[0:01] Mary Fasbender: Time being seven o'clock, I call the city council meeting to order. Please stand for the pledge of... [0:15] Mary Fasbender: ...and to the allegiance for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Welcome, and let the role reflect that we have Councilmember Folch is absent and a quorum has been established. Uh, tonight we have a Highway 61 corridor study and um, Brian Fiechek is with us—and Ryan—oh, it's not Brian. I just looked up and you're not Brian. Ryan, you can do the introduction then. Thank you. [1:01] Ryan Stempski: Thank you, Mayor, members of the Council. Yeah, tonight we just wanted to stop in. Big study going on was with Highway 61. A lot of work's been going on. We're really in that stage right now of the 61 study where we've gone out to the public in the community and asked and listened what comments and questions folks have. So we've—we've been hitting the pavement hard. We've had an open house, as you know about. So we're kind of at a different phase of the study, wrapping up that phase. And so we've asked Ryan Wilson with MnDOT tonight to come and kind of update what we heard from the community. I will also say we are continuing to take comments and feedback. So it doesn't mean even though we're moving on to the next phase, starting to build concepts along the corridor based on what we heard and—and what data we've—we've received, we're also—we still have the interactive map online through the MnDOT website so folks can still give comments that way if something pops up. I will say we've also door-knocked or dropped cards off to every business along 61. So we've talked to some folks, some folks we're waiting to hear back from yet. I'll say as—as early as today, I rode around with the Hastings Bus Company just up and down the corridor, listening to their routes, their concerns. Um, so taking that feedback as well, incorporating that with the team. Uh, we've—we've been in touch in constant communication with Kristy Barse and—and the Chamber of Commerce of when we can kind of get their collaborative feedback. We've met with the DBA um, specifically on this—this study and—and uh, reached out with them and—and was an attendee at one of their meetings as well. So I just wanted to say, um, even though we're moving on to another phase of the study that Ryan will talk about, we still are hearing from our public and gathering input and feedback. So with that, I'll turn it over to Ryan Wilson. Thank you. [2:33] Ryan Wilson: All right, Mayor, Councilmembers, you are very astute. I am not, in fact, Brian Fiechek. Brian uh, sends his deepest regrets; he fell ill today so—uh, in the last couple days, so I'm stepping in fresh back from Oregon. So happy to be here, which was a lovely state by the way to recreate in if you've never been. So in my role, just to introduce myself for the few of you I haven't met, I'm the South Area Manager, so that's covering Scott, Carver, and Dakota counties. So I have a few staff along with uh, Brian. Happy to be here with you to kind of reground ourselves first. Uh, you all know the corridor well, but for yourselves, for the audience, you know, we have 61 in downtown Hastings from 4th to 36th. And when we entered this study, kind of, you know, the backdrop again is we have this pavement preservation project of some kind on this road in fiscal year 26, or we'll just say 2026. And that is often the impetus that we kind of say, "All right, well, what—what is this road?" Especially in a case like this where we've had a great partnership with the City of Hastings over the last few years to 316 examine corridors. This was a great chance to kind of say, "All right, what does 316 want to be moving forward and what types of issues are out there? What types of things do we want to understand? What types of things do we want to do either concurrent with or after our pavement project?" So really it was this comprehensive evaluation of the corridor to look at the issues, define the vision, and examine some alternatives. [4:05] Ryan Wilson: So as Ryan said, we've—we've undertaken a number of things already. We have uh, I'd say well completed—but as Ryan alluded to, still accepting comments—uh, on things that might come on folks' minds about what issues are they experiencing on Highway 61 today. And so the next couple slides here will summarize some of the what we heard. You know, what we asked people, what we heard about engagement. So this would be online tools at public meetings here in the—in the City Hall and as well as this mapping tool. A bit about the demographics; uh, you know, just anecdotally I would say the graphic on the left is fairly similar to what we see across surveys. A lot of times the folks who are in the working class—so, you know, middle age or oftentimes even a little bit on the older side—are often the ones who are maybe having more time, more ability to comment, come to meetings. So that being said, we do have a decent spread though, um, you know with 20 percent of folks under 35, that's not—that's not too bad uh, relative to some I have seen. [5:26] Ryan Wilson: And then we asked people, "Well, what—you know, what about you? Uh, what describes your relationship to Hastings?" So we see, you know, a variety of answers. Eight percent live or have a business along the corridor; nine percent work along Hastings; 15 percent live on the corridor. And definitely the most common one here, perhaps unsurprisingly, is they live in another area of Hastings and they're using the 61 corridor either to get over the river to come into town to do some work, to shop, or whatever. So a nice mix. What you're seeing here is kind of—so this is the ranking order of the questions we asked now. So, how do you travel on the Highway 61 corridor? The number one answer provided, likely unsurprising to you, would be driving a personal vehicle. Number two: walk or roll, so if they are using a wheelchair or walking along the corridor. Three: driving a commercial vehicle, bike, carpool, so on and so forth down the list. [6:15] Ryan Wilson: "How would you like to travel?" So in this particular instance, we asked respondents to select the top three answers—up to the top three answers, they didn't have to select three. Again, drive personal vehicle came out on top, but then we see a bit of a shakeup. So we saw bike and driving a commercial vehicle tied. Carpool came in at number three, transit, walk, rideshare. And so some similar kind of themes to come out of that, but also a little bit a shakeup, but just kind of wanting to maybe experience the corridor a little bit differently than they experience it today. Then when we think about survey improvements, so we asked respondents and attendees of the meetings to think about what are the types of things that you might envision happening to the 61 corridor? So we didn't necessarily list, you know, "Here are the 10 things that we mean by this." So there's some interpretation that could be had here, but you see the eight on the screen here. So, improved traffic flow is number one. And kind of reading all the comments, my take is that's encompassing of some different things. Some people probably have a safety theme to improving traffic flow. Quite a bit of commentary about turning vehicles onto the corridor—so either light, you know, left turns into the corridor, left turns off the corridor, or stopping at a cross-section or vehicles darting out of a business. Kind of those themes are maybe the common ones with improved traffic flow. [7:34] Ryan Wilson: Improved aesthetics was number two. So maybe broadly defined as "What does Trunk Highway 61 look like?" Could it be trees? Could it be planters? Could it be other space in the medians that could be used or defined in a different way? Improved sidewalks, improved pedestrian crossings—number three and four. That's definitely a common theme in the answers. An emerging theme in the area of what we're seeing: just better quality experience for non-motorized users along the corridor. Crash prevention did come in as a standalone, i suppose a proxy for safety in many ways, as number five. Bike options, green infrastructure, and increased on-street parking was the last item. [8:15] Ryan Wilson: So when we think about emerging themes, so staff from our consulting team, staff from MnDOT, some of you