7 o' for it okay all right folks if I can get everybody's attention here real quick we'll get this show on the road well good evening uh welcome to White Bear Township's uh 2024 annual meeting I'm Pat christofferson the clerk Treasurer here at the township um just want to let everybody know that this evening's meeting is being cablecast Live on YouTube and is available there for any any viewings anytime that you want uh this or tonight's meeting is not repeat not a town board meeting but a meeting of the people um Town board staff and town Consultants are present as a resource uh should you have any questions that could be directed towards them during the discussion this evening uh main part of the presentation is the proposed preliminary tax levy for 2025 um when it comes to a vote only Town residents have the privilege of voting since the meeting is not a town board meeting uh the meeting is run by a moderator rather than a chairperson person so at this time so we can get things going here legally and properly I would ask for a volunteer as a moderator for this evening's festivities got one here Bob kermas anybody else want to get out there no okay so at this time uh Bob kerm has volunteered to be our meeting moderator and I would ask for a nomination from the floor for Bob can I get a second second all in favor all right your show Mr kermes we appreciate it well thank you all uh just in case you overlooked at there our agendas on the table by the door in the back so you have if you haven't gotten an agenda yet go ahead and grab one uh the U just a couple of things housekeeping issues uh we'll we'll follow a modified uh set of Roberts rules as we conduct the meeting so we'll have we'll be looking for motions in seconds Like Pat said it's uh a resident town meeting so you you all are the ones that are going to be making the motions and conducting the proceedings so uh that said that the proceedings are being recorded both on tape but we do have a recorder over there in the corner she's listening so if you could help her out and when if you do have something to say please identify yourself with your uh with your address in the township okay I think that covers the housekeeping stuff unless I've overlooked something Pat will let me know uh oh I'm sorry yeah we do have a parliamentarian I mentioned Robert's Rules of Order I'm no expert but we do have an expert that is and our town attorney Chad Clemens is is their parliamentarian he'll be helping us out if issues come up okay so first item that we have to deal with on the uh agenda or the next item is to approve the meeting minute agenda for this evening so we need a motion to approve the agenda as accepted or uh presented is there a second motion's been made and seconded uh here heing no suggested changes or amendments I'll call the vote those in favor of approving the agenda please say I any opposed the agenda is approved uh next item we need to approve the 2023 annual meeting minutes uh they have been uh posted online at the township website and did we have yeah we have copies on on the table also so uh we need a motion to approve those minutes there second motion's been made and seconded to approve the minutes from the 2023 Annual Meeting those those in favor please say hi hi any opposed okay the minutes are approved all right we do have at least one elected official uh sheriff sheriff Fletcher is here uh was John Choy gonna be here oh okay uh we will you okay Sheriff you got here first so if you'd like to visit with us good are you well first of all uh thanks for having us and I do want to start by saying thank you for being one of those communities that has supported us for so many years and supported the men and women of the Sheriff's Office you know I I had this job back in 95 and I've I've always felt that Whitebeard Township understood the tough job that law enforcement has and appreciated the men and women of our department I can tell you last night that there was a Oakdale officer that was fired upon and uh thankfully not hit our SWAT team and Kyle I don't know if you were on that call but he's on our SWAT team as well our SWAT team responded with our barette St Paul SWAT team Washington County SWAT team it was a collaborative effort and finally after gassing the suspect out of the house he did come out but this comes on the heels of one of our deputies getting shot at here 10 days ago and um of course these were in St Paul not in in Whitebear Township but the job is getting increasingly worse the Burnsville officers that were killed of course we've had a number of Wisconsin officers killed and of course Fargo and St Cloud so the bottom line is assaults against police officers are up three times what they were five years ago and it's getting hard for us actually to recruit officers in this environment um but this community has always been so supportive and gracious and appreciative of our efforts I just wanted to to thank you for that we we uh have had great success here in the township crime is as low as any major suburban community around and I have to tell you the uh thefts have dropped dramatically catalytic converters have uh dropped and thankfully because of the new law requiring ing you know Auto Parts Place salvage places of recording the number and who who actually brought brought it in that law has been very helpful Auto thefts have dropped dramatically we're down 40% this year and last year we were down 45% and I will tell you right now as I stand here in Ramsey County we will probably have one carjacking every 10 days that's the frequency of our car jackings in Ramsey County which we're very proud of because to be honest with you 3 years ago that wasn't the case in Minneapolis however they will have one carjacking every day hey John I'm stalling for you that the in Minneapolis they're going to have one car jacking every day and so we have uh made extensive efforts actually John and I partnered up on this program working with uh the county attorney's office to have a three-pronged approach of actually aggressively pursuing our car jackers and auto thieves once they're caught and I always tell people you have to catch them before you can help them because there are a lot of people that want to help them and that's great we love that that effort some need to be incarcerated but a lot can change their ways and so once we catch them we have ambassadors and Navigators that are reaching out to these young kids and helping them change course and we have of course a new program that we're we're trying to have treatment houses intensive treatment houses in Ramsey County that these kids can get treat treatment for mostly it's their drug addiction depression all the chemical issues that they have on top of their mental health issues so John's been very helpful in getting grants from a variety of sources sheriff's office has benefited from the Department of Commerce grants and I do want to introduce two of our cat team members Kyle Williams if You' just stand up for a minute there and Darren McDonald Darren they're out there every day we have a team of 10 people that are out there every day uh working to try to catch them and um I I have to tell you they've this team of 10 deputies has arrested hundreds hundreds of Auto thieves in the last three years just uh amazing work so quick Round of Applause for those two guys there if you wouldn't mind thank you and uh uh Andre Jerome is one of our uh K9 officers there his partner Sunny is out in the parking lot we were going to bring him in but we knew that some Pardon Me Maybe maybe at the end of the well might not be around he's got to go back to work they're all working but uh um so anyhow our Patrol guys out here do amazing job anybody remember the name thurmer well B now Norm thurmer III and Billy thurmer worked here as well in this area they're off tonight but their father Norm thurmer II actually is the one that talked to me in the running for Sheriff back in 1994 when it ran so the thurmers of course have a long Legacy here as well so thank you gentlemen so um the good news is here in whitee Township things are great the bad news is what happens elsewhere in the metro area does eventually affect us and I have to tell you the biggest problem that I see on the horizon is that the Minneapolis Police Department is so short staffed that they cannot combat the crime that they have keep in mind when I was at the St Paul police department years ago they had 1,00 police officers in Minneapolis uh for the