##VIDEO ID:RuXH4ABySXU## e e e we're going to why don't we start with um uh the the two folks who are here see if those other folks show up otherwise we'll go to our Bullpen waiting list we got Brian wolf Gary turnis is Gary here no there's Gary okay and Jerry Hillin Jerry don't see Jerry yet and then Allan reading and there's Allen okay so I don't know if we're going to get all the way down the list but why don't we get started um and why don't we give everybody why don't we limit it to like five or six minutes and try and get as many folks done as possible this evening if we could do that if that's okay uh Mark hi hello uh thanks everyone for allowing me this opportunity um I will say before I get into my remarks that being involved in this thing I've been involved in all summer has shown me some very crazy stuff that goes on out in the community that you people probably deal with every day and I had no idea happen so my hat is off to you for what you have to go through for this giant $3,000 a day salary that you make so so thank thank you for all you do I really appreciate yeah yeah yeah on a good year right yeah so anyway I'm here uh I moved to uh Bloomington in 1990 grew up in Richfield um I'm I'm a retired union electrician and uh I uh lived uh real close to here up until this year and then I moved to a senior Cooperative on Lindale Avenue South and that's where I currently reside um I'm here to just talk about bike safety uh or about things I've noticed this is just observations from an old guy that R gets to ride his bike every day if he wants and things I've seen and just things I'll pass along uh uh not necessarily advocating for things right now I may do that in the future but just things uh and maybe you can enlighten me on some things I'm Miss but uh the first thing I want to talk about is just trying to be safe now we're talking now about riding a bicycle in on the streets of the city of Bloomington so this isn't a recreational thing although it is for me because again I'm retired but more of a this would be an actual activity that people would use to like replace a starting up a car for a day or a week or you know if they're lucky their whole career so um I I think it's important and I see the city doing it so again there's nothing negative I don't think other than the times I was scared so I'll and I'll share those with you but uh first thing is about bike lanes and you guys are doing an amazing job so far with bike Lanes to be a city that really grew up in love with and embracing the automobile to to to have to change that direction and make that fit what we're all trying to do now I think is wonderful um I would say this the problems I've had in bike Lanes I ride a lot on 86 Street which is a nice one I mean for a bike lane it's nice but there's a couple things uh that I noticed first of all it would be helpful I think uh if that that little emblem of a person on a bicycle that gets stencl on if you put those in more places because and I'll get into it but I think a lot of car drivers it it still seems like a lot of people don't know what that little lane is for I don't know if any of you ride and if you notice that I always have a little I have lights on the front and back of my bike and I have a little rear view mirror that sits off my helmet and so I can watch what you know I always say I do it so I can see my impending death coming but mainly I can see what people are up to behind me and you know if you're on a small Trail and somebody's faster than you which is pretty much everyone for me I can let them ride by me that kind of thing so and I I'm just gonna say make the bike Lanes as wide as possible but I know there are limits to that I think also it seems to sometimes be helpful to have signs actual signs although I see those a lot so I'm not saying you don't have them um but it's nice sometimes on that Lane I I've noticed if there's two lines that seems to help people and one of the things that I mentioned to actually at the the uh the public uh engagement events for the creek last week I was talking to a couple engineers and I was mentioning that where you've gone to three lanes from four which is a really nice thing and thank you for doing that wherever you've done it um one of the things that I notice is that people I can see it in my mirror people are reluctant to get into that center lane because there's yellow Lanes there yellow lines there excuse me I got to relax um and I think that scares some people especially people who were taught how to drive back in the 50s you know just like no you can't cross that you you're not passing anyone and so I I don't know if permission needs to be given but I I see that and so people go right next to me and of course my thing is like dude you had that whole other thing so I I don't know what can be done about that but that's one of the things um that I that I notice with that um um the other issue and it's kind of interesting is even where there are bike sort of like bike and walking Pathways I'm thinking now like on Cedar going north from old Chaka towards towards uh you know Richfield um it's on the sidewalk but the weird thing is people in their cars coming out of apartment buildings businesses whatever they sort of go right through that lane you know they're they're stopping to see if there's cars Cedar but they kind of ignore that and that can get a little dangerous at times I mean me I don't care what your car is doing I'm looking at your eyes if I don't see your eyes I'm nervous about what you're GNA do you know and that's you have to do that as a as a biker um and the other thing I'm gonna I brought a prop I'm G to demonstrate and this should be off anyway so it's a good thing um we we passed a law where you can't drive like this anymore right so what people do now is you see them doing this like and