[1:32] Mayor Clint Hoopman: All right good evening we'll call the meeting to order for the September 12th 2024 Apple Valley city council meeting I'd like to welcome everyone and before we get started as uh your name is called or as your item comes up please approach the podium to address the council uh the first item on our agenda is the Pledge of Allegiance and I would like ask all I would like to ask all of us to rise and join the Council on the pledge [2:00] Council and Audience: of the United States of America and to the for it stands Nation God indivisible libery and justice for all [2:15] Mayor Clint Hoopman: all right the uh next item on our agenda is to approve the agenda and Tom do we have any changes or additions [2:15] Tom: Mr Mayor members of the council good evening we do not have any changes tonight [2:15] Mayor Clint Hoopman: all right we would take a motion to approve the agenda as presented [2:15] Council Member Grindall: so V [2:15] Council Member Meander: second [2:15] Mayor Clint Hoopman: motion from council member grindall a second from council member Meander all those in favor indicate by saying I I opposed agenda passes the next item on our agenda is the audience participation portion for the meeting this is for items not on the regular agenda and we do have a total of 10 minutes for this item we have uh two people who have signed up to speak the first is John ratle and John would you like to come up [3:00] John Rexall: good evening mayor hoop and council members my name is John rexal I live at 13835 flake staff Avenue Apple Valley uh couple of uh points I want to make but then I want to ask a question for you guys just to answer along the budget process here just so people can understand it uh first of all my background for people that are watching uh I did work with City staff for many years I retired from the city of Apple Valley and I want you to know first of all I appreciate the job you all do with City staff and the council budget process it's very thorough people have no idea how much Works goes into that and how much scrutiny it all falls under uh but with that I suspect there's going to be some changes coming because uh you just take a look around with all the inflation that's going on you just can't control the expenses though unfortunately I'm sure costs have gone up for this city and uh I mean the headlines are saying now two though that we've been seeing this for the last couple of years the state's been sitting on a big Surplus and uh this going bring bring me to my question and I think cman Goodwin and probably Ron Hedberg our finance director can be the best ones to answer this in the presentation later uh just uh with LGA regarding uh Aid to the cities now I know Apple Valley I think the last time we had received it was in like 2006 maybe it was earlier that but uh there's a there are millions of dollars that get do out every year to a bunch of cities around this state Apple Valley unfortunately is one of the suburbs that doesn't get a dime and it's not fair uh and now we're going to be I know we're going to be seeing our taxes going up because the costs of everything have gone up so much uh I'm just wondering where we're at with that we heard anything from the state have our reps done anything to represent us and try and get us a slice of the pie back so that'd be the question if you guys can answer that in the process and if Ron or somebody can try and explain how that all works it'd be even better because it's a tough one to understand uh but regardless of what happens in this budget process I appreciate your scrutiny you've given to it and I just want you to know that I want to maintain the standard of living we have here in Apple Valley even if it does have to cost us a little bit more I appreciate having quality streets nice parks and a safe environment so let's maintain that thank you [5:20] Mayor Clint Hoopman: thank you and we can talk about the budget related LGA and other questions there and I think uh our city administrator could even give us a little update on some of the attempts we made at the legislature this year to start that conversation up um again as well so thank you John uh next on on our list is Diane mccrawley did I say that correctly mcau mcau thank you [5:20] Diane McCauley: you're welcome thank you I appreciate you letting me speak tonight um the reason that I uh asked to be uh able to speak is uh we moved here in January and we've only been here six months and we finally found a house after a year of looking in alha Valley our Dream Come True um everything was going great until the spring and our neighbor uh plays his music very loud uh so loud that the base is felt into our house uh we have called the police officers um and they go over there and somebody has a scanner and they're tipped off so they turn it down before they get there uh we count we contacted city council and we were contacted by Sarah toppon and we were told at 99177 redwell where the house plays the noise disturbance that uh if they Contin this they would be fined um then we were told that we needed to call 911 we have called 911 at least 6 to 12 times I requested a report I filled out a data release and I will get that for you if you'd like that um my question to you is what are my rights as a homeowner uh what can be done um I like loud music probably more than other people but I put headphones on and I just um wonder what is the disturbance of the piece uh policy and how can we get this rectified and solved [7:39] Mayor Clint Hoopman: y thanks for the comments we can't solve all the issues here tonight right we're here to take the feedback but you are doing the the correct thing right the corre thing is to call 911 they do need to witness it in order to issue the any kind of citation okay so that's what you will need to do to get there we can't be there all the time right [8:10] Diane McCauley: I understand y so that that's the that's the uh the action I would ask that you take is when you're witnessing call as soon as you can so that they can dispatch and get out there okay I I just want to know if you know if this is something that Apple Valley tolerates or if this is something that is not tolerate [8:25] Mayor Clint Hoopman: uh we we have noise ordinances and those are what you are calling on okay I also looked at the call logs and the complaints we are not registering any other complaints from anyone else in the neighborhood on those and I know that there's you know other elderly and I know that they're vulnerable and you know and you know with today's you know people uh you know it's it's uh intimidating to go talk to somebody because you never know what the retributions are you and I and that's why you're doing the right thing we would always rather have someone call and have us dispatch and have someone come out than to have someone confront a neighbor or confront someone else right whether you more because you don't know who you have right I don't think your neighbors are dangerous but you don't know I don't either okay we will just continue thank you thank you can oh I'm sorry yes I didn't see your I apologize [8:50] Diane McCauley: so you're aware that they have a scanner and you're saying that they know when the police are coming how know they have a scanner because it drops from as soon as I call the police officer 10 minutes to the time that they get there and I can hear the officer from my house the music goes down and then when the officer leaves it goes back up so somebody has a scanner thank you you're welcome thank you [9:03] Council Member Bergman: member B Bergman excuse me yeah thanks and and one comment to you and then I'll ask staff about the other comment that I'd like to make um when you call um Dakota 911 in your case when you call and that's this is the proper way to do it say this is a non-emergency so that way they know so you you follow that that's fantastic they they appreciate that a lot I guess for staff either Nick or for staff is a lot of times things are based on because I work in a noise environment on deciples so does this meet any criteria does anything around this particular resident that this person is talking about does it meet a deciel level that's