This transcript is from the July 7, 2020, City Council meeting. Please note that while your provided list includes current officials like Jon Radermacher, the transcript from 2020 features the officials in office at that time (such as City Administrator Neil Jensen and Council Members Bringold, Duncan, Gesme, and Matson). [2:06] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** You good evening everyone. I call the July 7th, 2020 city council meeting for the city of Cannon Falls to order. Maybe start out by congratulating Derek on the birth of her twin girls. He's sleeping, wake up Derek. I'm here. Okay, could we have a roll call please? [2:06] **Sara Peer (City Clerk):** Okay. Bringold? Here. Duncan? Here. Guzme? Here. Lindell? Here. Matson? Here. Montgomery? Here. Ulta? Here. [2:06] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** Would you rather the pledge of allegiance? I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, [2:54] **All:** One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. [3:18] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** Such a second motion by Duncan, a second by Gizme to approve the agenda. Any discussion? All in favor, aye. Opposed, carried. No bill. Okay, public hearings. Resolution 2487 certifying unpaid utility bills to be collected with taxes. This is something we do every three months. Neil, you want to say anything on that? Or it's kind of routine? [3:18] **Neil Jensen (City Administrator):** Council a few years ago decided that was the fair way to collect unpaid utility bills. Those taxes rather than shutting off the water and that. [3:18] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** So I'll open a public hearing on resolution 2487. [4:04] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** Second call public hearing. Third and final call public hearing on resolution twenty four eighty seven. Hearing no public input, I'll close the public hearing and accept a motion on resolution 2487. [4:34] **Council Member Bringold:** So moved. [4:34] **Council Member Duncan:** Second. [4:34] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** Motion by Bringwell, second by Duncan. Resolution 24 is serving unpaid utility bills to be collected with taxes. Any discussion? All in favor? Opposed? Carried. Okay, we'll move to the consent agenda. Items may be adopted under one motion as presented or may be removed for discussion and resolution as council business. For you and the audience and at home, I'll go through the consent agenda. Item A: Just and correct claims for the accounting period ending July 1st, 2020. Item B: Minute meetings for the June 16th, 2020 city council meeting. Item C: City parking lot tree replacement quote. Item D: Appointment of Rebecca Youngmark to the park board. Item E: Resolution 2488 adopting primary and general election judges for 2020 and setting the hourly wages. Item F: Resolution 2489 requesting that certain tax forfeited property as described herein be withheld from public auction for conveyance to the city of Cannon Falls. Item G: Disposal of vehicles. Item H: Resolution 2490 accepting a donation of a hundred dollars from Daniel and Verily Obie for the police department. And item I: Resolution 2491 adopting the city of Cannon Falls COVID-19 plan. Is there anything the council would like to pull down? [6:39] **Council Members:** No. [6:39] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** Do I have a motion to accept the consent agenda? [6:39] **Council Member Gesme:** Motion. [6:39] **Council Member Duncan:** Second. [6:39] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** Motion by Gizme in a second by Duncan to approve the consent agenda. Any discussion? All in favor, aye. Opposed? Carried. Okay, Mr. Northland Securities is not here yet, so we're here... yeah, he's on the screen. Okay, resolution 2486 approving the 2020 A GO bond purchase. Maybe you want to introduce him? [7:27] **Neil Jensen (City Administrator):** Oh, there he is. Um, yes, we sold a bond this morning. George is helping us, helped us out considerably. He's from Northland Securities. On your desk you had a bond sale summary, he'll be going over that for you in just a minute. It was a sale of 3.3 million dollars of general obligation refunding bonds. It took over the 2011 A and the 2013 A bonds that we refunded. We had a great, great sale this morning. We are still a global rating of double A minus, and George, you want to take over and go over what we got accomplished this morning? [8:12] **George Eilertson (Northland Securities):** Sounds terrific. Thank you, Neil. Thank you, Mayor and members of the council. Good to be part of your agenda this evening. As Neil indicated, this is a bond issue that refinances your street utility projects that you had from 2011 and 2013. With Neil being new, he did a really good job. As he noted, the city had previously been assigned a double A minus bond rating with Standard & Poor's. And so again, Neil worked hard. We had received the questions ahead of time and he did a good job of pulling information together about the city's policies, procedures, the budgeting, etc. All led up to the affirmation of the double A minus bond rating by Standard & Poor's. I believe you have a hard copy of the bond sale summary in front of you. Am I correct on that? [8:12] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** Yes. [8:12] **George Eilertson (Northland Securities):** Okay. What I'd like to do is, if you wouldn't mind, I'll actually have you turn to the very last page, page 13. Shows a graph of what's called the Bond Buyer's Index. This just kind of shows the trend of municipal interest, municipal bonds, and what the interest rate trends are. And I'll give the city council kudos for great timing here, because if you look to the very far right of the graph, that's basically the low point in the market for the last 20 years. So that's the reason why we got such favorable results. The bond market is very strong right now in terms of low yields for borrowing. I'm sure Neil and city staff would agree