##VIDEO ID:8b7xzM4JDHs## it is Monday December 2nd at 7:30 and I call the meeting of the Brainard city council to order Tony please call the rooll stun here Terry here sting line here Johnson here chz here oday here bans here B here please rise for the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice item four is the approval of the agenda is there a motion to approve second we have a motion by Johnson a second by Stang line any discussion hearing none all in favor say I I I oppose same sign that motion carries item five is a consent calendar notice to the public that all matters listed are considered routine by the council and will be enacted by one motion there'll be no separate discussion of these items unless good cause is shown prior to the time the council votes on the motion to be adopted by roll call is there moov to adopt the consent calendar so moved motion by Terry is there a second second second by stting line any discussion hearing none Tony please call the rooll stun yes Terry yes Stang line yes Johnson yes chz yes oday yep bans yes the consent calendar is adopted item six is presentations let's see let me switch to the correct agenda [Applause] first presentation Brainard Public Utilities operating capital budget presentation Mr Evans who's presenting that that's an excellent question I think it's Danny lock but I didn't want to presume after my last time's mistakes all right Danny lock can everybody hear me from back here no okay I'll do it from back here so I can control the computer as well so poor Sean doesn't have to follow my uh thought process here is he on the mic yeah does a mic pick him up can we move does that mic reach back he's on the mic Crank It Up can you hear me now is this better okay so what was presented in the packet is the budget of both um the operating budget for 2025 as well as a 5-year Capital plan that was included in your packet the similar to how this has been presented in the past you've seen both the capital the first couple pages of the budget and then the operating budget follows when we look into the operating budget that's showing the or excuse me the capital budget that is showing the five-year Capital plan I wanted to highlight some changes in numbers that we saw with updated engineering estim estimates from what was presented in last year's Capital Improvement plan one being the lighting system improvements now at $700,000 in 26 and 27 that is for the 210 project those were updated numbers um I believe they were at 250,000 per year and they're now at 700,000 with the increase in costs that we're seeing the Digger Derek truck was up uh $90,000 from what was previously presented the items highlighted so the downtown substation there was $100,000 the bucket truck had $160,000 the operations pick up at $50,000 these are all carryover numbers that were in 2024 that were not spent and I brought them forward in 25 to be transparent on items that carried forward um and then we also had uh updated numbers from the hydrogenation project that project uh presented with numbers last year at about a $9.7 million price tag uh with the updated numbers that we just received from the engineers we are showing the high number that they estimated was 14.5 so I included that all in the capital budget and that was presented and approved by commission this last meeting the caveat being these projects are going to need to be funded and that's whether that's through bonding or rate increases we have with the hydro project we have reached out to the state and the state is getting back on some direct funding support that they have for hydrogenation projects that was that request was just under $10 million and we expect to find out information on that as the legislator closes this next session so we should know in May of 2025 when looking at this electric budget the commission uh approved the budget with the least amount of increases in rate payer costs as we go across all five years and when we move to different divisions in looking at the electric Department the estimated increase in rates to achieve the budget that is presented and approved was 1% in 2025 3% in 26 27 and a 2% in 2028 um the 2029 total I see did not print on the amounts that you guys were presented with that was 2, 210,000 $250 that is the electric and hydrogenation Capital plan plan that was approved by commission moving on to the um water department and the capital plan from 25 through 2029 the update significant updates in the water department were related to the city water main projects that are ongoing and the updated numbers we received from um and the engineering department this year what we noticed in our project costs are these project costs have doubled if not tripled in some cases as we look from the for the 5year plan from what was presented at last year's budget when commission discussed and saw the Reclamation and backwash project that's happening down at the central water treatment plant that project was budgeted for $6.5 million in 205 and 2026 bids opened at over $10 million the commission decided they wanted to postpone that project and allow us to look for additional funding we have received already a direct appropriation of $5 million the lowest bid on the project was 10.3 we are still assessing those bids at this time and more information will follow at the next council meeting yeah Danny can we ask a question go ahead how long do we have to spend that $5 million from State bonding for that project we have to have a contract be started by the end of 20277 27 okay thank you can I Mr chair y president um Danny when you talk about youve Got 5 million secured for that waste uh water treatment facility correct that's through bonding it's a direct appropriation thank you so they're just give us the money there I mean direct appropriation tell correct you just say uh yeah here's 5 million Briner public utilities and use it for that facility is that how it works yes okay it's written into the state law okay for us to receive that funding thank you thank you addition questions no do you anticipate that being on the next agenda for the public utilities because you said to have more information at the next meeting here which is on the 16th uh there'll be additional information coming at city council meeting with the bid updates so we're getting additional information from the engineering uh Bolton and M and we'll present additional information at the next council meeting thank you as it relates to the assessment of the bids um two things to note that we that were um