were at our open house and have seen some of the material and talked to some folks. You know, we think about themes that are of interest to folks. Very clearly: pedestrian and bicycle crossings. I think we think about safety of those is the lens that most people are thinking about those crossings. So, what is their exposure while crossing 61? How can that be as safe as possible? Maybe another bucket about reducing speed, speed enforcement, traffic calming. So it's a bit out of that bucket of improved traffic operations where we just see a lot of interactions with vehicles in different manners. Quite a few folks feeling a sense of vehicles driving too fast, particularly along portions of the corridor. And then reducing access is kind of a similar vein of that. So just a lot of access. So some of the comments: driveways, access to businesses—could you consolidate some of them? Could you put them on other package roads? Those are ways we can respond to those types of things. [9:24] Ryan Wilson: And then we think about traffic operations more broadly. So some things that came up in comments and things that could be done from an improvement standpoint: you look at signal timing, the coordination and/or individual operation of traffic signals along the corridor. Uh, where might we use turn lanes in certain locations to assist with backups, eliminate rear-end crashes, just provide more comfort to both drivers and/or pedestrians trying to cross the corridor? And/or just the idea of reducing left turns. If you think about conflict points both for vehicles and vehicles, and vehicles and pedestrians, left turns require the most calculation as a driver. Whether you're crossing lanes of traffic, looking for vehicles, that is the highest risk movement we have on any traffic system is a left turn. And so that kind of fits in that bucket as well. [10:14] Ryan Wilson: Uh, sidewalk and trails on the southern end of the corridor. So as you kind of get south of the river and just making an improved connection in the area of Trunk Highway 61 or even farther south. Traffic operations standalone as an item in the area of County Road 46/47 as it comes in at the river there in the area of the mill—that kind of has its own kind of theme as an area that needs some attention. And again, just that idea of improved aesthetics, which can mean a lot to different people. And we certainly didn't capture what everybody meant specifically by aesthetics, but the idea of some—a different identity for the corridor. Maybe the corridor has a different theme, whether that's road—you know, slight tweaks in the road design or the landscaping or the medians or whatever in different parts of the corridor. That could be public art. I think one thing I will observe in reading the comments and working on other corridors, sometimes people don't necessarily mean corridor aesthetics like on Trunk Highway 61 specifically; they might be thinking building faces, they might be seeking streetscapes, how the other roads intersect. So I don't—you know, we didn't necessarily say you must only comment on 61, you know? So there could be themes in a neighborhood that might be important to people in these comments. [11:27] Ryan Wilson: Maybe a minute on next steps here. Um, and then I also want to touch on a couple other items quickly and certainly leave plenty of time for comments here. Ryan did allude to—were kind of, I'll say, wrapping up part one, which is really this examination of existing conditions. What is 61 today? What do we know about the traffic patterns? What do we know about crash incidents, either vehicles or pedestrians? What are the people telling us? So all the engagement that we're capturing—um, what have we learned? That's wrapping up. [11:58] Ryan Wilson: Step two really is the next phase. So it's—I'm going to use a formal term which may mean some to a few of you, but the identification of a "Purpose and Need" document. So as we go into a project, we're required to identify a purpose and need. So kind of like what are the needs of the roadway? We know that pavement preservation is a need—what are the other needs? And so we can start to document that using this existing conditions as kind of that framework to guide the identification of our needs. Ultimately then, this really leads to evaluation criteria. What are the ways we will examine this corridor from—what are the lenses? How are we going to rank, if you will, evaluate, compare different potential treatments for 61? Ultimately that is kind of the next phase—is that creation, that evaluation criteria—and then we craft that range of alternatives. [12:51] Ryan Wilson: So what are some of the treatments—infrastructure-based of course, if it's a Trunk Highway lens, a state highway lens—what are the range of improvements we can do? So it could be themes of treatments, it could be specific treatments at certain locations, it could be common treatments across the length of the corridor. Maybe Trunk Highway 316 needs its own examination; it probably does. Maybe the mill area and 46 needs its own work. Maybe there are improvements that can extend across the whole corridor. And so really we're going to try to find that range of things that works, put together some alternatives, and then kind of try to come to a list of four—and I'm using "four" in air quotes here because again, it might not be one corridor alternative, it might be an intermixing of different things. So what are a range of alternatives that we can again bring out and share with folks, get some feedback on how those alternatives, you know, captured the need, spoke to what folks were telling us about the corridor? And then ultimately down the road, as we get into spring of next year, we go through our outreach phases, we do all this work, certainly there'll be a matrix, a study report. That's an important part of this to document that work, of course to inform our own project, to inform opportunities to look for grants and other things which, of course, are common in the new federal transportation bill. So we want to be sure we have a product that we can draw upon and look towards those opportunities with. [14:14] Ryan Wilson: So that is the presentation material here. I'm going to dive to one related topic... I assume they're just drawn up here, Ryan? There you go. I think that is—that big enough to see? In fact, why don't I just zoom in a little bit here. There were two questions that came up at the last Council session. I of course was not here, but Bryant worked with Ryan and other staff to kind of get some information. One of the questions asked was: Do we have some thoughts about other comparable corridors? So to Trunk Highway 61. So when we mean comparable, what do we mean by that? We mean a route that is on the National Highway System, so an important state highway. Most National Highway System routes are state highways, not all—we'll say the large majority. So a fairly important route that carries a decent amount of traffic for a four-lane facility that had, we'll call it, some moderately significant changes done to it in recent times. [15:19] Ryan Wilson: And so so far we have a list of four to draw from. So three of these are on trunk highways, one of them is a Hennepin County road. So we have the Saint Peter project in Highway 169. This was some time ago now, but if you can—all have driven down that road—you get to St. Peter and it's like you stop being on 169 for about five to seven minutes and you're in this completely different space in downtown St. Peter. And that's about 24,000 vehicles. It necks down to 30 miles an hour and it definitely is a different space. I would say that's a pretty consistent corridor from top to bottom in Saint Peter there. So the theme is fairly consistent across the corridor, but definitely some lessons that we can draw from that. [16:03] Ryan Wilson: Highway 51 is a different example. So higher volume, quite comparable to the 61 corridor. So this is Highway 51 or Snelling Avenue, and we're talking about the section north of I-94 up to Pierce Butler, or about the fairgrounds if you want to use that as a reference. So it's kind of a transitional urban corridor. Again, there was a lot of concerns about access and turning and crashes, a lot of pedestrian volume in that area. And Hamline—thank you, yeah, the wrong—the