This transcript features **Chair Keith Miller** (Environmental Management Commission Chair), **Hannah Dunn** (Community Development Specialist), **Commissioner Bonnie Wilson**, **Commissioner Lee Gerding**, and **Mayor Kevin Zabel**. *** **[00:00:00] Chair Keith Miller:** Yes, I'd like to call to order the July 17, 2023 meeting of the Oakdale Environmental Management Commission. And first time let's uh I'll stand for pledge of allegiance. [Pledge of Allegiance]. Thank you. So we'll have a roll call. Commissioner Gerding? **[00:00:30] Commissioner Lee Gerding:** Here. **[00:00:31] Chair Keith Miller:** Commissioner Wilson? **[00:00:32] Commissioner Bonnie Wilson:** Here. **[00:00:33] Chair Keith Miller:** And we also have present with us uh Andrew Gitzlaff and uh who is the director for our Community Development and also uh Hannah Dunn who is the new Community Development Specialist and Hannah maybe you'd like to say a few words introduce yourself. **[00:00:48] Hannah Dunn:** Um so my name is Hannah Dunn I just started about a month and a half ago I graduated from the University of Minnesota's Humphrey School of Public Affairs with a master in Environmental Policy that was about a year ago and it took me a year to find the right fit and now I'm here at the City of Oakdale and I'm excited to be here tonight and I look forward to working with you in the future. **[00:01:10] Chair Keith Miller:** Great or welcome. So the first item on our agenda is approval of our meeting minutes and we have meeting minutes from March 20th meeting and also our May 15th meeting this year. Uh are there any changes required to the meeting minutes and let's start with the March 20th—any changes that would like to be made? If not I would look for a motion to approve the March 20th meeting minutes as written. **[00:01:36] Commissioner Lee Gerding:** So moved. **[00:01:37] Chair Keith Miller:** Do I have a second? **[00:01:38] Commissioner Bonnie Wilson:** Second. **[00:01:39] Chair Keith Miller:** All in favor of approving the March 20th 2023 meeting minutes of the Oakdale Environmental Management commission say aye. **[00:01:45] Commissioners:** Aye. **[00:01:46] Chair Keith Miller:** Opposed? Meeting minutes are approved for March 20th and now the May 15th meeting minutes. Do I have any changes? Hearing none I would look for approval of the May 15 2023 meeting minutes of the Oakdale Environmental Management commission. **[00:02:00] Commissioner Bonnie Wilson:** So moved. **[00:02:01] Chair Keith Miller:** Do I have a second? **[00:02:02] Commissioner Lee Gerding:** Second. **[00:02:03] Chair Keith Miller:** All in favor of proving the May 15 2023 meeting minutes say aye. **[00:02:08] Commissioners:** Aye. **[00:02:09] Chair Keith Miller:** Opposed? Meeting minutes are approved for our May 15th meeting. All right so we'll start our meeting tonight the review of our old business and with that is a bicycle and pedestrian progress update and there was a Memo from Max Losh on this in our packet and at our last meeting we did get a chance to talk with Max about this and uh there are a number of items that we talked about in that meeting. The bike and pedestrian plan is moving along nicely and we will be getting a final review before it's all done but Hannah would you like to uh provide us with the latest update on this? **[00:02:44] Hannah Dunn:** Yes yes um Community Development Specialist Max has been working hard to bring this plan across the Finish Line. The memo provided in the packet describes the actions completed by the project team and since the Environmental Management Commission's last meeting in May the first draft of the plan text was completed and was and reviewed by staff from various departments including Community Development, Engineering, Public Works, Fire and Police. The next step in the process is to provide the EMC and City Council with the draft plan text and to allow Commissioners and City Council members to provide feedback and input. The draft text is anticipated to be presented to City Council on July 25th and also shared with EMC members at that time. **[00:03:30] Chair Keith Miller:** Great. I'm I'm happy to see the the progress continuing on this and look forward to seeing the the draft probably next month so that'll be a key point because then it uh where we'll also be going to the City Council for formal adoption after that. So um since we are the lead Commission on this we'll have that chance to review that draft and provide our comments next month so thank you for the update on that and uh I think the items that we had discussed you know in our last meeting have been addressed here and uh I think we'll see what the first draft holds for us. Any comments? **[00:04:10] Commissioner Bonnie Wilson:** No. **[00:04:11] Chair Keith Miller:** All right the next item for old business is the Washington County Recycling Grant update and as you know we have had a recycling grant for many years here from Washington County and once again we have been have received a grant and uh we look forward to doing some great things to Advance Recycling in Oakdale as part of that Grant one of the items is to decrease Reliance on single-use Plastics and um maybe you want to talk about Hannah if you would jump in and talk about we have a couple of potential Graphics that the City staff has come up with. **[00:04:44] Hannah Dunn:** So one of the projects as you know is to create reusable bags that we can give away at community events such