e e e e e e e e all right we're all active here in chatty here tonight so uh this is uh I'm calling the uh March 19th 2025 Cottage go city council meeting to order um our first order of business is the Pledge of Allegiance so if You' please rise 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 all right well the clerk please is Du the role Council Clon here council member Olsen here council member thei here council member Garza here mayor Bailey here uh next on our agenda this evening is open Forum this is the opportunity for anybody who wants to speak on something that normally is I'll say is not on tonight's agenda however we do have somebody that did sign up because we had a sign up out there and um they want to talk we're doing a bid award later this evening but I thought it might be better maybe just in this particular case to let Kelly is it Kelly Don Kelly Don uh Kelly Don if you want to come up and express whatever it is that you you you want to tell us about it uh just state name and address for the record and uh we'll take that and then obviously utilize it and and answer your questions after okay thank you yes so I do have um contact information for other homeowners in the Hidden Valley neighborhood as well that also um wanted to um have their voices be heard as well um but I can give those in a second um I've got I spoke very passionately passionately last time I was here um and I am excited to see that the bid came in significantly lower than they had initially anticipated however the company that they chose shows MN uh mcnamer um Contracting um I know that the city has used them before but I don't know if the city's aware of the absolutely horrific reviews they have as a company in general um and I would like to know what is in their contract that if they were to damage personal property um as they have seemed to have done several different times on several different projects in several different cities um and I brought actually all of the reviews that I was able to get printed so you guys can see those um what does that what what is in their contract to protect the homeowners first and foremost um secondly I wanted to point out that the second um company that was the second lowest bid they actually have pretty fantastic reviews their bid came in at $57,900 to possibly look at utilizing them instead um I think that as a homeowner at $255 for a slight Peace of Mind rather than A500 or $1,000 homeowners insurance policy deductible um especially if one of the reviews um I couldn't get it to print but they had um mcnamer had ruptured a city water line that ended up backing up in their home and I don't know if you guys know um but if you don't have homeowners insurance that covers flooding often times those types of um those types of things aren't covered under some homeowners because they're it's outside water coming into the home um and it depends specifically on each individual insurance company but I think that that's something um that we really should look into because that could be a very costly event if that were to happen when they're doing our our project um the other thing that I wanted to talk about is the park Edition so they are doing a um covered Pavilion with three picnic tables with a basketball hoop um and I wanted to actually take this back to the park redus um so all of the many of the other neighborhoods um that had gotten Park redus had strong input from the neighborhoods Hidden Valley was never given that opportunity um I bet you if you were to currently poll homeowners I would say that roughly 90% of the neighborhood wishes our Park was never redone it was redone significantly less of a standard than the old park none of us even knew that the park was even being done that was admitted by Zach in the city as well when I had originally emailed him he said he swore that Hidden Valley was um was questioned about the park redo and he went back into his notes and he couldn't find any information about it um and now here we have a large bill um and the park additions are I think I did the math and it came in at about $78,000 um for the addition that 50% of the neighborhood doesn't want we don't want a basketball hoop we have a basketball hoop with paths right within a 5 minute maybe seven minute walking distance um the how that area is in on top of the hill that basketball hoop is just going the basketball swings are just going to Echo all the way down into the rest of the neighborhood um so I would really love to have that looked at as well um and then here's the other homeowners yeah you want to give it to me yeah yeah I'll take those thank you so I just wrote the name this is Megan um and she really has the same sentiment as me um and then this is an actual letter from Kelly and then this is all of the reviews um this is M's reviews this is the next lowest company's star rating and then some of the most concerning reviews for Mair are attached as well okay thank you and are you going to stay for the bit because they'll answer your questions or or share feedback okay hopefully can mexo at 3 a.m. I am very tired all right sounds good thank you thank you for sharing uh was there anybody else that wants to speak on anything that's not on tonight's agenda under open Forum that one too thank you all right I'm I'm going to go ahead then and close open forum and then uh what we'll do now is move on to number five which is adoption of the agenda move the agenda we have a motion by council member Olen second second by council member Clawson all those in favor signify by saying I I I opposed motion carries uh next is six which is probably my favorite part of tonight's meeting and that is introducing rigs which is our Cottage gr Public Safety therapy dog and I believe uh Sergeant Mike McCormick um is going to introduce uh detective Scott Schaefer and is this where the councilor really wants to come