added in 20124 here for 2025 one is the lead service line Replacements that is the um efforts from the state and and Environmental Protection Agency federally to eliminate lead within the drinking water system so large Le uh lead service line Replacements those are required for the utility to perform and complete within the next 10 years funding for those lead service line Replacements we are told will be available starting in 2026 and moving forward so uh we added at the commission meeting approved we're estimating that'll be between three and $4 million per year over the next 10 years starting in 2026 that has been added to the budget as a line item that was not on last year's additionally um Provisions for a new water plant have been added starting in that uh 2029 time frame as we get into the funding sources and what that means for the utility in general is we will need to either Bond or raise rates to uh continue with these projects commission had decided they are instructed staff to come up what is the least impactful on the rate payers and what does that look like um with this budget we are going through the rate study but our estimates are a 9% increase in rates in 25 15% in 26 27's a 23% 28 a 133% and 133% in 29 as well that is primarily due to the lead service line Replacements and funding that we will need for those as well as the water projects uh coming off of the bonding that we just issued those are where we came up with those estimates moving into the Wastewater Plant um when we look at what was presented in 2024 and moving into what we have now for 25 through 2029 there were not uh as many significant adjustments in the Wastewater Plant there was still the storage tank biols upgrades this um 24.5 million was there presented last year uh we had carryovers so some gbt control panels in the gravity belt thickener and then the hydride humidifiers as well as this main lift heated air exchanger and the lift station improvements those were all items that were on 2024's budget and carried forward into to 2025 Mr President Mr chz oh me Danny um when you talk about the previous just before this last item you talk about the rate increases projected um what specific rates are you referring to that would have been the water rates okay related to the water budget that would water exclusively okay thank you as we look at the Wastewater improvements as Jeff mentioned looking at rates so for Wastewater rates to achieve the plan as presented and approved by commission there' be a 2% increase in rates estimated for 2025 26 be a 20% and 30% in 2027 28 and 29 be 16 to 18% these rate increases are all estimates at this time but commission wanted uh Council to be aware of the potential of rate increases and what that looks like we are currently going through rate studies uh to determine and finalize those numbers president bevans yep Mr Tes M Danny um when you talk about those rates no that's for the treatment rate right correct okay not not water or anything else just treatment correct okay thank you Chris anything to add from the capital side no you've covered it fairly well there Danny any questions from Council before moving on to the operations for 2025 nope um I would say that um at commission meeting the staff um I thought it was kind of remarkable they provided three capital Improvement project budgets one was essentially a worst case scenario um this one and then another I what would you call that the one in the middle sort of speak I believe that was if we required full I had one where it was worst case scenario we didn't have any funding what that might look like for rates one if we had full bonding for uh everything without any with the known grant funding we have now and then this one had anticipated grant funding for the lead service line Replacements which led to the um lowest rate projections so so the reason I'm mentioning that is because it was they they had their choice and what to present to the council and it's it's uh it's very revealing to see without the funding that you hope for what the anticipated rate increases would be enormous absolutely just unbelievable rates so we got to count on funding for all this stuff it's so important so I'm I'm finished on that thank you thank you with the 2025 operating budget that was approved by commission um significant increases in utility revenues related to the crypto Miners and the additional um consumption that the crypto miners have as well as the increase in the purchase power needed for that as it's a direct pass through we have in the operations budget what we have is combined at all departments on the it's page uh 59 of your packet but presented on here this is combined all departments that include or divisions that includes the electric Hydro Water and Wastewater there was approximately a 20% increase in expenditures uh anticipated from 2024's budg to 2025 that is um 70% of that relates to the purchase power for that increase in the consumption and then 15% of that relates to um salaries wages and I'll get into how that comes about uh there's an offsetting increase for those expenditure increase so that 20.8% increase in expenditures there's an offsetting 20% increase in overall revenues anticipated in the budget as well the Electric Division uh is estimated to have a 202 2% increase in revenues and reflected in purchase power there's an additional expenditure there the distribution side of the division anticipated 1.65 6 million in increase in net position the hydrogenation anticipating a loss of 657 for a net of the 99 $999 320 as shown in the packet and approved by commission when moving to the water department this um anticipated budget change in net position of a loss of 176,000 $210 that is uh a reduction in a loss from what was budgeted in 2024 $444,000 in a loss so that's a overall 17% increase in revenues this is after the increase in rates that occurred um that are set to occur that commission approved last month so we had a 177% increase in revenues with offset by only a 99.2% increase in expenditures and then Wastewater um had a budgeted change in net position of 120,000 780 which was up from last year's budget of 7,800 there that's an 8.8% increase in revenues and only a 7.9% increase in expenses that's the general overview of the operational budget that was approved uh significant items to point out to council a lot of this uh expenditure added expenditure relates to employees and the needs that uh have been requested from Mission the total employee budget that is included in the numbers that I just