as the farmer's market and you know City staff have been progressing towards making those bags a reality and one of the big steps in doing so is is deciding on the bag Graphics. In the packet you'll find two different designs they both utilize the same recycling logo but have two different slogans these are just two options that we've come up with and can continue to brainstorm and explore other slogans if the commission would like us to do that. In terms of the bag colors we haven't really begun to decide or explore that that really depends on what vendor we go with in the specific bag but Oakdale's colors will be utilized whether that's with the font or or the bag color. So is there any initial feedback from the commission on on the logo, the slogan, the text at the bottom, the overall graph layout—is that the universal sign for recycling? **[00:05:44] Commissioner Bonnie Wilson:** Yes. Well personally I like the way "plastic free is the way to be" sounds; it's a little more melodious. The "ditch plastic switch to reusable" sounds a little forceful I'd offer something as a hybrid like ditch and switch. Anyway overall I think it looks really good. What would um what would the best method be for us to communicate any other feedback on this? By email? **[00:06:12] Hannah Dunn:** Email's fine yeah. **[00:06:13] Commissioner Bonnie Wilson:** Do you want it by a certain time? **[00:06:15] Hannah Dunn:** Um probably by the end of probably by July 28th so that we can—so it's about two weeks from now. **[00:06:21] Commissioner Bonnie Wilson:** Thank you yeah. **[00:06:22] Chair Keith Miller:** I tend to like the the first one better but I can think about this a little more give some comments back um and that it's uh the first one's more I think a positive message uh rather than a negative uh on ditching Plastics but um yeah. What are the bags gonna be made of? Um if they're not going to be canvas because that's the but they're not going to be plastic. **[00:06:48] Hannah Dunn:** Um canvas is more expensive so looking at the at the vendor quotes I can't remember the material type but um it won't be canvas and it won't be plastic. **[00:06:58] Commissioner Bonnie Wilson:** And then in terms of the grant um language I can't quite recall—is there an amount that we committed to distributing in terms of data or metrics or anything? **[00:07:07] Andrew Gitzlaff:** No no we have not committed to a certain number of bags to go out. We'll determine a price point and and figure out a good number of bags to get because I assume they'll be quite popular when we bring them to the farmer's market so we don't want to sell out—not selling them but you know don't want them to go too quickly. **[00:07:28] Chair Keith Miller:** All right well well if we have any further comments I think the mock-up of one I like the layout uh looks nice and we can maybe think a little more about the slogan we want on there but I think that looks good. All right well our next item on the agenda is the EMC recruitment. So our commission has been operating with just four people for the year so far and now with uh the resignation or non-renewing their um term on the commission we're down to three people and it's really difficult to conduct business and Advance these goals with just three people on the commission and so we need to look at new ways to possibly to well to get a full commission. We full commission is seven we have seven seats on our commission and four of them are currently vacant and so uh this opportunity for the commission and City staff to uh talk about different opportunities we would have for getting the word out to people and get some strategy going on how we can get this commission up to a full membership so I'll let you run through uh this. I think this was is really good in looking at different methods and also looking at what other cities are have as far as commissions as well. **[00:08:44] Hannah Dunn:** Yes so because of decline in membership appointment on the EMC and other City advisory committees City staff felt it important to look into recruitment strategies best practices and potential solutions and present this information at the EMC meeting as described in the memo. Past strategies for recruitment have included social media, mailers, video promotion, event tabling, and electronic sign advertising. These strategies fall under what is known as a broad-based recruitment strategy so getting the message out to as many people as possible um and in the memo I mentioned other strategies for recruitment including a targeted strategy where you seek out individuals with specific skills and and try to recruit them to the commission or there's what was called a concentric circle recruitment strategy which is leveraging the networks that the commission members and City Council members have and spreading the word about EMC vacant positions um and in the memo there's also uh the summary table of what other cities and commissions are doing so that we can better understand how Oakdale compares and if there's potential changes that we could consider and maybe making the EMC more attractive to potential members so information regarding you know whether the commission is made up of only residents or residents and non-residents, the number of members, the meeting frequency, meeting location, whether the meetings are televised or streamed—these were all listed in the table. Considering all this information staff have identified ideas for consideration