This transcript features a City Council meeting for the City of Hastings, Minnesota. Based on the context provided and the phonetic clues in the text (mapping "Vaughn" to DawnMarie Vihrachoff, "Brocks" to Mya Beck, and "Folch/Fox" to council members commonly serving alongside them), here is the identified speaker list. [0:00] **Mayor Mary Fasbender**: of the united states of america and to the republic for which it stands one nation under god indivisibly with liberty and justice for all [0:18] **Mayor Mary Fasbender**: thank you and welcome let the role reflect that all council members are here with the exception of council member lund tonight we will be doing a proclamation for recognizing national day of deployed veterans day and military family appreciation month whereas it has been a custom to honor and to recognize our nation's service members veterans and their families and whereas october 26 is the national day of deplo of the deployed which honors the brave men and women who have been deployed in service of our country and acknowledges the sacrifices that military families make during deployment and [1:03] **Mayor Mary Fasbender**: whereas in 1954 president dwight d eisenhower signed the first veterans day proclamation calling on our nation to pay homage to the veterans of all its wars who have contributed so much to the preservation of this nation and whereas november marks military family appreciation month a time when america honors and recognizes the unique sacrifices and challenges family members make in support of their loved ones in uniform and whereas the hastings city council pledges our gratitude to every man and women currently serving in uniform to all veterans who have helped preserve preserve and defend our precious freedom and to every family member who shares in the service and sacrifice of military [1:50] **Mayor Mary Fasbender**: life and whereas we ask you to remember to thank and honor our veterans and their families for the sacrifices they have made for our freedom therefore be it resolved the hastings city council hereby recognizes national day of the deployed veterans day and military family appreciation month thank you and our little flags that you have on your diaz is from uh dean marcusen so we thank dean for bringing this proclamation to us and tonight we also have a presentation for the 2021 levee park programming recap welcome paige [2:49] **Paige Marschall Bigler (Recreation Programming Specialist)**: good evening council members and mayor uh happy to be here i'm smiling under my mask right now uh we had our sixth year of programming at levee park at the rotary pavilion so i'm here tonight to share with you a brief recap our season just ended just a short few three weeks ago similar to previous years we've utilized communication planner platforms online and with our local media partners here in hastings calendars were also distributed to local businesses and featured in the rivertown newsletter to date the last the top two ways our residents and visitors hear about our programming at levy park is through our rivertown newsletter as [3:34] **Paige Marschall Bigler**: well as our facebook page the third highest actually being word of mouth [3:45] **Paige Marschall Bigler**: in 2021 we were able to have a full season uh different from 2020 where we did not have programming in the month of june so you'll see a uh quite a big bump in attendance um from 2019 to 2021 and consistently going up we're seeing visitors and residents in hastings attending our programming at levee park [4:13] **Paige Marschall Bigler**: with our programming we did have 37 events seven events were actually canceled due to weather so whether that was the heat advisory that we had for a few weeks our thunderstorms that were forecasted frequently throughout this summer and then the 90 degree heat that we had this summer was not too long ago but those were some struggles that we faced of course every year with weather you just kind of never know what's gonna happen we try to make a consistent call uh all for all of our events the day of at 1 pm to make the cancellation postponement call and fortunately with our agreements and contracts with our performers groups [4:59] **Paige Marschall Bigler**: and program partners we're able to reschedule for 2022 so those funds and that performance group would be rebooked [5:12] **Paige Marschall Bigler**: offerings we offered six different types of programming most popular is our music in the park and this year our partnership with pleasant hill library took a pause similar to last year but an alternative is they had staff and volunteers put together some take and mate crafts that went along with all of our themes for all of our story time in the parks so whether those were daytime or evening story time in the park so that was a fun alternative and we still continue to partnership in that format with pleasant hill library music in the park this is our first full year offering music in the park every thursday from beginning of june to the beginning of september that was really well received both by residents and [5:59] **Paige Marschall Bigler**: visitors and that definitely is a huge shout out to the daffing fund here in hastings making that possible through their donation last year and having those funds roll over to 2021 so we could utilize our 10 000 donation from the daffing fund which really makes a difference in booking our high caliber groups the 10 piece kind of ladies of the 80s groups that really draw bingo out big crowd this summer for our program funding i continue to seek out grants and build partnerships with local organizations and businesses whether those are monetary donations sponsorships or in-kind [6:46] **Paige Marschall Bigler**: to leverage our funding that's allocated and this year we received over 18 thousand dollars in grants sponsorships and donations the doffing fund being one that rolled over from 2020 and then ardent mills is a continued sponsor for six years speed manufacturing has been a sponsor for five years and dakota electric has been a sponsor for five years as well um huge thank you to all of our partners we have over 87 i want to say almost 90 partners that i work with to facilitate all of our programming in our different offerings that we provide our our residents and visitors in hastings here and continue to support from city [7:33] **Paige Marschall Bigler**: council and our parks and rec commission we're so grateful for those continued partnerships and making our programming happen here in hastings for the sixth year uh levee park at the rotary pavilion not only provides um a location for all of our programming down along the riverfront um but also private and public um park rentals so private meeting like a wedding or a family reunion and then public meeting like the always lucy strong or the relay for life or the rivertown live concert so 49 um was a big jump from 2019 and 2020 2020 the downtick and being of course [8:19] **Paige Marschall Bigler**: we did not host events at that facility in june and then also just with the requirements for gatherings under 250 so we saw less less groups