presented is a 56 56 full-time employees that is up two from last year that includes a network administrator systems administrator Journeyman Electrician Tech supervisor maintenance supervisor the business office support specialist the facilities custodian and the relief operator the journeyman electrician business office support specialist and Facilities custodian are currently going through the interview process and and the acquisition the other positions are placeholders at this point that were approved with the org chart back in August of 2023 as well as discussions with the it integration that is where the network and systems administrator their budgets have have been included in here president bans Mr chz um Danny could you just uh give me the first two employee positions you mentioned there the systems administrator and network administrator okay uh those two positions have not yet been approved by the city council correct correct okay could somebody explain maybe to everybody so there's an understanding of what's going on here because I sat through the commission meeting last Tuesday and I feel like I pay attention and I at the integration workg group meeting last Monday and I understand what was said there but not one single word that I received in a follow-up email was given at the Public Utility Commission meeting and and I I don't know if it needs to be done now but he just identified two positions that technically have not been approved and so if somebody would explain maybe Chris or Nick would be willing to do that is what is going on so everybody knows instead of sitting quietly during a meeting letting a commission vote on something with I think an understanding that what is happening wasn't really happening I'd love to hear that answer maybe right now is not the appropriate time but we need to identify that these two positions he just mentioned have not been approved but he says they're in their budget now how does that work they are in the budget right I think we'll turn it over to Chris Schubert but just just I had one point they are in the budget right Danny I included them in the budget yes okay so so if we approve the BPU budget tonight then we will appr those two are in it so yeah okay yeah and that's good but I'd like to have an understanding of what's really going on because the answer I got that that should that's got to be approved by us and that would be approval of those two positions so am I missing something maybe Chris Chris can Chris can maybe help yeah Chris Hubert our HR Director well I'll try to help so during the per um the public utilities commission meeting they gave conceptual approval to two new positions the systems administrator and the um network administrator positions so they did talk about those two positions they knew that they were in the budget um one of those positions was actually in the budget in 2024 already and what they were told was they were given a sample job description that was provided by the public utilities it um supervisor based on the um job duties that he felt that that position would hold and at this point those job descriptions have not been vetted by HR they have not been finalized the it integration group or the integration work group excuse me is still looking at what should be done with the IT department so they just got an idea of what those positions would be so that they weren't approving something they had no idea at all about I hope that helps clarify that Mr chz well it it does but there's still things that are left out there that really we haven't explained like what union that was discussed not at the commission meeting I I don't think the commission fully understood what they're voting on and what the r what what's coming forward here I I'm I'm I'm a little concerned that we talk about transparency and I don't see any part of this as being transparent when we have the commission approving two positions maybe one was budgeted for last year we have a completely new one conceptual approval oh I that's that's all new to me conceptual approval of a job description that's a sample I've never heard of this type of thing before and it really bothers me because I don't think we're given all the information all the time I don't know if anybody wants to weigh in on that and correct me I'd be happy to hear it Chris Nick you were there didn't say a word it's very troubling to me Mr bevans thank you uh Public Utilities director Evans has the floor uh thank you Mr President uh yeah we we did this as a conceptual idea for the purpose of making sure that we had places reserved in the budget so at such time in the future when these positions were created that we could actually fill these positions as opposed to having to postpone to another budget cycle to actually get them in a budget if that makes any sense it helps thank you yes sir Kelly Miss uh Gabe Johnson yeah so I I don't think if we approve the budget we're approving adding FTE I mean I just don't agree with that assessment on it I think it's I think it's proper budgeting to include the positions that you intend to add because if they the commission does bring the those positions to the city Council and they get approved in February or may or whenever they will have the money in the budget to hire immediately so I think approving the budget numbers and approving the positions are two entirely different actions in my opinion thank you any other comments on operating or employees Danny anything else in included in the budget is 10% of the administrator's salary and benefits as requested at the council's budget session in 2023 what was that Gab I said in 20123 y please proceed Dany that concludes my notes if there are any questions I have one quick thing could you just could you explain what the commission did uh on Tuesday regarding the uh fees for credit card and does that number show up in your budget the for the savings for the credit card fees yes so at the commission meeting on last Tuesday the commission approved credit card transaction fees to be uh at a 4.75% I have to be mindful of are they called transaction fees or but credit card fees are being passed on to uh those using credit cards that is what the commission approved at a 4.75% uh the credit card transaction fees themselves are included in the expense lines that those expenses will not go away what I did is in other revenues for each of the divisions included a provision for uh half of the credit card fees um to give us time to implement the administration of accepting those fees and what's the