[0:03] [Music] [0:11] **Mayor Mary Fasbender:** Ready, ready. Time being 7 o'clock, I call the Hastings City Council meeting to order. Please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance. 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. Welcome, and let the roll reflect that all council members are present. Council members, are there any items to be considered or any corrections from the July 22nd council meeting? Okay, approval of minutes. [0:57] **Mayor Mary Fasbender:** Council members—oops, I already did that, sorry. Comments from the audience: At this time, I will hear comments from the audience. Anyone wish to speak to the Council at this time? Anyone on Zoom? Not raising their—okay. Okay. Council items to be considered: Council, I would accept a motion to add the joint powers agreement with the DNR for repair of the boat launch to the consent agenda, and this needs a unanimous yes. So, Councilmember Pemble and Councilmember Lawrence. All those in favor of the motion, state by saying aye. (Council: Aye). [1:45] **Mayor Mary Fasbender:** Opposed to that motion, state by saying nay. Thank you. Council, I would accept a motion to approve the consent agenda. Councilmember Fox and Councilmember Haus. All those in favor of the motion, state by saying aye. (Council: Aye). Opposed to that motion, state by saying nay. And that motion prevails. Tonight, under public hearing and resolution, we have a special use permit for cannabis for the Westview Smokes, 1355 South Frontage Road. And for this item, we will have a public hearing, and Lindsay is with us, our intern. [2:31] **Lindsay (Community Development Intern):** Thank you, council members and Mayor. Before you today is a special use permit application for cannabis retail sales from Westview Smokes, located at 1355 South Frontage Road. The property is zoned C4 and is located in the Westview Mall. It's surrounded by properties zoned as commercial in the north and east, and properties zoned as residential in the south and west. As for the existing conditions of the property, they have been in business for several years now, and they recently obtained a misdemeanor for violating Hastings City Ordinance 117.03. [3:29] **Mayor Mary Fasbender:** Any discussion, Council? Councilmember Vihrachoff. **Councilmember DawnMarie Vihrachoff:** Thank you, Your Honor. Lindsay, could I just ask: for the one dissenting vote that came out of committee, was it around the misdemeanor issue? **Lindsay (Community Development Intern):** Yes, yes it was. **Councilmember DawnMarie Vihrachoff:** Okay, thank you. **Mayor Mary Fasbender:** Thank you, Councilmember. Councilmember Leifeld. **Councilmember Lisa Leifeld:** Thank you, Your Honor. Lindsay, I'm not sure if this is a question you can answer or not. Under our city code, chapter 155.32, on page one, it talks about—it allows cannabis retailers and edible retailers. Do we differentiate between the two in our code? [4:15] **John Hinzman (Community Development Director):** Sure, no problem, Councilmember. Either one of those can be had by a special use permit. I don't think that we've had any differentiation with vendors or sellers of those two items. The special use permit would allow for both, from my understanding. **Councilmember Lisa Leifeld:** Okay. So then just to clarify, as reading through this, this is for our purpose as the Council—it's just still following state guidelines. So will this be a step—I guess my question is: is this a step that these people are going to be able to skip when we get to legalized marijuana, legalized bud? [5:02] **John Hinzman (Community Development Director):** Councilmember, we're going to be talking about that at some length here coming up, probably in October. We've discussed having a workshop specifically around the new cannabis laws. So there will likely be changes to our code to reflect the new cannabis laws at the state level, and it may affect the sale of other items that are cannabis-related that we have now. **Councilmember Lisa Leifeld:** Okay. Because I guess the only—when I was reading through it, my biggest concern was that these two businesses that we're going to be discussing here, they don't believe that this is like an "in" to be able to sell. That would be a completely different item of consideration at this point. So as they may apply for it, and if they fall within the regulations that we established at that time, they could be considered. Okay. Just as far as their misdemeanor goes, I know there's been a lot of confusion with what's been happening over the last couple years in the state of Minnesota—who could sell, what can they sell, how much of it. I get that. So that misdemeanor piece, I mean, there was so much confusion. I guess I'm not terribly concerned about that. My biggest concern was that, you know, as I'd mentioned before, understanding that the state is planning to sell these at dispensaries, so smoke shops and such would still have to qualify under those state guidelines. Awesome, thank you. Appreciate it. [6:34] **John Hinzman (Community Development Director):** Thank you, Councilmember. Just a point of clarification too, pertaining to this matter: we have this item here which is listed as a public hearing as well. So if the Mayor or Council is ready to open that up, I'd suggest doing that at this time to see if there's any public comment, and then we could move forward from there. The reason why this is on for a public hearing tonight is because we missed the deadline for Planning Commission publication in the newspaper. So we put on the public hearing notification that we'd be having two public hearings: one at Planning Commission and one tonight. So if we can take care of that. **Mayor Mary Fasbender:** Thanks, John, for clarification. At this time, I will open the public hearing. Anyone wish to speak at this time? Anyone on Zoom? Okay, no one on Zoom. Anyone in the audience wish to speak? Okay, I will close the public hearing. Open discussion for Council. Council? Something, Councilmember Fox. [7:20] **Councilmember Fox:** Thank you, Your Honor. I had my light on just—I wanted to get the public hearing over with, but then I also wanted to highlight Councilmember Leifeld's point and go back to some of our Public Safety Committee conversations. This is kind of an ever-moving target, and it continues to evolve at the state level, and we're trying to keep up with it as much as possible so we can encourage business to be productive in our economy and also healthy and safe for our residents. So this is something that Attorney Land pays really close attention to for us, and we're just trying to keep up so that we are not thwarting commerce. So thank you for all of your work too, Lindsay. [8:06] **Mayor Mary Fasbender:** Thank you, Councilmember Fox. Any other discussion? If not, I would ask for a motion to approve a resolution for the City Council of the City of Hastings granting a special use permit for the retail sale of cannabis products at 1355 South Frontage Road. Councilmember Leifeld and