badg for example you can get really loud cars as we all know or whatever does this exceed any of those decimals [Music] is this oh oh yes I'll come up there it's on now um just going to come up until was on hello hey um Mr Mayor members of the council [10:44] Nick: so for our Amplified music ordinance it comes down to feet so it's not a decel level its number of feet away um so during daytime hours between um 700 a.m. and 10:30 p.m. it's 100 feet uh and then overnight hours it's down to 50 feet man yeah go okay 50 50 okay 100 feet in two let's say I live next to that person that if my house is 100 ft or less that's where you're going to do it but how about somebody that lives a block or two blocks away is that is that you still playing into that [11:31] Nick: no because you would hear that a lot the and the calls we've gone to the officers have gone to the residents in front of the residents on the street within that 50 or 100 feet and listened right can't hear nothing can't hear anything audible like obviously loud music and certainly not a violation of the ordinance when they get there okay great thank you thanks [11:31] Mayor Clint Hoopman: thank you all right we will move on to our consent agenda and these items are considered routine and will be enacted with a single motion unless a council member member or citizen request to pull an item and council members are there any items you'd like to pull from consent all right citizens any items to pull seeing none we would take a motion for the consent agenda [11:31] Council Member Grindall: second [11:31] Mayor Clint Hoopman: motion from council member grindall a second from council member Bergman all those in favor indicate by saying I I opposed the consent items all carry we'll move on to our regular agenda and we'll start with item 5A which is our family Aquatic Center Improvement project update and Eric is going to take us through this one [12:18] Eric Carlson: Mr Mayor members of the council this evening or requesting that you approve a guaranteed maximum uh contract with Tera construction for the construction of the Aquatic Center improvements and I'll just walk through those right now so that the public knows what we're planning to do and so this is the project team from the city staff that have been working on this project with our architect and with our contractor Tera construction um the Apple Valley Family qua Center is an $8.2 million project we had planned to spend about 80% of that or $6.5 million towards the actual construction and about 20% of that or $1.6 million towards the soft costs of the project um rounding the numbers this is kind of where we're at so we were were exactly where we expected to be uh when we started this project with regards to how the budget is laying out um as a part of the project we're planning to Rebrand and rethe the uh Aquatic Center from the Apple Valley Family Aquatic Center to Splash Valley waterp Park and so throughout the water park we'll be introducing the brand of the Splash Valley and an otter on our signage on some of our Play features um we'll be putting together birthday packages around that theme um and just doing whatever we can to create a new theme and a new brand for the facility so that when people come to it um in the summer of 2025 um it'll have it'll look new and we'll be referring to it and marketing it marketing it uh as Splash Valley Water Park as part of the Improvement project the facility was originally constructed about 25 years ago um and so we will be updating things across the facility to make them more ADA Compliant and inclusive for folks that may have a disability we'll be uh improving uh concrete slopes and approaches door hardware uh the showers we'll be adding an adult changing station uh the the pool entrance and exit will be adding uh an entrance and an exit with a handrail um making sure that our signage meets the Ada code right now none of our signage is Braille has Braille on it and so our new signage will um and all of this has been reviewed by one of by an ADA consultant that specializes in these types of um code issues we'll be making landscape improvements to the entire facility we'll be dressing up the front of the facility so that that as you drive up um it'll be an improved look um will be improving the Landscaping on the lazy river and then throughout the water park itself from the pool uh Improvement perspective replastering both of the pools gel gel coating all of the slides to make them look new again and last another 25 plus years we'll be updating the pool gutters uh the stair slides and The Landings uh to those facilities as well when it comes to the concession stand we'll be adding some shade out front of the concession stand so that if you happen to be standing in line instead of standing in the hot Sun you'll be able to stand in a little bit of shade you won't be standing on hot concrete we'll be making some service window improvements uh layouts with inside the concession stand itself so that hopefully we can do a better job of serving customers a little bit faster doing some equipment updates and HVAC upgrades uh to the concession stand for the staff that has to work in it uh one of the items that was highly requested was additional shade at the uh at the Aquatic Center so we'll be adding uh shade throughout and it's a little light on the screen but the Shaded uh shapes that you can see on the screen are where additional shade is going to go we will be uh installing some emergency Gates the red arrows on the perimeter of the site are emergency Gates that will be added to the fence line so that if there's ever an emergency or an accident uh and it causes us to have to um have people leave the facility in a hurry um and maybe not in a place where the accident or the issue is happening there's other ways to get out of the facility uh than just just through the front gate which is really the only spot for folks to get out right now you'll notice on the screen on the uh in the middle of the facility there's a black line with the yellow arrows we had thought about putting a fence through the middle of it separating the zero death entry pool from The Lazy River in a way that we would be able to um not have both of them open at the same time and allowing the facility to be a little bit more cost effective to rent out but the cost of the fence doesn't really allow us to make enough uh we can't make enough money to really justify the cost of the fence so we're not going to move forward with that we'll be updating mechanical systems and maybe the the one to point out the the most is we'll be replacing the the pool filters to both facilities we'll be going from a sand based filter to a regenerative media based filter which requires us to do less backwashing which means we will get to use less water we should be saving about 790,000 gallons of water every year about so about 25% of the water that we use uh also means that we're going to use a little less electric electricity uh for that so saving about 21,000 kilowatt hours annually we should save about $1,000 uh with the upgraded filters and again those filters are 25 years old so they're really at the end of their useful life we're replacing boilers um other HV other HVAC equipment throughout the facility plumbing and electrical upgrades to meet current codes um and do some bath house improvements and along those lines uh we'll be updating the family changing rooms uh which are kind of at the front of the facility making them handicap accessible again adding that adult changing station for uh so that if if an adult comes that has special needs that there's a place for them uh to be able to take care of their needs and and the people that help support that individual uh again Plumbing upgrades and Mission improvements or air improvements to the admissions area to try to get when we open up in the morning um or the early afternoon there's always a long line out the front door so we're doing everything we can to get people through the gate as quickly as possible because everyone's excited to get to the pool and they don't want to stand in line uh we're going to be adding a little bit of solar power the facil is open for 60 to 70 days a year