most part they were always between 850 and 900 even the last five or six years there was a law passed that they have to maintain at least 725 right now they have about 525 so they're 200 under what their Charter says they have to have and they're 300 under where they should be probably in the 8 825 it's very difficult to police a city like Minneapolis with without those resources and that's why I mentioned they have a carjacking every day they have um you know I have to be honest they have 20 Auto thefts every day in their town and we're constantly going and helping them they're coming to our side of the river but for the most part because of the proactive approach that we have on our side of the river we've had tremendous success in reducing that John I think I mentioned before you came in it's a 40% reduction this year on top of a 45% reduction last year so with that I'm just going to pause for questions uh about crime or anything you'd like to know right well unable is an interesting question there is a red flag law that's passed and if um people apply relatives or the Sheriff's Office not the red right removing the guns yeah we don't at this point we it's supposed to be voluntary the judge orders them to turn the guns in and we go to the house and attempt to acquire them or set up a time to acquire them but if we don't get the guns we have to prove a that we know they have them that's step one which is problematic for us um but why do you have you had an experience where you were troubled yeah yes well that's the big problem that's the big problem we hate to go forcibly into a house that we know there's a guy with with a gun that's not going to want to give them up we have this happen on a regular basis we there was an incident in St Anthony the other day where we we had an order to civil commit this person to a hospital in a NOA lock up and we knew that he had some weapons and so the question is how do you go in and civil commit a person um and so fortunately we had actually scheduled our SWAT team to help with that if you can imagine how unusual that is but 3 days before we were going to execute that RIT he threatened all his neighbors with a knife and then um you might have saw it in the newspaper then he ended up assaulting two St Anthony police officers as they arrived so mental health biggest issue that we have there's no doubt um you know I've been at this for a while since 1977 we've never seen the mental health challenges that we have now John you can when you're up here you can try to take a shot at that question too any other questions about crime for speeding yes well I mean we're we're pretty good we're not perfect you know State Patrol has got primary responsibility for freeways and highways but our deputies do like to jump in there the biggest problem we have is when the racers are actually out yeah well well we we're we've done a really good job of telling the racers stay out of Ramsey County and the reason that they stay out is we seize their cars there is a provision if they're breaking the law that we can seize their cars so we have several seiz Char Dodge Chargers and Challengers sitting in our impound lot and that's the biggest thing they do not like they don't like tickets they don't like getting arrested but they really hate getting their cars seized so and if you listen to the live on patrol when I'm out there on Friday I have direct conversations with these young kids and their Racers just tell them don't come to our County they've been sneaking back into New Brighton there's a spot up in New Brighton uh that they snuck back to two weeks ago but by and large um they're I hate to say it they're afraid of us which in this case is good right well it's good I'm not it's good that you uh tell me about the buzz bikes because that's something I'm I'm not really cluding on as well so that's a big issue huh really all right well I appreciate that it's good to know what else yep well for the most part it's the same in Ramsey County but there are new initiatives being developed where social workers can be sent to certain types of calls um some cities have been more aggressive at that than others um some people believe that police officers don't need to be at most calls I'm not sure what the magic number is but it's it's far less than 5% in my estimation of calls that police officers don't need to be there because the problem with the social work issue which they're great they're really great resource for us to have with us the problem is is that the mental illness of many of the people that when they arrive is such that uh you can't predict where it's going to go so yes there are new emerging strategies about sending out um a a counselor a social worker maybe a suicide prevention person we get a lot of you know suicide calls attempted suicide calls now that we'd rather hand off to someone who's an expert in that but if they have a weapon it's we have to go there with them anyhow uh you can say that that'll probably work but I don't know what the the com Center the Communication Center isn't under our supervision they set policies independent of us and they try to manage 17 different communities at once so I think if you tell them you want a police officer they'll send a police officer but but you are going to see more of that in the future Minneapolis is exploring that now or they're going to have a number of people dispatched that aren't police officers partly because they're so short handed you know was really the issue somebody else yes sir ghost guns are making a big big uh in are having a big increase guns with switches which make the gun an automatic weapon there's a dramatic increase in that even the last two years the number of switches on the street has increased dramatically um we had uh five of our local car thieves in St Paul that went to the Mall of America the Mall of America has stationary license plate readers on their parking lots the car was stolen so the Bloomington Police Department knew that the car was in there they went there and the five kids ran from the car there was a ghost gun in the car with a switch this is just last week and another ghost gun that was thrown in the garbage can in the parking lot so we're seeing in them ghost guns on a weekly basis and we're seeing switches quite regularly now a switch is a small piece that attaches to the the slide of the gun that causes the gun not to reset but instead refire so it takes a it takes a you know 30 round magazine and delivers it in 5 seconds it's extremely dangerous technology one thing I would say about this weather you mentioned the weather and I I have a long history of this when I was working in the St Paul police burglar unit um there are going to be a large number of theft from Autos in Park parking lots we get it every single year and people will watch they'll sit in a car or at Kom they used to sit on top of the hill and they'd watch women come to the park for a walk and K's a mile a half round right and we have tamre and other paths here but it applies anywhere you go um vadis Park sucker Lake Etc we get hit the hammered every April and because the weather is getting better guaranteed we're going to get hit again well what will they'll do is look for if a woman goes on a walk without her purse where's the purse it's in the car right and they're going for those credit cards checks whatever else is in that purse so men usually have their wallet in their pocket but they will wait for women to leave their car and go on their walk and I it's I I try to warn people every year just take your stuff with you don't bring it to the park just take your car keys with you because they are going to try to break into your car and steal your purse it's the number one thing and I I and the other thing I'll just say and it doesn't happen much here I know every time the weather hits 75 children are falling out second floor Windows it it happens every year and we always say you know people leave because they don't leave the screen down so just remind your friends and neighbors that uh when you're open the windows if you got little kids in there pull the screen down so that's that's our seasonal protection yes sir yep yes yes well we get alarms over there in that new development area on a regular basis Andre I don't know you want to comment on that at all or yeah yeah any any other questions yes sir um we had about a 5 to 10% increase in Ramsey County which is isn't the highest and it was about the same that we see um