that's actually harder for a biker because where before I mean I'm not advocating we repeal that law by any means I don't want to repeal anything by the way just so we're all clear on that but anyway um uh I I'm it's fascinating to me like it's gone from a peripheral vision thing to now like you gotta physically put your head so it looks like I'm running out of time mayor indeed Mark I'm apologizing for that but we want to make sure that we talk one last thing it came up a couple times at the engagement events that people were complaining to me I guess because they know I ride bikes that there's no way to get and this is not safety related but there's no way to get to the river if you're on a bicycle hardly and I just want you to know there are 12 ways and I've documented all these I've got them right here I'll leave this here and so if you know anyone who is thinks we don't have enough ways to get to the Minnesota River feel feel free to share that and you have my name a bunch of you do in my email address I can get you copy so no problem I would even give you the electronic version all right thank you for your time yep well done uh Andrew was is that Andrew did you just walk in I'm sorry are you Andrew no I'm not are you on our list are you Tom not oh good enough then okay uh Andrew is is Andrew here all right we're moving on to Sally Sally n hello so I remember there was a speaker at one time that was commenting about a neighbor having a camera directed at the house and if I recall correctly the response was there wasn't anything the city could do because it's not against the law and so there wasn't anything the city was offering to help I don't recall that was that here at a listening session at a listening session okay so another example if it's 7:05 and you're mowing your lawn and you call the city and say this is not neighborly does the police come out seven our noise ordinances yeah they call the police and say at 7:05 the I think the response they would get from the dispatch is that the noise ordinance is is in effect until 7: a.m. and if somebody's cutting the grass no it is not neighborly but it is not against the law and same thing like if they're doing their leaf blower on the next ban of my existence Sally I ha met a rake the police wouldn't do anything I mean basically the police don't do anything unless there's been a crime unless there's something against a city code not necessarily that's not they they respond to for example uh lurking calls or suspicious activity that would be crime lurking call suspicious activity is not a crime that's specific you have to say suspicion of a crime you can't just say oh the person's suspicious you would have to say not necessarily not NEC I also reply to injuries yeah that's not a crime an injury something something or if a child is lost that's not a crime they'll respond to that so no they they respond to a number of different things that are not necessarily crimes okay so my point being that for my name to be in a report they had a concern the concern is you're saying they were concerned I was hurt no obviously that's not the case they were concerned you know I mean that I'm not getting any council member instead you're justifying my name in seven reports I'm hearing people commenting and justifying that my name is in seven reports my understanding like again I recall the person commenting that there is a camera pointed at my house and it's like we don't have a law against that there's nothing we can do about that so for my name to be in a report so lurking seven times lurking that's okay you put it someone's name you know I mean lurking like really oh she's lurking and then the police are going to come out because I'm lurking but I wasn't there and that's the other kicker again I filed against the city on December 2nd I wasn't in the area because I thought if you guys charge me with something which I was afraid you were going to even though I wasn't committing any crime then my case would have to hold until the criminal proceeding went through so I know I wasn't anywhere that someone could say I have a concern about her because I had to remove myself from the whole situation so that I wouldn't be falsely charged with something and so again no there's no reason my name to be in there and it should be a concern to council members that my name would end up in a report when I'm not in the area at all there's no crime that I'm accused of committing so yes there should be an investigation yes you don't want to but I want you guys to hear this is wrong it's wrong we've heard we've heard that now You' said this a number of times and you've heard us say that I mean the police chief asked the department and nobody could recall and he considers it a closed case within the city right wimington Police Department right and I'm saying it doesn't it doesn't make sense doesn't make sense you don't agree with and that's and where we stand and I'm here comment it again that's where we stand try to make it it doesn't make sense car a question quick one here I thought you were going to do a data request on this I am I'm waiting for the why don't you just get the data and file do whatever you're going to do I mean none of us have the we don't have the data most of us weren't on Council we have no idea what was happening then so why don't you just do your thing and come back to us when you have the information and you can tell us exactly what you want and as a council member who represents somebody why aren't you calling up and saying I want to know she's doing a data request but I really want to know why is her name in seven reports what was she doing from our understanding she's telling us she filed against the city on December 2nd and then you got tell because you're going to do what you want to do anyway so just do it so I mean you come here