input um so we'd like to gather feedback regarding those ideas to increase member participation and recruitment include asking current City Council and commission members to identify potential individuals to recruit; allowing non-resident business owners and representatives to join the EMC; reducing the number of meetings maybe quarterly thus reducing the time commitment; identifying existing City neighborhood groups and reaching out to them—those are made up of people who are committed to serving the community and might be interested in coming to the EMC; um combining the EMC with another commission to increase both membership and broaden the work plan of the EMC and then identifying additional platforms aside from Facebook and Oakdale Update to get the information out um so I'd like to reiterate that these are just ideas and acting in any of these would require City Council direction so with that are there are there any ideas that the commission is drawn to or or dislikes and why and are there maybe other strategies that you've thought of that could be added to this list and further explored? **[00:11:35] Chair Keith Miller:** Well thank you Hannah for that and uh you know the recent strategies are have been more just broad-based strategies and have not been successful so I would look to really going to the what call to the concentric circle and uh you know since we only have three members I think it would be good to get other people um also involved in helping to reach out to individuals that may have the skills that we're looking for on the commission and uh and I think that uh you know we have found commission members that way in the past. Uh I know successfully besides those just um we've had some come in from a broad-based approach as well and and some people knew residents that have moved in and maybe they were on a commission in their city in the past and so um I think we should definitely try to reach out to people we think have the skills to be on the commission um the other thing here is that mentions that business owners who own a business in Oakdale are currently not allowed to be on the commission you have to be a resident. See St Louis Park has non-residents allowed and there may be another benefit to having business involved is that when we've looked at things like Recycling and reducing water consumption and that or even solar energy that we've wanted to reach out to the businesses in Oakdale and haven't had real a lot of success and maybe of having a business owner on the commission it would give us more access in their thinking on how to connect with other business owners so I think that might be another benefit. But the question is um what would we need to change as far as our bylaws and that to make that happen where we could have non-resident but business owners in Oakdale? And the other thing is the we had talked in the past about having student members and I think that's something we still want to pursue but probably not until school's back in session this fall but uh I think that's something we um we have had a approval of doing that from the City Council in the past so it's just something we need to search for students that would be interested so yeah. National Honor Society students are requested to do a certain amount of volunteer work to keep in the Honor Society so that might be one group you could reach out to both at Tartan and North. **[00:13:58] Commissioner Bonnie Wilson:** Yep absolutely. Historically and I can't quite recall the way the bylaws read but do from a high school voice and lens perspective do they have both voice and vote? **[00:14:10] Chair Keith Miller:** No they don't have a vote. **[00:14:12] Commissioner Bonnie Wilson:** Okay. Question about the social media piece and I'm going to echo um Chair Miller's remarks this is fantastic to have such a baseline. We've never really had like a "state of the state" before so thank you. You talk a lot a little bit about the memo says in terms of like the terms of like "likes"—the two posts what were what was like kind of looking unpacking the engagement numbers behind them? What are we doing with the people that actually like us and or share—is there any kind of follow-up strategy with those people? **[00:14:48] Hannah Dunn:** Not to my knowledge but that's something we can certainly explore. **[00:14:52] Commissioner Bonnie Wilson:** Yeah those are pretty warm leads I would imagine. **[00:14:55] Chair Keith Miller:** So could we see a copy of the um thing that you handed out at the Summerfest? **[00:15:01] Hannah Dunn:** Oh yes the one pager. I don't have it on me but I can certainly send that via email if that's something you're interested in. It was it was pretty basic um you know I had lots of colors you know to catch the eye and it just um but it explains what the commission—explained what the commission does, who can be on the commission um you know kind of some catchy things like "help your community" and "give back" stuff like that and then it had a really easy QR code that they could just you know use their phone camera to go to the application so that kind of I think I could use some of those. Definitely got lots of copies. **[00:15:43] Commissioner Bonnie Wilson:** We talk also about like the the natural extension of our work plan and our work and I just think of like Oakdale has so many amazing like residential awards for you know ecological or environmental investments and same thing for businesses and um