wrong of the two. I have a friend who's not going to be happy that I just said that. So we'll go with Hamline. So lots of activity and concerns about how people interact with that road. [16:48] Ryan Wilson: Highway 3 and Robert Street was uh, redone over a couple years in the middle 20-teens, so 2014, 15, 16 or 15, 16, 17. I can't remember which of the two. A little lower volume, but significant concerns about access there and vehicles turning onto Robert. I grew up really close to there and yeah, you didn't feel great as a pedestrian trying to cross there—just people were turning into Robert Street everywhere. And so that's another place we can draw from. [17:15] Ryan Wilson: And then the relatively recently redone Washington Avenue in downtown Minneapolis. It's kind of a different example where it's very urban core, right, Minneapolis? But yet carrying a lot of traffic for downtown Minneapolis—24,000 vehicles, very—fairly steady throughout the day. Um, and maybe some lessons to be drawn from that. So we do have some corridors. We of course know a lot about our projects that are on this list as a state agency. We certainly have plenty of contacts at Hennepin County that we can reach out to, um, and we'll kind of keep combing that—keep combing that list, if you will. [17:49] Ryan Wilson: The other thing I wanted to share that came up... I'm hoping this is big enough. Let me see how this is coming up. The colors are the most important part, so I might just leave it there. The other question that came up at the previous work session: what were some of the upcoming projects in Hastings? And Bryant and I talk about this area a lot, probably unsurprisingly because we have a lot of activity in this area. And so I can walk you through what's on this map here. I'm sure this graphic in its full form will be gotten to people, but you can have the years and the projects. The black lines would be things that have uh, either happened or are going to be wrapping up happening, or are going to happen I guess. So 2022, the project of course on 316 you're all familiar with. We have some cleanup work that'll be happening this fall, and we're making some tweaks to 31st and Tuttle. I think that that's uh, common knowledge to a lot of folks—that just kind of making some small refinements based on truck movements. That work's going to happen later this summer to start early fall. [18:49] Ryan Wilson: The one that might not be on your radar is the northern of the two black lines. So at the river bridge there. And you might be saying, "What is that project?" And you would be good to ask that question. We're actually going to be in August doing some bridge preventive maintenance work on—on top of the deck. And so we had an opportunity towards the end of this last fiscal year, so over the last few months, we had some additional bridge money—like national bridge money—that we could tap into. And so we tried to find a project that would be easy to design in a couple months that we could get out the door and bid. And the one that we came up with was doing some preventive work on the bridge deck. [19:30] Ryan Wilson: Yes, the bridge deck looks really great still—I just drove over it a few minutes ago—but really these major river crossings, as you know the work that went into this bridge, they are our biggest asset liability. The single biggest thing we can do as an agency to keep our bridges in good condition is to keep the deck in good condition. And so this is a couple years in advance of what we might normally do it, but it's really like keeping a good deck great. And so we're working with Ryan and the team on a communications plan that we can get out, but it's going to be about two weeks on both sides, necked down to one lane in each direction during that two-week span starting in August at some point in time. I do not have a specific date for you yet, but it's going to be happening kind of quickly. But it really will keep a very good deck in great conditions. So it'll be a great project to get done, but it will—I mean, there's no question that'll have a traffic impact, um, being one lane over the bridge there for two weeks in each direction. [20:19] Ryan Wilson: Other projects on this list... so maybe spending a moment on the purple. The purple would be—it's at Doyle Path, it's a heavy industrial area. Spectro Alloys and some other businesses are right there. We're in fact starting soon constructing some turn lanes into those businesses, doing some railroad improvements. So that'll be nice to get that done. That'll be done this fall. Let me make sure I'm jumping to the right year. Purple, blue, green, right? So the blue project, which would be the highway section of 316 that's south out of town—so where 316 ends and Hastings, where the project ended—we have a project in 2025 to basically, you know, do the rest of the road, so do a surfacing of that road down to Highway 61. Then really kind of that—the big kickers are, you know, that green line is the project that we're talking about. It's that downtown Hastings work, the one this study is helping inform, followed closely on the heels by the project in yellow, which would be the Highway 61 portion outside of town going down to 316. [21:28] Ryan Wilson: So we have projects in several consecutive years. This also isn't uncommon, I've found, in the metro. We build a lot of roads at the same time and they seem to come due at the same time, but it really will be a great system of roads there when they're done and resurfaced. The other piece that might not be on your radar is everything west out of town. So on Highway 55, that's maybe the last thing I'll talk about and then leave some time for questions. We have quite a bit going on on Highway 55 as well, and probably some opportunities to coordinate this work a little bit better even among ourselves as an agency. Uh, what is the blue line again? Oh, Pleasant. So at Pleasant and Westview we have signal upgrades, some ADA improvements. That's one thing that's going to be happening in 2020-2025. [22:20] Ryan Wilson: We are working on this yellow—yellow dot here is uh—what is the golf course entrance there at...? Emerald Greens? Thank you. Goodview and the County Road 46... County Road heading north, County Road 42 heading north. So we're looking at scoping a roundabout at that location. That is a location that was identified for a potential improvement. We did a road safety audit of Highway 55 that wrapped up two years ago, and that was one spot that was identified as a potential safety location for a roundabout. So we're going to be scoping that, which means we're going to kind of try to figure out what's the cost, could it work. The bigger thing you see on here is the—is the—is the orange line, which would be a resurfacing of Highway 55 in 2028 is kind of the current tentative schedule, and actually extends in the joint section of 52 as well, so off the page here to the north. So this would be a significant resurfacing project. Uh, you might be asking yourself, "Could we coordinate some of those yellow and blue things with that project?" Yes, we're going to examine that. Um, that's part of kind of our coordination among ourselves over the next few years before we even work with our friends at the City and the County. [23:36] Ryan Wilson: And the other tie to that is this red line, which is currently planned for 2031 but intended to be done with the orange project. That is the southbound 52/55 flyover bridge to eastbound 55. That bridge is in need of replacement. And so this is the replacement for that—for that bridge. It would be—it's in a different year on this map, but our intent would be to coordinate that. We just haven't had a chance to coordinate; even, you know, nine years away is still a long time in our world, but we need to start thinking about that coordination sooner than later. So that was a lot. I think I did okay on time. I think we have a few minutes for questions. Uh, I'm certainly happy to take them on either these projects or any of the work on 61. And uh, thank you very much for your time. Really appreciate being here. [24:06] Mary Fasbender: Thank you, Ryan. Any questions, Council? Councilmember Vihrachoff. [24:14] DawnMarie Vihrachoff: Thank you, Honor. Um, thank you Ryan. I did—the quick question I had is you had two percent of