but obviously anytime violent crime goes up the applications for gun permits to carry goes up as well but we didn't see a dramatic increase this year in part because we think you know frankly it's pretty safe on the Eastern side of the river I have to tell you that it's it's it's gotten a lot safer but I'll you see the reports in Minneapolis if you watch it I just you know I feel bad for that Chief O'Hara is a good person but he's got his hands full over there anything else well feel free to call me anytime um just call my office and uh you know leave a message be glad to get back to you and um and we enjoy working with Chris and and and so anything you want to anything you want to ask there board members Navigators mediator thank you very much appreciate [Applause] it CH the County Attorney is hello good evening everybody thank you for the invitation to be here with all of you just to for me to come up here and have an opportunity just to um thank you for the opportunity to serve uh in this County I've been the County Attorney now for uh I think it's about 13 years I started in in 2011 and uh it's been the the greatest honor and privilege of my life to try to come up with Solutions and we've got a lot of complicated issues lately and you know I was listening to what the sheriff was talking about I want to just tell you that you know everything that he talked about in terms of like ramsy County doing a lot better around um addressing some of the crime issues that is so true in fact uh on a pretty regular basis we get contacted by other jurisdictions uh around the country wanting to know you know how did we reduce so drastically uh the auto thefts in our County how are we why are we doing so much better around the sexual assault uh investigations and at the the bottom line is this it's all happening because um there are committed people who are working together you remember when uh we kind of experienced that uptick and violence probably starting at about I don't know I think I kind of started feeling it at about maybe April February around that Springtime of 2020 uh and it was just something that we were experiencing carjackings and that was something that we never really tracked before we never even had to count them um um and it was a scary time and but I think at that moment in time we were kind of at our worst in our ability to solve crime because it was so confusing and I remember a lot of times you know a city council member from St Paul would get some complaint about a carjacking or auto theft and you know it would be easy for them to maybe just deflect that to the police then the police might deflect that to me and it was just easy for me to deflect that to the judge and we weren't really accomplishing anything but through some really good conversations and good people people like Sheriff Fletcher uh coming together and having some of those hard conversations about what do we need to do because the problem I think in uh this country is that we have a lot of elected officials who want to pull and they want to try to solve things but often times we don't pull in the same direction and when we do that we're so much more powerful and so Sheriff Fletcher talked about some of those hard conversations that we had with um uh just some of the young kids who were committing these crimes right and what do we do about that and so you know we could talk about in 2019 I guess our County Board decided to close boy Totem Town uh for a number of reasons and I'm not going to go into whether that was a good thing or a bad thing but that was a decision that was made before the pandemic but through a number of conversations and listening to what the judges were telling us and what they were telling us was they just don't have any options other than sending them to Redwing which was the the the state Correctional uh place for young kids or electronic home monitoring and everything in between just doesn't really exist for us it exists on paper but often times the placements where you can't leave where there's intensive therapy they're out of state they're in Greater Minnesota and they simply don't want our kids maybe because our kids were there before um and so we've had difficulty finding that placement so we recognize that just internally within Ramsey County we needed to have some conversations about what we needed to do to have some more options for judges so that we could have intensive therapeutic types of uh Residential Treatment uh for these young people and then we also learned something too you know it's really hard to be a parent to teenagers and there's a lot of mothers out there that we met and Sheriff Fletcher could talk about all the people that he the conversations that he's had but there are families out there that are desperate for help and so we all came together and came up with a comprehensive solution working with the business community on a bipartisan basis went to the legislature we're able to get $10 million uh $5 million for the construction of some of these intensive therapeutic homes for Youth and some additional Services for Families and for re-entry all of those things that were just desperately needed uh but all of that came together because we all decided that instead of trying to blame each other that we'd come together listen to one another learn about each other's problems and challenges and I think we're on the road to building out some local Solutions on that uh on the auto theft front um so true I mean we've had massive reductions and it's we're the only county in the state of Minnesota that has reduced that far so it's this is not like we could compare ourselves to St Louis County or any other County but we've had massive reductions and the reason why and the sheriff lecher said you have to catch the kids that are doing this and we have been able to do that in fact our carjacking clearance rate uh the Sheriff's Office clearance rate is probably about 30% if I'm not mistaken that's like the best in the country but minneapolis's clearance rate 2% so investing in making sure that we have enough police making sure that we have enough investigators prosecutors and judges everybody coming to the table about trying to get to Solutions uh it's been uh it's been a hard time during this last few years but it's been also very rewarding because I know what we're capable of as a community when we come together um I was just looking at some data today around one of the things that I'm just really passionate about is doing better around sexual assault uh prosecutions uh when we did a study and a report back in 2018 we talked about how a lot of these cases just weren't coming to the prosecutor's office and then if they did we didn't charge a lot of those cases but with the cases that we did charge we won in court all the time in fact we our conviction was really high we never lost in trial but we weren't taking the right chances on certain cases that needed where we needed to investigate more and do right by the victim who was harmed and today for the just the last three years in a row now uh our charging rate is above 50% and we've had a doubling of those presentments from law enforcement across the county so there's just a lot of exciting things that are happening and I just feel grateful to be able to be in partnership with people like Sheriff Fletcher other law enforcement agencies our judges our social service workers uh there's so many entities and agencies and also you the public that if you're a part of the solution I think we can accomplish good things and so our we're not going to stop and trying to come up with those Solutions just because crime is a little bit down we have to be vigilant and making sure that we have the resources have enough uh investigators have enough prosecutors and continue to collaborate and work together and um do everything that we can to get all of you the outcomes that all of you deserve so thanks for listening and if there's any questions I'd be happy to to answer them yes ma'am yeah oh thank you for that question yeah so that's another thing see I one of the things I love is the the just the opportunity to be able to try to solve challenges and and bring people together so back in the fall of 23 um I convened all of the superintendents and including Northern Dakota County uh to the table because we've got a huge problem uh in our state and in this nation chronic absenteeism has doubled we also have a problem with kids that are in school who aren't in class