anticipated Savings in one year when we get that fully integrated approximately 490,000 thank you that's a lot of money any other questions or comments on the BPU operating or capital budget all right thank you Danny thank you Chris Evans uh we we're looking now for a motion adopting the 2025 operating bu budget and 5-year Capital Improvement plan for the brainer Public Utilities Commission so moved motion by chz is our a second second second by OD day any discussion on the motion Mr Johnson well I I would like clarification on if we approved this budget as presented are we approving hiring two new positions January 1 I I don't have clarification on that and I want I want a clear concrete answer because I will vote no if we're expanding the IT department when we're looking at reorganizing it all right Chris has got the no you are not and the reason why is the council has not approved the job description yet we would still need to negotiate the wages with the unions all of that process still needs to happen as Chris has stated this was a placeholder in the budget just so that we have the positions there and we also wanted to make sure both the commission and the council was fully aware of what was happening so there was no surprises as far as the positions that they were planning to include in their budget okay thank you so I'm hearing a clear answer of the positions are not authorized they will come back okay so then I'll support this I you know it looks it looks good Danny I'm sure it's it's a lot of work it's a lot of numbers it's a lot of departments I really support it I think it's unfortunate that nobody from the commission could show up because the charter literally says the commission shall present an operating budget but they've got confident staff and I think you guys did a great job so I'll be in favor of it thank you any other questions or comments on the budget presented Mr chz yeah I um I I appreciate gab Gabe asking that question because we we need to be clear and I don't know if everybody necessarily is or was I think it's cleared up a lot and I would just like to thank the U Public Utility Commission members for doing their job they have a lot on their plate as you can see and um they hire staff to do this work and I think staff did a fine job of presenting tonight and not necessary that they commission members be here uh in contrary to what Mr Johnson said so and the charter says a lot of things we don't always follow so thank you Mr chesk any other comments or questions hearing none we have a motion we have a second uh I believe this is just a Voice vote all in favor say I I I oppose same sign that motion carries thank you Public Utilities next up is the 202 budget and Levy discussion for the city of Brainard and public hearing Connie hman we're going to start with you anything you'd like to add to what's in our packet um actually I would like to give the presentation so that we can open up the public hearing Perfect all right I like the way you think so the purpose of tonight's meeting is to discuss the city of brainer 2025 budget and Levy and allow for public input this is not a meeting to discuss the valuation that has been placed on properties as those meetings are held in May questions regarding property evaluation and classifications can be directed to the Land Services building at the county and their phone number is 218 824101 0 Minnesota's property tax system is very complex so this is a simplified version of it at all starts with the estimated market value in Crowing County that is determined by the assessor's office the statutory formula is then applied based on how the property is classified whether it's commercial residential Homestead Etc and we get the total task capacity of the city this is a sum of all the different parcel Parcels in the city the city council sets the city's Levy the amount of the levy is the city's income or Revenue the city's tax levy divided by the total tax capacity of the city equates to the city's tax rate the tax rate is then applied to each parcel to determine the property owner's tax bill so let's they take a look at the city's estimated market value the estimated market value of your property on January 2nd 2024 is what is used to calculate the amount you pay for taxes in 2025 how is that rate amount determined one of the main items that the assessor's office uses is a sales ratio study which analyzes sales that took place between the time frame of October 2022 and September 2023 this study determines the value for the January 2nd 2024 assessment date last March you would have got an evaluation notice and in May is when the board board of appeals and equalizations hold their meeting in November Property Owners received the proposed tax taxes notice and in December cities with a population over $500 500 people need to hold a tax levy hearing and that is what we are doing tonight in March of 2025 your actual property tax bill will be mailed to you and your first property tax half is due in May 15th and the second half is due October 15th here's a chart of the city estimated market value comparing the pay year 2025 to pay year 2024 overall we had a 4.1% increase over pay year 2024 um this chart shows the history of the estimated Market values for the city of Brainard 2023 and 2024 were significant increases they were double digits whereas the 2025 increase estimated market value seems a little more in line with previous years so if you look at the total tax capacity of the City by taking the total estimated market value and applying the statutory formula based on classification this equates to an estimated tax capacity for the city of Brainard of 13,31 18,2 for paye 2025 this is a $360,500 increase in tax capacity tax capacity of the city is about 1.1% of the estimated market value just to kind of give you an idea idea this is a graph of the estimated tax capacity by classification over the last years we can we have seen a shift in the tax burden from commercial industrial properties and others to residential for 2025 there was just a slight change from the other and residential to commercial industry however residential property is still the biggest portion of our tax capacity at 61% so what does it mean for an increase in the city's tax capacity well if the city has its Levy and there's no change to the levy divided by an increase in tax capacity we would expect to see a decrease in the city's tax rate we have looked at the estimated market value and the tax capacity of the city the next thing we'll look at is the