start out by reciting the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge aliance to the flag of the United States of America and to the rep for it stands one nation under indivisible with liy and justice for all thank you um the next item on the agenda is approval of the regular agenda as presented there second I'll second there's motion made by Rick seconded by Maggie um any other discussion hearing none all in favor say I I opposed motion carries the consent agenda is in front of you if there's no discussion or questions on that um we will I would take a motion to approve I apologize I should have asked for the part B to be treated as a separate item if I could do that app okay so so I mean all you do is pull out yep pull Part B out and then uh go back to the other two items so Mr Mayor uh would we would we be placing that as 13 then correct okay okay and then uh claims for payment and monthly Financial summary I would take a motion to approve if there's no questions so moved is there a second second okay Sean made the second Magie made the motion all in favor say I I opposed motion carries Memorial Park baseball field update and Nick you'll have to state your name and sure address Nick shener um representing I guess baseball group and uh new preoral Chuck and I are two of the tri chairs um on this upcoming state tournament that we will be hosting in 2026 so that's one of the reasons we have a couple events coming um 2026 is the next state tournament I think it was in uh 2021 I think Matt had an update that we were putting a bid in uh for a state tournament and we did get it um it won't be nearly as much work as the last one uh when we had all the upgrades and everything coming so this one's pretty well I mean a lot of work to do but not the upgrades that we had last time so we wanted to make the council aware of that um we'll be working with Matt we'll be working with um Park board on some different things we're looking to raise some um more more funds uh through some advertising which we've done before uh the scoreboard advertising is is about due to um be up again where we can get more uh more funds for that uh field fund that all the funds from last time went into um to help with improvements and so that's where the funds for the next state tournament would go as well back into that field fund where we've purchased new equipment we've helped purchase uh Clay and other items for the field that used to um come out of like individuals or even the city accounts for some of these different things so we've been able to save money by using that and that's where the funds in the next state tournament would go we are co-hosting with Shaka and Jordan on the state tournament so would be 2026 generally can expect probably 10 to 12,000 um fans to be coming through over the few weekends um and then this summer we are hosting I guess I was notified a few weeks ago uh Fox n does a Wednesday game of the week where they travel to different uh towns and we were selected so on Wednesday June 5th we'll be having the fox9 uh game of the week which is kind of a fun fun day it's not necessarily something that um you know you get a big crowd not a huge crowd like the state tournament will'll bring in uh so we want to make you aware of that in case there's interest in helping publicize it in some of the letters and different things that go on so those are the two events that we have coming up and Nick what was the date of the fox n uh Wednesday June 5th June 5th is that a 700 PM game uh that we're not 100% sure on but they're I'm kind of waiting for them to get back to me but um could be anywhere between 6 and 7:30 there is talk a lot of the towns have like a youth game before that so we've kind of talked about um maybe working with new Youth Baseball to have like a 14y old's play or something leading up before that a lot of interviews go on kind of during the morning throughout the afternoon fox9 kind of Tours the town and stops in some local businesses and things like that so um I'd imagine they'd be doing that again good sounds nice thank you thank you thanks D okay the next item up on the agenda is the police facility schematic design update and community recreation planning update floor how are you I'm good how are you mayor and Council it's been a little while since we've had a chance to present a couple of things and tonight I have two presentations so you'll be tired of me by the time we're done uh the first presentation I would like to uh present to the council tonight as we've been working uh diligently on the schematic design for the addition to the fire station to add the police department out at that site and so tonight what we wanted to do is just kind of walk through our design process spent some time looking at the schematic design diagram so this is a continuation of the initial you know blocking diagrams that we had uh discussed during the planning stages of it so we have a a solution that we've been working with the police department on and then talk through kind of the next steps and schedule and some of that type of stuff uh so for this project we really wanted to spend some time and develop a design team or core planning team to work with us on the design process so this was a continuation of the um team that we worked with uh during the planning stages of it but more focused on the police department and had uh meetings with the chief and his team to make sure that the program and the design elements and the adjacencies were what would be best for the police department long term um and so what you'll see tonight is really kind of the culmination of that with a lot of ownership on that final design solution so the stage that we're in now is schematic design so this is kind of the creation of that you know those study drawings they kind of look at the relationships the scale and the form of the building so we have we do have kind of a concept sketch for feedback tonight as well but we're not 100% done with the design certainly on authorization in the next phase will'll be more detailed design which we uh talk through as design development and then onward into the construction documents and the construction phase uh the program for the police department uh as a reminder uh we had spent some time looking at not only existing utilization but we're really looking at something that is in that short to midterm uh time frame for the project and so uh the spaces that we have in the building kind of reflect that far column on here uh to make sure that we have enough room for our Patrol and investigation area one of the spaces that we spend a lot of time programming designing is the evidence and processing area so that we have the right type of spaces and the right size spaces for that um and then looking at right sizing our locker spaces um our spaces for you know our nursing room our quiet rooms are in here uh we do have a break room and our fitness and defensive tactics training spaces are part of those staff support spaces and then uh our vehicle and tactical storage and so we roughly had looked at a program of roughly about 20,700 Square ft we're slightly under that program based on our meetings and stuff like that so I think uh from a design perspective we were able to kind of hold the line as far as some of those square footage that we had talked about during the planning stages of it so this is our uh design solution for the facility so this is uh an addition to the south side of the existing fire station uh so where we have that uh label out the green label on there defensive tactics and training that is repurposing the existing ambulance garage there so uh we decided that we weren't going to tear off that garage but uh we'll U utilize that space uh for defensive tactics and our uh Fitness space uh we have Incorporated a couple of changing rooms in there as well uh to make sure that you know for not only for people that are coming in uh off duty but you'll notice that the location of is is in kind of a neutral area so that if others outside of the police department want to use that for Fitness whether that's the fire department or other City staff um they can have access to that without necessarily going through the secure area of the police department um to the South we did add a uh garage for the ambulance service so it's a smaller garage it's a two Bay garage versus the three Bay garage and that was based on feedback that we got during the design process uh we are creating a new entry to the building for Public Safety so our hope is that this will become more of the public entry for the whole building versus having two separate entries for the fire department and the police department so we have a a Lobby there with a service window in there we have an interview room off of that Lobby that'll not only serve uh as an interview space but also uh can be used as a safe room so if somebody comes to the police department uh we have the ability to lock down that area so somebody could wait for an officer to show up uh so we have a couple of public toilets in that area uh the blue spaces along the north side are our office bases for uh Patrol and investigations uh we have a the chief's office a Sergeant's office and then a small conference room for that cluster there uh our Patrol area is an open office area kind of in the middle of the heart of the building there uh right adjacent to a briefing room and a small location for our Duty Bags as we head out towards the garage uh we have a larger evidence storage room and an Evidence intake and processing area that comes in right off of the garage so we have a couple of flexible locations in the garage that can be used to hold a vehicle in that location to process a vehicle in there or if we don't have um a need for that it's additional parking in the garage so we don't see that as a formal uh walled in space we would plan to put put a fencing or cage rpe tractable cage around uh that area off the garage we also have a tactical equipment storage area uh and the garage itself will be a drive-thru for roughly about 12 vehicles in there uh we have a break room that connects to kind of an outdoor uh patio area off of the east side of the building and then it just rounds out with our mechanical spaces that we'll need for uh the building from a site plan perspective here again we're adding on to the south side of the building uh we will need a little bit of more parking for the police department in the public area so we are going to expand that parking lot and reconfigure it off of Fifth Avenue there um and then we are going to demolish the garage that's on the site right now uh which will allow space for uh Ingress and egress out of the squad garage uh and we would be expanding parking on the east side for uh staff and for the ambulance service at that location there um and then an access Drive uh would align with where the kind of the dirt road is there right now so that's really kind of the extent of the uh site development uh we are planning on separating the public parking areas from the uh PD Drive areas so those two areas won't connect it so that we have safe circulation in and around the site so as part of the design process we are looking at how we might uh add on to the building because the building already has a current aesthetic to it which uh has a combination of brick and pre-cast panels down at the base uh we would extend that that material pallet onto the connecting link between the fire station and the new police station and over and across where the offices are on the West Side uh we are enhancing the entry to the building to make that more visible to the public that are coming to the site uh with a much larger element at that location with some monumentation to kind of get a significance of Entry at that location uh we are thinking that the garage would be pre-cast construction uh there's uh an easy way to add uh some detail to a very some of that will be dependent upon the design schedule and approve approvals from the council but um again utilizing pre-cast for our building material it would make it easy for us to um have a contractor work on that over um that November to October time frame if that's the the decision or direction we want to go so tonight we're looking for feedback on our schematic design of the project uh and uh approval for that schematic design and budget and then should the council desire we can talk about next steps uh for moving forward to the next phase so with that mayor and councel I would answer any questions You' have does anybody have questions I'm sorry did we I we haven't even approved agreed to do this yet correct that's why we're talk through it I know so I don't know why we're taking next steps I'd really like to see how this is going to affect next year's budget and moving forward we don't have a lot of that stuff yet and some of the other needs um personally I'm not ready to vote on anything right now I mean I appreciate the work and I like the design and um you know I think we had asked you when it came in at $12 million if we could somehow skinny it down and I don't see that happen at all um I mean a few things were change but so I I don't know what the rest of the council