and I think one of the biggest problems that I learned from uh people in the cat team is that a lot of the kids who are doing the most violent crime the kids that are engaged in the carjacking when uh someone like Kyle Williams will ask where do you go to school the answer often times is I don't go to school and a lot of things fell apart during the pandemic so a part of you know that work around the the the truancy and the absenteeism but also just kids that have just literally disappeared um I convened all the superintendents to kind of collate all the data and guess what everybody has this huge chronic absenteeism problem we talked about kids who are in school but they're you know maybe doing drugs in the bathroom or whatever might they're not in class okay and so one of the things that we then we engage the Department of Education and the governor's office about trying to get more resources uh for for the schools to maybe even try to get them the resources to bring more resources and community members into the school to be have adults uh in our school buildings and also to figure out a way to get that data because the data exists we can actually figure out where if the kid is not enrolled in school but nobody's in charge of that that's the problem and so hopefully by the end of this legislative session we'll either come up with a legislative solution or I think it just can be done by executive order I think the governor or the department can just say this is what we're going to do these are our responsibilities at the state these are your responsibilities at the school district and then let's go and find these kids and figure out ways to get them back engaged in school I one thing I can tell you too Sheriff talked about uh you know when we see people who are committing crimes often times it's because of the drug addictions it's because of mental health another thing that's a a trajectory to being in prison or just criminal behavior is just having positive caring adult role models in your life the less you have of that the the the higher your chances that your your trajectory is not going to be good and so schools is that infrastructure for for our community it's a way that our community shows up and we have positive adult role models for kids it's for eight an 8 hour period so that part of our community our schools has to be strong and it really needs all of your support to do everything that we can to connect those kids to just activities and positive adult role models and often times the kids that we deal with they don't have that at home and so oftentimes they're running from that or there's something that right there uh but there's also a lot of parents who are just they're struggling economically financially they have to have multiple jobs and so supporting uh them I think is also a big part of the equation parents are a big part of um how kids will grow up to be adults I believe that the schools or that there's a school resource officer from the Whitebear Lake Police Department that's there um I don't and then there's other schools in Whitebear Lake as in this area which is the 916 school district and Sheriff do you provide SRO service there yeah in the town and then you had asked earlier about uh guns in the domestic violence context but there's also a new law the extreme risk protection order a law that would just became effective on in January and one of the things that we're doing in Ramsey county is we want to make sure um that we don't repeat what happened with the domestic violence um law that pass where the judge could order the guns confiscated I think it took us a really long time to even have like a protocol and for rightful reasons the way that the law was written it just was very confusing so we want to be really clear so that everybody knows what they should be doing within Ramsay County so for instance if uh you know a mental health counselor or someone at the school believes that someone is posing a threat maybe a former student is coming threatening to come and blow up the school or whatever it might be and they have a an assault rifle or whatever it might be that it's clear for what members of the public and family members can do Under This law I want to make sure that Ramsey County uh is going to be helpful to people who would show up at the front door and say that I'm worried about my brother I'm worried about this student at this particular School uh because the law does allow for the sheriff or the or the law enforcement or the County Attorney to make these petitions and so we're developing out kind of a framework so that we have common understandings of what we do when some when that information is presented to us how we work with domestic violence Advocates because oftentimes um in those particular situations uh we police officers will routinely ask the victim of a domestic violence incident other guns in the home right um and we'll be working with those Advocates and police to figure out if there should be more questions that's a part of a lethality assessment but all of those things could trigger some more actions on the law I think this law can be a great tool but we just have to again it's about collaborating and listening to One Another because there are real concerns about how this isn't going to be implemented but I just don't want anybody in government to say it's not my responsibility it is our responsibility to prevent uh mass shootings or to prevent suicide if we can do that we should try and so I'm going to make sure that we're listening to One Another developing some PR practices and protocols put them down on piece of paper communicate out to the public so the people know what they should be doing so like a you know like a therapist who might come across this information what should they do I want to be very clear so that they understand what what to do yes sir yeah yeah well thanks for that question that's something that I it's always really bugged me because I think that is a a pathway for how I mean if you think about all the guns that are manufactured right in this country and the manufacturers and those sellers know that they're being sold here in this country but all of it can't be for lawful uses right and it just bugs me that we have so many guns in this country and I'm not saying that we should ban people's right to own them to defend themselves to go hunting but there's got to be just some reasonable ways that we could be thinking about this and so and there's so many loopholes one of them are the just the straw purchaser so that would be me knowing that um if I just know somebody doesn't have a criminal record I ask that maybe it's my girlfriend and I ask some her to buy some guns for me right in fact in the burns full situation involving uh the deaths of our first three First Responders um some one one or some of the guns were uh purchased through a straw purchaser and so one of the conversations I've had with Sher Fletcher and this is another partnership that we have is that we've been putting resources and attention and Leadership around um raising awareness about the fact that um if you don't get killed uh with in a shooting and you get shot but you didn't die a lot of those cases never get solved and it's not because we don't want to it's just because the resource question about and it's just you know we got those investigators have to move on to the next thing and so those clearance rates are really really low and so uh we're putting more attention to solving those crimes because if we don't catch the people that are shooting to try to kill somebody they're going to continue to do that so we got to solve those crimes number one uh and then secondly I think there's maybe some other things that we could be partnering on and I had the conversation with sherff Fletcher the other day about you know I noticed that we were able to figure out where the straw purchaser H where the straw purchase happened in the Burnsville tragedy and what can we do here locally in Ramsey County to um figure that out right and so I would like to put more local resources often times I'll be the first to admit we just sometimes assume that this is a federal responsibility and they'll do that but I think it's worth uh our time to try to to answer because I had a lot of questions from people about what are we doing to F exactly to address those straw purchases and any other loopholes we can get at so I think it's worth doing and we'll we'll continue talking about what