Based on the context provided and the dialogue within the transcript, I have identified the speakers. **Main Speakers:** * **Lisa Hiebert:** Councilmember (elected as Chair of the committee during this meeting). * **Eric Carlson:** Parks and Recreation Director. * **Mark Shari:** Committee Member (elected as Secretary during this meeting). * **Kayla:** City Staff (likely administrative support for the committee). *** **[0:00] [Music]** **[0:58] Lisa Hiebert:** This... all right. Well, it's 7 o'clock. Good evening, everyone, and welcome to the April 4th Parks and Recreation Advisory Committee meeting. Um, I'd like to start by calling this to order, and please stand if you're able to do the Pledge of Allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. All right, so the first thing on the agenda tonight is our annual election of officers um for the chair of the committee as well as the secretary. And Eric, will you kind of walk us through that process? **[1:45] Eric Carlson:** Yep, sure. Um, committee members, so this evening we are—uh, I think we'll take the chair first. And so if anyone wants to nominate one of the other members of the Parks Recreation Committee, they can do so. Um, if we only have one nomination, um, we'll still ask the board to uh affirm that person um into the role of the chair. If there's multiple people being nominated to be the chair, we will have a vote and a paper ballot, and Kayla will collect the ballots, count the ballots, and then we'll uh announce the—the results. And if we need to do another round because there's a tie or something, uh, we'll do that. So um, if people want to make a nomination, um, feel free to do so. **[2:31] Lisa Hiebert:** All right, open up the floor for nominations for chair. **[2:34] Committee Member:** I will nominate Lisa Hiebert for committee chair. **[2:39] Lisa Hiebert:** Thank you. **[2:40] Eric Carlson:** I had—I had previously informed the committee members that while Nol Hamm can't be here this evening um due to a medical uh issue, he is interested in being nominated for either the chair or the secretary if there's somebody that would like to nominate him. **[2:59] Committee Member:** I will go ahead and nominate Nol Hamm for chair as well. **[3:08] Lisa Hiebert:** All right, hearing no other nominations for chair... all right. So with two— **[3:13] Eric Carlson:** So there's—yep, so there's two people being nominated. Uh, one is Lisa and one is Nol. So if the members would please vote on—on those two candidates and then Kayla will collect your ballots and she will let us know what the results are because we trust Kayla. **[3:32] Lisa Hiebert:** Very trustworthy. **[3:35] Eric Carlson:** Please don't write Mickey [Laughter] Mouse. No write-ins. No write-ins. **[3:52] Kayla:** All right, and it looks like our new chair is Lisa Hiebert. **[3:57] Lisa Hiebert:** Thank you, everyone. I don't know who to give them back to. **[4:02] Committee Member:** I'll just toss... oh, sorry. **[4:03] Kayla:** You can just rip them in half too. **[4:05] Lisa Hiebert:** Yeah, that's a good idea. I'll rip them in half. In half makes it easier. Sorry. **[4:13] Eric Carlson:** So the committee should make a formal motion to uh appoint Lisa Hiebert to be the chair of the Park and Recreation committee. If somebody wants to make that motion, a second, and then do a formal vote please. **[4:26] Mark Shari:** I'll make a motion to accept the vote totals to uh appoint Lisa Hiebert as chairperson of the Parks and Rec Advisory Committee. **[4:36] Committee Member:** Second that. **[4:38] Lisa Hiebert:** All right, there's been a motion and a second. Um, we'll go ahead and all those in favor say Aye. **[4:44] Group:** Aye. **[4:45] Lisa Hiebert:** All those opposed? Hearing none, motion carries. Thank you very much. All right, now just follow a very similar process for the secretary position. Does anyone want to nominate someone to be the secretary? **[5:05] Committee Member:** Nominate Nol Hamm for— **[5:08] Lisa Hiebert:** All right, we have a nomination for Nol Hamm. I will actually nominate uh Mark Shari. Any other nominations? So we have two nominations: one for Nol, one for—for Mark. And so if you would please uh fill out a ballot for that, um, Kayla will collect those and she'll let us know what the results are. **[5:27] Eric Carlson:** All right. **[5:36] Kayla:** Thanks. **[5:40] Eric Carlson:** You're welcome. **[5:50] Kayla:** All right, it looks like our new secretary is Mark. **[5:54] Lisa Hiebert:** Good. All right. All right, congratulations. So with that, I need to entertain a motion for uh approving nominating Mark as our secretary. **[6:06] Committee Member:** I'll make a motion to accept the votes of the committee to appoint Mark as the secretary of the Parks and Rec Advisory