This transcript appears to be a meeting of the **Oakdale Parks and Recreation Commission**. Based on the context provided and the dialogue within the meeting, here is the attributed transcript. **Key Identifiers used:** * **Chair Steve:** Addressed as "Steve" by Jan; manages the agenda. * **Julie Williams:** Recreation Superintendent (addressed as Julia/Julie). * **Jeff Koesling:** Parks Superintendent (addressed as Jeff). * **Andy Morcomb:** City Council Member (the council liaison present). * **Commissioner Jan / Glenn / Mark:** Members of the commission identified by first names in the dialogue. *** **[0:00] Chair Steve:** Good evening and welcome to the Oakdale Parks and Recreation Commission meeting of September 19, 2023. Please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance. **[0:08] Group:** 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. **[0:18] Chair Steve:** Thank you. All right, roll call. Just Glenn Birth is gone at this time, everyone else is here. Councilman [Morcomb], thanks for coming. Let's get right onto the approval of minutes. Everybody get a chance to look at last month's? Questions, concerns? Can I get a motion? **[0:36] Commissioner Mark:** Motion. **[0:37] Commissioner Jan:** Second. **[0:38] Chair Steve:** Mark second, all in favor? Aye. Those no? Minutes are approved, thank you. Next, we have the old business. Julie, would you like to go through the commission work plan draft? **[0:50] Julie Williams:** Yeah, thanks Chair. So I did, based on our workshop last month, I put together everything we did discuss and this is what I've come up with as far as a draft plan for us for the work plan. So I'm just looking for any thoughts on this, anything you'd like to see added or anything you didn't like. **[1:10] Chair Steve:** I think that's exactly how we went through it and I don't see right now anything that I could add. No, but I think it really is a step in the right direction. **[1:19] Julie Williams:** Sure, yeah. Okay. Well, in the meantime then, between now and our next meeting, if you come up with anything, certainly call me or email me and we can add this to the work plan and we'll get that on the agenda next month again. Sound okay? **[1:33] Chair Steve:** Yeah. Was there anything you or Jeff thought we should ask? **[1:36] Jeff Koesling:** Nope, looks good. **[1:38] Julie Williams:** Yeah, okay. **[1:39] Chair Steve:** All right, we're all good. Perfect. All right, let me go with that. Let's hop into new business. New Commissioners update—where are the Commissioners? **[1:50] Julie Williams:** All right, yes! Hopefully they're coming. So we've got three of them on the agenda for the Council workshop on the 26th. They will be interviewed and hopefully we will have two in place by the next meeting or the following. So we're getting there. **[2:07] Chair Steve:** So on two or three is what you're looking at? **[2:10] Julie Williams:** We're interviewing three, we have two openings. **[2:12] Chair Steve:** Okay. Is there any other new business? Okay. All right, let's go to Jeff. What do you got? **[2:20] Jeff Koesling:** Oh yeah, good evening. Just fall sports are still—the season's moving along. The weather's been great, cooperative. We haven't had very minimal closures as far as rain, which we can use. So that's good. And then we'll be starting shortly, probably within the next week, we're going to start—we won't do the athletic field areas—but we'll start aerating and overseeding some areas. Once the soccer wraps up, then we'll start on the athletic field areas and pulling some plugs and doing some more overseeding. And then also the crews will start within the next week or two—hate to say it—but we'll start winterizing irrigation systems and buildings. So it's coming. I hope it's far away, but we got to be ready for it. So yeah, we're just plugging away. Today they—I didn't have a crew—they were all out doing salt training for plowing. So what does that tell you? Oh no! So it's here. I mean, it's went by already. **[3:25] Chair Steve:** Was it at the stuff out at the Fairgrounds? **[3:28] Jeff Koesling:** No, it was down in Cottage Grove today. So... **[3:31] Chair Steve:** I saw that off in Como too. **[3:32] Jeff Koesling:** Yeah, yeah. So they have to go through it. They're on the equipment and they require it. But it's like, already? It's only September and it's 80 degrees out again. Other than that, if you guys have any questions, that's all really I have. I don't have a whole lot. **[3:49] Commissioner Mark:** The athletics at the fields—any confrontations? **[3:53] Jeff Koesling:** I haven't heard of any. You know, so that's been good because they had their permits. But whatever, that's what I was afraid we were going to run into. We did last year in a couple places. I don't know, Mark, maybe you could... if you have any that you know about? **[4:08] Commissioner Mark:** I don't. Yeah, I mean besides Skyview being on our permit and not being able to use it, it is what it is. And just a few disgruntled coaches. **[4:17] Jeff Koesling:** Well, when you say permit now, is that their ball fields? Because we don't have control over