All right. Good evening. Uh this is the June 18th, 2025 Cottage Grove City Council meeting which I'm calling to order. Um I have something to two things to read at the very beginning here. One is uh this meeting is being recorded by True Lens Community Community Media. You can view uh city meetings live and replay them on cable channel 799. Meetings are also streamed live and archived at the City of Cottage Groves YouTube channel. So, I wanted to mention that real quick uh for everybody. The other thing I want to do this evening before we uh uh get the meeting rolling is as I think it's only fitting by the way that out in the out in the entryway out there, you can see if everybody were to look behind you, you can see we've uh got a bunch of police officers here this evening. And uh we had a very unfortunate event uh this weekend uh where uh there was some shootings of some elected officials uh within uh the state of Minnesota. And I thought it would be appropriate first of all to thank our uh officers out there. Some of them may have been out searching for the the perpetrator. Uh but also the ones that were making sure that all of us were safe um as electives because that who knew, right? We didn't have a list. But I did want to do a moment of silence. Uh if you would uh join me in that for Melissa and Mark Hortman who obviously lost their lives. Uh she was speaker of the house. And then John and I bet Hoffman who are still recovering. Uh but thank goodness it appears that they're going to successfully recover from the uh the multiple gunshot wounds that they had from this individual. Um so if you would join me in a moment of silence uh where we remember these uh individuals Okay, thank you. Uh, next on our agenda is roll call. Uh, Tammy, will you please do the roll? Oh. Oh, who's doing it? Oh, I'm sorry. Look at I jumped all the way down to the next thing. I'm sorry. We're going to do the pledge of allegiance. So, please rise. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. That's what I get for changing things up at the beginning. Right now, uh Tammy will do the roll call. Council member Clawson here. Council member Olsen here. Council member Theiti here. Council member Garza here. Mayor Bailey here. Uh next on our agenda is open forum. Uh this is the opportunity for anybody who wants to speak on something that's not on tonight's agenda is welcome to do so. We did have a signup sheet out in the entryway and no one did sign up. So in the case that says somebody came in and missed the signup, is there anybody that would like to speak during open forum? All right, seeing none, we'll go ahead and close open forum and council. I'll move to number five, which is adoption of the agenda. Move the agenda. I'll second. All right, we have a motion by council member Theiti, second by council member Garza. All those in favor signify by saying I. I. I. Opposed. Motion carries. Now we're going to move to six, which is presentations. We have two this evening. A very special one at the very beginning here. Uh A is the sergeant promotion swearing in and badge pinning of officer Matt Sorgard. And that is why we've got many many out there. So if you want to come in, you guys can come in. And council will go down in the front uh along with Jennifer, our administrator, who will be doing the swearing in. and I'll turn it over to Pete. [Music] All right. Well, good evening, honorable mayor and councel. Um, this is a exciting night. I apologize. We have a lot of our SWAT people in from our practical, so there's a lot of sweat. It's a little warm out at our practical tonight. So, no one in particular back there. So, but with that, um, this evening we will formally recognize Matt Sorgard as we celebrate his promotion to police sergeant. Matt will serve as a frontline leader, directly engaging with our community and modeling our organizational core values of empathy, accountability, trust, and transparency, just to name a few. We're proud to promote Matt to the rank of sergeant. The leadership team supports this decision and we are confident that his transition in a leadership team will be a valuable addition as we continue to grow and evolve as a progressive and resilient organization. In a moment, city administrator Jennifer Levit will administer Matt's oath. Um, prior to that, I'm going to read a short bio. I had Matt put it together, so I bear with me. It's even stapled Matt, but um, it's actually the font I had to increase it. So I did I did kind of add lib on this Matt just to warn you up front. So but u Matt grew up in the area of Maple and Oakdale but now calls Cottage Grove his home. U when I did ask him do his u bio what I thought was interesting. None of his career things were listed first. He honestly did uh right away he was quick to list his wife Jesse and his two children Hadley and Mason his chocolate lab Kota and of course his canine partner Odin. Um I don't know what the list was. It could have been it could have been the Kota could have been number one. I don't know, but he did list his whole family as as his priority. So, um Matt did have a life outside of law enforcement before he worked in the banking um industry. So, that's where he got a lot of his uh customer service. Um he has his bachelor's degree from Metropolitan State University. Started um his law enforcement career as a volunteer with the reserve as a reserve with the city of North St. Paul. I know that's when I first met you, Matt, when you're hanging out with some of those officers. We hired him nine years ago already with Cottage Grove. In that time, Matt's been involved in a lot. Um, he was a explore adviser, did the compliance checks, both alcohol, tobacco, drug recognition expert, SWAT team member, field training officer, use of force instructor, and most currently or his most current role is um a cana handler to Odin and he will still have Odin with him. So, um there won't be any changes to that. Outside of work, Matt is um him and his wife do a lot of running and the kids to sports. He likes to find random projects. I agree, Jesse. those aren't necessary. He just does them to to keep busy, right? So, and he has a lot of just excuses to get down to Menards. So, um that's not bad. But, uh when he's not doing that, he likes to play softball with his friends, golfing, does a lot of yard work, and enjoys training with Odin. So, pinning his badge a moment via his daughter Hadley with the um supervision of his son Mason. So, with that, I will turn over to city administrator Levit. All right, please raise your right hand and repeat after me. I state your name. I, Matthew Ellisard, do solemnly swear do solemnly swear that I will support the Constitution of the United States that I will support the Constitution of the United States and of the State of Minnesota and of the State of Minnesota and faithfully discharge the duties and faithfully discharge the duties of the position of police sergeant of the position of police sergeant for the city of Cottage Grove for the city of Cottage Grove in the county of Washington and the county of Washington and state of Minnesota and state of Minnesota to the best of my judgment and ability to the best of my judgment and ability. So help me God. So help me God. Congratulations. Yep. And with that, we'll have Adley come up with Mason. That's what you practice for, right? That was We need to get a picture. You guys want to come up? The whole family. Yeah. That was better than any character. You guys kind of want act