resources we can put into it yeah yeah yeah one way I also try to bring people together and think about some of the complexities of all of that right yeah well I'm just going to leave it basically the Chiefs saidy chief sheriff yeah right yeah yeah and so at September of 2021 there were some agencies that made a change like St Paul and um Roseville at that time actually Roseville was the first I think in the state to do it and then um Maplewood is now followed suit and uh North St Paul will be doing the same thing and um again I always tell officers you should listen to whatever your Chief says the chief should be listening to what the the board says or their city council or their mayor and their people and I think values are going to be different but in certain communities um there's a lot of discussion about just the racial disparities and those types of traffic stops and wanting to uh ask the question about whether or not they're actually effective and I think they can be effective there will be instances and examples in which Contraband will be recovered because of those stops uh but this the research we when all this research by the way is available on our website but we actually studied all those traffic stops in Ramsey County and the hit rate is actually like less than what the national averages it's like 1% that's a really low number so from my perspective I don't know if I was shooting 1% and three-point line I'd be on the bench so yeah yeah well I think you know Sheriff lecher has a whole life professional history on gangs but so correct me if you are if you think that I'm wrong but I think what we understand as gangs and what we've thought about it back in the 9s it's a little different today there maybe more groups they're certainly not a like a commercial like a illicit commercial purpose to steal cars and Export them to Africa or something like that it's I think there more small groups of young people often times who lack the social connections that they want and need and they form these groups and then of course you get young people making bad decisions it gets contagious um but I think those are the groups that we're dealing with I mean we still have have some of those names like the East Side boys the ham crazies and things like that but it's just it's different um and Bob maybe you I mean you're the expert in all of this I think it's better nowly was mids the Ecom right now we do have groups that they call themselves a game part of grou but it's not the same it's the high used we're making progress on that most concerning part I have daily basis we monitor a lot of social media the question really is we get these kids turned on the right path I don't have a future anyhow so I might as that's myg fear you're GNA be sorry you invited us if we keep going yeah right exactly you guys got to get out of the meeting I see 2005 preliminary or 25 tax levy that's proba everybody's here hopefully it's zero right no I'm kidding thank you for having us yeah thank you thank [Applause] you lot of uh important comments uh okay the preliminary tax levy for 2005 and the town finance officer Tom Kelly will give that presentation all right excuse me oops all right a 2025 uh property tax levy I always like to start off uh telling you that the township has received uh Financial Awards uh from the government Finance Officers Association uh the one up on the upper leftand corner is for our audit report or our annual financial report uh we've received this award uh for the 28th year in a row the one in the bottom middle uh is for our budget document uh we've received that 22 times and uh the the white one that is up in the right hand corner is for our popular report which we put out on our website every fall that summarizes our our audit report and we've received that one uh eight years in a row in total we're one of 10 government agencies in the state of Minnesota to receive all three of the awards thank you so our 2025 preliminary Levy uh as it's proposed tonight is our worst case scenario uh we've used uh conservative Revenue uh uh projections and kind of our worst case scenario for our expenditures uh once uh you the residents approve our Levy tonight uh we can lower it as we go through our budget process but we cannot uh ever exceed what is approved tonight which is why uh the bullet point above uh the 2025 budget and final property tax levy will be presented at the special town uh budget meeting which is scheduled for 700 p.m. on December 3rd uh here in this building uh later this year uh as I said uh this is our worst case scenario uh when uh we do our final uh budget in Levy uh we typically do end up lower uh than uh what is approved tonight and that is what this graph is showing uh the red is what uh is approved at the proposed and then the yellow is what was uh finalized uh to give you an example in 202 uh 4 uh for the proposed the residents approved a 5,912 188 uh dollar Levy and at the final Levy that was down to $ 5,682 th000 the proposed uh 2025 uh property tax levy as it stands right now we are proposing a 6,535 $336 Levy uh that is a 10% uh 10.74% increase from the 2024 preliminary Levy and it's basically based on the 2024 budget and then 2022 and 2023 actual revenue and expenditure levels plus some inflationary uh uh estimates in there uh but there are uh some except ions to that the first one uh on the revenue side is our rental U licenses and our animal licenses they are collected in the even years uh next year is an odd year so we won't be collecting uh those revenues and so that results in a revenue decrease of about $21,000 uh for the year building permits we're pretty much uh a fully developed town uh now uh we're seeing uh still quite a bit of remodel uh reciting re-roofing permits but uh those big uh building permits that we saw in the past have been declining and so we decreased our building permit revenues uh down $33,150 our County State AIDS uh we left at the 2024 amounts uh we I'll be honest with you we normally do not receive a whole lot in state and county aids uh in fact our state aid has been getting cut the last few years uh we used to get about $17 now we're down to about $12 a year in state AIDS um our fiscal disparities uh which is a revenue sharing uh in the metro area for commercial development uh we decreased that uh almost $5,000 down to $410,000 for 2025 uh we're pretty stagnant on uh our fiscal disparities revenues it seems like we're in a pattern right now where one year it goes up one year it goes down and then the next year goes back up again uh it did decrease in 2020 for uh so we are just uh plugging in a uh slight decrease for 2025 next on the expenditure side uh we did settle our Union contract uh to a three-year contract it does call for uh 35% uh cost of living increase uh on January 1st and then we did increase uh the budget uh for summer help uh to to continue to help uh address uh increased Street and Park maintenance needs uh that the township has our health insurance uh that comes due every or is renewed every uh March uh we've been lucky so far we've only been seeing 6 7% increase on that but in the past we did see uh double digigit increases on our health insurance uh so I did plug a 15% increase on our our health insurance for 2025 our Park Improvement uh which is based on our 10-year Capital Improvement plan uh and projecting out what the park needs are in the next uh 10 plus years uh we did increase uh the budget uh for that uh it was 350,000 uh we're increasing it to 375 and again that's kind of based on on the the improvements needed at the parks the biggest area uh for our expenditures oops uh is our Public Safety area um we just heard from the sheriff uh we did are increasing the sheriff's department uh budget um 15% uh it has been going up about 78% a year again it's one of our biggest expenditure areas so I'm plugging in a little bit bigger of an increase there because then it gives us a little bit more wiggle room uh so again it's uh a 15.67% increase our fire budget uh that's a big been a big problem the city of Whitebear lake has been trying to play catchup from uh budget freezes that they had in the past plus uh trying to replace equipment that needs to be uh replaced uh we've been seeing 20% increases in our uh Fire operating budget and so I did plug a 25.8% increase for 2025 we currently are discussing uh their new facility over there uh they want the township to pay 182,183 and so overall our Public Safety area of the Township's budget is