are we are we engaging with those either award finalists or award recipients differently in a way to do a soft ask for this kind of you know engagement? Uh there's the survey groups from bike and ped which also extends into the high school demographics there's the Business Association um because everybody knows something and um in my work it's the best way of getting involved is through a personal ask right a one-on-one. And so as I think of all the ways that people do engage with us in a more intimate non-to-the-masses setting non-mass marketing setting I think of what are the natural intersections of people in our community and how are they I don't know getting folded into our work and those those associations or volunteer groups could be a great way to—and I know we already have a we have a volunteer had maybe a volunteer coordinator at Oakdale a year ago... okay only with Rec? Okay. Nope that's a that's a great idea and something that I think would be really yeah good to leverage even when I went to pick up the our little new elm tree at the tree giveaway this year I noticed like the U of M was here and all of our other partners beyond the tree board to make the Arbor Day Giveaway happen there's a whole other like second degree third degree connection to Oakdale that we might not yet be tapping. **[00:17:35] Chair Keith Miller:** Yeah and the landscape alternative event might have been a way to talk to people one to one. **[00:17:41] Commissioner Bonnie Wilson:** Yep absolutely. **[00:17:43] Chair Keith Miller:** Well personally I can think of a couple of people in my neighborhood that uh one person who served on the commission in the past—he hasn't been on the commission for a number of years now but um can see if he's in a different place now as far as I think he may have retired so now so maybe he has more time to be on the commission so um yeah. And I think that um as we recruit people I know in the past we've had I think there were four people on the commission from my neighborhood at one point and so that is something you know it can be a good thing but we don't want to load up on just you know one group of people and also to if we can uh think of diversity and having some diversity I think that also helps the strength of our commission. So I think if we could all reach out to some people that we think would be good that would be one step that we as Commissioners can can take before our next meeting and see what for sure and come up with some candidates there and then the other things we talked about that's why I'd really like that handout. I will get this time and I guess you know in talking to people people always ask well how much what's the time commitment for this? And uh you know I I think you know we have monthly meetings but we do not have a meeting in December uh because of the holidays; generally we also don't have one meeting in the summer due to vacations and things; it's usually one meeting is lost there um so 10 meetings a year I don't think is unreasonable and usually you know they're only an hour and a half long at most and the preparation generally um is is not extensive. So you know I think that uh it's not—I don't think we need to reduce the meeting frequency is as what I'm saying I guess. I think it's really I think good to keep things updated and moving things along with a monthly meeting and I see that all of the other cities have monthly meetings here too very very similar. **[00:19:42] Commissioner Bonnie Wilson:** Chair may I ask one other question? Um thank you. So in the on the second page of the memo um I mean the the whole thing is "concentric circles" and so that's something I I get intimately. You had opened up the—the memo opens up the question of while those are probably the best methods for volunteer recruitment it'll take greater commitment from staff. Can you share more about what you mean by that because we're all partners in this work? **[00:20:13] Hannah Dunn:** Sure sure. Well it just you know it's you know extra phone calls or you know it's just really easy to put together a Facebook post that then just goes out um so then you know if we're if we're using the targeted concentric circle strategies I just I had envisioned that it might take a little bit more of a commitment you know you have to think more on your your own time about who might be to individuals to target and the skills that we want and then if you bring those to me then I you know reach out or you've probably already reached out. So um I don't envision it being that much more of a time commitment but I think um it would lead to a bit more of a dedication to the you know Continuum you know consistent recruitment. **[00:21:03] Commissioner Bonnie Wilson:** Okay thanks. **[00:21:04] Chair Keith Miller:** All right well um I think we'll try the recruitment strategy as much as we can and uh because I think that's one thing we haven't done a lot of really in the past. So now I think is the time so let's uh let's move this forward with uh continuing the you know the various broad-based approaches we're using because I think we can pick up people as they move into Oakdale that way uh and also I think you know that's that is a good strategy as well but I think the concentric circle recruitment is something we can pursue more vigorously. All right so uh the other new business item we have this evening is the fleet electrification and we have a report on the City of Oakdale Fleet or actually a presentation