Mayor Mary Supple:** It's been moved and seconded. Any further discussion? All in favor please say aye. **[00:55:36] Council Members (In Unison):** Aye. **[00:55:37] Mayor Mary Supple:** All opposed? All right, we have passed the motion. Next, we'll move on to the City Manager's report. **[00:55:42] City Manager Katie Rodriguez:** My only report is to thank you for your feedback and your commitment to continued improvements for the residents of Richfield. That's all I have tonight. Thanks. **[00:55:50] Mayor Mary Supple:** Thank you. Next, we'll move on to claims and payroll. **[00:55:55] Council Member Sean Hayford Oleary:** Move approval of claims and payroll. **[00:55:57] Council Member Sharon Christensen:** Second. **[00:55:58] Mayor Mary Supple:** It's been moved and seconded. All in favor please say aye. **[00:56:02] Council Members (In Unison):** Aye. **[00:56:03] Mayor Mary Supple:** All opposed? All right, we have approved claims and payroll. Next, we'll move to Hats Off to Hometown Hits. Council Member Christensen. **[00:56:10] Council Member Sharon Christensen:** I'd like to give a hats off to the Richfield History Center. This Saturday, June 29th, at 1 p.m., there will be "Quick Steps Baseball"—an exhibition game with 1860s rules. **[00:56:30] Council Member Sean Hayford Oleary:** I wanted to recognize that today is June 25th, and "Richfield Drives 25" starts today. Thanks to the Public Works staff and Public Safety for making this happen. I also want to thank the Richfield Fourth of July Committee for their work—it's so hard to get a tradition like that re-established and they've been putting in the hours. **[00:57:00] Mayor Mary Supple:** You've stolen my thunder because those were the two items I was going to talk about! But I did want to point out that if you want to get one of these yard signs, you can go to the Community Center to pick them up Monday through Friday from 8:30 to 5:00. I also want to thank the Fourth of July Committee; I believe they're still looking for volunteers. Also, a reminder that the parade this year is not on 66th Street—it is on 70th from Harriet Avenue to 12th Avenue. If there's no further business, I would entertain a motion to adjourn. **[00:57:40] Council Member Sean Hayford Oleary:** Move adjournment. **[00:57:41] Council Member Sharon Christensen:** Second. **[00:57:42] Mayor Mary Supple:** All in favor please say aye. **[00:57:45] Council Members (In Unison):** Aye. **[00:57:46] Mayor Mary Supple:** All opposed? Meeting adjourned.