increasing uh 25.4% and Public Safety makes up 40% of the town's uh budget and overall our operating budget uh right now as proposed is increasing about 16.8% so that brings us to the tax levy to uh pay for all this operation uh the first thing I'd like to mention is that we do have uh three different Bond issues that we need to uh Levy property taxes for uh the 2025 uh debt Levy uh based on their the bond payment uh schedule is 488,000 uh that's an increase of 9,289 or 16% from Over the 2024 and uh you see here on the slide uh the three Bond issues they were issued for uh mainly Street reconstruction projects there was a little bit in the 2020 bond that uh went uh for Park improvements but uh the majority of it is uh Road reconstruction projects and again the debt Levy is based on the bond schedule now another bit of good news here uh last year we were rated uh by uh Moody uh and uh even though we didn't have a bond issue out there they hadn't raid the Township in probably 10 15 years so they uh took a look at our finances and gave us a new rating and they rated us uh doublea one uh SNP the last time we did a bond issue in 2021 uh they rated us a ablea plus so both Moody's and SNP we are now one step below AAA and about the only way we can become uh AAA rated is to uh take over another city and incorporate them into the township so we got to get a larger so uh what makes up our uh property tax levy uh this slide uh shows you uh the comparison between 2024 and 2025 we have the operating Levy for 2025 which is 5,637 1225 uh the fiscal disparities at $410,000 and then our three uh debt levies uh that total up to $488,851 336 which compares to the 2024 preliminary Levy of 5,901 288 so what does this all mean uh if you uh if the town's tax capacity remains at its 2024 level and I'll preface that by saying uh our tax capacity uh mainly because uh Market values have been going up has been increasing uh last year it was about an 8% increase in our tax capacity uh but I left it at the 2024 level of 21,100 4998 if we apply that to that uh proposed tax rate our proposed tax rate would be 28.9 61% and that compares to our Uh current tax rate of 24904 when you apply that uh Market Market or that tax rate to your market value or your tax capacity uh if you saw no no increase to your market value between 2024 and 2025 uh you would see about a five about a $6 to $113 a month increase in your Township property taxes for a home valued between 200,000 and 400,000 so as I said before uh the the township can lower the uh Levy as we go through our budget process but we cannot exceed whatever is approved tonight uh the preliminary Levy uh is our worst case scenario and uh what we're asking you tonight is to uh approve the proposed 2025 property tax levy of uh 6,535 336 and with that I will take any questions got a mic here for anybody who has a question if you could speak into it please I'll bring it to you thank you uh I'm Mark Miller 1229 Birch Pond Trail I'm always confused about property taxes and assessments and capacities and whatever so bear with me but so what you just said is that if there were no change in the market value of my house which is you know it's going to change because it went up quite a bit this year but if there's no change based on this I can look at that range so automatically if my valuation goes up 10% again I can try to Fig Factor what that means is all it really means is more tax money am I reading that right you are correct okay thank you um as your market value increases and if our rate increases like with the proposed Levy it's being proposed to increase uh you would pay more property taxes now last year when we got to the final uh Levy because our our People's Market values had increased and our tax capacity had increased our tax rate actually went down so if you hadn't seen a market value if your market value stayed the same you would have actually seeing a property tax decrease but most people saw some type of an increase because their market value did go up and you should be receiving those notices probably in a month month and a half on what your value is being estimated at by the county assessor uh those usually go out sometime in April beginning of May and there's a process to appeal uh that market value if you think it's incorrect um one way or the other I mean um and then um like I say that market value will then be used to determine your 2025 taxes you know just ping it into me I get it we have the I question way too late evation yep no nope I totally get it um you know I do not know that question I know he has to or they have to do so many [Music] homes in a certain period of time so they've got to revisit similar homes like and I please don't hold me to this but it's like every 3 four years that they have to look at homes but they don't have to look look at every home and so they'll look at homes in a certain area and then see what they're selling for and somehow come up with what everybody's house is worth um and that's why I try to stress to people when it comes to their market value to pay attention to those notices that come out in the spring because that is going to affect your next year's taxes and I think there is a disconnect you know people see those notices saying oh the county assessor just increased my value of my home 10% I got a 10% home value increase that's great and then in the fall they get their notice of their taxes and they go holy cow my taxes are going way up what the heck's going on here and a big chunk of it is the value went up and so there's that disconnect and people really do need to pay attention to those notices that they get in the spring as to what their market value is and you may look at it and say yeah that seems about right and not question it but if you do have a question there's a process and uh to appeal it and call and get those questions answered and they do a pretty good job I think of responding to the residents of Ramsey County uh as a whole uh to get those right but you're right it it's yeah and the thing is is it on yeah thing is is I live on Otter Lake right six houses south of County Road J there's going to be this great big roundabout situation which I would like me it's going to degrade my house because there's going to be more traffic and they're possibly going to take some of my property for a bike path or walking path um so I could all all the city or the assessor and he might come yeah um there's a whole appeal process and um part of that appeal process is that they have to hold a um they call it like a border review and uh I don't know who sits on that panel but they hear the arguments both ways and again they can then adjust your value if they think it is incorrect and and so forth so there is a a process now I don't know how well some of it works and doesn't work you could argue okay more traffic in front of the road your house is that a good thing bad thing uh walking path some people would say hey that's better than having to walk on the street so that's a good thing and should increase your value others would say no I it's not I you know I don't know yeah actually addition on what she saying based on the process that I just did a couple months ago which I did not pay attention to my statement last spring uh but they were nice enough to come out like I said is that you definitely have a chance to make your case go with data make sure you're not just be building your case on emotion so in your case you might want to study that what happened to other areas when they put in roundabouts close to Upper Lake property or any property and you know in the bike pass and so on and so forth because they'll come back with those same types of studies that say well no we show that a bike path is a property increaser type of thing so but they're very I found them to be very open even in a non-official capacity that I did this spring very open to hearing what the homeowner is presenting and again data will may you know after you get your evaluation in a month or two um make your make the call or get your data ready to go or whatever depending on what you see on there and I believe that they will as as tommen said they will entertain your your concern or your appeal whatever so if you if you call they could they came to mind I mean they do come they do go to some people's homes like I say every so often they have to do an area so they will uh actually go to some homes but if you call on that and and can can I don't know the whole process but