This transcript appears to be from a **White Bear Lake City Council** meeting (specifically February 28, 2023). Based on the context of the dialogue and the officials serving at that time, I have identified the speakers below. **Speakers:** * **Mayor Dan Belisle:** Presiding officer. * **Jason Lindahl:** Community Development Director (also referred to as "Mr. Lindahl"). * **Greg Geiser:** Fire Chief. * **Bill Walsh:** City Council Member (Long-tenured, often uses humor/irony). * **Kevin Edberg:** City Council Member (Focuses on detailed policy and ambulance data). * **Caley Longley:** Deputy City Clerk (Referred to as "Cali"). *** [00:00] **Mayor Dan Belisle:** Everybody, um, it’s Jason—we have our guest from Woodbury arriving. We have our guest from Woodbury arriving, you can’t see him. All right, do you want me to make his life miserable by asking like a weird OBS, you know, obscure questions? [00:15] **Mayor Dan Belisle:** [Music] So I really don’t have much background on this, I mean other than that. So the dog beach? No, but just so I understand, is it currently open? Yes, okay. Yeah, sorry, so if you vote this down then presumably status quo for a minute. So this is making a decision to keep it open subject to installing these things? That’s how I would say it, yeah. This is it. Yeah, okay. Okay, pretty sure that’s how it works. [00:45] **Jason Lindahl:** [Music] The way that’s set up, it’s going to print on it eight and a half by four feet. I understand. I spent hours in a room with them over the last few weeks negotiating a fire contract and they—they helped do the numbers for us. Yeah, I think he’s a nice guy. [01:05] **Mayor Dan Belisle:** [Music] Gamers and dreamers, still providers in politics. You know, one a month, one a year. Yeah, probably okay. Dollars processing. Yeah, good. All right, we’re going to call the meeting to order. Will the Clerk—we’ll call the meeting to order. Will Clerk please, please note those in attendance exception of council member Engstrand who is excused for the evening. Great. Will you please join me in the Pledge of Allegiance? [01:35] **All:** 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. [01:50] **Mayor Dan Belisle:** Right into the approval of the minutes. Item 2A, minutes of the regular city council meeting on February 14, 2023. I'd entertain a motion to approve those minutes. [02:00] **Council Member:** So moved. [02:02] **Council Member:** Second. [02:03] **Mayor Dan Belisle:** We have a motion and a second. All those in favor say aye. [02:05] **Council:** Aye. [02:06] **Mayor Dan Belisle:** Any opposed? Minutes pass. Item 2B, minutes of the city council work session on February 21, 2023. I'd entertain a motion to approve those minutes. [02:15] **Council Member:** Motion. [02:16] **Council Member:** Second. [02:17] **Mayor Dan Belisle:** All those in favor say aye. [02:19] **Council:** Aye. [02:20] **Mayor Dan Belisle:** Any opposed? Motion carries, minutes pass. Moving on to item three, the adoption of the agenda. We have one addition: we’re adding item 4D, which is the downtown mobility and parking study consultation adoption, if you will, the resolution moving forward with that. So with that, are there any other additions or changes to the consent or to the adoption of the agenda? Seeing none, I'd entertain a motion to adopt the agenda. [02:45] **Council Member:** Second. [02:46] **Mayor Dan Belisle:** Motion and second. All those in favor say aye. [02:48] **Council:** Aye. [02:49] **Mayor Dan Belisle:** Any opposed? We have an agenda. Moving on to item four, consent agenda. I’d entertain a motion to approve the consent agenda as amended with items A through D. [03:00] **Council Member:** So moved. [03:01] **Council Member:** Motion and a second. [03:02] **Mayor Dan Belisle:** All those in favor say aye. [03:03] **Council:** Aye. [03:04] **Mayor Dan Belisle:** Any opposed? Motion carries, the consent agenda is adopted. All right, jumping into item five, visitors and presentations. Item A: White Bear Lake Chamber of Commerce hundred-year anniversary and Proclamation. So I have the great privilege of reading the proclamation which celebrates a hundred years of the White Bear Lake Chamber of Commerce. [03:25] **Mayor Dan Belisle:** So without further ado: "As the White Bear area Chamber of Commerce is a respected organization that has been helping local businesses prosper since 1923; whereas the White Bear Lake Chamber of Commerce strives to strengthen business through advocacy, networking, and education; whereas the White Bear area Chamber of Commerce works with businesses, merchants, and industry to advance the civic, economic, industrial, professional, and cultural life in White Bear Lake and