so it's hard to justify spending a lot of money on solar but we are spending a little bit of money on introducing rooftop solar to the facility um and that's on the ba that'll be on the bath house and on the concession stand um and it'll it'll uh be enough power to run some of the lights and one of our HVAC units uh at the facility so we are making an effort to be a little bit more friendly when it comes to the environment and using solar power from a construction uh schedule standpoint tonight we're asking the council to approve the guaranteed maximum price contract with Tara for just over $6.7 million um and once that's approved they'll sign contracts with all of their vendors that they received bids from construction would start in September of 24 it'll go through through the winter um into and into the spring of 25 and we hope to open up in June of 25 like we normally would only with a rebranded remarketed facility as Splash Valley Water Park and a lot of new improvements to the facility itself I think that's it I can stand and answer any questions that the council may have [19:16] Mayor Clint Hoopman: Council have questions I know we've seen this a handful of times in a couple settings so if there's not a lot of questions for those watching it's not that we aren't paying attention it's that we've seen it four times now probably in different settings so yep counil good one's going to prove me wrong and ask a question though [20:02] Council Member Goodwin: well I'm not I'm just going to say the new the new name of it Splash Valley is kind of cute it's got got a got a nice look to it so we got a what was that that's an Otter Otter yep we're gonna name him Tom we're name him we'll all know it as Splash Valley looks like you're retired I like it it's a very clever name thank you [20:47] Mayor Clint Hoopman: thank you we appreciate the support you know uh there's been a ton of uh chances for input you sent mailings out there's been website things it never seems to fail that after this gets going somebody writes us an email and says what the heck where did this come from so it it amazes me uh L somebody could be watching tonight and and and think that this is being done behind closed doors or Ram roded through there's been more than ample opportunity for input on this thing and and all of these improvements have been carefully thought out and planned and and uh the work that's gone into this and and you in particular that put into it and your staff has been remarkable to develop a first class water uh recreation facility and and I appreciate that yeah we gotten great you great first 25 years out of the facility we have too so very popular y all right if there F questions we are looking for a motion to approve the guaranteed maximum price [21:33] Council Member Goodwin: so move [21:33] Council Member Bergman: Amendment second with [21:33] Mayor Clint Hoopman: motion from council member Goodwin and a second from council member Bergman all those in favor indicate by saying I I opposed that item carries thank you Eric uh Ron has our next item which is our proposed 2025 City budget and property tax lovey and uh Ron we'll turn it over to you [22:19] Ron Hedberg: all right thank you Mr Mayor members of the council there we are uh as the mayor mentioned we'll be talking about the preliminary budget and tax levy for the coming year 2025 um one thing to keep in mind when we set the levy this evening that becomes the maximum Levy can be reduced anytime between now and uh end of the year when we certified the final Levy to the uh to the county auditor tonight's schedule uh we'll look at some of the overview General overview high level overview of some of the significant impacts some of the changes presented in this year's budget we'll talk about uh one change since the uh August 22nd informal meeting is there is an updated resolution that was included in your packet uh it does uh apply $ 24,2 of the bond premium that was received when we sold the 2024 pay General obligation bonds and uh the reason for that is the premium uh resulted in a levy for 2025 that was higher than what we were including in the earlier drafts so this brings keeps it at the level that we were looking at back in early summer so in an effort to uh mitigate the increase to the uh to the property taxpayer we'll talk about some of the significant budget items of note we'll talk about some of the valuation changes in tax impacts and some changes in the market value Homestead market value exclusion program which this year there were some uh significant changes to that that'll benefit uh a number of uh number of our residents the action formal action this evening is one to adopt the preliminary budget and Levy uh that sets the maximum Levy again uh as I mentioned can be lowered at any time through the end of the year but not increased the uh other action uh included in here is to set a date to discuss the budget and Levy where the public is invited to attend we used to call that the truth and Taxation hearing it's now just the budget meeting is the the state uh title for that we are recommending that uh that meeting can be held on a regular scheduled city council date we're recommending December 12th it does provide uh the city council if the city council cannot take action finish that evening on December 12th it provides a backup date to December 26th to finish uh the budget and Levy adoption for taxes payable 2025 the budget timeline uh really the uh staff budget is uh starts with the city council goal study session in the in the spring but the staff starts working on it in May through early August we this year distributed the uh preliminary draft to the city council on August 8th held a budget workshop on August 22nd we uh had scheduled at that time uh this evening's meeting to adopt the preliminary Levy and budget um the other piece we need to do is by the end of September is notify the city coun uh the county auditor of the city council meeting date to discuss the budget and Levy where the public is invited to tend budget process um again begins each year with the annual goal sub city council a goal setting session in the spring of each year sets the goals for the coming year at that time we we typically have the preliminary values received from the county for the estimated valuations for the following year we can take that and estimate an impact to the median value home and throughout the whole budget process that becomes I'll say the taxable the target Maximum Impact for the budgets that in process we don't always meet that but that that is kind of our overall Target as we go through the process um we then following the city council goal setting we provide direction to the Departments of course to meet the city council goals but then to uh as they prepare their Department budget requests both re revenues and expenses uh should be uh consider in addressing the goals budget impact should be within the levy impact goals that I mentioned expenses should be realistic and based on projected costs if they are anticipated uh new programs of course that would be in there as an additional cost but there would be offsetting Revenue expected uh prior expenses should be reviewed and compared to the prior year actuals of course that is what uh staff does when they prepare the budget request and then this Administration finance and the department sit and review those over one or one or one and a half week period in in June and July and we go through a similar exercise comparing to the prior year actuals um and talking about the additional programs that may be happening Revenue should be projected at realistic levels and related to the cost to provide the service so for example if costs are increasing 8% the expectation would be fees and charges should also be increasing at or about that same same rate if not more this year the um the once the department submits the requests Administration Finance review the budget requests we compile it all and put it into the one system into one document um at the end of that the city admin uh an administrative recommended budget is presented into the city council which we we did back in uh on August uh 22nd just an overview of the of the budget request