down in front they can if they want we're doing this okay he's not related to scout right what's that no so may or I do have a couple couple slides I was just going to present while we while we do this say hi hi bud how are you yeah safy board Chief ker was like well maybe we should maybe we should bring the dog at the end because he's going to be a distraction it's like then no one's going to see me you know screw up if we have something like this you know that's good strategy I think so yeah honorable mayor honorable mayor council thank you for this opportunity to introduce uh something that we're really excited um if anybody seen our Facebook page um anything that's got a thousand likes or more this guy's This Guy's in every one of them so uh he's been a been a really wel welcome Edition um this kind of started with as we continue to add to our case management unit um Jen Stubblefield our newest social worker is also part of that new addition and and rigs is the uh the newest member um of our department first first therapy dog um that we've had so he uh right here how he's acting as how he is on a normal day this is actually um Scott was telling me he's pretty worked up right now it's like 12 weeks so uh for to to be a puppy worked up like that that I'll take that because I have I have one like this that's not like that at all so um so tell you were upset he was I always supp live minesa um so a couple things you know we've already seen rigs in action on on some of our uh our case management calls where he can go in and just be that that voice or that that calming presence for someone in crisis and um so that's really what his role is going to be is to enhance mental health and therapy support and I can tell you that there's First Responders that have had their days better just because of just rigs being there and um so you know initially the whole idea was to bring it bring rigs out in the community to help with uh those in crisis but then we see with our officers and our our EMS staff that have bad days and they go right to him too and so it's it's really been a godson having having rigs here um role is to offer offer Comfort during difficult moments kind of like I was just talking about strengthen emotional well-being for those who serve and those we support and again it's really a big step for for our case management program as we've been trying to get out in the community and trying to do stigmatize with the with the community what the role with police is in in that and now we have this this little guy right here which just makes it even better so what is what is he going to do what's what's are his expectations um playing a vital role with our Public Safety team providing emotional support and strengthening Community connections um so he's accompanied by um Scott so if Scott isn't here then rigs isn't out in the field so we just much like our K9 uh officers there he's kind of a one dog one dog owner kind of thing although rigs can get along with just about anybody and I don't think anybody want to be in the room by themselves as will Scout but I'd I'd be okay with this one airplane yeah um he's going to assist on calls where his presence can help Foster trust and provide Comfort during difficult situations uh he's training with Soldier 6 which is an amazing group um yeah for those that uh that don't know they specialize in uh helping people that are um dealing with post-traumatic stress or other other type of stressful or mental health issues so um they know when when they come in to train rigs they know exactly what they're uh what what they're going to be doing with them and rigs is natural with all this so it helps um and the other job that he's uh exceeds that already is bringing smiles to everyone he meets while showcasing his playful quirky puppy personality that's for sure yeah he's got that same thing I mean you can you can just tell always um we had a very generous grad from the Minnesota Department of Public Public Safety for law enforcement and fire for the therapy dog Grant and a lot of credit goes to Sergeant Patrick young for for doing all the all the leg work with that so um they handed me the program on a silver platter so no I get to take credit but really there's all sorts of things going on in the in the background for that and again Soldier six is providing the training for Ricks and uh and with Scott so that's I was told to keep it very brief because everyone's going to want to talk to the dog and be with the dog anyways so I'm I'm done all right well first of all thank you uh and thanks obviously for those for that went after the funding um it's you you hear about therapy dogs and I think our partners to the north here uh Woodbury got one and I saw pictures of it and the council members all too just like us are like oh they're so cute you know and so uh having um him here to obviously help with stressful situations that might be uh out in the community I think is is absolutely absolutely amazing and I I don't know I'm hoping I'm not like spilling the beans but I did hear that he's going to be at the Minnesota Wild game on Saturday yep so five five of their dogs got picked and he was yep so uh we'll be showcasing him at the Minnesota Wild game I guess on on Saturday so that's cool so the last thing I'm going to have you do is bring him up here because we want to see him sett oh now he's going to say no I'm done yeah I'm tired look at you look at you yeah a mic good boy say good boy good boy yeah there you go there you go aren't those folks from Soldier 6 just amazing amazing absolutely we do a lot of work with them through the L they're phenomenal meeting's over [Music] I think did you get them all right let's get them over here let's get some officials come here buddy come here the other way [Music] look at that that was funny oh you want one more all right I think you got it oh nice knows