they if you question them they and it seems like a legitimate concern they will come out and take a look at your property and your home and and walk through the home with you and and explain the whole thing Mike brudon 5435 Peterson Road not so much a question just a statement um some of these are are County issues more so than related to the township directly tonight so I just don't want what we're proposing tonight to be misconstrued with the statements you receive specifically related to the county that's all I want to add it's just the numbers you see here tonight when you get that document from Ramsey County there are numbers unrelated to what we're basically trying to approve tonight yeah um like I say the the levy will be applied to those values and and so forth but the real reason for the levy increase is the different uh uh numbers I showed earlier the increase to the police the fire um our wage increases and so forth so any well then I'll turn it back over to Bob to oops oops one more question I'm sorry hi Tom just a quick question uh Kelly Johnson 4064 Whitebear Parkway I saw a few slides back that our local government Aid or aid from from the county and the state uh continues to be stagnant or if any decreases a little bit uh what are the reasons for that and our other area you know townships and uh suburbs experiencing similar dilemmas um some of it has to do with the formula that the state uses for AIDS um because again because our Market values keep going up uh that's a part of the formula and so it knocks us down a little bit um most townships uh and cities they get a lot more Aid than we do our size uh kind of affects us on it uh there's other factors that affect us to the point where and when I say they cut us I mean 10 years ago we were getting like $17 every year it seems like they cut us a dollar and so now we're down to about $12 that we get state aid um believe it or not it doesn't take much to spend that $112 um especially when a public works truck costs you a half a million dollars uh you know we can go through that money quite quickly um um I think the simplest response is that we're statutorily prohibited yeah we're just by being an urban Township we don't don't receive it and we're uh we're an island surrounded by municipalities that do so yeah any others well then I will turn it back over to Bob and he can propose the question okay bear with me for a second I'll make a couple of comments here on this issue of the appraised value or the market value uh when shortly after we moved out here I questioned the stack the tax statement first of all you're right read that statement when you get it from the county and uh I I questioned the value that they put on the home I was satisfied with the house but I think they were a little exaggerated on what what they fixed the price at so I I called them and I complained I objected and I thought it was priced too high and they listened and they lowered the the market value of the house so it does it does work at least there's one example where it does work uh so pay attention to that and don't be afraid to call the county and uh complain uh bear with me for a little bit on this state aid and I I think you've heard my comments before on this but part of the problem like well the basic problem as Pat was saying is that uh the formula that's used to calculate the aid distributed to to municipalities is a pretty complex complicated convoluted formula it includes things like home age number of people living in the house the market value of the house and it's a list of couple of dozen items and uh you go through that and and it's uh it's quite amazing to see the results they come up with it's sort of of a academic exercise for the township it's according to the state statutes that calculation is made and it's distributed to the cities it's distributed to the cities in the state of Minnesota townships are not listed it's strictly the cities next door the city of Whitebear Lake they have been getting over a million a half dollars a year of local government Aid and like Thomas saying granted we're less than half the population but a million and a half dollars next door and $12 here anyway just comment thanks for bringing that up again Bob yeah I'm getting tired of hearing me saying it too all right getting back to the agenda uh next item on the agenda is is regarding the proposed 2025 preliminary Levy and we're looking for a motion to approve the township proposal for 2025 preliminary property tax levy of 6 million5 35,3 36 is there a motion from the floor there's a motion is there oh who made the motion okay is there a second and you are okay motions made in second is there any further discussion if not I'll call the question those in favor of approving that preliminary Levy please say I any opposed all right it's approved for you Tom deal all right next item on the agenda is to announce the location for the special Town budget meeting right now that is scheduled to occur on December 3rd 2024 7:00 at this location Heritage Hall and in the event that that date doesn't work snowed out blizzards whatever there's an alternative date of Thursday December 5th December 24th December 5th 2024 at 7 p.m. it oh yeah oh no it was the it's what it was set last year at the oh at the last year's budget meeting I'm sorry so we're just announcing that yep all right but then we do need my apologies on that but we do need to set the time and location for the 2025 annual meeting and that is scheduled for de uh two Tuesday March 11th 2025 700 p.m. at this location here in Char now is now is there a motion is there a second motions made seconded those in favor please say I I and opposed is there any other business yes I'll defer that one to Pat not our website has also wa would indicate that okay there was a hearing here's how it worked the DNR was required to amend all the permits within a f mile radius of Whitebear Lake they did that each holder of those permits had the right to challenge that Amendment which everyone did including the township the Township settled before the hearings were to start this last October a number North St Paul settled and actually Mamita I understand settled as well number of them settled and the only issue remaining well those that didn't had all the issues you know opposed all the issues but in reading all their post-trial briefs from the hearing and by the way this hearing was not before the district court this before an administrative law judge because any amendments to the well permits would would have been heard under the administrative rules of the state of Minnesota which meant they were heard by administrative law judge so White Bear Lake you know was one of the people that Carri decided to carry through with the hearings so did Hugo LOL lakes and I think that was about it everyone else settled the only issue was was basically uh the you know the irrigation ban that was the big one and we'll see what the Jud what the appell what the administrative law judge rules that ruling will come out oh thing now was okay they was February 15th was the date that they had to apply send their last set of briefs in they had and the and the and the judge had 90 days from that date to rule so that would make it I think we figured out May 15th approxim when they would finally get a issue a final rule on that that can be appealed too but the point is almost everyone well agreed to all the terms the only one that really was you know was was being challenged was the irrigation ban and I don't know how well that's going to go I mean after be perfectly honest you reading the briefs I think the uh state is going to Prevail on that one as well and just let you know those hearings lasted I think they had well they started in uh I think it was October 20th and they didn't finish up their hearings until December I think it was December 15 now they weren't hearing every day was not a hearing date but they had hearings all for basically a month and a half all that and I this is strictly my opinion by think the state's going to Prevail so it was not any my opinion based on my my advice to the town board was to settle the lawsuit and we're not the only ones that you know we settled it that um North St Paul settled and monam I settled uh almost everyone settled except for a few that's a good point that's a good question actually the golf courses and this is something that you're right it's exactly what I was going to tell you that's what what they did was this they