city's Levy the city determines its Levy through the budgeting process we estimate all of the expenditures Personnel costs supplies Services debt and capital we estimate all of the non-property tax revenues the fees the LGA fines and per the league of Minnesota City handbook budgeting is planning and prioritizing goals for the coming year based on experiences in the past year or years so we'll start by taking a look at the operating expenditures and Personnel Services Personnel Services with a budget amount of just under 92 9.2 million is the largest expense category of the operating expenditures Personnel Services have increased about $654,000 over the 2024 adopted budget this increases primarily due to contracts that were settled and the employees moving through the city's pay scale the council has budgeted one less full-time employee in the working funds but is budgeting an additional temporary employee so a quarter FTE and we're budgeting 3/4s of a less of a seasonal employee however for all governmental funds the same number of full-time employees are being budgeted for 2025 the council will be using the one-time Public Safety Aid Revenue it received in 2023 to fund 67% of 1 and A2 police officers we will see this reflected in the use of fund balance later we're budgeting to have the one open position in the operating funds to be filled in 2025 and we're budgeting any new employee will elect the $3,300 family plan option for health insurance the 2025 health insurance rates for the plans that the majority of employees have the increase was an average of 8% over the 2020 24 rates two unions that affect the levy amount and the non-union department heads and supervisors wages have not been settled for 2025 but an estimate is included in the budget our services increased just over 400 just under 43,000 from the 2024 budget the budget we're budgeting to use a thirdparty contractor for inspections needed for certain building projects this has to do with our state delegation we're budgeting for an increased cost in the records management software for the police department part of the increase will be funded with a grant from Source Wells which we will see in the revenue and the remainder of the additional cost will be covered using the one-time Public Safety Aid which we will see later reflected in the use of fund balance this also assumes that the city will continue to lease Vehicles we budgeted various we budgeted various assumptions for The General insurance that renews in March of 2025 and we increase in Professional Services and Rental expense due to up ating the comprehensive plan and street sweeping screening cost both of these projects occur every 5 years and the city has been saving for these cost in the capital fund the increase in expenditure is off by set offset by an increase in transfers in which we will see in the revenue section we're also budgeting increase in the amount of Aid to be passed through the fire relief Association after we look at operating expenditures we look at the amount needed to fund Capital needs the capital Levy is to fund All City owned facilities and to fund equipment needs for all departments except for the Enterprise funds the council is proposing a reduce to reduce the capital Levy by $100,000 in 2025 total Capital purchases for 2025 total 1,712 856 excluding equipment for the Enterprise funds this is a summary of the capital purchases that are currently being budgeted for 2025 the park board has requested a long-term maintenance um Capital asset maintenance request of $59,400 th000 to $49,444 to be able to decrease the capital Levy by $100,000 you may have noticed that the levy for Capital Equipment and Facilities is 1,1 180,000 927 yet we're planning on spending $1,728 56 the goal of the city council is not to have to issue debt for equipment and Facilities the next slide will show a portion of the 30-year Capital plan assuming that the capital Levy will setay up the same for the next 5 years at the reduced amount by $100,000 starting in 2025 we have the $1,728 56 that propos cash expenditures for 2025 as well as a future year budget budgets and we have the increase of the $49,444 added to the park long-term capital maintenance plan and the future year plans amounts have all been reduced by $100,000 at this point the bottom line shows that the council may have to rep prioritize the projects in the future years as 2027 is showing a projected negative cash balance the city needs to Levy for Debt Service the city needs to Levy what is needed to make the August 2025 and February 2026 payments for 2025 we had a decrease in the amount needed for the debt Levy of $212,100 the city also has other levies that are set by Charter or that the city has to fund these levies are for permanent Improvement roads and for the senior activity Green Space and Community festivals are based on a percentage of the 2024 total Levy the library Levy is a 2% increase over 24 the Eda board has requested the maximum allowed by state stat statute we got we got a question by Johnson so the library increased by 2% because I heard on the radio I don't know if you guys listen to the radio I heard on the radio that their funding has been stagnant but an increase isn't stagnant that's an increase right or is that the same the city is increasing the funding for the library by 2% okay so the radio advertisement I heard the library purchase was misleading me and I understood it to be the con's levy they didn't say that they mentioned when the county truth and Taxation hearing was they said the library funding has been stagnant they did say that and we're putting 500,000 into the building we increased our operating by 2% I I'm a little offended they would just disregard the increase that we sent them so I'm just bringing that up right now thank you thank you Mr Johnson go ahead Connie okay so the Eda board requested the maximum allowed by State Statute which would have been a $27,800 increase but the council kept the Eda Levy the same as in 2024 the airport commission requested a 2025 appropriation of $220,000 the council has set the airport Levy at $1,000 to eliminate the double taxation of the Branded residents for the airport this is a decrease of about $145,000 so when we total all of the estimated expenditures that are supported by the levy the total 2025 budget expenditures total 16 m6111 38 and this is an increase of $669,500 increase so now that we have the total budget expenditures we now need to look at the non-property tax revenues total budgeted non-property tax revenues