his name already that's awesome well thank you for bringing him in nice job whenever we have future tough agendas I think we're going to bring him in here and just let him walk around yes give all the love and it'll be great That'll be amazing else okay all right that is awesome all right thank you again for uh bringing him in and uh sharing obviously the public is going to be loving him as time goes forward here mayor if you don't mind I just want to take a second and put in a big plug for Soldier six yes go ahead excuse me great great organization run by a former South St Paul police officer and his wife and they provide therapy dogs to uh veterans and First Responders dealing with PTSD we do a lot of work with them through our Cottage Grove Lions Club and through our um Mississippi River Valley beyond the yellow ribbon because we do deal with a lot of veterans who are experiencing PTSD and they are absolutely amazing and the training that they do is second to none so I'm so glad to hear that they're involved with helping us out it's a great great partnership for sure that's the best yeah all right so uh Council next on our agenda is consent um uh this is the point where if Council has anything they want to pull off of consent for separate conversation or vote anything at all move consent all right we got a motion uh to approve consent by council member Olsson do have a second second oh SEC second by counc regar I think okay any other discussion seeing none all those in favor signify by saying I I I opposed motion carries so if anybody's here for anything on tonight's consent agenda all of those items have been approved uh next uh is number eight is approved dispersement or to pay the bills move to pay the bills all right we have a motion by council member Garza second by council member theti all those in favor signify by saying I I I opposed motion carries uh public hearings none this evening 10 is Bid Awards which we actually heard a little bit about what we're going to be talking about here but uh we do have a bid award this uh evening for the 2025 payment management project uh and our Public Works director Ryan bfine is going to walk us through this and I think in this process all going to answer some of the questions um for her mayor members of the council I think what I'll start with some of my typical information on the the bid opening that we had and and uh where we are at in the process so 2025 payment management project um sorry here we go we took bids on um let's see La not last Thursday but the Thursday um prior um we had four bid uh results um as you can see all four bids were a little bit under our Engineers estimate um and that low bid was you know about 11% underneath our Engineers estimate so we were happy to see that you know a little bit of concern in the market these days with you hear about obviously everything in the economy and tariffs and such but luckily with a project like this Paving concrete not really affected by that from what we're seeing so um in general uh we are happy with the bid results and feel they are very competitive um and in terms of the questions regarding U mcnamer Contracting and also just the bid award process so this is a low bid process that is a state statute so um it is a requirement to you know award the project the lowest responsive contractor um it's not like a best value type process where you can you know select different contractors now what I will say is you've probably seen these names these names look very familiar um there's only a certain number of these paving contractors in the Metro they all do an extremely large amount of work every single year um and all four of these contractors actually are ones we're very familiar with and have done quite a bit of work in town um maer Contracting you know there were some questions about um the reviews and some things we heard from the the public as well was like a Better Business Bureau rating um you wouldn't find any of these contractors on the Better Business Bureau they do low bid projects for agencies cities counties mot um they're not in the business where they would have that type of of rating or try and get that kind of accreditation because it doesn't provide any benefit to them um in terms of the reviews I looked up some of those as well um I was actually surprised that there were things like Yelp reviews or Google reviews on these contractors they are interacting with tens of thousands if not hundreds of thousands of people every single year um on just endless number of multi-million dollar projects so I think yel there were four reviews Google reviews there was maybe 24 um there are reviews on this company right I mean anyone can go on those and provide a review of a contractor um but it's not I mean that that's more for like businesses that people would hire right plumbers contractors going to a restaurant right you see thousands of reviews um certainly there was negative reviews on there right about you know maybe my car was towed in a project well that was like the city that tow towed the car um you know maybe some concerns about damage maybe how late they were working and and it's just really things that we do see on our projects but it's just such a small sample size right there's so much interaction with these contractors um what we really have to look at is our great experience we have with them and all four of these right we would be comfortable with awarding the project too u m DEA has worked on I just quickly today pulled the list and I came up quickly with nine projects they've worked on over the last um six or seven years from City projects maybe like a development project that's new city infrastructure and always a great experience they're a very reputable contractor in the metro area um so from a staff perspective from our experience we have zero concern obviously things can happen on a