This transcript has been formatted with timestamps and speaker identifications based on the provided context and the dialogue within the meeting. **Note on Council Membership:** While your provided list mentions Garza and Clausen, the transcript explicitly records **Councilmember Steve Dennis** and **Councilmember Tony Khambata** as present and participating in the roll call and motions. *** **[00:00:00] Mayor Myron Bailey:** All right, good evening. Uh, this is the December 7th, uh, 2022 Cottage Grove City Council meeting, which I'm calling to order. Uh, the first order of business is the Pledge of Allegiance. So if you please rise. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. All right, we'll be... uh, Clerk, please do the roll. **[00:00:30] Tammy Anderson (City Clerk):** Councilmember Khambata? (Present). Councilmember Dennis? **[00:00:34] Councilmember Steve Dennis:** Here. **[00:00:35] Tammy Anderson (City Clerk):** Councilmember Thiede? **[00:00:36] Councilmember Dave Thiede:** Here. **[00:00:37] Tammy Anderson (City Clerk):** Councilmember Olsen? **[00:00:38] Councilmember Justin Olsen:** Here. **[00:00:39] Tammy Anderson (City Clerk):** Mayor Bailey? **[00:00:40] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Here. Uh, next on our agenda this evening is Open Forum. This is the opportunity for anybody who would like to speak on something that's not on tonight's agenda is welcome to do so. Uh, we do limit uh, it to three minutes and we did have a sign-up sheet out in the entryway and I did have a few people that signed up and I saw there was "maybes." Do you—do you want to speak? Okay. So why don't we start. Do you want to do it together? Okay. So uh, Mark, if you want to... Mr. Gallagher, if you want to go up and just state your name and address for the record. Yeah, yeah, right up there. Thank you. **[00:01:10] Mark Gallagher (Resident):** Good evening, Mayor Bailey and all the city council people in attendance here. I am just concerned with my tax—text—uh, my um, tax statement, okay? Um, we got 28.8% increase, and I was... Justin explained to me somewhat, but um, I'm just concerned that it said the average tax was four percent and I'm just wondering why I was taxed at the higher rate. Okay, he's someone explained it to me, but I wasn't—man, I'm not very well versed in this. **[00:01:45] Councilmember Justin Olsen:** No, it's okay. What I explained to Mark was, um, when you look at the statement that came from the county, where the county states that the average value of a property in Washington County increased 20 percent, that—that is due to the County Assessors taking a look at the property values, etc. And then there's also a line in that—in that document that says that the county increase was 4.6 percent. And so, um, we got cut off by the clock, but we were talking about the fact that on the property tax statement there are several lines: the county is one line, the school district's another line, the city is another line. And so the 4.6 percent that's indicated in the county document is only applicable to the county. It is not applicable to the other taxing districts. **[00:02:30] Mark Gallagher (Resident):** I just wondering because I said I live in a county— **[00:02:32] Councilmember Justin Olsen:** Yes, yes you do. Yes. Yeah, so when we—when we get our tax statements, um, we all have to take a look at sort of the detail around which of the taxing districts either has an increase or a decrease, and then those numbers will total at the bottom. And I think you're going to hear more about that when um, our illustrious Finance Director, Brenda Malinowski, does her presentation in a bit. **[00:02:55] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Yeah, so if you do... I know—I know we normally don't talk about things that are on there, but I wasn't sure what your topic was, but um, no, no, you're cool. Yep. But uh, I'll just... if you want to hang around when Brenda starts going through the city's portion of it when we have that conversation, if there's any further questions, you can either ask at that time—obviously, I'll let that happen—and then if anything, I know Brenda's been great and our staff's been great with, you know, reaching out to you and talking to you separately too, if you'd like. Thanks again. **[00:03:25] Mark Gallagher (Resident):** Okay. And you have my number, so if you have any questions just call me, okay? **[00:03:28] Councilmember Justin Olsen:** Justin, thank you. **[00:03:29] Mark Gallagher (Resident):** Thank you. Thank you. **[00:03:30] Mayor Myron Bailey:** All right. And then, Bonnie Mattson? I can say it for you. 6649 Inskip Avenue South in Cottage Grove. Oh, thank you very much. Is this someone's—[Music] Hello. **[00:03:45] Bonnie Mattson (Resident):** Hello, Mayor and Council. Um, I'm just here tonight to say thank you very much to the city staff, to the City Administrator, to the City Attorney, just out to everyone. I mean, they've been great. There was a budget open house that they held that answered a lot of my questions. There were—there was a two, three meetings regarding the new zoning, and I also received answers to other questions that I had. So I'm just here to say thank you to everybody. I appreciate it. That's all I have. **[00:04:15] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Awesome, thank you. It's always good—our staff is very good. All right, um, in case somebody came in and didn't sign up for open forum, is there anybody like to speak on Open Forum before we close? All right, we'll go ahead and close Open Forum. We'll move to number five, which is Adoption of the Agenda. **[00:04:30] Councilmember Steve Dennis:** Motion to adopt the agenda. **[00:04:31] Councilmember Tony Khambata:** Second. **[00:04:32] Mayor Myron Bailey:** We have a motion by Councilmember Dennis, second by Councilmember Khambata. All those in favor signify by saying aye. (Aye). Opposed? Motion carries. Six is Presentations—we do not have any this evening. Uh, seven is Consent Agenda. Is there anything Council would like to pull on consent? **[00:04:50] Councilmember Steve Dennis:** Thanks, Mayor. I'd like to pull item number R, which is the Old Cottage Grove Wayfinding Signage. **[00:04:55] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Okay, I've got R. Councilmember Thiede, you said which one? **[00:05:00] Councilmember Dave Thiede:** P. **[00:05:01] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Okay. And Councilmember Olsen? **[00:05:03] Councilmember Justin Olsen:** I'm going to pull F, Mayor. **[00:05:05] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Okay, and then I'm just going to mention I... just for the public... so, uh, anything else? All right, so why don't we... Councilmember Dennis, why don't we start with you with the Old Cottage Grove Wayfinding Signage. **[00:05:15] Councilmember Steve Dennis:** All right, thanks, Mayor. And mine's pretty straightforward. Um, there's—there's a proposal here tonight that we would um, approve of a couple different signs it would be placed to provide recognition and direction for some of the businesses that are in Old Cottage Grove. And um, some of us may know there's another sign that happens to be out on Lamar Avenue at 70th; it's a wooden sign that somebody had constructed. We don't really have the full details or understanding of where—where or when that sign got there. But um, but what I wanted to do is just draw attention to this—the signs that are being proposed are—are very, very basic and it just, as we looked at our packets, just indicates that, you know, "Business District" and ahead or points with the arrow. I think there could be an opportunity for us to do a little bit more with that. As we notice, if you drive down the highways, you'll find that there are signs that are out that have different businesses that are identified there and maybe even a mileage count like half-mile or something along those lines. And so Old Cottage Grove is a little bit out of—of the way, off the beaten path so to speak. And what I'd like to see is if we could consider potentially adding some more information to those signs to make them be a little bit more complete. I know some of the businesses that are out there have put signs around the community in places that probably, technically, they're not supposed to be. And I think we have an opportunity here where we could alleviate that factor and at the same time provide some good direction for people to find those different businesses. Now on the—the wooden sign that's over by Lamar ball fields, I see an opportunity that could be there for us if—if we were to allow for some placards to be attached to that sign. So for example, if you go to the business district at Almar Village, you'll see there's a monument sign—I know a monument sign is different than this sign—but you'll see that there are businesses with logos or names that are on there. And again, I think this is something that could be an opportunity for us. We could probably construct that—we do have talented people that work in Public Works that are out of the previous trade of construction that know how to build things. So if—if we could have a little discussion on that or or just maybe give the staff some—some opportunity to work on something for us, it'd be nice to provide that. And whether people were to—to buy the right to have their sign there or to rent that space to have a little, you know, logo of their business and an arrow pointing down, I think it'd be helpful for them. And so that's—that's why I pulled that. **[00:07:35] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Okay, just one real quick so from a staff's perspective, I know we've got the—the plan that's in—in our packet. Um, I—I kind of... it's what you were talking about, it almost reminds me of kind of like the things you see on the highway where the highway department—I think they charge those businesses to actually have a thing that says "The gas station you know is this way, the restaurant's that way." Is that something that... do you want us to do a separate vote on that or do you want to take his comments and then go back and look at it, bring it back to us? **[00:08:00] Jennifer Levitt (City Administrator):** Mayor, members of the Council, in regards to the wayfinding signs, yes, we can... we don't need additional motion if that's the direction you'd like us to go. We can look at some options. Um, yes, the blue signs are a very specific logo program with the DOT and they have strict guidelines for it. But a lot of times when we have construction, we do list businesses' names associated with it—you know, "Business X, Y, and Z are open." So we could do something like that on those signs. The additional sign that you're talking about on Lamar, I think that's just something that we could explore some opportunities and bring that back to Council at a later date. **[00:08:35] Councilmember Dave Thiede:** Yeah, because I was—I was going to say, I looked like those signs... they're—they're extremely basic and not very attractive. Um, so I thought they were just kind of thrown in there and that there was going to be something a little bit more to those than just the blue with—with white print or whatever it is. It—it... I know we're—we've got some talented people that can make signs. **[00:08:55] Jennifer Levitt (City Administrator):** Mayor, members of the Council, we do follow the MUTCD—Manual for Uniform Traffic Control Devices—and so unfortunately the DOT doesn't give us a lot of um, uh design discretion. So we were trying to stay within that conformance of the law in that regard. The sign that Councilmember Dennis was referring to is a little bit more of a creative design off on our premise at that time. So that would have a different consideration. **[00:09:20] Councilmember Dave Thiede:** Okay, sounds good. **[00:09:22] Councilmember Steve Dennis:** Does that answer your question? Yeah, and I—I think it's again, it's just a nice opportunity for us to demonstrate that, you know, we are committed to businesses, especially small business. Those that are out there are really small businesses, so they could use a little help. So I like the idea. Thank you. **[00:09:35] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Uh, Councilmember Thiede, you had pulled uh, P, which is The Preserve at Prairie Dunes final plat. **[00:09:40] Councilmember Dave Thiede:** Just kind of pulled that for a little bit more clarification because as I was reading through it, it—it kind of was confusing because it was saying something about everything north of—of uh, one of 105th Street, but 105th Street goes right into the middle of that uh, the lower property. And—and so I guess just some clarification, which I think is basically what it was saying is that the—the—the part under the square is which is kind of where Hadley comes down. I'll let you explain it, Emily. Welcome, Emily. **[00:10:10] Emily Schmitz (Community Development Director):** Good evening, Mayor, members of the Council. Councilmember Thiede, to—to clarify what you just described, and this is—I'll say it is maybe a little bit of a unique situation in that you saw a preliminary plat way back in May. Um, and the applicant at that time was Summergate Development, and they proposed uh, kind of two different parts to a development. So the what we've called the Civic 40, as you see in the green... I can't seem to find... oh, here it goes. Um, so the Civic 40 on the preliminary plat, as you can see, uh, was those four potentially developable parcels. And then south of 105th... um, well south and a little bit north, but here's 105th and you've got the residential lots shown on the preliminary plat that was proposed, like I said, back in May. Summergate uh, did not continue on um, with a final project for this particular preliminary plat. However, uh, and another developer has come forward, Norhart, who was looking to work through a project on one of the parcels up on the Civic 40, as we're calling it. So they're not