Committee. **[6:14] Committee Member:** We'll second that. **[6:16] Lisa Hiebert:** All right, there has been a motion and a second for Mark Shari as our secretary of the Parks and Recreation Advisory Committee. Um, all those in favor say Aye. **[6:26] Group:** Aye. **[6:28] Lisa Hiebert:** Those opposed? Hearing none, motion carries. Thank you, Mark. Congratulations to both of you. **[6:34] Mark Shari:** Thank you. **[6:36] Lisa Hiebert:** All right. Next on the agenda is approval of the agenda. Um, is there—any—everybody received that in their packet? Is there any changes or updates to the agenda as—as presented? Hearing none, I'll entertain a motion to approve the agenda. **[6:59] Committee Member:** So moved. **[7:01] Committee Member:** Second. **[7:03] Lisa Hiebert:** All right, there has been a motion and a second to approve our agenda for April 4th. All those in favor say Aye. **[7:08] Group:** Aye. **[7:10] Lisa Hiebert:** Those opposed? Hearing none, motion carries. All right, this is always the fun part: the audience participation. Um, if people want to bring things forward, um, we have 10 minutes on our agenda for uh things not on the agenda. And just a real opportunity to just remind people that we would love for people to come down, share their—their thoughts, their input, their ideas, their concerns about anything with parks and wreck—um, especially with all the work with the Parks Bond referendum, um, all that great work that's getting going. So please don't hesitate to come down and come and speak with us and share your thoughts and concerns. We'd really welcome that. All right, next on the agenda, moving right along, is the approval of the February 2024 minutes. That was also provided in our packet. Any questions, changes? **[8:01] Committee Member:** I'll make a motion to approve the minutes of the February 2024 meeting. **[8:05] Committee Member:** I second that. **[8:07] Lisa Hiebert:** All right, there has been a motion and a second to approve the February 2024 minutes of the Park and Rec Advisory Committee. All those in favor say Aye. **[8:16] Group:** Aye. **[8:17] Lisa Hiebert:** All those opposed? Hearing none, the minutes are approved. Um, on today's agenda we have both the Committee Annual Report and also the Department's Annual Report. And I believe, Eric, you're going to talk us through that as well. **[8:35] Eric Carlson:** Yep. Madam Chair, members of the Parks Committee, um, as you stated, there's two annual reports in your packet: one for the committee itself and one for the department. Um, we do this annually to kind of um summarize the activities of the previous year, so in this case it would be 2023. Um, you've had the information in your packet that got mailed to you last week, so hopefully you've had a chance to—to um look through it. If anyone has any questions about the information that's provided in their reports, we'd be happy to answer any questions you may have. Otherwise, we'd ask that you um ultimately approve uh the—the reports. They would be forwarded on to the City Council for their review and approval, and then once that happens, we will be posting the department report on the City's website for residents to be able to look at and review at their leisure. So at—at this point I can stand and answer any questions you may have. **[9:36] Committee Member:** I just had one. I don't know if it's a question or not, but—well, I have two things. A comment: first of all, I think this is a very, very good report. So tip of the hat to you people that put it together because I think it's—it really does what it's supposed to do. Um, I guess the thing I had is I read through the whole thing, and um under the Park Dedication, it pretty much explains what that's about. But the last line says "the Park and Rec Advisory Committee reviews dedication funds annually," which I don't think we've ever done that, that I remember. And I just was wondering if that's maybe something that we could put on a future agenda item for an informal meeting to maybe take closer look at that? **[10:30] Eric Carlson:** We absolutely can do that. Um, we actually—I had a conversation with—um, I think it was with Commissioner Day um yesterday about the same topic. And we could—we can definitely bring some more information to the Parks Committee about Park Dedication: what the ordinance says, what our rates are, and what our uh Park Dedication balance is. Um, so we can—we can do that for an upcoming meeting. It may—may not be the May meeting, but definitely for a meeting coming up in the next month or so. **[11:05] Committee Member:** There's no time frame for it. So it just—I think it would be good for us to—as long as we're supposed to review it annually, we should probably have an update on it. **[11:15] Eric Carlson:** Yep. It's