right over here if you Perfect. Thank you. One of the other [Music] try to see you guys. Oh my gosh. Yeah, you're okay. Thank you. Thanks for coming. Was it? All right. Uh we'll move on to B, which is it's that time of year. We don't have to have Dave scream at us now. Um Strawberry Festival presentation this evening. And our communications manager, uh Phil Jent, is going to walk us through some of the festivities that are going to be happening as early if depending on when you're watching this, as early as tomorrow. That's correct. Uh, honorable mayor, u, council members, uh, good evening. My name is Phil Jent, the city's communications manager. That's a terribly tough act to follow. I will do my best. I will not succeed, but I will do my best to follow that. Uh, as you, as stated, honorable mayor, uh, depending on when you're watching this or viewing this, Strawberry Fest does begin uh, tomorrow, which is incredibly exciting. But first and foremost, uh, I do want to thank the Strawberry Fest volunteer committee. untold hours of volunteer time goes into this incredible event and we are thankful for everyone's contributions. Something like this does not happen on accident. Uh it involves a lot of work, a lot of sweat, a lot of time uh many uh of which from volunteers. So just want to state that and thank them for that. So Strawberry Fest does start tomorrow and runs through Sunday. The main events very exciting. Uh new this year is the drone show. I believe council member Theiti may have an exciting update on that front. I won't go into details there, but nevertheless, the drone show on Friday night is very exciting. And then the parade is Saturday at 10:00 a.m. Uh, keep an eye out for our friend uh renowned folk artist Eric Dowel is joining us for Strawberry Fest and I believe will be joining Mayor Bailey in the parade which is very exciting with me. Uh, the Mega Jump motivational experience is on Saturday from noon to 3. as I understand it, a high energy mobile jump show, which if the pictures do it any justice, looks very fun to look at. Uh, and then of course the fireworks on Saturday evening at 10:30 p.m. Carnival will be open Thursday through Sunday. And then of course the Strawberry Fest buttons are for sale. Uh, they are $5 each. Um, and I'm to understand there's a lot of really great prizes this year. The drawing will take place on June 23rd following the coronation and I'm told that you do not need to be pres present to win um that that drawing. Buttons are for sale at the Cottage Grove Public Safety Department, Old National Bank in St. Paul Park, and uh from one of the 11 uh ambassador candidates. Uh any event with live music is aokay in my book. Uh so bands that are happening at Strawberry Fest throughout the weekend. Uh basic and boring will be playing the family night on Thursday and some may remember that band from last year's food truck festival. So we're very excited to bring them back to Cottage Grove. Uh on Friday we have Double Down from 5:00 to 7:00 p.m. Closing it out on Friday night as Ruff House. And then on Saturday, Jonah and the Whales and them pesky kids uh closing things out on Saturday night. Other events, I won't read them all, but you see them before you. Uh very fun and great stuff happening throughout the rest of the festival. The long list of ongoing events uh has everything from car and pet a car and pet show to uh demonstrations from our very own public safety staff, just to name a couple. The full list of events is at cottaggrovestrawberryfest.com/events. And then last and certainly not least, I would be remiss not to talk about Discover Cottage Grove. Uh DCG will have a booth at the Strawberry Fields Marketplace this year. And as I mentioned, uh renowned folk artist Eric Dowel. Uh we we launched a bring a friend campaign for Strawberry Fest this year just to encourage people who maybe haven't been to Strawberry Fest in a long time. uh people who live here who have some friends who want to come in from out of town to enjoy the festivities. So why not bring our own friend? So we decided to bring Eric Dowel back uh for Saturday. So Saturday, June 21st, uh he'll be there to uh sell puzzles, sign puzzles, take selfies, and meet folks uh at our booth. Uh as I mentioned also, he's going to be in the parade on Saturday. And then we'll be showcasing uh all of our 115 coloring contest submissions. Uh myself and our staff uh put together the coloring contest for Strawberry Fest this year and I would have been happy with 30, 40 or 50 submissions and we got 115 almost all of which happened on the last day of the submission which is pretty wild and fun. And so all of those will be on display in a binder and four of the finalists slash call them winners uh will also be prominently displayed there with Eric Dole. And then we'll be giving away uh freebies for uh folks who come by the Discover Cottage Grove booth. We'll have drawstring backpacks, visitor guides, uh Discover Cottage Grove beach balls cups, and a flyer for the upcoming food festival. That's all I've got. Council member Theiti, I don't know if I stole your thunder, so I figured he would. Go ahead. If I missed anything, please by all means fill in the blanks. Thank you. No, I'm just going to enhance some of the things that you that you said. Uh you know, one of the things as uh as you had had positioned in terms of the the drone show we got the the whole design, you know, they take that they they make this whole design kind of the CAD system and they you got it on the screen and and so forth. And we found out it's it's it's uh we uh it was going to be a hund drone show. Okay. But we found out that they went ahead and and it's going to be 200 drones. So that is at 10:30 on Saturday night. So if you got to take a nap, take a nap. But uh you know, so you can stay up and watch us because it's going to be really neat. And uh some of the other things I'll mention is uh you know, buttons. I forgot to wear mine tonight, but mayor mayor has his on. And one of the new things we're doing this year is that different food vendors are giving discounts if you have your button. So people go out and get your button. And you also as uh as was shown that that uh there's a lot of different prizes in that uh with the with the button raffle and such. So that's fantastic. Um the Strawberry Fest uh Strawberry Fields Marketplace again uh this year we we we had to start turning people away because we we'd gotten to about 110 booths and and uh we just have so much room that uh that we can can uh can have them use out there. So uh it's going to be fantastic. you know, we we had uh I was very involved in in that when we, you know, 10 15 years ago and everything and and so forth and and it's actually just blossomed. We instead of calling it just a bis business expo, we we changed it to Strawberry Fields Marketplace to to really try to to get it to be more of a craft thing and things like that besides otherformational booths and and so forth and and that's been fantastic. Um, also again, uh, on Saturday night is the is the fireworks at again at 10:30. So, if you got to take a nap, take a nap. But, uh, you know, be out there for the for the fireworks. Uh, it looks like, you know, the weather is going to be good, but it's going to be hot and muggy, you know, so make sure you bring enough uh, water to hydrate and everything else. But, uh, it's it's it's going to be a fantastic fantastic time. Let's see what else was I going to mention. Oh, and um tomorrow is