feels like yet but I'm not we haven't even discussed how to fund it right I'm sorry we haven't discussed even how to fund it I mean it if would have to be bonding mean you know that would do it our our budget over the next number of years I mean so we certainly have looked at in the past shared with you guys various scenarios of project costs and um how that would um at that at that point in stage with those estimates on uh on budget be with how how they would potentially affect a future Levy if I remember right um it was estimated to cost somewhere between 700 $750,000 a year um on the bond that would basically be added to our our debt Levy was what we discussed in the past yeah I guess I would like those numbers you know in front of us um before we make any okay I mean yeah I mean I can certainly bring them back to you guys again but and it's not just those numbers it's everything else that you want coming up next year's budget too I mean I'd love to be everything to everybody but we can't we're going to choices yes Sean but you're also discussing an ENT the entire 25 budget at this point like it it's likely that this wouldn't hit until 26 anyway and so um I can't give you guys an exact 2026 budget of exactly what 2026 is going to look like I know that would be tough uh that's why I'm saying I I don't know why we're even at this stage that we should wait till probably September when we do see your initial preliminary budget and then start making decisions whe How this affects that and how it if we do it and if we don't do it it affects it this way um you know we don't know where well I know I mean I can continue to bring stuff back and I I have no problem doing that but it feels like every time I bring something back we we just kind of stall out and then you guys want to see the numbers again a few months later and we're so I have no problem bringing numbers but I mean at some point we do kind of need to make a decision one way or other on this and we keep pushing it back and it's only going to get more and more expensive as as we've shown yeah that be kind of my point of point on this is that the longer you wait the more expensive it's going to get um just as an an example um when I first started here the uh we expected to do a u um a hockey and additional uh indoor skating Rank and it was estimated at 11 million and um this morning I found out it's up to about 26 mil now so it's doubling in no time so before you put it off too too long the uh um I I feel this is the next step in the process and this is what we asked or what the council decided to do in November is to pay for the cost of this design preliminary design to to do a few things to to uh look at site issues right which I understood you did as part of this process I don't know if you did soil borings or not or got to that extent okay and um certainly refined the floor plan which is part of the design and then trying to verify cost estimates so all those were part of the costs that we agreed to pay in November and bringing forward to this next step and I think that we're walking this forward and this is um I I don't know that anyone at least I didn't think that we were going to be um voting on anything today it's more or less trying to have the continued conversation and what the next steps would be logically after we get our questions answered about the design aspects of it the next step to me would be to to go back and look at the financial projections that we had for the levy and what how this would affect the levy it would not be really practical to gu kind of figure out the whole budget already in April for next year but we can try to find out what effect this would have on any budget that we put together and I think that's how we would have to look at it but we're we're starting to commit we committed as sizable amount of money to this already so I don't think we should lose the value of it by talking about delaying it but but that's where I come from anyway but I had some general questions about your comments um I kind of miss or maybe I didn't understand when I thought you said something about a a joint Lobby or Lobby together and I'm not sure I understand how that is in the diagram what is there one Central entryway then for both the fire and the police so what we had talked about is because the fire station isn't typically staffed during the day the one of the advantages of bringing this together as a public safety facility is you would have somebody there during business hours where if somebody did show up for the fire department and there was a locked door there would be a door for the police department that they could go engage with staff to be able to solve whatever it is that they're there for it so we're not necessarily getting rid of the entry for the fire station it's locked already during the daytime and so this would have the advantage of having a public entry that public could go to during normal daytime hours just the lobby just the lobby just the lobby okay and then you have the separate because that has to be secured and correct different and then with security I think in the uh original Bubble diagrams back in November I didn't really understand how the security for the people entering the ambulance to get into the secured police area it almost seems like you can get into the police area through the ambulance garage there there is a door from the office area for police that goes into that ambulance garage are it it would be secured door um not necessarily allowing access from the ambulance area into that but if the PD for some reason needs to get in there there's a door there there is another door over off to here which is where amb the ambulance folks would be able to access that garage so the green shaded area the defense tactical shared meeting room and all that are those all secured areas uh yes and ambulance people or fire department would not have the ability to get into those areas that would be a conversation with the police department as far as how far in but traditionally no there is certain clearances you have to have to be in the office area of the police department it would likely be similar to our police station is now I mean right now we have a code on the door but we'd probably move more to a key card system so certain people's cards could get them into rooms and may not be able to get them into other rooms just depending on whose it is so for your other for your other piece of it in order for the ambulance folks to get into their office living area there's a door off the side of the garage where they would be able to access Cent spaces that they use in the building so that would keep them separate from the police department so there's a door right in this general area I'm not sure I caught that but is there a way that possibly have two different type of secured accesses or codes yeah for those defense and shared yep separate so you can share those more freely than the other areas m the uh ambulance was an issue that was discussed in November and I know Dwayne you brought this up um and it was talked about that this will be explored and uh I was wondering what the status of that exploration of the ambulance issue was so I know when we talked we talked internally about the ambulance garage whether and regardless of whether it moves forward or not um speaking with John generally garage space is some of the cheaper space that you can build um and so even if for some reason maybe we decided not to move forward with housing the ambulance there it would be garage space I guess that the sea would have access to using um in terms of just if nothing indoor climate controlled space so the discussion I guess was the cost talking about for them paying for some of it or whether they explored the and I guess the was made we can resolve all this in the design phase but I I don't want to get too far into it without whatever that resolution is and it might not be any change but just to make sure we don't and I don't believe there was a significant cost savings by taking that off was there John I can get that number I do recall that we had talked about pulling a number out for that but I just don't have it today but I can get it for you okay was the cost a factor in in it in in whether to leave it in there or not no to have the discussion yeah if I remember right it was the cost of why are we potentially building this these garage Bays if we may if the if the cost of these garage Bays makes sense because we're collecting so little in rent from the ambulance does it make does it make sense if we could save a million dollars on two garage Bays or three garage to be two garage Bays it may not make sense to build the garage Bays um but if that's not what you're spending maybe it does make sense just to have two garage Bays so um if I remember right we talked about it it wasn't a significant cost in the overall cost of the project but um we we can get that exact number yeah I guess to me that's beside the point I thought the comments in November and Dwayne you pointed out that asking them to pay for something or at least understanding what's going to happen when the rent agreement ends are we agreeing to provide that space to them into the future or I thought that's what was going to be looked at in the interim time period here yeah I mean I I can certainly dig into that too I know our current contract I believe is up at the end of 25 and so I think this would probably get if everything kept moving this would probably be done at a very similar time to that current lease being up anyway but yeah I'll certainly explore that with North yeah I'm not necessarily advocating for it one way or the other but it was brought up by more than one person here and so I just don't want it to be bouncing around here for the next few months either we agreed just to keep things to quo or we're going to ask them to participate in the project one or the other to me it seems like we have to kind of decide that um but I'm just speaking for myself no I would agree anything else Bruce um you mentioned through the design phe you'd be looking for opportunities to downsize the budget through the process proc and it seems like everything like you said came in very close so there wasn't really opportunities that you found during this process so far anyway that would downsize the budget so we did have some conversations during the design phase and it's challenging to take out a office or take out a workstation here and there where there are these larger spaces such as the ambulance garages or the garage Squad garage itself that just needs more feedback you know out side of our group as to whether or not that's something that we need to either take off the building or reduce those are The Logical target areas for that but without feedback um beyond our core planning team it didn't seem appropriate for us to just arbitrarily say let's take out half the garage without having some additional discussion with leadership on that so I uh so John just just for everyone's edication um such as the size of the squad garage that was built based off of the fact of kind of present needs as well as very near future needs that may be present um just knowing that we don't want to obviously build something too small so we're we're squeezed on week two already I think that was already cut back from our original discussion I believe it was larger much larger than that I think if I remember correctly um I I've seen a lot of numbers and I understand I I support the project and and the concept but I do I do think that we need to get to a point where we really have a good um marketing piece that really describes why the needs are and I think some of your some of the things that come out that you said now and in this write up kind of helps with that but it seems to me to be need to be presented more where we really explain why is this the right type and why is this the right size and why do we need that and I know that there's some state code compliance that we're resolving because we're doing this so that's a good reason why the costs are what they are maybe the size is what it is but um at before we get the final okay I would like to see a nice write up that really fully describes why why are we looking at this particular size in little detail uh I think the bullet points are great I think that's kind of how I'm seeing it but um I would like a more thorough narrative written down that can be something that can be handed out and really fully better explain it but I'm supportive of the concept I think we've very similar to the November bubble graphs I didn't noce anything much different but I guess my point that I was getting at with the funding was maybe have Baker Tilly or was something together it was yeah I I'll run it by Baker Tilly again I know they were the ones that did our funding stuff the first time but that was about a year ago so I now we got update numbers yeah I mean I can have that stuff back to you at our next meeting so I think if you're talking about that um ones that you provided last time I I think are helpful but I would like to where you put the projections in for the uh tax capacity growth you could have that highlighted