every single meeting on a different issue once this issues then you'll have another one right so just do your thing and the previous and the previous issue about the handicap parking you still had it Mis you you misunderstood it you incorrectly commented the city gave an inaccurate information to the councel and you are accepting the in Cas s you know that's not the case five minutes now for five minutes now thank you uh so Tom did has Tom made it yet Tom Anderson all right we're gonna go head to the bullpen quickly here Brian wolf umly sorry um so we did get an email from Renee relatively recently about with an update from the engineers who were assessing 9 M and I don't think that's public yet well I think we can say something preliminary yes because so many of you are here I just think it might be it might influence some comments that might worth letting me speak and then if you have questions or want to add something because I'm thinking we all know the same thing oh okay all right good first of all if okay I'm Gonna Stand just because my back gives me some trouble and it's actually easier to stand so I'm gonna stand if that's all right and I'll a bike what's that would you prep a bike I was on a bike today that is that is it's lifting it but I've only got five minutes and none of that back his minutes so I'll introduce myself for the record Brian wolf 3321 Overlook Drive um and I'm gonna start by expressing appreciation for the reveal event that was held on Monday and Tuesday it was well done appreciated the the boards um they were clear and well done and I really appreciate it and when I say I I should really be saying we I think in all cases we would all agree that that was really well done and we really appreciated the staff that was there their willingness to answer questions um it was a good event and I'm not saying that just because of the results but obviously that's the next thing I'll mention here is um obviously we're very happy to have have seen what we saw it's it's clear that there will not be uh dual use Trail um the boards did not make it clear that that there would not be natural surface Trails but staff did assure us that there wasn't room for natural surface trails and so from Moyer Park to the river bottoms there will be no bike trails as I understand it and we're obviously pleased about that um there are a couple of items um we would like to talk uh at some point about the surfacing of the trail south of 106 Street and we have some concerns about a possible bike access off of Queen and um I think we may also want to have something to say about the educational component and the restoration but that's not why I'm here either um we'll come back to do that I am here because I want to thank the city council staff um for the way that we've been treated with respect the opportunity we've had to address you um that's uh been greatly appreciated by all of us we also um very much enjoyed and have a great deal um of thanks for the walks that we took many of you went walking with me personally I was involved in a lot of those um others here were involved as well and universally after every one of those walks we had the same things to say you were great you listened we could tell by your questions that you listened um you were responsive didn't always give us everything we wanted I heard sometimes that may have to be compromised I didn't want to hear that but um but you know you you you paid attention you listened and we uh we respect that greatly I have to say that you didn't go for a walk with me Del lman but but you did have me over to your house and I think our conversation went on about 2 and 1 half 3 hours my wife was wondering why I got home so late so maybe you can just confirm that at this point that would help me out just a little bit when I come home with on my breath at that time walking very straight when he got it's important that I have a counsilman in my pocket when when that happen the the Corum here is one person speak at a time I'm going to ask you to make one exception for just a moment I think everybody in unison would like to say thank you from restore the nine we appreciate it thank you that's all I've got very good least for now thank you uh question uh quickly just a comment so thank uh I don't want to speak for anybody else just me but I enjoyed my interactions with all of you as well um I do want to be sure that you all one of the things I hope you take away from this is that um faith in local government is not dead um the feasibility studies that they did were going to always happen they were always going to happen and they were done in a way that was objective and intentionally meant to give us information as a council to make decisions on without bias without leaning One Direction or the other or anything like that that's true of all of the staff here in all the Departments um we are very lucky to be supported by some of the best staff members in a city government and I just I want you all to know that um every single time we do work within the city we're using the same processes that you got to witness so I hope that it does restore a little faith in our government to you as well and the next time we have an issue we can start with asking questions and reaching uh reaching consensus as opposed to potentially starting off the way that we did with which was uh you know hell no uh as our first idea so but I love the interaction and I I appreciate you all so very much for sticking with it the narrative that we are selling is that we brought you to this the reason that has to be the narrative is you can't imagine the number of hours we put in and if this was going to be the result anyway no I don't mean clarify I don't mean that your input wasn't important I just meant that the feasibility study is of is is part of that and is neutral long