a great—it's a great question. **[11:17] Lisa Hiebert:** I have one question, Eric. Can you speak a little bit about the "Adopt a Park" program? Um, what that—adopting a park entails and what that process looks like? I wasn't—uh, I'm not sure that I caught that in our last—last year's packet, um, but it's interesting. I'm glad to see that so many of our parks were adopted, but we still had a few out there. **[11:45] Eric Carlson:** Yep. So we do have um Apple Valley, like many cities, does have an Adopt a Park program. And what the Adopt a Park program is, is it gives uh the community an opportunity to do what the name is: Adopt a park. And so a lot of Cub Scout groups, neighborhood groups, businesses, uh service organizations like—like the Rotary will adopt a park. Um, and their—their expectation is that they clean up the park a couple different times of the year, or they might—they might do a special project of a—of a planting or uh some tree trimming, or uh maybe they're going to do some uh mulch around some of the new trees or something like that. So um, that's—those are the types of projects Adopt a Park groups get themselves involved with. Um, so they're really um volunteering to help us maintain the park system and keep it beautiful and functional, etc. And then we try to recognize them through our website um by saying thanks for adopting such-and-such a park. **[12:44] Lisa Hiebert:** Excellent, thank you. I guess one of—one of the things I just wanted to say looking at this is, again, a—a ton of great information. And I guess I'm speaking a little bit more to the Department Annual Report, so I might be skipping a little bit ahead, um, but I—I really—uh, it's very detailed of what the attendance and participation was at the Aquatic Center with the—the—the rinks, things like that. And what I'm really noticing is that we've got—we've got an upward trend of participation. Um, pretty much, you know, really solid I think across everything it really kind of looks like and feels like. And it looks like, again, it's um kind of up—kind of pre-COVID, um, if—if not a little bit more. Is—am I reading that right? Can you—can you talk to any of that at all, Eric? I—I just think that this is—this is good news that people are using and enjoying the facilities and our—our uh programs. **[13:46] Eric Carlson:** Yeah, that sure seems to be our experience, and certainly that's what the data is suggesting as well—is that we do see um strong participation in the programs that we offer in the activities that are uh that make up our Park and Recreation system. At least the ones that we're able to keep track of, if you will. You know, there's a lot of people that use our park system um that we don't necessarily keep track of how they're using it. An example might be kids playing basketball in a particular park or people that go to a particular playground. But where we can keep data, um, we do try to do that so that we can measure our success and measure if we're providing the right types of programs and services for the public. Um, and so yes, it does appear for the most part that things are um on an upward trend as far as use is concerned. And I think um cities across the Twin Cities are experiencing very similar types of uh results, if you will, um especially since uh the pandemic. **[14:48] Lisa Hiebert:** That's—that's great news. So thank you. I do have one other question. Um, in here there's a section on the air quality standards um due to the Canadian wildfires last summer. Um, what—um, can you give a rough estimate as to—you know, it says we had some swimming lessons postponed. Um, how big of a disruption was—was that um for, you know, our programming generally speaking? Because I'm—I mean, it felt like there were several weeks that we had poor air quality, but I'm not sure when we were over a limit to cancel something or—or under. **[15:15] Eric Carlson:** So what—what we found is that um individuals respond differently to the air quality and the different levels of and quality of the air um that we've experienced in the last few years. And you know, I guess as a society we're getting—we're doing a—a better job, if you will, of measuring that and then informing people of what the air quality is or isn't. And so depending on the individual's personal health situation, they may have to stay home because the air quality isn't as good as they need it to be uh because of their health situation. We're trying to react to not only our customers, but our staff. So um, as an example at the Aquatic Center, if we've got 30 lifeguards there um and we're expecting them to work and the air quality isn't um ideal or isn't healthy, um we need to think about the impact that has on our staff. Because we have to—we have a duty to protect the public, but we also