i am calling the wednesday february 23rd 2022 code review task force meeting to order at 5 30 p.m roll call of members andrew nussma present eric cameron absent tim hole present donna jensen present godin nam bergapod did i say that right present nancy nice to present michael o'brien absent joshua walls absent shelly ward absent sarah albrecht present and steve roush absent members of the public may attend in person or participate online at zoom dot us slash join meeting id 974-2342-2054 once you log into the meeting please use the chat feature to tell the moderator if you wish to speak to an item for more information you can see the agenda packet on the city's website now on to the agenda item one adoption of agenda the first item of the meeting tonight is adoption of the agenda city staff are there any changes to the agenda um do any task force members have changes may i have a motion to adopt the moved agenda jensen seconded by golden um to adopt the agenda will the city clerk please take a roll call vote as we have members participating virtually he really wants it to pass this is our old sister pad yes yes nice tune you're all bright hey all right the motion carries the second item is the approval of minutes item two of the agenda is approval minutes of the january 26th meeting does staff have any changes to the minutes nothing from staff do any task force members have changes may i have a motion to approve the minutes okay moved by golden seconded by donna may i have a roll call vote please newsman yes nice student uh the motion carries item three review outstanding items um item three of the agenda is to review those outstanding items are there any updates city staff um chair i just wanted to let you know that um you know under the current situation where mr lemberg is now our interim city manager there is of course some conflicting meetings on his schedule now as he's performing two um roles for the city and he will be here it when when he's needed here but otherwise he's not going to be here at the meeting every month but i will be here every month and erica is my deputy city clerk and she's also going to be here for many of the items as well because she's our our mini code our city code online specialist okay and our license thank you for joining us licensing specialists as well and for those of you who haven't met erica henderson is a new deputy city clerk she started here in at the city in november thank you um item four is questions and comments from task force uh do city attorneys or staff have anything to add to the packet that was included no okay the um the information that was in your packet was carried over from last month because we haven't moved on from this chapter but um it was included in case there was any follow-up questions perfect do any task force members have further comments okay um there are no items for final review which is item five on the agenda so that takes us to item six on the agenda review of title three chapter one uh this chapter was included in the meeting packet with staff's suggested edits since our discussion in january so what we did last time that i thought worked pretty well was we went kind of page by page so right now we we don't actually have page numbers on this but we do have sections and i think that's okay as i recall we got through the first seven pages last time we did specifically vote on a few motions we voted to keep the minimum distance required of 0.75 miles and to keep uh the freestanding building requirement i forget if there was another motion i think there was a resolution to have a certain language aligned that would bring in the bottle club yes right and and and i remember there was quite a bit of discussion about aligning this more closely with the with the state statute regarding liquor license and so as staff went back we noticed where we were off quite a bit right um and so what we did is we went back and kind of reworked it all so that it would be more in line with the state statute and remove a lot of that extraneous stuff talking about submitting reports operational things that didn't need to be in the code remove those things just kind of stripped it down to be more similar to the state law we also looked at some other cities to make sure that we weren't leaving out something important that in there that other cities are are also doing um erica do you want to add on to that at all no that summarizes it okay good um but specifically we had like an on sale license type a type b these these are not things that are delineated in state law so we had that removed we also took out uh combined things that should have been naturally combined in the first place and um and whereas over the years you know we've had a liquor license uh code that started out with this and then we added you know brew pubs and we added the stuff we you know things were added and moved around over the years and just tried to make it more streamlined and easier to follow and easier to read so i hope that you found that thank you i'm confused about what this printed piece is is this in our packet yes as which review title three title chapter one okay but it okay all right i wasn't getting it aligned so i'll go back and try harder [Music] um well one of the things we also did is go through all the comments from the the previous version was also in your packet so that you could compare what we did was we went through all the comments as we went along and took those comments into account into this newer version as well thank you um so i think let's just start on the first page and as we get to the first few pages we'll just call out the comments that have been changed um and then i think we'll continue on probably uh rather rapidly if you have points for discussion or clarification uh we'll try to bring them up on the page that we see them so basically you're saying review this new edit yeah okay just just to make sure yep thank you um so we'll start with 3-1-1 state law provisions adopted there's a comment that this was previously made by jared incorporated into the section so you see the addition of a paragraph and then at the end of the page 313 types of liquor licenses we see that this has been updated to reference minnesota statutes and include the licenses in the statute 313a on sale intoxicating liquor license remove the distinction of on sale a and on sale b license