the, or, travelers or commuters out of the 31,000. How do you get the message to them? I mean, they're coming through quickly, I'm assuming trying to get through town as fast as they can. If you guys have tactics that can lure them in to pull over and give us some good feedback, or you guys put the signs up there to say, "Hey, give us your input that this project's going to get done," or do we—do we just let them be and hear about it after they—we do the project? [24:50] Ryan Wilson: Mayor, Councilmember Vihrachoff, that's a—probably a tough question to know what the perfect answer is. I think it probably is a bit corridor dependent. You know, when we think about a corridor like 61 where the—you know, at least according to survey graphics, we do have a lot of people in town—I think at a broader project level, there's clearly a lot of commuters using the 61 corridor, obviously at the amount of traffic we're seeing. I think the best thing we can do is keep trying to drive people to our website. To advertise meetings is tricky. I wish I had a great answer for you that—um, we do try, and we try to get as many folks engaged as we can, and it's not always easy. [25:34] DawnMarie Vihrachoff: Fair enough. And I—I think you're right. I think we're—after—we may have to help with that to try to get people to our web—to your website to get some input, otherwise I think we—City Hall will probably get the phone calls saying, "Who designed this road?" which is what I'm thinking. So... [25:47] Ryan Wilson: And I will say as you, Councilmember, as you all know—I mean, we have a great relationship with the City. The City has done a great job trying to get information on your own pages, to your own forums, and we greatly appreciate that. And we will keep trying to drive that message out, but it's—it's a continual challenge to get people engaged, whether it's on any project in any corridor, to be frank. Thank you. [26:10] Mary Fasbender: Councilmember Leifeld. [26:12] Lisa Leifeld: Thank you, Honor. Ryan, in this particular snapshot, the green on the right represented obviously the biggest demographic and people that don't live directly in or near the corridor—is that kind of what that said? Is that what I got out of that? [26:30] Ryan Wilson: Mayor, Councilmember Leifeld, i would—I would characterize that as people that live in Hastings or maybe we'll just even say closed—I mean, Hastings could be broadly defined—so close to Hastings that are using the 61 corridor. [26:44] Lisa Leifeld: So what I would want to just really stress with that is when you look at that number and you hear "reduced access" onto 61, that does concern me because I'd like to be hearing from these 17 streets of people starting at 4th Street out to this 316 split. There's 17 streets if I did a quick number in my head. I'd like to hear from all those people that would experience the redo or the excess traffic by closing some of the, you know... If it's the two percent of people that are traveling through town—slow down, it's a beautiful spot to stop and check things out—but I would just want, you know, your people to really be keeping it in—in the back of the mind that we've got those roads all go off into communities and to neighborhoods. And we heard about this at our last meeting—you know, people are already concerned about increasing traffic coming into the neighborhood. So that would be my only... Excellent. Um, you know, the demographics, everything looked awesome. I can't wait to—I'd love to be able to walk it. You know, I go downtown on my bike quite a bit. I don't go 61. You know, I take Pine Street or whatever, but you kind of stay off of that road. But I'm excited to see what's—what's coming. So thanks for your time, appreciate it. [27:56] Ryan Wilson: Thank you. [27:58] Mary Fasbender: Councilmember Fox. [28:00] Councilmember Fox: Thank you, Mayor. Uh, thanks for being here, Ryan. Um, I want to highlight some of the outstanding stakeholder engagement that Bryant and Ryan from our team has been—have been doing. Um, thank you for listening; some of the concerns that um, a couple of the meetings that I was at were brought up today in your presentation. So thank you for listening and thank you for incorporating those concerns already from the business community. [28:24] Ryan Wilson: Thank you. [28:26] Mary Fasbender: Councilmember Lund. [28:28] Councilmember Lund: Thank you. Back to your um, survey question about how do you use it versus how would you use it: Is that consistent? Is that—the "how would you use it"—is that pretty consistent with any surveys you have done in other, you know, other areas of late, biking being number two? [28:51] Ryan Wilson: Mayor, Councilmember Lund, that's a tough question to answer. I can probably anecdotally tell you every survey I've seen—and in fact, I personally designed some back in my younger days—it's kind of tough to parse this out because your goal is to... Not driving continues to be an important and will continue to be an important means of travel for a lot of people, right? So we know we're going to accommodate that. It's—it's always a challenge to find the best way to get folks to think about what might else be a good option either for commuting reasons, uh, for recreational reasons. I would say that it sometimes I have seen bike on top of walk, and my only intuitive reason that I can come up with that is that people that are walking already are probably going to walk in the future. And perhaps, as Councilmember Leifeld said, like maybe they're just not comfortable biking now. Uh, so we'll see that in some corridors. I remember that being a theme um, in Snelling there; I talked about the Snelling project. I was in a different role at that time where people were just concerned about using Snelling in that avenue. So tough to know for sure, but that's maybe the best guess I have for you based on just doing this a few times and—and hearing folks. [30:08] Councilmember Lund: Okay. I—I just ask because it, you know, adding a bike—bikeability and bike lane, that adds a lot of complexity to the design. And if we put a lot of weight into that response, prioritizing that type of activity versus, you know, walking is number five on there—you know, if we're using that as some sort of a guideline or a guide um, for decision-making, you know, I—I don't know, I'd like to dive deeper into that. And—and probably even, you know, what—what other examples that you showed up—the five examples that you showed there—you know, some of those I think had, you know, bike-friendly um, lanes or whatnot. You know, how much is it actually being leveraged? You know, just getting some ideas around—or getting some information around that too. [30:57] Ryan Wilson: Mayor, if I could say one thing that kind of maybe uh, speaks to a couple of comments here. I think when we think about access or bike lanes or things along a corridor, ultimately, as you all know, these are all trade-offs, right? We have a relatively—relatively speaking—constrained corridor along much of 61. I think about St. Peter: not constrained in the same way in terms of right-of-way. So we have quite a bit different of a corridor here than we do there. Again, we can draw some lessons from them, but they're not one and the same. And so a potential bike lane, it could be something that's worth examining on 61; it could be side streets that are better connections for bikes that are then getting to corridors. So maybe Side Street X is the better bike corridor and there's a focused effort collectively to get folks to use that corridor and then cross 61. So that's a technique we'll use in partnership with municipalities and counties. [31:51] Ryan Wilson: And the same thing kind of goes for access, right? Every—most roads or streets have goals and objectives. It's not a good practice—i mean, 61 for better or poorer is the primary route through town, right? It's not—I don't think anybody's objective to push a bunch of traffic to other roads. And so we need to look carefully about that. You don't want to necessarily close left turns for a mile in a row, and so are there strategic locations you can do it where you know based on usage or traffic patterns? So those are the types of things we're looking at with—with the City and the team and the consultant, and just kind of trying to figure out what might