wanting to use our spaces but we're really excited and a huge uptick and our park maintenance really worked hard to make that space accessible and available and keeping that up for our rentals whether they're half day full day back to back so pretty much every weekend at levee park was busy and i'm here to stand for any questions or comments i'm happy to be here tonight thank you for for um supporting our programming here in hastings thanks paige counsel any [9:05] **Mayor Mary Fasbender**: comments for paige well i'll thank you for the community as well because i i'm i just it's so exciting to go there every week every thursday to hear music good music and i have so many people that come up to me and say how it's just such a wonderful pavilion and page i always give them your name your are um you you decide on what events to do and you seem to hit all the music that everyone likes so we get that variation of people but everyone comes but it kind of concentrates on a certain group each week so i think i think you've done a great job and continued uh success and for next year yeah thank you mayor [9:52] **Paige Marschall Bigler**: and i look forward to programming in 2022 um and a huge piece i take into consideration is those anecdotal conversations i have with our residents and with our visitors um just those conversations before during and after events i try to be available to take it their input [10:04] **Mayor Mary Fasbender**: great thank you and also tonight we have a presentation via zoom and we will be welcoming christy sebastian and she is the dakota county traffic engineer she will be giving us a brief update on the um pedestrian pedestrian safety crossman crossings for county road 42 welcome christy [10:53] **Mayor Mary Fasbender**: yeah christy i'm not sure if you can hear us but you're not mute i think we're trying to figure things out on our end here she should be you're on [11:52] **Mayor Mary Fasbender**: yep i think we can hear you christy [12:07] **Christy Sebastian**: and more specifically how this relates to an area within these space so we began this assessment earlier this summer and the goal is to we recognize challenges with nations crossing our county hallways so we are looking to develop a consistent approach county-wide to aid us in locations we've identified already that are concerned and also moving forward with ensuring reviews for concerns that might come up in the future so our process involves several components we're looking to identify identified locations that have represented various crosses that we have for example two lane higher speed roadway four-lane [12:53] **Christy Sebastian**: or three-lane divided roadways so we categorize we want to be able to address those different types we are looking at research that has been developed and policies both at through minda and federal highways we're also looking at what people have done agencies have done throughout the country as well so the key piece is that we are conducting observations in a survey at specific locations in dakota county to really get that hands-on assessment of the different enhancements that we've decided to do and how they are are working and then all of that has been come together for the ultimate objective to develop some findings and guidance for us looking forward to professionalism [13:44] **Christy Sebastian**: so pedestrian safety and action that we might take may sound counterintuitive but simply adding signing markings especially for some of our higher speed of all failing roadways alone is actually not going to be a benefit or improve the situation from a staging perspective so we really need to be careful we want to evaluate what the right approach is based on different conditions and what i'm showing here is a few things in our toolbox the considerations that we look at i mentioned a few earlier in the speed and the geometrics we also want to look at what possession activity is traffic finds our consideration along with as well as what is going on within the area so we'd be looking at different conditions such as trail markings maybe [14:30] **Christy Sebastian**: bringing a location to a mid block crossing lighting of course we recognize that these are mainly engineering and our focus is more about engineering and approach we recognize that ultimately people need to be working with law enforcement education as well we have a comprehensive safety approach at the end so one of the locations we initially looked at was the law county road 42 in hastings between madison and pleasant and we looked at this location based on concerns that were raised and we identified that the best location would be a mid-block crossing that would bring the pedestrians to a location that's away from the activity at both of the intersections with people turning onto or off promoting [15:16] **Christy Sebastian**: to reduce complex we would need to modify both the trail and the motorway in order to make that happen put into curb ramps and provide a median refuge in in the in the middle so here i'm showing some of the things we discovered through the the assessments and with this being initially selected one of the pieces of the assessment was to connect the survey so we put out signs you may have seen asking people to use their phone and connect with us and we received 37 responses at this location specifically and 100 of those people were a positive about improvement or enhancing of crossing in this area they also noted that they have very little delay so the issue is not that [16:02] **Christy Sebastian**: they're waiting to find a gap but that they wanted some enhancements in order to much more easily so this is an overview of what we were planning to do and it was the mid-block crossing we'd like to add move the through traffic away from the middle and have a minion refuge in between along with some signing in order to do this we also believe that lighting will help the area and the full median refuge would be constructed so as we went along and we were planning on doing that we decided to put a pause on that that that project specifically we do think we have the right location in terms of [16:48] **Christy Sebastian**: being a mid black crossing and where where the pedestrians and bicyclists are coming from but there is a greater level of questions and issues out here that we would like to address so i will look to pause that particular element i think it would be more comprehensive to look at county reporting to fishing considerations for an entire quarter that being the area from the river to river trail on the north end and down down to the south and this would look both from riverdale down to the industry which i believe it's high and so we'll be looking at trail connectivity we recognize there's a couple of sidewalks or trail gaps in the [17:34] **Christy Sebastian**: area this study would also involve a greater level of community engagement knowing that there's greater challenges here than just the lung crossing and then looking at a longer term from the first of the temporary cancers we are getting closer to the winter season some things we would be able to do on a