actually the the family night and so forth. And so there's other attractions and activities, you know, really kind of focused on families. Uh we've got the uh uh the uh tractor, the pedal tractor pullback, uh which is always uh something that the kids really like. And uh you know, we've got work workshop, wood shop crafts where you can come out there and and the Lions Club will help you actually make a birdhouse and so forth. Uh it uh so that's going to be a lot of fun. And uh food vendors, again, food vendors, we had to turn away food vendors, too, because we had uh filled up. So the the parking lot's going to be full of food vendors. And uh uh what more can I say? It's just going to be a a fantastic time. So, uh, be there, be square. That's for sure. There you go. And the only other I will say one more thing just because I thought was pretty awesome. I don't know in the I don't know if the public is aware, but uh we have our ambassador program here in Cottage Grove. Right. Good point. And um there's a lot of communities unfortunately that their ambassador programs are going away or be being suspended because there's nobody actually wanting to come out for those particular events. One that I I heard of recently is Redwing uh is not going to have an ambassador or a a program where they represent the city. And I didn't remember the final number. What was the final number of of people that we have this year? 11. So we have 11 uh people vying for uh to represent Cottage Grove over the next year. Two young male and female and two young men this year for the first time, which is pretty amazing. So, got a chance to meet them this last week uh during the kickoff dinner uh in uh auction that they did which was absolutely fantastic. So, I think we're going to be we've been well represented this past year by the current ambassadors. We're going to be whoever gets it, I can tell you we're going to be uh very well represented as a community in the future. So, and they're all selling buttons right now. Yeah, they're all selling buttons. So, if you need a button for the stuff, go ahead and get them. Button. Button. Who's got the button? There we go. There we go. All right. Anything else? Good. Good. All right. Thank you, Phil, for uh sharing that. And I just say uh get out there, enjoy this great weekend. It's all about Cottage Grove. Bring a friend and come up to me, say hi when you're there. Um or one of the council members. We'd love to uh love to chat. Okay. Uh next on our uh uh our agenda is consent. Uh which is number seven. Uh is there anything council would like to pull on consent? Council member R, please. Okay. R. Anything else? All right. So then I guess I'll kick it right to you. Uh, Council Member Olsen, R is a planning commission appointment. That's correct. We did have a opening on the Cottage Grove uh planning commission. As many of you know, we have several volunteer advisory commissions to the city council that uh are um staffed by volunteers from the community who want to give back and um provide advice to us as a council whether it's about parks and recreation, uh historic preservation, planning, public services and so on. Uh it just so happens this year um I am the liaison to the planning commission and we did have uh an opportunity for a new member to potentially join. So I did interviews with two very very good candidates this last week and uh I want to thank John Steekman and Casey Thompson for putting their names forward as uh potential planning commissioners. It was a tough decision, but um I did select John Steekman for this appointment and I would just ask that my council colleagues take that under advisement. John has been a longtime resident of the city of Cottage Grove. Uh he has a lot of good experience working with cities because he does work for the city of St. Paul as an attorney as well. So, he's kind of seen the world from both sides uh as a resident and and somebody who works for a community. Very level-headed guy. um very knowledgeable about the things that uh we've got going on in the community and he's definitely got his finger on the pulse. So, I would ask for your consideration to appoint John to the open planning commission slot and certainly we're going to continue to work with Casey to find a good spot for him too because uh both interviews were just wonderful. That's all I've got, Mayor. Fantastic. All right. Since uh no no other items were pulled off consent, I'll look for a motion to approve. Move to approve consent. All right, we have a motion by council member Olson. Do I have a second? Second. Second by council member Clawson. Any further discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor signify by saying I. I. Opposed. Motion carries. So, if you're watching or hear anything that's on uh tonight's consent agenda, they have all been approved. Uh number eight is approved dispersement. 8A is to pay the bills. I move to pay the bills. Second. We have a motion by council member Garza, seconded by council member Theiti. Any other discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor signify by saying I. I. I. Opposed. Motion carries. Number nine is a public hearing, which we actually have one this evening. Uh A is the Mississippi Landing first edition edition easement vacation, and Emily Schmidz, our community development director, is going to walk us through this fairly simple one. Right. Good evening, Mayor Council. Uh simple easement vacation. Uh typically with our developments where we have several different additions, there's always an outlot that's platted um that is for lack of a better way to put it held for that next edition when those lots are platted over that. Um so Mississippi Landing first edition uh was approved by you council uh back in 2024, May 1st of 2024. Um and now you have seen uh the second edition come before you which you approved uh in April 2nd, 2025. However, uh a a DNU easement exists over outlot I uh which is a part of uh the phase 2 of the Mississippi landing. In order to record those lots over that outlot, we do need to vacate that drainage and utility easement that allowed us to have access if we needed it to potential utilities or storm water before those lots would have been platted. So in an effort uh to allow that developer to record that plat this evening uh the recommendation is to hold that public hearing and vacate that drainage and utility easement that is existing over outlot I um I will stand for any questions if you do have them. Any questions council on this one? Pretty simple. Pretty simple. All right. I will go ahead be official. I'll open the public hearing. Is there anybody here that would like to speak on this item? Seeing none I will go ahead and close the public hearing. and council. You can see number two on the screen if you want to whoever wants to take it. Um I'll move to adopt resolution 2025-088 vacating rescending terminating and releasing certain easements over outlaw I in Mississippi do Mississippi Landing first edition. All right. So I have a motion by council member Clson. Do I have a second? Second. Second by council member Thei. Any further discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor signify by saying I. I opposed. Motion carries. Thank you, Emily. Uh, next is 10 is bid awards. Uh, we do have a couple this evening. The first one is a is the intermediate zone water treatment plant bid award and Ryan Berine, our public works director, is going to take us on this one. Thank you, Mayor, members