total 9,248 38 $86 which is an estimated increase of [Music] $312,500 increase to local government Aid otherwise known as LGA from the state but is also budgeting over a $60,000 increase in police state aid and over a $41,000 increase in fire state aid the increases are based on using the amounts received in 2024 for the 2025 budget the fire state St Aid is passed on to the Fire Relief Association that we pre previously discussed and that's why we saw an increase in the expense we're budgeting an increase in revenues from other governments this is mainly due to budgeting for a $20,000 Grant from sourcewell for the records management system and an increase in the mons to be collected for the SRO contract and the joint prosecution agreements with Baxter and nisah there's also an increase in transfers in in the 2025 budget has transfers of funds from the capital fund for the comprehensive Plan update and for the street sweeping screening cost that occur every 5 years that the city was planning for Savings in the capital budget the other items that the uh to consider in setting the levy is any use any use or addition to the fund balance in 2025 is not an election year the city budgets $115,000 for the elections that are held every other year therefore in 2025 the city will increase the fund balance by 15,000 to be able to use it in the 2026 which is an election year here we also see the use of fund balance in the model of 11,375 of Public Safety Aid this is to fund again the 67% of the 1 and a half police officers in the increase in budget of cost for the records management software that's not covered by the grant to get the levy of 4% the city would need to use an additional $29,400 budget expenditures and property tax non-property tax revenue equals the levy needed and for 2025 this amount is 7,237 341 and is a 4% increase over the 2024 Levy Connie um you said 7,000 you mean 7 million right 7,237 341 sorry Jeff that's okay so the 2025 preliminary Levy was adopted in September at 7,515 698 this was an 8% increase over the 2024 Levy the 2025 preliminary Levy which was used to compute the property proposed property tax statements that property owners just received the city's final Levy set in December can be lower but cannot be higher than the preliminary Levy since September light items have been reviewed and initial assumptions used have been changed based on an additional information received and light items have been updated based on actual Revenue received in the case of police and fire State AIDS and recent adoption of the fee schedule therefore the final Levy could be set at 4% and a 4% increase to cover the budgeted expenditures the above table shows the preliminary Lev levies or the final or proposed in the case of 2025 the city would like to avoid the Peaks and valleys in the levy the table also shows that for nine out of the last 16 years the council has reduced the final Levy set in December from the preliminary Levy set in September setember the city has over 80 different funds but it does not officially adopt a budget for all the funds this graph shows the funding sources for all governmental funds that the city does adopt a budget for the city does have two Enterprise funds that it does does officially adopt a budget for and the information is excluded from this graft so we have the amount that the city levies which is 39.4% of all revenue all revenues budgeted the next biggest portion of funding comes from governmental revenues on here oops happened to my M um the next biggest portion comes from LGA and the biggest source of the city LGA which were certified to um collect 5 M22 $244,800 um in LGA that's a $630 increase in what we're scheduled certify to receive in 2024 we also have fines on Services which is 7.5 % of all budgeted revenues Enterprise fund from BPU also provides funds to the city which is 4.2% of all budgeted revenues and then we have other taxes licenses and permits and miscellaneous such as our um special assessments and interest it's important to note that 60.6% of all budgeted revenues come from sources other than property taxes we look at our budgeted expenditures the general fund Public Safety parks and Street and seers funds are what we consider the working funds and activities from these funds are supported by the levy which total 71.6% of of total budgeted expenditures we have Transit at 9.3 Capital at 9.1 Debt Service at 4% Road and maintenance at 2.2 and the other category which is programs of the in the charter such as Green Space senior activities and Community festivals Library Eda Recycling and city- owned parking lots I have a question if I can't get y any any questions do we Levy for the transit no but this is we do budget for them so they part that's their expenditures is 9.9% of the city and part of the intergovernmental includes the funding for the trans thank yeah I was just because it did still says Levy up at the top so I just I was just clarifying s not levying for Transit right we're not levying for Transit so now let's look at the city's tax rate with the levy at a 4% increase the city's estimated 2025 tax rate is 54.8 51% the rate is an estimated increase of 668 per from the 2024 tax rate of 54.1 183% keep in mind that the preliminary Levy was set at an 8% increase and the estimated tax rate was 56.96 3% and this is what was used for the pro proposed tax AMS that was just received now let's look at the impact of applying the city's tax rate to the individual Property Owners tax capacity which determines the property owners tax bill for 2025 assuming that an individual Homestead Property had an estimated market value of $150,000 in 2024 the property owner's tax capacity in 20124 would have been $1,263 and that's determined by taking the estimated market value of $1 150,000 applying the homestead exclusion and the statutory percentage then applying the city's tax rate of 54.1 183% to the tax capacity that homeowner would have paid $684 in city taxes in 2024 this table shows a changes to the city's tax rate liability for 2025 assuming that there was no change in the value of the property um now if you'll notice that the tax capacity is different in 2025 than what it is in 2024 now in 2025 the tax capacity is only 1,170 versus $1,263 and that is because they made a change to the homestead exclusion for 2025 it is now 40% on the first 95,000 and it's completely gone if the estimated market value is $57,200 so if the property owner if we had a 4% increase in liability the property owner would actually see a $43 decrease in their