This transcript features the **Lakeville, MN City Council Meeting** from April 6, 2026. Based on the context of the dialogue, I have identified the speakers including **Mayor Luke Hellier**, Councilmembers **John Brummel, Dan Wolter, Joshua Lee, and Michelle Volk**, as well as city staff. [0:36] **Unknown Speaker:** It sounds like something experienced by itself. [1:34] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Good evening and welcome to the April 6th City Council meeting. If you join me for a moment of silence in the Pledge of Allegiance. [1:55] **Crowd:** I pledge allegiance to the flag, of the United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. [2:11] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Okay, Miss Orlowski, roll call, please. [2:14] **Ann Orlowski (City Clerk):** Volk. **Michelle Volk:** Here. **Ann Orlowski:** Hellier. **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Here. **Ann Orlowski:** John Brummel. **John Brummel:** Here. **Ann Orlowski:** Dan Wolter. **Dan Wolter:** Here. **Ann Orlowski:** Joshua Lee. **Joshua Lee:** Here. [2:25] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Okay, we'll move on to item three. This is citizens comments. Opportunity for anyone to address the council for up to three minutes. Okay. Seeing none, we'll move on to additional agenda information, Mr. Miller. [2:38] **Justin Miller (City Administrator):** Nothing tonight, Mayor. [2:40] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** All right. Right into number five. Recognition and badging of our new firefighters. I'll turn it over to our fire chief, Mike Meyer. [2:52] **Fire Chief Mike Meyer:** Good evening, Mayor, Council members. It's my pleasure to introduce 13 firefighters who joined the fire department March of last year. These individuals represent the pivotal chapter in our department's history. And tonight, we're recognizing their transition from probationary status to permanent members of our team. So, as I say their names, I'd invite them and their families to come forward... [List of names: Kyle Johnson, Ben Fleisher, Nels Fredrickson, Ashley Hellyer, Lucas Churchill, Devon Kominsky, Steve Grass, Dom Zelensky, Derek Stepanek, Aaron Eicher, Matt Woodford, Steve Higgins and Jacob Coughlin]. [4:04] **Fire Chief Mike Meyer:** ...I want to thank them for their dedication to the city of Lakeville, and to look forward to their continued service to our community. And I'm going to pivot to do the oath with them. Very good. I'll ask the firefighters to raise your right hand and repeat after me. I, state your name... [4:43] **Firefighters:** I, [Names], do solemnly swear that I will support the Constitution of the United States and the State of Minnesota. [5:02] **Firefighters:** And faithfully discharge the duties of firefighter of the City of Lakeville in the County of Dakota and State of Minnesota to the best of my judgment and ability. So help me God. [5:17] **Fire Chief Mike Meyer:** If your family members want to pin your badge on, I see some already got them on. This is a mixed group. We have some internal candidates and some external candidates that are receiving their badges. [6:10] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Council, any comments you'd like to? Yeah, well, I'll just say this. I mean, for those new to the city, we want to welcome you; for those who were internal, thank you for taking the next step for our community as we kind of move into this new phase of the hybrid department... We're so excited to work with you and to support you and again, to your families, thank you for the sacrifices that you do allow your spouse or others in your family to serve our city. We're grateful for that and grateful for all of you. So welcome. We'll have you guys come through. We're going to shake all of your hands. [7:36] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** I'd like to give them a round of applause. Thank you. Guys, everybody. Yeah. We'll give you guys a moment to kind of exit. Thank you again. We won't make you sit through—it's only a barnburner tonight, so. [8:38] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** All right, we'll turn it on to our next item, which is a proclamation for Arbor Day and our city forester Zach Jorgensen will kind of give us some background. And council member Brummel will read the proclamation. [8:54] **Zach Jorgensen (City Forester):** Excellent. Good evening. Mayor, Council. My name is Zach Jorgensen, city forester of Lakeville. Uh, just here with a brief introduction for the Arbor Day proclamation... Lakeville is recognized for the 33rd year as a Tree City, USA. Uh, we also again received the Growth Award for activities for community forest management in the past year... our volunteer planting event this year will