here so I'll let you go ahead with that. **[00:21:55] Hannah Dunn:** Perfect thank you. So this evening I'm going to present some of the preliminary high level findings from the electric vehicle Fleet assessment that was conducted by Sawatch Labs. [Detailed presentation regarding Fleet electrification findings]. **[00:33:55] Chair Keith Miller:** Thank you. Well um had a couple questions here as you went through. Well one comment as well as that uh I think another benefit besides the environmental health and financial is uh the City setting a good example for residents by going to electric vehicles and makes it more mainstream for people to consider that as a choice knowing that the city has probably done their homework to evaluated it and you know and as I look through the some of the details of the report uh it looked like the Chevy Chevrolet Equinox was recommended for quite a few vehicles and that's coming on the 2024 model and I know I've been looking forward to taking a look at that when it comes out and so it made me think wow they're recommending that so maybe I I really do need to take a good look at it. I think there's that part of it and I'm wondering about hours idled um and uh you know there's a reason with the internal combustion engine for like certain vehicles to remain idling and I realize there probably is in the winter for vehicles to remain idling as well but I'm wondering if that's something that um well could there be a change with electric vehicles that they wouldn't need to idle because it's pretty much instant on and I don't know just a question I had. **[00:35:16] Hannah Dunn:** Yeah I don't have the answer but I can certainly look into you know more information about idling and and you know initiate conversations with the other departments about the reasons and and you know if there's room to explore something else if we get you know an EV to replace one of their fleet vehicles with. **[00:35:36] Chair Keith Miller:** Yeah and I know with some electric vehicles in the the winter you can have the heat on without have you know have other equipment in there so you either use less energy so you're not needing to charge as much. Um I think those were the main questions I had. If there are other questions please go ahead commissioners. **[00:35:54] Commissioner Bonnie Wilson:** You know just just to comment then a question um so the it would be interesting to see—you said the opportunity to reassess within a 12-month period it would be interesting to see what winter would do to any of these numbers. I think that might be kind of what you're speaking to but just as a as a comment as an aside. Um and then on what page—this is I'm sorry 30 something on the recommended replacement—the suitability assessment the first page the I don't know where it was but when we recommended the Silverado the EV work truck is that is it EV work truck because she's also said—I said how many out of the PD 13 out of the 14? Wow. Is that like a CSO truck or what function does that serve? **[00:36:44] Hannah Dunn:** The one that didn't wasn't selected for EV replacement was a Transit uh van. **[00:36:49] Commissioner Bonnie Wilson:** I think that would be the CSO? **[00:36:51] Andrew Gitzlaff:** The CSO okay. **[00:36:53] Commissioner Bonnie Wilson:** I'm wondering whether um hybrid vehicles should ever factor into this thought process? **[00:36:59] Hannah Dunn:** Absolutely and in the Sawatch Labs dashboard there are when you can switch what car you're looking at there's battery electric vehicles and plug-in hybrid so that could be explored more. **[00:37:11] Chair Keith Miller:** Do we have to have a password or something to get into that? **[00:37:15] Hannah Dunn:** I think for now just City staff has access to that and I I think that will remain that way that um we'll just you know only a few of us and Andy, Max and I have logins to that dashboard. **[00:37:30] Chair Keith Miller:** I guess one question I with the—I would be if the city would consider leasing versus purchase and look at that option as La Crescent to lower the upfront costs because I think that's you know looking at budgets that might be able to um get more of these vehicles leased as a option versus purchasing and uh and I'm also to spread out the cost or a period of time and it would also potentially um you know resolve the question of Technology changing and that after a three-year lease period you know you could rather than purchase it at the end you could maybe purchase the the next or at least the next model that has come out that maybe had more benefits. **[00:38:15] Commissioner Bonnie Wilson:** Question—did La Crescent say anything more about staff buy-in in terms of a potential barrier or what that felt like? **[00:38:23] Hannah Dunn:** No they uh the La Crescent staff member presented in at the the Great Plains Institute EV Smart um you know it's a little cohort and we meet monthly and he presented on it and he didn't elaborate too much just that it was a barrier but didn't provide any advice for how to overcome that barrier. But you know I've got his contact information—that's certainly something I can I can reach out to him and and have more of a one-on-one conversation about that. **[00:38:53] Commissioner Bonnie Wilson:** Yeah I just I just feel that with at least with Oakdale what we've heard is that there's been so many cross-functional conversations at least getting to this point with the study right? It sounds like there's been a