annual city tax liability however we know that this is not true and it's not what prop property owners are seeing on their taxes because there are seeing increases in their estimated market value and that the tax rate was set at 8% instead of 4% so we look at the same property and we look and assume that the property owner had a 4.1% increase in their estimated market value they would assume they would assume a they would they would have saw on their um proposed property tax statement a $20 increase in their property taxes with a 4% increase in the levy and the same 4.1% increase in estimated market value they could see a decrease of about $6 in their tax in their city tax liability so to compute the updated city property tax liability for paye 2025 you would take the city proposed tax liability from the proposed tax statement and subtract 37033 per to come up with your tax liability if we take a look at the total tax impact for a residential home property owner using the 4.1 1% increase in their estimated market value the total tax liability for 2025 is estimated to be $1,384 or $3 a year or. 22% increase now the proposed property tax statements would have showed a 2.16% increase in their total tax liability there are three reasons why your tax book can change this year we have the usual change in tax rate two the change in the estimated market value and the third one for this year is the estimated effect in the change of the homestead credit overall the total tax rate has increased so due to the change in tax rate this homeowner would expect to see a $24 increase in their taxes due to the change in tax rate they would also expect to see a $71 or a 5.29% increase due to the change of the estimated market value however due to the effect of the change in the homestead credit the property taxes reduced by $92 or 6.93% % for a net difference of $3 or. 22% we have the different taxes by the jurisdiction in which they would expect to see a city decrease of the $584 86 so for 2025 every dollar that a residential property owner pays in taxes 20 cents goes to Crowing County 2 cents goes to other this is Region 5 the city HRA and the county HRA trust fund 27 cents goes to the school district and 51 Cent go to the city now if we look at the impact for a commercial property owner assuming a commercial property owner had an estimated market value of $525,500 in 2024 the property owner's tax capacity in 2024 would have been $975 and again that's determined by taking the estimated market value and applying the statutory percentage for commercial property then we'd apply the city's tax rate they would have had a city tax liability of $528 in 2024 this chart shows the various changes to the levy assuming no change in the estim market market value estimated market value with a 4% increase in the levy they would expect to see a $271 increase in their city tax liability again we know that it's not realistic to assume that there was no change in the estimated market value and so with the um proposed property tax statement a property owner who paid 58 5,285 in city tax liability in 2024 but had the average 4.1% increase in the estimated market value would be seeing a $516 increase in their city tax liability with the 4% increase in the levy and a 4.1% increase in the estimated market value they'd expect to see about $31 increase and again there's the formula to how to compute your tax liability if we look at the total tax bill for a commercial property um the total tax property total tax liability in 2024 would have been $2,834 2025 is $1,797 which is a714 or 5.91% increase again their proposed property tax payment would have showed an overall total increase of 7.69% there's only two reasons why commercial property tax uh bill would change and that's the effect of change in tax rate and the change in estimated market value we on overall increase in the rates and so the estimated market value by the increase due to the tax rate change would be $146 or 1.21% change of market value would have been $567 or 4.7% for net increase of $714 or 5.91% and the city's increase is $31 which represents um I lost my mouse here the increase was about um about 42% I do believe for 2025 for every dollar a commercial property owner pays in taxes they pay 19 cents to the state general fund 17 cents to Crowing County two for other 19 for school district and 43 cents for the city so the final budget and Levy will be adopted at the December 16th 2024 council meeting the levy must be certified to the county auditor by December 30th and now we can open it up for public hearing perfect can I ask if anybody has any questions up here first none all right it is 8:25 and we'll open the public hearing on the 2025 budget and Levy and allow anybody who wishes to speak to come on up state your name and address please first cuz we're on television and let us know what you think if you're online star three will notify us that you wish to speak and then star 6 will unmute you I'll ask a second time if anybody in the public wishes to speak on the 2025 budget in Levy don't see anybody [Music] online and I'll ask a third and final time if anybody wishes to speak on the 20 2 budget and lovey to please come forward or Star three online it is 8:26 and I will close the budget and Levy discussion for 2025 public hearing Connie is there anything else we need to do till next December 16th correct perfect we will move on to item seven Council committee report 7A safety what's that Mr stun he's happy we're moving on okay Mr Mr Mr stun wish just to wish us to speak on behalf of all the accountants in the city of Brainard thank you for the presentation all right 7A is safety and Public Works committee chairman Mr Mike OD day thank you Mr President uh safety and Public Works we had five items tonight we'll try and get through this in under an hour uh first item was payment for improvement 22-8 South brainer reconstruction and motion coming out of committee was to recommend authorization to pay the contractor up to 3,629 7551 and I so move second we have a motion by OD a second by chesk any discussion Mr OD yeah this is our big project in South Brainard um mostly along 7th um and some other streets involved uh slightly over budget um due to some random line items um if you want more detail you can ask our Public Works director Mr Habor uh we're we're about $2,618 3 over the uh estimate um and still withholding 1% retainage pending the uh Turf establishment next spring thank you any further discussion hearing none all in favor say I I oppose same sign