I think the tax capacity growth on those examples was kind of aggressive to me okay but um yeah I will I will look at that and get all that stuff updated yeah and maybe you could give us or maybe if you feel like you can show it to me first just so I could look at it because I I I will try I will try to get out to you as early as possible so that way you you have questions we can do updates that but I think that's very helpful I think we came up with some numbers that really brought our tax capacity city tax capacity rate in the projections these seem really kind of lower than what I think they will be but I do think in my mind as I said before if we can get the overall tax rate under the 50% that's where my comfort level is even knowing that we have budget considerations that we have to factor in there but okay okay okay all right you have another study for us I do stuck with me for a little while if that's okay so we have also been um working through the discussions related to uh Recreation needs um focusing specifically on kind of the city inventory so we did have an opportunity uh towards the end of summer to uh go walk the existing Fields uh as part of our report we published our Consultants um observations and uh thoughts related to the uh field conditions we have a little summary of that today um and then um we have some conclusions and recommendations that uh if you read through the presentation uh we can talk through at the end uh our main focus was on the uh City inventory of parks um the community center is a city asset so it's listed here but again it's an existing uh facility that we didn't really look at uh doing much uh expansion uh of that facility mostly focusing on outdoor uh Recreation uh there are other uh Fields uh within the city really related to your uh education Partners uh so those are highlighted uh as well as opportunities for additional uh Recreation programming um but again those as we concluded in here uh would need some continued collaboration uh with those Partners so one of the things that we took a look at was field usage from uh 22 and 23 um and one of the things that that you know it might be self-evident but it's one of the things that um comes up as you look at the numbers is that Mo most most of the scheduling starts in the spring you know around April and is pretty well wrapped up in the fall obviously weather dependent um much of the scheduling of fields is you know in the evenings from 6:00 to 8 you know and during you know the um spring and summer that's when we have the most daylighting at the fields and that would be where you would expect most people to to look at programming stuff like that um and there was a number of conversations you know with the associations and surveys About You Know Field quality and some of that type of stuff is really going to um come into play as people are looking at scheduling out uh the fields um as we look at the field usage from 22 to 23 uh there are a few highlights in there uh as you look at Memorial Park in 22 there was you know quite a bit of peeled usage in 22 uh we did note that that dropped a little bit in uh 23 not exactly sure the reason for that Chang but that was noted in the usage data that we had um and across the board there was uh some increases over at settler Park um and a few decreases across the way but um these were the numbers that U we had had for 22 and 23 for those city parks uh as we looked at at Memorial Park um you know the concrete and the bleachers are in good condition there they were done uh in 2010 one of the challenges we have or you have at M Park it's kind of in a low area so drainage there is challenging as you can see out there um and there's little some erosion here and there and stuff like that so um one of the things that U we also looked at was while the Pavilion itself is in good condition uh we probably should take a look at the facilities there the restrooms and stuff like that could use some uh improvements out there so the recommendations that came out of the um observations was a deeper study on drainage patterns in that area would be appropriate um that would certainly improve the overall quality of the fields there if we could control the water there a little bit uh some reaing and weed weed management there would also improve things out there um the lighting while there is lighting out there you know it's in the play area so if you are considering at some point changing the lighting out there there's probably some improvements that can be done to that and uh some of the safety features with back stops and netting and some of that those types of things um could be upgraded uh over time uh as we look at the field usage out there it's you know as you might imagine it's used mostly by um Youth Baseball uh there was some football usage in September out there and most of the scheduling was in those prime time between um 6 and 8:00 pm Monday through Friday with most of the usage being kind of midweek usage out there um one could you know imagine that because the the fields are lit you could schedule them out long but as we know people you know it's harder to get people available during daytime hours when people are at work and such that so as we looked at the numbers in 23 there was roughly about 700 hours of usage at Memorial Park um so you know it's about 50% usage which was uh fairly high as you look at it in comparison to uh some of the other Parks uh certainly it is one of the nicer Parts uh within the city I did include some summaries of some of the use usage data that we had starting in uh April all the way through summer there's more detail in the detailed report that gives you all of those that especially those that want to look at that stuff uh but you know I tried to make this as simple to follow as far as kind of our major users and uh you can see through there there are gaps in there that you could see some additional uh scheduling could occur uh at different times of the year but again it probably has a lot to do with people's availability and um Team usage and stuff like that so um as we look at North Side park this was the park where he recently redid the basketball court out there so uh that is really nice uh again most of your Fields have had some drain tile installed to help with drainage uh but you know again you know some additional uh drainage out there would improve some of the quality in there and again we noted some safety features of the back stops and stuff like that that you might want to look at um and you know the infield at that location we noted was in good condition uh but there is you know the turf could use some improvement out there um so for Northside Park most of it was related to kind of player safety features out there with fencing and dugouts and some of that type of stuff uh we did note that irrigation at all of these fields would help with overall you know lawn condition and stuff like that so uh that would be something to consider especially in some of the more used locations and if you were to look at improving the turf out there you know some top dressing and over seating would uh improve the overall uh field quality out there for uh North Side uh it's mostly being used by Youth Baseball between mid April to Mid July um not much use scheduled use I'm sure it's used for you know other things but there's not a lot of scheduled use on the calendar uh after mid July um and we noted that there was about 106 hours of use in 2023 so again you know some nice schedules for you as far as you know what that looks like on paper uh but again certainly there is uh room for additional scheduling out that uh that location there and certainly out there there at that park there isn't a lot of parking other than street parking around it so that probably has an impact on you know people's usage of that location uh The Foundry Hill Park uh has the nice baseball field out there that was you know done through Community funds in 1999 and 2000 um at the time we looked at it the dugouts were being worked on so I assume that they're done by this point in time uh there is some accessibility concerns out there only because the route from the parking lot takes you through the bathroom structure to get to the pathway that get you out to the field so it might be beneficial to kind of look at circulation out there to try to improve that um and overall the the field is in good condition there's just a couple of minor notes here and there uh that you might want to take on in the future so our recommendations really revolve around you know looking at that pedestrian access you know maybe looking at enhan ing the back stop with some additional uh intermediate rails there on that um maybe some additional safety features out there would improve it but overall the field is in a good condition out there uh usage data out here again um wasn't super high again it was scheduled for about 106 hours uh in 2023 uh so similar to um our last part so certainly uh there is an opportunity here for some additional scheduling uh that um certainly Could Happen uh out at this location uh Southside Park we looked at in that area there uh as those that are familiar with that Park that softball field is way down in the low area there so it does have some drainage issues uh in that location um there is a drain tile system out there um but we also noted that there isn't a lot of safety features on that uh ball field out there so that would be something to take into consideration this is the location of the disc golf um course out there so uh we noted that out there as well um and so as you look at usage out at Southside there really wasn't anything calendared out there so this was one of those you know followup type of things but there was some usage data for 2019 uh but not a lot of scheduled usage from 2019 through 2023 um so this would be again one of those locations where some additional U marketing additional discussions with the associations might you know improve that yes sir could I just ask a question and clarification from that maybe mat can help me with this um because a few years ago we we put a chunk of money into that and I thought it was for flood problems or something about was that just tiling or what what what was done I thought was like $40,000 or something yeah we retied the whole Outfield then we also put in a kind of like a rain Garden to collect a lot of the water coming from the parking lot that used to run all the way to the field okay so that's why we didn't we don't have much data because that actually field was closed for two years um the one year we had a lot of rain in 2020 I want to say and then we did the construction in 2022 so the field is completely uh you couldn't even reg you couldn't sign it out um so that's why we don't have a lot of data on it being used it should get used a lot more hopefully in the up and coming years but the flooding concern should be corrected but again that still only corrects some of the flooding um we are in a low plane so we talked about that that'll correct probably 80% of the heavy rainfalls I think we talked about Ken but you're still going to have those two three 4 inch rainfalls that's still going to flood the area because it's in a flood plane so that I guess what's what concerned me is that the sentence that says no teams came back to play here after 2021 or they couldn't in 202 two and then in 2023 we just didn't have anybody use it I didn't know that but yeah as of the data that is correct but they were used a lot of the teams that played there were playing at Memorial Park because we didn't have adult softball going on there oh I forgot that is correct yeah so they just kind of moved up in quality since it was available because it was there and available yeah and lights and lights y okay thank you yeah and you'll note on here in TW to uh you know Matt's point 2019 it was scheduled out about 25% of the time so its usage was you know fairly consistent at that time so again my only point in there is that there's an opportunity here again for um field usage you know uh at this location so if you don't mind me stepping in real quick too on a lot of these recommendations that we did this walkthrough with uh me Ken Josh um John and one of his staff members we actually did a lot of these Corrections already a lot of the fieldwork uh the turf got corrected obviously because we walked with John and we had a really bad dry year last year so we receded all Memorial Park um the Ada concerns we had at Foundry hill we corrected those last year um so because of John and pointing out a lot of these items um we did a lot of these Corrections already or not all of them but half the corrections already just wanted to point that out um so just kind of finishing up sliding Hill skate part again there's no ball fields or anything there but it does have an archery range at this location this is where you've got a warming house out there there are two uh winter uh areas there one with some Dasher boards on it and one is just an informal skating area um the warming house appears in okay condition there's some you know just some regular maintenance rusting stuff that you would expect for a building like that to