looking to continue to move forward with the single-family residential portion of the preliminary plat. So that's been platted on the final plat as an outlot, and that outlot will require future final platting if or when any developer is interested in some type of development on that outlot. **[00:11:35] Councilmember Dave Thiede:** Got it. All right, so that—that—that's more clear. The—the reference on 105th was—was throwing me because it was going right in... I was—I was looking at the 65-foot lots being referenced by the south of the... yeah. Okay, thank you. Good. **[00:11:50] Mayor Myron Bailey:** All right, thank you. Anything else, Councilmember Thiede? **[00:11:52] Councilmember Dave Thiede:** Nope. **[00:11:53] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Okay. Uh, and then Councilmember Olsen, F, which is the Lions Club temporary uh, liquor license. **[00:11:58] Councilmember Justin Olsen:** Thank you, Mayor and Councilmembers. The reason I pulled this is I actually wanted to ask our Public Safety Director, Pete Kerner, to take a moment to talk a little bit about this temporary liquor license and the reason that this application is on our consent agenda this evening. It really has to do with the Lions partnering, as we often do, with other non-profits in the area, and in this case we are partnering with the Cottage Grove Scramblers Snowmobile Club for their annual event. Now I turn it over to Director Kerner to kind of fill in some of the blanks and let people know what's going on. **[00:12:30] Pete Kerner (Public Safety Director):** Sure. Thank you for giving this opportunity. As a Lions Club member, I'll just um, this year they did partner—they're calling it the "Third Annual Dust Them Off Vintage Snowmobile Show." They're going to have it right out on the—the fields across from Almar Village, County Road 19 and 70th Street. They have a vintage snowmobile show. This year the Lions Club is partnering with them, so they're going to have the beer sales and they're also, weather permitting, they're going to do hot dogs, brats, things like that. The—the club is putting together... they have the—the raffle that's out there right now. I'm not a snowmobile guy, or a vintage one, but they're raffling a 1972 Polaris that's supposed to be pretty cool—it's been refurbished and everything. So um, this event grows each year. They have a short ride with all the um, the old vintage snowmobiles, and the—the Lions felt it was important to—to partner with them as we keep talking about Cottage Grove being a recreation destination, and one of those is, you know, the—the snowmobiling. So the money that is raised goes back to the club that—they groom the trails right outside of our Hero Center on the trail, there's a—they have a warming facility as well. So it's going to be a—sounds like a great event. They—they love... there'll be some bonfires out there too, so those like me that aren't into the cold can still enjoy it. So if you have any other questions, hopefully that was a good enough plug for them—they're—they have a planning meeting tonight, so... **[00:13:50] Councilmember Justin Olsen:** No, you did a great job. Thank you. And uh, you'll notice I have my Lions shirt on and of course um, Director Kerner is a Lions member as well. And this is one of those things where we have several members of our club who also happen to be in the snowmobile club, and they've wanted to partner with us for quite some time, and this is the first opportunity that we've had to actually make that come to life. So we're looking forward to a really fun event. Hopefully the weather somewhat cooperates—I anticipate it'll be cold but um, you know, January 7th you can expect that. But as long as it's just cold and there's nothing else going on, we should be just fine. So I invite everybody to come out and have a good time, take a look at some of the cool snowmobiles, um, maybe come out and have a... I'm not going to call it a hot dog, it might be a lukewarm dog, but come on out and get one! And uh, hopefully we'll get to really enjoy having a good time with all of these snowmobile riders coming in from all over the place. This won't just be Cottage Grove people; this will be people coming in from throughout the county who have heard about this event. So it definitely will be a destination. Thanks. **[00:14:50] Mayor Myron Bailey:** All right, thank you both. And then the last item that I had pulled just for a comment um, is uh, I, which is a park naming request. So one of the—the things that the public can do, and we've had this in a couple different occasions, there's an opportunity for um, and a process for naming uh, parks or trails or buildings or whatever within our community. And I want to just uh, uh mention to the Council that on our agenda this evening is adopting resolution for the approval of the uh, a future municipal park in Cottage Grove, which would be called Jack and Marlus Denzer Park. And for some of you that, like myself, may have been around for a while, uh, Jack Denzer was a long-time business owner along with Marlus here in town, also the Mayor, Council, very active in our community. Same with Marlus, doing a lot with Public Safety and such. And some of the family members had reached out to us about, you know, doing some type of the naming within our community. And so interestingly enough, Councilmember Thiede mentioned the Prairie Dunes plat—the area uh, that uh, was mentioned in there with kind of like the X, if you will—that area over there, there's a proposed future park. And so our intent would be that that park would be named Jack and Marlus Denzer Park. So just wanted to give the public an awareness that that is uh, what the discussion and the—the hopefully the approval tonight will be. And that'll be a nice park uh, that will be named after a previous Mayor and his wife who were very instrumental in our community. Uh, so with that, um, any other things to pull from consent? **[00:16:20] Councilmember Justin Olsen:** Move consent. **[00:16:22] Mayor Myron Bailey:** All right, so we have a motion by Councilmember Olsen. Do I have a second? **[00:16:25] Councilmember Tony Khambata:** Second. **[00:16:26] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Second by Councilmember Khambata. Any further discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor signify by saying aye. (Aye). Opposed? Motion carries. So if you are here for anything on tonight's consent calendar, all of those items have been approved. Moving on uh, to number eight is Approved Disbursement. 8a is to pay the bills. **[00:16:45] Councilmember Steve Dennis:** Motion to pay the bills. **[00:16:47] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Motion by Councilmember Dennis. Do I have a second? **[00:16:49] Councilmember Justin Olsen:** Second. **[00:16:50] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Motion by Councilmember Dennis, second by Councilmember Olsen. Any discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor signify by saying aye. (Aye). Opposed? Motion carries. Nine is public hearings—there is none this evening. 10 is Bid Awards—there aren't any this evening. Um, the uh, number 11 is Regular Agenda. We do have three items this evening. We'll start with the first uh, which is a liquor compliance check violation: uh, M-O-P-E-C-A of Cottage Grove Incorporated, Las Margaritas Mexican Restaurant. And our Detective Sergeant Mike McCormick, I believe, is going to take us through this—and hopefully I got your long title right. I was told not to demote you, and welcome. **[00:17:35] Detective Sergeant Mike McCormick:** Thank you, honorable Mayor, members of the Council. Thank you for this opportunity to present this. Um, I'm here to talk about uh, Las Margaritas' most recent alcohol compliance violation. A little bit about our program—and I should state that as a Detective Sergeant with the city of Cottage Grove, this is one of the programs that I oversee for the police department. Our Public Safety currently conducts two liquor compliance checks per calendar year, which has been our practice for decades. It's also a best practice recommendation set forth by Washington County. We believe hiring, training, and supervising responsible staff is essential to keeping businesses in compliance with state laws and city ordinances regarding the sale of alcohol. We appreciate the effort businesses have put into this important part of their operations. Responsible alcohol sales are a respected part of our business community, and their efforts to help us keep alcohol out of the hands of youth are commendable. Our goal is 100% compliance, which has been achieved by many of the businesses over the—over the history of the time that I've—that I've run this and overseen it. Our department always reviews our best practices in aiding our community members and businesses, and obviously with the uh—with uh the great job that the city has done with attracting more businesses, we owe it to the community to make sure that we're doing this right. With that being said, we've also incorporated our—our new position, which is Dan... I forgot what he does... Community Engagement Officer? **[00:19:10] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Engagement Officer, okay. I told you, all these titles... wow, yeah, you threw too much at me, I guess. **[00:19:15] Detective Sergeant Mike McCormick:** There, he actually demoted them. Yeah, I think I did. Better him than me! Yeah. So we do have meetings coming up um, just to review our practices and policies and to make sure that we're doing—doing things right. And if we can do things better, we're—we're obviously open to that too. Uh, background: this uh, incident took place on the evening of November 7th, 2022, which is a Monday evening. Our Police Department conducted liquor compliance checks of Cottage Grove businesses holding liquor licenses by using an underage buyer. Uh, Las Margaritas at 7165 East Point Douglas Road failed that compliance check. This is their second violation in two years. So the procedure—and this is pretty standard on how we operate whenever we do these compliance checks—the decoys are given following directions and actions are taken. They arrive at the police department at a predetermined time and date in normal everyday clothing as far as whatever they would wear on a normal—normal day. Uh, they're advised not to change their appearance in any way from their normal uh, what they would normally look on a daily basis. We take pictures of what they look like on the night of prior to going out in case that is needed for—for court or anything. Prior... well, to do with that. Volunteers are instructed, if asked, that they are to state their real age. They're instructed under no circumstances that they're authorized to lie about who they are. They're instructed to provide their Minnesota state-issued ID card or driver's license, and that would be an accurate description of who they are showing their true age. Um, there is a photo ID—we make sure that we get a copy of that to show what was presented that evening. They're also provided monetary notes, and then we make copies of that too to—to show that that's what was used in the transaction. This is the new orientation for under-21 uh, driver's license and state IDs. This actually took place in 2018, so our businesses have had a—a few years now to—to get acclimated with this, to become aware of—of the changes. So you'll notice the picture on the left is a vertical license. So Minnesota is one of 46 states that if you're under 21, it's—the picture and the information is vertical rather than what we're used to being on the horizontal. Um, you'll notice with the red arrow there's a red block that also says "Under 21" and gives the date of when um, they will be 21. So again, off to the right is more of your traditional, but this was—this was done to aid in businesses to make sure that they're aware of the proper ages for—for serving alcohol and tobacco for that matter. I believe you've been supplied with the report from that evening with your packet. Um, and again this took place on November 7th. On that evening our decoy was a 20-year-old female and went and sat at the bar. She was approached by a server who asked if she wanted a drink. The decoy ordered a Bud Light. Server asked for identification, which the decoy presented. Server looked at the ID and then served the decoy the beer. After serving the beer, that server did come back and asked to see the ID again for verification. Server then examined the returned ID to the decoy and left the beer with the decoy. So again, we're looking at the vertical license with the red block that says Under 21. Uh, continuing, the officers then contacted the server to advise that she had uh, served an underage decoy, that she would receive a citation um, for the minor. So getting back to kind of what our goal is for education, typically in the majority of other agencies, when someone is served with um—or someone was given a—a charge of serving an underage minor, that's a gross misdemeanor in the state of Minnesota, which is jailable, and I actually have a friend that was jailed in Stillwater because of that. Um, however, we use the city ordinance, which is a misdemeanor, and again this is more for a learning tool—so, you know, because this affects the individual that serves quite a bit more when you throw a gross misdemeanor on someone. Officers spoke with the manager and explained that the employee failed a compliance check and that they would receive a letter outlining the next steps. The letter was dropped off at the business for the license holder to attend the council meeting. As stated, this—this is the second violation in the last two years. Uh, the last one being November 22nd of last year. Um, on March 13th of last year, after the violation, the council meeting, the following sanctions were imposed: having the owners and staff of Las Margaritas undergo an approved training program within 90 days, and the $500 fine and one-day