all their athletic field area. I have to look at the [permit]. I don't know if it's just ball fields. **[4:29] Commissioner Mark:** I think it's just ball fields probably. I don't think it's their entire athletic field area. We don't own that, they own it. **[4:35] Jeff Koesling:** So I was just told that they were using the area we needed, it was going to be utilized for their sports team. So I can't override the District, it's not our property. But if things change, I'd be more than happy to help. **[4:50] Chair Steve:** All right. Any other questions for Jeff? Thanks, Jeff. Appreciate it. **[4:54] Jeff Koesling:** Thank you. **[4:55] Julie Williams:** Thanks, Commissioner. So I do have a couple updates on a few events that we had in September. Touch a Truck recap: it was held last Tuesday. We had vehicles from Public Works, Fire, Police Department, and a variety of others. We also provided free ice cream—we do that every year—and the Oakdale Lions Club provided concessions. Thanks to Glenn (he's not here tonight) but the Lions... I know they had a good night selling concessions. I think they ran out of hot dogs once again, which is great. I think they went through 300, he said. **[5:32] Chair Steve:** Yeah, so impressive. **[5:34] Julie Williams:** And then again, thanks to Public Works, Jeff, Fire, Police Department. They always make this a really great community event and you could see that with the great turnout that we had. It was nice, then it got a little misty and I think we just missed the storm, so we lucked out on that. **[5:50] Jeff Koesling:** I'll just echo on Julie, it's a great event she puts on. She does a great job organizing it and it's cool to see the kids. **[5:58] Julie Williams:** Absolutely. And it seemed—I had several people tell us it seemed bigger this year. **[6:04] Chair Steve:** So many [people]! **[6:05] Julie Williams:** Yeah, we did have a few more vehicles. It was cool. **[6:08] Chair Steve:** Yeah, the weather was perfect with the little mist we had. It was still a perfect night for it. **[6:12] Julie Williams:** So yeah, it's nice to see the community come out and celebrate. The [Farmer's Market] is slowly winding down, we've only got four markets left, so we're getting down there. We've got the fall products coming in for the season. Our Market Coordinator, Nathan Timmons, he'll start transitioning to the indoor market season and that will begin on November 11th at the Discovery Center. So that'll be here soon. Another big event we just did: the Family Fun-flatables. That was this past Saturday at Walton and that was from 11:00 to 4:00. Another great turnout and the weather really was perfect that day. We had a total of 12 inflatables, six sponsors, and the Tartan Boosters provided concessions. I know they ran out of all of their concessions as well, so it was really good turnout. And then a thank you to our sponsors: the Gold sponsor was Oakdale Athletic Association; the American Legion Post 39; Silver was New Horizon Academy; and Bronze was Marcus Theaters, North Star Skate School, East Metro Stars Hockey, and Parkview Chiropractic. So thanks again for our sponsors with that event. And we've got Oakdale Wellness (and Jan may speak to this) but we've got an event coming up: the flu clinic. That is with Walgreens and they're hosting the flu clinic at the Discovery Center. That is on Saturday, September 30th from 11:00 to 2:00. No registration is necessary, you can just show up and participate at that event. Then our Oakdale Update: the fall/winter Oakdale Update is now available online and it is expected to arrive in mailboxes this week. So it's a little earlier than what we anticipated, which is great news. And then our Discovery Center beehive, which won the Blue Ribbon at the Washington County Fair and three Minnesota State Fair ribbons! Congrats to our beekeepers Kieran and Dwayne Boyce. **[8:17] Chair Steve:** Nice job for them. Very cool. **[8:19] Julie Williams:** Yeah, they were really excited about that. It's nice to see. **[8:23] Commissioner Jan:** Ever get a chance to taste it? **[8:25] Julie Williams:** I didn't taste that, but there were some that did at our bee extraction event. And then lastly, we've got our MEA Amped Up Entertainment and that'll be coming in October. We're doing a special fall edition of that event and that'll be Thursday, October 19th from 10:00 to 11:00. That's during the MEA break. Again, we've got the Rad Zoo coming, bringing their radical reptile adventure program. They've got snakes and lizards, turtles, and an alligator. We haven't done them before, so that'll be exciting to see. **[8:57] Chair Steve:** Something going that week, definitely. **[8:59] Julie Williams:** Absolutely. So that is all I have. I'll stand for any questions if anybody's got anything. **[9:05] Chair Steve:** Any comments? I just have a comment on that Family Fun-flatables. It was pretty cool. A lady walks up and she comes up to [us] and asks, "Is this free?" Yeah, it's free. She’s like "Really?" She yells over to her house, "Hey!" and that's great. I think people should know that it's free when we do this. It's good to do that, that's