be some spots where that could work because it does speak to some of the themes, but it's not a tool to be used universally uh, with no caution. [32:41] Councilmember Lund: Okay, thank you. Yeah, I think that's just important to consider as we go. Thank you. [32:46] Ryan Stempski: Councilmember Lund, just to add to that same comment along the line, Ryan, do we—do they have our Movement Plan that...? So you've already gotten that, and yeah. It's—your mind was kind of going two things there. One, Trevor—to your point, Councilman—to your point, um, the—the—the team consistently talks about, you know, "complete streets." We understand complete streets, that's kind of the buzzword. Then what we're applying to this corridor is "complete networks." So I think that's—that's a—just to your point, that might not fit, but uh—but uh, connected bikeway system a block or two off, right? And emphasizing that that's part of the 61 study, so complete network. So keep that in mind. Just because we got the responses, just know that we're looking for Hastings context-specific results, and then also feeding in of those comprehensive plans on file, feeding in of our Vermillion Street corridor studies and People Movement plans. So those are key elements that we're feeding in. I just wanted to be sure you knew that's—we were heading in that direction. [33:48] Councilmember Lund: Appreciate it. Thank you. [33:50] Mary Fasbender: Thank you, Ryan and Ryan. Any other comments, Council? Okay, thank you. Look forward to more updates in the future. [33:58] Ryan Stempski: And just to conclude, a lot of information, great information from Ryan tonight. I want the Council to be assured we're going to be sending the PowerPoint out, sending those—those had links to get you on a Google Map so you could cruise down those corridors and quickly see and get some other ideas in—in your minds. Um, and then the map as well. So we'll package that all up and send that out, probably get it on our website um, and link some of that key information to the project website. So it'll be extremely accessible after the meeting. Thank you. [34:36] Mary Fasbender: Thank you, that'd be great. Councilmembers, are there any corrections to the minutes from the workshop and the regular meeting from June 20th? Okay. Comments from the audience at this time. If there—we have public comments, we have options for comments to be mailed in prior to the meeting and they have been forwarded to the City Council and there is—their receipt has been acknowledged. Please recognize that items not on the agenda will not be discussed this evening. For live comments, they may be either through Zoom or through in person. We ask that the attendees raise their hand and come to the podium, state their name by saying their name and address. And Zoom, use the raised hand feature. And I also want to remind you that everyone in the public comment period is not intended for extended dialogue. Is there anyone that would wish to speak to the Council at this time? No one on Zoom? Okay. Councilmembers, are there any Council items to be considered? Okay. Council, I would look for a motion to approve the consent agenda. [35:41] Lisa Leifeld: So moved. [35:42] Councilmember Fox: Second. [35:43] Mary Fasbender: Councilmember Leifeld and Councilmember Fox with a second. Any discussion? All those in favor of the motion state by saying aye. [35:48] Group: Aye. [35:49] Mary Fasbender: Opposed to that motion state by saying nay. And that motion prevails. Uh, tonight under a parklet application for River City Popcorn and Candy Company—and this is a public hearing—John Hinzman will give us the update and action items to be considered. [36:06] John Hinzman: Thank you, Mayor, City Councilmembers. Tonight we do have a public hearing to consider a parklet at 208 Sibley Street for River City Popcorn. So the application is located within this building here on Sibley Street, a couple of blocks from City Hall. It would be about 38 feet long, which would encompass these two parking spaces here roughly within Sibley Street itself. So that's where the parklet would be. This is what the parklet would look like uh, when it has things on it. A couple of tables on here, some planters uh, to form the barrier around it. Come out about eight feet from the sidewalk into the right-of-way and then 35 feet. So the 35 feet would constitute about two parking spaces would be uh, less—lost with this. So as with our other parklet applications, we do have a public hearing requirement per our ordinance. We did provide notification to individuals within 350 feet of the property. I'm not aware of any comments that have been received at this point. So tonight we're asking you to hold the public hearing and consider action on the approval of this parklet application. We do have the Hessians in the audience, Kevin and Lynette, if you have any questions for them. Thank you. [37:19] Mary Fasbender: Thank you, John. At this time, I will open the public hearing. Anyone in the audience that would wish to speak to the Council on the parklet for Popcorn—River City Popcorn and Candy Company? Anyone speaking—wanting to speak to the Council this time? I will close the public hearing and open the discussion for Council. Councilmember Vihrachoff. [37:46] DawnMarie Vihrachoff: Thank you. I just want to ask that... A couple weeks ago, or two weeks ago, I think we had a request to maybe expand parklets or other Friday night events every other Friday where alcohol goes into the streets. And it started to think about when this came forward... I support this, but sooner or later I think: Does the committee need to discuss the big picture of this? How many of these are going to be allowed in the area? Right now we get an administrative fee, but we're allowing private business to make money in a public space where, if you own a business not on a public street, they don't get that option unless they go through the parklet somewhere else. So I bring up these questions and the third would be: How do we expand this if—if we want to expand it, how are we going to do it and how are we going to message that? Because I think we can hear from neighbors that are around that area. 350 feet, I think, is what's in, but how about the community? Does the community really want streets blocked off? Do they want parking spaces taken up on public space? And I think we really need to emphasize that these spaces are not owned by the businesses; they're owned by the people. And I'm really concerned about big picture long-term: Is this going to be the future of how we use public spaces moving forward? So I just bring it up as, someday, I think a committee should discuss the big picture of this um, how we're going to continue it and is there a timeline that maybe we look at it after so many years is what I'm thinking. So just my two cents, but I support the one today. Thank you. [39:09] Mary Fasbender: Thank you, Councilmember Vihrachoff. Councilmember Lund. [39:13] Councilmember Lund: Thank you. Um, thank you, Honor. John, can you refresh our memory on what the requirements are for what type of business can—can qualify for a parklet? [39:24] John Hinzman: Sure, Councilmember. Anyone can make an application for one. Generally, we've seen it as food-related industries in the past. We did have a couple of retail parklets, but that was more pandemic-related. So i really, even though there's not restrictions against all businesses happening, you're generally going to see them with a restaurant service, food service type of business. [39:48] Councilmember Lund: I think—Councilmember Lund. Any other discussion, Council? Councilmember Leifeld. [40:11] Lisa Leifeld: Thank you, Honor. I did have one clarification just because I saw in there that it's—they up—they're going to operate it Tuesdays through Sundays, but we're looking at a—that area will be cordoned off the whole week, right? Every day? Okay. I assume so; I just wanted to make sure um, that that's what they were intending. Thank you, Anna. [40:30] Mary Fasbender: Okay, thank you, Councilmember Leifeld. Okay, Council, I would accept a motion to approve the parklet application for River City Popcorn and Candy Company. [40:43] Councilmember Lund: So moved. [40:44] Councilmember Fox: Second. [40:45] Mary Fasbender: Councilmember Lund, Councilmember