Councilmember Lawrence. Any new discussion, Council? All those in favor of the motion, state by saying aye. (Council: Aye). Opposed to that motion, state by saying nay. And that motion prevails. Thank you, Lindsay. [8:53] **Mayor Mary Fasbender:** Thank you. We also have a public hearing and a resolution for a special use permit for cannabis for the Hastings Tobacco, 1769 Market Boulevard. And you may continue—oh, sorry. **Lindsay (Community Development Intern):** Thank you. For this item, we will need some clarification about the application and the applicant, so we have waived the 60-day rule for a decision. **Mayor Mary Fasbender:** Council, I would accept a motion to continue the public hearing and special use permit resolution, as well as the associated cannabis retail sales license, until the City Council's meeting on September 3rd. Councilmember Pemble, Councilmember Lawrence. All those in favor of that motion, state by saying aye. (Council: Aye). Opposed to that motion, state by saying nay. Thank you. [9:38] **Mayor Mary Fasbender:** Tonight, on Public Works, we have a resolution for the CSAH 42 Corridor Study recommendation scope of improvements. And we have with us tonight Dakota County's Bryce LeBrun and John Caven from the City of Hastings. Welcome. [10:24] **Bryce LeBrun (Dakota County Project Manager):** Good evening. All right, my apologies. We had a little miscommunication and weren't quite able to get the presentation up on the system for the meeting tonight. However, I have it here; I came extra prepared. So we can follow along. **Dan Wietecha (City Administrator):** John, I'm just playing it. Go ahead, see if I can get it up somehow. **Bryce LeBrun (Dakota County Project Manager):** Yeah, so I'll just kind of get going here. So basically, I'm the Dakota County project manager for the Second Street West/Nininger Road Corridor Study and Mississippi River Greenway improvements project. It's been ongoing for the last several months here. I've been here a couple other times to kind of give some background. Yeah, so basically, you know, the front end of this is pretty similar. To recap for the public, in 2021-2022, Dakota County set out to do a countywide pedestrian crossing safety assessment. Basically, that overall goal was to find consistent infrastructure guidelines for pedestrian crossing safety. We had a number of locations... **John Caven:** Let me see if I can get this thing up here for you. There we go. **Bryce LeBrun (Dakota County Project Manager):** All right, thank you very much. Thanks, John. Excellent. All right, now I have my graphics I can go off of. Appreciate that. Okay, so yeah, so this project was included as part of that study as one of our study locations. We looked at a location near Madison Street and County Highway 42, or Second Street West/Nininger Road in the City of Hastings. Out of that study, basically, the recommendation was that we look at a wider corridor assessment to kind of get a more complete picture and infrastructure treatments for the corridor. We understood and realized during that initial study that it was more than just a single location that was the issue. We saw a lot of different behaviors out there; folks were crossing kind of at random throughout the corridor because the routing is unclear. The crossing infrastructure just isn't really up to our modern standards, and especially not the standards that we established through that initial study, the countywide ped crossing study. So the County programmed this wider study, this 42-161 on CSAH 42 in Hastings, and then we also tacked on a segment of the Mississippi River Greenway, just since we had engineering and surveying data collection, to kind of get that economy of scale and fix up some things along with that trail. Similar goals, and we're able to kind of partner with the Dakota County Parks Department and do these projects simultaneously. So we partnered with HR Green as our consultant to review the current roadway and sidewalk and then trail design. Also, that network—collect some more up-to-date traffic data: speeds, volumes, intersection counts, things like that; do community engagement; and then also provide alternatives for some near-term lower-cost or longer-term higher-cost improvements and then provide recommendations to that end. I was back here a while back to provide updates kind of before and after our public engagement. So we had our online survey and comment map, a first open house in January, and then a follow-up in May that were pretty well attended. We were able to kind of get the word out, hear from the public, and then also hear back on the alternatives we had developed from folks in the neighborhood. Those were really positive. Basically, we took that back into our process, took a look at all our options, discussed internally and with City staff, and we kind of landed on that nearer-term improvement. So we had the opportunity to leverage a mill and overlay—so a pavement preservation project—on this corridor in 2028. And a lot of times we can do roadway changes in advance or in conjunction with those, and it works really well with costs. We can make some big improvements, make some good changes to the ends that we were looking for in this project, and like I said, do it at a relatively reasonable cost on a reasonable timeline. So what we landed on was this Alternative One, which I'll get to later on. I had showed it the last time I was here, and we showed it in public engagement, which is kind of our lowest level of overall change—pretty achievable. So just to kind of go through the high points: we're looking at some roadway geometric changes, so some curb extensions or bump-outs at intersections or various mid-block locations. So that narrows the roadway, allows us to kind of get that context changed when curb lines and things get closer to drive lanes and through lanes. And for drivers, it makes it shorter crossing distances for pedestrians. It naturally slows traffic; it's been a proven implementation to do that. And then also taking a look at the bypass lanes—convert them to dedicated left-turn lanes or remove them as applicable along the corridor. I talked previously about those bypass lanes. It's more of a rural application. They're really good out in a farm field where you have high-speed traffic and sporadic left turns so that you kind of keep things moving and it doesn't force someone to stop in a through lane with traffic coming up behind them at a high rate of speed. That's not really what we're going for here. This type of roadway in this area, we're looking for lower speeds, calmer traffic, more predictable for pedestrians, so that if a vehicle is in that left-turn lane, they're there to turn left and you're not going to have somebody flying around them at speed. People just know more of what to expect. And then we have a couple right-turn lanes that we're going to evaluate for removal as well. Again, right-turn lanes are also more of a higher-speed environment type of treatment—gets you out of the way of traffic as you're