wonderful. And you did do a great job, excellent job. **[9:30] Julie Williams:** Thank you. **[9:32] Chair Steve:** Any questions for Julie? All right, thank you. Commissioners' comments. I'll start. We did go on a couple of park tours since last time. Saturday, August 19th, we went to Golfview, Furlong, Northdale, the Bark Park in Oakdale. At Golfview, we had some very nice families that showed up—great input and we appreciate that. We hope more of this happens, whether when we're out and about or if you just want to email any of us to let us know what's going on. We're not going to get specifics on these now; we sent them into the staff and we'll work on them. There's just things we can do to improve on some of the parks—some maintenance stuff—but that is continually done. Of course, they're going to say that and that's fine, but that's what we need to hear. We did see some spots that we could possibly have for t-ball and OAA and other youth things that could be multi-use in these parks. Especially with Golfview, I think when we come to deciding which parks we want to work on, that one's going to be moved up in our aspect because we found out that there's a lot of younger families out there and they want to use it, but it's not for every age. I think that's something we can look at and do with minimal funding maybe. We looked at Northdale, and while I'm on Northdale, there's a couple other parks that we actually would like to know in the long run: what are we going to do with them? Are they sustainable? Are they going to be used? We ran into a Tot Lot this last Saturday and Glenn and Jan talked to a neighbor. She's right next to this lot and she doesn't even use it, and she has little kids. This is Tilly? **[11:34] Commissioner Jan:** Tilly, yeah. **[11:35] Chair Steve:** So on that one, we need to upgrade that swing if we can, but is that going to change anything? So there's certain things: do we put the money into it or do we figure out something else to do with it? This is something we have to look into on some of these parks. Are they going to be used if we do throw money and try to improve it? If they're not, then we should take the funding and work on other parks. As we move on, I think we'd like to pinpoint which parks those are and have a really good discussion and see how we move forward. Overall—and I have one more thing I like to say—overall they are in really good shape, honestly. You know, we have so many parks here and we have limited people to take care of these parks. So that's something that needs to be addressed. These are just comments from us as members of this commission and as residents of this city. There was a Guthrie Park—that was another one we had comments on. Oh, the grass on all these parks is just really good, but we went to this one and it looked not as good, I will just say that way. And maybe the Councilman can talk about that a little bit when we get there. But other than that, I'm going to put a plug-in for the Parks and Rec. Jeff and Julie, they're doing a great job, but I think more funding overall for Parks and Rec would be great. Those are my comments. Thank you. Jan? **[13:10] Commissioner Jan:** Yeah, I was just going to say thank you, Steve, for organizing the park tours. I thought it was really beneficial because we as the commissioners really get hands-on knowledge of what's going on at these parks—what really needs done, what could maybe wait. It's just really good to have Julie and Andy at those too, and you know, have the neighbors come out and talk to us. It just makes us a community that really is there for the kids and adults using those parks. **[13:42] Chair Steve:** Great, thank you. Glenn? **[13:44] Commissioner Glenn:** I echo what Jan has said. You know, it always kind of amazed me for the size of a city this is, we have a really large number of parks. And so kudos to you guys to try to maintain all of these. It's a daunting task, especially when you don't have necessarily the personnel or the money to be able to do the things you'd like to do. One of the things that we've discussed among the commission here is that maybe to try to help a little bit is when we have new commissioners on board, we start to look at each commissioner taking a little bit of responsibility for specific parks—pretty much what we've done this last couple of times. We would choose parks to go look at a little bit more frequently. When we have new commissioners on board, we'll see how we can maybe parcel that out and just be able to help with Jeff's job and your job. If we see some things that maybe need to be addressed on a timely basis, at least we can alert you. Hey, we saw this here or that there, or "Hey this is working great." In fact, we were talking about even at Guthrie, the grass might not have been so good but the baskets were really nice. Anyway, just things like that where we can maybe help with awareness of what might be happening. It's something we look forward to doing here in the future. **[15:15] Chair Steve:** Thanks, Glenn. Mark? **[15:17] Commissioner Mark:** I just wanted to again say thank you to Jeff and his staff. Especially