in on the column on the left side the 2025 Department proposed we started off with a department proposed revenue of 45.7 million and Department expenses projected or proposed of 47.8 we can see we we started off 2025 at a two $2 million U deficit or a two $2 million puzzle to solve and throughout the process revenues were increased 970,000 and expenses were reduced to 1.1 million to address that and we now have a Balan budget in 2025 of 47.7 million we do in Apple Valley we do a two-year budget the second year in the subsequent year the prior Year's second budget becomes the base for the for the next year so that explains why in this example this the problem to solve in the first year for 2025 smaller because we solved part of that already the previous year so in 2026 the department request was uh included revenues of 48 million expenses of 52 million through the process we had a solve for 4.2 million so we did uh we did solve for that um by either additional revenues Andor expenses we are sitting with a the second year budget is balanced the action that the city council really takes this evening or and in December is to adopt a one-year budget but we do a two-year look just so we can see into the future on how how the budget will be uh playing out in the coming year throughout the process staff does seek outside Revenue to mitigate any impact some examples include we heard earlier this evening a number of Park and W grants that have been received uh just over the last year year and a half Redwood includes a playground 1.4 million from the state another half a million from the feds for that uh Redwood Park uh the Mighty Ducks grant for the Hayes Arena 27,000 a DNR grant for 250,000 for the Cobblestone Lake uh trails totaling 2.3 million uh some federal grants uh installation of a level two uh electric vehicle charging station 114,000 and recently A Safe Streets Grant was awarded for two for 280,000 for the development of a plan for the safety action plan and supplementing safe routes to school there's a number of uh storm water grants that are either in process of being applied for Andor awarded there's uh received Awards of 488,000 from both the state and and the Watershed the they have a number of Grants 1.6 million that are in the approval process and then there's another 900,000 that they are working on applying for at this time one of the uh things we need to that will be coming into play this year is property valuations and the change of that for the coming year overall property values are increasing 0.3% so less than 1% increase in the property value um but we can see here the first line is the residential and of course is the value of uh taxable market value of all Residential Properties in town is going down uh 0.58% for the coming year from 6.5 billion to 6 well 6 billion 470 million uh slight reduction there we'll talk about part of what's driving that uh commercial industrial we can see that they are increasing 10.8% for the coming year utilities is going up just over 2% we do see a slight reduction in Department valuations coming for taxes payable 2025 I believe a a good portion of that is related to tax appeals that have been working their way through the tax courts and the county has uh settled some of those and have adjusted the values going forward because of that when there is a larger change in one property class when the other one does not change or even goes down in this case it'll shift the burden from the uh one class that isn't going up to the one that is going up more for example commercial is going up at 10.8% versus residential going down 0 58% so that'll shift the burden property tax burden from the residential property class to the commercial property class this is continuing a shift that occurred also in taxes payable 2024 Apartments decline for the coming year 1.4% and that'll reverse part of the shift that they experienced last year so but there's always uh movement in all of the different pieces of the uh in the variables in the property tax calculation overall tax capacity in a minute we'll we'll take a look at an example of how to calculate tax capacity but this is basically the tax capacity overall of the city for new construction is going up one and a half% which is positive news a good chunk of that uh percentagewise is in the commercial industrial we are having experiencing some tax capacity changes on the residential side as well if we look at appreciation or the valuation changes without new construction we could see that residential uh is going down 1.5% that is in this case the majority of that is related to the change in the market value Homestead exclusion program which we'll cover in a moment uh commercial industrial we can see the appreciation on existing commercial industrial is up 6.3 3% utility is up 2.2% and again the uh apartment classification for tax capacity purposes the appreciation or valuation decline 3.56% overall overall the preliminary tax capacity increases just under 1% Citywide both appreciation and new construction so all of that is just under 1% which two years ago but last year it was 5.7 7% the year before that it was double digit so this is showing a moderation of that uh valuation increases which is a good sign for I think for everyone the median value home uh for the coming year is going to be decreasing .9% from 362,000 to 358,000 that's given for tax payable 2025 um and we'll take a look at what that means when we calculate a tax tax Bill the market value Homestead market value exclusion program I mentioned there's some uh changes H happening in there the the exclusion for coming online the change for uh 2025 the market value exclusion reduces the taxable market value of qualifying Homestead Properties and the maximum exclusion is 40% of the value up to the maximum up to the minimum threshold and that maximum exclusion for the homes is changing from 76,000 for 2024 in preier Prior years to 95,000 so you'll they'll get a maximum exclusion of 40% up to that 95,000 and then once they reach the 95,000 it begins to be phased out and the phase out previously was 43,800 it is now 57,200 so we will see more homes that participate in the market value exclusion benefit program for the coming year again 40% of the estimated market value is excluded up to the maximum value which is achieved at 95,000 after 95,000 it's reduced by 9% of the value that exceeds 95,000 until it's totally phased out at 57,200 the market value Homestead exclusion program just a graphical image you can see that of the the value of the homes are on the horizontal axes and then the the max the market exclusion is a percent of the estimated market value starts out at 40% once it hits at 95,000 it starts to decline until it's fully phased out again at 57,200 U we the budget includes a number of different programs and in funds the total of all the budgeted funds is6 m718 th000 on the expenditure side the general fund is the largest operating fund that makes up 44% or approximately 46.7 million of the total budgeted expenses Enterprise funds which includes the water sewer utility operations storm water utility the liquor stores all are included in the Enterprise funds at 38 m983 th000 approximately 37% and the road fund is a significant portion of the uh overall budget for the coming year on the expenditure side seven just under 7.7 million or approximately 77% of the total budget is for the road fund all other funds make up 12% approximately 13 million of that is one one of the larger ones included in there is the future capital projects fund which uh for the coming year is funding the uh $4 million of the police and fire station project that is going on to reduce Reliance on debt issuance as well as 1.6 million for the redoing of the parking lot here at the municipal center for the total budget uh the revenues that generate uh included in the budget is 98,9 36,000 we had expenditures that were exceeding the revenues that is the city's investment in capital outlay investment M uh in improving buildings infrastructure um and those costs are recovered in over the future in user fees um the biggest portion of the uh again this is the all all funds for the total budget user and franchise fees is 37 million