be Wednesday, May 6th. That'll be at Cherry View Park. [11:12] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** You say May 6th, the Cherry View? [11:14] **Zach Jorgensen:** Correct. [11:15] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Wow. All those people live by there that are really focused on their park. I hope they show up that day. [11:21] **Zach Jorgensen:** I do too. Yeah. Excellent. So with that, I thank you for your consideration of this year's proclamation. [11:27] **John Brummel:** All right. City of Lakeville proclamation for Arbor Day. Whereas established in 1872, Arbor Day provides an opportunity to celebrate the importance of trees and forests... Therefore, the City Council of the City of Lakeville, in support of its community forest, proclaims Saturday, April 18th, 2026 shall be observed as Arbor Day in the city of Lakeville. [13:06] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Very good. Thank you, Council member. Thank you sir. All right. Thank you. Look forward to it. Okay. We'll move on to item C. Just a change in our agenda. It's not actually the proclamation on the agenda. But we will have Councilmember Lee read the Together and Peace Day proclamation. [13:26] **Joshua Lee:** Absolutely. And I'll tee this one up real quick. This proclamation is in relation to an annual event that's happened in Lakeville for the last several years... The Lakeville City Council does hereby proclaim that Saturday, May 16th, 2026 shall be observed as Together in Peace Day in the city of Lakeville. [15:06] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** And some news this year, I think it's fun, we're going to be celebrating with Valencia, Spain at the same time, which is fitting considering Lakeville and Nate Reuvers plays for the professional basketball team in Valencia, Spain. Moving on to item D, which is our Public Works quarterly report, and we'll turn it over to our Public Works director, Mr. Olmi. [15:33] **Paul Olmi (Public Works Director):** Good evening, Mayor, city council members. Uh, yeah. This is the first quarter report for public works. I'd like to start off with some new employees. We just hired Charlie Tolga as our new engineering tech... Chloe Anderson comes to us from a consulting firm in Wisconsin... and Oscar Gasper, our new utility maintenance one employee. [17:05] **Paul Olmi:** Public works had the opportunity to participate in some AI training... Spring activities are well underway now. Street sweeping... we're going to be working six days a week now... pothole patching is ongoing. Snow removal usage was up a little bit from the last two years... The biggest project we're working on right now is replacing the filter media at the water treatment plant... Watering breaks are tracking as about average. [27:02] **Joshua Lee:** Council, I have a question? Um, the upcoming cleanup day, I think there's always been a little confusion on the garden swap tool event. So you bring in an old rake or shovel, and there are new tools available that you just take with as an exchange? Or is it other people's donated items that you're exchanging with your own? [27:32] **Paul Olmi:** Uh, I think you exchange your old equipment for a new, new shovel or rake or something. Exactly. [27:39] **Joshua Lee:** Okay. All right. I think there is... yeah, a few people were thinking that you were swapping with people or also trading items in. [27:48] **Paul Olmi:** Yeah, more like a trade as opposed to a swap for new items. [27:54] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Well ones, I want to send a gratitude to public works for all the snow removal. It was an interesting year, as they say here in Minnesota. Um, but then also how responsive they've been on when people are, have concerns about, you know, grass dug up and those type of things. So thank you for that. [28:13] **Paul Olmi:** Thank you. [28:15] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** All right. Okay. Thank you. Moving on to our consent agenda, anything you'd like to highlight, Mr. Miller? [28:22] **Justin Miller:** Thank you. Mayor, city council, a couple items. Item 6J and 6W are both final plats in the Heritage Commons area... Item 6Z is a resolution amending the dates of City Council meetings for 2026. We've tried out this new format for a while. We need to formally adopt. So basically this is just removing what were the work sessions from the official city calendar. [28:58] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Okay. Very good. Council, anything you'd like to discuss? If not, I'll take a motion to approve the consent agenda. [29:05] **Dan Wolter:** I'll move approval of the consent agenda. [29:08] **John Brummel:** Second. [29:10] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Any further