have a duty to protect our staff. And so we tried to put together some guidelines on how we would deal with those types of situations so that we can be as consistent as possible um when we choose to either delay or cancel um or postpone something that's going on in our park system due to the quality of the air that's being reported to us. So that's really—because it's becoming a little bit more front and center, if you will, we felt it was time to put something together that could help guide us in making our decisions. **[16:42] Lisa Hiebert:** And the um kind of the standards or the—the—the levels that you would postpone, are those posted like on the website? Are those public? Or that's just an internal number that you guys pay attention to? **[16:55] Eric Carlson:** Uh, to the best of my information, to the best of my knowledge, it's more internal information at this point. Um, and we're—we're getting—we're gathering that information from public sources and obviously following the Department of Health recommendations and things like that. **[17:11] Lisa Hiebert:** Okay, excellent. Thank you. Yep, anything else from committee members? Um, one other thing that I—I know that our last meeting was February 1st and since then we had the Mid—Midwinter Fest, um which, not a lot of winter, but the—the Midwinter Fest was a real success. And—and Eric, I just wonder if you wanted just—if you can share some—again, it's in the—in the um annual report—if you want to just kind of share some of the highlights and some of the things that were changed um due to not necessarily having so snow, but still a really successful event. **[17:51] Eric Carlson:** Yeah, so Midwinter Fest kind of turned into Mid-Early Spring Fest. Um, it was a pretty nice day out. I remember being there without a hat on and—and feeling pretty comfortable. Um, but we—we did try to do as many of the what I'll call normal Midwinter Fest activities that we could. Um, so we still had the garden cart rides from the Police Department, we had the horse-drawn carriage rides albeit in the parking lot, um so we still were able to offer those things. Um, we had kids' dance DJ there so that kids could dance early in the day. We had a live band later in the evening for more of the adult flavor. There were food trucks, there was beverages, both adult variety and um youth variety—uh, of beverages provided by the Rotary and Rascals. Um, so I think people still had fun. And then of course, course, we closed the evening with a pretty nice fireworks show um that happened that night. And we changed the location this year because some feedback from our Fire Department with regards to safety. So we moved it south of the Johnny Cake Activity Center in that big open field, and that turned out to be a pretty good decision I think from—from our perspective and certainly from our public safety's uh perspective. We had the Fire Department and the Police Department there participating and just meeting with the public and showing kids, you know, what the Fire Department's all about, what the Police Department's all about. So all in all, it's just a great community event. And you know, and we couldn't do it without our sponsors. We had the Apple Valley Hockey Association, the Eastview Hockey Association, we have the—um, the—the Rotary Club, the Apple Valley Rotary Club, and then we also had the Apple Valley Arts Foundation pay for the band. So can't make those programs and those events possible without some strong relationships and partnerships with our community. **[19:35] Lisa Hiebert:** Thank you. I—I heard it was—I wasn't able to make it but heard it was a fabulous success and um thank you to everybody on Parks and Rec in the city and of course our wonderful sponsors for making that happen. Appreciate it. Thank you. Uh, any other questions? All right, then I guess—I—I will entertain a motion to approve first the Committee Annual Report. **[20:00] Committee Member:** I will make a motion to approve the committee's annual report. **[20:04] Committee Member:** Second. **[20:06] Lisa Hiebert:** All right, there has been a motion and a second to approve the committee annual report. All those in favor signal by saying Aye. **[20:13] Group:** Aye. **[20:14] Lisa Hiebert:** Those opposed? Hearing none, motion passes. Uh, the next one is the Department Annual Report, and we've kind of—we've kind of talked through that already. Um, so I will entertain a motion if there to approve the department annual report. **[20:29] Mark Shari:** I will make a motion to approve the department annual report. **[20:33] Committee Member:** Thanks, Mark. Second. **[20:35] Lisa Hiebert:** There's been a motion and a second to approve the department annual report. All those in favor signal by saying Aye. **[20:41] Group:** Aye. **[20:43] Lisa