surrounding areas; whereas the White Bear Area Chamber is a leading resource for its diverse business community, ensuring future growth opportunities to maintain a vibrant economic hub for all; whereas the White Bear area Chamber of Commerce is one of the largest business organizations in the White Bear area, representing 12 communities; whereas the White Bear area Chamber of Commerce has served as a conduit of communications between the business community and local government to advance private and public collaboration; whereas 2023 marks the 100-year anniversary of the founding of the White Bear area Chamber of Commerce; and whereas with the century of achievement behind it, the White Bear area Chamber of Commerce is looking forward with a continued commitment to ensure a lively and prosperous community for future generations. Now, therefore be it resolved that the White Bear Lake City Council formally recognizes the White Bear area Chamber of Commerce in celebration of its Centennial anniversary and publicly acknowledges the service that it has provided its 12 communities over this past 100 years." [05:15] **Mayor Dan Belisle:** So with that, I would like to invite the director of the White Bear Area Chamber of Commerce to come up, and I think we are going to take a picture. I am now signing the proclamation with that, please. [Applause] Delayed clap, but we'll just move on. Yes? [05:40] **Council Member Bill Walsh:** May I please? Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I would just like to say my comment: after 15 years of being on this Council, when I got here, the Chamber of Commerce had a few bumps and bruises. There’ve been three people involved in restoring the chamber and making it the organization—I’ll be blunt—that is worth celebrating 100 years. That is Executive Director Shari Wilson—you are one of those people—former Executive Director Tom Snell, and the person that probably held it together even more is Maureen Francis, despite her husband who’s in the audience... sorry, Jim. But those three people really turned the organization around, and you guys are doing a great job. Thank you to you and your members. [06:25] **Mayor Dan Belisle:** Thank you. All right, let’s do one more clap. Thank you. All right, we’re going to jump into item 5B, the bi-annual fire department update. Chief? [06:40] **Chief Greg Geiser:** Thank you, Mayor, members of the Council. I will go ahead and start up the update here for you. All right, so I put on this slide—which is what I do every time really for the audience more so than all of you because I know all of you know this—but this is a reminder to everybody: these are all the communities that we serve, which is the city, the township, Dellwood, Birchwood, and Gem Lake. It’s about 35 square miles, it’s over 40,000 people, which makes this a very, very busy department. [07:15] **Chief Greg Geiser:** Go ahead. I wanted to also acknowledge that this year is our 135th year of existence. There is some mention in the history searching that I’ve done of kind of a Bucket Brigade, if you will, before that, but when it was really first established as a fully-fledged fire department was 135 years ago. So things have changed a little bit since this picture, but nonetheless, it was pretty neat. So throughout this year, we will advertise things on social media in different places, kind of recognizing significant events throughout all the decades that we’ve been in existence. [07:55] **Chief Greg Geiser:** Go ahead. I was here in the fall and kind of predicted that we’d have around 5,300 runs. I was a little off; it was 5,283. And so that is a pretty significant incline. You can see what’s happening over the last number of years, and I anticipate that this trend will continue as we go through 2023. Go ahead. It was about a seven percent increase from 2021—I’m sorry, from 2021 to 2022. We went from 2020 to 2021 with a 13 percent increase. I was hoping that wasn't going to happen again; it didn’t. So the seven percent increase, though, is still significant. [08:45] **Chief Greg Geiser:** Go ahead, next slide. This is what it boils down to: it’s remained in the 80/20 range somewhere with both the fire response and medical response. So the vast majority of what we continue to do is medical calls, and we do a lot of them. Go ahead. Our average response time is six minutes and 13 seconds for last year, which is still very good considering the size of the area we cover and our locations of our stations. And that’s just for emergency calls; that isn’t non-emergency calls. [09:25] **Chief Greg Geiser:** Go ahead. So there were "all calls"—we just had one prior to the meeting. I wasn’t sure how many people were going to be here