suspension would be discontinued when completed. And they did do that. Unfortunately um, in speaking about some of the good things we've had with our compliance program, this business is—is an outlier. They opened business in Cottage Grove in 2005, and they've had nine violations since 2005. Uh, the staff is recommending the three consecutive day suspension uh, and the one thousand dollar civil penalty from the city fee table with the additional conditions: while holding a city-issued license, the licensee or representative from this establishment will attend any future city-sponsored alcohol compliance training when notified. The license holder will establish an age verification policy for the establishment's employees and provide the police department with a copy of this policy within 30 days of this resolution. While holding a city-issued alcohol license, the license holder must document and maintain the signatures and dates of any alcohol training their employees receive, including being advised of the policy cited above. This list must be kept up to date and made available to the police department upon request. The license holder shall not have any alcohol-related violations for a period of one year of this resolution. If the licensee fails to abide by the conditions and sanctions set forth in this resolution, the licensee may be required to attend a council meeting for additional sanctions. And that is what I have. Thank you. **[00:24:45] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Um, Council, any comments at this point? Uh, Councilmember Olsen. **[00:24:50] Councilmember Justin Olsen:** Detective Sergeant, thank you for being here this evening and for your um, very thorough explanation of what we're looking at here. Uh, one of the questions that I have is with regard to the penalty phase. Yes, when the business is at the stage that this business is currently in, and they have the three consecutive days of liquor license suspension, how are the three days determined? **[00:25:15] Detective Sergeant Mike McCormick:** That's a good question. Now I spoke with um, Chief Kerner regarding this, and I believe it's at the discretion of the police department. And in looking at the days, I've noticed that they are Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday in January. **[00:25:30] Jennifer Levitt (City Administrator):** A question on that... Okay, according to city code, the—the three days have to be consecutive, and it's um, at the discretion of the the Mayor and City Council. We did put in the resolution... we just put three recommended days in January. **[00:25:45] Councilmember Justin Olsen:** And the reason I asked the question is if we go back to the slide that you showed with the various violations over the course of, you know, the last several years. Um, you know, in my—in my time as a city council member, I know we've had Las Margaritas in front of us several times, and—and there were even incidents before that time. And I'm just wondering what we're going to need to do to really help them understand that this simply cannot happen. Everybody likes to have a variety of restaurants in the community—I just had lunch at Las Margaritas with my wife a week ago. It's one of our favorite places to go on a Saturday or Sunday for lunch. And um, you know, they've—they've moved into the new facility there that used to be Perkins. Obviously, there—there are lots of very loyal customers who appreciate having them in the community. But this sort of behavior seems to be pervasive, and I'm just curious if we need to implement a three-day license suspension over a weekend to really drive home the point that this really needs to be the last time. Obviously, that sounds potentially overly punitive, but the reality is, when you look at the track record, it's pretty scary. And the last thing I think any of us wants, including the business owner, is for somebody to get served who shouldn't be served, and then end up in a situation where they've either, you know, caused some sort of an accident or, you know, God forbid somebody gets hurt. So I really am hopeful that—that they will recognize that this violation is uh—it definitely needs to be the last one. And so, just asking your—your opinion if you think a three-day, you know, Friday, Saturday, Sunday type of implementation of this—this license suspension might be a little more effective than a Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday when they're probably not experiencing the same degree of sales. So I'll just leave that out in the air for you or any other council member who might want to come comment on it. But I guess the overarching thing that I'm trying to get to here is um, I'll turn it... we need—we need to get this fixed. It's been—been a problem for a while. Thanks. **[00:27:50] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Is there any other council members that have a comment? Uh, Councilmember Khambata. **[00:27:55] Councilmember Tony Khambata:** Um, to kind of piggyback off what Councilmember Olsen had to say, as somebody who's worked in restaurants and has had to manage people, I know how difficult it is. And it's especially hard being the owner-manager and having these things keep coming up. So it—I empathize with the owners in that, you know, this is going to sting a little, but I do really think it needs to drive home a point that, you know, some—they need to, you know, maybe do their own, you know, uh compliance checks in the lead-up to our compliance checks, and maybe incentivize their staff through some sort of bonus if they get it right. I don't know—that's not for me to decide. But um, I'm—I'm—I'm kind of feeling torn because I've been in the ownership position where this is—this isn't fair to the owner; they aren't the one who overserved, but they are responsible for everyone who works there. And um, I would like—I would truly like to see them continue to thrive in our community, and I think for that reason, you know, we have to drive home that this needs to be the last time. **[00:29:05] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Got it. Oh, Councilmember... go ahead, Dave. Councilmember Thiede. **[00:29:10] Councilmember Dave Thiede:** So I guess uh, you know, one question I had was how does this compare? Like nine times over 17 years—uh, how does that compare to the other restaurants that serve alcohol? **[00:29:20] Detective Sergeant Mike McCormick:** It really doesn't, actually. I mean, compared to our other businesses, um, I think we may have one other business that's failed three times since I've been here. **[00:29:30] Councilmember Dave Thiede:** So—so my question would be, you know, you can—you can kind of penalize to say, "Well, you just can't... a business suspension," but is there a way, you know, to make it... I mean, I actually, to be honest, I didn't realize the—the vertical uh, license like that. And I would imagine by this time pretty much all the new uh, uh people getting licenses, they're probably, percentage-wise, a lot of them are vertical now. And—and so forth. So it—it... I mean, it would appear that it should be clear. But—but there's some other foolproof ways with some electronics or or some other things. If that establishment doesn't have those electronics that would require, let's say, a reader or or something else to actually be able to perform the transaction... and—and I know we've said before there's some limitations with the POS systems and things like that. But uh, point of sale systems... but it would almost seem like at some point maybe a requirement to get that additional uh, electronics or whatever it might be to make it more foolproof is maybe better than—than having him lose money on—on not being open or something like that. Either way, it's—it's a kind of penalizing to a certain extent. So I mean, that's kind of one thing I was kind of wondering that's was listed in one of our requests for conditions, if I'm... was that correct? **[00:30:50] Pete Kerner (Public Safety Director):** Chief? If I can speak to just a few of these here quickly before I... on my mind. Um, I—I don't want to speak for the owner, but one of the owners is here tonight and I can tell you, you know, to me they've—they've admitted the violation. It was a new employee that hadn't had the training yet. So I think um, we took some guidance from our City Attorney too on what other communities do. So we do have these additional um, additional conditions on here. One of those is years ago Las Margaritas did get some age verification systems and as they wore out, they just didn't replace them. Um, so just some of these that we've talked about is having the age verification, better onboarding when they get their employees on, versus "We'll just wait until next year we do the training." So that's—that's why we're working, you know, want to work with the business to provide additional training before they even start because they start the employee and of course now this happens. And since that time the employee has gone through the training, but of course uh, too late on that. Um, so that's—that's why generally the the city fee table just lists the suspension and the the penalty, and that's why we're adding these additional conditions because we don't, just like the business, we don't want to be up in front of you either with these violations. So um... but then I think and then something you want to add? **[00:32:15] Councilmember Steve Dennis:** Yeah, thanks, Mayor. Um, so being an individual that—that holds a liquor license here in the—in the city, um, I always like to remind people that we—license is a privilege, not a right or guarantee. And if you meet the conditions of the issuing body and stay in a good position with them, you continue to have the benefit of that license. These things are always difficult to come before the Council and I'm sure we're all feeling pretty much the same way. There's a degree of sadness that—that happens when you see these things. As I've said before, we like to embrace success, not failure. The goal is for everybody to pass, come across the goal line in a good way. Um, but this—this is—this is a tough one. And when I saw that list of nine different violations—and I know that's over a number of many years—that... I mean, the question was asked, "Was there anybody out there that's had this—this much trouble?" The answer is no. It's unparalleled, uncharted right? So um, I'm really hoping, and I see the owner back there, I am really hoping that you guys can get your hands around this because I'll tell you, this is not what we like to deal with. We don't want to have to deal with this thing, any of us. This is—this is a sad—a sad, sad moment. Um, I will tell you we've got a fantastic Police Department here that uh, you know, when we hire new people in, we put them through a rigorous program—a field training officer program. Pete, how long does that last in totality? **[00:33:45] Pete Kerner (Public Safety Director):** 12 weeks before they're even on solo patrol. **[00:33:48] Councilmember Steve Dennis:** Yeah. So I mean, please make sure your people are trained before you put them on the floor. I mean, as a responsible owner, that's on you. So um, I—I do, in—in this particular circumstance, I do agree with Councilmember Olsen. I think that uh—I think we need to have the days that this is selected for um, have a little bit more meaning to them. And uh, you know, I would be okay with a, you know, a Friday, Saturday, Sunday, or probably more effectively a Thursday, Friday, Saturday. And I would pick that at a point where um, you know, uh it's going to have a little bit of an impact. Not to be punitive, but we really need to make people understand: this, please—this has to stop. It has to stop right here. So that would be—that would be my recommendation on it. Um, and make sure that, you know, you guys are doing training, never stop the training, always communicate. Um, make sure your people are as bulletproof as you can make them. We take care of the public—it's the right thing to do. And you know, here's the thing: these penalties here are—they're minor. They're minor. Carrying dram shop insurance, which you have—if you were to sell to an underage or over-serve someone, that individual goes out and hurts themselves or somebody else, you can lose your whole business. You can lose everything. I mean, the—the dollar amounts that can come from settlements in court, you guys know, it can be big. So we're really pulling for you here. We want you to succeed and do well. So um, let's, you know, please make a commitment that, you know, when we see you—we come into your restaurant to have a nice meal—we don't want to see you here. Thank you, Mayor. **[00:35:25] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Okay, thank you. Uh, Councilmember Dennis... um, just real quick for staff. Um, so I'll—I'll ask the Council kind of a question about the dates, but um, my question in the process... we just went through the changes to this ordinance and if—if they would come back with another violation in the next 12 months, isn't—if I—I'm doing—trying to do it off of memory, but it's a normal—isn't it a total revocation? Are we that close? Like they won't carry up—for... okay. Third one is pretty stiff. Yeah, and I guess that's my—my point. You know, our goal is not—not to, you know, lose a restaurant in town. But we—I mean, that list is pretty extensive. And we actually have as a Council been very supportive and—and celebrating the fact that we haven't... most of our businesses have uh—almost all literally have passed compliances. We uh, compliance checks. And we've had multiple businesses that have never had an issue. Um, it sounds like, you know, kind of listening to my Council colleagues up here, kind of sounds like you've had some opportunities, if we'll just put it that way, with having a system set up and then you just didn't replace it and then putting somebody on the floor who's a new employee. But I know, and I think we