of the council. Um so tonight uh first we have the intermediate zone water treatment plant uh bid award. We took bids on this a few weeks ago. Um this was a big day for the city. Uh we've been working on this plant I mean really at some level since 2017 when the first kind of PAS situation really boiled up in Cottage Grove. We started looking at concept planning long-term planning on how to address this issue. And through the entire conceptual drinking water supply plan from 2018 to 2021 we were working with the state on this. and then going all the way through design. So, this is almost eight years in the making um from lots of staff at the city. So, it was a big effort and uh very exciting to take bids. Um in terms of the uh the bid results, so uh we had really good bidding on the project. You can see all three bids are underneath our engineers estimate. Um I will say these are interesting projects to um to look at and try to estimate. Um there is no one single plant that's going to match it. that the processes are similar to our low zone treatment plant, but it's different. It's different in how it's going to treat the water and do its work. So, um we hired our designer to do a really good um very thorough estimate. Obviously, the market's very volatile right now with uh tariffs and such. So, um there was a little bit of unknowns and that's why our estimate was as you saw it. I think we were also helped by there was a third bidder that came into the process um pretty late due to some changes in a different large treatment plant project um that didn't move ahead in a different community. Um so also we had an additional bidder who was very hungry for work um that I think made everyone else sharpen their pencils a little bit as well. So I will say the low bidder rice lake construction group uh they did do the low zone treatment plant. They also did several of our temporary treatment plants. So, we've had very good luck with them and um they have a long track record of delivering projects like this. So, uh no concerns with their performance or working on this project. And with that, uh the recommendations in front of you and I will stand for questions. Council, any questions? Council, any questions on this one? Sure. All right. Glad to see Well, the bids obviously is going to benefit the the settlement money obviously uh for other cities. So, it's very very uh quite amazing to see that it came in as low as it did versus the estimates uh from the engineer. So, all right. Uh with that, uh who would like to take the motion in a second on the on the screen? Mayor, I'll move to adopt resolution 2025-084 awarding the intermediate zone water treatment plant project for the base bid and alternate one to Rice Lake Construction Group in the total amount of a big number, right? um $90,135,600. All right. So, I have a motion by council member Olsson. Do I have a second? I'll second. Second by council member Garza. All those in favor at this point signify by saying I. I opposed. Motion carries. And then B is another bid award, which is the 2025 sewer lining bid award. And Ryan, you're taking this one, too. That is correct. So, for this project, mayor and council, we uh took bids last week. Um and this project uh is a lining of a sewer um that runs uh roughly from the intersection of Inwood Avenue and East Point Douglas Road. Um and then through that commercial area, it actually goes through a city controlled easement, a pretty large one, 50 ft wide following their roadway down south to where the the Northern Jamaica roundabout is under Jamaica Avenue and then underneath Highway 61 ending in the dog park. So very critical piece of infrastructure. It's an 18-inch concrete pipe. It's actually, you know, basically original to the city when we started having sewer. So, it's very old. And we identified this as a key item uh several years ago to do a sewer lining. It's it really puts a whole new pipe inside of that concrete pipe. We couldn't do it with the Jamaica and East Point Douglas project for a variety of reasons. Those impacts would not correlate. So, we had to do it after. Um, and it's actually a project where typically you try to televise this pipe first to see the condition. the costs are so most of this cost is bypass pumping this pipe. So it made no sense to do that work to see is it is it fine? Can it get 10 more years? I mean we have a pipe that's you know approaching 60 70 years old. So um we're going to do that work and it'll have a whole new life cycle for that pipe. So um that's why we're doing it all in one shot. The bypass pumping and and um installing it. Um you can see the bids uh came in well um two two bidders and the low bidder was just under engineers estimate. Um so we're happy with that. Um overall I should mention it's it's not a very impactful project. That's why we're okay with doing it after last year's uh or the two years worth of projects. Um it's really all underground work. You know the main thing is is our our access point for the manhole is in the driveway between Merchants Bank and B or um Subway. So, we do have to close that driveway access for about, you know, 3 weeks or so while the project's done. Um, but we have the legal right to do that. We have worked with all the property owners. We notified them of what's going to happen. That'll probably be late August, you know, into this fall when they'll do the work. And there's two other ways into that development commercial area, right? So, there's really no major impacts. Um, everything else will be a variety of kind of driveover ramps and things like that. So, it's pretty interesting where you actually see an 18-inch pipe on the ground that temporarily bypasses um this work and then we'll actually be directionally drilling it underneath the roundabout. So, we obviously didn't want to close the Jamaica roundabout to bypass pump sewage across it. So, we're actually putting a temporary pipe underground. So, it's a complicated project, but our team did a really good job of putting it together. So, I don't usually go into that level of detail, but I just want you to see it's it's it's so short and it's so quick, but it was a challenging project to design. So, we're excited to get it done. And with that, uh, the recommendations in front of you and I'll stand for questions. All right. Council, any questions for Ryan on this one? Yes, Council Clawson. Thank you. There's going to be a temporary pipe on top of the ground or underground. Um, that's a good question, Council Member uh, Clawson, Mayor Bailey. So, that uh, it is above it is above ground for the most part. And that is it is standard. It sounds a little, you know, frightening, but it's a it's a fuse pipe. It's all one solid pipe. Other than where we cross driveway aprons, it actually converts into a drive over ramp. It's pretty interesting technology. The only place it'll be underground is under the roundabout. So, we're actually going to put in like a bigger carrier pipe under the roundabout. You'll see them dig pits on both sides and push that under the roundabout to carry it underground just right there. Yeah, I' I've seen those before and I just wanted everybody to know it's going to look ominous. It's going to look weird for a while, but it's needed. All part of the plan. Y Thank you. It's necessary. All right. Anything else? All right. Council, we have a motion before you if one of you would like to take it. Sure. Uh, Mayor, I will adopt resolution or post to adopt resolution 