Fox. Additional discussion? New discussion, Council? All those in favor of the motion state by saying aye. [40:53] Group: Aye. [40:54] Mary Fasbender: Opposed to that motion state by saying nay. And that motion prevails. Thank you for coming. At tonight, under Parks and Recs, we have a budget amendment for this Hastings Civic Center. For this item, we have an introduction by City Administrator Dan Wietecha. [41:16] Dan Wietecha: Thank you, Mayor. Um, luckily all of you were at the workshop two weeks ago, so I shouldn't need too much of a review of the—the concept itself. But we are at a point that uh, really, if there's a desire to move forward with the Civic Center project—the arena project—next year, because of some long lead times on some specific pieces of equipment, we would need that direction and budget authority now. The project in total is about four million dollars. The key feature to it is upgrading the refrigeration system, which we've been talking about for a number of years. It also involves a new roof on the West Rink, which rehabs an aged roof. It also would enable adding solar panels to that roof. There's also some low-E ceiling installation in the building, basically just trying to address the refrigeration and some immediate needs with—with a leaky roof. Um, but it's not by any means a wishlist. It's not trying to look at uh, boiler replacements, which could happen separately afterwards. It's not trying to enhance or upgrade the—the entryway with the vestibule or anything like that. It's just trying to do—here's the basic minimum project. It's about four million dollars. [42:49] Dan Wietecha: Um, we've been talking about doing it in 2023 on the—the Capital Improvements Plan. Where we begin to run into an issue—where two issues are: wanting to do—planning to do a major street project every year. It's possible, but the money gets real tight to do two big projects in the same year—the street project and the arena. Um, so uh, some uh, pressure to say, "Is this the—the timing to—to do both of them?" The other question is um, might there be other uh, funding sources that could help with the arena? We certainly applied for state bonding dollars this past session. The legislature did not make a decision, so it certainly was not approved uh, and—and don't know if it would have been. But we—we could certainly reapply in the future. Uh, there may be some processes to look at with um, seeking authority for local option sales tax because this is a regional project. Putting in place a half-cent sales tax helps bring in non-resident dollars to the project. Or we could—could simply look at—because this is pushing our bonding beyond what we normally would do in a year, two major projects—putting out to the voters and asking their thoughts on—on a second major bonding project. Those other funding options need time to—to pursue those, so they would be for a project not in '23—maybe in '24 or even '25 or '26. [44:31] Dan Wietecha: So that's where the question is: Is the Council interested in pursuing the arena project in '23 or delaying it? And—and the key piece to if—if '23, there are a couple of key pieces—some relief valves and a motor control center—that have a 10-plus month lead time. Order them tomorrow so that we can have them next year so that the building could be constructed and in operation by '23, the winter '23-'24. So it's a tight timeline; we're up against the deadline if you want to do it in '23. If—if it's something that we might put off a couple of years, which quite frankly is my recommendation, we don't need to hurry up and purchase equipment today. And actually, we would rather not have that equipment sitting on the shelf; we'd rather make sure that we're—we're purchasing whatever's state-of-the-art at the time that we construct it, even if it's just a couple years delayed. But with that, I can take any questions. Thank you. [45:49] Mary Fasbender: Thank you, Dan. Council discussion? Councilmember Lund. [45:59] Councilmember Lund: Councilmember Fox... [46:00] Councilmember Fox: Uh, thank you, Mayor. Uh, Dan, I appreciate that you said that the budget is tight and doing two major projects in one year is hard for us. We obviously need to find another resource to make this project happen if we would like to construct our roads and keep—keep doing those—those construction projects. So I—I agree and support your recommendation for tonight. [46:39] Mary Fasbender: Councilmember Vihrachoff. [46:41] DawnMarie Vihrachoff: Thank you, Honor. And I think the memo says it well, though—we got a risk versus reward here because we—we may have a leak and we may have an expense staring at us pretty quick of R-22 that we have to purchase. And I'm in the industry, so I'm not scared off by the R-22 is going to get phased out because you can still buy it—because you can't release it to the atmosphere, it's going to be there. But it's going to be an expense. I'm thinking bigger picture on this one though and and to hear Dan's um, invite here on this timing. I'm feeling a little bit like—like we're just borrowing too much. We're always up against the wall, like every project is coming and then we can't do that project because we got this big brother. [47:24] DawnMarie Vihrachoff: I support roads, I think we're doing the right thing, but I'm going to ask staff and—and us as elected officials: let's—we need a map that says every fourth or fifth year, we need to calm down on a road project and go after one of these projects and start being prepared for that. Because I get about time, but I also get about bandwidth. We have city staff here that does streets and they do a really good job at it, and you can see it takes a lot of their labor time. We're going to probably have a Parking and Rec that's going to have to lead this other project. I just want to keep consulting out some of the bigger projects when we can do them internally like we do with the streets. So I just think we need a map because the uh, water park is going to be next, City Hall might be next—renovations will come on other assets that we have besides streets, and I don't know what they are. And I think it's important for us to have that because I would then take a big—bigger picture and say: every four years, not five years, we gotta—we gotta start to approach some of these so we're not always worried about how much we can bond or how much can we borrow against. Because um, I don't like it as a chair of the finances—I just feel like there's everything's gonna come and then we're gonna be making really hard decisions where I'd rather just try to map this out a little bit. So I'm okay delaying it, but we just got to know we may see an expense in front of us that staff was not—they tried to say, "Hey, get ready." They've been telling us "get ready" for a couple years. So I—I can support delaying it, but I'd really like to see this map of when this comes in and working with the other staff to figure out which ones we're going to calm down on before we get to the next one. So I can support also staff's recommendation not to go forward. [49:03] Mary Fasbender: Okay, thank you, Councilmember Vihrachoff. Additional discussion, Council? Okay, move forward and take staff's recommendations. Thank you, Dan. Tonight we have a resolution for a conditional use permit for Hub's Landing, Six Spiral View Loop. And for this item we have John Hinzman. Thank you, John. [49:33] John Hinzman: Thank you, Mayor and City Councilmembers. Tonight we have a conditional use permit before you for expansion of docks and slips at Hub's Marina. I think you all know where Hub's Marina is—this is Highway 61 just crossing downtown Hastings. Off to the left is Hub's Landing here. This is an aerial map showing the location of the property and—it's more pictures of what it looks like presently and what they propose to do. [50:11] John Hinzman: Now a little bit of history on this project here: In 2008 there was an Environmental Assessment Worksheet that was completed for various expansions and dredging for this project here. The result of that was a "negative declaration," which means that the environmental analysis on it was sufficient—there wasn't need to do further analysis on it. Also at that time in 2009, there was a conditional use permit issued for dock expansion, slip expansion, and some other expansions