discussion? Seeing none. All those in favor say aye. **Council:** Aye. **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Opposed? Okay. Consent agenda passes. Will now move on to 7A public hearing and resolution adopting assessments for unpaid special charges. And I'll turn it over to our finance director, Miss Stahl. [29:30] **Jerilyn Stahl (Finance Director):** Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Members of the council, um, this is our spring certification process. So it is a public hearing. This is the way the city minimizes our losses due to bankruptcies... What we're covering tonight are delinquent utility bills, nuisance abatement, unpaid false alarms, and any tree removal charges. [31:02] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Okay. So any questions? This is a public hearing. So I'll open the public hearing if there's any comments. Seeing no comment I'll move to close the public hearing. [31:26] **John Brummel:** Second. [31:28] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** All those in favor say aye. **Council:** Aye. **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Opposed? Okay. We're now closed. Any final comments? If not, I'll take a motion to— [31:36] **John Brummel:** I move to approve the resolution adopting assessments for the unpaid special charges. [31:42] **Joshua Lee:** Second. [31:44] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Any further discussion? Okay. Roll call, please. [31:48] **Ann Orlowski:** Wolter. **Dan Wolter:** Aye. **Ann Orlowski:** Lee. **Joshua Lee:** Aye. **Ann Orlowski:** Volk. **Michelle Volk:** Aye. **Ann Orlowski:** Hellier. **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Aye. [32:00] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Okay. That passes will now move on to assessment hearing for improvements to 214th street. Approval of resolutions and construction contract for the 2026 miscellaneous project. And we'll turn it back to our public works director. [32:12] **Paul Olmi:** All right. Thank you, mayor, city council members. So yeah, this is a item for the assessment hearing for 214th Street and the miscellaneous project... 214th Street is in very poor condition based on our OCI ratings... McNamara construction was the low bidder at 484,000... The total assessment per unit is proposed at $30,423.60. [38:24] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** I only have one question—the intent is to have this done before the First Center opens? [38:35] **Paul Olmi:** That's correct. [38:37] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Okay, fantastic. Um, this is a public hearing. So I'll open the public hearing if anybody had any comments. [38:53] **John Brummel:** Yeah, seeing that nobody's coming forward, I'd make a motion to close the public hearing. [38:58] **Dan Wolter:** Second. [39:00] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Okay, all those in favor say aye. **Council:** Aye. **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Opposed? Public hearings closed. Any further discussion? If not, I'll take a motion. [39:16] **John Brummel:** Move to approve: one, resolution awarding a contract to McNamara Contracting Incorporated for the 2026 miscellaneous roadway repairs... two, resolution adopting assessments... three, resolution authorizing funding and 2026 budget amendments... and four, proposal with Braun Intertec for professional services. [39:42] **Joshua Lee:** Second. [39:44] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Any further discussion? Seeing none. Roll call please. [Roll call results in unanimous "Aye"]. [40:07] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Very good. Thank you, Mr. Olmi. Uh, we'll now move on to item C: Lakeville 35 Logistics Center, South Edition. Preliminary plat and conditional use permit. And Mr. Strohm to tee this up. Welcome. [40:24] **Tom Strohm (Likewise Partners):** Thank you. Good evening, Mr. Mayor. Members of the council, Tom Strohm Likewise Partners here to represent our project. Um, we're excited to get going on phase two of our Lakeville project... hopefully you guys are excited about the way that turned out. [40:51] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Okay. Council, any questions? I mean more jobs would be great. I mean the turf is fine, but go ahead. [41:03] **Kris Goodroad (Community and Economic Development Director):** Good evening. Mayor, members of the council. Um, representatives from Likewise Partners have submitted the applications for a preliminary plat and a conditional use permit... The site plan includes construction of a 171,000 square foot industrial building... Planning Commission unanimously recommended approval. [43:20] **Joshua Lee:** Just a comment. I looking at this what struck me was the