slowing down to make that turn and get off the roadway faster. And again, in this context, further east from where there are right-turn lanes right now, there are none with actually higher traffic volumes, and it's perfectly safe. It's actually a little bit of a calming measure to get some of that friction from that slowing if there is turning, and it's perfectly safe from our assessment. And then we're also able to reduce those crossing distances as well. Narrow that roadway; also acts to try and lower the speeds through the area. And then we also have some locations identified for crossing improvements. So as we approach kind of the final stages of our study and then on into the final design eventually next year, we'll look at signing, striping, and lighting improvements beyond these curb line and geometric changes to further reinforce those improvements and make it extremely clear where to expect crossing at locations where they matter. And then we've also got some potential trail improvements that we identified. So the countywide planning shows bicycle trail gaps or bicycle facility gaps basically to the east of Pleasant Drive, and that's something we'd like to take a look at, potentially widening that existing sidewalk on the south side. We think we could potentially fit a wider trail through that network and then have it maintained over the winter as well. So that kind of fills that trail gap further east from Pleasant. And then also look at, for completing some network where we can fit it, evaluating a trail on the north side from Pleasant to the east, possibly as far as United Hospital entrance—again, it all kind of depends on right-of-way and our ability to fund. And then also on the south side between the river and Pine Street, where there is currently no trail or sidewalk but there's connections on both of those blocks. That's something we'd like to take a look at—you know, if it's feasible to extend it just that much further. And then, yeah, get that bicycle connectivity to the facilities of the west and the Greenway. And then we've also got some existing infrastructure updates that normally would go hand-in-hand with a standard mill and overlay, but we can pull into this project, again to further reinforce our other improvements: replacing and updating our pedestrian ramps and trail and sidewalk throughout, even where we aren't making changes; and then repaving those existing multi-use trails that are on the County Highway right now that are either too narrow or in just pretty rough shape—I don't think they've been maintained since. And also roadway signing and striping updates as applicable. Again, with our changes, there will be some turn lane changes, certain tapers, things like that will change how they look. And signage updates—this is a really good example: that bike sign doesn't really mean anything anymore. So we'll look at placement, where they make sense, what matters as part of the final design. So this is kind of a highlighted look at that Alternative One that we had discussed at the previous meeting and public engagement with some of those trail improvements on there. Again, kind of looks like there's a lot going on on this graphic, but the closer you look, it starts to make a little more sense. So we've got curb extensions proposed coming around the corner out of the higher-speed rural area, some of those turn lane changes as you progress east, another set of curb extensions and a really good enhanced crossing at the Greenway connection where the Greenway heads north to the dam. And then again, left-turn lane assignment rather than the bypass lane at Pleasant, some of that trail extension, and then some more curb extensions as the streets and accesses get denser to the east. Again, to try and narrow that, get more of that lower-speed context in traffic behavior throughout. I just have a more zoomed-in version of this here as well. Yeah, so that's kind of—we'll have a more fully fleshed out—we have a sort of preliminary layout right now. We'll get that finalized along with that report that's in your packet that kind of lays out all the background information, the reasons why we're doing this. And then I also have a broad timeline in next steps here. So again, this is focused on the 42 Corridor project; I have a little piece on the Mississippi River Greenway portion at the end here. So right now, in the draft County CIP, we're programming this for the 2025 to 2029 CIP (Capital Improvements Plan) for final design and construction. So we're going to look to solicit for final design services for an engineering company to help us out with that, to start a contract in 2025, which is our earliest year for that funding for design. And then we're looking at putting final plans, any potential right-of-way acquisition (which would be easements if needed just for construction limits, things like that), and then bidding programmed for 2026—so later in 2026. And then with the intent for construction in the summer of 2027—spring, summer, fall, depending on where that lays. And then we'll mill and overlay after that. So it'll be kind of a two-stage project, but that tends to be how these construct a lot better—do the curb work, the concrete work, things like that, do some temporary striping changes as needed, and then get the new pavement the year after. Just works better with coordination schedules. To continue on from that on the project side of it: County staff, myself and others, will work with City staff on a Joint Powers Agreement to this end. So we'll formalize our cost share and project coordination going forward. And then our cost share for the entire project will follow the County cost participation policy as applicable. So we've got some more details to kind of drill down on to that end. We've got a draft version of the estimate, but there's a couple different things in there that we just have to, again, fully flesh out as far as that goes. We split costs a couple different ways. This is just the example straight from the cost participation policy, and again, through that Joint Powers Agreement and the CIP process, we'll get those specific numbers nailed down before we progress. I'll be back again, likely, if staff wants, along with that Joint Powers Agreement to come. And then, yeah, on from there. So this is the piece about Mississippi River Greenway Improvements. This portion of this project was on a little bit different schedule, different timeline—was a little more nebulous as far as where it could go. So again, we took a look at that existing trail that you can see here that heads north off of 42 in partnership with our Parks Department, because the trail is in poor condition: it's narrow, the curves are tighter, the slope is steeper than we normally like to see on our regional trail system. And this is part of the Mississippi River Greenway. So the intent was to take a look at current land control—what does the City and County have that we don't have to go out and try and acquire land, which is expensive, time-consuming, and