2025-089 awarding the 2025 sewer lining project to Hydro Clean LLC in the total amount of 779,748.90. All right, we have a motion by council member Gar. Second, second by council member Theiti. Any other discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor signify by saying I. I. I. Opposed. Motion carries. Thank you. Thank you, Ryan. All right, we'll move on then to our regular agenda. We have two items on the regular agenda. Uh the first one is A is a tobacco THC compliance check violation. And um I believe our Sergeant Mike McCormack is going to open this one up for us. And is the are you guys here for this? Is No. Okay. I don't believe they're present. Okay. I just want to make sure they if I needed to recognize somebody. Okay. Thank you for the opportunity here to tell you a little bit about our program and uh as far as the procedure and what what happened with this particular event. Um as you know um our city does two compliance checks both with alcohol um and tobacco. And with the uh the new laws governing THC, we've also incorporated that into our uh tobacco checks. Um obviously you're aware we believe hiring training and supervising responsible staff is essential um in keeping compliance as well as regulating tobacco and THC. Uh on May 21st was one of the nights that we did the compliance and this night was uh tobacco. Uh we used an underage buyer. Um and in the next slide I'll kind of cover the process um and who and how he came across with our buyer and whatnot. Uh on this evening though there was one violation and that was High North Dispensary at 8711 East Point. Uh it should be noted this is their second violation in 24 months. Um as I mentioned our decoys are given instructions. Um and this is something that we've always done. This is best practice. This is what county does and this is what other other agencies do that um do compliance checks. Um so they arrive at the PD, they're not allowed to change their appearance. So we want them to look like the picture on their driver's license as much as possible. Um we also take the picture right before the compliance just so they say, "Well, they threw a hat on or it's not somebody we recognized." Um they're instructed that if asked, they are to state the real age. At no time are they allowed to be um deceitful. Um they have to be truthful. Our our our goal with our compliance checks has always been education more than anything else. Uh they're instructed to provide their Minnesota state issued identification card or picture, driver's license, and make sure that it has their true identity and um date of birth on it. Um, we also make sure that we have that on file should something like this come up. Um, they're provided with a monetary note. In this case, it was a $20 bill. Prior to that being given to our decoy, the officers also take pictures front and back to make sure that the serial number lines up uh with that monetary unit. Um this is uh this is a few years old now, but um this it's really easy now to tell the difference between a under 21 and over 21 Minnesota driver's license. So um everybody in this room has them this way, but if you turn it up on the side so the long end is facing up, you'll notice that that's the under 21. It's also in big red letters right under the picture it says under 21. and then it'll have the their birth date right there. Um, so it's anybody in anybody in the state is instructed and trained on how to look for those those things and I believe they have to sign off on on their uh they're trained uh to be a business here in the city as well. Uh so this is the actual incident that took place on May 21st. saw our decoy was a 17-year-old male. Had followed all the instructions um that we had asked. Uh they had first met with officers and then proceeded to go in the store and ask for Zin pouches. Uh Zynn, those are tobacco. So they look like a uh they come in like a can of chew or a tin of chew, but if you open it up, they have little white packets that just can contain tobacco. Um our uh our decoy asked if they had those zin pouches and they were told that they do not. However, um the employee um said that he couldn't sell them that because they don't have them, but he's offered to sell them THC gummies instead. Um the employee did ask for the driver's license, looked at it, and handed it back. Um and again, that was an under 21 driver's license. Um the interesting part which uh our decoy had a $20 bill and the the total cost was $20.67 and the clerk was really nice and said I'll cover the rest and handed it to him and out the door he went. Um officers did meet with him uh the employee he did admit to the sale and looked at the wrong date of the identification. I don't know if they delve more into that but that's um was the response from the employee. um he was advised that he would be receiving uh criminal charges. And I can tell you that I emailed directly uh to the owner the the actual letter inviting them to the council meeting. Did not receive any uh emails or phone calls in response. And then I also had that hand delivered to the business the following day as well. Um, so I wanted to point that part out, but you have the recommendations in front of you and I'll answer any questions you might have. All right. Uh, thank you, Mike. Uh, yeah, I'll start I'll start with Council Member Brol and I'll go to Council Member Clifford Clawson. Thank you. Uh, Sergeant, I just wanted to ask, was that the only violation that night you were doing was with this business? That's right. Correct. I believe that was one of 14 14 business that were were checked and that was the loan failure. Okay. And at this saw, it's interesting that uh the employee tried to well, for lack of a better word, upsell the product that they did not have to move on to something else. It just was interesting to me. Thank you. That's all. Council member Olson. Thank you. Uh Sergeant McCormack, couple things. First of all, um thanks for the presentation and going into the detail that you did with regard to the process that's in place. I want to make sure I understand um when our decoy goes to these uh businesses and attempts to make an underage purchase, they're traveling with a licensed police officer. Correct. Correct. And if the sale is made, as it was in this situation, there's an immediate response by the licensed police officer to say, "Hey, look, this was a uh compliance check and and you know, you didn't make it." Is that right? That's correct. Okay. So, there would be no reason why um somebody from the business would not be made aware virtually immediately that they, you know, had a compliance check that they failed. And then you followed up with an email and then you also had a document delivered to the business. Correct. And they're not here. I find that very disappointing. Yeah. um especially since it's their second violation in a 24-month period. So, um I see that that the resolution uh you know that we're looking at recommends imposing the scheduled penalty for this, which is um you know, a $1,000 fine plus a 3-day suspension. That three-day suspension, do we have um perview over when that three days is? Do they get to choose? Do we get to choose? How does that work? Yes. I'm not sure how that process goes. If your honor, members of the council, the way the resolution is worded, it is in coordination with the police chief. Okay? So, they will probably ask for specific days and the police chief will review that and if it's appropriate um and