building's orientation... I'm just glad that there's some diversity in the orientation of the building. So you don't look like you're going through some sort of tunnel. Um, so, uh, and the building looks great, too. [44:02] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Well, I'll just say the first one's been great. So we're glad that you're wanting to reinvest again in the city. Uh, Council, I'll take a motion to approve. [44:11] **Dan Wolter:** I move to approve: one, resolution approving the preliminary plat of Lakeville 35 Logistics Center, South Edition, and two, approval of a conditional use permit to permit a warehouse building... [44:23] **Michelle Volk:** Second. [44:25] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Okay. Any further discussion? Not roll call, please. [Roll call results in unanimous "Aye"]. [44:37] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Okay. We will now move into new business, but we're going to take a five-minute break. We'll come back at 6:48. [Break occurs]. [49:56] **Kris Goodroad:** Thank you. Um, as a request of the city council, a draft residential interim ordinance has been prepared for your discussion. The intent of the ordinance is to put a pause in the acceptance of new applications for residential, to allow the city time to study impacts to the Metropolitan Council's Imagine 2050 regional planning document. [51:46] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Thank you. Just kind of broader background too—I mean, part of this was impetus related to what's happening with the legislature and their efforts... My concern long term is that if we just keep building this year without having a moratorium... it puts a little bit more pressure on us to think through our comprehensive plan. [53:48] **Joshua Lee:** There seems to be some good examples just within our city over the last several years... Similarly, you're seeing changes in use of Office Park districts. The concern and one of the examples that I keep thinking about is a property near Antlers Park, which in its current form, could be preempted for quite a large residential facility. And I think that's something that we've heard loud and clear from residents that they don't want there. [57:42] **Dan Wolter:** Well, I think first off, the discussion at the state level has been frustrating in many regards, largely because I don't think there's any city that's done more to address the housing needs of the state than Lakeville in recent years... to me, this is a good time to take a breather and assess where we're at. [58:20] **Michelle Volk:** I have a question. Um, and it's just a curiosity question. How does something like this—I realize a year is a very short term—but how does it affect the property values for the current residents? [58:59] **Justin Miller:** Mayor council, I think it's hard to say, but I don't think it's it's been rare that property values have decreased in Lakeville, regardless of the circumstances outside of maybe the recession and 2008 timeframe. [1:01:03] **John Brummel:** I'm at the point where I can say ditto because a lot of really good points have been made... I think because of there's a lot going on, particularly at the state, it does make sense to take a pause... I would also want to manage expectations that say a moratorium for a year does not mean construction is going to stop. It's going to pretty much look like it had been for a while, especially right off the bat, because once again, we have 1,319 [lots] out there. [1:05:44] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Moving on to item B: water treatment expansion study. Mr. Olmi, you're back up again. [1:06:01] **Paul Olmi:** Thank you. Mayor, city council members. Tonight I'd like to present again the water treatment plant expansion study... the water treatment plant was originally built in 1998... we are looking at needing additional capacity down the road. [1:08:17] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** My question is—Met Council had us at 79,000 for now, coming in 2026. I think it's low to say we're only going to add 6,000 people in the next 14 years. So let's say we get to 90,000 by 2040. Is this enough capacity? [1:08:43] **Paul Olmi:** There is some redundancy and some additional future capacity that we have built into the expansion projections. [1:11:39] **Paul Olmi:** So the three alternatives that we discussed... Alternative number one would be to add two additional filters at the existing water treatment plant... Alternative number two was a satellite plant... 