Hiebert:** Those oppose? Hearing none, motion carries. **[20:45] Eric Carlson:** Madam Chair, if you don't mind, just a quick comment. Um, just a want to uh thank Kayla for all of the work she did in putting both of those reports together. Also want a shout out to Eve, our communication specialist. She helped set up the—the um format of it, and we changed the format this year. And so between the format and the content, the two of them put together um some really nice reports that are informative but they're also easy on the eye and they—they look—they just look good, which I think is helpful. So thanks to the both of them for all the hard work they put into making that happen. **[21:28] Lisa Hiebert:** Absolutely. Thank you, Kayla. Thank you, Eve. And I—again, I know that this will be—now that it's been approved—will be put on the website, I understand. So I—I highly recommend that people take a look at it because it has a lot of great information about parks and wreck and um what's a lot of the accomplishments in the past year. So again, thank you. Um, the next on our agenda is a committee-staff discussion items. If anybody has anything to bring forward? **[22:04] Eric Carlson:** Madam Chair, members of the committee, maybe just um a brief talk a little bit about what's happening related to the parks referendum. Um, and so we're working on a number of projects. Um, as the committee saw earlier this evening, uh the Hayes Arena project is well underway. Um, we—and for those watching from home, we—we met informally at the Hayes Arena just to see the pro—the progress that's being made there. We're hoping to have ice back in the building by sometime in early June. Um, so that project's right on schedule. Again, we're replacing the refrigeration system. We're moving away from R22; we're putting in a new refrigerant, 516A, which is more environmentally friendly. Um, a new floor and new dashers. We're also doing a lot of other smaller type of improvements. We're making sure that the building is as handicap accessible as it can be. Um, and again, we're hoping to have that wrapped up um by early June. We are working behind the scenes on plans for the improvements we plan to make at the Apple Valley Family Aquatic Center. Those improvements will start after the swim season is over in—in the middle of August this year. Um, construction will start in September, run throughout the—the fall and the winter and into the spring of '25, with the goal of completing construction in time for the beginning of the 2025 swim season in June. And a lot of those improvements will be things that people don't notice: new filter systems, new boilers, um improvements to the showers, the concession stand operations, etc. So a lot of the improvements people might not notice, but they're still improvements we need to make. It's—it's probably important to point out that this summer is the 25th year of operation of the Apple Valley Family Aquatic Center, so we're going to be celebrating that throughout the summer. Um, then um another project that we're working on—and we'll start doing some public engagement on—um, is the Hayes—the Hayes complex youth baseball softball complex project. Um, so we'll be looking for some feedback from our youth athletic associations. We'll be looking for feedback from the neighborhood that lives around the Hayes um park um location, and also working closely with the school district um because the land—some of the land that we'll be making improvements on is owned by the school district, and so obviously they need to be on board with whatever happens there. So for those that might be listening at home, um, know that in the very near future we'll be having some opportunities for the public to give us some feedback and—and let us know uh what they'd like to see happen there. And then we'll also be uh doing something very similar for Redwood Park. Redwood Park—um, this will be the last summer of the pool as we know it at Redwood Park. And after the swim season's over, sometime this fall or early in the winter, we'll start doing demolition of the um the park amenities that are there. And we'll be starting um construction of all of the new amen—amenities, including a new community pool at Redwood Park in the spring of 2025, with the goal of finishing construction in the spring of 2026. So that we can open up those new facilities, which will include an inclusive playground, new tennis courts, pickleball courts, basketball courts, um EA volleyball—E-A-volley courts—and again, the new community pool. We've been working closely with Dakota County on their plans to um remove the signal at Elm and County Road 42, and their plans include putting in a pedestrian underpass of 42 in the Redwood Park neighborhood or in the Redwood Park area. And so