all can speak for this, we don't like to be here and deal with these kind of things. So I'm, you know, asking... I know we're asking for you to really, you know, work to get this under control. Uh, from a—a Council's perspective, it sounds like there might be a consensus if I'm kind of gathering here uh, to do like a—instead of doing a Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, do like a Friday, Saturday, Sunday. And I just happen to be looking kind of what the dates that you had put out there, and the one that's probably closest to that literal time frame would be uh, January 9th through the 11th. So whether Council wants to use those three dates would be Friday, Saturday, Sunday, or if you want our Director of Public Safety to pick the three days um, you know, Friday, Saturday, Sunday in January of... um, I'll leave that up, or do I need to refer to staff? **[00:37:30] Jennifer Levitt (City Administrator):** Mayor, members of the Council, in the resolution before you, it would actually list the specific three days. So if you are looking then um, at a Friday, Saturday, Sunday, we would just need to confirm those dates for the resolution. So that would be the, like, the 13th, 14th, and 15th of January. **[00:37:45] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Oh, I see, okay. I actually said the wrong... I was looking at the December calendar. So you said which days? I apologize. **[00:37:55] Jennifer Levitt (City Administrator):** 13, 14, 15. In the resolution we have proposed January 9th, 10th, and 11th. If you are recommending a Friday, Saturday, Sunday, then that would be the 13th, 14th, and 15th. **[00:38:05] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Okay. Council, are you comfortable with that? **[00:38:08] Councilmember Justin Olsen:** Mayor, I'll make the motion that we approve the staff recommendation, but for a change in the three consecutive dates to reflect the 13th, 14th, and 15th of January. **[00:38:20] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Okay, so I have a motion by Councilmember Olsen. Do I have a second? **[00:38:23] Councilmember Tony Khambata:** Second. **[00:38:24] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Second by Councilmember Khambata. I'm sorry... yes, I'm sorry. Um, yeah, I was going to say I'm looking at at Steve—her Attorney—Corey, the uh, licensee should be given an opportunity to be heard that. Thank you. I—I will do that then too. So before we get to you uh, would you like to speak? Yeah, please come on up. And again, just state your name and address for the record. I apologize for not inviting you up. **[00:38:50] Nora Perez (Co-owner, Las Margaritas):** Hello, my name is Nora Perez—N-O-R-A P-E-R-E-Z—and one of the co-owners of Las Margaritas and Vice President. And I mean how the data is here, so I'm not here to make any excuses. Um, like it's, you know, we've been here in the past and we had to follow some of the recommendations. Um, I mean we do work on our—our training, but um, and sometimes we have staff that have been... it's been hard to keep staff steady. So we are constantly, you know, having our returns and training new staff. And so I think that's just what happened that time. She got trained on what to do and I think when we talked to her and asked her what was going on, she just said like, you know, she—she didn't know what happened. She usually was really good at looking at the dates and that day she saw and she was not sure, but she thought she was looking at the date, even though the ID, you know, it's hard to—to not know that it was an Under 21. Um, and I know that we... like I—I respect the—the recommendations that you are making, but I just think that if you give us the three days which is Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, that would be severe enough for us to know. I mean, there's no need to do a weekend. We never had a suspension before. This would be our first one. So I think I would like you to consider at least just giving us the Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday instead of the harsher one. **[00:40:40] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Okay. All right. Council, any other comments for the applicant? Yes, Councilmember Dennis. **[00:40:45] Councilmember Steve Dennis:** So just—just uh, to make clear um, whatever happens here with this—the suspension would only affect the alcohol sales for the business. The business would still be open to serve food and soft drinks to people. So it's—yes, it's—it's a percentage, but it's not like the business is closed for three consecutive days. I just want everybody to know that. Um, that's not what we're talking about, just—just for the alcohol sales. Yep. Okay. Right. **[00:41:15] Mayor Myron Bailey:** So was that all you wanted to mention? All right. So Council, there's a motion and a second before us. I know that the applicant asked to go back to the original dates, but I know we have a motion a second. I'm assuming there's no—is there a desire to reverse that motion? **[00:41:30] Councilmember Justin Olsen:** No, I think we—we stayed a suspension the last time. So I think—I think in light of that, I think I'm still comfortable with my motion. **[00:41:40] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Okay. And same with you, Councilmember Khambata? **[00:41:43] Councilmember Tony Khambata:** Yeah, the relevant facts don't change. **[00:41:45] Councilmember Justin Olsen:** Okay, the—the number of violations over the course of time, the fact that the employee um, actually looked at the ID twice and wasn't able to figure out that this was an underage buyer is very disturbing and speaks to a lack of training. And the last violation in November of 2021... one of the things that we often do on first violations is we sort of provide a "stay of execution" as it were, and we ask that the business go through some additional training with all of their employees. One year later, here we are again. So as far as I'm concerned, the—the motion on the table is relevant and I'm not interested in making any changes. **[00:42:25] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Okay. Uh, Councilmember Dennis. **[00:42:28] Councilmember Steve Dennis:** Thanks. One last point. In—as Councilmember Khambata had brought up, we really did go out of our way to try to provide leniency on this last one which we dealt with in March of this year. So it was just a number of months ago and we really went out of our way to make—to make that easier, knowing that we had come out of the time of COVID and places were open again and we wanted to give everybody as much, you know, leeway as we possibly could. So I think we've shown some good faith already. **[00:42:55] Councilmember Dave Thiede:** Yeah, all right. Yeah, Councilmember Thiede. **[00:42:58] Councilmember Dave Thiede:** So I would just kind of recommend, in light of what's—what's occurring, you know, and I know sometimes things can get busy and—and some people are better at math than other people, you know? But uh—and that's why having some of those devices where they could just automatically check it, it might be a—a great idea to, you know, even though they might cost a certain amount of money, it might be better than other problems that you're having. So I'd recommend probably looking into getting those things back in play. **[00:43:30] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Okay, so we have a motion and a second. All those in favor of the motioned... signified by saying aye. (Aye). Opposed? Motion carries. Thank you. Let's hope that you're not back again. Uh, next on uh, regular agenda is the B, which is Property Tax Levy Payable in 2023 and Adopting the 2023 Budget. And our Finance Director, Brenda Malinowski, is going to take us through this. And before we go any further, I know I said it earlier, but happy birthday! **[00:44:05] Brenda Malinowski (Finance Director):** Thank you! Thank you! Yes, um, what a way to celebrate my birthday, but uh, here. **[00:44:10] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Uh, if you want Dave to sing to you, he'll do it. I'll even do Elvis's version! **[00:44:15] Brenda Malinowski (Finance Director):** Okay. Um, so tonight I'm going to do a brief presentation um, regarding our 2023 budget and property tax levy that's in front of the Council this evening for consideration. Our first slide is just a timeline going back in history here. We started uh, in May on the budget, but actually we actually started here in January and February as we talked about the Strategic Plan and a long-term staffing plan at the city. But in May, Council gave us some guidance and the department heads and their teams went back and they sharpened their pencils, they worked on budgets and presented that to Council in budget workshops. And so in July, August, Council had three workshops regarding the budget in the levy um, and did gave final direction on August 31st. The Council did adopt the preliminary levy in September. That is the same levy that's in front of you this evening. Um, and when that uh preliminary levy was adopted, we sent it to Washington County. Uh, they took our levy and then all the levies from the other taxing jurisdictions and they created what are called uh proposed property tax forms or statements. They sent that to our residents at our businesses and they received those in November. Um, on that notice, that gave based on this levy what their property taxes would do uh, in be in 2023 and it also did list tonight uh, that the Council will be discussing the budget and the levy. Um, also since September uh, the Mayor did uh talk about the budget during his "Mayor's Moment" in October. We did a "Truth in Taxation" video uh, in November uh, discussing the budget and in particular that proposed property tax noticed, just because there was a—a new flyer in there that we wanted to make sure that our residents understood. We held an open house on November 29th; we had three residents attend and they asked questions of staff about the budget in the levy that we were able to answer. And so tonight we're here asking for consideration on adoption of the final property tax levy and budget. Uh, the levy in front of you, it's a 20.6 million dollars uh, and it is comprised of uh these different line items. We have our—our debt levy at the bottom of our slide, and that's really not changing much from 2022. And where the—the biggest increase in our levy is in the general fund. Uh, we've had some increases for 2023 um, and really we can detail back those to uh keeping the levy low in 2022 and 2021, especially the operating portion due to the pandemic and knowing that we wanted to keep that levy low for our residents. Uh, we're going to be talking about a tax rate on the next slide, and to calculate tax rate, we take that preliminary levy that we were talking about and we divide it by total tax capacity. And that's how we set our tax rate. And so in Washington County and for Cottage Grove, our tax capacity increased to 58.3 million dollars in 2023. It's about a 25 percent increase. So really substantial—the largest increase there in recent time. Four percent of it was due to new growth and the rest was appreciation of existing homes in Cottage Grove and businesses. So once we take that property tax levy divided by our tax capacity, we come up with the city tax rate. And so on this slide, we can see that for 2023, we're at the lowest level that we have been at: 33.74 percent. So a very low tax rate uh, due to the fact that our tax capacity is increasing by a large amount due to, you know, depreciation plus the growth. And then if we look at it that further—take that tax rate rate and then look at there's four sample properties that we look at here in Cottage Grove uh, just to get a feel of city taxes and what those homeowners are experiencing. Uh, property one: if we looked on the right side, there's a detail there of nine-year history. In 2015, that market value was 233,200. Now for 2023, it's at 329,600. The nine-year average um, increase on market value for that property is 5.3 percent. City taxes in 2015 were nine hundred and two dollars. Based on the levy that's in front of you, that property would pay 1,086 in 2023. That nine-year average is twenty-seven dollars or three percent per year. And that holds true with the other uh three properties to property three and property four. They're starting to... there's a market value exclusion program in the state, and uh, the property taxes when they increase in value over 413,800, that exclusion goes away. So instead of the state picking up a portion of those property taxes, that homeowner does. And that's why we're seeing a little bit higher increase on property three and property four. But you know, just to—to state again, your market value on property one, it increased 5.3 percent in nine—nine years, but the city property taxes are only increasing three percent over that nine-year period, or twenty-seven dollars per year. Uh, levy per capita: another thing that we—we look at to—to verify how we compare to other communities is we look at cities and Cott- or cities in Washington County. And on this slide, our levy per capita is 521.39 for the second lowest in Washington County. And they increase from there—we've got Oak Park Heights at 1,312.60. They have a state prison um, in there, so that skews their levy a little bit. But you know, we're at the bottom of the list when we look per capita. Um, and then one more slide: this is a newer slide this year. It is showing our median value home for homes in Washington County. It's looking at the tax rate and it's calculating uh, the taxes on that median value home. So in Cottage Grove, our median home value is 326,900 for next year. What that means is that 50—50 percent of the homes are higher than that, and 50 percent of the homes are lower than that in Cottage Grove. But that median value home will pay a thousand seventy-seven dollars next year, based on this levy that's in front of you and