difficult for a project like this. And it turned out that we could actually fit a pretty significant improvement and hit all of our project goals without having to go outside of existing land. So that was good news. We got a pretty good construction estimate for our preliminary plans for that, and the Parks Department has decided to go ahead and program that for potential construction in 2025, or at least bidding as early as 2025. There's still a few things with permitting with the Army Corps of Engineers, and then the Mississippi River itself has a whole host of different requirements that we have to make sure we're checking all our boxes with the project. But we are going to move directly into final design for this one. Yeah, with the intent that we're going to construct as soon as we can. So that'll be a Parks project, 100% Dakota County funded at the moment. And we'll kind of continue on with that as well in parallel. This is where these two projects will kind of split in scope and timeline. So, yeah, as far as that goes, again, just some broad timelines as far as finalizing this portion of the study—you know, getting that fully flushed out layout, kind of like what we have for County Highway 46/47 right now at that stage. And then we'll move on with that Greenway design, look to get Engineering Services for final design to start in 2025 budget year, and then look to bid and construct that Greenway project as early as spring 2025. And then the CSAH 42 project for late 2026 bidding, with 2027 construction and a 2028 overlay to kind of tie a knot on the bow, so to speak. So with that, I can stand for questions, comments, clarifications, anything else Mayor or Council would like to hear. [25:04] **Mayor Mary Fasbender:** Bryce, yeah. Council, any discussion? Councilmember Pemble. **Councilmember Dave Pemble:** Good evening, Bryce. On the Greenway portion, I'm wondering—last year I was out pedaling on a bike, if you can believe that, but coming down the hill as I'm trying to walk up the hill from the Lock and Dam and the crossways there of the lake, and here comes this young child coming down, and he literally lost control. And it was like, you know, when you get down to the bottom and it turns to go out, and he—he went piled up into the ground there. And luckily he didn't get hurt, but his bike kind of took it a little bit. So I'm wondering if in the new design some of that can change a little bit so younger kids that aren't well-experienced in coming down a pretty good hill have some exit or some way to, you know, not just pile into the corner here. [26:36] **Bryce LeBrun (Dakota County Project Manager):** Yes, yep. So that was a big part of that "tight curves, lack of sight distance" point. **Councilmember Dave Pemble:** Yep. I just want to make sure that we do something about that here's the opportunity. **Bryce LeBrun (Dakota County Project Manager):** Yes. So in that design alignment we were able to land on—right now, there's a little bit of a curve on the downhill portion which obstructs your sight up and downhill, and then also right when you get to the bottom, it's that sharp curve. We're kind of limited on the sharp curve at the bottom itself because we can't and don't want to get out into the dam structure. But we will be able to kind of open up the sight lines with vegetation, things like that, with this larger project. There will be some clearing as well, and that's something—not with this project, but again, it's all partnership, it's a Dakota County Park project, it's just the expertise is in Transportation. So yeah, there will be some clearing of trees, things like that, but they'll be back in there. I was out there with one of our natural resources folks that was pretty stoked about the opportunity to kind of start over. Nothing out there is very nice or desirable for what they're looking to go for, nature-wise. But yeah, to that end, it'll be less steep on that downhill section. It'll be arrow-straight, which—yes, you can pick up speed, but that's two of one, one of the other. It's better because you can actually just see all the way down, and you'll actually be able to see that there is a curve at the bottom of the hill as well. And it'll be wider; right now, I think it's barely 8 feet wide and it's not in good shape. And usually on a downhill like that, our minimum is 10 feet; we'll actually usually widen it a bit to 12 or 13 feet to give some passing as well, because some folks are faster than others uphill. **Councilmember Dave Pemble:** The only other comment I have is on the roadway itself. At Riverdale, you know, people come into town at a pretty good speed, and we do have—or the County has—the miles-per-hour sign there. Is there any way—I've seen other communities have like a crossing light, so when you're actually coming up to cross, you can either push a button before you start across and the lights blink a little bit farther back so people can see that there's somebody going to cross in front of them? Because especially during early morning hours or when it gets towards dusk, you know, it's kind of hard. You're making that right-hand turn coming in, and if you're not paying attention and got your speed down, if somebody's out there walking, there's a problem. [29:43] **Bryce LeBrun (Dakota County Project Manager):** Yes. So that's one location we're going to look at. You can see here we have a line denoting—again, we're going to evaluate if it makes sense, if it's feasible to fit a multi-use trail in there. Right now, it's a ditch, so there's some drainage things, but it'll also help potentially extend the curb out to kind of start that context change earlier along with that in order to fit that trail in. So there's a few things we're going to look at to that end. We weren't considering enhancing at the crossing there, again just because of the speed; we might have ramps that would receive if people did want to cross, but again, it would be more over at Riverdale itself here. **Councilmember Dave Pemble:** Well, that's where you're talking—that was what I was talking about is the Riverdale portion. **Bryce LeBrun (Dakota County Project Manager):** Yeah, so we will look at, as part of adding that crossing, we'll have those curb extensions to tighten things up, and then that's going to be a spot where, you know, when we looked at it, studied it, discussed—it didn't make sense to try and go in and change all those front yards, all those driveways all the way across, so we kind of moved on from extending the trail all the way on the north side for now. But that will be a crossing location. So something we'll evaluate, yeah, to your point—whether a push-button flasher like that makes sense there or not. Striping, lighting for sure—overhead for at night, things like that. But the curb extensions themselves, even in lieu of anything else, are a pretty significant improvement to narrowing that up. It's really similar to, like, 15th and Prairie, I believe, in Hastings, as a local one—there's one right there, yeah, very similar type context to