time to get there I think interrupt you both Mr Buie in quick here yeah I just uh Mr Mayor and council members just in case uh folks in the room aren't familiar with what Mr Wolf was talking about is uh and just to share the boards from the reveal last week have been posted to the let's talk Bloomington site uh with project updates related to the 9mile creek Corridor project um and the uh discussion around shared used trail for Peds and bikes or separated Trails for Peds and bikes both said uh not Fe ible due to cost and environmental impacts um the one comment that I would like to make uh on behalf of staff is the feedback that I received from staff was um their appreciation that uh you um told them how much you appreciated the integrity and the honesty that they demonstrated throughout the process and that meant a lot to them I'm glad that was communicated good yes great thank you Brian thanks for being here tonight yes we are G please come on up Gary turnis Gary turnis oh Gary Gary you Gary too no I'm Jerry oh I'm [Laughter] sorry I have uh I have fies but I don't know if I have enough for everybody is a letter um from our board of directors I I'm a my name is Gary turnis I'm the on the board uh of Directors for real life cooperative on Lindale and this letter comes from the entire board to the council I'd just like to read it as a matter of routine the Bloomington Police responding to calls to our building use a device like the one pictured below in the one I have here in my hand to open the to prop open the door when they enter the door is then left a jar while they proceed to the location of their call no one is ever left to monitor the open door during the entire time the officers are busy with their duties which may last quite a while all emergency services have easy and ready access to our building thus we fail to understand the persistent use of this device which routinely leaves our building wide open our manager has tried unsuccessfully to bring this issue to the attention of the police department a few of our members have addressed this this issue with officers responding to calls and each one has reported being met with a mind your own business response often expressed in less than Pleasant uh manner on October 12th a couple weeks ago the device pictured below was used in our front door by the pluming by the Bloomington Police after a long call inside all of the Personnel from the three responding vehicles walked out the front door and pulled away leaving the door unlocked with this device in place we can verify that at least one non-resident gain gain access to the building through this prop door during the officer's visit we realized that forgetting to remove the propping device is not the norm however if this call had been late at night our building would have been left vulnerable not only just during the officer's visit but throughout the night before anyone would have discovered it the senior population of Bloomington is among the most supportive of our police public officials and services and thus it is most discouraging to find that those we rely upon for our most important needs of security routinely dismiss this concern in favor of this unsafe and unnecessary practice we uh the board passed uh unanimously to send this letter to the council and I appreciate your sharing this with us Gary and we will certainly share it with with Chief Hodges and um and bring this up uh I honestly haven't even seen a device like that so I'm not sure how it's used or why it's used or or uh what the what the response why they're there in the first place I don't know any of the details around all of this we will share this with Chief the chief and uh we'll have somebody from the police department get back to you in your board members uh with a with an explanation and continue this conversation and make sure we get a resolution isn't always used but is always placed at the top of the door where even if it found later good half maybe two-thirds of our residents could never reach it okay appreciate it so all right all I need thank you for being here tonight thank you uh Jerry hilleren it is Jerry you are here Jerry welcome well I too uh my name is Jerry Hillin 9349 Quinn Road um and I too I'm here to speak about the seniors but uh I would also uh follow the lead uh that I've been very impressed too um not having ever been involved in any city government but went to a few Council meetings and uh you it struck me and going to the council meetings that uh we had uh the council would agree with whatever was put before and uh which was not impressive and then I got involved with the health and wellness center uh issues here and had the opportunity to communicate with three of the members and uh uh have first of all I was very impressed that they responded to me and spent time with me and uh to the depth of their knowledge that made it obvious that there's a lot that goes on behind the scenes that uh public watching TV uh and a council meeting wouldn't have any awareness so thank you all for that and shame on me for thinking otherwise from the council meetings um so I I have uh as I say been a member of uh the community for better part of 55 years and uh graduated second graduating class from Jefferson uh raised three kids through graduation coach baa managed Club teams was on uh Elementary School steering committees owned and Opera a business in Bloomington for 35 years I've used the uh Jefferson activity centers uh and the tennis and also used to swim at the um Olsen uh indoor swimming pool so I've enjoyed a lot of change in Bloomington um from having Jefferson built two blocks down from where my parents and I lived as a teenager uh to building my home where I used to ride my my dirt bike and occasionally be chased by Bloomington Police on their barley that figured we weren't supposed to