budget. Whereas if we look at Lake Elmo, they have a lower tax rate, 24.04 percent, but their median home value is 548,900, and so they'll pay more on that median home in property taxes for that resident. Oh, what do the city taxes pay for? So that median value home at 326,900, what do they pay for if instead they sent us a monthly check here at the city? $89.75. Uh, $37.68 would pay for our Public Safety services—our Police services; uh, Public Works to plow the streets, maintain the streets, $14.90; a Debt Service, $13.20—that's our pavement management programs in the past, uh, it's—to pay for debt on our Hero Center, our central fire station; parks and recs—so to maintain our parks, provide recreation services, ten dollars and ten cents per month; fire, six dollars and 21 cents; and then we round out with uh General Government, Capital Equipment, and the EDA. Um, our general fund gets the largest portion of our property taxes, so I want to talk about that uh, the budget. Next year is 23 million, 83,960. That's the proposal. Uh, it is considered a balanced budget, so our revenues equal our expenditures. And those services that we talked about on the previous slide—fire services, police services, uh plowing our streets—we don't charge our residents for that, so we have to generate the revenue to do that. And so 76 percent of the general fund is property taxes, and then license and permits is 11. And just, you know, to talk about license and permits a little bit further, we're a growing community, and so that's a larger portion of our budget than some communities. If we weren't growing, we would have to uh increase property taxes, find other revenue streams if that was a smaller portion of our pie, or decrease our expenditures. So that's a good mix there for Cottage Grove. On the expenditure side, personnel services are 68 percent of the budget. Uh, where you know, we're in the people business—we provide services to our residents, and so that's why it's a large portion of our budget. And then contractual services and supplies are 28. If we looked up back at 2022, actually personal services last year were 70 percent of our budget, but now this year, supplies and contractual services increased. And that is what we're experiencing is no different than our homeowners. We saw some inflationary increases for 2023 as we prepared our budget, looking at IT services, Fleet services, and our fuel costs. Uh, expenditures by department for the general fund: Public Safety is our larger—our largest component at 48 percent. It does in—decrease when we look back at 2022 by one percent because Public Works went up by one percent. Uh, there is a public service worker uh, in the Public Works uh budget, plus inflationary factors uh, affected their budget more than others. There are some property tax relief programs that I just wanted to leave here. There's the website and a phone number. There's a regular credit refund for property taxes that is tied to income, but there's a special property tax refund program and that is tied to the increase in an individual's property tax year over year. And then there's a senior citizen property tax deferral program. So there's more information at the state, at the Department of Revenue, or a person could call the city and talk to myself—I can put them in contact with the right information. But the time to apply for these programs would be when that final property tax statement comes out in March. So when that... is the time to apply for it is when those property tax statements are received from the county. And then, you know, we've seen a lot of information about valuation increases. When that property tax statement proposed that was sent out in November, really the time to look at that valuation notice is when it comes in March. And so there'll be a valuation notice that comes from the assessor's office in March. That is the time to look at those uh book open book meetings, and if you have any questions about your valuation at that time is the time to talk to the assessor's office about that. With that, here are the resolutions for this evening. **[00:54:20] Mayor Myron Bailey:** All right uh, thank you, Brenda. One—one quick thing just uh, I guess for the public because sometimes we do hear as a Council and that about who—who does the—um, the valuations of the homes. And I know I just want to be very clear, and obviously is the city, but do you want to share a little bit on that? **[00:54:40] Brenda Malinowski (Finance Director):** Yes, the county assessor's office does valuations on our behalf, and so they are the ones that set those valuations. And so they—they set a value on uh, January 1st of each year and those notices are—are sent out to our taxpayers uh, in March, April. And those are the times to look at those valuations. **[00:55:05] Mayor Myron Bailey:** All right. Council, any questions? I know we've been going through this quite a bit, but um... yeah, Councilmember Olsen. **[00:55:10] Councilmember Justin Olsen:** One question, a couple of comments. First of all, thank you again for all the hard work and effort that you and your team put into this year's budget um, for 2023. I know that uh, you kind of came in in the middle of it um, with Robin retiring and then um, you stepping into the Director's role, but of course you've been here before so you kind of know how the city rolls. Um, I—I think this year, at least from my experience, was one of the most challenging years we've ever had from a budgetary perspective because you're trying to balance the—the growth piece, which has been astronomical for years, and—and then you're trying to also balance what that growth means in terms of service delivery. The thing that I'm always impressed with is when we get the slide that shows the per capita cost of living in the city of Cottage Grove, we're always right towards the bottom, and in this particular instance we're—we're second from the bottom to our friends in Saint Paul Park. And yet I constantly hear comments about how awesome our Public Works team uh, you know, gets the roads plowed so—so early and they get it right down to the cement. I hear from developers how awesome the staff is to work with at City Hall, how they're responsive and willing to be flexible and work with people, which has been really critical during COVID due to supply chain issues, etc. Yet we've continued to maintain the growth. I hear all the time about how fantastic our Public Safety team is, whether it's at a—an event like a Fire Department open house, what have you. And our staff delivers all of that and more for the second lowest per capita cost in the county. And I also want to remind people—and this is where my question is going to come in, Brenda—that there's this thing in the state of Minnesota called Local Government Aid, or LGA. What local government aid essentially does is it helps supplement the budget for the cities that receive it. And local government aid actually has to be approved by the legislature year after year after year, so the—the numbers change to some degree in terms of what you get for LGA. And I'll just quote a couple of numbers and then, Brenda, I'm going to ask you to just take a minute to explain to people what LGA really is and why it exists. So our friends in Hastings get nine hundred and three thousand dollars in 2023 in Local Government Aid. Our friends in South St. Paul get 2.8 million dollars in Local Government Aid. Our friends in Newport get 455,000 dollars, and our friends in St. Paul Park get 688,000 dollars. And then finally, uh, our friends in Stillwater get almost eight hundred thousand dollars—796,000—in Local Government Aid for 2023. And the city of Cottage Grove gets how much again? **[00:58:05] Brenda Malinowski (Finance Director):** Zero. **[00:58:06] Councilmember Justin Olsen:** Zero. Yep, and it's been that way for quite a while. Um, so we don't count on that, and that is one of the reasons that um, you see that—that per capita number is so low is because we're very, very um, tight with the penny. Could you just help people understand for a moment what LGA is and why we don't get it? **[00:58:25] Brenda Malinowski (Finance Director):** Okay. To recognize the legislature um, you know, while they have great intentions, I understand that. Um, in the community I was before, we received Local Government Aid, and so we were kind of diving into the formula a lot. And it was—it's based on, you know, your housing stock before a certain period of time, it's based on your tax capacity, it's based on your—your population. And it is a formula that goes column by column. And so based on this, the formula is determined. And so a lot of times the more established cities, the older cities, they get the Local Government Aid, whereas a growing city, they do not. And typically that's because those—those large older cities—and we can use Minneapolis and St. Paul as perfect examples—you know, they have a lot of aging infrastructure and they're built out basically. So that aid is intended to help them with their budgetary needs. **[00:59:20] Councilmember Justin Olsen:** We put cops in the field, firefighters in the field, Public Works workers in the field, Park and Rec Department workers in the field um, fantastic city staff here at City Hall in the field without any contribution from the state as far as Local Government Aid is concerned. And so there again, I'm really pleased and very proud of the staff for how they attacked 2023 and how they continue to attack our fiscal element as—as a body here by maintaining that per capita number at such a low rate. That's—that's really great news for our residents, of which I am one. Um, and it also, I think, speaks to the hard work and effort that our people put into doing more with less as often as they can. So thank you for that. **[01:00:10] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Okay. Councilmember Thiede. **[01:00:12] Councilmember Dave Thiede:** Okay, so one of the things I do want to start out with is—is... and you know, you might even notice on my—on my website, different things that I've said. I think one of our greatest accomplishments in the last 10 years or so is—is the—the remarkable staff that we put in place and—and how good the—the people are and the ability for those people to actually, you know, make decisions and—and provide services and things of that nature. Um, you know, the—and—and everybody knows that I—I'm really squeaky when it comes to—to money and everything else, and—and so sometimes I have to be careful. But—but uh, my—you know, flags have gone up just a little bit because of a couple different factors in that we've had some unprecedented growth, okay? And you know, we're—we're saying, "Oh great, we got this—this money," all right? And we've uh, you know—and—and the fact is is that it's very likely that that growth could go down just as it is now, as you've noticed with housing and some of that sort of stuff. We'll see if it bounces back up, you know, next year. Uh, but we do have to be, you know, very careful, especially with expenses that aren't... that are easy to increase but hard to decrease, in light of, you know, the money coming in. Because you know, it—it... we can't just always say, "Oh well, this is what our costs are, we got to go get it from the residents in the city." You know, there's—there's got to be some—some limits. And while, you know, some of the statistics in that show that, and I believe that we're providing great value to the—to the residents. Um, sometimes maybe, you know, maybe a little fancier than what I would be okay with. But like—like I say, I got to be careful about that sometimes. But uh... so you know, I think uh, we just really kind of uh, need to make sure that we can watch it out and—and—and look at some of these things. And—and unfortunately, I probably probably won't change much. And—and so in terms of—of uh, really kind of trying to watch some of those expenses and—and be—be diligent about that. Um, you know, because it's uh, we also know that the residents have gotten increases from—from a variety of other places and—and things like that. So um... so while I don't like it too much, I guess through all the meetings and everything that I've been in, it kind of is justified still, actually. In comparing with other—other localities and things like that, it's—it's favorable and such. So—so I—I'm... I'll... I'm going to approve it, but uh, not necessarily totally like it, but... **[01:03:00] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Okay. Councilmember Dennis. **[01:03:02] Councilmember Steve Dennis:** Thanks, Mayor. Well, you know, it's a compromise, right? And the—the best compromise it ever is achieved is the one where really nobody's completely happy. I mean, that's just how those things go. But it's—it's a very long process. You mapped out uh, the calendar of how long we've worked on this, and it's a very intrinsic process. And um, we—we did a lot of work on this one this year, and—and it had to do with, you know, like uh, Councilmember Olsen says, you know, accounting for the growth and for the needs of a vibrant and expanding community. And I think that we've done um, about as good of a job as we can. Um, the goal uh, overall is to arrive in a process where we can make sure that we're giving people the level of quality service that they've come to expect from us. And I think these numbers deliver that as much as we humanly can possibly do. So I feel good about it. I'm glad to hear, you know, two Councilmembers, you know, acknowledge their appreciation for the process and—and uh, you know, their—their approval for it too. So it's—it's a good thing. And you know, it's never—never easy. But—but once again, we did the work and—and I think we've come to a good conclusion. Thank you. **[01:04:15] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Okay. Councilmember Khambata. **[01:04:17] Councilmember Tony Khambata:** Not to talk... I'm last in line, so I don't want to repeat a couple of things