that, where it works really well even just with striping and signage. But again, yeah, we'll run it all the way up and down the chain on the process. We usually try to be careful with our Greenway and Regional Trail crossings on roadways, especially County roadways, with the potential for higher speeds, because they're marketed and aimed at a broad user base, right? So we want to get everybody from your fast cyclist all the way down to, you know, a family with children. [31:17] **Mayor Mary Fasbender:** Thank you. Councilmember Fox. **Councilmember Fox:** Thank you, Your Honor. Thank you, Bryce. This is exciting—continued efforts toward safer pedestrian and cyclist access to our resources. My favorite thing about it is identifying the timeline overlap so that we can work together and we don't have to do it twice. That is good government. Thank you. The one thing I want to ask—and I don't think you have an answer to yet, but I know people listening are probably eager to know—how long will my trail be closed? It's not a super significant amount of trail, so I'm sure it'll be quicker than some trail reconstruction, but as soon as we have an answer, that would be helpful for us to plan around. And then I would encourage us for the trail specifically—even though this is specifically about 42—is to potentially work with our Arts and Culture Commission to enhance that. If we're going to remove some of the nature for sightlines and stuff, just to keep our community involved in that way would be fun. [32:51] **Bryce LeBrun (Dakota County Project Manager):** Yeah, and that's something—I can bring that feedback back to our Park staff. I know there's been efforts to that end on local trail systems; I'm not sure if we've gotten there for Greenways. There's been a couple locations—maybe the tunnel in West St. Paul? Yeah. **Mike Slavic (Dakota County Commissioner):** Good evening, Council, Mayor. Mike Slavic, Dakota County Commissioner. So we have a Dakota County Arts Commission which, by the way, I'm looking for a person to fill District 1, so just a little plug there if you know someone. My person moved out of state about two months ago, so I do have an opening. So the Dakota County Arts Commission is actually looking at the Greenway system for our County—to be able to go in and also incorporate art. We've had a couple examples as Bryce had stated, but we're looking to kind of do that, and I think some better collaboration and partnership with that. We have some means and some other connections that necessarily the cities do not have, but you frankly have a fully staffed Commission, so that makes it advantageous on your side. And then I'll just make one last point in here: as this project is being covered 100% by the County, this was a city trail at one time. And part of the County Greenway system is city trails where the City took the initiative 25 years ago to construct this trail, and it's becoming part of a corridor. As those trails are getting old and worn and not up to the standards, now, as part of the agreement from 2021, this is now part of the Mississippi River Greenway; therefore, it's 100% for these repairs done on the taxpayers countywide because it truly becomes a regional asset as opposed to just a city asset. But frankly, it was the City that took the initiative back in the '90s to construct this with the vision and the wisdom. But that's why it's truly a partnership. This is one of those things where it actually gets to be a benefit of all County residents, and really a source that is mostly used by Hastings residents, but as we've seen with tourism, it's becoming an asset used by so many more. So that's why it's nice to see things like this, and as the County Board has taken a commitment on the Greenway system of doing this expansion to be able to really make a regional system and be committed to the finances with that. Thank you. [34:23] **Councilmember Fox:** Thank you, Commissioner. And Bryce, the thing that you mentioned, Councilmember Pemble, about the blinking lights—I think you and I both have heard much about that in our neighborhood. I appreciate your answer wasn't "no," right? You're looking into every option and research. So thank you for making sure that we're making the best decision possible for our pedestrians, cyclists, and automobile drivers. [35:10] **Bryce LeBrun (Dakota County Project Manager):** Absolutely, thank you. Yeah, to your initial question about duration—again, we'll keep in touch as we get closer. Like I mentioned, there's a few things with permitting that we have to just make sure we cover our bases on before we can commit to that 2025 schedule or a certain day. Generally speaking, though, with our construction projects, we try to keep a pretty open timeline as far as construction start for our contractor. I'm sure you're used to that, even with City projects—you want to leave them as much available wiggle room to stage, get equipment, what have you. The tighter we get with that window, the more the cost can go up potentially with that coordination. But that's definitely something we've discussed that I brought up with Parks—this being a difficult one to detour. You get down past Lock and Dam Road, basically, and there's no going anywhere else, right? It's a lake all the way along it. So yeah, we do want to be as sensitive as possible to that, and I do think that there's some things we could probably write into contract language, again speaking way ahead, but to address that—basically once work starts, that it has to continue until it's finished, things of that nature. We want to be sensitive to it. We also want to make sure that it's very clear that it's a closed trail after a certain point too; there's some things we can do with signage at "the point of no return," right? Still have the rest of the trail system open as long as it can be, but then make sure that people aren't wandering down and back unless they're just completely ignoring the signs, which happens anyway. [36:41] **Mayor Mary Fasbender:** Thank you. Councilmember Leifeld. **Councilmember Lisa Leifeld:** Thank Your Honor. Bryce, it's always nice to see you at our podium. Thank you. A couple things for you. One, to Councilmember Pemble's point: when the child on the bike—I know people only read so much of signs, but is there maybe an option to put something up at the top on 42 there that, you know, kind of like your Black Diamond runs and your Bunny Hill runs? Just something that sort of warns riders, because I know for a lot of people that's a really fun spot. You get up a little speed, you got someone up ahead of you who yells "all clear," and you get to run through there really fast. So maybe some options along those lines; I don't really know what that looks like. But you have a graphic in here from HR Green—on ours it's page seven—where it shows the route that goes windy through and coming down, and then there's another route that comes off on the right of it and down. What's that all about? [38:13] **Bryce LeBrun (Dakota County Project Manager):** So