uh they did they got an they settled with the plaintiffs and with the state and that settlement was approved by the district court and they're while they didn't have while they were not completely Bound by it they did agree to certain terms and they are if you'd have to basically you'll have to read the order that was uh that's in the district court file and I'll tell you what I'll do is I will pull that out it's a little more complicated there but you're right basically the main thrust was they had to adjust soil moisture they they had to cut back irrigation or the greens because the state and the plaintiffs remember we were a defendant in that case the state and the plaintiffs agreed to settle it with the with the with the golf courses and they and and so and the court approved the settlement that they reached so not I will tell you this the attorneys who represented the cities and I was one of them were not happy with that but we can't stop the we we cannot stop the state or the plains from settling with any of the defendants and that's what they did that's a good question it's a very good question I mean that's the main reason why we spent understand this case started in 2013 oh yeah it's going going on that long and that was one of the main reasons why the town board decided to get him get themselves involved in the lawsuit unlike some of the other cities Whitebear Lake and the town were the only ones that decided to get involved in that lawsuit because we all saw the handwriting on the wall which is the dnar could settle for anything they wanted we wanted some say in it well do your representatives yeah well it's not as bad as it sounds but it's not great either I think what we'll probably we should probably do is get a copy of that court order and put that on the website so you can all read it but you're right I mean that's yeah yeah because yeah that's a good point see here's here's the only reason why these permits are well reason why the town's permits and the and the permits for the golf courses are involved because under State Statute DNR has jurisdiction for all Wells that pump more than that pump 10,000 gallons or more per day so if the well is below that state has no jurisdiction and all those golf courses y Wells pump more than 10,000 gallons a day so that's why they're they're involved in fact um the milk plant over right over here was saot Saputo was the defendant in that action they also settled separately too another thing that graded on a lot of the attorneys the the municipal attorneys involved now we weren't I don't think I think if you checked you find that most of them are not happy with the way it was handled but there's nothing we could do about it the state's Prevail what what does that mean that that in colloquial thing does that mean the the irrigation ban will be hard cast Okay that's my op I just wonder what that state yeah no it's the state yeah yeah again the irrigation ban was all part of the amendment to to the well permits issued to the to the township as a result of that Court the court order from 2007 no no 200 200 17 and this case has been going on for well over a decade and I will don't think it's over with yet but there became a point in time we were spending when it was my opinion the town was spending money needlessly on a lawsuit that wasn't going to change and I think you should talk to talk to your legisl friends in White Lake so direct response to your initial question is that we're going to be amending our current ordinance 16 which uh gives structure to our irrigation and how we manage that probably here in the next one or two Town board meetings so when that is amended uh and corrected to reflect the settlement we'll be posting that that'll give you some pretty good guidelines but the other thing is too is once we get into the irrigation season yeah as things change on a day byday or week by- week basis we'll be updating it on our website component of the set of the of the court order and the changes in the well permits was put the one that the town board fought the hardest on but it became a point time where there was just no point in fighting anymore but I understand completely what you're saying having sat through that for the last 10 years EXC it is I I would call it irritator that's what I do more hi again Kelly Johnson 4064 Whitebear Park hearing the talk about the possible irrigation ban based on whatever the lake level is a a four Whitebear Lake if it falls below 900 some feet above sea levels at the 9 9235 ft above sea level is what triggers that well that mean those homes that use Township water that who don't have their own Wells does that mean they will not be able to water their lawns or wash their cars and you mentioned some of the other businesses in the area the golf courses you know the saoto milk plant such like that maybe even car washes how does it affect us as homeowners versus these commercial entities will will we be able to water our Lawns good question vness Heights fought it all the way through the you know they were a part of the hearings and their big argument was the car washes that all the all the car dealerships within with through in the jurisdiction of vness heights that's affecting their water level so yeah no that was a big point and so yeah I mean it's as here's keep keep in mind that the way this the way the settlement is reached is we have to we can't pump we have to pump no more than 75 gallons per day per citizen residential but 95 overall so 75 no 90 7590 so as long as we stay below 90 gallons per day per capita fine but if it gets above that we got a problem and by the way that's not one year it's a three-year rolling average that's one uh your your board shair Ed came up with that idea of doing a three-year rolling average because you know the fact is drought rain who knows what's going to happen just to use one year in isolation is wrong you should do it over a three-year rolling average so that's one of the things that's one of the terms we we inserted in the in the whole settlement and it was came up with it P I think we had one more question we back here I was just going to ask about observation you go by white bare Lake on lake Lake Drive right now and it's way way down this scares me so that's all I was going I wasn't going to say anything besides that and we're not off to a good start just because we didn't have any snow melting into the lake this year so City so just the like if my neighbor with a sprinkler system decides to water at midnight I mean how are you guys going to enforce this within the township that's a good question and I'm glad you asked it we are hiring a uh conservation Community officer to go around the township this year uh and record who's violating our our time parameters and day parameters um every no no no he H or he she has to witness watering going on outside of the allowed times um at which point you'll step one get a warning if you're spotted violating again it's a $100 fine and if you're spotted violating a third time it's $500 so we this is going to be a trial and error year for us we haven't done this for guys how how many years 10 at least or yep well well I water I water my yard with with a well and it's only hooked up to the front spet so when this lady or man comes to my door and am I going to have to prove that I dat can I can I go and make sure that I am updated to that who has that yeah just let us know at our main offices we'll we'll get you in our database we've got one already started 1281 Hammond that's our right next to Polar Lakes Park polar Lakes Park H Hammond y one more question here one thing you can water whatever you want is your garden that doesn't include Theon or anything I call I called up Township a long time time ago Gardens trees yes all that remains in place correct you should be using a hose or whatever else there right oh oh boy period okay so Pat you're going to uh use the town website and we have the News and Views uh section in the wiper press we do we have a Facebook page we have an nextore um account will be on all of that stuff coming up so the initial press releases is already on our website so it outlines all the rules and regulations right now ordinance 16 should be updated here within the next two weeks and all that will be published for residents to see yes okay all right okay is there any other are there any other comments if not is there a motion to adjourn e all right is there motion to adjourn is there a second we are adjourned e