continue to maintain that building as fing house um and you know again I don't think it's being considered for that anymore but it came up in our conversations that there is some space around there uh that could be used for some other things as well um so you know again there are some certainly some things that you could consider doing long term out there um you could add some concrete in that uh um skating area to improve the ice quality there um you know you could look at uh adding some additional screening or Landscaping some of that type of stuff to help with some of the wind issues uh out there um and again there are no uh formal Fields out at this location but there was some conversation related to pickle ball so um we also look at Settlers Park so this is a really nice uh Park out there it's got two uh ball fields out out there um again there at the time that we were out there uh there was you know very there was various you know uh Nets out there and stuff like that so I think it gets used for more things than just baseball out there but there isn't a lot on the schedule that kind of supports that so but overall the drainage is good again to uh Matt's Point drainage tile has been installed at most of the field so that's really helped quite a bit um and it's got a nice park shelter out there so the only thing we discussed out there was you could improve the back stops you know to um you know for additional safety out there again some irrigation would be nice uh there are again at most of your parks there isn't much in the way of permanent uh restrooms and I think that does you know uh help with overall maintenance because you don't have buildings then to maintain and stuff like that I know that was a decision that was made quite a while ago but there is a accessible portable restroom out at that Park and other Parks um so again consistent use usage by Youth Baseball uh during the mid April to Mid July uh again there is plenty of uh availabil availability for other sports out here whether that be soccer or lacrosse uh but that doesn't necessarily show up in the schedule uh there are no lights out at at this field which again might be one of those long-term considerations if there's a part a location where uh lights would help with uh usage but again this was this park is actually scheduled out quite a bit the usage out here was roughly about 28% so um 382 hours and uh 23 for that Park um so then in looking at kind of some of the conclusions and recommendations so we did um have some feedback from the various athletic associations related to some of their thoughts and ideas related to the recreation needs for their particular sport um and again much of the facilities that you as a city are providing align with those national standards that we presented previously as far as the number of fields that you have the types of fields that you have based on population and that type of stuff but again those are National level statistics and stuff like that so certainly there are going to be you know variations depending upon each community's needs and stuff like that so we did want to make sure to highlight some of um the suggestions from some of the associations on areas that they feel could be improved uh certainly the Lacrosse Association has been uh looking for and advocating for some additional uh more formal space for uh the lacrosse uh program but one of the things that they had noted in there is that you know having a centralized location and this was kind of a common theme with a number of associations uh having kind of a centralized you know uh Recreation Complex if you will that has a variety of fields in there would help with hosting tournaments it would help with some of the um practice times and some of that type of stuff and you know some of the associations have suggested that as they grow it's going to be more challenging to to you know get field time so that was noted for the Lacrosse Association Soccer Association kind of you know cited the same thing we're having some sort of a dedicated location we've beneficial um they talked about some availability and quality concerns and so obviously as some of that stuff gets addressed those will go away uh pickle ball as we know is a a growing and popular sport much of their programming was talked about as indoor space and much of that indoor space is supported by the school district so uh that'll need to continue to be a topic of conversation but there was some discussion about having some dedicated indoor outdoor spaces would be beneficial to that program long term uh Youth Baseball uh only noted that some of the outdoor spaces can be limited at times and it was mostly just related to uh if another outside program comes in sometimes they take up space that they could use so without anything of challenging there I just some additional conversation but again to kind of summarize many of the associations we looking for better and more access to indoor practice facilities and for tournaments right so again you know at your shoulder months where sometimes the weather is either cold or um rainy having you know other alternative spaces uh would certainly benefit some of the P the practice uh for those programs so in kind of conclusion recommendations I kind of categorize IED it into three categories of collaboration improvements and expansion so certainly on the collaboration Side based on the number of fields that you have and somewhat the lack of um feedback that Mo that there were significant issues with um scheduling and stuff like that there were a few noted you know challenges here and there additional collaboration with your school partners and the associations would certainly help with some of the schedule and you know perhaps get greater efficiency and flexibility for uh those spaces um you know perhaps having some additional collaborative conversations regarding priority usage you know might help for some of the tournament discussions but as uh we had talked about for improvements you know continue on with some of the work suggested in the facility field assessment as Matt had said they're doing much of that's already been done but again there are certainly other things related to irrigation and some of the safety features out at those locations that would uh be something to consider over time and then certainly as City population grows and some of the need for uh these associations incre increase you know we you may want to start looking at that outdoor facility that has been talked about often on to develop that um outdoor wreck area and then to deal with some of the uh increases in demand for either indoor practice space or uh out you know some of those Indoor Sports and Fitness things you know a Community Rec Center type of building would be something that um you might want to consider long term so so those were what uh we put together obviously the report has a lot more data and Detail in it uh so uh feel free to read that in your spare time but if there are any specific questions or additional discussion uh we have not put cost to any of this stuff because a lot of that gets down to whether it's you know fundraising as you had had heard earlier uh more dedicated conversation about the types of projects um certainly we can give you rules of thumb for certain things but I think it needs a deeper conversation related to uh where we want to proceed next with those three categories of recommendations before we would feel comfortable putting budgets to some of that Stu with that I would certainly entertain any questions or comments that Council might have you mentioned um I think what I understood you to say is what we have is kind of what you would expect against the national averages as far as we don't seem to have a severe lacking of any particular area maybe there's a particular usage that's maybe one ttimes more lacrosse Town wants more of a southp town that type of thing corre do you see any changes in the trends of our usage of our facilities that would say that we're running in we we're not going to need as many Soph Mall fields or we we don't need as many trails or we don't do you see a trend is it seems like the numbers have certainly gone down in certain parks in some areas we saw the numbers stay steady if you read through the association surveys and stuff like that they are projecting some growth in those programs uh we you would need to dig in a little deeper to see when that pinch point would occur as I said there's you know for some of those outdoor practice things just either you know reworking some of the fields or changing some of the way U some of the locations where people are looking for that stuff I don't see I just don't see it right at this exact moment right so you don't see any major CH Trend or any change no when you look at the data between 20 22 and 23 there wasn't a lot of change in hours of usage which would then if there was a huge increase you know in usage for a particular Association then I would say okay this is really indicative of a a growth curve that needs to be addressed but I didn't see anything in the numbers that would suggest that yeah I guess what spurred the question is the the fact that we just don't have as much softball usage and there statements have been made that we just don't use softball fields as much but it's not to the degree that you would feel that we should do away with one softball field make it a lacrosse field there are a few parks that you could that you could change a few things to add more lacrosse Fields if that was you know a pressure point um you know sure but I I don't know that we have enough data as to the you know the use of a couple of the parks to be able to like Southside where you know there there is nothing going on there right now so if you know softball doesn't go back there then sure that's a big field area that you could look to change to something else okay yeah yeah I'm I'm not advocating for lacrosse I don't don't play it but um no I just wondering if that those are things we should be thinking about or it doesn't seem like anything were U out of step in any dramatic way that we need to think about making many dramatic changes the the one biggest thing and it's probably no big surprise was a lot of desire for additional space for pickle ball and that's fairly typical and common based on the um popularity of that Sport and so having additional paved areas in a couple of parks or striped out in a couple areas may help that program but that's a bigger conversation around orientation and location and some of that type of stuff I think the bigger desire is to have more indoor space for pickle ball versus outdoor space two other questions had we we didn't detail out Memorial Baseball Field did we not the comp not the not the big field no not the big field no why wasn't that included or I I think because generally that's not open to General reservation by the public correct Matt yeah that's correct and actually that field is I don't have the data in front of me but I signed that field out um that no act no activities can happen up there because it's used so much throughout the summer and it has no downtime I mean I had 28 games played in 14 days on that field and that's usually after the Orioles uh tournament which is great that it's getting used but the field needs time to recover so I'll sign the field out for like three four straight days so it cannot be used it's used that often I would appreciate if we could have a summary of that kind of information so it's kind of consistent we so we can say we did kind of looked at it all the same time and the park board or whoever has that information memorialized yeah I mean we certainly have that dat um because I didn't think it was used that much from the discussions we've had in the past I I when you say that sounds a lot more than what I thought I heard yep okay and then uh one of the things we were hoping to get out of the study I'm not sure if that's your next things uh is what to do with that acreage up there so I don't know if this doesn't really speak to that are you're going to tell us that later I think it falls to this particular recommendation of expansion so again I didn't see anything compelling that would make me recommend pursuing that at this juncture for Park use correct okay yeah certainly would be a great feature to have but just based on the development cost of that I just I just don't know how I could recommend that that's something that you take on right at this moment or in the near future or in the near future unless our population doubles by next year uh Ken could I ask that you get this in front of the park board please yep I've already got it uh tentatively scheduled that their April uh meeting thank you so I did put the diagram in there of the development of that 40 acres just so that it's memori memorialized in this report but again we could certainly give you cost on what we think that would cost but the last time I looked at it it was you know in the multiple Mill millions of dollars to develop it so well what what I was searching for or hoping for is that we get some actionable information that we can make a decision about that par of land um either we commit