again this is the liquor store sales the utilities water sewer storm water utilities Ice Arena all make up the user INF franchise fees taxes uh for the overall budgeted funds 35 million 370,000 approximately 36% intergovernmental Revenue uh makes up 8,1 133,000 in budgeted revenues that includes the municipal state aid support of uh of our Municipal state aid Road system so it's uh in addition to that we do receive some U uh police and fire Aid that is included in those Revenue numbers resident reigal U asked a question about uh LGA uh the city of Apple Valley doesn't receive LGA and and Mr ral's aware of that but the U the question really I think that uh that he had was um what are we doing to promote the city of Apple Valley receiving that and that is it comes down to re meeting and working with our reected state officials the um I don't I do have a slide in here but I don't know exactly where to get to it but I have a slide uh way back in the slide deck that uh breaks out the calculation for Egan Apple Valley and Burnsville and if we remember last year for taxes payable 2024 Burnsville hadn't all three of those communities were not receiving LGA previously and Burnsville began to receive LGA in 2024 when we look at the formula there's a number of variables that make that up but when we look at the formula the difference between Burnsville Egan and Apple Valley is the age of the housing stock and the age of the population it's those two variables where the state gets the age of the population I don't know that but those are those are the two variables in there and why I guess burnwell would be getting it in Apple Valley and Egan do not it comes down to th those two variables all the other variables that they use which is about 10 were very similar between each of the communities so in answer to to John's question is we need to work with the state on you know they they review the formula every 10 years and they make tweaks to it every 10 years they'll make a bigger tweak but in in the interum they do make minor tweaks to the to the formula so um so we will have to work with our state reps on looking at that program um licens and permits this is building permits um business licensing two 2,1 152,000 for the coming year we got other revenues fines interest everything else 1.7 we are not uh issuing debt in the budgeted funds for the for the coming year and then there is transfers and admin fees between the general fund and the uh some of the operating funds or the operating utility funds general fund we saw that made up a big portion of the uh of the total budget and this is what you would uh or what I would consider the general when people think of about General government operations most of that is included within the general fund and the general fund for 2025 is 46.7 million and taxes is on the revenue side makes up 75.6% of the operation uh the revenues for the general fund operations all the others uh kind of fees and charges building permits all that intergovernmental all that is included in the other uh other components on the General on the expense side the city is a service provider so you would expect that personal services wages benefits make up a big chunk of the budget and in Apple Valley that is the case approximately 64% or 29.9 million is wages and benefits for the general govern government uh operations Commodities that would include everything from office supplies to motor fuels to min equipment and then Capital outlay this is capital outlay just within the J fund but over 2 million for that the predominant share of that is the charge to the general fund for the vehicle and Equipment replacement fund um we use that to uh level out the capital outlay impacts to the to the budget in the future and again we have a transfer to the road Improvement fund 4.4 million transfers to the municipal building fund 545,000 for the coming year the uh on the expense side again the total the budget is balanced so the general fund expenses 46,7 33,000 just like on the revenues and this is just represents uh all of the different departments in total expenses throughout the throughout the city just identifying some of the larger departments within there talk about the property tax levy the general fund again biggest supporter of that is the property tax levy we we'll break down the the levy the general operations this includes the general fund Levy the transfers to the municipal building fund all of that up in general operations we've got a transfer from the into the from the general fund into the street maintenance program 4.6 million for the coming year an increase of 310,000 approximately 7% increase on the general operations the the levy impact of that is increasing 2.5 million approximately 8.8% facilities Capital Improvement these are the bonds U that have we issued in 2021 and 22 and then we issued another Series in 2024 for the first Debt Service payment is in 2025 so the total of those three bonds uh increasing 700,000 that increase is of course the the bonds that we just issued that's a 73% increase in that Levy or portion of the levy Park referendum bonds of course we had uh some older Park referendum bonds 1.1 million we issued new ones just this past summer and the debt service is going to be increasing to 2, 389,000 increase of one, 255,000 approximately 110% blend all that together the increase in the total Levy 4, 780,000 approximately 13.76% another way that uh we we can look at it is what is the increase you know a large percentage increase in a smaller number isn't really the same uh across the board so if we kind of boil it down General operations of the 13.76% increase in the total Levy General operations makes up 7.23% the street maintenance program makes up just under .9% facilities uh and park referendum bonds between the two 5.6 million or 5.6% sorry that gives us an idea of where the Imp the increase and the impact is coming from overall the levy uh what's call it the levy increase drivers what is driving the levy increase Levy increase as I mentioned 4.7 million approximately 13.7% um again the issued uh 2024 a bonds and the overall Debt Service on the facilities and the park park referendum bonds going up uh 1,958 th000 approximately 5.6% you have increased transfer to the road fund 310,000 but we decreased the transfer into the facilities fund 195,000 and then all of the other items we have uh in the 2025 budget we had a a reduction of revenues we have are experiencing reduced uh court fines or reduced uh cable franchise fees and sell Tower rentals those reduction revenues cause pressure on the property tax levy we also had increased salary wages including Cola and step increases 1.2 million increase benefits uh increase Medicare VI per there is two new positions that are supported by Levy and that's the it uh uh person and a CL uh Department assistant in park Administration those are supported in the levy uh increase in contractual services and utilities 340,000 along with increased increase in capital way 262,000 one of the things we do each year is We compare ourselves to similar siiz cities our neighboring communities this chart Compares our total increase of course again it's going up that 13.76% and we can see that we are on the top end of this comparison and what I guess what I say each year is behind every one of these numbers there's a story so we we kind of have to keep that in mind that we are towards the high end this chart breaks out the uh the impacts of the of the debt whether it's the facilities Capital Improvement bonds or the park Bond debt increases if we back that out it's just over 8% of the levy is going up for other than debt um which if we if we didn't have those debt we would be right in the middle where we typically are each year at uh just over 8% this again is a one-year snap shot and things change from year to year if we look at a go back 10 years and we look at the similar size cities of the 10 years and these are the actual levies uh reported to the state of Minnesota so these are firm numbers these are do not include preliminary 2025 numbers of course because nobody's certified those yet so over the past 10 years of these cities that we typically compare to we are the third