project right these are large projects uh impacting you know hundreds thousands of people so um certainly things can happen and the things I saw in those reviews we've had happen on our projects but I can tell you as staff we're very firm in how we work with our contractors holding them accountable and there was a question about you know the contract that's like a 300 page contract that we have with these contractors dealing with all the legal e part of it and the warranties and such and we're very strict with that contract and also things like working hours and all the things that can impact our residents we we have an important project to complete um but we do hold the contractor accountable while we will do that so um from a staff perspective we do not have concerns with this contractor or our experience with them we would recommend awarding the project to them uh with that I'll stand for questions I'll start down here then and work my way if you have questions I'll start with C Mar Clawson uh thank you Ryan do we also have an independent um project manager that works with the contractor to make sure that the city uh that the that works in the city's best interest I guess is that is that true that's correct Mr mayor council mlon so uh there's a city engineering staff who's on it and then we also work with Bolton The Mink as our hired uh design consultant and project manager we've worked with them for many many years on payment managements they also have great familiarity with this contractor and their work thank you Council M Wilson add something as you know I ask every time have we worked with these people before and and are they reputable and ACC the reason I ask those questions is because um you know on occasion we do have bad experiences but uh from what I understand and correct me if I'm wrong when we do have those bad experiences two things happen number one we don't pay for the job until it's done correctly so um any damage or issues or whatever may be caused by the contractor will be resolved to our Satisfaction by the contractor we don't just let them come by and do the silly thing twice um before they get paid and they know that so um that's one thing the other thing is I know that we've blacklisted contractors in the past where we've had such a Negative experience with the work that they do or the way in which they interact with uh the city that we just decide we're not going to work with them anymore but when you showed the list of the bids I know we've worked with all four of those contractors and and in general been very pleased um and I'm glad you mentioned that you know we are bound by uh statute to work with the low bidder unless of course we have some findings of fact that that's just not something that we're going to be able to do so I'm confident as our you that um you know when this Project's done it'll be done to our satisfaction and as my colleague uh council member Clawson mentioned one of the ways we ensure that happens is we have our people out there every day watching and making sure they're sticking to the specs and all the rest of it um one thing that I did want to ask however is you know we mentioned the bid came in low Etc what are you seeing in price of asphalt right now is it starting to climb a little bit did we sounds like we bid this right at the right time yep Mr mayor council rson that's a good question so yeah we did see favorable asphalt pricing which is really what you saw in this price here but already you can see like gas price is starting to creep back up as we go and that's all really tied to that same oil industry so I think we did hit the market at a good time um we've got one more bid to do for Paving with our Mill and overlay shortly hopefully we're still good on that one um but you know this March time frame is always a good time to bid yeah and we're happy with it and I know that you're very strategic and kind of when you do things like that and it's funny I was going to mention the mill and overlay too so we might want to get on get that one on the books ASAP but great job with this and uh I think it's going to be a nice project when it's all done okay did you have a question or no yeah go CC m so uh so in in how many did you actually count how many mcnamer has done for us how what was it yep so uh Mr mayor council member theti um I could come up with nine quickly I mean there's because sometimes there because there're a Paving contractor they might be the paving contractor not the general but I came up with nine um quickly going back to 2015 and then with binus um so with the other contractors I would say less um going back binus would definitely be less um we worked with them probably a handful of times Northwest um would be I would say similar in that um you know eight 5 to eight range and then the the Minnesota paving materials they used to be called hard drives so it's probably a very familiar name um I would say at least 10 in that same time frame and uh and we obviously uh we we keep track of of uh the uh the jobs that they do in in in the past and the issues that we came came across and and uh and again like like I say we we have blacklisted some of them before and and uh you know so if there was any significant things that that uh that had happened in the past yep you know we we have them and which I I got to admit that it might be a little bit better than than Yelp I guess I've never but then I've never really used Yelp for looking at much of anything except maybe consumer stuff right but uh um so I think I even though I don't like paying all that money to make new road in front of my house it uh it I think they they probably do the good job and my gosh I'll be standing out there Custer mcara thank you mayor and thank you thank you for the presentation it was a lot of good information and I think it was pretty much answered um my question was the same as far