types we'll move on to the next page just stop me if you have questions um on b so 313b the distance building requirements were kept for for our last meeting um item c wine licenses previously the ordinance addressed wine licenses separately that section was removed i will proceed to the next page and i'm looking at item p on 313 distiller distillery cocktail room on sale license you'll note that distilleries have been added to this list and that'll take us to the following page 3151 license fee payment it says new and renewal liquor license applicants must pay the license fee prior to the issuance of the liquor license there's a comment that removed the allowance for on sale and wine to make two payments for renewal they surveyed several cities they all required the entire fee to be paid at the time of renewal 316 days and hours of operation this has been updated to reference minnesota statutes that'll take us to the next page um and so i think i have one question yes well what section three one five one just a real quick question just um yep um when we when we remove that that uh allowance for payments what does the next cycle do for these businesses and is it going to take the businesses by surprise um and is there like a uh a grace period which we will roll into that or is will they just get hit with it right away so the original uh code said that they were allowed to make the first payment with the application and the second payment would be due 60 days after july first um so it's really only like two and a half months three months tops that that that there was a grace for um we looked in and there was a few of our um on sale license holders that did utilize this but for the most part most of them were didn't want to have to remember to make that extra payment it's a it's extra staff time to to go back now who hasn't paid and and find out who hasn't paid and go notify them just more work for for both people and because it was such a it's not like it's six months period of time and like i said like it said in the comments we've surveyed other cities and other cities aren't allowing this so we just and took it out it didn't seem like it was a benefit worth keeping thank you thank you are the licenses all aligned for all licensed the fees are they all lined for all licenses so everyone is like july 1st so all liquor licenses are july 1st except consumption and display correct which this which the state sets that date for us thank you um so we'll continue on to the following page which starts at 318 um uh i think at this point we are in a spot that we hadn't previously reviewed at all um are there any comments on the page starting at one eight and ending with three one eleven okay i'll move on to the next page and if i go too fast and just raise your hand and we can always jump back a page so on to 312 and 313 persons ineligible for license this was updated to remove the restriction for multiple interest parties um can someone explain that to me so previously the code restricted any one person or entity from owning more than one um establishment and so for instance at one time we mgm tried to have two establishments in the city and it wasn't allowed they did end up selling their interest in that other building to an another party and they still operated with an mgm on the sign but it wasn't allowed and we didn't see any reason to keep that restriction okay just i haven't read this in detail quite yet but is this on sale and off sale i seem to remember it implied that uh even bars you could only own one in the city which seems unnecessary to me so right i think we had right there had been comments on it in the previous section so we were we looked at it and and i we think it was something that's kind of held over from years back if applebee's wanted to have two applebee's here i don't see why there should be any issue with that as well yeah yeah i think that was in response to your comment all right good okay excellent thank you uh we'll move on to the next page three oh i'm sorry sarah sorry this one little thing and the three one twelve d there's just a small spelling error for a sibling so just a quick glance oh thank you brother yep yep sibling is spelled no brother and sisters because it's already underlined we probably didn't notice yes thank you sarah on to 314 special conditions of approval uh the task force comments regarding why this is needed special conditions are situation dependent for example bright outside lights cannot be aimed towards residential neighbors okay so this is for the approval just of a business location no a special condition can be anything um i i put put this in here because i this has come up for a different business for it it wasn't a liquor establishment but i can see that you know like a business that's close to residential maybe they're not allowed to have if they have these big bright lights in their parking lot they can't have them like aimed at the residential homes in the neighbor in the neighboring area there that kind of thing just to keep a public nuisance away or something like that it would definitely be only under certain circumstances if people came and said we are having a problem with this business then the council could put a special condition um but they would have to do it at the time of licensing the time of licensing which is uh is there a distinction between the renewable license and the original granting of a license i think that a special condition could be added at the time of renewal if there was an issue okay and uh since it's in 3-1 this is only uh related to establishments that have liquor licenses is that just liquor there are other provisions of the code that allow for special conditions in other areas okay thank you and i had been concerned that there could perhaps be some of the punitive kinds of conditions but the wording seems to limit that kind of thing so that's good rather than just you know we really don't like that owner and so we're going to put up all these conditions that have nothing to do with right you have to hire a whole bunch of security guards i can tell you that i don't currently have any special conditions on any of my liquor license holders right now okay great thank you we'll proceed to the next page which is still a continuation of uh three 115 um item g you see that safety health or repose um is highlighted and specifically