temperature basis wouldn't be able to stay in the winter and we wouldn't be able to do the lighting most likely so doing this comprehensively will allow us to program a project to address not only the ziploc classes that i mentioned but these other areas as well so the study would entail placing the study 42 for wherever dance of time in our county capital improvement program [18:20] **Christy Sebastian**: and we've identified that 42-161 we have an estimated cost for for the preliminary design conceptual work and then the preliminary design estimate of a hundred thousand dollars there is a fifty percent city share for the project so fifteen um dollars the plumeric designs would start early next year allow us to assess the the stream connectivity and what all the various concerns are and be able to identify what enhancements and actions should be taken so we could develop a whole plan along with the cost estimate and have discussions through the 2020 to 2027 [19:06] **Christy Sebastian**: capital improvement forever cip process next year in the city to better inform them to know what what the improvements may be and what those costs will entail and with that i thank you for inviting me here today and i will be happy to answer any questions [19:24] **Mayor Mary Fasbender**: thank you christy for your presentation counsel any questions at this time okay no later on we will take you be having a motion for this in the later in our packet so thank you again christy uh council members are there any corrections to the minutes from the [19:52] **Mayor Mary Fasbender**: workshop or regular meetings on october 4th seeing none they are approved for public comments we will be doing that right now and we have options for comments to be mailed prior to the meeting as well as interactive feature during the meeting for this email for the email comments they have been forwarded to the city council and the receipt is acknowledged please recognize that items not on the agenda will not be discussed this evening for live comments they may either be through zoom or in person we ask that the attendees either raise to accept the consent agenda to approve council member brock's and council member vaughn with the second [20:38] **Mayor Mary Fasbender**: council do you have any new discussion okay all those in favor of the emotions state by saying i i those opposed state by saying nay that motion prevails tonight under public works we already saw the presentation of the pedestrian safety assessment and now we'll i would accept a motion if there's not any if there isn't any additional discussion for that to accept the motion to accept the pedestrian safety assessment council member leiffeld [21:18] **Councilmember Lisa Leifeld**: some move i would like to recommend that we um approve to authorize the pedestrian safety assessment joint study with dakota county [21:26] **Mayor Mary Fasbender**: okay thank you councilmember lyffeld councilmember fox with a second any additional account uh discussion council oh councilmember fox [21:31] **Councilmember Jen Fox**: just to add to that i'm excited to see this study come through i have many many concerns from constituents about these crossings particularly pine river and in between madison and exactly what we just saw so i just want to thank thank the operations committee for moving this to our attention [21:49] **Mayor Mary Fasbender**: so thank you councilmember fox all those in favor of the motion state by saying i i opposed to the motion state by saying nay and that motion prevails tonight under administration we have a focus engineering contract and for this [22:09] **City Administrator Dan Wietecha**: good evening we have contracted with focus engineering for the past six years for our city engineer service our current contract runs through december 2022 so a little over a year from now our proposal is my proposal is to amend that contract and do a few things most notably to add some services some responsibility for focus to provide public works director service for the city uh this would be [22:55] **City Administrator Dan Wietecha**: enter an interim appointment through the remainder of the contract roughly the next year additionally it does make some changes to the payments under the contract currently we have a monthly retainer plus hourly service under this it would change strictly to an hourly service it retains ryan stimsky's hourly rate but because of the change from retainer to hourly as well as an addition of of some additional hours it would be a net cost increase for the city which i believe reflects the added responsibilities of the public works service or public works director service [23:44] **City Administrator Dan Wietecha**: in in total there actually is a cost savings because we're not filling the public works director position at this time but would expect that that could be kept in the 2022 budget as a placeholder so that if we needed additional project management or some additional assistance throughout the department it helps us backfill that the interim recommendation does a few things for us at one it gives us some stability in the department at a key point in time obviously we have a closing out project with mndot on 316 planning for projects [24:31] **City Administrator Dan Wietecha**: future projects on 42 and 46 with dakota county planning which is starting to really ramp up for highway 61 with mndot and our workshop earlier this evening some planning with met council for relocation the wastewater treatment plant so some real key projects going on uh helps to maintain those relationships and and have experience that we have in house with with ryan some stability so that staff and the public can see what we're doing instead of wondering uh what our efforts are for filling the the vacant position um and ryan stimsky [25:17] **City Administrator Dan Wietecha**: with his time here has really shown experience and built relationships with these other agencies that would serve us well to continue in an interim position with that i can take any questions [25:22] **Mayor Mary Fasbender**: thank you dan counsel any questions for dan councilmember beck [25:24] **Councilmember Mya Beck**: since i wasn't on the operations committee but i'm one and i know chair lund isn't here so maybe could council members vaughn or leifeld just summarize the discussion that you had in your committee just so i don't re-ask any of the same questions [25:52] **Councilmember DawnMarie Vihrachoff**: thank your honor dan did a decent job explaining it i think our biggest concern was mine was it's a department head and i didn't really want to i think the department should be an employee of the city but we're starting to recognize that it's like everywhere there's a shortage of workers out there and these um ryan and his his company is high high value and and i get it why they do what they do and dan made the very good point that really helped me was we got some big projects here in the next year year and a half and having ryan stay with us as our public works director and engineering service is very important to us to get us through this hump and then we're