because we just got called to North St. Paul fire for a house fire, which turned out to be just burnt food. So they got canceled right away and luckily a lot of them were able to make it here still, but I wasn’t really sure because as I was driving here we got that call. But we had 47 all calls—these are all the real significant events where we call everybody back. I’ll talk about a couple of them that have happened since we last met in September. [10:05] **Chief Greg Geiser:** Go ahead. This is one of them—this is the Pine... yes, help me, I’m drawing a blank. Pinders? There you go, there it is. I was like, "Pine," there's another word... the apartment building. Those ladders where you see them placed is where we rescued a gentleman out of a third-story window. That window is about like *this* by about *like this*, and he was stuck in the window with the fire coming up behind him. There was also fire coming out—you can see the balcony on the third floor there—that’s where the fire started. The majority of the fire was coming out of there. He tried to get out the bedroom window and was stuck between the bedroom and the window. [10:50] **Chief Greg Geiser:** And so Captain Andert and firefighter paramedic Ricky Vasquez went up, grabbed the ladders—at first it was just the two of them there—they grabbed the ladders, went up, and then as other firefighters showed up, Ryan Schneider (he’s one of them in the back of the room here also) and other firefighters then went up those ladders and were able to eventually unwedge him and get him out of the building. He had pretty significant burns, and while he did survive the burns, when he was in the hospital it was discovered that he also had cancer, and then he chose to not pursue any further treatment and eventually died, which is sad. But the crews did a heck of a job rescuing him out of that window. I think it’s important to note that. [11:35] **Chief Greg Geiser:** All right, next call. Not all of them are terrible, by the way. This is a big wildfire that we went to up in Columbus. This is a wind-driven fire late last fall. Do you remember? It was a kind of an Indian summer day, it was very, very warm out, there was a lot of wind, and it was a pretty significant fire. Forest Lake Fire covers this area up in Columbus, but they called us for help. There were about at least 18 acres that were burned here, and when we were on our way there, it was rapidly taking off. Luckily Forest Lake Fire called a lot of help really fast and we were able to contain it. But some of you probably remember the Carlos Avery fire a number of years ago that burned 20-some thousand acres—this is right next to Carlos Avery. So they were concerned that it was going to get into that park reserve again and take off like it did before. [12:25] **Chief Greg Geiser:** Go ahead, next slide. There’s a garage fire that we had at the end of last year, and this was quickly extending to the outside of the house. We were able to stop it at the house and keep it from going into the house. It was pretty close; crews did a good job. It was a very, very large garage and at least one shed on the backside and a gazebo that were all on fire when we got there. So those are some of the significant ones, at least ones I have decent pictures of. [12:55] **Chief Greg Geiser:** Next slide. So as far as the fire calls go, we do mutual aid and receive mutual aid. This is a split for last year, so it’s not terribly far off. We went 28 times to someplace else where they called us, and then we requested aid 18 times ourselves. Fairly well-balanced as far as the fire calls go. Even tonight, that was considered a mutual aid call even though it was just burned food. Some of these are significant events, some are like, "Oh, you can forget it, never mind." So that’s what that’s all about. [13:30] **Chief Greg Geiser:** Go ahead, next slide. We’re really out of whack last year on mutual aid ambulance calls. We received aid 106 times because we weren’t able to get to that call to transport the patient, but you can see we did over five times as many in terms of helping out other agencies. One of the things we did—you have to remember from the last time we presented—is we decided we’re not going to send our last ambulance out of the city, out of our response area, even though there was help needed. We needed to protect our own area and kind of stay here. Even though we implemented that last year, we continue to have a number of calls that we were going to. [14:20] **Chief Greg Geiser:** All right, so as far as staffing goes, you approved two more additional firefighter paramedics for this year, which I greatly appreciate. Currently, we have 15; we still have another spot open