to doing nothing with it or sell it or do something and I'm not getting a lot of information I and I I guess what I've gleaned from this process is that as he said right now like it doesn't seem like the pressures are there that if we want to develop that land in some way that maybe developing as a park land is not the best use for the city at this time would that parse of land be a good use for Park use I mean can we get the resources infrastructure there I thought that was one of the problems with that parcel we do not have um at this point any water or sewer anywhere near there um with our updated sanitary sewer study that we are working on with the landies plan that will get to that area do we have a defined time period in you know five 10 years no we don't at this point but it can be serviced it just isn't immediately available with that property right now and I know when the initial concepts are put together it did look at having well and septic uh for the um irrigation system and then for the bathrooms that were provided there so it can work that way too that's it's not ideal obviously but you know if we at a 20year time frame to get water uh and Sewer connected out to that area that might be a good interim solution but again like John said we're not seeing that pressure for anything in their numbers other than some of the groups would like to see a centralized you know complex for tournaments but our day-to-day use we're not we're not seeing that demand there just not and I didn't include the kind of summary of where you are as you compare the number of Acres of Park the number of you know trails and all that type stuff but it is in the report putting you know developing this 40 acres would add U more to your current inventory that's already meeting the needs for the population size that you have so I I know you might have said this but uh just developing that parcel and the Very Bare Bones with the septic and well what kind of and just most of its dirt work what what is the cost of doing something like that I recall from the past study was like 1.6 million to do it however many years ago that was so 2004 2004 so you'd have to inflate that by that 20 years so as council member mentioned costs have gone up a lot over that period of time so we would have to take a look at that 40 Aces and figure out what the cost in 2024 but as I said it's multiples of millions of dollar to right and there but there's no building that was on that concept plan correct there was a concession scroom area y for for the yeah for the pin wheel yeah okay thank you we're not looking for any particular action on this I published the report as a draft because the council hadn't had a chance to read through it so certainly if you have any additional questions or feedback let the administrator know and then we can and uh finalize the report and and publish it thank you okay thank you thank you for all your time tonight sorry I took up most of your agenda yes you did thank you thanks so much okay the next item on the agenda is the uh city engineer projects update do you have anything M oh there he is can't hear you no you want to jump in M yep I can give you the engineer update and then uh like Chris kind of figured this part out and hopefully he can get to the last section but really the main update is a 2024 project we have our first meeting with the contractor on Thursday um this will be with all the utilities City util uh the city and the new PR utilities and we'll kind of go over a time frame there you are I'll finish it real quick though um we'll go over the timing of phase one phase two phase your access code followed by the pound or h fine and then after that uh this Thursday uh night from 6:00 to 7:30 we have the neighborhood meeting anybody in the area has been notified about a week and a half ago um we'll have all the plans laid out and everyone can come in and kind of see what's going on in front of their property and ask any questions it'll be me Chris the contractor and a few other City staff staff uh the other one uh as you see 10th Avenue in First Street you probably saw the weekly update a couple weeks ago that that is installed and working um seems to be working really nice we just uh as I said in the weekly update we just got to repaint the liines here this spring other than that it it's working as it should and if Chris is there I can have him finish up with the last two items I'm here I called in I about uh hopefully you can hear me now y yes you got okay um next few items on here relate to the 2024 student utility improvements project I do have two prop pools in front of you one is from and that is for uh Construction Services which would be our phase three of the projects so we did the feasibility phase which design and then um I bu my Construction Services proposal um at in front of you here today um the first item here I'm going to mention is uh related to um additional work during the uh fin design and bidding of the project so um the did alternate uh one with the lining added to the project and the design service soing for500 amendment to a design key um and then items under our test four to the construction services construction observation and uh later moving into assessment and record drawing so what I have calculated is um as far as the construction observation goes is our estimated cont uses the entire schedule that they have available to them um if they get the project done quicker which is what they have in their schedule um I don't expect to use that much compared to last year I think where we had a 265 now observation currently what around 200,000 because of uh quick construction by the contract so um with that I guess I'll see question for me on our proposal okay I think the main question that gets brought up to me every year is how does this compar to past years's this is right in line of where it was last year uh he sent it over to me about a week and a half ago um and it was pretty much exactly what I expected it the estimate to be at so I good with it okay all right any questions otherwise I think is there a resolution in here or we just need approval just approval okay I would take a motion for approval to enter into Construction Services proposal uh from SE so moved okay Sean made the motion is there second second and Bruce made the second any other questions or discussion hearing none all in favor say I I opposed motion carries all right the second item is the construction material testing proposal from CVT so we did receive a proposal from construction I'm sorry these um boring Sol boring is last fall on the project historically this city has engaged um the geot technical firm that completed those um prary tests to complete construction testing as well uh for for this type of a project they provide an estimate of what they expected to be it is a time and material contract um the uh es provided by soen Val testing is uh in amount of $ 27,32 and it would be my recommend to proceed with this okay that seems cheaper than last year quite a bit it's it's half the price of The Proposal received by by Braun on last year's contract I around 62,000 if I recall correctly around 6,000 or so um D Valley testing did a um do the work last fall I I no no concern about the work uh done on the um investig um they have performed on other F projects um rock area primarily but uh they they curently are capable of complet completing this work um you know most of the cost on on geot technical testing is usually just on the dve there so they do have to make assumptions of how many CS they're going to make um so I can't I going to hold them to that dollar amount but I do expect them to um feel perform the services that they that I proposed on um without okay all right I'll make a motion to um to give the bid to construction or to CVT um for construction material testing is there a second second Rick made the second um any other questions or discussion hearing none all in favor say I I opposed motion carries thanks Chris thank you okay the next item on the agenda is the public is uh invited to be heard on matters not on the agenda speakers are limited to five minutes does anybody want to speak to the council yes come on up uh you'll need to state your name and address and and what you're here for my name is Kar I live in newe I have lived here for over four years okay before that they live in minan for 21 years my address here is 208 Kennedy Avenue 203 Kennedy Avenue I'm originally from Liberia I lived in America for 30 some more years I moved to newer because I love new and my daughter did go to my Kido so when I passed I choose that new was a beautiful place for me to be but ever since I came here for the last month my son has been harassed by a police that he have been driving Rong for it I'm afraid because of what has been going on with black kids that scar me off I consider you all to be my family I don't have family yet my son go to my kid I have three Bo I ra relig we are strong ke I don't know what to tell you guys I pray and I beg you guys to help my son I'm afraid that's one thing is going to do something to my son you guys is getting out of hand I mean I seen I beg you guys than you okay I just I just want to ask what's going on basically there's been a lot of racial profiling with my brother over there okay and who are you I'm Katherine Garnett and liter I'm the oldest of my mom's kids and first actually I been racially fall in your city like you know what I mean waiting for my parents at a KC gas station the cop saw me and literally looked at me as I'm waiting for my parents to get home because I didn't have keys to get in he's sitting there looking at me waiting at the gas station I went in to go get a Red Bull I pull out he decided to pull me over and tells me oh your license blate lights turned on I'm like literally I saw you over there you know that's the first time my parents move out here my oldest brother stayed at my parents house he was racially profile as well there's a lot of stuff I heard you sir I actually appreciate you saying I've noticed since 2022 you guys are talking about your budget let me tell you why your Parks aren't being used my kids go to P Lake my son is a athlete for baseball plays for you know basketball your Parks aren't being used because there is a lot of people not want to play in your city because there's so much racism there's so much things going on in your city that literally if you guys don't start training your officers start training your Schoolboard about culture and not profiling people you guys will be the next city that will have black lives matter here and unfortunately I love new pre like I said my kids go school in PR Lake I'm sure you've heard of things that's happened to Pake they had a huge black lives matter out there they even our superintendent guy bought it out she went to St Louis Park and they tried to get her out there too I'm telling you he got foued one night they pulled him over they said that someone saw him driving erratically my brother does three three times and who are you sir SAR um I live in Kennedy Avenue with my mom and everything like that um I remember the first time officer pulled me over through my neighborhood literally for I don't even know for no reason I'm coming back from work and he literally stops me in my neighborhood he says what are you doing and I told him I live here like I literally live in that neighborhood for him to actually say that was kind of weird because I'm just why do you think that like it's a nice house I get it but yeah why would you think that why would they to say that and I'm just getting off work so there was no reason for it to even say to say all those things okay and then a couple of nights ago I guess and it happened again I get pulled over same thing he's like I've been driving erratically first time they were like saying you've been driving erratically you've been driving drunk I'm like nah he doesn't even drink I don't drink that's not my thing so yeah they're trying to find reasons to for my brother over and my he's a student at Mano and this is not the first time and you guys have know there's been the fact that like if my mom is like every night having an African-American son woring if her son's gonna make it okay because some cop thinks that ask him why is he in your neighborhood another one pulls him over because what was it they said that somebody called or something somebody called somebody called and said he works at Best Buy out in Shak area like seriously this is not the first this is not the second and like my mom is the we're like it I mean there's just something needs to be done you guys need to talk to your police officers just stop like it's getting to point that we will start getting the city city involved and we will start getting African-Americans to come out here and we don't want that we're asking your City to please have a talk with the police officers and my name is Al that's my dad I'm the Dad we all live on 203 cidate for since 2018 we have lived in that in the house for for all those years about four years now oh yeah almost about five years the last time when he pulled my son over it the cops to told us after they call us that