going to reevaluate how do we look at this position and it might be a better time at that time to go out and look for another public works director so that's how we kind of concluded that it's the [26:49] **Councilmember DawnMarie Vihrachoff**: next year and a half that was so important to us and ryan has been with us and it's not just city projects it's dealing with state and uh county on some projects so it was important to have ryan's expertise with us to stick with us [27:03] **Mayor Mary Fasbender**: so thank you councilmember [27:04] **Councilmember Lisa Leifeld**: thank you yeah and to council member vaughn's point it was an just a real eye-opening conversation for me and when we talk about the fact that we're the people aren't out there they're not applying for the jobs that that we need at this level especially and so we talked about the um you know looking at within our own our own home right within the house here and um making sure that we're training and teaching and mentoring the staff that we have in an effort to [27:35] **Councilmember Lisa Leifeld**: have these jobs you know as they can increase so i've i was i had a lot of questions about it and agreed with the you know we want that position to be a city employee but right now this is from what we came up with it's it's what is best for the city right now and in completely capable hands of ryan so it was good conversation and it's um definitely what we found to be was right not only for the city but also for the staff out there you know to give them that comfort level of having someone that they trust and that they know and is going to lead them so that was our conversation [28:18] **Mayor Mary Fasbender**: thank you i appreciate that [28:20] **Councilmember Mya Beck**: and my question is more about future planning i support this motion i support um extending this contract to focus engineering i'm just thinking about what's next and so my question is do we expect something to change in the next several years if so what or have we looked at the position and are other cities doing similar things where they're having to contract out specific positions or are they changing who they're looking to hire how you know kind of what is the future outlook for this position and what can we do in the meantime to make sure that when we come back to this we have new opportunities in the pipeline thank you councilmember beck [29:07] **City Administrator Dan Wietecha**: um in terms of having uh some added bench within in our department uh we're not going to build that in a year um it might help with some of the existing positions so that they're in a better position for for a step up but not all the way to public works director i know that some of our peer communities are having difficulty hiring it's not for similar positions it's not something specific to hastings i wish i had the crystal ball to know what it looks like a year from now there might be things that we could actions we could take to to change [29:54] **City Administrator Dan Wietecha**: um that hiring environment in the future this past summer or earlier this year when when looking at hiring the position we talked to uh some of our networks and contacts to come up with about a dozen names of potential candidates and and recruited specifically you know said hey you you might be a good fit here plea please consider applying and we did have a couple of them uh did express some interest in the position um but so anyways the point being i don't think it was our advertising wasn't just a matter of put out an ad and we didn't get responses we we actually went out and beat the bushes and tried to find some i think we would continue that type of effort [30:41] **City Administrator Dan Wietecha**: i think there's some other targeted recruiting we could do through public works association and just some of those industry groups invergrove heights currently trying to hire for a similar position i believe wound up after a failed first round went and hired a head hunter so there might be some other ways like that that we could look at a year from now it does hiring a a recruiting firm help get us additional candidates that we might not have identified there might be an option like that um i think certainly we could look at things like reconsidering the requirements of the job description and [31:27] **City Administrator Dan Wietecha**: things of that sort as well uh you know there was a specific piece of our prerequisite in our job description that had some some pushback and some questions about if we set the bar too high but going into it was something we had deliberately said that was a a standard we wanted to have but that might be something we would reconsider in the future [31:49] **Councilmember Mya Beck**: thank you yeah my thought was just that if we're doing a compensation study also that might address some of this is it possible that it would address this pay scale and and really just thinking about what do we have to offer as a competitive advantage as hastings what are we offering these candidates that they can't get somewhere else i don't know off the top of my head what i would say but you know have we thought about our story and how we're pitching ourselves that was just what was going through my mind thank you councilmember beck [32:38] **Mayor Mary Fasbender**: thank you dan councilmember folch [32:39] **Councilmember Tina Folch**: thank you your honor i'm supportive of moving ahead with ryan i've been impressed with ryan over the last few years and so thank you ryan for for stepping up and wanting to serve in this capacity um for our city um one thing that i was a little concerned about was just the number of hours um that ryan's gonna be putting in 32 hours a week whereas i guarantee nick wasn't putting in 32 hours i'm sure it was probably more like 48 or something like that and so um just i just wanted to say that [33:02] **Councilmember Tina Folch**: obviously that work still needs to get done and perhaps it's being delegated to other you know staff within the engineering department and i just want to make sure that we're taking care of whoever that extra workload might be pushing being pushed to and that if um and if there is another staff member that's suddenly you know beginning to work out of class or needing to have their job duties um re-looked at their job descriptions and such i think that we should be fair to whoever else is picking up you know the the slack in the meantime so um i concur with uh council member brock's that i'm concerned that things aren't gonna change within it within a year because um this isn't new this whole uh [33:48] **Councilmember Tina Folch**: dilemma about not being able to get qualified public works directors you know within the metro area that are also requiring the engineering degrees it's very common um at this point it's just that government doesn't pay enough and there's not enough folks who are going into civil engineering to be able to fill all the slots that are available so um so yeah i think that we definitely need to think outside the box and you know how is it that we're going to be doing this differently