that have already been said. But um, yeah, this is a—a grueling process and tough decisions had to be made. And I think in light of everything, we get to maintain our high level of service, we get to meet our obligations as a city and to what I would consider uh, the—the least amount of impact to our individual property owners as additional tax capacity comes online with our growth. I hope that we can continue a trend of being at or near the bottom of our per capita spending. So I think we have that going in our favor. Uh, however, uh, I was impressed by staff, and specifically by Brenda, at the amount of forethought that was put into what our future needs are going to be as well. So we're not, you know, we're not—we're not foregoing our—our budgeting for, you know, stuff that's going to come up in two and three years. We're not going to get caught on our heels when that stuff comes up, with the budget the way it's been prepared. And—and that's what I'm most happy about: is we didn't have to, you know, cut our long-term goals to meet our current day obligations. **[01:05:25] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Fantastic, thank you. Um, I do know that even though it's not a public hearing uh, Mark, did you guys want any—have any other questions regarding the budget at all? Okay. And—and whether Councilmember Olsen talks to you or our Finance Director... would be more than happy to have... our staff is amazing. You know, she's much, much smarter than him! We can make sure that that's the case. Yep, you got it. Okay, was there anybody else that wants to speak on the budget? All right. So um, before I look for uh, some motions, I'll just make my comments real quick too. And—and that is: you know, great job to the staff, uh fantastic job. Even with the transition that we had in our Finance Department this year, and you came in and you hit the ground running uh, Brenda, we really appreciate uh the fact that you joined our team again uh, and are leading it uh now over there. The one—the one thing... and it kind of, I mean, echoing a little bit about everybody said. And the one that the—the thing that makes me most proud, frankly, as the Mayor um, isn't necessarily... it isn't the growth and, you know, the restaurants and all that kind of stuff that we're all trying to get, and all the stuff that we're doing here. But really does uh, make me feel great is when I go into the ice arena and I hear from residents and I hear from people from other communities that rave about the arena. I hear from people that rave about our parks. I hear people rave about our golf course. Um, literally, people talk about this building or the Hero Center. Um, and—and it's at all sectors. Um, Public Works... I mean, just most recently... I mean, sometimes social media can be a little interesting as we all know. But when people were having a little fun commenting about... there's like a—a line when you go from one community to the next from Cottage Grove, and our Public Works team does an absolutely amazing job. And so what does happen, from a—a public awareness standpoint, is we love hearing that too, right? And none of us want to get a phone call that says, "My street's not plowed" or "The fire department's not here, I have a—an emergency." I mean, we have the quickest response times for ambulance and—and paramedics and Public Safety uh, in—in the metro. I mean, it's just absolutely amazing. And so what we have to do then is we have to go, "Okay, staff, how do we maintain that? How do we keep it?" Um, and—and you know, and—and I'll be honest with you: most—a lot of our staff members actually live here in Cottage Grove. And the fact is is just like us, whatever they propose or we propose, it affects all of us. Um, and so we're—we're very cognizant—I know I am and I know this Council is—about how um, what the—the rate would be or what the taxes would be. And you know, it's fun... so I talk about all those things. If there's a—if there's a personal challenge for me that I'm really trying to work on—and—and our staff knows this uh, from—from a grandeur standpoint—and that is uh, some of the infrastructure stuff that we're really trying to get ahead of. Um, and—and Councilmember Khambata kind of mentioned that we're looking down the road too. And when I say infrastructure, I'm talking about, you know, road repairs, you know, looking for other options out there that isn't just counting on the Cottage Grove taxpayer to pick up the—pick up the tab. So our goal is to try to figure out are there other pots of money or buckets of money other places and such that we can do to make some of these projects that we're going to be doing... and matter of fact, part of this budget is some big projects next year that citizens of Cottage Grove have been really asking for when it comes to road projects and that. So um, again, I just want to say thank you to the Council, thank you to our staff, and thank you to the citizens for being appreciative of the—the services that our community is providing and will continue to provide as we head into 2023 and beyond. So uh, with that uh, I believe we have two motions ahead of us, or before us, I should say. So uh, Council, who would like to take... yeah, Councilmember Khambata. **[01:09:40] Councilmember Tony Khambata:** I move to adopt Resolution 2022-162 adopting the 2022 tax levy collectible in 2023. **[01:09:48] Councilmember Justin Olsen:** Second. **[01:09:49] Mayor Myron Bailey:** All right, so I have been motioned by Councilmember Khambata, second by Councilmember Olsen. Any discussion? All those in favor signify by saying aye. (Aye). Opposed? Motion carries. And then we have the second one here. **[01:10:02] Councilmember Justin Olsen:** I'll make the motion to adopt Resolution 2022-163 adopting the 2023 budget. **[01:10:08] Mayor Myron Bailey:** All right, so we have a motion by Councilmember Olsen. Do I have a second? **[01:10:10] Councilmember Steve Dennis:** Oh, second. **[01:10:11] Mayor Myron Bailey:** All right, so Councilmember Dennis... all right, a second by Councilmember Dennis again. Any further discussion? Seeing none, all those in favor signify by saying aye. (Aye). Opposed? Motion carries. Thank you, Brenda. Now go have some birthday cake! All right. Uh, and then our last item on our regular agenda this evening is the 2023-2027 Capital Improvements Plan, and our Public Works Director/Engineer/Everybody else that needs additional titles uh, is Ryan Burfeind. So Ryan, welcome again. **[01:10:45] Ryan Burfeind (Public Works Director):** Thank you, Mr. Mayor, members of the Council. I'm sorry batting cleanup tonight in the—in our presentations and continuing on the budget and funding discussion. Um, looking at the 2023 to 2027 CIP approval. This is before the Council in August as a workshop, kind of in our budget discussions, and it went to Planning Commission October where they recommended approval at the public hearing at that time. And I always like to mention that this is really a planning tool; this is not an approval document. There's a lot of projects in here, a lot of big dollar amounts, but nothing by passing and approving this document approves this project. Those all come back to the Council, whether it be approving or, you know, authorizing feasibility reports, preparing plans and specs, or setting bid dates. So all these would come forth again. And what I'll be talking about tonight is the first two years in my presentation, just going through all those projects—that's kind of our work plan. Those first two years are the projects that were—that we're talking about more with the Council and, in some ways uh, continuing that work. So first, we have new parks and park improvements. I'll just draw attention to some of the larger ones in the next two years. We have the Mississippi Dunes Parkland Acquisition for a million dollars, and also the Glacier Valley Park Building for a total cost, including all the design and whatnot, a little over four million dollars. And then the River Oaks Golf Course Irrigation Replacement—that's one that is moving ahead. So that's one of those fewer that are in here for a future year, but already been discussed and that bid was awarded. For 2024, a couple of larger ones is the Roberts Lake Neighborhood Park—this is on the Waltersdorf property west of Jamaica Avenue. This would be a kind of development-driven park tied to that neighborhood if that were to move ahead next year. I also have the Oltman Middle School ball fields and parking lot for one million dollars. For our utility CIP projects in 2023, we have the new water tower construction for the low zone—this is kind of just behind the park and ride, for 4.5 million dollars. This is really a growth-related item; we have an area fund where we collect um, area fees from developments, and then as we grow, we just need more infrastructure like new wells, like new water towers. We also have the 3M settlement project—our first major project, starting the low-zone treatment plant and Well 13, of just over 15 million dollars. Fully funded through the 3M settlement through the state. So those are no dollars coming from any city funds or tax dollars. We also have a million dollars for lining of a trunk sewer underneath Highway 61. Very important, very old sewer in the city—it takes probably 70 percent of the sewage and gets it down to the Met Council treatment plant. We know that that needs rehab, and a lining project... we are looking at grant funding for that. We talk about looking for other dollars when you look at Inflow and Infiltration grants. So that would really be next winter is when we'd start that, and hopefully get grant funding to help support it. Finally, we have in 2023 a proposed signal at Hardwood Avenue and Hardwood Court for 700,000 dollars. And that's... we're in the process of finishing our warrant analysis to see if we're going to meet the warrants for that, which would trigger that signal. In 2024, we have the intermediate zone treatment plant, which is just behind the fire station. That's the much larger one, of about 28 million dollars. Once again, fully funded by the state through the 3M settlement. Some public facility projects that we've been discussing is our utility division building. In the CIP right now, it's just shown for 1.5 million potentially for design in 2023, with some site grading and building construction in 2024. So that's one that we've discussed and that's where it is shown, you know, right now in the CIP. We also have the north rink dehumidifier replacement for 250,000 in 2024 as well. With that, I'll get into our street projects that we have for the next two years. The first one, probably the biggest one, most exciting, that we've been working on, talking about for a long time, is our East Point Douglas and Jamaica Avenue project. This is a two-year project. So the seven million dollars is the amount that would be expended in 2023, and this would really cover Jamaica Avenue and then East Point Douglas Road from Inwood up to that roundabout. And then I'll talk on the next—next slide later on about the the 2024 portion, which is the roundabout itself. So a multi-year project. We're looking to keep the project area open with accessibility during construction, so it's kind of a balance: so stretching that project timeline out but keeping accessibility to all those businesses in the meantime. We have Pavement Management in 2023 uh, just under three million dollars. This is the area north of Hillside Trail, south of 80th Street, and kind of along Hyde Avenue and to the west of Hyde Avenue. But pretty straightforward, but much-needed pavement management—just a full pavement replacement, spot curb replacement, and very efficient cost for the number of miles of road that we're looking at. But just very old, deteriorated roads that we did a thin overlay about nine years ago on, and there's just much-needed replacement. For a development division-driven project, Ravine Parkway on that Waltersdorf property—it's kind of tied to that park I mentioned earlier on. If that project were to move ahead, that would be another segment of Ravine Parkway for about two million dollars. That is a split; it's not all city funding. That's anticipated to be about half development, half city for funding that project—so a million dollars each. But that would only move ahead if that development moved ahead at the same time. Uh, we have the second phase of the South District street and utility improvements project. This is one that was awarded this year as a two-year project. Uh, the first phase did utility construction in that kind of highlighted bright yellow area. We did not do the street construction because as that single-family home development did not move ahead, there was no need for that street construction. But we do have still programmed kind of that X on the civic parcel because that would support those proposed uses that we've been discussing more—more recently. Another big one for the city is 100th Street Extension design work in 2023. Joint project with the county. The county has been leading that effort, but it's, you know, following the county cost-share policy—it's a split in cost between the county and city. We do want to keep working on the design portion. Obviously the huge part is the construction—we have that in 2025, so not in the first two years, but we're very much looking at Federal grant funding for that. We have a Rural Surface Transportation grant that we're... should be hearing soon in the next month or two—you know, they said end of year, it might be January like I said—for 25 million dollars to really largely fund 80 percent of that construction uh, with the remaining being funded between the city and county. And that's critical—if we don't get that funding uh, we will continue to reapply and it may push that project back in the CIP. But that's really important for being able to provide that project. For 2024, we have the second phase of East Point Douglas and Jamaica, which is that roundabout and