we've been working closely with the county on that uh part of the project as well. Um, tomorrow, Friday, um we're expecting to get um RFP responses to our construction manager at risk proposals that we've sent out. Um, next week we'll be interviewing the companies that turned in proposals, and we're hoping that the council will be hiring construction managers for our five large projects um at the May—at the May City Council meeting. And then will be well underway um on the Aquatic Center, Redwood Park, and the youth baseball softball complex. The—um, Kelly Park will be something that gets um delayed—just not delayed, but it won't be one of the first projects we—we tackle. It'll be um more of something that we start in the fall of '24 or the early spring of '25 from a planning uh perspective. And then the Community Center/Senior Center project, we plan on starting that public engagement process in early 2025 with construction starting in—in early '26. Um, then there's a bunch of um other projects that we need to accomplish. We haven't been spending a lot of time figuring that out right now because we've been so concentrated on these large projects and getting those started, but we will start to turn our attention to some of those um smaller or some of those other projects that are across the entire park system. So want to make the committee members uh aware and remind them that um we did receive some money from the state of Minnesota last year for the inclusive playground um to the tune of $1.4 million. We also received $500,000 from the community project fund from the federal government uh for the inclusive playground project. We also received $166,000 from the um James Metzen Mighty Duck um grant opportunity for the Hayes Arena project. And we just submitted two Minnesota Department of Natural Resource grants: one for the trail project at Cobblestone, so that would—if we're successful—that's a $250,000 grant to help us repave the trails at Cobblestone Park that are not a part of the uh North Creek Regional Greenway. So that's basically everything on the north side of the lake. And then we also turned in a grant to the DNR uh for $350,000 uh for the courts at Redwood, and so that would help us pay for some of the uh improvements at Redwood. This is—we're applying for these grants so that we can stretch out the money that we're receiving through the referendum as much as possible. We anticipate that some of our cost estimates may not be as true as they—we'd like them to be because of inflation, and we just can't predict everything. And so this will provide us with um, hopefully, with some extra dollars to cover anything that um where inflation maybe was a little bit steeper than what we had anticipated. So that's—that's a—a quick summary of what's happening uh with the parks referendum at this point. **[28:26] Lisa Hiebert:** Well, I just have to say thank you. I—I don't think people really can appreciate the fact that um, you know, all the property owners and taxpayers voted on this just really five months ago. Um, it's only been five months and, you know, there's already work at Hayes and all these other projects are well, you know, underway and—and seeing this happen. So um, not only the work that's happening and—and—and underway, but also the fact that uh you and your—the team is is really looking at finding additional funding sources to help with this, to maybe cover some in—you know, expected inflation gaps, I think is really great. So I just want to say, you know, this is a lot of work that everybody's been doing in the last several months. So you know, again, thank you for that. Um, any questions from committee members for just kind of—just um kind of generally speaking? **[29:33] Committee Member:** Is the new pool going in at Redwood going to be the same size, slightly smaller than what's there currently? **[29:41] Eric Carlson:** Um, so what we've advertised, if you will, is that a similar size. So I—I couldn't tell you what the exact dimensions of the existing pool are. It's—it's might be a little bit smaller, it might be a little bit bigger, but it's going to be similar in size. Um, off the cuff I would tell you that it's pro—probably going to be a zero-depth entry pool, so we won't have a wading pool and a—we won't have two separate pools. But that'll be up for feedback from the public before we make any final decisions. **[30:11] Committee Member:** Okay. And has there been—I know that shade is something that we looked at including at the uh Family Aquatic Center. Is uh shade structures something that's going to be discussed for either Redwood pool or the inclusive playground there? Because I'd hate to put in a new, you know, multi-million dollar playground and then have it too hot to play on for uh half of the summer. **[30:30] Eric