lowest over 10 years if we do that over five years we are we we increase to fifth lowest and our change in that ranking is related to we're issuing debt and we're spending Capital outlay that may or may not be happening in the same in this other cities what we compare to and then U our ranking this is again was through 2022 should be expected to fall because of the recent Bond issues in 21 and 22 do that same comparison over 10 years of the larger cities within Dakota County Apple Valley's increase for average increase over that 10 years 4.3% increase in the levy second lowest of these cities uh if we go back over five years our raking fell to Fourth highest of uh of those cities in the in the major larger cities within Dakota County again the change from 10 years five years within the past five years we did Issue a couple U facilities Capital Improvement bonds so that will impact the levy of course in that time period we'll talk about the tax impacts to the medium value home and we said the median value home for the coming year 2025 is 3587 we talked about the change in the Homestead market value exclusion so that home this year would receive a a market value exclusion of 14,265 to be an increased market value exclusion reduction but in this case for 2025 they will result in a taxable market value of $344,450 it's that number times the state property classification rate for residential property under 500,000 is 1% gives you a tax capacity for that property of 300 3,444 it's that number times our tax rate it gives us the gross taxes paid on a tax capacity basis of 1435 we have the old park Bonds were based on the market value so we add those in that's approximately $51 for the coming year equals uh property taxes again for the city's portion of the tax bill for 2025 of $486 do that same calculation and comparison between the two years we can see that um the the tax capacity based Levy is increasing $120 for per year $10 per month Revenue uh referendum market value based referendum bonds that we ISU previously stay about the same so the increase in total $120 for the year $10 per month going from 1366 to 1486 impact to the me value home going up about 8.81% another way to look at that tax the tax impact impact and breaking it down we can see that General operations is going up $38 from 1,81 to1 $19 approximately $38 increasing 3.54% if we do the same calculation what we did with the levy increase and showing how the 8.81% of the percent change in the impact of the med Val home we can see that the general operations is making up 2.8% of that street maintenance program is going up $462 the impact of on the median value home is uh two it's going up 2.4% but the impact of the median value home is going up 34% facilities capital prit bonds again we issued uh uh debt over the past year so that increase coming for the coming year going up $27 or the impact uh to the share of the impact is 1.99% same with Park referendum bonds we just issued going up approximately $50 on the median value home for the year um which is about 3.67 so of the 88.8% increase in the medium value home uh 2.8% is General operations less than a half per for the street maintenance program just under 2% for the facilities additional facilities Capital Improvement bonds and 3.67% for the park referendum bonds for the coming year another way to look at it uh I like to look at it is the annual Property Tax Bill we do have this lays out the different uh departments and we can we'll see that not all uh departments and activities are included here one uh example would be building inspections they're not uh they don't make up a portion of the utility bill or the annual property tax bill because they have offsetting revenues that cover all of the expenses of that department so again the uh the largest operation here is $418 which would fund the police operations Park and Recreation $81 Public Works 163 and we go around the uh around the pie chart here uh the street maintenance program we just saw made up $196 of the annual tax bill part uh the park Bond Debt Service now I changed this and these two debt services are are uh are are mixed are uh switched around so the paron is actually $100 the capital Improvement bonds is the $70 that probably about that not quite sure how that didn't make its way in there uh another comparison that we do is the the taxes on the median value home in some comparable cities these are I only received uh eight other responses to my to my survey of the uh oh way to go him touch got it back back so this uh this craft compares the taxes on a median value home in a number of different communities for example let's start with Edina the the median value home in Edina is 72,300 the tax rate in ID is the 31395 results in a uh tax on the medium value home in Indina of 2,43 we do the same calculation of the median value home in each of the communities and it uh we can see our comparison in the tax impact of the city's portion of the taxes on each of those communities and again we're in the middle at about $1,486 for the coming year and again we point out that does include the um the levy support of the road and infrastructure reconstruction that isn't the case in all all communities we do uh annually a comparison of per capita governmental fund governmental type expenditures per capita and these are the same larger cities metrowide that we compare ourselves to 2022 is the most recent year that's available we can see that Apple Valley's rank at that uh is third lowest in this comparison at $957 per uh per capita for that uh year 2022 we do the same comparison for Dakota County cities again the same larger County cities that same $957 per capita governmental fund type expenditures is a ranking of third lowest in in Dakota County as well the state Minnesota just uh with the changes in the valuations and the impacts that we're expecting not just uh with Apple Valley's Levy but with the county and is uh just point out that there are a few different property tax refund programs we we'll we do cover this again in the truth and Taxation budget meeting in December there is a homestead credit refund uh the state haven't posted the amounts for 2024 yet but it applies for maximum household income of 135,000 and a maximum refund of 3,310 and it's based on uh the portion that your property taxes exceed a per certain percentage of your income of course you have to be classified as Homestead Property there is a special property tax refund then it's eligible there is no income uh um restrictions on that if the increase is more than 12% and that increase was at least $100 there is a refund that is eligible for the property owner maximum refund is uh $1,000 there's also a renters property tax refund uh that is based on homecome similar to the homestead credit refund and maximum refund for that is $2,570 there is a senior City citizens property tax deferment and now this isn't a reduction this is the state if it exceeds a certain percentage of your uh income the state and the property taxes are exceeding more than 3% of the net income that portion that exceeds the 3% would become a deferred uh lean on the property and it would be paid it would just sit at the uh be certified to the county if and when the property is sold that lean would be paid out of the proceeds at that time so it could go on and there is interest that does accumulate on that there's a disabled veteran prop property exclusion in addition to the market value exclusion there's another one for disabled veterans uh that reduces the market value of the home there's a couple different exclusion levels 150,000 300,000 depending on the disability status um of course there's requirements you have to be disly discharged from the armed forces and then have a service connected disability rating 7% or more this program is administered by the county uh there is a dis disable abled property owner classification as well um provides a reduced tax rate for Homestead Property so again that uh is uh administered by the county brings us to the timeline remaining uh the action this evening would uh set a budget meeting date for December 12th 2024 we're suggesting at the regularly s scheduled city council meeting on December 12 