uh the language was updated to renew morals and comfort from um from the list of some of the concerns yeah some of the members had mentioned you know morals was kind of a subjective whose morals are we talking about um i thought comfort could possibly be in a similar situation where you know somebody's one person's comfort would not be the another person's comfort um i i didn't i left it up to the task force if you feel like this is uh accurate of how or representative of how you think it should be worded uh i i like that language myself yes i agree i didn't understand that word repos health safety or repose uh well means a state of rest sleep or tranquility i had to look it up as well go then i i think of it like um if you're disturbing the peace there would be no repose right yeah all i'm thinking is should we say that rather than this word it doesn't matter i'm if it confuses me um so would perhaps the word tranquility be an appropriate word that is both understandable and conveys the meaning or is that too seems a little promoted this tranquility is another word that's subjective for yeah definition difference between people so then i i would prefer to leave it as is the way it is i i understand it it's uh you know if they suddenly start blurring out music at one in the morning at closing time or something that would be harmful i don't i can't really think of a a phrase that would say that same thing but peace do we like peace better i think that's uh getting more m you're adding ambiguity that's more and that's more of a feeling word really the word tranquility means much more than i think tranquility even implies a little more than repose doesn't it that's what you know basically that's what the intent is i think from that word so you say something sorry jumping into the computer realm here something about the nature of the environment something about not not changing the nature of the environment because if it's a generally quiet area that might be different than if it's near a busy intersection i think that this is an example where the law is trying to communicate an intent and i think we probably all generally agree with the intent to preserve the state of i'll use the word tranquility although we agree that's too loaded so i'll ask council if this word is removed does that take away any ability of the city to enforce um i'll say quality of life concerns that businesses might impose on their neighbors i do think it would harm mr chairman members i do think it would diminish the ability to deal with some certain nuisance conditions that probably don't rise to the level of safety or health but are disturbing either through noise light vibrations or other types of nuisance conditions we could go with the health safety or welfare we do in the line above but i think the intent originally was to expand or provide additional descriptive terms regarding health safety and welfare and i think repose isn't as ambiguous as morals and comfort is but does get some additional direction that it is broader than pure public health and safety types of nuisance conditions that we're at and i would recommend keeping it okay that seems reasonable to me looking for kind of a consensus um i'm seeing head shaking if no one is violently opposed or strongly opposed to keeping or opposed i think uh we'll keep it in i think it's an excellent word actually [Music] um item 3 1 15 1 hearing notice point b 10 calendar days is highlighted and this is a comment from council of recommending changing to 14 days uh oh i'm sorry maybe not counsel uh it was jsu okay sorry uh to uh due to reliance on u.s mail um i think that changing it to 14 days seems reasonable do people agree seems people agree with that so if you would note the change of 10 days to 14 days on the next section 31152 best practices program and administrative penalties this section has been updated to describe the best practices program that is currently in place item one a vendor trains all employees uh remove the requirement that the vendor be approved by the city yes sure i just wanted to let you know in the in in the title here this was this section was originally entitled just administrative penalties um but because the administrative penalties were dependent on whether or not you're part of the best practices program we looked at this quite extensively we found that the state statutes have a best practices program for off sale but not on sale and our current practice is to use the same for both on sale and off sale but it was not written in our code anywhere that we did that so we wanted to spell that out clearly so that it was understood what a best practices program was and it's the same one that's spelled out for off sale in state statute thank you for that context on to the following page point three establishes a cash award an incentive program to award employees who prevent underage buyers and a penalty program to punish employees in the event of a failed compliance check the best practices program requirements are derived directly from statute go ahead i had noted originally that that seemed over it seemed especially prescriptive for exactly how to do something and you know to start saying you have to have an incentive program for employees seem odd so but if that's the requirement by the state the staff felt the same way and we went to look at the statute and it was written in statute that way so we couldn't change it all right what we did change is in the on the page before about the vendor it said a city approved vendor and we did take that out because that was not required i don't feel real strongly about it but someone might want to look at that at the state statute level agreed i i was like looking to strike that line completely until i realized it was in statute and i couldn't yeah okay thank you uh so that takes us through the rest of the page where we see a a fee structure for violations and on to the next page where we see another violation schedule yes it wasn't commented on here but one of the comments from the previous uh from the previous version mentioned it wasn't clear about days and that kind of thing on here so each one was spelled out completely in this schedule instead of just having a number three in there that's so to speak thank you just curious these fines and the schedule is that just for the city or is it from state you know