then East Point Douglas going around behind Target. We have a 2024 Pavement Management project. This is just south of the project that's proposed for 2023—a very similar scope of work uh, with just a full pavement replacement, spot curb replacement for this neighborhood. We also have one remaining neighborhood in those areas kind of north and south of 80th—this is like the last segment to do. This is a full curb replacement, full pavement replacement project. It's been a full curb replacement... so we did a thin overlay just to buy more time out of it. If we're going to do a full replacement anyways, let's get the full life out of that roadway. But we're looking at 2024 for replacing that. Uh, 80th Street Reconstruction: when you think about other funding options, this is an earmark with the federal government of 7.8 million dollars that we've been working on. That funds, you know, most of this project. It remains just about two million dollars that would largely be covered by utility funds and some of our trail replacement funds, which would be replacing all the pavement on 80th Street, doing some enhancements to the signals, replacing all the trails and pedestrian facilities, and really kind of bringing those medians up into a better shape as well. So really hoping we can get that funding, but that's really critical to be able to provide this project. We also have Ravine Parkway at Cottage View Drive, five million dollars. This is the first phase, the area highlighted in red. We do have a three million dollar funding from the government—federal government—for this project. So we're working through that process right now to be able to access those funds. Um, a bit of a process to do that, so we're looking at 2024 and delivering that first phase at this point. Another grant that we got from the state is for uh, intersection improvement down at River Oaks. So we were able to get uh—it used to be Cooperative Agreement Program, now it's Local Partnership Program—of 710,000 dollars. So that was the maximum award in that program that the city got to provide this new intersection that'll be... you've probably seen them on highways in rural areas where we have the U-turns um, in close proximity to the current intersection. So you're trying to avoid that full crossing movement as these highways get more and more traffic. So that was very exciting to get that funding. I know we beat out Washington County for a very similar project, so it was uh—it was a good battle between us and the county, and we were able to secure that funding for our project. And finally, the second phase of design for 100th Street Extension, that remaining 1.25 million, and then as I show here, construction in 2025. But very much dependent on that federal grant. And when you look at the funding sources uh, just one thing I want to draw attention to because there's a lot of big numbers in here, and really what—what are we looking at for our actual levy? And there's really only three lines. It's those bonds for park projects, street projects, and pavement managements. Those are the only three that would have any impact really on the levy because it would be bonding if those projects were approved. But like I said tonight, this is just a planning tool—this is not approving those projects. But when you see all these big numbers, those are really the three that would have any impact on the levy in this five-year term. With that, I've got the recommendation on the slide, and I'll be happy to stand for any questions. **[01:21:00] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Council, any questions on this? Uh, Councilmember Thiede. **[01:21:05] Councilmember Dave Thiede:** Well, if you put up the sources... because the one thing that always gets me when we in the 12 years that I've been looking at CIPs and so forth is all the big numbers, you know? And—and uh, to me big—those big numbers are kind of scary. But—but the fact is is that with the sources and so forth, as as Ryan pointed out, you know, the—the critical things are the ones that—that actually affect the levy and—and—and directly, or you know, pulling money out of the the residents' pockets and so forth. So I just uh, you know, want to commend the—the staff. The fact that they do very good with grants as—as Ryan was going through that, uh made mention of, you know, very good uh mention of what—you know, where some of that money is coming from and so forth. So I guess the one thing I want to reiterate is is, you know, when you—when you look at this list uh, you know, as a lot of people do and don't understand, you know, where that money is coming from and uh all of it, and it's such that that a lot of that is—is coming from different places besides their—their pockets directly. So uh... so I just—I just—I just really wanted to point that out because that's always the thing that kind of—kind of got me a little bit, but... **[01:22:30] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Okay. Councilmember Olsen. **[01:22:32] Councilmember Justin Olsen:** Ryan, thanks. It was just as good today as the last 24 times I've seen it. Really good job. Um, you kept it exciting. The reason that I wanted to speak on this is I wanted to just ask a couple of questions about the commodities piece and how it plays into some of the um, Capital Improvement projects that we have on—on deck. And I don't know if Brenda's going to need to help you with this or not, but um, one of the things that—that we do well as a city is we work in conjunction with, you know, other agencies on fuel price uh, so that we can purchase, you know, a big—big amount of fuel every year and we try to lock in a price. Have we done that yet this year? **[01:23:15] Ryan Burfeind (Public Works Director):** Yeah, we haven't. The price hasn't come out yet, but we did with that state contract—we did give our quantities for next year. **[01:23:22] Councilmember Justin Olsen:** I think that price comes out in February? **[01:23:25] Brenda Malinowski (Finance Director):** I believe it comes out in February. **[01:23:26] Councilmember Justin Olsen:** Okay. Is that also true of um, our asphalt? **[01:23:30] Ryan Burfeind (Public Works Director):** So asphalt we do purchase in bulk. That's not through a state contract, but it is through a closer by plant, I would say. And it's one that, you know, uses that mix that we—that we use, and it's, you know, at a very good low cost since we do it in-house. **[01:23:45] Councilmember Justin Olsen:** Right. Okay, good. And then the last thing is um, with regard to some of the pavement management projects that you put up. Obviously, we've got an important area to get done this year. We've both seen it. When will you start taking bids for that? **[01:23:58] Ryan Burfeind (Public Works Director):** Yeah, that's a good question, Councilmember Olsen. So we do have our in the coming months our process to work through with neighborhood meetings, public hearings in January, and we'd likely be bidding in that—that March time frame. It's always kind of tricky with asphalt. You don't want to bid too early because then there's a lot of unknowns, and you want to be too late to the game. So a lot of times for paving projects, we're in that March time frame. **[01:24:25] Councilmember Justin Olsen:** Sure. The reason I asked you all those questions is because um, as I indicated at the outset, the commodities piece really plays a big role when it comes to our ability to get some of these projects done and to get them done in the most economical fashion. Today, oil closed at its lowest mark in the entire year, and that then has a downstream effect on our asphalt prices, on our fuel consortium, etc. So um, I just wanted to make mention of the fact to the public that one of the things we try to do is we try to buy low, obviously. And so if there are opportunities to lock in some values using the um, the state bids and those kinds of things to uh, to hopefully save a few dollars on some of these projects, that would be a wonderful thing to see. The market is definitely very different today than it was when we started the budget process and the CIP process. That goes for everything from the price of plywood and—and steel and, you know, pipe and so on and so forth, to the oil and the asphalt and—and the fuel. But we use a lot of those things. So if we can hopefully time the market a little bit, maybe we can experience some values and get some of these things done at a little lesser cost. And hopefully as it relates to Pavement Management, you know, that'll give us an advantage at the time that we get those bids um, with regard to, you know, what the residents may end up being asked to pay as their portion of that project. So that's really all I wanted to talk about: was the commodities piece and how critical that is to all of the things that we're doing here and as well to our city budget. Thank you very much. **[01:26:10] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Okay. Any comments, guys? All right. Um, so actually what's interesting to bring that one subject up uh, Councilmember Olsen, because I noticed earlier this evening on our consent agenda there was two um, areas where we actually had a reduction uh, then from the original estimated cost. One was on the pavement management from 2021, and then the other one was from Mill and Overlay project that we did in—in uh, this—this year. So I just wanted to say, you guys do a really good job of watching the pennies, if you will. And in this case, if you find the two together—and I was trying to look real quick here—it was, I think between the two, it's almost a million dollars in savings uh, between those two projects. So I just want to mention that to your comment on commodities. And that when—when our Public Works team is—is doing that, I think that's a great thing. So... all right. Um, so with that, there is a motion before us, Council, if somebody would like to take it. **[01:27:10] Councilmember Steve Dennis:** I'll make the motion, Mayor, to approve the 2023-2027 Capital Improvement Plan and adopt Resolution 2022-157 amending the 2040 Comprehensive Plan to incorporate the CIP. **[01:27:25] Mayor Myron Bailey:** All right, so we have a motion by Councilmember Dennis. Do I have a second? **[01:27:28] Councilmember Tony Khambata:** Second. **[01:27:29] Mayor Myron Bailey:** A second by uh, Councilmember Khambata. Any other discussions? All right. Saying none, all those in favor signify by saying aye. (Aye). Opposed? Motion carries. Thank you, Ryan. Thank you, Brenda. Everybody. All right. Uh, we're now to 12, which is Council Comments Request. I'll start as I normally do with uh, Councilmember Khambata. **[01:27:50] Councilmember Tony Khambata:** Thank you, Mayor. I did in fact run a 5K um, and a costume! So I got my hundred bucks from Justin! It's all gone, right? You did, yep. I'll be giving that to uh, Friends in Need Food Shelf as promised. Um, but you know, I just have to commend uh, city staff. We've had a couple of great events. Um, if anyone can make it out last Wednesday, it was a great—I mean great event in the parking lot here. Um, and I know we've got a full calendar moving through the rest of the month, so I'm looking forward to seeing um, seeing everyone at those events as well. That's all I've got. **[01:28:30] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Fantastic. All right, Councilmember Dennis. **[01:28:34] Councilmember Steve Dennis:** Thanks, Mayor. We've got a couple things for us. First and foremost, I want to share um, with the community and the rest of the Council that you and I had an opportunity to attend breakfast this morning uh, with the Chamber of Commerce. It was the annual holiday business breakfast down at Tinucci's. And uh, so there was a gentleman came in and the subject matter really dealt with leading with character, which is a good thing and something that we all should be doing and need to do at this point in time. I just want to commend our Chamber leadership, the Board, and also Laurie Levine, who's the Chamber President and CEO, for—for doing a really great job on that. And a couple of our staff members attended it as well, so it was a good time. Uh, second to that: holiday shopping season is in full swing as we know. And uh, so if you can't find or source your products locally, which we encourage at first, just a—a reminder... and I'm actually sharing a post that Public Safety had put out earlier today, and that was to make sure that we're doing our part to get packages that might get shipped to the house, get them in quickly and get them put away. As we all know, there're folks that go around that are sometimes called "Porch Pirates," who—and can be funny, but not a laughing matter um, if you know what I'm saying, who take things that are not theirs. And so—so we do our part as a community to make sure that we're not making ourselves a victim to that. Please remember to take those packages in. And then last but not least—and I don't mean to end on—on a somber note, but um, 81 years ago today, the United States and Pearl Harbor was attacked on the "Day of Infamy." So I think we just take a—a moment in our own place and time to think a little bit about that and to remember what the meaning of that was. There's probably less and less people right now that are alive that went through that. Um, many of us who are here in this room went through 9/11. We know what that felt like as a country to be attacked. And so I think, in the spirit of holiday season and these events if—and leading and interacting with people with character, that this would be a good time to think about those things. So thank you. **[01:30:50] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Fantastic. Thank you. Councilmember Thiede. **[01:30:55] Councilmember Dave Thiede:** All right. Well, you'll notice that uh—the Mayor and I, we have our Holiday Train garb on, you know? And—and uh, that's coming up on Monday. And—and so it's—it's a fantastic time. It—it helps the Friends in Need uh, Food