at Hub's Marina. At that time, most of it was constructed albeit these last 11 slips. These 11 slips were part of the 2009 approval, were not constructed—as you can kind of see from the aerial map underneath there. [50:56] John Hinzman: What they are proposing to do tonight is instead of constructing the slips here, which are in orange, they would construct them over here, which is in yellow. The amount of the slips is the same. The conditional use permit that they have on the property from 2009 is still active, so the only thing happening here is the switch in location from one to the other. There has been the involvement of the DNR and the Army Corps of Engineers within this project. They have reviewed this and found in their opinion that the location of the slips in this location is a betterment than uh, they would be over here from—a few—for a few variety of reasons. So they are supportive of it. [51:39] John Hinzman: Planning Commission did review this at the last meeting on June 27th. They did recommend approval on this on a 3-2 vote. There was some discussion at the meeting related to parking on the site, access to the site—I though that was kind of the major topics of discussion there. And we did have a public hearing as part of this and we did get one notification or one response back from that from an individual that had some questions related to the—the parking on the site there that they thought that that might be problematic, and that was concluded within your report here. [52:13] John Hinzman: A couple of clarifications on this uh, procedurally today. Number one: this is a conditional use permit. You're acting as the Board of Adjustment Appeals. So because of that, this does require a 75 percent vote of the Council. With the absence of Councilmember Folch, that would require unanimous approval of this action tonight—so just to make you aware of that. Uh, second of all, within the conditions of the report, we as staff are asking that condition number seven, which uh, deals with parking on the site, that that be stricken. Uh, we did have conversations with our legal staff that it was their recommendation that that condition be stricken from the conditions of approval because this conditional use permit is based upon the 2009 permit, and we didn't want to add anything that was addition to that. What we're doing here is modifying that permit itself—the location from one area to another area. With that being said, we do have the—the Fraziers here tonight, the owners of Hub's Landing, Monica and Mark, if you have any questions for them. Okay. Thank you. [53:18] Mary Fasbender: Thank you, John. Any discussion, Council? [53:23] Councilmember Lund: So moved. [53:24] Lisa Leifeld: Second. [53:25] Mary Fasbender: Councilmember Lund and a second by Councilmember Leifeld. Any discussion? All those in favor of the motion state by saying aye. [53:32] Group: Aye. [53:33] Mary Fasbender: Opposed to that motion state by saying nay. And that motion prevails. Thank you. Thank you for coming. Tonight for this item under administration, we have a ballot drop grant to be talked about. And with us we have Assistant Administrator Kelly Murtaugh. Welcome, Kelly. [54:05] Kelly Murtaugh: Thank you. Good evening, Mayor and Councilmembers. This evening in front of you is a summary of a ballot box—ballot dropbox grant that the state legislature approved late last year, earlier this year. And we were made aware of it, i think, in about April. And so in May, on consent, Council approved us pursuing this grant. And the grant would pay for a ballot dropbox to be installed in front of City Hall. It would pay for the requirements that are listed in the memo, which is: it must be under 24-hour camera surveillance. So it would pay for the camera, it would pay for storage for the video, it would pay for the actual dropbox itself, it would pay for installation, and the dropbox has to be either attached to a building or somehow attached to a concrete pad or somewhere so that it isn't removable and is stationary for the duration of the time period that it is being utilized. [55:04] Kelly Murtaugh: We were just made aware about a week or so ago that we—we are eligible to receive the grant, so we can get the grant if we so desire. I got an agreement—I've had Attorney Land review the agreement and the agreement is fine as is written, so would be seeking support to sign off on that agreement. There are a number, as is noted in the memo, a number of cities who are choosing not to pursue or use their existing ballot dropboxes for a variety of reasons that are listed in your memo. But they—excuse me—they would be folks who have just decided not to use it because of the challenges that might come as a result of using a ballot dropbox and some of the challenges that other cities have faced. [55:50] Kelly Murtaugh: There are new clerks and deputy city clerks, like in Hastings, that would have—that would be newly exposed to this process and not familiar with it. There are ballots that are dropped off from various jurisdictions. Dakota County used to have a box that got ballots dropped off from all over the county; Farmington would get them from all over the county. And so not—we wouldn't just be processing our ballots; we'd have to get the ballots to the other cities that didn't have a dropbox and ballots were dropped off here. So that's some of the discussion that we also perhaps need to have this evening. [56:32] Kelly Murtaugh: The other piece, as Dan mentioned earlier, challenges with supply chain. I've been assured by folks so far that we could get a ballot dropbox, a camera, and the materials that we need to do this for the general election if we get things ordered probably in the next two weeks. After that, it's hard to say because the lead time is long enough that it would put us too close for comfort. We would also need to give notification to the state that we would be utilizing a 24-hour ballot dropbox for our general election. So this is nothing to do with primary; it would just be general going forward. There—i've just tossed a bunch of information at you. I'd be willing to address any questions that you have. [57:19] Mary Fasbender: Thank you, Kelly. Councilmember Leifeld. [57:24] Lisa Leifeld: Thank you, Kelly. So when people drop it in the box and they don't—it's not supposed to be here, how does that work? Do people mail us ballots and—and we have the same issue, I assume? Do we not? [57:38] Kelly Murtaugh: Uh, typically so far with anything mailed, they—they have their pre-addressed to come back to us, so we shouldn't get any through the mail. But if they do just drop them off, what clerks have done in my conversation with other clerks is they call and meet each other halfway, or if someone lives in that area, they take them and they hand-deliver them to the jurisdiction where they belong. [58:05] Lisa Leifeld: So since we voted to—agreed to apply for the grant and now we got the grant—awesome, nice job. So now, what do you see? I mean, as any concerns or issues here? Do you have concerns with the process of us approving this and putting that box out there? And do you think this will make more work or less work for the City? [58:30] Kelly Murtaugh: Tough one, huh? I think it depends on the day. I—I have a hard time actually saying what it might entail because I haven't gone through this process personally yet. So I know that it would be something new, right? Along with everything else new that we would learn. But we've got great resources in Dakota County to go to for assistance and to learn how to process these kinds of things. I think that there certainly could be challenges coming to us as a result of national conversation related to using drop—dropboxes, but again, I think that we would follow the requirements that the state has set out: that we would have surveillance, we would have, you know, we would have to check the box every single business day and process them just like we would process anything else. They come in, they have to have been sent a ballot so we have their checks and balances in place, and then we would have the recordings should anyone pose a question—we would be able to go back to those recordings because we'd be required to keep those for the length of time that we're required to keep all election materials. [59:38] Lisa