with me, maybe not so good on the investment side, but good on the borrowing side. So, if I could actually take you back to page one then... I just wanted to show you what the market is looking like. At the bottom of page one is a chart that just shows the summary. The data on the right where it says "Finance Plan June 2nd" actually goes back prior to June 2nd when you first took a look at the possibility of refinancing the 2011 and 2013 bonds. This was the kind of savings we were looking at then, where a true interest cost of about two percent would generate a total savings of about 228,000. So that was the market a couple months ago. At that time, that sounded like terrific interest rates resulting in a nice savings. And so just look at the interest rates on the final—I don't want to have you flip around too much—but this morning at 10:00 AM we took financing bids and we got seven investment banks to bid on the bonds. They're on the next page, I won't make you go there, but Piper... a large firm, you know, Piper Jaffray, formerly named Piper Jaffray now named Piper Sandler and Company, was the low bidder with a true interest cost of 1.03 percent. So very, very favorable interest rates, especially compared to when you looked at what the rates used to be when we first started this process. So the interest rates have been cut in half and the savings has basically doubled. So your overall savings now is up to 441,000 dollars, which is a present value savings of over 10 percent. In the public finance industry, that present value percentage number, as kind of a rule of thumb we work with, it's a pretty good refund if it's over three percent. So this is a really strong refund. The market cooperated very nicely. You got seven bids which is really strong, and the results are... I'm really pleased to present these to you Mayor and Council. So I can certainly address any questions you may have. [12:53] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** I think I speak for all of us when I say this was our plan all along. I'm kidding. No, it looks really good. [12:53] **George Eilertson (Northland Securities):** Excellent. Yeah, absolutely. [13:01] **George Eilertson (Northland Securities):** So Mayor and council, I know you indicated it earlier Mayor that the only action for you this evening is to consider approval of the resolution authorizing the sale. And again, I appreciate the opportunity to help you with this sale. As was just noted, you did phenomenal picking this date to sell bonds on July 7th. So good job, thank you. [13:01] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** Any other questions? Well, I'd entertain a motion to approve resolution 2486 approving the 2020 A bond purchase. [13:47] **Mary Jo Matson (Council Member):** So moved. [13:47] **Council Member Bringold:** Second. [13:47] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** Motion by Matson, second by Bringold. Was that right? Yes, to approve resolution 2486. Any other discussion? That's great. Okay, all in favor? Aye. Opposed? Carried. Thank you. [13:47] **George Eilertson (Northland Securities):** Thank you. [14:35] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** Okay, second item. Set up city council work sessions. Neil? [14:35] **Neil Jensen (City Administrator):** Yeah, I would like to get started with the city council on budgeting. We had a finance meeting here a week or so ago on June 25th it was, and I'd like to start with the whole council and start in a work session setting and get started for the next budget season. So I'm looking for two dates: one in July and one in August. I did have suggestions of July 21st and August 4th. If there's any conflicts I'd like to have you guys discuss it so we can have everyone there. That would be at five o'clock prior to the council meetings. [14:35] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** Okay, did that work for everybody? [14:35] **Council Member:** I did have one question on the other engineering and RFPs on the 28th. What time was that going to be? [14:35] **Neil Jensen (City Administrator):** I don't know if we had it on the RFP, but it'll be in the evening if that's okay. [14:35] **Council Member:** Well that's fine, I just wanted to know what time. [15:21] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** I want to do that at 6:30. Or do we want to do it earlier? RFP said three companies, so probably give them 45 minutes each. [15:21] **Council Member:** Okay, then we should probably start before 6:30. Five again? [15:21] **Neil Jensen (City Administrator):** Maybe about five o'clock. Yeah, that would be fine. Five o'clock on the 28th. [16:03] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** Okay, a motion to set those work sessions and also the RFP meeting on the 28th at five o'clock. [16:03] **Mary Jo Matson (Council Member):** So moved. [16:03] **Council Member:** Second. [16:25] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** Motion for the work sessions on the 21st of July and the 4th of August at 5:00, and the RFP meeting on the 28th at five o'clock. Any discussion? All in favor? Opposed? Carried. Okay, reports. Kyle. [17:12] **Kyle (Chamber of Commerce):** Good evening city commissioners, Mayor, and of course the community. I first want to start out with thanking everyone for the flower sponsorships. We've been receiving them still on a weekly basis and so they just keep coming in. The flowers are blooming beautifully and the vines are hanging down there so that's wonderful and thank you for that support. I also want to thank the fair board for all of their work on the appreciation cruise, the fair food vendors, and the fireworks. I think the community really came out. I know that on Friday I was out there, it was a good crowd and I think everyone really enjoyed themselves, so thank you for all of that time and commitment. In regards to the Chamber itself, we are now up to 105 leads/contact requests for our Discover Guide. They are from 25 different states—that's pretty cool out of 50 states—and so 16 of them have asked