that was one of the iterations that we would have looked at. There are a few different options and trade-offs between them that HR Green basically iterated on to see what it did to retaining walls, if we can keep the old retaining wall. The concept that we moved forward with preserves that existing retaining wall and then builds another one that'll be below it, since we have to drop elevation quite a bit in order to flatten that slope out. So yeah, the one that went off to the right was kind of a—would have been a brand-new one with a little bit of a curve on the downhill, so not currently something that's being... **Councilmember Lisa Leifeld:** Okay, correct. Thank you. **Bryce LeBrun (Dakota County Project Manager):** Yeah, we'll have a—again, we'll have, as we go forward and kind of split this off into its separate project, we'll have something that's a little more digestible that we can share publicly. [39:46] **Mayor Mary Fasbender:** Thank you, Councilmember Leifeld. Any other discussion, Council? Okay, if not, I would accept a motion to approve the resolution in support of the recommended scope and features for the CSAH 42 Corridor Study. Councilmember Haus and Councilmember Fox as a second. New additional discussion, Council? All those in favor of the motion, state by saying aye. (Council: Aye). Opposed to that motion, state by saying nay. All right, that motion is approved. Thanks, Bryce. Is there anything else I need to do here tonight? Under Community Development, we have a resolution for a special use permit for cannabis for Ace Liquor at 1355 South Frontage Road. And for this item, we have our Community Development intern, Lindsay, with us. [39:46] **Lindsay (Community Development Intern):** Thank you again. So before you today is a special use permit application for cannabis retail sales from Norma Pacheco for Ace Liquors, located at 1355 South Frontage Road. This property is located in the Westview Mall and is surrounded by properties zoned as commercial in the north and east, and properties zoned as residential in the south and west. As for the existing conditions of the properties, it's a small business and has been running for several years now. They do have a tobacco license, and the staff is unaware of any compliance issues at this time. The property itself is zoned C4, so it is consistent in being able to have a cannabis retail license with a special use permit. We had the Planning Commission review this application at their meeting on August 12th, and the commission voted 7-0 to recommend approval for this request. So we are offering this forward to you as a recommendation for approval. [40:31] **Mayor Mary Fasbender:** Great, thank you Lindsay. Any discussion, Council? Councilmember Haus. **Councilmember Angie Haus:** I'd like to make a motion to approve that resolution. **Mayor Mary Fasbender:** Thank you, Councilmember Haus. And a second by Councilmember Leifeld. Any discussion, Council? All those in favor of the motion, state by saying aye. (Council: Aye). Oppose that motion, stay by saying nay. Thank you. Tonight, we also have a Downtown parking report, and Lindsay, you may continue. [41:16] **Lindsay (Community Development Intern):** Yes. Okay, so I did the Downtown parking report for the City of Hastings. I first want to start off by going into a little bit of history about this report. The first study was done in the summer of 2017 by John Hinzman, the Community Development Director. He created the study area and determined which lots we would analyze. The next study was done in the summer of 2021 by Grady Timmerman, the Community Development intern at that time. He collected data and prepared many graphics and then presented his findings to the Planning Commission. And then last year in 2023, the Community Development intern Madeline Swanson conducted a study and reported her findings to the City Council. Prior research revealed underutilization of parking, or that parking is frequently accessible and open during peak and regular hours. For the study area, it consisted of 20 blocks, and within these blocks there were 70 different areas I collected data from. These consisted of parking lots, side streets, and alleyways. I analyzed both public and private areas as well. On this map, we can see the public areas in blue and private in red. There was a total of 1,558 parking spaces available: 1,012 were public and 546 were private. The purpose of this study was to get an updated inventory of available public and private parking, to see parking usage during various time periods and various days of the week, determine areas of higher concentration of use, look at if any recent development affected parking utilization, and determine any redesign possibilities. This analysis consisted of a few steps when collecting data. I started off by following five different maps and outlining 70 different parking areas. When collecting data, I counted the number of cars that were using the spaces at the time I was there. I then plugged the numbers into an Excel spreadsheet and found the average utilization for each day and each time. I looked at the 2023 study and I found that there were five areas with an average utilization of 50% and above. These were the most used parking areas at the time, and they consisted of the City Hall parking lot in pink, Fourth Street from Vermillion to Sibley in blue, the Block 3 Levee main parking lot in green, and in yellow we have Sibley Street north of Second and Second Street from Vermillion to Sibley. Comparing the 2023 data to the 2024 data, we can see a big difference in the number of areas that surpass the 50% threshold. The five areas from 2023 stayed at the average above 50%, and nine more followed—a total of 14 areas in 2024 were seen to have a 50% or higher average utilization rate. Although more areas have seen an increased usage, none exceeded the average utilization of 80%. For some more data, 17 surveys were conducted between May 13th and August 6th. Each were done on various days and times of the week: seven were done on weekdays before 12:00 PM, eight were done on weekdays after 12:00 PM, and two were done on the weekends. The chart shows that the average overall utilization was 32%. Weekdays before 12:00 PM was also an average of 32%, weekdays after 12:00 PM had a 34% average, and weekends had a 33% average. The data shows that weekdays after 12:00 PM had the highest utilization of Downtown parking. And yes, we can see that parking is being utilized, but it's nowhere near being full. On this slide, we have an image of a Hastings Walmart overlaying the downtown study area to show the proximity of parking to storefronts. The distance between Walmart parking areas and the areas within the store are comparable to a one- or two-block distance in the downtown area. So we see most individuals tolerate the parking distance at Walmart, but not in the parking areas downtown. This image helps show that parking one to two blocks away from the storefront is the same as you would be walking if you parked towards the