state uh statute how this came we established it or is it from state just curious mr jamnik do you remember where this came from the two thousand dollar is the amount that's been in the state statute for many many years it's hopelessly outdated but the legislature hasn't reviewed 348 to increase it and so when the city adopted this progressive fine schedule or fee schedule it started with the maximum amount that's allowed under the state statute and worked backwards to give a a progressive incentive to have a lower first violation and then a moderated second violation and then the the worst but the the only thing that you can do beyond the two thousand dollars civil penalty is the revocation and so that's the reason it's drafted the way it is and then it distinguishes between those businesses participating in the best practice to give them a break should they slip up um thank you am i correct that uh cities are allowed to um issue penalties up to ten thousand dollars no i mean the statute in 348 specifically has that dollar amount in there our general authorization for standard violations of city code provisions is a misdemeanor level violation which is the lower amount do you know what that amount is uh it's one year or 90 days and um a thousand dollars at this point i believe thank you so the liquor is actually more than the misdemeanor gross misdemeanors would be a one year and what five thousand dollars are dependent on what's in the statute but we don't we don't have the authority to do a gross misdemeanor level thank you that'll take us into the following page where we see e f and g uh and three 116 right of inspections uh i don't i don't see any uh comments in there does anyone have any questions or comments on this page okay that takes us to very weird formatting is this just is at the end yes 3 116 is the last section okay so then we see the next 20 or so pages or 30 pages i guess it's just a repeat of that that was last month's version and we wanted that to be available to you so that you could go back look at the comments to see if everything that you had concerns or questions about was addressed okay um so this is not the final review so i'm not certain that a motion is needed okay unless anybody has any other questions or would like any other language restated revised okay so we uh uh talked about the comments from the public have those been considered do you mean when people came and spoke to us no i'm reading um um someone named shayna conklin shayna's was with our office as the attorney's draft comments okay there is one comment regarding from skip regarding the micro distillery and that was the truth took that okay all right okay um so i believe that that will lead us very quickly to the conclusion of this meeting um item seven is miscellaneous items the next code review task force meeting will be march 30th 2022 5 30 pm here in the council chambers meetings will be typically held in the last wednesday night of each month in 2022 our homework is to review title 3 chapters 4 through 19 which is included in tonight's packet chapters 2 and 3 were previously repealed and that's why we're starting with chapter 4 for the homework task force comments need to be submitted by wednesday march 16th uh it is in this current agenda or previous agenda it's in this packet under homeworks under the miscellaneous homework section to the very end oh got it okay sorry and i think it's about 31 pages approximately then i think at this point if there are no additional items i would be uh looking for oh i guess i'm not looking for a motion to adjourn i just am a journey according to my script it's a motion to adjourn required no you can declare i mean you can make a ruling from the chair if you wish that canadians adjourn if there's no further business but i think remember neiston had a question i'm sorry i'm just it's not evident to me when i click on the agenda report slash miscellaneous pdf that i have chapters 4 through 19 but apparently i do and i'm just not really seeing it very well so there's a cover sheet and it says assignment and homework review title three chapters four through 18. that's the packet i'm looking at and it says attachments title three chapters two through 19 for task force homework and then is pages two through thirty chapter apparently i do i guess that's a definitive yes yes it's a little foreshadowing or introduction to both sections a lot of those sections are very dated and were adopted by the city when the state did not generally regulate and license occupations to the extent that they do and consequently the task force members when you review that those sections you'll note that many of them this the margin indicates that we no longer believe that they are necessary in the city code because the state has assumed oversight or licensing of those occupations and what we're trying to do is simply network and meld our regulation to pick up the state regulation for instance in building contractors pipe fitters and laborers and those types of situations the state has stepped up in regulation some of those occupations one of the occupations they have not yet done that with is massage therapists and some of the other alternative health care providers and so that's why that section would would be recommended to be retained and would be the you know the focus perhaps of uh task force comments study in more in depth but just lay the groundwork that that's why you'll see strikeouts on a lot of those sections uh in the next next set of sections most a majority of it yeah yeah okay yeah i would expect that our next meeting would be probably pretty quick to review these items it appears there's more things removed from the remainder of the of the title than there is left in i think the the bulk of the changes are going to show up in the massage licensing similar to the liquor license we're looking at doing a revamp so that it's more closely aligned with with statute and and just easier to read and easier to follow because over the years this section has again been piecemealed in with things coming in and out and we'd like to to kind of streamline that a little bit and now that we have erica on board with us we're having a little more success with that great um for the people online do you have any questions or comments before i'm adjourned [Music] okay thank you very much the meeting is adjourned you