a year from now because i mean i would put money down that we're going to run into the same scenario again if we just um just repost the position as it is um just because it's been going on so for several years now where this is a really um difficult position to be able to fill here in minnesota so so that's it thank you [34:35] **Mayor Mary Fasbender**: thank you councilmember folch no additional discussion and i would look for a motion to accept the amendment to the professional services agreement with focus engineering council member fox [34:49] **Councilmember Jen Fox**: second [34:50] **Mayor Mary Fasbender**: second by council member beck additional discussion all those in favor of the motion state by saying i i those opposed to the motion state by saying nay and that motion prevails again ryan thank you for all your work that you've done and we'll continue to do we're excited to have you to be continued to be here and with 316 and all the other projects that you're going to be working on thank you [35:20] **Mayor Mary Fasbender**: good tonight we are going to also look at liquor license fees and dan with teacher you can continue continue your conversation with us on a on another item thank you [35:36] **City Administrator Dan Wietecha**: this is not an action item tonight but potentially would appreciate some feedback or direction from city council last year during the height of kovid as well as this spring as we were starting to come out of covid the city council waived the fees for several different liquor licenses for uh on-premises uh establishments [36:06] **City Administrator Dan Wietecha**: um much of that i believe right i know in the prior conversations much of that was due to uh restrictions put in place uh during covid whether it was state executive orders limiting hours of operation or occupancy limits recognize that that impacted business viability at this point those orders have certainly expired but covid still does have an impact psychologically on people's willingness and comfort going to restaurants and bars in town [36:53] **City Administrator Dan Wietecha**: with that lead in if council is comfortable or so inclined at keeping our existing fees in place those bills will go out at the end of november uh due at the end of december um and no action is needed that the mechanism is already in place and we'll move forward but if council has other thoughts and and is interested in waiving or reducing fees again i need to know that so that we can have appropriate ordinance on the council agenda in november so you [37:39] **City Administrator Dan Wietecha**: can stop that that automatic process and do something different so i i know that when we talked about it back in april there was some hesitancy on was it right to waive it again but council obviously decided to but there also was some deliberate discussion on this is something we want to see or you want to see again in six months and and not have just just automatically waived so with that i can take any questions you have or certainly would appreciate any feedback on where your minds are about whether fees would be waived for the next six months or not thank you dan any discussion council if not then we [38:26] **Mayor Mary Fasbender**: will just move on okay councilmember folch [38:34] **Councilmember Tina Folch**: thank you your honor you know honestly i haven't uh had the opportunity to speak at length with you know the restaurants in town who have the on sale liquor licenses to know exactly where they are in their recovery process um you know i don't know if any of the other council members have had you know that opportunity i think that um some of the i've heard posit very very positive feedback about the patio extensions you know down in the downtown area and that um that folks were feeling very good about that but i'm not sure to what extent i had [39:12] **Councilmember Tina Folch**: heard um a couple of the restaurant owners say that it has been slow going and then furthermore they've had a lot of difficulty with just staffing and having enough you know staff on hand to be able to even work at you know full capacity and so um i think would be interesting to take the opportunity to get some feedback i don't know if we wanted you know to invite them so that we could have a public hearing from them and have you know some conversation or um we all you know just reach out on our own or you know that we just have i just think it's fair to have a communication with them to really baseline how how are they feeling and and to really um be thoughtful about how [39:58] **Councilmember Tina Folch**: it is we move forward so i open that up for other consider you know discussion concerts members thanks [40:15] **Mayor Mary Fasbender**: councilmember lifeville [40:17] **Councilmember Lisa Leifeld**: thank you anna you know to council member folch's point you know as we've talked about this over the last year and a half plus right um a lot of it started because so you know if there was a way that we were able and i know there were programs you know that we you know that the state had and that the county had and there were grants and there was you know money available to other businesses as well but just for the people who are listening and wondering well what is this why do we keep doing this with bars and restaurants this is an in-house fee it's something that we can [40:44] **Councilmember Lisa Leifeld**: control um i do see the staffing being an issue it definitely has a lot of impact on how many people you can have in your in your bar or restaurant that at a time if you know if they can be helped so i'd be very curious to hear what everyone else's thoughts are i think to council member folks just point i'd like to hear a little bit more about how everyone feels i you know my my significant other is in the industry and i don't i don't even have a answer for you know obviously taking fees away is always helpful to a business you know especially these small businesses that we're talking about so i'd be curious to know what other [41:29] **Councilmember Lisa Leifeld**: council members think and maybe it goes back to dan's point where we say you know what let's let's look at it further you know and put it in our november agenda i just don't think the answer to me today is no let's just charge them i think we i think i need more than than my being able to say to you today yeah that let's just go back to charging it in november and it's back to business as usual for us so that's my my opinion anyway [41:59] **Mayor Mary Fasbender**: thank you your honor i think our businesses all around town have have done well and i think they've truly appreciated the breaks that we have give them given them um i don't know that they're expecting additional assistance at this point because they feel the community has really stepped up and supported them locally i guess moving forward if we maybe have a motion to look further into it or do the other council people would like to speak otherwise we just give dan direction to either get a little more information or we just move on and they mail out the licenses on november 