and we just are in the midst of a hiring process to fill that and any other openings that take place. And then we have 26 part-time employees—a lot of them are standing in the back of the room right now—that we added this last year. Our goal is to continue to add to the full-time staffing. The part-time staff does a good job, but the demands of the job are very difficult, it’s hard to commit to. As we continue to add more full-time staff, we’re going to get better coverage as far as response times, increase our service level just because of the consistency of it. We're not trying to fight against other people's obligations. It'll reduce stress and injuries and then it’ll help attract people. There are a lot of fire departments in the suburbs right now that are expanding into a full-time staff, which is creating a lot of competition. Trying to attract and keep people—it used to be if you got a full-time fire job you were really lucky, and nowadays there’s a lot of options out there. So that’s what we’re trying to do here. [15:40] **Chief Greg Geiser:** All right, next slide. This just took place recently: the EMSRB (the EMS Regulatory Board of Minnesota) recently recognized us with this award: a Certificate of Clinical Excellence. This is a new program they put together at the end of last year. They have 15 criteria and in at least nine of those we had to get a score of 80 or higher. If you want more details on that I can get it for you, but nonetheless, not everybody got this award. So this is pretty neat that we were able to achieve this. The crews, as you saw, are very, very busy and we’re asking a lot of them, but they’re still doing very good work. It was nice to see that recognition. [16:25] **Chief Greg Geiser:** We ordered, after you approved last January, a new ambulance. We still haven’t seen it. They are talking maybe June, maybe July of this year when we get the new ambulance, but that is with all the supply chain issues. That is frustrating because our trucks—this particular truck—is getting pretty beat up right now. But it is due to be replaced, so we’re waiting on that. [16:55] **Chief Greg Geiser:** The other thing that you approved was to purchase the new boat. This is a schematic, kind of a generalization of what the boat is. It’s a heck of a lot better than the work barge that we’re using right now, and so we greatly appreciate that. This will be a big step up for us to be able to have some capabilities when we’re out on the water. Probably won't get it until at least this fall; might not be until next year before it ever gets in the water. [17:25] **Chief Greg Geiser:** We also got a new Lucas device—this is a cardiac machine device. We already had this device, same brand name; this is a newer version. Ours were 10 years old, kind of getting to the end of the life of them. One of the things about this that’s very subtle—it’s hard to tell in the picture—but this one’s a little wider and a little taller for bigger people. We’ve had issues where our old devices wouldn't fit, so this was a good upgrade for us. The mechanical device is a heck of a lot better than any of us can do manual CPR. It’s just a lot more efficient, it’s consistent, you don’t wear out. They’re a great device. [18:10] **Chief Greg Geiser:** For community outreach, same list as before, but this is one of them that we did: we did the Safety with Santa. It was a lot of fun, a new event for us. Families came in, got fire prevention materials, kids got to meet Santa. This couple has been doing this forever and they’re excellent. All right, next slide. [18:35] **Chief Greg Geiser:** Of course, Hockey Day Minnesota, which took place in the township, but we were there standing by. Extremely cold; some of them in this picture are huddled around the fire. It was a really big event, thousands and thousands of people. It was a really neat experience for everybody. They kept everybody safe—nothing too significant, a lot of trips and falls, but not too bad overall. That’s all I have for you right now, appreciate it. [19:05] **Mayor Dan Belisle:** I have one quick follow-up. So with regard to the mutual aid, particularly the EMS, that imbalance—is there a particular city or area that’s sort of the culprit for where we’re going, or is that spread out amongst many communities? [19:20] **Chief Greg Geiser:** It is amongst many communities, but the majority of those calls that we’re going to are for private ambulance agencies, that’s what I can say. The Allinas of the world, the Fairview system—that is usually who’s calling us. It is spread out, but that’s the vast majority. [19:40] **Council Member Bill Walsh:** Mr. Mayor? Here I thought the vaunted private sector was so efficient at making