for the guides to be mailed to them. There's still people that like to have that guide in their hand, but otherwise we've just been doing an email and asking if they want the guide to request it. We are planning on doing a Fun Fest on August 13th and September 10th. Those are the second Thursdays in August and September, so please mark your calendars but also watch for more details. Then, starting today, myself and our planning committee for our golf tournament and fundraiser joined a webinar on how to have a touchless golf tournament. Pretty interesting ideas, we'll see what we will implement and we'll move forward from that. The golf tournament will be in September; that date has not been selected yet. Any questions? [18:43] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** Yes, I didn't know golfing was a contact sport. [19:30] **Kyle (Chamber of Commerce):** It is if I golf. [19:30] **Bill Angerman (City Engineer):** Verify that. No, the most interesting part was in the bunkers—they do not even have their rakes out there. They want the golfers to move the sand with their feet. [19:30] **Council Member:** Oh Kyle, at least at the Cannon course they do have the rakes out now. [19:30] **Kyle (Chamber of Commerce):** They do have the rakes out. What they requested in this particular webinar was that you have a volunteer at each bunker so that only one person is handling the rake. Not sure how we'll have to do that. [20:17] **Bill Angerman (City Engineer):** Bill, I don't know, the rakes are in there, can you see them from the fairway? [20:17] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** What's a fairway? No, I'm in the sand quite a bit so I know all about it. [20:17] **Kyle (Chamber of Commerce):** Well it's kind of like the elections coming up, everybody's going to have their own pen. [20:17] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** Yeah, oh okay, that's right, that's right. [20:17] **Kyle (Chamber of Commerce):** If there's no other questions, we are still moving along with our membership management software and working away at getting all the memberships in and then we start working on getting all the individuals in. It'll be quite the program when we get it completed. Thank you very much. [20:17] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** Thank you. Thanks. Okay, joint powers board? [21:03] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** Matt, Mary Jo? I got nothing from that. [21:03] **Mary Jo Matson (Council Member):** I got nothing, sorry. Nothing. Trails open, a lot of people using that trail my goodness, the cars down there on Saturdays and Sundays. [21:03] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** Finance committee, Mary Jo? [21:03] **Mary Jo Matson (Council Member):** Oh boy, yeah we had a meeting and we started kind of looking at some preliminary numbers for budgeting but we're not there yet. So not much to report yet, that's what our work sessions are going to be about here. But we've got... Neil gave us some encouraging news this time though. I think it's safe to say that our department heads have really come to the plate and they're really working on it because this could be a very challenging year, we just don't know yet. But it's going to be good. We don't know what the state's going to do with their LGA money and what we're going to get, so it's going to be an interesting budget talk. [21:48] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** Yep. Okay, should we go around the horn? Let's see who's here. Greg, why don't you... anything? [21:48] **Greg Bringold (Council Member):** I'll let Neil update you on the military project, that's all I got. [21:48] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** Okay. Jeff? [22:34] **Jeff McCormick (Police Chief):** We are seeing an uptick in scams, especially telephone scams. So just like to remind residents: if somebody contacts you telling you that you've won something or you have to pay taxes on something, don't hand over personal information or banking information, and contact the police department. That's all I got. [22:34] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** Okay. Neil? [22:34] **Neil Jensen (City Administrator):** I got a few items. Engineering RFPs closed on July 1st and we received nine packets. There will be a meeting as you guys discussed today, July 28th at five o'clock. Public works director closed at the same day, it's in process, we'll be holding the July 22nd interviews... I said April again didn't I? Hi, I'm sorry, that's the second time tonight. One good news: we received our CARES money, 310,000 went into our fund. We got the form in right away and seven days later it showed up, so that was great. As Greg stated, the mill and overlay... we did have some extra added that we talked about when the bid came in under our budget amount. We included the safety building parking lot, the Barclay circle, and the two cul-de-sacs as they combined together in the street connecting Ridgecrest. The total came to 134,000 and some change. I would suggest our budget is 130,000; we'll take the extra 4,000 out of the other bituminous line items that we have. That's quite a batch of streets for that amount of money so I believe we'll move ahead with that and just take it out of the sealcoating budget line item. Update on the Cannonball: it sounds like the gas is going to be unhooked. The thing has been empty but the gas has never been unhooked from that thing for four years. So it was quite a surprise that it was still up to the building. They're going to do that this Friday, and electrical is unhooked. We're going to be taking it down sometime in the very near future, so take a picture. And also we got a thank you note from the senior center for the extra two thousand dollars. I wanted to pass that on. That's all I got. [22:34] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** Thank you. Very good. Let's go around the horn here. Mary Jo? [25:41] **Mary Jo Matson (Council Member):** Nothing. [25:41] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** Morris? [25:41] **Morris