lot of inner department collaboration so I think you know maybe that's not something that they had—La Crescent had so. **[00:39:13] Chair Keith Miller:** Yeah I guess one other thing was uh in the key takeaways one was uh closer look into the potential charging infrastructure locations and I know if we could identify some there currently are incentives to install those through different programs and so it would be nice to identify locations you know as soon as possible if we could through this program some then we could enter some of those programs or enter a program to to uh you know do it at a lower cost for the city. And oh I think that's a question related to that with the vehicles: did they um when they factored in the total cost of operation and the total cost of the vehicle did that include the and had the current incentives for like the Chevrolet and and that? **[00:40:02] Hannah Dunn:** Not to my knowledge but that is a question I can ask Sawatch Labs to confirm. **[00:40:15] Chair Keith Miller:** Okay but to my to my knowledge no? Okay that's possible like savings could even be greater. Thank you. In the next steps I think all look look good for moving forward with this um you know looking at options purchase options as part of the Capital Improvement plan and then perhaps considering a pilot program to get some experience and some I guess comfort with uh with this approach for the city and uh and then also to uh you know I think I like the considering the charging infrastructure types and locations as part of this and of course the grant opportunities—I know there's a lot out for both charging stations and for vehicles so um yeah. That looks good and I think you know the technical assistance programs—I think since we're working with uh Great Plains Institute on EV Smart that uh they're a great help for getting technical assistance and if they don't have it they can recommend others that do so I really like that that we're in that program. Any other questions or feedback on this? Well I'm really happy to get the the results of this and can I think with this report and that and uh steps to move this forward the next steps uh we're getting closer to having some fleet electrification here so that's great. So I think that's the end of the business section of our our meeting this evening um and we have our review of the monthly um editorial calendar our Communications program where we identify Communications opportunities in certain areas and uh so we'll move on to that editorial calendar and do we have that here? **[00:41:59] Hannah Dunn:** Yes um so just to recap the social media Communications that have gone out since the last meeting in May. There have been four Facebook posts promoting environmental initiatives since I started at the end of May. On June 4th there was a post about renewable energy opportunities such as Excel Energy Solar Rewards program. On June 28th there was a post promoting the giveaway of compost pails at the farmers market so I was out there at the whole farmer's market and it was quite a successful day. I think about 30 people took compost pails and a few of them mentioned seeing the Facebook posts and that's what prompted them to come out. On July 6th there was a post about residents submitting pictures of themselves biking and walking so this is in support of the bike and ped plan just to make it a little bit more personal to Oakdale and and have pictures of actual residents on on the trails. And then lastly it was yesterday—there was a post regarding plastic bag and film recycling locations in Oakdale and where you can bring your plastic bags and other plastic films to recycle. So that was something that went out yesterday and you know in support of Plastic Free July and then in August we've got um water conservation slated to to be promoted um so I will um continue to work with Sarah and Communications for getting some posts about water conservation. I know on the editorial calendar we had identified maybe coordinating a guest presentation for the August meeting so we'll see if maybe in the next week I can contact someone so that they have enough time to maybe get that on their calendar and we can see if we can have someone from a Water Conservation District or a water management organization come in and give a little educational presentation about water conservation. **[00:43:52] Chair Keith Miller:** That would be great if you could reach out to the Watershed District—I think the Ramsey-Washington County Watershed District we've had them in in the past—well we've had all three at different times but uh they cover most of Oakdale the largest part so maybe that would be a good one to bring in but all three any of the three would be acceptable. Any comments on the editorial calendar? **[00:44:17] Commissioner Lee Gerding:** No. Are we going to get another little printout like we had it? **[00:44:21] Hannah Dunn:** Yes I can do that yes. **[00:44:23] Chair Keith Miller:** All right well let's move along to the Commissioner updates. Are there any uh Commissioner updates uh you'd like to talk about? **[00:44:31] Commissioner Bonnie Wilson:** For me I went in—boy what month was that Lee, May?