as how many jobs which that was answered nine or so but also do we have anything of significance that came from any of those projects with mcnamer that we had to really address yep uh Mr mayor council member Garza um that correct you know obviously I've been here for all those projects City administrator has as well so we remember everything um nothing major that they would have caused um I mean actually to show that they do hold themselves accountable they had a situation in 2015 payment management completely out of their control um Mother Nature decided to drop 5 Ines of rain in about 2 hours um the day after they milled off the road and it took out about 500 ft of curb that wasn't going to be replaced on Hillside Trail and they paid fully to replace that curb and and we did not pay for any of it they didn't do anything wrong right but it was Mother Nature deciding to uh be very difficult that morning and it wasn't a City cost and it was something that they bore um without any challenges so I think that just shows their willingness to step up and fix issues even when they didn't actually cause that issue um there was no way to stop happens so um obviously anything can happen on any project right I can't stand here and say there will be no issues on this project right they're big projects and we watch them very carefully but the important part is we always work on those and we get those resolved all right so just a couple quick questions and one might be in the back corner there Mr Zach but um one is with when when we do these projects we also have the the call the we have in the past done the call where you could call a number or whatever is that still case in this case yep that's correct we have a project hotline and email Mr Mayor okay and the reason I'm bringing that up because I was noticing through some of the the Yelp uh comments or the the the negative reviews there was uh conversations about no parking or uh signage and I know we do it a little bit different where we kind of take sections of the of the areas and then we let those neighbors know in advance for these days you can't park in in front of your house on these days because they're going to be doing work I'm assuming that's still going to be the same process yep that is correct Mr Mayor and really the communication we take really important you know we we hold that really importantly and we do all that work so us and our design consultant inspector we do all that communication with the residents you know we don't want to have to rely on the contractor uh to be doing that so they will get to know our inspector very well okay and I don't know if this is for you Jennifer this might be for Corey so the there was a reference about somebody um they hit a water main or a water line and and the water line was damaged and it flooded out a home wouldn't they be responsible for that cont the contractor year honor members of we actually had this exact same happen in another city that I represented and they didn't flood just one home they took out a whole block so the league of Minnesota City's actually helped assist with recovery from the the contractor so it it the contractor is 100% responsible um but because of the magnitude of that particular situation it was multiple homes uh the league I call them the Cavalry stepped in and and really helped those homeowners become whole not that we want any because if a water main gets busted or something that's a big deal other than just for your neighborhood for us too but I thought so I just want to make sure because I don't know if it's different in other cities or whatever but I know in our particular case they would have been uh the contractor would have been would would have been responsible and the homeowner would not though obviously dis uh inconvenience the homeowner would not correct be charged for that that would be or have to pay a down you know or a a deductible or whatever and then my last question maybe is for USAC so she was commenting a little bit about the the park um I know in the past when we've went into do neighborhoods we have done some surveying and such and I know maybe we I don't know if we did or didn't on this one I guess that's what I'm just looking for and and what your thoughts are on that yeah mayor thank you Council thank you uh right I thought we did she was right I thought we did but there was a time where we never did neighborhood surveys and then we started probably a handful of years ago this must have been the last playground we did um where we didn't actually do a neighborhood survey but I will say the neighborhood survey is just one tool in the equation when we pick out playgrounds so we do all everything's the same except for you know now we do the survey you know we have we we get proposals from three professional playground designers and manufacturers they give us their best proposal for the budget that we give them so they're they're well designed well thought out um then we take those three proposals now we'll go out and do a neighborhood survey with those proposals but back then what we would do is we bring them to the Parks Commission who were also moms and dads and grandparents and you know Park professionals um they would review them and then they would choose which playground maybe there's some slight modifications there but they would choose the design that they felt they felt best was for the park so the rest of that process is still the same and just as far as a survey sometimes a survey doesn't help us at all because it's split 5050 or 30 303 or whatever it is so the survey is one tool um it is helpful we do enjoy doing the surveys because sometimes it helps guide the decision a little bit but it's not always the answer um so hopefully that help but you know in terms of the playground that's there uh as a park professional that we have you know we manage over 30 playgrounds