like for Touch a Truck; I know that's a longer day for you guys, bringing all the equipment up and then bringing it all back. It's fun to be there. I know Julie does a great job, and you know, Julie coming with us on the park tours and then working the inflatables and the Touch a Truck—it's all extra work for you guys and we appreciate that. I'm old, we never had that when I was little, so it's cool to see that the kids have that now. **[15:47] Chair Steve:** It is great. I echo that. Thank you guys so much for the behind-the-scenes work. That's it. All right, very good. Council member Morcomb? **[15:58] Council Member Andy Morcomb:** Hey, thanks for having me. Good to see you all again. So yeah, a few updates. It was great to go on the park tours. I went to a few parks I'd never been to before, which is good. But I do want to definitely address the comments that you all brought up as a commission. Your feedback's really important to us as a Council so we can decide what makes sense: how do we fund going forward? What do parks look like in Oakdale? The comment you made about making sure we have enough staff to maintain these is certainly well taken. We've got three new parks coming up at Willowbrook. The Bus Rapid Transit along 4th Street—the small area plan has another park allocated for that. Four new parks, and sizable parks at that. This could have been shared in the past, Jeff and Julie, but it'd be actually really helpful to see if there's some kind of an equation for "so many parks" or "so much acreage," this is how many staff it takes to manage it. Then it helps us make sure: are we behind? Do we need to budget accordingly once these parks are going to open in the future so we can make sure that we're taking care of the resources we have? So that would be great for us as a Council to have. And then Guthrie Park too. Yeah, we mentioned the grass there. If I'm not mistaken, that was the one park where we were trying a new fertilizer, is that right? **[17:21] Jeff Koesling:** Yep, correct. **[17:23] Council Member Andy Morcomb:** And so I have to admit, I haven't been to that park—if not, I've got friends that live right alongside it, but I haven't been through the park until we just did this tour. So in your opinion, Jeff, has the grass been any different with the new fertilizer? **[17:37] Jeff Koesling:** I don't think it's as thick as it's been in the past. However, we've had a drought. We've been in a tough summer. We've had very little rain. So you know, we've struggled everywhere. To be fair with that, that plays a big part of it too. **[17:53] Council Member Andy Morcomb:** Sure. And it could have been, too, we went to Gardenview and Tower Park and—I mean—I thought it was a golf course we were walking onto. Sometimes when you start with new turf in a less-used park, it stays a lot better. But just something I noticed, because that'll come up in conversation. We've got a year of this new fertilizer, the organic fertilizer they were trying, to see if it had a good impact or if what we were doing before is really the best option. A few other updates: last time we were here we talked about the trails at the new Commons park in Willowbrook. The asphalt trails—biking and walking—those are pretty much done. I took my bike around it. There's a couple of connection points where the road meets the trail that they're still finishing up. I do warn anybody that's out there, be careful, there's some cones out. They're not totally finished, but it's close, which is good. And then 36th Street is one of the roads that's being worked on still. The asphalt layer, I believe, is scheduled to be put on later this week or early next. We've had some residents in the new neighborhood asking, "All the equipment's been cleared away and it's been a month, what's going on?" Even I learned in the process: they let it settle for a number of weeks to make sure there aren't sinkholes that form. So that'll be finished up soon, which is good. The last update is nothing formal yet, but we've got our Norheart Apartments down off that Bus Rapid Transit line and 4th Street. We have had developers coming forward; they haven't submitted any formal applications, but there's more and more interest around the land there. So that future potential park is certainly something that's being looked at as they look at the zoning and what businesses come in. Lots is happening, and I'm happy to take any questions. Oakdale's not so small anymore! **[19:48] Chair Steve:** All right, any questions? Nope. Great, thank you. **[19:54] Commissioner Jan:** Can I mention one thing? Sure. Under Wellness 50 Plus: October 7th, which is a Saturday from 10:00 to noon, we are doing a Police and Fire Department crime and fire prevention event. I just wanted to welcome everybody to come to that if you're interested. You can sign up under the Oakdale Wellness email. Thank you. **[20:18] Chair Steve:** All right, good. Can I get a motion to adjourn? **[20:21] Commissioner Mark:** Motion. **[20:22] Commissioner Jan:** Second. **[20:23] Chair Steve:** All in favor? Aye. Approved, we are adjourned. Thank you very much and have a good evening.