12th the county would send partiel specific notices during the second and third weeks of November notifying the property owners of the meeting date and time but also of the uh tax impact for the coming year uh the council would then uh hold the budget discussion on December 12th at 7 p.m and then uh following that uh adopt a final budget and tax levy for pable 2025 on December 12th with a backup date of December 26th also both of those that regularly scheduled city council meeting dates uh the action uh requested the evening is consideration of a resolution adopting the 2025 proposed budget property tax levy and a separate motion to set December 12th as the truth and Taxation budget meeting at 7 pm so with that Ron take a breath take a drink questions for Ron [1:02:37] Mayor Clint Hoopman: I don't have questions I'll have comments do you want to start you want to take a motion and then start uh leave up take a motion and then jump to them does that work yeah all right oh we'll take a motion to adopt the resolution um for the 2025 proposed budget and property tax levy Mo second a motion in a second now let's pause for comments council member grindle [1:03:22] Council Member Grindall: thank you Madame mayor obviously my colleagues know that I have a concern about um the increase in the levy this year um I'm going to vote Yes tonight but my anticipation is that we're going to continue to work to see if we can't find savings um in the levy and you know we spend a lot of time on the medium home value what is this going to do to our businesses and we need a friendly environment for our businesses and their valuations are going up what 11% their taxes are going to be going up even higher than residential from last year that's corre because of valuation so we've never even talked about what this is done to our business community so like I said I'm voting for this tonight but if we don't find some more ways to lower the levy I will not be voting forward in December with uh [1:04:08] Ron Hedberg: um I'll just make a comment on the commercial valuations we at this point we don't have a the fiscal disparity number that we can apply to the commercial property and that's frankly why I can't include you can't get it yet because you don't have all the which you know which way that's going to land yet um we have we have a couple elements of it but we don't have have it down to the parcel yet y that we usually don't get from the county until November [1:04:54] Council Member Goodwin: council member Goodwin thank you mayor couple things just to clarify for the public we talk about this $10 a month for the median price valued home which is 356,000 now my understanding of that is the medium price that's the house that's right in the middle that's correct half the houses would be valued less half more so half the people in Apple Valley will be paying less than $10 a month increase yes increase I'm sorry I should have said it was like that CLE on that okay okay $10 a month or less for half the bank home we should now for those of us like me whose home is higher than the median valued home I'll be paying more but I just think it's important for people they know that half the people in this city will be paying less now I've talked to some people in this town and um I said the meeting value is going to go up 10 bucks a month and quite frankly people have kind of just said oh really that's what they say to me anyway I've talked to my neighbors and my neighbors because the value of my home my will be going up about $14.25 a month according to a the finance department and I've talked to a few of my neighbors about that and they say now why did they say that they say that because they read some of the same articles I've read in the paper about what's happening to Minneapolis in St Paul and U so I don't see a real problem with with how we're setting the living tonight but I'd also like to make a few comments Mr rigal made a comment about local government AIDS I'd like to make a few comments about that there're 800 I believe it's 56 counties or cities in the state 90 of them do not get local government Aid do I think that's fair no I do not think it's fair I wish I changed the formula now some of these poor little cities out state that get LGA I'm all I'm all for of that that's fine but uh there's I'm just going to give you one example of a I think a city that's in good shape Rochester that gets a lot of LGA they get $5.6 million dollar a year of local government Aid now that's if you look at that tax base that's a pretty healthy City Scot IBM Meo Clinic all the Enterprise around that uh does it make sense that Rochester should get $5.6 million and Apple Valley should get zero no it makes no sense how do we change that I've talked to our state representative and he agrees with me this very unfair if I talk if you talk to your state representative your state senator I'm sure they'll tell you they agree with you you're citizen that we should get some LGA what are someone the problems with that well what did they say 856 cities yep 90 don't get it there's a lot of legislators that represent those cities um and most of the people that don't get it are the metro area and outstate the Suburban Metro I shouldn't say that because Minneapolis and St Paul get a lot of LGA but politically it's just very difficult to change I remember many many many years ago this was after governor fenny was no longer the governor this is between the time that he was the governor and think and running for president I ran into to him in a chamber of commerce meeting and I said Tim I can call him Tim because he was a Eagan council member when I was an Apple Valley Council I said did you really have to cut us totally out of the budget in 2006 couldn't you have just cut it back so with inflation we would have got something I never got an answer but um yeah it's not right John Mr rle it's not right that 90 cities don't get LGA but if you're a little city outstate and you look at the quote rich cities like Aina and Neen Prairie and Egan and Apple Valley um there's just much isn't much sympathy for it and I'm sure our state legislators would love to change the law but I just don't think they have numbers on their side so that was the comment I had about LGA thank you mayor [1:10:17] Council Member Bergman: thank you council member any other comments yeah go ahead there's an old saying he who robs Peter to pay Paul will always have their support of Paul and that's very good council member it is it so while we're getting nothing out of this the cities that are getting it are not going to be pleased about giving up a share of what they're already getting so it's it's it's AC an argument and there's no more unfair word in the language in my opinion than the word Fair because Fair all depends on how you're looking at it you know the people are getting more think that's fair the people are getting less think it's unfair and it's uh it's it's a darn shame but if you look at it as objectively as possible you know it it doesn't seem right that cities that c been brought up are getting uh abortion and and we're getting a high how are you so the whole thing with taxes is is a barad to work with and I agree with council member grindle um to try to keep it as keep the impact is as minimal as possible it's it's tough but as a citizen of Apple Valley we get a lot of bang for our our tax buck and and one of the things that that I was uh brought up to speed on years ago was the the Street Maintenance thing which is a fairly substantial portion of our budget uh on the other hand an individual uh property owner does not have to pay when the street is rebuilt in front of his or her house uh which uh I ran across this in with my business hat on uh a 40 foot Frontage on A Street in Minneapolis uh they were say 16,000 bucks not too long that was several years ago so uh the fact that we're not getting that and a number of other cities are is a quite a benefit for for the citizens of Apple Valley and it's it's we take it for granted but a lot of cities surprise surprise you open your mail and you know there should go for a lot of money so well that that was one of the discussions when we went down that path is trying to