uh some Anonymous caller call that he was driving erratically and he did not observe the traffic light sign on Highway 21 as far as I know there's no traffic light sign on Highway 21 so I don't know where he came from with that but it's very concerning it Happ been twice in recent times since January three times now so we are con and that is why we decided to bring it forward to app we address this situation with the chief of police already Y and we met with him at once we drafted another letter to him today and we see I just y so we just hope that the city council may look at it and if we can get any redress we appreciate it if not can take some other actions that you thank you for coming thank you coming Coco I was wondering what happened you you kind of disappeared on us sir it was doing the yeah that's right she's a nurse so she works in a hospital so she here no she she works at a hospital yeah we both work in hospital so during Co she wasn't trying to come out because we deal Co patients like I'm saying you guys I just feel like you know your cities don't need any arat but this is getting out of hand I mean there's been even in your basketball games you know like I said I've seen I've heard stories how people are being called racist remarks like my kid play baseball and we are looking for parks all over literally like all over to play like we have state tournaments my son actually played on Two Cities his dad lived in Aken we played in he played in P Lake he's a picture so he was sing aing in in P Lake and my little boy's 12 years old we're looking for Parks all over the fact that your Parks not being used there's a problem with your city when these if you ask P Lake everywhere they're looking for Parks we have the place which is p Lake Athletic youth center they're looking for Parks every day looking for courts to even play a lot of people don't want to play in your cities a lot of schools like Armstrong Robinsdale St Louis Park people are literally going to start boycotting new prank like you guys need to start teaching your people like about culture racism is not good and if you guys the next thing I'm telling you I've been into I've dealt with diversity you guys will be the next city to have black lives matter out here if they don't start doing something and you being a Shiva police train your officers I understand sometimes you know people call in a lot of times people make these V profiles ma'am you just you're addressing the council okay okay so yeah just sorry just I understand I apologize I'm sure you know it's hard being is she for police being a manager sometimes you get the new people out there but train them to like not every call you know look at it look into it don't you know especially when it's the same kid you know and this is why kids are black kids are so afraid to like even like when they get pulled over in this dark area my heart would start racing because with everything going on you know and yeah that made me feel uncomfortable like why they got to stop me by my house if realistically I should be able to just go inside my house I to worry about them I really didn't have to talk to him but the fact that I gave him my time whatever I could have just gone inside so the fact that I had two cars stopped me by my neighborhood I don't think that inside my driveway I don't think that's okay she definitely should have addressed that situation we will we will excuse me is is is your guys' contact information on that letter I haven't seen yeah I I believe so just so I know who to on a your friends of get here is yes have people that know him very well still have his body that he we all up Lally a better life for America but this time I feel like I don't need to be new pray like it's literally to the point my mom call balling and I'm like we grew up in minetonka we went to Hopkins High School like he went to minona high school we grew up with I'm sorry but my kids are half white and I don't I teach my kids about racism but the fact that my mom is afraid of my little brother's life and the fact that I have to leave my job we all called in to work today from the hospital to come here that's how serious it us okay thank you for listening thank you much appreciated I you I want you guys to help me yep we'll address we will we'll address it address address it thank you thank you thanks for coming thanks for waiting through the interesting stuff okay does anybody else wish to speak to the council anybody else going once going twice all right the next item up is to uh an ordinance to partially vacate certain easements in a plat of how do you say that Sue Sur okay so pretty simple easement vacation request even though it includes uh a somewhat large area that I've included in the map I don't have anything to put on the overhead for you but um back in 2020 when the Sur uh development was platted um and just a throwback to last meeting we had a condition use permit for a moved in home on actually lot two um of this plat lot one has a home on it already so anyway back in 2020 Co was going on obviously um their engineer turned the plat in and had the easements basically at twice as wide as they were required to be they could be wider we don't say they can't be wider but it was really a mistake on their Engineers part when they drew up the plat said you can go ahead and have it reprinted and we can go through the process of waiting for that to get done so you can refile it he said no let's go ahead and we'll file it and when I bring in new house plans if we need to vacate we'll go ahead and we'll take a look at vacating those at that time so that's where we're at um and uh Mr pin request is to vacate back to our standard easement size um which is basically reducing them in half um so you'll have a 10ft easement along every public roadway uh 10 feet along the alleyway and then five feet on each side Lot line so that's what we're looking at is really just getting it back into our current standard um I don't know how to better explain that other than they were twice as wide as they needed to be and with Co they didn't want to wait the many months time period to reprint and have it come back through for our signature and it wasn't hurting us and um having it be wider than uh we required it just prohibited some wider buildings going on there so cleaning it up is really what we're doing so looking to introduce the ordinance tonight and then the next uh agenda item related to this would be calling for the public hearing at the April 15th um city council meeting okay so who wants to offer ordinance number 348 so moveed first reading is there a second I'll second okay Sean made the second um any discussion questions on it all in favor say I I opposed motion carries the next item up is a resolution 2431 1801 setting a public hearing to partially vacate certain easements in the plat of Siri Sur Sur I'll make a motion uh to pass the resolution 24381 setting a public hearing to partially vacate certain easements in the plat of Sur okay second and Sean made the second um any questions or discussion on that all in favor say I I opposed motion carries the next item is order appointing city of New PR Charter commission members uh yes so um back in 2014 uh a charter commission was reformed with the city of New cig um with the very purpose of reviewing the city Charter on a yearly basis um the charter is made up of nine individuals who reside in city limits each to a four-year term we have these St up staggered so every uh every two years four comes up and uh just this last year five ended up coming up uh the five members whose appointments expired were Ben Bart tousik Mary climp Chuck nicolay Bernard wesler and uh councilman Shan Ryan three of those members did wish to be reappointed um and Ben baruchi and Mary climp were ready to step aside in addition to those uh two appointments uh mayor Dwayne TR who was reappointed in 2023 asked to uh step away as to create a little more space between the council and the charter commission um so that means that there are in fact three open appointments uh two for four-year terms and then one for a two-year term to fill out uh Dwayne's position and so I did include a list of uh recommended appointments um as you can see uh Chuck Bernard and sha are on there as well as um rri etlin and Eric brev to fill out the four-year terms and then Brent Quast to fill out the two-year term so part of this process is the city council doesn't technically approve these the city council makes a recommendation and it is the district judge um up in uh I believe they're in Shaka uh that is the formal approver um so working with Scott rigs I have prepared resolution 2431 1802 um which would uh make the recommendation for these six members uh to be appointed to the Charter commission thanks for any questions I'm GNA ask a stupid question how many members do we have on there nine nine total total okay just and then any changes that are made at the charter commission do those still come to the city council for approval so well I would have I would have to I don't believe they do because the charter commission's job is to oversee the city council so if the charter commission decides to make a change um having not been through an actual Charter change I'm not sure the exact process but I it does not come back to the city council since it is technically overseeing the city council right so that's why I was wondering why you were getting off if I well I thought I personally me I thought having too many um council members on there is my thing it should be more run by the citizens that's just my deal with that what was that get some feedback and I my feeling is is that there should be at least some representation in the city council well there's you and I'm on it yeah oh may you are okay you're just weren I sometimes think I sometimes think that I don't want like the mayor position to steer do you know what I mean I that's especially when we make decisions about your term could be yeah yeah so Sean is some context I know like in uh in hennipen County um the cities have zero say as who is on it um basically the pin District Judge appoints everybody um and so some people might be connected with the city council in some way and others may have zero connection with the city council and may just act on the charter commission so sure it kind of depends on the area of the state as to how the judge um has overseen Charter Commissions in the past sure I understand um I just thought it worked well but mayor Nikolai was on it myself Maggie just because I think a lot of the charter commission sometimes doesn't have a good cont that we have more information that we can share to the group before some decisions can really affect yeah no yeah I get that okay okay so I would take a motion for approval somebody I'll make a motion that we approve resolution 24318 D2 City Charter membership recommendation second there's a motion by Sean seconded by Bruce any other questions or discussion hearing none all in favor say I I opposed motion carries all right the next item is golf cart funding discussion uh yes back at the uh end of 2023 we approved the 24 budget which included for the golf course purchasing 26 golf carts um at that time the golf uh golf Department also requested to utility carts um but the city council did end up tabling those utility carts so with the purchase of the golf carts the council did delay the decision on how exactly they wanted to pay for those and we discussed that with the coming um bonding in the spring that we could look at potentially bonding any or all of that that purchase um in the past the city for equipment at times has taken out a 5year equipment certificate and so um we've kind of come to the decision now as to how we'd like to pay for the golf carts as at our next meeting we will be having bonding Council here to talk about the 2024 Street project and the bonding for that so as a reminder the cost of the golf carts was a little over $184,000 and this is the final cost after tradein of the existing carts um speaking with Baker Tilly right now they estimate a uh bond rate uh interest rate of about 3.5% um obviously this is subject to change a little bit but that's kind of where they're currently thinking this would fall now if we were to bond for the entirety of the carts at that rate you'd be looking at about $42,000 a year so getting idea of how much is existing in the cash fund um at the end of the year for at the end of 2023 I had estimated we'd have about $620,000 uh working with Robin uh our books Bank are reconciled at the end of January at about $677,000 um which is up from 458,000 Over the same time last year uh I've also T talked to Kurt um about current uh year-to-date numbers on the golf club uh last year about this time we' sold 115 memberships this year right now we're up to 192 memberships um that could be slightly affected by the weather so if you look at compared to five days into the season which we did open up here last week I believe for the first time are we're actually slightly down on beginning of the season but we uh are starting 33 days earlier than normal so it's possible that some people that buy closer to April just have not done so