coverage of customers... I don’t know, I just have to go back and rethink my economics. [19:55] **Council Member Kevin Edberg:** So Chief, last fall you and Council Member Houston had a conversation with the City Manager about not sending our last ambulance out. We didn't see changes in the data because the data you provided was for the full year and the change was only made in about the last quarter or so. Had we looked at data from the last quarter or since the change was made, what kind of imbalance—I’m going to assume there’s still one—but has that narrowed? Has that gotten better, and if so, how much? And what can we look forward to looking forward? [20:30] **Chief Greg Geiser:** So I didn’t compare it to the last quarter, but I can and I can get it back to you. Just by being around and knowing the call volume, it’s made a slight change; it hasn’t been a significant change. We were in Roseville earlier this evening—it continues. So we are going to continue having to think and worry about our crews being overstretched. [20:55] **Council Member Kevin Edberg:** Well, we don’t have to quite worry about that as much; we have another ambulance in town to deal with that. If that doesn’t work, what’s your next strategy for us? Have you thought that far ahead or been able to envision what a next piece might be? [21:10] **Chief Greg Geiser:** Well, me personally, the answer is more staffing. Because limiting our response to other cities—we can do that to a degree, but we also rely on them. It’s going to be a very difficult position for us to say we’re just not going to go anywhere anymore. You can’t pick and choose. It’s a difficult position to be in to be collectively part of a system which everybody expects. [21:40] **Council Member Kevin Edberg:** I won’t ask the question I was going to ask. So, every week when I open up the White Bear Press—and maybe this is just selective reading—but it seems like the big story is the medical calls, clearly all the way up. But my perception is that we are having more fires that we are attending and having to deal with. Is that an accurate perception, or am I just reading selectively? What’s going on with what we might call fires of significance? [22:15] **Chief Greg Geiser:** Sure. So the answer is there are more fires of significance. A lot of it has to do with the materials that are burning now. You have less than three minutes to get out of your house now if there’s a fire, even a small fire, whereas historically you could have up to 20 minutes to get out safely. And that is because of what everything is made out of. Most of what we have in our homes now is made out of petroleum products, and so that is why they are burning hotter and faster than ever before. [22:50] **Council Member Kevin Edberg:** Is that something we need to be thinking about from a policy perspective in terms of building code, building materials, other things? Or is that just... is that horse out of the barn? [23:05] **Chief Greg Geiser:** I think for the most part it’s out of the barn. Commercial-wise we’re good and there’s a lot of rules there. There was an attempt a number of years ago to get sprinklers in private homes that were more than 4,000 square feet, but that was eventually taken out of the laws due to political pressure. There’s still a lot of resistance to having sprinklers in homes. [23:25] **Council Member Kevin Edberg:** Last question: you posted a really interesting photograph at the beginning of your presentation. What was the physical location of that first fire barn? [23:40] **Chief Greg Geiser:** I don’t remember. I unfortunately don’t remember. It was near downtown, but I don’t think it was that Second and Clark, but it was near there. [23:50] **Council Member Kevin Edberg:** Cool, thank you. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. [23:53] **Mayor Dan Belisle:** Council Member Walsh? [23:54] **Council Member Bill Walsh:** Just to follow up, thank you Mr. Mayor. On the mutual aid calls, I mean the goal is not to get to zero. I mean, maybe this is a question you don’t want to ask, but I mean there’s revenue, right? I mean if the ambulance is working... so I like what we’re doing as long as we’re leaving one in the city to handle the White Bear call if it comes in. Is there... I mean, we certainly are getting revenue out of those calls when we go to Roseville or Shoreview? [24:25] **Chief Greg Geiser:** One of the issues that we’re running into is just like if we get multiple calls going on right now, we’re going to triage those calls and go to the most critical ones. Other agencies do the same things. So a lot of times the crews are going to less critical calls which oftentimes results in less revenue. And if