I'm happy with it it it takes care of all the swinging balancing climbing sliding Spinners um you know upper body strength social connections it just doesn't maybe look like some like the old playground where there's a lot of stairs and platforms this one has more ropes and bars and different tools like that so it just maybe looks a little more different but I'm happy with what's there okay I that's the reason I wanted to ask is it's funny because whether we did the survey or didn't the survey I do remember a neighborhood where my son uh where they did the ne they did the neighborhood survey and after it got done my my at least my son and his two and my two grandkids were like I don't like this one you know and you know how that you get you deal with that all the time but um but that's what on on that particular one I remember that was somewhat of a majority but it wasn't like you said it was closer it was real close so some people are going to like it some aren't but I just wanted to check so that I kind of understood what's going on uh with regards and how how was that funded Zach when you do those Park projects oh yeah that was the other one thank you thank you uh those are through the park Improvement fund um so it's they're they're they're on 20 year cycles for replacement so um that one was just on a on a 20-year replacement schedule so when that came up we went through that process um it's the park Improvement fund which has you know limited resources to to make sure is it part of the assess for the road project so we're not replacing the playground the playground is only about 5 years old okay so there's a little bit confusion between the word park and playground and this is when we were emailing back and forth Park is a playground is within a park the park is the park right so we're not replacing the playground we're we're just adding the other features around the playground the park the the park features we're not we're not the playground stays as it is I say yeah that's where we were that's where so there was baby I that's why I was curious about what you were talking about it between the two cuz I'm going geez I guess i' if you're talking about equipment or you're talking about the park but I think real quick though what you were asking about is does does it does it get layered into the assessment for the road project or is it build separately oh councilman rson uh and mayor council yeah uh it gets layered it doesn't get layered in the assessment no so the project happens at the same time because it's convenient yes but in terms of the ass Park work is not part of the assessment accurate may I know there's a weird thing in there so that's I want yeah that's why I want to introduce may members of the council um to be very clear the residents do not pay any assessment related to the actual uh Park Improvement so you will never see Park improvements in that column when we go to uh do projects like this we do bond for the $78,000 but it is not calculated in the assessment right the city what I want to make I know you might not like maybe what some of the stuff is in that Park maybe but you're not getting the residence of Hidden Valley you're not getting charged for it's just confusing because it is a line item yeah I I totally understand you're not the first and that's why I wanted to bring you up other than the initial question and we will take donations if people are interested but yeah it's not we're not going to mandate it y uh Kel beti Zach refresh my memory wasn't there was there actually like a pavilion type small Pavilion type deal going into right yes council member thei and Council um so one of the things I know when we built the playground there was concerned about shade out there so we actually went back and we added shade to the playground so then when we were talking about the redesign of this park um we just wanted to make sure we took into in into consideration the shade because it is under the power lines there's not a lot opportunity for planting trees so this was our opportunity to get a little more shade out there okay and one of the things so with with Hidden Valley that we do have an advantage is that we do have a homeowners Association and I know that there's a a newsletter going out soon which we could put uh some questions into that I mean we've got you've got the Facebook page and so forth but that doesn't necessarily kind of hit everybody or or query everybody you know so we could probably put something into the into the newsletter just to get some feedback from people so okay all right thank you Zach thank you for hanging to hear the answers I figured you might want to hope you had fun in Mexico yeah yes you did good although I really sad about basketball understood all right so uh before go ahead I I'll move resolution 2025-the any other discussion seeing none all those in favor signify by saying I I opposed motion carries thank you for coming again all right uh next on our agenda regular we have nothing on our regular agenda so believe it or not we're down to council comments request I will start down here I'll start with have nothing to add tonight oh there you go there you go uh oh nothing from council member Olson either how about council member the I have one thing you know I just just I'll I'll make the standard mention of Strawberry Fest and that we're getting closer and closer to that uh to that time uh in uh June so uh obviously we we love having people participate and planning and everything else and and I believe our next meeting is the first Monday in April which would be what oh it's actually a week later uh the first Monday is SE the 7th oh the 7th yeah okay cuz Tuesday is April Fool's Day ah okay so we'd love to have you come over to uh um uh to Kingston no you at the hero Center or where no no at the at the uh the training room uh Italian Caron Caron Caron Caron