uh current debt I did include the current debt schedule in here for you to look at uh as you can see our debt um because it's all equipment certificates is really ever out for more than five years and all of our debt um last payments are being made in 2028 at this point um so generally way we can look at this as whether is to whether we will pay for the carts with our existing cash balance um in its entirety um pay for a combination of debt end cash or pay using debt entirely um I doo truly believe each of these has a scenario and it kind of comes down to personal preference and how you want to go forward with it from the cash perspective uh obviously you're not paying the interest on the carts and so your overall cost is lower um but it does hit your cash reserves a little bit uh from the debt perspective it reduces your year-to-year cost of the carts and frees up your capital for other uses um in the short term uh I guess it also allows the golf club to take advantage of the fact that the interest ratees estimated only about 3.5% right now on the borrowing rate um and at that rate there's a chance that any Revenue collected at least in the short term um from potential Investments uh would actually outpace that interest rate um and obviously using a combination of both of them kind of Hedges your bets um uh against risks and rewards on that so in my opinion um I guess I would proceed with bonding for the entire amount um knowing where our cash balance stands uh basically earmarking that cash for payments of those um and taking advantage of that roughly 3.5% interest rate um though like I said I certainly see the merits of all three I know um councilman wolf has uh discussed kind of uh leaning towards more more use of cash over debt so I'm certainly open to discussion and going wherever Council would like to go with this okay when I orig talked about it it's or maybe if you can just refresh my memory what happened to the utility carts so the utility carts um their CIP did not have that fully updated to show the utility carts and at the time Council didn't really feel um ready to move forward with it since it hadn't been initially FedEd on the CIP I know we have updated at this point by when we review the CIP this summer they'll certainly be on there but that was why at the time council did not want to proceed with the utility cards so there's no cash Ed they weren't purchased at all correct and they're not planned to be purchased for this year correct okay yeah I think my comments before were to try to get the payments lower and trying to get down to at at the time I last thought about it I think we're for some reason 220,000 stuck in my mind or something or over 200 or something and that might have been with utility and then trying to get it down to 180 as far as a loan amount to try to get the payment down lower because um uh you the golf course uh in their budget is projecting a loss as they did have last year um and my thinking was to try to keep the payments as low as possible and thereby wanting a down payment on it but if they're only if we're still talking about 180 you're still going to get in that range um but their budget projected U I think a 50 $7,000 loss and adding back depreciation and interest they have them they they still would not be able to make the total payment so they're going to have to make payments out of cash or we it's not they um even with that based on their based on their budget so I guess I'm I'm okay with it if we don't use the cash because I know we're going to probably need to use the cash to make the principal payment unless they have a really good year or start earlier like they have so there's a potential that instead of a $57,000 loss they might have break even which would be great right there they'd make the all the principal payment just by breaking even this year and next year but to me that's still the goal keep it low enough that hopefully we can get the golf course to be able to afford the payments they have I I would love to get the golf course where it's self-funded at that point yeah so I'm I'm okay with it I mean one way or the other there cash is going to be used up I did want to mention at least I'm comfortable where we're ending up I'm not necessarily comfortable how you're getting there in the narrative I guess admittedly you have more of a finance background than I do so um but I I I don't want to I don't think we should get too excited about having that cash balance especially in January where that that should be the highest it should be probably because that's the money that's used to pay for the losses in February March April and May into June so that's all worked down and they didn't make money last year so there was no additional cash added really we'll see that in the audit probably but um but they do have cash balances um but most of that 600 some thousand has spoken for yes and and that's why I kind of tried to explain I'm sure outside of the snowbirds that maybe haven't come back yet some of that increase in memberships we've already seen this year is likely just people with the warm weather chopping at the bit to get on the course right but a lot of that is memberships that were prepaid or deposits that were made so there's an obligation those are used for expenses later in the year yes that type of thing so memberships that probably would have come a month later if we had a Cold Spring type situation okay so what's uh what does the council want to do Finance it I guess I'm okay with it's an okay interest rate so still going to use the cash either way yeah right yeah yeah that's fine I'm okay with it all right so I would take a motion what do you need here uh yeah just a motion motion just to let me know how to proceed that way next week or next meeting when we bring back the bonding for the street project it'll include the equipment certificate so I'd say just a motion to move forward with the bonding of the equipment if that's what you'd like to do okay I'll make the motion to move forward with the bonding of the equipment for the golf course or the golf carts for the golf course I'll second there's been a motion in a second any other discussion hearing none all in favor say I I opposed motion carries all right the next item is the Refuge holler agreement we were waiting on this from the last meeting uh for Waste Management for commercial and it's identical to the one we did with Lakers just simply for Waste Management for their commercial hauling routes which are very limited but we needed to enter into the agreement and they as you can see agree to it and already signed it so that's all I have to add for that one okay any questions or discussion otherwise i' take a motion to approve let's have a quick one um do they accomplish all the the commercial pickup in one dat or are they here in multiple days generally speaking they try to get done within one day they do have some people that they hit multiple times in a week similar to Lakers oh they do it just really depends on you know the typical uh pickup for that client so there's not a standard we don't have like oh they can only come Monday Tuesday it's very low volume I think they have one truck that they bring into town okay thank you um I'll make a mo did you make the motion no I didn't okay I'll make a motion that we approve the uh commercial Refuge holler agreement with Waste Management okay there's been a motion made by Sean second Rick seconded it any others discussion hearing none all in favor say I I I opposed motion carries Eda 2023 summary report yes as part of the bylaws of the Eda that they kind of report back each year on how things are going um this report was discussed at the last meeting here last week oh yeah and so now it's before you um basically for the eada this year uh kind of the first page there page three uh talks about the business retention and expansion and how that program has been going um last year we did have a little bit of a a Slowdown in the number of businesss we were able to visit um some of that was due to availability some of that was just kind of due to uh generally the Scott County CDA has lined those up for us and they had some turnover various things going on um as Bruce and Dwayne can attest we have kicked off 2024 with a bang and we've probably already outdone these just in the last month so next year's report promises to uh do a lot more business retention and expansion really that is um valuable to the Eda uh as helping us connect with businesses and just maintain those relationships as well as here firsthand from businesses the thing is they struggling with um and uh in many ways help connect them to the Scott County CDA uh who has a lot of programs for training and whatnot uh moving on to page four kind of going to construction activity um it's not news to any of us I guess that uh single family permits for or homes for sing permits for single family homes are certainly down um we are we are seeing lot availability dwindle and while Ken and I um have had conversations with people over the last year or two nothing just seems to have really taken off as um ready ready to build there are certainly sellers there are certainly Builders but they can't seem to find that magic dollar point in the middle um to make anything pop uh commercial activity on the other hand is certainly um picked up over uh the last five years we're slightly back off of last year but not much um and that includes both brand new businesses and remodeling while we're not as seeing a ton of brand new buildings going up uh we are seeing certainly a lot of expansions of existing businesses and so that that is certainly a good sign for the commercial activity around new pra uh going into page six talks about just kind of our net tax capacity this is something we talk every single year at budgets you all are very much aware that 2023 I'm sure when you look at your tax statement saw your valuation jump like crazy and that was a big driver in our net tax capacity jump in 2023 24 saw a much more standard or mellow increase and so that shows on page six uh the next few pages page seven eight and nine are some maps that kind of show the exact location of available Lots um when you look at the buildable Lots on page seven uh you zoom in and take a look at it just make sure you note that not every lot that is available is necessarily for sale for some reason somebody owns two lots and never join them together just because they don't want someone to live next to them or maybe someday they plan on selling it but not now um those do show up on that map so um we believe that while they're are 38 vacant Lots uh that the actual amount that would be for sale is probably less than that uh moving into page 10 uh just kind of our updated flyer we are down to three lots left in the industrial park um there is still interest in those lots um we keep hearing from various businesses but right now everybody is kind of in a holding pattern waiting to see if interest rates are going to come down at all and we haven't heard anybody who's so pressured at this point that they're willing to move regardless so as youe may remember bricks Boat Works came in last year um they were one of our recent uh brn Evas it's actually here in the last month and I think in my opinion at least that has turned out far nicer than I could have ever expected it to and uh their their plans are to continue um putting up buildings and getting as many of those boats inside as possible because um they say even this year they had to turn away clients who wanted indoor space and so I think they are even considering expanding beyond what they were initially considering and then finally just going into our endof the year financials and how uh the budgets played out for the year um of note on last page page 12 there just looking at the various cash balances um the Eda Industrial Park did fi finish out uh Sixth Avenue and eth Avenue responsibilities that it had um it's showing we've got a cash increase of about $40,000 over last year um that 30 there's probably about 35 to 40 that is currently spoken for on behalf of the Eda um as there is still a top lift that needs to be applied on those streets um and then just the general holding contingency so I would expect that once those are uh taken out um cash will be in a very similar position as to where it was uh last year at the end of the year so I guess are there any questions on uh the Eda summary report I don't to have any anybody else does that need to be formally adopted it does not it's just a report shared uh with with you all um as I stare at the PDF right now apparently in the PDF the word draft didn't disappear off two pages even though it was not there in the word document so I will get that removed um in their finalized document okay I just make the comment that uh I appreciate Josh and I think Josh and Ken have been doing a good job especially with the BR visits it's something that we've been doing now at Ed for I think four or five years maybe something like that it seems to be uh now a consistent regular program and I think it's really a good it's really showing that our staff really is engaged in the community and plus we've really