take uh make the that burden more predictable and that we're we're still paying for it everybody is still paying for it I don't think anybody's hiding that fast [1:12:37] Council Member Grindall: I just add to that one is you know we talked about business impact and and I would say nonprofits in churches as well right that that assessment impact is often bigger on them than it is on the average uh homeowner and so they're uh they're saving as well and uh yeah many of our neighboring cities when Street gets improved in front of the church that's scrambling to right they're not property tax but they're still stuck with the assessment and so that does spread across all of those institutions right um John anything to add I'll leave it till the just a couple [1:12:37] Mayor Clint Hoopman: just a couple other things we talked about LGA you know the comment I hear periodically especially people new to the state is hey you you got a a ton of retail you must be raking in the sales tax and you that's another piece that we don't talk about in here but right the state takes in the sales tax and with the exception of a few recent additions they get to reallocate that as they choose from the legislature level and so despite collecting a lot of sales taxes in Apple Valley we don't get those back so really our source of Revenue is effectively uh property tax for almost all things um yeah to me this there isn't anything I pay for that I don't want to pay less for but you also have to figure out do you get a value for that as well and we made decisions on Public Safety on roads and infrastructure while everybody didn't show up to vote for the referendum those who did made a decision to spend $50 more a month right on on parks in this case and I guess those who didn't show up also made a choice to show up or not show up and so to me this is about choices and we'll have a chance to make some more of them if we have some chance to shave and move and adjust kind of going forward we should absolutely figure out how to do that at least we kind know what this is and we can start working toward uh getting those notices out and that kind thing from here so we had a motion and a second on this you have any other discussion Tom before we call [1:14:08] Council Member Goodwin: well I was just saying sometimes these statist statistics can be you have to be very careful with these statistics our assess or our our Levy went up 13.76% sounds like a lot except if you ask the average the median home owner in this community your taxes went up 10 a month they go huh you have to be very care careful with this the statistics because 13.76% 10 a month great so you have to be very careful with these kind of I'm just saying that in case the newspaper is listening maybe they would uh point that out thank you very much mayor [1:14:44] Mayor Clint Hoopman: thank you so we we had a motion in a second and I didn't write them down but I'm hoping our city clerk noted them earlier so uh we had a motion and a second all in favor of adopting the resolution for the 2025 proposed budget and property tax levy indicate by saying I I I opposed that carries and we also need a motion to set December 12th 2024 as the truth and Taxation meeting at 7 p.m. [1:15:20] Council Member Bergman: motion [1:15:20] Council Member Grindall: second [1:15:20] Mayor Clint Hoopman: from council member Bergman and a second from council member grindall all those in favor indicate by saying I opposed carries as well R to you staff and really all the staff thanks for the time this is a six-month plus effort to get to tonight so thank you theill all right let's move on staff and Council Communications uh Tom I we had a couple items we wanted to make sure everybody was aware of [1:15:20] Tom: yes Mr Mayor we have two tonight we have one regarding our fall cleanup day and one regarding our food truck festival so let's call on Charles to uh start us off [1:16:00] Charles Grawe: mayor mayor and members uh it is the season to get the budget Levy uh presentation and then the cleanup Day presentation so just a reminder to our folks that uh the cleanup day will be Saturday September 21st it's the family Aquatic Center parking lot which is uh just off of Johnny Cake Ridge Road we open at 8:00 a.m. and we will close pretty promptly at 100 p.m. uh the event is is for nonhazardous materials things like appliances tires scrap metal furniture remodeling debris um and then we also do uh paper shredding and uh there are fees that apply to most of those not the shredding but most of the other things uh we encourage people to check our website for the prices we do not accept hazardous waste so things like Electronics paints uh cleaners pesticides the fluorescent bulbs those things have to go to the recycling Zone up in Egan um and and a couple couple pieces of information we just try to stress uh for folks every every year once the longest line of the day is always at 8 a.m. uh typically we have a line literally out to Johnny cake and that takes us a little while to get through probably 20 30 minutes so we say feel free to sleep in you do not need to be there at 88 uh most other lines the rest of the day are extremely short uh we try to get most people through in less than 5 minutes um the shredding just for the Public's uh information is in the parking lot that's right off of Johnny cake at the top of the hill so they do not need to drive down and get in line with everybody else who's dropping off the construction debris and everything else they can just stay at the top of the hill and go right to the shredding truck and uh take care of the shredding so I think that's uh that's all but people can check our website for more information and we'll see them on the 21st [1:17:31] Mayor Clint Hoopman: thanks Charles I will grab in here the last couple years and you're in and out as quick as there's people to help unload right you uh it's it's quick and easy so thank you great thank you and Eric let's talk about the fall food or the food fall food truck festival that's what I want to say there it is [1:18:18] Eric Carlson: uh Mr may members of the council just want to make sure that we invite everyone in the community to come out on Saturday looks like the weather forecast is going to be pretty decent maybe a little bit overcast so it won't be too hot but um Saturday September 14th at Kelly Park from noon to 600 there'll be uh live music food trucks and a lot of fun we have a great partner in the Apple Valley um Arts Foundation going to be sponsoring the band so uh grab some friends grab your family come out and enjoy some uh fall food truck festival at Kelly Park thank you we look forward to it [1:18:18] Mayor Clint Hoopman: anything else Tom council members anything um just we're here at the middle of September I'll just add that uh September 10th uh we had a Hos on coupling a ribbon cutting at the new Fire Station uh it was great to have there it was great to see not only our current firefighters show up but also a number of our retirees including uh way up to for retired Chiefs maybe wandering around the parking lot somewhere somewhere in that ballpark so so uh it was great to see them great to see them all there and just you how appropriate to do that on the uh the 10th the day before the uh remembrance of September 11th and so um um nice to have a good thing to celebrate as we remember that but also just a good time to remember uh the job done and the sacrifices made that day so um worth celebrating worth remembering any other comments Council if not we will will um approve the calendar of upcoming events and our next regular city council meeting is Thursday September 26th at 7M do I have a motion to approve the calendar [1:19:50] Council Member Grindall: so moved [1:19:50] Council Member Bergman: second [1:19:50] Mayor Clint Hoopman: motion from council member grindall and a second from council member Bergman all in favor indicate by saying I I opposed and we have motion to adjourn [1:19:50] Council Member Grindall: so move [1:19:50] Council Member Meander: second [1:19:50] Mayor Clint Hoopman: motion from Council May grindall and a second from councilor Mander all in favor indicate by saying I I we're journ thank you [Music] oh