Carlson:** Yep. Those are all things that will be uh part of the planning process. Excellent, thank you. Should—I should point out one other project that we're working on, and that's the sign master plan. Um, the committee will remember that we worked a lot on uh updating the sign master plan for the entire park system last year, ultimately recommending to the City Council a new plan, if you will, and the City Council adopted that. So at the May meeting I'm hoping to have that—we'll have actual signs constructed. Um, so we—we—we've hired a sign company to produce one of the big signs and one of the small signs for Farquar Park. Um, and we're having them um—the posts and—it'll—it'll be the sign that would get installed, except for the post won't be as long as they need to be uh installed in the ground. So you'll be able to see it, you'll be able to see the colors, the material, how it's constructed, um the fonts, etc. Because in the in the paperwork that we've looked at at times, things look different because it's—they're not truly what it's going to look like. So we had some uh prototypes made that we'll be able to use—just—we'll just change the posts on them, we'll actually use them in the park. But we wanted the the committee, us as staff, and the City Council to be comfortable with, "Here's what—here's what the plan actually looks like in the real world," if you will. So I'm hoping to have that in time for the May meeting of the Parks Committee. **[31:58] Lisa Hiebert:** Anything else? All right. Um, just another reminder is that a lot of you can find a lot of this information and—and the updates and stay up-to-date of everything on the city's website. Uh, again, a lot of great tools and updates of what's happening with all the facilities in the park will—are online. So again, you know, thank you for keeping everybody up to date with with all the work that's happening on there. Um, anything else? I just wanted to then take a quick opportunity to publicly do a quick—some quick thank yous. Um, first of all, I just wanted to publicly say thank you to Brent Schultz, who is our former chair, who um has stepped—stepped down after 14 years on this committee. Um, wanted to thank him publicly. And then we also found out today that another committee member, Matt Hinrichs, who has been on the committee since 2017, um is stepped down as well. So my understanding is the City Council will um appoint two new—two new committee members here um hopefully maybe by our next meeting. **[32:56] Eric Carlson:** Yeah. Um, Madam Chair, members of the committee, so the—because Brent had chosen to uh to step away, um the council had advertised that we were looking for a new Parks Committee member. They had nine people turn in an application of interest to be on the Parks Committee. With Matt's resignation today—because he and his wife and family will be moving—so now we have two openings. And so the council will be asked to pick two people from those nine applicants, and they're planning to do that at the—at their next meeting, which is next Thursday, April 11th. So I would expect that we would have two members attend our May meeting. **[33:43] Lisa Hiebert:** Wonderful. So again, just really wanted to say thank you to Brent and Matt for all of their work all these years. Also, the last public thank you that I—we'd like to make as a committee is just to really acknowledge and thank Mike Endres, Parks Superintendent, whose last day is tomorrow. Um, has been with the city—what, 23 years? And just want to publicly say thank you for all of his work and—and service. And he's been great to work with. And Eric, I don't know if—if you want to add anything on that, but I just wanted to make sure we take the opportunity to publicly say thank you to Mike. **[34:19] Eric Carlson:** Yeah, we had a—a retirement party for Mike yesterday at the golf course, and some of you—some of you were able to make it. And I think without going through all the slides that we put in the presentation—because um we probably shouldn't go through them here—but um I think the last slide maybe sums it up the best. And we—we thank Mike for his service, we thank Mike—Mike for his leadership, but we especially thank Mike for his friendship of 23—three years uh to the city of Apple Valley and to the people that work here and the people that recreate here. **[34:59] Lisa Hiebert:** Thank you, and thank you Mike. That—anything else? All right, next item is um—is there a motion to adjourn? **[35:10] Committee Member:** I'll make a motion to adjourn the meeting. **[35:12] Committee Member:** I will second it. **[35:14] Lisa Hiebert:** A motion and a second. All those in favor? **[35:17] Group:** Aye. **[35:18] Lisa Hiebert:** Those opposed? We are adjourned. Thank you all. **[35:22] [Music]**