benefited from the cooperation collaboration with uh Scott County CDA we have one or two people that are regularly involved in our meetings uh and actually involved in a lot of different um engagements with different businesses in new pre and they're very active in our community so we're doing well I think they are certainly a valuable resource that not every County provides correct I would agree with that okay next item is we added one here um item D it's the liquor license for the bras Bruce you had a question on that uh I didn't have a question I'm an officer of that company so I don't want to vote for oh okay is that way you making our meeting longer okay so um what was the uh is temporary one day temporary at yep so I'll offer a motion to approve the temporary on sale liquor license to forward new PR foundation on June 1st 2024 is there a second I'll second Magie seconds it um any questions discussion hearing none all in favor say I Iain and Bruce abstains so motion passes Okay so we've exhausted everything here um discussion not on the on the agenda I'll start with the fire chief as I told you last meeting we had our uh six applicants for our two open spots we held our interviews last week and uh we found uh two that I think will fit us very nicely and we'll bring to the next meeting you guys have for recommendation mat yeah I just got a few items um kind of like everybody else we've had issues hiring um I'll just use an example 10 years ago when I hire did my first hiring we had 135 applications for one street opening uh this time around we received four um we also had uh struggles hiring Wastewater operators uh nowadays people go into school and they it always has been you get a Wastewater and you also get a water license then you decide the path you want to go out of school um 95% of people coming out of school now are going to go to the clean water and not the dirty water uh so we actually ended up about six years ago opening up a position called the Wastewater one operator you come in with no license and we teach you how to be a a water wastewater operator U we had some pretty good luck with that we hired one so we had two openings uh a department that only has four so we were down to two um we had a internal candidate you guys approved about a month ago uh he's been there and he's doing great um hopefully we filled the second one but we did do uh eight interviews um they're just trying to find the right candidate that fits us uh so we ended up finding one hopefully we'll have that one to you guys at the April 1 meeting um we also hopefully will have uh the approval for the street opening again we only had four candidates applied interviewed two um so it's been a major struggle hiring um so I just want to put that out there I think there's many reasons for it um also I just want to make sure everybody a lot of people know our Wastewater superintendent Scott Warner um I want to give him a shout out he's worked 30 straight days at the waist treatment plant uh because of staffing issues uh one uh we're down to two people uh one were short um the other one has a work injury so he wasn't able to work uh and then our new hire that's a Wastewater one operator cannot be left alone at the waist treatment plant because he's still in the training process um the waist treatment plant is someone has to be at the waste treatment plant seven days a week weekends they're usually only there for two hours but again someone has to be there um so again I just want to give a shout out to Scott Warner and thank him he has not complained playing one bit uh he is looking forward to this weekend when he has off um but it's we are very lucky to have Scott uh uh I don't know what we would do without him so again just want to give a special shout out to him for all the dedication he has given to the W imp plant in the city thanks that's all I got Ken just a real quick update on the uh free tree giveaway that we have going on uh we do have 15 trees left uh 11 of those are common hack bears and then four American Plum so uh we've been putting it on social media I think uh new per times had an article as well but just wanted to note we're getting down there but we'd like to get those all out the door and the pickup will be April 27th at Memorial Park from uh 10: to noon thanks Chief uh one quick update from the last meeting when you approved the liquor license uh renewals for this year there was one that was not on that list um we did not receive U payment Andor the paperwork for that so you don't have anything here to renew a license because we haven't received the documents for them to do so so that license will expire on the 31st of March until such a time they can provide the documents and payment to the city for that license that will just be in in suspension at that time so with the counil is it suspension or they have to start it just won't they just won't have a license so I don't know that you need to take any action to suspend or revoke or do anything that way it just expires and they just don't have a license so that's what that'll look like just so you're aware of that as we get to the end of the month here and we won't have a meeting before that date so but both justs uh shown well that the city hall and myself have had numerous conversations and they're well aware of what needs to happen so there's been an abundance of communication with them over the last week here so uh again well with to add on to Matt we've had our struggles with hiring as well so we have received a couple of uh applications so there is some hopeful light at the end of the tunnel here for us and um some potential candidates so we'll be looking at that here in the next week or two so hopefully some good news uh all I've got is just reminder that we've got a special Clos session after this um to discuss those two Parcels of land that are on that agenda Magie I don't have anything today Sean uh are we going to get a copy of that letter yes I will provide this I actually I'm going to give it to you yeah if you want to give it to me and I I can get it sent out to you guys so appreciate that I'd like to see it and then I don't know do we or doeses the county offer do we do any diversity training with our police officers ority train activity training anything like that I will look into it and we we do an abundance of it we're required to by the state okay they've recently increased the amount of training that we're required to do to renew our license so we actually go a little bit above and beyond what's required okay that's nice to know okay thank you sounds like you might need to do more we will certainly look into it thank you um you you done yes that was all I had um the only thing I had is is I and Josh had a conversation with the US Postal Service the reality arm of the Postal Service uh did a conference call last Thursday Thursday and um it's I'm excited they basically said if they uh find either an existing place that fits their needs or somebody will build something they'll take it forward all and when means somebody build it for now like an investing group yeah so Magie let's say you had $15 million you wanted to build a new post office you would build it and they would lease it from you yep so yeah they're they're willing to enter into a long-term lease with somebody so yeah they're willing to talk to anyone who may have an existing building or may be interested in building a building for them when does the current lease run out um February 25 yeah he did make it sound like they were going month to month basically yeah it doesn't bother him oh okay like because he has a hundred other projects that he's working on he he said first priority on his desk of projects that he's really pushing are ones where they don't have a post office for let's say the person kicked him out of the building he said they're not in that situation here so it's on his desk and he's certainly willing to move it um but it's not top priority on him that way if if we can find somebody who can instigate that back end for him then he'll push it up and take it with it so was good news so that's it Bruce um I just have a couple follow-up questions to the things you've talked about already but the wastewater treatment operator I I don't I don't know if this would work in this circumstance at all but I'm aware of other jobs where you try to do Cooperative with other providers like I don't know if there's other wastewater treatment operators in the state of Minnesota communities that you can partner with to sub have substitutes available where they cross train and have a substitute available especially for the critical um the emergency kind of scenario because um and I'm trying to think of what what the job I'm trying to think of but it would be I don't know if there's any other operators close by but let's say say there's one in shocka or somewhere that you work out an agreement when you Co-op a substitute that they come in once a month or twice a month so they're familiar with the situation and they can provide emergency substitutions yeah so we I have been talking with Bolton mink um they would be our substitute if it really came down to it so yeah no I so we have a backup I have all plans in place just in case because just the world we live in nowadays you never know what could happen so so they have a they have a Cadre of uh people that can yep yes they could have um they could step in and run our whole facility if absolutely needed to yes okay did did you just make Jess shonal type Cadre into the minutes yeah I have to look that up um and then um dealing with the police and stops I was just curious as we're listening to this when another law enforcement agency makes a stop in new pra do we is is that part of our recordkeeping to know who who made the Stop and and the circumstances of the stop so if it's state patrol ler County or Scott County or whatever so our the new pre Police Department so it's through a cad system so anything in Scott County goes through Scott County and that's who we are our CAD system is through so you can get that data if you sought it out um anytime that we make a stop or create an incident in new PR it's our incident so if the like the Scott County Sheriff's Department would make a stop in new PR that would be their incident in their data so we might never know about it correct yep if we would assist them or show up to help them or we were on that call then an incident would be created for us because then we were there and that creates an incident for us as well so yes to answer your question if if there's a stop that's made and we are not there we we would not have a record of that is it is it just that there's really no good system to manage that data or because it would seem to be interesting or important to know what's going on in our city limit yeah so so part of that is trying to create every every agency kind of has their own system right so if there's an incident that and their names and things a record gets created that's data of the new PR Police Department so um we are the keeper of that data just as every agency is for their own incidents so there is some some shared data within LG that we can access but we can't go into say the state patrol or leisur County because we're not a part of their their CAD system so and that's part of the greater conversations throughout the state is how do we get everybody on the same page and as you can imagine to try to get 400 agencies on the same platform and has its struggles so and since I'm asking curious questions but um so I'm aware of other departments uh Patrol well we have a number we have officers from Savage Prior Lake and a number of other communities that live in new prey so if they're on their way to work and make a stop that's so they can do that right they can make a stop anywhere can't they if they have a squad card yeah most of them most Patrol officers don't have a car that they would take home so they would drive their personal vehicle to and from work so they they could depending upon what their policy says many policies say endangering life or or property so it' have to be a pretty significant event for them to make a stop if it's a speeding motor motorist or a traffic concern usually the directive is to call someone that is working and have them make that stop or I guess what I'm I see more most often is the the counties and the state patrol uh where they have their units right with them but used to be time I'm not sure if it's true now but we we've had new pra has had an abundance of law enforcement people living in our community um because we're halfway from both state patrol districts I think uh from the Twin City in Maino and um we have our Sher leiser in Scott County officers too so it's yeah so I just wondering about all that activity and um whether we know about it so if we question any stops it's not just new pra it could be other it could be yes yep thank you nothing nothing all right then I would take a motion for adjournment so moved second a motion a second all in favor say I I I opposed motion carries okay are we going to zoom through this or should I go to the bathroom I think you can go to the bathroom by the time everybody buz