1st [43:03] **Councilmember Mya Beck**: would it be instead of asking individual people would it be worth a conversation with the chamber of commerce to see if they've had feedback in sort of a more generic way so we're not reaching out to individual owners or individual businesses because i i would imagine this varies people's opinions are going to vary so if we can identify like a pattern or some data in general maybe the chamber of commerce would be a good resource to talk to and then that information could come back to us with the next proposal or not [43:30] **Councilmember Jen Fox**: council member fox um speaking as a business owner your honor um i i would naturally abstain from this vote however i think it's valuable insight um fees will be have to will have to be reinstated at some point and business owners would much rather and again speaking from my own personal perspective i would much rather start paying fees again after the summer then after the winter and then budgeted into the winter so um just considering this could be a cold dark scary time with kovid still out there during the winter time bars and restaurants are not feeling very optimistic about that my my personal perspective however at some point we're gonna have to reinstate fees we have to pay for liquor licenses so that's something that has been considered hopefully by most and many bar and restaurant owners [44:17] **Councilmember Mya Beck**: i agree with council member beck i think reaching out to the chamber of commerce would be a great resource i know they recently again personal perspective did a survey of what your main concerns and stresses are so there's some fresh data there that we could work with so thank you [44:48] **Councilmember DawnMarie Vihrachoff**: councilmember vaughn i i think we still need um i would need a matrix of why we have fees for a reason so we're gonna have to backfill that somehow and i don't i like to get input but i also want a matrix we gotta we need to justify versus word of mouth or someone saying hey i could really use it i get i understand everything but when do we when do we use a matrix to say okay now there's a reason why we do something that's why i support what staff saying today that we needed there's no matrix to say you know what like counts for life i'll talk before it was because they were restricted now i get it staffing but there's a lot of businesses that are restricted we're one of them we can't find a public works director so that's a we got a good one though i got it full disclosure i really like the focus engine that's what i want so i'd be very cautious waiving fees again because it's going to come from somewhere and it's the taxpayers through their budget so i would want a matrix before we justify waiving them again thank you [46:04] **Councilmember Mya Beck**: thank you councilmember i don't want to belabor the point but i was just thinking similar thoughts if we can consistently waive the fee then why are we collecting it and obviously if we need the fee it is covering some cost and if we're not going to have that revenue then do we need to have that fee at all so i guess my question is a little bit broader in the sense that if we're charging a fee that we can easily waive maybe we should be approaching liquor licenses with a different structure than if we're just able to just say well we're gonna do without forty three thousand dollars of revenue you know so i guess my thoughts on it are i would i would support reinstating the fee for some of the reasons that council member fox was saying after the summer and not in the middle of the winter might be better and if we don't need to have this money then why are we charging it in the first place so that would be my my question about waving it again if that was so if that was proposed thank you councilmember beck [46:58] **City Administrator Dan Wietecha**: yes dan just as a partial clarification although we have waived those fees for the last year and a half we've backfilled that with cares and arpa money so it has not been a hole in our coffers that without that other funding it would have had a more direct impact on on city and it's it's not a fee that we've gone without or could easily do away with [47:43] **Mayor Mary Fasbender**: okay so you have your direction dan thank you council all right tonight uh the re renew the arts task force for the sign i'm dan will continue [48:07] **City Administrator Dan Wietecha**: thank you as i'm sure you recall after our or during our last uh city council meeting uh there was lengthy discussion about a proposal uh to consider creating an arts and culture commission um the city council referred that to the planning committee of council who is council members folch lieffeldt and vaughan they met last week and discussed the importance of having arts in our community and how do we continue to support that recognize some practical limitations with just a matter of not having staff bandwidth to take on added responsibilities to supporting a commission the committee recommended several parts but essentially to reinvigorating our existing arts task force uh and and additionally asking it a couple of uh [49:22] **City Administrator Dan Wietecha**: specific things one uh what let it do some of that advisory role at what does it see about potential structural changes is a task force adequate or is that too time-bound and should there be something more ongoing such as a commission some of the other logistics of potentially making a change or not making a change you know how do we support it from a staffing standpoint how do we support it with volunteers in the community how do we support it from a budget standpoint but tasking charging the task force with what are its advisory pieces to how that might look going forward the other is not wanting to have a pause on the importance of of arts in our community but wanting it to actually identify some short-term action items uh the next six to 12 months and things that the task force might be able to take on uh in the immediate future um recognize that that there are some other questions about the task force hasn't met in a couple of years are individual members still able and [50:53] **City Administrator Dan Wietecha**: interested in is is this the role that they signed up for is this changing and maybe their interest has changed obviously some people from the community that that propose the made the commission proposal have expertise and passion that might be tapped to either join the task force or or help supplement it or enlarge the existing task force but essentially that's what the planning committee's recommendation was was uh let's get the task force back in operation uh have it make some recommendations for the long term as well as identify some some short-term tasks that it could take on to support arts and with that i can certainly take questions and all the planning commission planning committee members are here and can certainly speak to it as well or clarify something that i might have glossed over thank you [51:41] **Mayor Mary Fasbender**: thank you dan uh councilmember folch [52:03] **Councilmember