—I went to the commission conference at Ridgedale and it was a huge it was bigger I think than the previous year I went and I would say we even extended the footprint to Hastings and Saint Cloud came down to do a lovely presentation on solar energy and water; it was really comprehensive. So it was it was great—it's always great to network and I had a follow-up conversation with John from Conservation Minnesota because apparently I said something about all the great things and that we're doing in Oakdale and he's like "I want to learn more." So he learned more but it was fun to network and and people are people are watching what we're doing. I will say this across the County area um I think it's rare for other commissions with staff support to have a work plan that's aligned with a comp plan that's aligned with a bunch of other things that we're doing. So people are like "How did you do that?" They're like "Well staff!" But um anyway it was it was great to go and great to meet new people and hear all the the musings about the challenges of single-use bags in Edina for instance or things like that so it was fun. Great it's my big update. And we planted our tree. **[00:45:51] Chair Keith Miller:** Well thank you for attending that—that's great. **[00:45:54] Commissioner Bonnie Wilson:** I'd just like to mention that the Age-Friendly Oakdale has moved forward with their plan to study transportation and so there's two community conversations occurring this month: July 24th at the Discovery Center at 1:30 and July 26th at 2 PM at the Peaceful Lodge down in Hudson Road which overlooks the new Gold Line area. Both of these conversations will be led by our consultant Biko and Associates and so these will be an hour-long community conversations to explore what people really want in the way of local transportation—specifically how to get around Oakdale and how to connect to the Gold Line and how to stay at home and not have to go into a residence and they want to stay at home. So this will be a way to connect them to other things so we're doing these community conversations and we're really hoping that people come. We're giving out $10 gift cards as an incentive and we're providing treats but most importantly it will um really help with Oakdale's actually their 2040 plan Goal 5 includes "further analyze Transit service needs for Transit dependent based upon the 2017 Transit need study." In other words this activity which is organized by Age-Friendly Oakdale is right within the 2040 plan. So if you have any idea that you might want to go there's a poster. **[00:47:20] Chair Keith Miller:** All right well and now we have our Council Liaison update and we have the pleasure of having our Mayor, Mayor Zabel. **[00:47:28] Mayor Kevin Zabel:** Well thank you Commissioners—happy to be here. Um it has been a very busy summer thus far around town so everything from you know Summerfest and street projects and the City events, the farmers markets all that stuff our Movie in the Park series and Concert in the Park series are taking place this week and then everything we see with development so there's a lot happening around town. We know some of it is not always convenient for our residents especially those street projects so we are grateful for the patience we get from everybody but you know the work continues—it needs to be done and and they're making good progress on it. That's the that's the one blessing we get from the dry weather is projects like that stay on schedule. So if if it has to be dry we we at least get something out of it. Um the 2024 budget work is continuing. We are getting closer by the day to our September deadline for setting the preliminary levy so um the City Council has been working a lot with City staff on reviewing um the 2024 budget. Um early conversations about those budget changes for next year really focus on you know inflationary changes just those increased cost drivers that every city and business and family are facing as well as some personnel additions primarily in Public Safety. So those will be some of the bigger changes we're looking at for 2024 but the work continues and um you know we have to we have to give a lot of credit to our City staff for all of their hard work and pulling all that information together. So with that I'm happy to answer any questions you may have for me. I see you thinking Bonnie what are you thinking? **[00:49:15] Commissioner Bonnie Wilson:** 50 Plus by hosting a line dancing event at the uh right over here in the park and it was very successful so we appreciate um we Oakdale seniors appreciate your support. **[00:49:29] Mayor Kevin Zabel:** Absolutely. You know those those types of events are a great great way to engage with you know different pockets of our resident base so um even the ones you mentioned about Age-Friendly if you can get the information over to me I'll help promote it as well and you know it never hurts to get it out to as many people as possible. So those are good events. **[00:49:50] Chair Keith Miller:** All right thanks everybody thank you. All right we're at the end of our meeting here and I'd like to mention that our next regular Environmental Management Commission meeting will be held on August 21st at 7 PM in these Council Chambers. So um unless you have anything to add Commissioners I'd look for a motion to adjourn our meeting. **[00:50:11] Commissioner Lee Gerding:** So moved. **[00:50:12] Chair Keith Miller:** Do I have a second? **[00:50:13] Commissioner Bonnie Wilson:** Second. **[00:50:14] Chair Keith Miller:** All in favor of adjourning our July 17 2023 meeting of the Oakdale Environmental Management Commission say aye. **[00:50:19] Commissioners:** Aye. **[00:50:20] Chair Keith Miller:** Opposed? Meeting is adjourned thank you.