be back there and uh they didn't know the trails like we did and they had big Harley that weren't as agile so we we relished when they came to chase us that's a long time ago um so uh so change change is good and change is not always good climate change for instance so although I didn't vote uh for the referendum when it came around the half cent uh tax I I not because I didn't see Merit in Civic projects many of which I've enjoyed in my tenure here um but I never see it wise to write a blank check uh with and at the time of this referendum there were no defined plans on what this would be other than that the name was going to change to the Bloomington health and what was it I just blank Dom and nervous I guess Health and Wellness Center um so uh I I should also add that uh I've been around long enough to seen when the refer referendum for the Jefferson and Kennedy activity centers which put for I think it around 2002 um and as I mentioned I used to swim in the uh in the pool there at Olen and uh now all these public resources are down to we've got four months in the wintertime we can run at the Jefferson and Kennedy tracks for a nominal fee of5 to $10 a month but there's a lot of resource I think there's still a pool correct me if I'm wrong at uh the former Penn junior high too yeah as well as valy view so we've got three indoor pools that are no longer available to the public we've got uh two uh activity centers I uh I don't know how this best work I did talk to the director of the program at Jefferson and this is what he's told me um I guess he's a director for the uh for Jefferson and Kennedy's program and so you can rent the pools uh out for events but it is not open for general public use so you know when we've had a program a standalone Senior Center although it's been called a community center it has been a de facto senior center it's worked for better than 30 years and now it's being eliminated to put up a facility where we're going to be duplicating resources that are not being fully used um draw through my ey and uh had me begin investigating all this so I wish to see the senior center retained I think that we all benefit from having a home of our own I uh Jenna and I have communicated a little bit I did send back a message to you today um and uh I think all this stuff is good I'd like to see a community center um I don't want to see a senior center be eliminated um and I don't feel that it was probably uh presented in the referendum to change the name to health and wellness gave no indication the general public that this was going to be changed we would have figured assumed that a senior center would have persisted and I know many of the resources will and many of them the ones that I've used uh have not are not being replaced um great benefit in having an inner generational uh activities and I have prior to the uh uh release of the plans I had realized that this uh Senior Center is not being adequately used I could imagine so many exciting things going on they used to serve meals to seniors which would still be nice and why couldn't we have a program after school hours where P Mech baking and cooking were taught Jerry I'm going to have to interrupt you now I miss well well we're past time we got to get downstairs actually for the council meeting and so pass our five minutes but appreciate your your comments and appreciate what what you brought forward here and it's uh I mean I I can give you 20 seconds to kind of wrap up and and put a bowl on it if you'd like so are things uh still not written in stone that was a comment I've heard you make several times well we we continue during the through the process here and as as time goes on and each different iterative process process the stone becomes a bit more and more solid sure and uh and and that's just the practical way that you've got to do a a building plan especially in today's climate where if we delay by six months it's going to cost us an extra x million dollars right I mean we've gota we have to keep moving forward on this we have done a number of different focus groups we have uh I mean I I've heard from a couple of folks how they were they're surprised that the these this uh proposal coming forward because I think if you go back and look at the information that was presented uh there weren't specifics you know it's going to be this much square footage but this is what the Health and Wellness Center was going to be and was going to look like and is going to include and Community rooms and and gymnasium I think that any that I I think that was all part of it without anything again without anything carved in stone at that time but then as we've gone on through this process and have heard back and looked at feasibility and and use of square footage and so on it's kind of evolving into what it's evolving in so I just close our surrounding communities do have free standing senior centers Eden prair Dina um and entrance is is at no charge I doubt that you're going to get too many seniors to pay six bucks to go play cards I also doubt you'll get too many of them to go swim or go to the gyms for that same fee when we can go to Lifetime on silver sneakers at no charge I appreciate I I appreciate your comments Jerry I do and and we'll we'll incorporate it as we keep walk working forward on all this we'll I mean it's part of the conversation we've been we've been hearing from folks so yeah things have been spent hundred millions is a lot of money a million dollars a year is a lot of money if we go the wrong path as well very good yep thank you uh Allan Allan don't go anywhere well we've got to adjourn here but don't go anywhere okay I'll talk to you uh folks we're over time we got to get downstairs all those in favor of adjournment please signify by saying I opposed motion carries we are adjourned let's get downst okay