Tina Folch**: thank you your honor thank you dan that was a very well said synopsis of our conversation um i would add however that um the three of us were all very supportive of moving forward and uh and there was agreement that we felt there probably was enough support um to move ahead with an arts commission however we wanted to also you know just be very respectful about the implications of having a commission and and its impacts you know to staff and so um you know staffing when you're starting a new commission is is a is a big lift um because you need a person who is you know knowledgeable and has some background in you know that subject matter but then they also have to have the bandwidth and so i think that it's really prudent you know to start with the arts task force so that um whoever it gets you know assigned to so that they can you know track the number of hours you know that they're having you know to put in to it so that there's a love a love level of effort um and and then as a part of all of the other recommendations i think it's really [53:13] **Councilmember Tina Folch**: important that uh that we all uh recognize you know what the implications of that are on staff members i think some folks just you know think that oh you know what do you need a staff person for all their you know they're just putting together an agenda and and it's not true you know the staff do so much leg work behind the scenes that i i don't think folks can really you know comprehend um how hard they work especially when there's um analysis that needs to be done or you know follow-up minutes to meetings and and all of that so um i think that it's just very you know very important that we're being you know cautious in that respect but as dan had said we all felt that it was important to keep [53:59] **Councilmember Tina Folch**: this moving along um and so that we don't lose synergy and i highly recommend and the other council members can chime in about i think it is very important to expand the membership of this new arts task force you know test forces usually have a shorter duration of time attached to them and furthermore they have a specific objective and the original objective of the original arts task force was to uh you know expand public art within our community and so that there was um an allocation that i believe it was ten thousand dollars that was set aside and it was you know up to them to figure out okay well what um what makes sense [54:45] **Councilmember Tina Folch**: for our community and how do we go ahead and award that and the final the final product was the the beautiful mural that we have now on the hastings family service you know back wall and so um with moving ahead now again with the arts task force just to you know very be be very clear that the objective is no longer that that it will be just specifically i'm figuring out you know future objectives and missions for the group coming up with a short-term work plan um and and and really making recommendations about how to move forward and perhaps you know that's also well what does that mean staffing-wise do we need another half-time person do we do staff augmentation by you know contracting with [55:32] **Councilmember Tina Folch**: someone who does arts related consulting you know just so that we have you know something firmer uh to move ahead with i just think it's very you know very prudent and because we all recognize that there have been some challenges with on some of the other tasks or the commissions within the city and we want to make sure that you know volunteers who would also be on the commission that it's time well spent for them and that we're setting everybody else setting everyone staff including up for uh for success you know into the future and so um i know it's probably not what uh some individuals in the community were hoping for that we would just move forward with the commission but you know the one thing that i've learned in the last five years i've been on the council is that you really have to have patience you [56:18] **Councilmember Tina Folch**: would hope that we could snap our fingers and move some things along very quickly but um doing our due diligence and making sure that we're moving forward um in a prudent manner uh will hopefully you know result in a better product in the end so um with that said i will uh i'll personally make a mish motion just to get it out there and that uh that we re reinvigorate the arts task force we do expand the membership and and define its objective as being you know coming up with recommendations for how to move forward with an arts commission which includes staffing recommendations roles and responsibilities for commission members [57:04] **Councilmember Tina Folch**: and staff creating a work plan a short term work plan and in taking into consideration what a budget might look like for an arts commission you know to have a small amount of money perhaps that's set aside for um so that work can be done and that they're not um their hands aren't tied if they would like to do a little you know imp program implementation so um i know that was probably a really long motion but i just think it's really important that we we really define how it is that we would like for this to proceed so thanks [57:48] **Mayor Mary Fasbender**: councilmember folch i'd look for a second to the motion council member lifefelt additional discussion counsel councilmember beck [57:50] **Councilmember Mya Beck**: so i am supportive of the motion i just have a question about some of the underlying assumptions so what i heard dan saying is there's still going to have to be some work done from a staff perspective on like having conversations with current arts task force members that could be recruiting for new arts task force members there's several things you know creating a direction for the group a mission some of that has already been laid out in draft form um so my question is it seems like there's an underlying assumption that the arts task force would be less staff intensive than a commission but my question is is dan you know some of the things i just mentioned still have to be done and is there availability from a staff perspective to support some of those tasks that's the only reason that i was concerned last time and i don't [58:37] **Councilmember Mya Beck**: know if the of a commission versus a task force matters from a staff perspective because there's still originating tasks that will have to be done because this is a new thing so whether it's a new commission or a reinvigorated arts task force it sounds like there's still staff work to be done is that true or am i missing something [59:04] **City Administrator Dan Wietecha**: um in terms of the initial reinvigorating the task force if it's a matter of making seven phone calls to see if people are still interested uh in in serving in the uh somewhat refashioned body although it takes time it's it's seven phone calls it you know maybe a follow-up phone call but it shouldn't be that difficult to getting it relaunched the the real place that it becomes more difficult is that ongoing support if this body call it