Leifeld: Thank you, Kelly. Follow-up to that then: so who would be eligible to do this? If I were going to be out of town... I mean, when—what would be the benefit to me as a resident to do this instead of mailing it in? [59:51] Kelly Murtaugh: I mean, what the benefit would be if you wanted to drop it off and you did not want to mail it, and you can't make the 8:00 to 4:30 hours that we are open, or the Saturday before the election that we are open. And I know that I've put it into the box and I feel okay. Thank you, appreciate your time. [1:00:13] Mary Fasbender: Thank you, Councilmember Leifeld. Councilmember Fox. [1:00:20] Councilmember Fox: Thank you, Your Honor. I like the idea of this for accessibility reasons. What—but one of my questions is: what are we supposed to do with this surveillance video that we're taking? So, is somebody required to review it? Where does it—what happens with it and how long do we have to keep it? [1:00:36] Kelly Murtaugh: That's a great question. We are required to keep it for 22 months. So all of our elections materials we retained for 22 months following the election. And we would not be required to watch it every day. It would be if—if a question came to us and said, "I drove by and I saw someone drop off a handful of ballots and I think there's something shady about that," we would need to go back and review the tape. [1:01:05] Councilmember Fox: Okay, so what you're saying is it's basically available for challenges, but it won't be proactively reviewed? [1:01:10] Kelly Murtaugh: Correct. [1:01:11] Councilmember Fox: Okay, thank you. [1:01:12] Mary Fasbender: Thank you, Councilmember Fox. Kelly, I have a question. So... these can be mailed to their individual—can a person come into City Hall, take it with them, and then drop it back? Is that absolutely okay? [1:01:27] Kelly Murtaugh: Yes. The absentee process allows uh, folks to come in and sign up to get an absentee ballot that we can send to them, or they can take it with them and they can return it to us via mail or in person. [1:01:40] Mary Fasbender: Great. Thank you. Councilmember Vihrachoff. [1:01:43] DawnMarie Vihrachoff: Oh, thank you, Honor. I—I support it. Why would we apply for the grant if we're sure we're not going to do it? I—I still... Councilmember Fox has a good point though. I—I think staff should really look at: what if somebody requests to say, "I'd like to see that video"? There's a public process to go for that. I would recommend staff be prepared for "I want to see that," or "How do you get to see that?" or does staff say, "We get to see that"? I think that's important for staff to be prepared for that, but um, I make a motion that we accept that. Um, thank you. [1:02:11] Lisa Leifeld: Second. [1:02:12] Mary Fasbender: And a second by Councilmember Leifeld. New discussion, Council? All those in favor of the motion state by saying aye. [1:02:18] Group: Aye. [1:02:19] Mary Fasbender: Opposed to that motion state by saying nay. And that motion prevails. Thank you, Kelly. Tonight we also have an approval of a first reading—reading of the proposed amendment by city code regarding alcohol beverages. And Kelly, you may stay there and continue. Thanks. [1:02:39] Kelly Murtaugh: I will just continue, Mayor, Councilmembers. What you have in front of you is the first reading of proposed amendments based on the Omnibus Liquor Bill that was passed earlier—signed by Governor Walz earlier this year. And so there are a number of items that would impact our liquor license. And so we thought we'd better address those because we'll get questions on those. And so uh, not every one of them will necessarily impact folks on a large—large scale across the city, but we do have a couple that may uh, folks may have a specific interest in. [1:03:17] Kelly Murtaugh: Uh, the—the first is related to the Small Brewer license and being able to do off-sale on a limited basis. And that is in the—ordinance. We do have off-sale already allowed, so it wouldn't be a modification of a fee, it would just be modifying who can take advantage of that off-sale license. We also have the ability to issue on-sale wine and also on-sale malt liquor to those competing in the Minnesota Baseball Association league if they had an interest. We also have an opportunity for special permits for folks to serve alcohol through extended hours for the World Cup Soccer, so that would be this fall and next summer. And so we thought we'd better take advantage of that. There is a fee for that of 250, which is the cap that the state has put on that for that license fee. So we've worked with Attorney Land to update the language and you'll see the strikeouts and additional language. The other thing that you will—you may see in here are just some updates that should have happened with language things that maybe have become unnecessary over time. So some of the language isn't necessarily directly related to the Omnibus Liquor Bill. With that, I will take any questions that you have. [1:04:41] Mary Fasbender: Thank you, Kelly. Council discussion? Councilmember Fox. [1:04:47] Councilmember Fox: Thank you, Your Honor. I am very clearly going to abstain from this—this vote. But I'm happy to answer—be—be another person to answer any questions if people have any questions. Um, and I will also abstain from discussing. But thank you. [1:05:03] Mary Fasbender: Thank you, Councilmember Fox. And Councilmember Vihrachoff. [1:05:06] DawnMarie Vihrachoff: I'm just making a motion that we approve. Obviously, there's some politics involved in this one, but uh, so be it. But I think we have to do our part to get our ordinances up to speed to the state law. So I'll make a motion to approve. [1:05:22] Mary Fasbender: Great. Thank you, Councilmember Vihrachoff. [1:05:23] Lisa Leifeld: Second. [1:05:24] Mary Fasbender: Councilmember Leifeld. New discussion, Council? All those in favor of the motion state by saying aye. [1:05:30] Group: Aye. [1:05:31] Mary Fasbender: Opposed to that motion state by saying nay. And that motion prevails. Okay, Council, any announcements? Okay, I do have a few. Thursday, July 7th: Music in the Park with the Board, supported by Ruth and George Doffing Charitable Fund. Friday, July 8th: Movie in the Park with *Jungle Cruise*, sponsored by Ardent Mills. Please bring a non-perishable food donation for Hastings Family Service. Saturday, July 9th is Bike with a Ranger. The ride is a 10-mile loop and learn about history and wildlife. Recommended for teens and adults—free, but registration is required. Tuesday, July 12th is Party in the Park to celebrate National Parks and Rec Month, with a live animal show, Cyr wheel acrobatics, Heba rock and roll band, activity booths, inflatables, and food trucks. July is National Park and Recreation Month. Thank you to our Parks and Recreation employees for 37 parks, 30 miles of trails, the Civic Center, and Aquatic Center, and year-round programming. Parks and Rec and Police Department are partnering with the Hastings Public Area Arts Council to serve up fun for tweens and teens this month. The "Rec Art and Police" event will be Wednesday, July 13th at Lions Park, sponsored by SC Toys and Country Financial. The cardboard and aluminum can recycling collectible previously located at Terry's Hardware have been moved to Coborn's parking lot at 225 33rd Street West. Happy birthday tomorrow to Councilmember Vihrachoff! [Laughter] [1:07:37] Mary Fasbender: Meetings coming forward are: Monday, July 11th, Planning Commission; Tuesday, July 12th, Parks and Rec Commission at 7:00 PM; Thursday, July 14th—there's a HEDRA meeting at 6:00 PM; Monday, July 18th, City Council, we have a 5:30 workshop, budget workshop, and a 7:00 PM regular meeting. I would look for a motion to adjourn... correct. Oh, yes! Rivertown Days is uh, July 15, 16, 17. There are schedules, I think, pretty much all over town. You could actually probably get that on our website as well as the Chamber. Now, I would accept a motion to adjourn. [1:08:24] Lisa Leifeld: So moved. [1:08:25] Councilmember Fox: Second. [1:08:26] Mary Fasbender: Councilmember Leifeld, Councilmember Fox. No discussion. All is in favor of the motion state by saying aye. [1:08:31] Group: Aye. [1:08:32] Mary Fasbender: Opposed to that motion state by saying nay. And that motion prevails. See you in two weeks.