Gesme (Council Member):** Matt, I just want to say the striping that we approved at the last meeting, I saw that it was done at Veterans Memorial Park. The park board had been talking about that for a long time about reconfiguring the handicapped parking and getting stripes there so that there's better access to the ramp. Because the way it used to be, people would pull in and park right on the ramp because there was no striping and no handicap signs. Now that we got that done, that little parking lot looks great. [25:41] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** It does look nice. Doesn't get it right. No, nothing right here... nothing but I do want to mention Mike, the guy behind the camera back there. Gesme mentioned that he's recorded I think the last 21 4th of July celebrations in Cannon Falls. That's a pretty good record. He missed one year when he was overseas but every other one of those 21 years he was there behind the camera. So congratulations Mike, that's a good feat. That's all I have. Yeah, thanks Mike. Derek you got anything? [26:27] **Derek Lundell (Council Member):** Nothing really, just wanted to thank the fair board for going ahead with the fireworks. You know, this whole fourth of July with nothing to do, at least it was nice they were able to do that for the community. [27:13] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** Yeah, I was also going to say thanks to the Legion color guard and Firepox for participating in the Heroes Cruise. I think although it wasn't a big crowd for the parade, you know, everybody kept their social distance so it worked out just fine. And thanks to the fair board for putting on the fireworks. Without any income this year, they stepped up and did their fireworks anyhow. They did all they could to space cars over there; it was packed for the fireworks and I thought they did a good job over there too. So thanks to the fair board. Okay, let's move to public input. Citizens may speak to issues not on the agenda. Please give your name and address for the record and kindly limit your comments to three minutes. Public comments must be respectful, pertinent to city business, and adhere to applicable data privacy rules. The city council will not take action on any issue raised by the public but may choose to schedule consideration of the item on a future agenda. Public input. [28:01] **Babe O’Gorman (Citizen):** Babe O'Gorman, Cannon Falls. Um, I've been quietly—which is hard for me to be quiet—inquiring about our police commission. Seems as though we don't want to have police commission meetings. Last one was about a year and a half ago. I'd say you're overdue, or haven't you noticed what's been going on? So I have talked in passing with Steve about it, I've asked you Jon, I've asked Derek... I've got nothing. It's been about a month, nothing's going on. So what, are we going to just dissolve the police commission and never have them again? They used to be once a month. I would say right now that you're running short on credibility and accountability in your police department and you have zero transparency. Now we know that certain people—or at least the department head of the police department—likes to be evasive. Me? I like to hit you head-on and I'd like to get some things straightened out, especially with our chief. So when are we going to get to it? When are we going to sit down and have a chat about it and resolve some of our issues? Anybody got any ideas? [29:35] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** Nobody wants to say anything do they? Yeah, you can't comment because you do regularly... [29:35] **Babe O’Gorman (Citizen):** I pay attention. [29:35] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** Okay. Anyone else? Public input. [30:20] **Timothy Diemer (Citizen):** Timothy Diemer, Cannon Falls. Wasn't going to really get up to speakers... I don't know if I should ask afterwards or something... that was never pointed out to me and I kind of would like to answer him if... but I don't know if this is the best time. You got something for public input? Yeah, it has to do with public input. Um, well I'm glad there's someone like Babe to point out some of the things or Mr. O'Gorman. He's... I don't know who's the best person to approach. Who can... I've called a few times, never got calls back about other issues. So who they... if I recall back when the new members were sworn in or voted, they said they're available, you know, call us, email us, whatever. So which one of you can I talk with? [31:41] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** What's your question? [31:41] **Timothy Diemer (Citizen):** If you want to make it public... I really don't. There's some things that I feel I want to keep... [31:41] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** Okay. If you want to talk to someone privately, why don't you talk to us after the meeting when the mics are off? So you don't have to put it out there if you don't want to. [31:41] **Timothy Diemer (Citizen):** Well at some point I'd like to put it out there, I just don't know how without proper help, reasonable accommodations for me in terms of advocacy. So I... I just seem to talk in circles and not just me, others. I mean, we... it's been... I was dumbfounded to hear it's been over a year since they've had... and they used to have a monthly with the police. I don't get it. Citizens of this city and council members. So I... I get blank frowns and stares. [33:17] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** Yeah, it's... anybody else? Public input. Second call public input. Third and final call public input. Seeing none, I'll close the public input portion of the meeting and I'll take a motion to adjourn. [33:17] **Council Member Duncan:** All moved. [33:17] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** Second? [33:17] **Council Member:** Second. [33:17] **Matt Montgomery (Mayor):** Motion by Doug, second by Montgomery to adjourn. All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Carried.