back of the Walmart. Overall, I learned a lot from this study, and some conclusions we can take away is that yes, the areas exceeding the 50% utilization threshold increased from 5 to 14, but the overall average parking utilization in downtown was 32% and stayed relatively stable since 2023. I also looked at the effects recent developments could have had on the Downtown parking. The newest development in downtown is the construction of the Lake Isabel Flats, and its impact on Downtown parking demand and utilization was found to have a very minimal impact on the surrounding areas as it provided on-site parking for its tenants. This compares to the data collected in the 2021 study when the Artspace Lofts were constructed. The Artspace Lofts only utilized about 42% of its spaces in '21 and has decreased to a 36% utilization in 2024. The Lake Isabel Flats have similarly underutilized its parking with only 12% use an average of 2024. Future development projects that are being considered within the study area region may benefit from this data for future parking possibilities. Overall, the data I collected over the 17 surveys showed that Hastings downtown free parking is underutilized. Thank you, and I can stand for any questions. [47:12] **Mayor Mary Fasbender:** Lindsay, excellent. Thank you. Excellent analysis. It's really good for us to hear it, and not only hear it but see the visuals that you had, because we do hear all the time that parking is such a problem. And I have always loved John Hinzman's analogy of the Walmart parking lot. So I'm glad you put that into perspective, and I appreciate all the work you've done. I'm sure John appreciates it too. Council discussion? Oh, Councilmember Haus. [47:59] **Councilmember Angie Haus:** Thank you, Your Honor. Lindsay, just wanted to start off by saying what a wonderful job. Thank you for all the hard work that you've completed, and you as well, John, for helping us with this. Something that I loved to hear and see was—I know I've heard from a lot of constituents that Lake Isabel Flats was kind of a concern coming in just with the amount of space that they're going to have, and I'm glad to hear that they're underutilized. That's really good to hear. I also loved that—I know Mayor already mentioned it—but that image of the Walmart parking lot. My mom has worked at Walmart for 30 years, so I can imagine that right on the money every time. Great use of visualizations for this as well. Thank you for everything. [48:45] **Mayor Mary Fasbender:** Thank you, Councilmember Haus. Councilmember Vihrachoff. **Councilmember DawnMarie Vihrachoff:** Thank you, Your Honor. Lindsay, I just have to echo the comments up here. I don't know if you heard it when your graphics first popped up, but this whole row went "whoa!" You knocked it out of the park with this. I am so personally impressed by just the way that you put forth this study and the randomness of your data and how you assembled it—how you thought to check the lots at different times of the day, different times of the week. I'm blown away. I just can't say enough good things. This is absolutely wonderful. My question to you is: with all of this incredible data, which is a huge resource for the City of Hastings, I have two questions. Number one, when you had said that we are about—you gave that slide of like 33% utilized, 32%—do you have a sense of, for a town the size of Hastings, is that pretty average? Is that—I don't want to say good or bad, because it's not good or bad, it's just kind of is, right? Is that kind of what you usually see in communities our size? And then also, do you have any recommendations for us? Because we can see that there is plenty and plenty of parking. So what are different ways that we could be communicating that with residents or folks that are downtown or constituents that might have concerns? [50:20] **Lindsay (Community Development Intern):** Personally, I've never done one of these studies before, so I don't know if it would be similar to another town like this—John might know. But some things I could say to work on is "show them the data," I guess. Or maybe even look at later times too during the night; I know people have concerns about that as well. So maybe taking time to do the data past 6:00. **John Hinzman (Community Development Director):** And I don't have anything really more to add on the comparison. It's a very good question, Councilmember, to other cities. I don't know how that utilization goes. I think one of the other takeaways I got from the report is when you take a look at two of our very large parking areas, which is the ramp in front of the Confluence and then the Red Rock ramp by the railroad depot—those are significantly underused at this point, and they're both lots of at least 100 spaces altogether. So we've got some capacity within those areas. It's just something to keep an eye on through development as it goes forward. The one thing that was interesting to me is taking a look from 2023 to 2024: we had the Confluence and we had Lake Isabel Flats open up, and I was curious as to what sort of effect this might have on traffic patterns and parking patterns. And it wasn't terribly significant, which was interesting. [51:05] **Mayor Mary Fasbender:** Thank you. Thank you, John. Thank you, Councilmember. Councilmember Fox. [51:53] **Councilmember Fox:** Thank you, Your Honor. Lindsay, wonderful job. I heard you say on average, the highest utilization time—weekdays after 12:00 PM—is only 34% utilized. So in the data that you sent us in our packet, we're over 60%—like about 61%—underutilized parking in our downtown district, which is more significant than just Second Street. And we have a lot of parking that we can use. I'm just saying all of that out loud for everybody listening. I'm curious, Lindsay, from your data background now—I love data-driven decision making, and I believe longitudinal data is the best way to make those decisions. So I believe we need to keep maintaining this data so that we can keep track and stay on top of the maintenance of parking for future capacity, kind of like John was just saying. But Lindsay, what's your perspective on residential versus commercial versus just visitor or tourism? Let's say that—is there a way we could add a qualitative side to this study? So we could check into if it's a residential person who parks overnight where they park and why, or if it's a commercial person or a retailer who parks during the day just during their shift and where and why? So when we do have to move forward with different capacity decisions, we could determine that based on data. I don't know—I'd love your input. [53:26] **Lindsay (Community Development Intern):** I never really thought about that, honestly. But I feel like surveys are always good, so that would be a great way, I feel. Or just like—I know a lot of places downtown have apartments above their commercial spaces. So I know the tenants leave during the day and go to work and stuff while the people come to shop around downtown. So I feel