how do gr carbon man it just wasn't slipping off the time carbonis but I'm not the only one that does that at 6:00 on uh on the 7th of April all right there you go there you go uh custom Garza sure well I would like to invite everyone down to River Oaks the fish fry is in full swing and I hear it's really good they suggest making reservations Friday nights are getting packed so if you want some fish head on down to River Oaks and the 2025 Easter egg hunt will be coming up on April 12th and that's going to be at our ice Arena so you can get your tickets online at the website it's going to be a lot of fun so hopefully your kids will make it down there and they'll get some good eggs all good that's it all right um the only other item I was just going to bring up and it's more for informational for the public um up at the capital uh right now um there are pieces of multiple bills uh that are going through up there um some are by the way I'll just say depending on which Bill you're looking at I'm just going to say I think there's upwards of six uh and in all of these cases just for the general public to be aware of it's really to take away um local control so for example zoning parking materials on homes um uh homeowners associations um another one uh and density and the reason I wanted to bring up the public is I would just ask you to please keep informed uh and when you see something whether it's from us from a city standpoint we haven't been been as a city been expressing our our angst or our our um our desire not to have some of the stuff and I know we're not the only ones around there but just to give you a couple examples of things that are up at the capital right now um so first of all uh homeowners associations on one of the bills um would be basically Obsolete and if somebody one of your nextra neighbor decided they want to build a Triplex uh next year single family home uh we can't stop them from doing that that's actually a bill that's up there or a duplex uh We Can't Stop uh if one of these were to pass we would not be able to stop um or do no parking on any City street because we can't require homes that are being built or whatever to be built that they had to have parking uh in the front of their uh in in the front of their uh their home or Triplex or duplex um we can't tell them uh one of the bills or parts of the bill was we can't tell them that uh they uh have to use certain types of materials on a home and you might go what does that mean I mean it's basically like you could say I'm going to use a aluminum or a a metal panel like a like a pole barn and they could build a home uh with basically a pole barn uh and I mean those are just a few of them and I know I'm I don't think I'm missing any that are more crazier than those that I just shared with you but uh one of those bills did pass from not from the house or the sen or the governor yet but it passed through a committee and so I know the league of Minnesota cities the Metro cities and I think just about every other city but maybe the two core cities I'll just say that um St Paul Minneapolis all are uh vly opposed uh to these uh processes because they would literally figuratively take our ability uh to Zone um uh single family multif family commercial whatever uh literally anywhere in the city of Cottage Grove so um I just wanted to throw it out there so if you see one of your legislative uh people whether it's a a representative or Senator whatever or you happen to know somebody ask them the question you know where did they stance on these bills that uh limit um Ci's abilities to uh Zone and create ordinances that would um obviously uh maybe maybe it works in one Community it definitely doesn't work in another so this one one broad brush approach uh and and the original Bill last year which did not pass was called the missing middle now they have all these other little terms that they're calling it that don't make it sound so missing middle-ish I guess is what I'd say so um we're going to keep it we're going to keep a breast of it um I know uh Tammy Jamie some of our people in the in the city here are keeping us updated on what's uh where it's at what's going and I've also offered myself up uh to the to our legislative team who by the way I'm I'm certain two of them are well most of them are all against it and they've one of them uh uh uh representative Johnson did vote against it in committee that's um so the fact of the matter is um we're moving in that direction to and our our contingency is is supporting our stance on it as well as the other cities around here that have that same stance but Metro cities too yes Metro City same thing you can but please ask questions if you go to a town hall or something talk about this particular bill because uh we definitely or bills because we certainly don't believe that this is necessary especially in Cottage Grove yes council member Gara I just also want to interject and you said it well but also write your um local government um if you are concerned about it or if you don't know anything about it do your research read about it understand it because it really is affecting our community um but write write our local Representatives email them their information is out there for you to um have these conversations but it will help um so if that's the least go ahead and email him right now yes very much so all right well that was my only thing that I was going to mention tonight so um we do have a workshop which is open open to the public this evening it is um we're having a presentation by yellow tree uh which is a proposed multif family project and an abatement subsidy uh which I believe are we doing in the training room okay we'll be in the training room so we won't be in here uh so we will not adjourn in here so everyone have a great day and thank goodness we didn't get the snow uh we'll adjourn out side thank you e