a task force call it a commission call it some something else if it's going to start meeting monthly that's the place that will be more difficult for staff support i want to be optimistic and think that we can give it some but uh really i i don't have an uh last meeting uh that some of those those people that might serve on the task force would bring [1:00:10] **City Administrator Dan Wietecha**: their knowledge and their passion that voluntarily they would pick up some of that staff role so although there might be a need to schedule a meeting take minutes research some topic really hopefully whatever might fall on staff at least early on would be minimal you know possibly the recommendation might be here's what it needs long term for for going forward and that might mean you know some some more dedicated staff going forward but the the hope is that in this initial kickstart to it uh uh that it would have enough momentum and interest from the the members themselves that they would carry it um or most of it [1:01:06] **Councilmember Mya Beck**: i could respond and just sound like you are supportive of this effort and you are in agreement with the planning committee's recommendation and you can support it from a staff perspective [1:01:21] **City Administrator Dan Wietecha**: as it's presented with restarting the task force charging it with reviewing what its structure might be you know what are some budgetary staff support mission gov sort of the governance aspect to it as a task force or commission and charging it with come up with a short list of short-term immediate goals that it might work towards that kick-off i i can certainly support the implementing those goals over the next six to 12 months it really will need for the members of that task force or some of their support network to step up to pulling those off but i can certainly support the motion i certainly do thank you [1:02:30] **Councilmember DawnMarie Vihrachoff**: councilmember vaughn i i support the motion too and i i appreciate the conversation the one part i i hesitated a little bit with the motion was create a budget and i hope the budget is to determine what will it cost on staff time because we don't allow any of our other commissions to create a budget so i want to make sure that we're not setting a precedence i hope that the budget part of the motion is what does it really cost us if we were to if we were to implement a full commission so otherwise i support everything that was said today i think [1:02:55] **Councilmember DawnMarie Vihrachoff**: it's the right thing just do it this way and contour folks is right be patient because we got to make sure we do it right if we're going to do it in my opinion so let's just make sure we cross all the t's and doubt all the eyes as we move forward into this thank you [1:03:22] **Councilmember Mya Beck**: i want to honor the disappointment that the advocates might feel when they watch this meeting so i just wanted to bring that up i know we had a very long conversation the last meeting about a commission and this is a different thing and that's okay and i also want to honor the committee structure that me and my colleagues work within and hashing out ideas in a committee is working for us so thank you for your time doing that and i do i too uh support this motion particularly the way it was detailed and worded so thank you councilmember folch thank you council number fox thank you honor and being part of that committee that had this conversation [1:04:15] **Councilmember Lisa Leifeld**: for me it's a matter of this is a spot for us to get it started right we've talked about it and talked about it and it's like what do we do what how do we get this rolling and to me it's and i've used the expression skin in the game but it's a budgetary issue for me and i've learned a little bit from my colleague councilmember vaughn when we talk about you know this budget's already in you know in place for next year so this gives us that opportunity to look at it to get it moving to get it started to find out how it's going to work for the city because i know there's a great untapped resource there from a city you know city level with the arts so for me it was a budgetary concern right now this gets it started and we can continue to move it forward and see where it it goes come next next budget cycle so that was my standpoint on it so i also support the recommendation thank you honor and i'll just add to it i'm sure they're listening in the crowd so [1:05:13] **Mayor Mary Fasbender**: um we do feel and we know your passion and we're trying to work together to get arts culture back in in continued in our communities so like council member fault said we'll be patient and we'll get through this like we've done many other things so thanks committee for your time in this and there is a motion on the table all those in favor of the motion state by saying i i those not in favor of the motion state by saying nay and that motion prevails council members do you have any announcements okay i do have a few um the council did hold a closed session on monday october 4th [1:06:00] **Mayor Mary Fasbender**: to conduct the performance evaluation of the city administrator and provided him with direction and feedback the hastings police department is holding its annual pink patch project to raise awareness and support breast cancer research a variety of items are available for sale through october 29th on saturday october 23rd about 50 new boulevard trees will be planted to replace removed repo replaced trees that were removed this summer due to emerald ash borer volunteers are needed to help with planting trees thank you to the tree trust committee for providing the trees artspace is inviting the public to view [1:06:47] **Mayor Mary Fasbender**: art displays and to learn more about artists and art space on saturday october 23rd from noon to 3. the community halloween party is friday october 29th from 6 to 8 at the high school lower level the free event includes giveaways and candy activity stations and costume contests the downtown business association is holding a halloween candy crawl on october 31st from 2 to 5 and that will be on 2nd street compost your pumpkin at your free pumpkin drop-off on sunday november 7th from 3 to 8 at the dakota county maintenance shop please remove paint [1:07:33] **Mayor Mary Fasbender**: candles wax and other organic materials non-organic materials meetings to follow are tuesday october 19th the heritage preservation commission has been canceled thursday october 21st the planning commissioning workshop is at 6 pm with a public safety advisory commission meeting at 6 30 pm monday october 25th planning commission is at 7 pm thursday october 26th is finance committee at 7 30 a.m monday november 1st is a city council meeting at 7 00 p.m and with those messages or um sorry um announcements i [1:08:19] **Mayor Mary Fasbender**: would accept a motion to adjourn councilmember folch and councilmember beck no discussion all right all those in favor of the motion to adjourn state by saying aye aye opposed state by saying nay all right we are adjourned thank you everyone