like that helps. [53:26] **Mayor Mary Fasbender:** Good thinking. Thank you so much for all your work this summer. Thank you. Thank you, Councilmember Fox. Councilmember Leifeld. **Councilmember Lisa Leifeld:** Thanks, Your Honor. That was awesome, Lindsay. So when we hear from people that "oh, there isn't any parking," I'm going to tell you: of the places that I frequent downtown—one of which I work at—I have never encountered someone from out of town complain about our parking, for the record. Look at Red Wing, Hudson, Stillwater, Prescott—very rarely do you get to pull in front of a door to a place and walk in. So I think what we're hearing is some of us residents who have been here a longer time—me, I've just got a horseshoe in my back pocket, I always get front row parking. Too bad, because I could use the exercise, but I get front row parking. It just happens. But I think a lot of that—and your numbers are showing those numbers going up—I think as residents we're all starting to realize that they're short blocks and it's not that far. When you talked about the bridge to Sibley, the number of parking from the bridge to Sibley, but then Red and then nothing—two blocks! It's only two blocks. So I think—and the parklets and things like that, we heard from so many locals that "oh, this is going to take all our parking spots." So I think we're getting there. This is one of those things that we just need to retrain our brains, and I think a study like this does that. So excellent job with this. And as a community, I'm not going to lie and say I'm going to start walking two blocks because I'm still going to take that front row spot if it's open, but I think we could all—I could use the exercise. Excellent job with this, and I'm really going to try to park in a different spot from now on, Lindsay, because of you. Okay. Thank you. [55:45] **Mayor Mary Fasbender:** Thanks, Councilmember Leifeld. Lindsay, I do have a question. I don't know if you have any data on—I'm just curious if you have a visual or if you remember handicap spots when you were doing these studies. Were they open? Were they not open? **Lindsay (Community Development Intern):** I did not look at any of the handicap spots specifically. I counted them as a parking spot, so I didn't really have any data on that. **Mayor Mary Fasbender:** That's okay. I just wondered if you might have remembered something, but okay. Thank you. Any other discussion, Council? All right, we will move on. Under Administration, we have a resolution to approve a new cannabis retail sales license for Ace Liquor. And for this item, we will have an introduction by Assistant City Administrator Kelly Murtaugh. Welcome, Kelly. [56:31] **Kelly Murtaugh (Assistant City Administrator):** Thank you, Mayor, council members. Before you first this evening is the consideration of the license for cannabis retail license—wow, I'm struggling today—for Upward Solutions LLC, which is doing business as Ace Liquor. You heard about this earlier this evening. They have an approved special use permit that was the final step in their process. They have met all of the other requirements to be issued the license, including an approved security plan. So certainly I can address any questions that you may have. [57:17] **Mayor Mary Fasbender:** Thank you, Kelly. Council, any questions? Okay, a motion please? Councilmember Fox. **Councilmember Fox:** Motion to approve. **Mayor Mary Fasbender:** Second? Second by Councilmember Leifeld. No discussion, Council? All those in favor of the motion, state by saying aye. (Council: Aye). Opposed to that motion, state by saying nay. And that motion prevails. Thank you, Kelly. [58:04] **Mayor Mary Fasbender:** We move on to a resolution to approve a new cannabis retail sales license for Westview Smokes. And you may continue. **Kelly Murtaugh (Assistant City Administrator):** Thank you very much, Mayor. So the application has been filed, of course, as you know, for Westview Smokes on 1355 South Frontage Road. This license would allow for the sale of adult-use cannabis like the others. And Westview Smokes, as earlier you approved the special use permit, now meets all of the requirements for the cannabis retail license, including the approved security plan. So I can certainly address any other questions you have on that one. [58:50] **Mayor Mary Fasbender:** Thank you, Kelly. Any discussion on this, Council? All right, a motion please for a resolution approving a new cannabis product retail license for Westview Smokes. Councilmember Pemble and Councilmember Lawrence. No discussion, Council? All those in favor of the motion, state by saying aye. (Council: Aye). Opposed to that motion, state by saying nay. And the third resolution in your packet: this item will be considered at the September 3rd meeting. Council, do you have any announcements? Okay, I do have a few. [59:37] **Mayor Mary Fasbender:** Thank you to the City of Red Wing and the Red Wing Fire Department for use of an old engine last week when we had an apparatus in the shop. This kind of inter-development collaboration helps keep our community safe. Thank you. Happy birthday next week to Councilmember Fox! Oh yeah, it's the end of the month. Summer rec programs at Levee Park: Wednesday, August 21st, Storytime in the Park with the theme "Jungle," a partnership with Pleasant Hill Library. Thursday, August 22nd, Music in the Park with the music of Bob Dylan, tribute to Bob Dylan, supported by the Ruth and George Doffing Charitable Fund. Thursday, August 29th, Music in the Park with Steam Machine, old-time and bluegrass, supported by the Ruth and George Doffing Charitable Fund. Maker's Way Alley Market will be at the Levee Park on Thursday, August 22nd; support area makers and artisans within our historic downtown and riverfront park by shopping at the markets. Concerts in the Orchard at the LeDuc Historic Estate will feature Double Down Daredevils August 25th, and that is sponsored by Merchants Bank. Rec, Art, and Police is Wednesday, August 28th at Vermillion Falls with choice of art, a DJ, and a contest, recommended for elementary and middle schoolers, supported by SC Toys, Country Financial, Hastings Lions Club, Hastings Family Service, Community Ed, and Hastings Prescott Arts Council. City offices will be closed Monday, September 2nd, in observance of Labor Day. Meetings coming forward: Tuesday, August 20th, Heritage Preservation Commission, 7 PM. Wednesday, August 21st, the Parks and Recreation Commission has been cancelled. There is a Finance Committee budget meeting at 6 PM, Wednesday, August 21st. Monday, August 26th, 7 PM, Parks and Recreation Committee. 7 PM, Planning Commission. Tuesday, August 27th, 6 PM, HEDRA. And Tuesday, September 3rd, 5:30, City Council has a budget workshop and our regular meeting at 7 o'clock. With that, I would stand for a motion to adjourn. Councilmember Leifeld and a second by Councilmember Pemble. All those in favor of the motion, state by saying aye. (Council: Aye). Oppose that motion, state by saying nay. We are adjourned.