he would but they it has to be mutual agreement. It has to be a mutual agreement. Well, it has to be approved by the chief. So, technically we have the say. Okay. The reason I asked the question is um I might feel differently if uh you know the the business operator was here to explain um this is what occurred, this is what we've done to try to mitigate this from ever happening again, etc. Uh but the fact that they uh chose not to do that makes me feel as though perhaps they haven't taken it as seriously as they need to. And so I would encourage if we're going to look at a 3-day suspension that we try to determine um a 3-day period where perhaps that'll send the message that they need to take this a little more seriously. I know we've done that in the past with um you know failed alcohol compliance checks and you know you take a look at a weekend as an example that's that's a pretty prime selling period. um you take that opportunity away for those three days and I think it gets the message across and interestingly the business that we've done that to uh in the past um hasn't had an issue since. It's it's funny how that works. So I would just encourage our uh police department and our public safety director to take that under advisement. That's all I had. Thanks very much. Yeah. Uh Council Member Garza. Thank you, Mayor. Excuse me. I as well find it pretty interesting that they upsailed another product and in addition to covering the cost. So, I know we haven't heard back from that um business yet, but I I think May 21st, we're almost we're about a month in and I'm really intrigued to find out what they really did with that employee because I almost feel as if did he pocket the $20, you know? So, I I'm I would love to know or will we follow up again with the business just to find out? Typically, we won't. Um, but we certainly could. Uh, I know that $20 bill was returned to the officers that night, but I don't know what the intent was. Then, do they have a receipt? Do they ring them out with a receipt? Yeah, they did. Okay. Yep. Just wondered. Thank you, though. And I it's the the conversation with the clerk was also uh filmed via body cam with the officers once they made contact with him as well. Thank you. All right. Council I'll just mention too I I agree with uh Council Member Olsen in terms of uh you know it'd be totally different if somebody had taken it seriously and and was actually here to kind of explain. So, uh, agreed. I don't know if I can ask I don't know if it's going to be for Mike or Corey if you can rem know this. So, this is the second violation a 24month period with a,000 and 3 days suspension. Should it happen again and it becomes the third? What's the do you remember what the next your honor? I believe it's a 10-day suspension. I don't remember what the fine amount was. And I I just just for the record, I wanted to know note as uh as the sergeant mentioned, we tend or try to educate with these compliance checks. And with their first violation, although they were given notice of it, we didn't actually bring it forward for a penalty. So there was no penalty imposed with their first violation. And that's been somewhat typical for whether it's tobacco or alcohol. So Okay. I just was curious because I thought it was 10 10 days, but yeah, I guess. Okay, we'll leave it at that. Uh, so council, um, they're obviously not here, so number one is is a mute subject. Um, we don't need to do anything with one. I'll move to approve resolution 2025-093 imposing the scheduled penalty for the second violation in a 24-month period of a $1,000 fine plus a 3-day suspension. All right, I have a motion by council member Olsson, second by council member. All those in favor signify by saying I. I opposed. Motion carries. Thank you again, Mike. Thank you. Thank you. All right. And uh I'll say congratulations to all those other businesses that uh successfully. Yes. Very happy that they Yes. Sometimes we don't get to recognize the good ones, so we want to do that. So, all right. Uh next on the regular agenda, which is B, is real estate equities comprehensive plan amendment. reszoning and site plan review and uh our senior planner Samantha and it's Perry Perry uh Purit. Yes, Pirate. Okay. Um she is going I want to make sure I get your name right. You know that's just me, but uh is going to take us through this project. Yes. And I'm assuming that's what our gentlemen in the back are for. Thank you. All right. All right. Thank you, Mr. Mayor, members of the council. Tonight it is my privilege to bring to you the real estate equities project um for a comprehensive plan amendment resoning and site plan as the mayor mentioned for a 164 unit affordable apartment building um in the pres preserve at Prairie Dunes Plat um at the Hamlet Avenue Hadley Avenue and 100th Street um X there. The property is currently guided as medium density residential in the 2040 comprehensive plan and it is proposed to reguide the property to high density residential using units from the former driving range at um Mississippi Dunes Golf Course. Um the DNR purchased the former driving range in 2024 and that area thereby will be preserved from development and the driving range was guided as medium density residential in our 2040 plan. So to increase density on this real estate equities property, some of that density uh proposed to be allocated is proposed to be transferred to the real estate equities property and the DNR property to be guided parks and open space in our 2050 plan when we adopt that. Um it's also of note that the metropolitan council is also required to review and approve comprehensive plan amendments. Um however our sector representative has verified this will be done administratively by the Met Council. Um as mentioned before the property is currently zoned egg 2 and a resoning is also requested to reszone it to R six high density residential income uh in conformance with that comprehensive plan amendment that's requested. Uh so Real Estate Equities is propo proposing a 164 unit affordable rate apartment building that will meet or exceed all of the city's standards. Uh it would be under the maximum height at 47 ft 10 and 3/4 in where the maximum height is 55 ft. All of our city setbacks, site coverage maximums, and parking requirements will be met or exceeded. As mentioned, uh, the property would be accessed off of Hamlet Avenue and the developer will be responsible for reconstructing Hamlet Avenue into a urban street section. Currently, it's a rural section of street. Um, there is an existing southbound turn lane from Hadley onto Hamlet and the right of ways here are wide enough to accommodate any future expansion that may be needed. Um, however, it's not anticipated to be needed at this time. Also, uh, pedestrian connections. Uh, some trail corridors were put in with the Hadley and 100th Street realignment. Um, this project will add an 8 foot wide batuminous trail on the north side of Hamlet Avenue uh to facilitate a pedestrian connection from the apartment building to those trails on Hamlet and 100th as well as pedestrian connections um running along 100th Street. Um and there will also be an internal sidewalk system there that uh contributes to a connection point there as well. Landscaping and tree mitigation. Uh the the applicants have proposed to meet all of our landscaping and tree mitigation standards. And they have also proposed to meet all of our architectural standards with at least 65% class one or two materials. Um and