Shelf, the local uh, type stuff. And uh, the event is actually 3:30 to 6, and the train actually arrives at 5 p.m. And there's going to be music as usual, and there's a bunch of us probably will be out there singing—or at least few of us. And uh—and so it—it's going to be a—going to be a great time and I hope to see everybody out there. Hopefully at uh... any precipitation we get, it's going to actually be somewhat warm yeah, on Monday. Uh, right now precipitation is saying 20 percent—it's worse on Tuesday, so maybe hopefully if it—if it does come down, it says snow and not as—as rain. But uh, so just encouraging everybody to come out and have—have a good time with that. So... **[01:32:00] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Fantastic. Councilmember Olsen. **[01:32:02] Councilmember Justin Olsen:** Thank you, Mayor. Again, I want to thank the staff for just an absolutely amazing, incredible, wonderful night last Wednesday for the Hometown Holiday Celebration. Um, I don't know who all was involved—I suspect pretty much everybody was involved. But um, I really want to compliment the level of teamwork and creativity and engagement and just focus on fun. A couple of things that stand out for me from that night: um, you know, we had Santa and Mrs. Claus and Sparkles the Elf here, as we do when we have our holiday celebration at City Hall, and they were out in the big chair uh, with a couple of reindeer as well. Um, and we had a line from the chair out to the Ravine Parkway of families and young people who wanted to have a moment to chat with Santa. We had uh, amazing food trucks here, the Park High Choir sang both inside and outside, we had fire pits, we had fire trucks, we had police vehicles, all kinds of things going on. Um, but the really cool thing is we had a ton of people. I mean, the turnout... yeah, it—it was a little chilly uh, although the Mayor, with that gorgeous head of hair, would not wear a hat! I tried to talk him into it several times. Those of us who are a little thinner on top don't have that option. **[01:33:30] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Yeah, not yet, but... um. **[01:33:34] Councilmember Justin Olsen:** Uh, the thing of it is, you know, he's Merry Christmas, so I'm sure he was just warm from the celebration and didn't really need to have any kind of protective clothing on. But um, it just was... it was such a wonderful event and I can see it becoming an annual uh, celebration for this community. So um, please accept my sincere thanks to the entire staff for all the heavy lifting that they did to put that together. We also, as a Cottage Grove Lions Club, had our annual Santa Breakfast—that was this past Sunday at the Cottage Grove VFW, where Connie and Doug always do such a good job of hosting us. And again, we had just an amazing turnout. But the good news is Santa's not done with Cottage Grove yet! He was here for the Hometown Holiday Celebration, he was here for the Santa Breakfast, and by popular demand he'll be back again this coming Sunday for another Santa Breakfast. But this time it'll be at River Oaks Golf Course and Event Center. You do have to have admission tickets to get in, so please go to the city's website or reach out to River Oaks directly and ask about the Santa Breakfast if that's something you want to attend so that you can get your tickets. I guarantee it's just going to be a really heartwarming and fun event, and I guarantee you the food will be excellent. When we cook at the VFW, the food is above average, but when Chef Isaac cooks, it's—it's a whole other element. And then the last thing is um, you know, I'm just going to mention that our friend and colleague down at the other end of the dais here, Steve Dennis, and his lodge brothers from the Masonic Lodge were out ringing the bell. Was it two weeks ago for the Salvation Army? **[01:35:15] Councilmember Steve Dennis:** A week and a half. **[01:35:17] Councilmember Justin Olsen:** Yeah, I know the days all run together for me too. But um, but you know, they were out uh, working on behalf of the Salvation Army. Our Lions Club will be out working on behalf of the uh—the Salvation Army at Hy-Vee this coming Saturday. Um, I'm not going to tell you what time I'm going to be there because I don't want people to come and throw things at me! But I will tell you that at some point I will be there ringing the bell. So please be generous this holiday season. There's a lot of people in need. We've talked through the budget conversation about some of the inflationary pressures people are feeling, and they're feeling that with their energy costs, they're feeling that at the grocery store, they're feeling that all over the place. So be generous to all the non-profits out there who are really trying to make the season as bright as possible for families who might be having a tough time right now. And one of the ways you can do that is to drop a couple of nickels into the jar when we're bell-ringing at Hy-Vee. And I'll even give you a free candy cane to thank you for your donation. With that, Mayor, I'll turn it over to you. **[01:36:20] Mayor Myron Bailey:** All right, thank you. Um, so I'll just kind of say "ditto" to everything that my Council colleagues said about the—about the holidays and all the things that we're doing. I'll uh, be with my family at the River Oaks uh, Santa Breakfast, and they love it because they do uh, sleigh rides out there too, horse-drawn. So you get to go around the golf course and that was pretty cool. Um, and then just another little plug, if you will, for the Holiday Train that Councilmember Thiede mentioned. Um, I would... it is an amazing event, and if you haven't seen the train um, it's—it's a sight to behold. And it's been a few years since it's been back here because of COVID. Um, so it's going to be an amazing time once again. And again, that's along East Point Douglas Road by the Youth Service Bureau along Highway 61. Uh, the main uh, purpose of this train—and CP Rail is great at doing this because they'll present the Friends in Need Food Shelf with a check—but we—that is a fundraiser for the Friends in Need Food Shelf. So uh, they do look uh, predominantly for cash, obviously. Um, and paper products. So uh, food is kind of an iffy thing, and—and that's changed over the years as we all know. But a lot of it has to do with expiration dates and such. But they can buy a lot more food uh, with your dollar or dollars that you provide uh, than um, if you just bought canned goods or whatever there. So if you do have paper products though—any type—you can drop them off or um, I'll call it toiletries, things like that. Uh, and uh, any cash would be greatly appreciated. There will be warming tents and—and food vendors there. Matter of fact uh, we'll also be down there too, and music and so on. So I encourage everybody to be there sometime between 3:30 and 6-ish or so. The train will arrive about five. Uh, you're welcome... Friends in Need Food Shelf? Yes, thank you. You have Friends in Need Food Shelf. So if you did want to write a check or provide funding, that's what they're doing. And I believe that their target this year—they always do kind of that target, but and then our community just flourishes and blows up in a positive way—so I think the target this year was 90,000. **[01:38:40] Councilmember Justin Olsen:** Yeah. **[01:38:41] Mayor Myron Bailey:** Um, and so uh, that's the goal uh, for them to—to raise uh, this year. Um, and then finally uh, for the Council, and I would ask that you uh, maybe join me down in front of the Council dais. We have a member of our staff who is going to be leaving us I think this Friday. Yeah, she's shaking her head. So we want to recognize somebody on our staff that's uh—uh, moving on. And uh, Christine Costello, if you want to join us up front. **[01:39:20] Mayor Myron Bailey:** So uh, for the public, I mean uh, as you can tell by the plaque here, it says uh—Christine has been with us from February 2016 uh, through this year. Uh, her final day with us will be this coming Friday. Uh, she's going to do something different uh, than what she's been doing with us. And—and frankly uh, you have done kind of a... you wore a couple hats with us while you've been here with the city of Cottage Grove: Community Development or Economic Development Director and then moved over kind of in your forte area, I would say, and that's Community Development Director. And obviously some of the staff members are here. Um, I just wanted to say for myself, and I know all the Council and the rest of the staff that's here, we really appreciate all the time that you spent with us and all the work. You're part of the reason why this city is—is where it is today and it's growing and—and people love moving here and people love living here. And so—and we love doing the job that we do because you do help make it a lot easier. So you will be missed, obviously, but uh, we do wish you much success in your future endeavors. And please just accept this small token of our appreciation today. It's just basically for the public, it is saying: we're presenting uh this to Christine Costello for her years of dedicated service to the city Cottage Grove, which as I mentioned earlier is February 2016 through December of 2022. So again, on behalf of myself, the Council, all of the staff here, and the citizens Cottage Grove, thank you for your service to our community. Let's go a round of applause please! Uh [Laughter] **[01:41:00] Christine Costello (Outgoing Community Development Director):** I just want to quickly say big thanks to the Mayor and Council for your support, always. I've enjoyed working with you in such a collaborative effort. And when I started here, I did Economic Development, which I really enjoy and actually going back to so um. But I loved helping position Cottage Grove for growth, and that was really exciting to see the community grow. So thank you very much for your support and all the opportunities that you provided during that time—my time here. So thank you, thank you. [Applause] **[01:41:45] Mayor Myron Bailey:** So there is a, you know, kind of good news, bad news thing. The good news is we have such amazing staff in the city of Cottage Grove. The bad news is: everybody wants them! So uh, just all stay here—don't—don't follow Christy! **[01:42:00] Councilmember Justin Olsen:** It bears mentioning, Mayor... as she was talking about her role in Economic Development, I don't think we can uh, give her enough credit or praise for the way she handled the COVID pandemic with our local businesses. Um, I'm going to leave something out, I'm sure I am, Christine, so please don't be offended. But um, we tried very hard to support local business, especially, you know, service industries like restaurants, bars, etc., through the COVID pandemic when there were lockdowns and things in place. And she came up with a really great grant program that she managed to help those businesses apply for Economic Development Authority, or EDA, grants through the city of Cottage Grove so that they could continue to make payroll and those sorts of things. She—she spent a ton of time on that program, literally filling out forms with several businesses—and by several I mean a lot—where, you know, the form needed to be filled out a certain way, it was very specific. And Christine was tireless in working hand-in-hand with those businesses to help them stay afloat. She did everything she could possibly do. I know she dealt with a lot of phone calls and—and emails, and I mean essentially it was a 24/7 gig for a while because everybody needed help and nobody knew how to do it because it was a new thing for us. So I just wanted to mention, Christine, that, you know, one of the things I've always admired about you is you lead with your heart. You definitely care about the people in this community, you care about your co-workers, you care about your subordinates. You know, you have done an awful lot of good for our community and—and I want you to be sure to remember that. Especially when it was really, really challenging for all of us, us... your effort to support those businesses probably kept some people from closing their doors. So again, well done, and you'll be missed. Thank you. **[01:44:00] Councilmember Steve Dennis:** Oh, Councilmember uh, Dennis. Thanks, Mayor. Well, Christine, I uh—it was funny, last week I—I walked into a little meeting because I didn't know if that was going to be the last time I'd see you, if you'd be at this meeting tonight or not. But I'm very glad that you're here with us this evening. And you know um, what Justin says is is 100 percent correct. And uh, you're somebody that I believe we're all going to miss very much. And you know, it—it's—it's not just what we accomplished, right? It's—it's the quality of the human being, and that's something that we can't replace. So thank you so much. You know, Economic Development to me is my greatest passion for the city, and so you did play a huge role in helping us to be successful. And as I've said it before, these last, you know, six, eight years um, represents the period of greatest economic development growth in the history of our city. And you can't get better than that. So thank you, thank you so much. We'll miss you. **[01:45:00] Mayor Myron Bailey:** All right, sounds good. How are you, Council? And for the public, uh, next on our agenda is a Workshop Open to the Public, which we do not have uh, any this evening. Uh, 14, we do have a Workshop which is Closed to the Public. And just for the public to be aware, that workshop is to conduct the City Administrator's performance evaluation. And so we will be going into a closed meeting pursuant to Minnesota Statute 13D.05 subsection 3a to conduct the said performance evaluation of our City Administrator, Jennifer Levitt. After we're completed with that, we will adjourn. So for the rest of the public, we'll see you in a couple weeks at our final December city council meeting. So everybody have a great evening.