20,000 square foot building. The big change there is redundancy. The delta between alternate number one and number two is about $15 million. [1:16:12] **Michelle Volk:** Can I ask a really dumb question? If we did [Alternative] 1 or 3, would we give up the land that we have available to be able to do a second water treatment plant? And so then at a future date, we'd be looking for a place to have it? [1:16:32] **Justin Miller:** Staff would recommend that we hold on to that property regardless. [1:24:00] **Joshua Lee:** I mean, one thing that I appreciated about the planning of the water treatment plan is that when you're inside, you can see where the wall is intended to be expanded... I alternative three, I just, I think we've already said is off the table... but alternative one, I I'm really weighing how much redundancy is worth the $20 million for a new facility. I just I can't justify it at the moment. [1:26:22] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Well, can you talk again about—I agree with you, except for site redundancy and cyber attack type stuff I get worried about. So having a secondary physical site, I can't put a dollar on that. [1:29:15] **Bo Johnston (Black & Veatch Consultant):** Hey, Bo Johnston. Specifically related to PFAS, um, that satellites usually with the PFAS, you have some sort of polishing treatments on the end of a plant... it would be easier to kind of save space on that other facility for that type of treatment. [1:31:58] **John Brummel:** As I read through all of this, I look at water and I go, this is possibly probably the most life sustaining resource the city offers... Every bit of emergency manager in me says redundancy is particularly important for something like this. So I favor alternative number two. [1:36:00] **Dan Wolter:** I feel like I would be remiss if I didn't complain about the need to plan for three days a year or whatever at that peak usage... and not to muddy the water, but I think I agree with John on the redundancy piece. We're in weird times. I don't think you can articulate how valuable that is. So I'm leaning towards that option [Alt 2], I think. [1:40:51] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** I'm leaning towards it's cheaper now. I realize it's expensive. But to build on the second site because we have it, it's a great location for it and it's a great place to have the redundancy. So I think keep down the road on two, and then we can continue having conversations about the financial impact on ratepayers. Very good. [1:41:11] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** You get to stay because now we're going to talk about the other largesse you want to spend money on. Get them all done. [1:42:07] **Paul Olmi:** All right. Thank you. This is our central maintenance facility needs study. The CMF was constructed in 2002. Population back then was right around 45,000. Today it's 78,000. Vehicle storage is undersized. Currently our operations are parking pickup trucks in the drive aisles over the night. The rough estimate right now is a little over $28 million. Most of that cost is associated with the vehicle storage at 26.1 million. [1:52:16] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** I thought, well, I'll never have to worry about that. That's ten years from now. But here we are. It's the inside storage that I have a little bit of heartburn. [1:53:27] **John Brummel:** I do think that we need this to maintain our assets well. We're looking at $650,000 for a plow truck and keeping that outside? But I think I would look for the cheapest alternative. [1:55:06] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** $26 million for vehicle storage is a lot different than a water treatment plant for 26 million. To the public, they understand you need to treat water. What they will never quite grasp is why we're spending $26 million to keep everything under cover. [1:56:01] **Thomas Strom (Architect):** I think there's a way to create different solutions. You know, Paul talked about rotational stock. I think there's something with a cold storage solution where we could downsize the warm storage. [2:00:25] **John Brummel:** I mean, we've been putting this off forever and a day. [2:00:30] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** I agree. I mean, I think we're all at this point where it's time—we've kicked the can for a decade. It's just how can we tweak it? And maybe so I think that makes total sense to try to value that up a little bit. [2:01:34] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Anything else last before we move on? Okay. Council committee updates. The state of the city is on Wednesday at Chart House. Next council meeting is April 20th. Special city council meeting with ISD 194 on Monday the 27th. That'll take a motion to adjourn. [2:02:28] **Dan Wolter:** So moved. [2:02:30] **John Brummel:** Second. [2:02:32] **Mayor Luke Hellier:** All those in favor say aye. **Council:** Aye. **Mayor Luke Hellier:** Opposed? We're adjourned.