they have already provided a material board to staff which has been acceptable. All right. So the recommendation there are four separate action items for the council to consider tonight. Those are on the screen. Um I'll just also note the fourth one is supporting that local affordable housing aid dollars for the project um as they go to state bonding hopefully in July. Um and so members or representatives from real estate equities are also here tonight. if you should have any questions. Great. Uh, thank you Samantha. Does council first of all have any questions for Samantha? Yes council. Um, explain for again refresh my memory. What what uh what aid that is that coming from the the city or the or what you're talking about the housing aid. Yeah, the local affordable housing aid. Oh, go ahead, Brenda. Council member Thei, members of the council. Uh, great question. uh the uh local uh affordable housing aid or we call LAHA uh the state uh implemented that back in October of 2023 uh quarter uh percent of sales taxes dedicated that uh to that in the metro and so we get funds uh we received our first um amount uh back in uh 2024 um and so this project um is a good use of those funds. In the past, we would have done a um tiff district for housing and it would been on our books for 25 years. Um and so with these LAA funds, we can uh dedicate three years of these funds uh to three years get this project up and going. All right. Thank you. All right. Uh any other questions for staff at this point? I council, it's probably for Samantha. Thank you. There was some concern about the views from the neighbors on Hamlet. It was at one of the planning commission meetings. Um the BMS and the trees that are on the north side of the new 100th and Hamlet Avenue, uh those are all going to remain. Those aren't going to be taken down at all from my understand. Um correct. So there are some existing trees on the site, some existing um pine trees if you drive by today, those will be all of those will be removed on the south side of Hamlet will be removed. Correct. Um however um the existing I'll call town houses or condos across the street they have some very nice screening. Um staff drove by and checked checked that as well. And then as you see on the screen as well um they will be providing some um landscaping where they're able to fit it in here um near that proposed um garage entrance and exit point there. So on the south side of Hamlet Avenue. Thank you. I just wanted to make sure that the screening on the north side of Hamlet or 100 is going to stay there for them. Yep. Okay. Thank you so much. Okay. Anybody else? Actually, I have one more question. Council. Yeah. So, I was the other day I kind of came around Hadley and and kind of going through there and and uh you know, turns out Hunter Street is let's see what's the speed limit going to be on that. What's the speed limit on Hamlet or on Hunter? It's 55 on Hal. No, no, no. On the Hunter Street. So, mayor, members of council, so it's 50 miles an hour until you get to the curve. And at the curve, it reduces to 40. It stays 40 all the way down the hill um down to Great Cloud Trail. All right. So, so the the one thing that I because it's it's not a four-way stop. It's only a stop for for Hamlet. Mhm. You know, and and and again, it's like I'm just thinking with the with the curve and everything and and people if they're already going, I don't know how many are going to slow down for the curb even though they they see the sign, you know, and and but if there was a stop sign there, and I know it's a county road, so that's going to be make that more difficult. But I just a little little red flag kind of with the consideration also that those buildings there's going to be two of them and and maybe maybe another one. We don't know for sure, you know, that are are going to be relatively tall and just terms of sight lines and safety and and just wanting to make sure that that and and I know we're we're good at that. we're probably taking all that into consideration, but you know, just to to kind of make some some mention of it or or something like that. Uh or Yep. Mayor, members of the council, I can maybe speak to a few points on that real quickly. So, in terms of the side stop control, once you do an always stop, that's actually considered a form of full intersection control. And then there's um standards we have to meet. It is still a city road, even though it's a future county road. It is our roadway today, so we govern it. Um, but we do really look to those mindot standards before you put in an always stop. Um, that roadway with the 180 foot rideaway and then the setbacks. It is fully designed to make sure we have the sight lines in excess of that 40 m an hour. Um, but it's certainly something we're always going to continue to watch and look at. You know, we want to make sure we have safe corridors for people to drive on. So, uh, no concerns at this time with, you know, this building and such, but it's something we'll always continue to look at as we get more development in the area. All right. Thanks. Y All right. Sounds good. Thank you, Ren. Uh, would you guys like to speak at all on this subject or on the project? Anything you'd like to share or You don't need to. You don't have to if you don't want to. I'm happy to. Well, does does council have any questions for the developer? I don't. No, I'm actually I think you're going to get off on this one. You don't have to come up. So, mayor, I'd like to move resolution number 2025-082 approving an amendment to the 2040 comprehensive plan to reguide a 4.7 acre parcel from medium density residential to highdensity residential and authorize staff to submit the amendment to the Met Council. All right. So, I have a motion by Council Member Olsen. Do I have a second? I'll second. Second by Council Member Clawson. Um, any other discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor signify by saying I. I I opposed. Motion carries. Uh who would like to do number two? I'll go ahead and move uh uh look for a motion or look move ordinance number 1101 approving a zoning amendment to change the zoning of the 4.7 acres from egg to agricultural to R6 highdensity residential contingent on the metropolitan council's approval of the associated comprehensive plan amendment. All right. So I have a motion by council member Theiti. Do I have a second? Second. Second by council member Garza. Again, any questions on this one or comment? Seeing none, all those in favor signify by saying I. I. I. Opposed. Motion carries. Who would like to do three? All right. I will take resolution number 2025-083 approving the site plan review for 164 unit fourstory affordable rate multifamily apartment building on an approximate an approximate 4.7 acre parial located on the north side of the hund 100th street and Hadley Avenue intersection. All right. So I have a motion by council member Garza and it was seconded by council member brethiti. Any questions or comments? Seeing none, all those in favor signify by saying I. I I I opposed. Motion carries. And Mr. Clson, you want the last one? There you go. Move resolution number 2025-092 supporting local affordable housing aid. All right. I have a motion by uh council member Clson, second by council member Olsen. All those in favor signify by saying I. I. Opposed. Motion carries. And you didn't even have to talk. You have to talk. Keep your fingers crossed for the the money, but it should be good. Looking forward to it. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Uh, now we're down to council comments request. I will start with, uh, council member Bclenson. I have none tonight. Thank you, mayor. All right. Sounds good. Council member Bolson. Mayor, I'll just take a moment to uh first of all thank all of the uh hundreds of state, federal, local law enforcement personnel who spent their Father's Day weekend uh in pursuit of a uh suspect in the uh brutal killings of Mark and um Mark Hortman and and his wife Melissa and um the shootings of uh John and Uvette Hoffman. Uh, a lot of those folks worked really long days and I know we even had uh some local members of our uh law enforcement community who were staged up to help out with different things. Um there were several SWAT teams that were out um working really hard to apprehend this person and uh thankfully they were able to do so without incident um before the weekend was out which was uh a really nice outcome to a very tragic situation. um that individual is now in custody and uh I'm sure the courts will do their work. But um thank you to all of the law enforcement folks, uh first responders, all the support staff who took the time to do that. Uh, I also want to say, um, you know, one of the things that really, uh, impacted me personally, uh, as I was, you know, got that first phone call at 5:00 a.m. on Saturday from a friend saying, "Hey, are you watching the news?" Uh, no, I'm in bed. Um, you need to you need to watch the news. um as a country, as a as a state, as a community, um it's important to remember that the things that you say have consequences. I know that um you know one of the very founding principles of of our constitution is free speech and I support that with every fiber of my being but there's also a part of life where you can say yeah I could do that but should I and I think that's where discipline and maturity and those kinds of things come in we live in a in a time when uh people have so much access to social media and and other uh forms of speech and communication that sometimes they take it for granted. And um I'm going to speak for myself only. Uh as as a local elected official, um it it stuns me sometimes uh how the same people have a negative comment about virtually anything we do as a city or as a body. And while they're entitled to their opinions and they're entitled to make whatever comments they want, um I think there's a time to consider uh is this helpful? Does does this advance whatever argument I'm trying to make? Um you know, I is this the appropriate venue to maybe say some of those things? What I find uh to be true often times is people will um put things out into their social media profiles or whatever the case might be and then when you actually take the time to give them a phone call and say, "Hey, I saw your note. Wanted to talk to you about that." The the tone changes pretty quickly. We need to understand that um elected officials, uh public officials in any way, shape, or form, whether it's city staff, what have you, uh we're all people. We all have jobs and and we all have kids and we all have hopes and dreams and um I know that this body works very hard to remain dispassionate and neutral. Um, we don't engage very often on social media. Uh, and and when we do sometimes attempt to engage on social media where somebody may say something, they're asking a question and we try to give the information that they're looking for, it can turn into a feeding frenzy of um, misinformation, negative commentary, what have you. And that's just not the way to do things. That's not uh we we need to be able to communicate with each other um with respect and with dignity because what happens is as that negativity proliferates and we see it at the federal level, we see it all over the place, there's going to be somebody out there who maybe isn't okay in the head, who's going to read what you have to say or uh perceive what you have to say differently than you intended it. and uh situations like what occurred over the weekend could be the end result. So, I just want to caution folks to take a beat may maybe wait a second before you type whatever it is you're going to type into uh your Facebook or your Twitter or you name it. There's probably 17 other ones I don't even know about. Um you know, you got your various neighbor pages and all those kinds of things. If you really truly are curious and you want to know about how come you did something, how come this decision was made, just ask. We're happy to tell you. We'll sit down and have coffee with you. We'll explain it to the best of our ability, and we may end up walking away agreeing to disagree, but at least we've had a productive dialogue. And uh I think if we could all do that a little bit better, um maybe the world would be a little less dangerous place. And with that, Mayor, I'll turn it back to you. Okay. Thank you, Council Broson. Council member Braiti. Yeah, besides uh again, I've already talked about Strawberry Fest, so that's uh you know, fantastic. It's going to be a great time. Uh I also have um I guess the uh movies with Mo the Wild Robot had to be changed because of rain, things like that. Friday was raining. So, well, you got rained out last year quite a bit, too. We did, but we got four in still. Yeah. So we we are so our fingers that was just Yeah. Okay. So uh I guess that's been rescheduled to uh Friday a week. So it's this Friday night. Two days. Yes. Yeah. Two days. But but it's later. So it starts at 7:00. But the movie doesn't start until 9:30ish. So people can enjoy Strawberry Fest first and then come and watch the movie. All right. So, I guess that is all I have right now. Okay. Sounds good. Uh, uh, Council Member Garca. Thank you, Mayor. Well, I will mention it sounds like Cottage Grove has some really fun, um, camps that are happening this summer. So, if you go to our cottagegrove Minnesota.gov, they have a safety camp. We have a safety camp for, um, kids ages 6 to nine. And that's coming up actually this weekend as well. Um, but that's going to be a lot of fun at the Old Cottage Grove Fire Station and they'll learn a lot, especially surrounding safety. So, um, sign your kids up. It's not too late for that. And then we also have beginning archery camp. That sounds really cool. Um, and that will start in July. So, you can check out our website and find more about that. And that will be at the Pine Tree Pond. That's it. Awesome. And and since we already talked about Strawberry Fest, I'm not I don't have anything else to add this evening other than I hope to see everybody this uh the next few nights and days over at Strawberry Fest. Um just so the public is aware, uh we do have two workshops this evening. The first workshop which is open to the public uh is the national community survey report which uh from the the Poco uh survey that we did uh earlier this year. Uh staff's going to provide it to us to review and comment. And then we do have a workshop which is closed to the public and uh that is a performance evaluation check-in uh with our city administrator Jennifer Levit. And just so that the public knows um that is a closed meeting uh pursuant to Minnesota Minnesota statute 13D.05 subsection 3A uh to conduct a performance evaluation of city administrator Jennifer Levit. So with that uh we won't be adjourning in here. We'll adjourn in the in the are we going in the training room first? Yes. Okay. training room. Uh otherwise everybody have a great weekend at Strawberry Fest. [Music]