they’re to patients that are on Medicare and Medicaid, then we don’t get much at all. And a lot of times that’s where we’re being sent. So we’re just trying to find better balance. [25:00] **Council Member Bill Walsh:** Yeah, the alternative is that the crew sits, the truck sits, not losing money but we’re not making money, right? [25:08] **Chief Greg Geiser:** Well, we're quicker to respond if we need to. [Music] [25:15] **Mayor Dan Belisle:** Thank you. Any other comments or questions from the Council? Seeing none, Chief, thank you for the report. And I understand we got a little more business to attend to—we get swearing-in some new firefighters? [25:30] **Chief Greg Geiser:** Swearing in some new firefighters. So I will call them up and Cali will do the oath as she has in the past. So we’ll call up first firefighter EMT Jacob Bogdanovic... then I’ll call up firefighter EMT Mindy Feaster... and then next up is firefighter EMT Tu Le... and next is firefighter EMT Charlie Pan... and then firefighter EMT Evan Young... and firefighter EMT Bryant Sinclair. We were fortunate to hire a lot of people in this last go-around; all of them are part-time employees that have experience, so it makes it a lot easier for us to get them up to speed. Cali? [26:45] **Caley Longley:** All right, so everyone raise your right hand and repeat after me. "I (state your name individually) do solemnly swear that I will support the Constitution of the United States and the State of Minnesota, and will discharge and faithfully execute the duty evolving upon me in the Fire Department for the City of White Bear Lake, without fear or favor, to the best of my judgment and ability." Congratulations! [27:30] **Chief Greg Geiser:** Right, so now I’ll invite their family or friends to come up and go ahead and place their pin on their badges... [Music/Applause] [28:15] **Mayor Dan Belisle:** Moving on to item six, public hearings. We have nothing scheduled, which brings us to item seven: unfinished business, the second reading of the ordinance adopting a new chapter 1128 to permit sidewalk cafes. Mr. Lindahl? [28:40] **Jason Lindahl:** [Music] Thank you. The Council discussed this conceptually back at their meeting in January. From there, staff took direction from the Council and did research in other communities and tailored an ordinance for us. We worked with the City Attorney to review that ordinance and brought to you a draft at your February 14th meeting for that first reading. We also took comments from the public. From there, we drafted slight revisions. Two specific changes were made: the term of the permit, which sets an earlier spring date of April 15th (with authority for the City Manager to adjust based on weather), and adjusting the start time of operations back one hour to 7:00 AM. Staff is recommending approval of the ordinance and the resolution. [30:00] **Mayor Dan Belisle:** Thank you. So a couple introductory comments, maybe one statement then a couple things that I’d like to see changed. But first I want to be clear: we’re not adopting any fee schedule tonight, that’s for down the road. All we’re putting in the ordinance right now is that it’ll be subject to whatever the fee schedule is, which will be set sometime down the road, correct? [30:25] **Jason Lindahl:** Correct. [30:26] **Mayor Dan Belisle:** Okay. So there are two things that we noted in the last council meeting and we had a good back-and-forth, and I’m not sure where it landed, but I want to throw the two things out there that I think are worthy of consideration of being changed. First is the prohibition on glass. I get the arguments against it—it could potentially cause a safety issue. I’d like to take the approach of why enforce a business to buy plastic cups? Why not allow them to use glass? And if and when it becomes a problem, let’s revisit it. We also have language saying each Sidewalk Cafe is responsible within 100 feet to keep it clean. Let’s enforce that. [31:10] **Mayor Dan Belisle:** The other issue I have is... I understand that when alcohol is served, it has to be compact and contiguous, meaning it has to be attached to the building. But if they’re not serving alcohol—and we know we have at least one Sidewalk Cafe that is not going to serve alcohol that historically has not been directly attached—I don’t think that’s ever been a problem. I don't see why I would want to bake into the ordinance something that would make that a requirement. So I would like to see that amended so that with the exception of when alcohol is served, it doesn't have to be immediately adjacent to the building. In other words, there can be that sidewalk buffer between the two. Other than those two things, I like the structure.