motion carries please proceed thank you Mr President next item was a final pay estimate for improvement 24-02 2024 chip ceiling uh motion coming out of committee was to recommend approval of the final pay request for improvement 24-02 2024 chip ceiling project in the amount of 9,736 and I so move second we have a motion by OD a second by Stang line any discussion chairman OD I'll just say this was uh roughly $111,000 uh over the original contract amount uh there was some problems with the original estimate uh just didn't take into account the radius the turn radius on each intersection on the north north or south sides of of B Street uh so staff is going to make sure we don't miss those in the future thank you any further discussion hearing none all in favor say I I oo oppose same sign motion carries please proceed thank you item number three was a final pay estimate for improvement 2315 and 2327 both the Evergreen and Bluff Bluff resurfacing projects uh motion coming out of sta of committee was to approve the final request for these improvements um in the amount of$ 17,5 3940 and ISO move second we have a motion by o day a second by St line any discussion chairman OD day yeah this one was actually quite a bit further over budget uh ran into some problems with a a very large tree we had to replace more curbing than we expected on the bluff side uh there was more patching and uh some more painting and some different random things that added significant amount of cost um again things that we're looking to not Overlook in future estimates but here we are are thank you Mr chair any further discussion Mr tzk U chairman o did you just repeat the total amount on that was it 150,50 something1 15753 N40 thank you thank you any further discussion hearing none all in favor say I I oppose same sign motion carries please proceed thank you next we had approval for the layout for the low safe routs to school project and motion coming out of committee was to recommend approval of the attached layout as presented for the L Elementary safe routes to school project and I so move second we have a motion by OD day a second by Stang line any discussion Mr chair I'll just mention we do have a our representative from WSB here who uh helped finalize this this design if anybody does have questions on it thank you any further discussion hearing none all in favor say I oppose same sign motion carries please proceed thank you item number five was a discussion on sanitary Force main sewer lining the project and Sewer rates motion coming out of committee uh was a split vote uh but the motion coming out of committee was to recommend to include the project in the 2027 uh 20 for 2027 the 10e capital Improvement plan continue moving forward with the sewer rates as per the rate study recommendation I so move second we have a motion by OD day a second by Stang line any discussion yeah president B okay I'm going to put you after Mr ter I was actually going to okay mrz Mr chz yeah I this goes back um I don't know pack probably till December when uh we had the um sewer line in the alley between Quint and uh um Rosewood and the additional cost and I asked that the fees come the cost come back to look at our rates that we're paying and we found out in the interim in that two weeks that uh they had another $100,000 on the uh cost of a sewer um sanary sewer line and then some additional smaller projects and so we're upwards of 200,000 in our sanitary sewer fund and so I asked that we look at the rates and the council agreed to have staff come back and our last meeting we the staff comes back and of course at that time earlier they showed us the uh uh uh East uh East River Road I believe it's called sanitary sewer line of Main and uh they got the SE report from February and it was rather alarming to me um these things have been uh looked at for many years now and it was scheduled this project was scheduled for this year and I forget the original estimate was in the 400,000 range and then it comes back at 1.1 million and estimate B and now we're being told we're just going to jack up the cost push it back to 2027 and add another $3 $400,000 onto this and I I I keep going back to this we're always looking at what's in the best interest of our taxpayers and I and I'm I'm sorry Mr haboc course but I kept hearing him say Well if we push this back or we push this uh on 2020 do it sooner instead of 2027 then other projects gets pushed back again this was scheduled for this year until we saw the cost that's what delayed this even from coming forward to us with the information until October and so it really bothers me that we we always talk about what's in the best interest of the taxpayer you hear this all the time and I am a True Believer in that and pushing this back to 2027 with literally the cost unknown it's all an estimate of what'll go up we want to bond for it and now we pay it back little by little I'm not in favor of bonding for anything cash is always best when we're talking about what's in the best interest of our taxpayers do to suggest that and and I still haven't got a clear answer maybe Connie I know Nick had asked you in an email what does it mean that last line in the agenda request it says we don't want to have this account overfunded nobody's given me a clear answer what the consequences of having this account overfunded are I'd have to ask that question first before I go on if I could Mr President absolutely Connie or any anybody on staff able to answer that I don't know if I can answer it fully Jeff but I would think that we would not want to have our current rate payers paying for future projects so that is why we would not want the fund to be overfunded is there any ramifications of having more cash than what we need I don't believe so well I I appreciate that answer but we we've got projects after projects after projects it's all got to be paid for our our community sorry our U our uh Mr Habor he indicated earlier that these projects are ongoing year after year sanitary sewer lines we all know they're deteriorating we all know they need funding and to suggest that any account related to sanitary sewer could potentially be overfunded it seems ludicrous to me because we have to pay for these things and we can't keep kicking the can down the road which I see this as happening with this particular project it's a mammoth project it's the largest line we have in the city if I'm not mistaken it needs to be taken care of and we just say all the taxpayers can pay an extra 25% because we want to wait it makes absolutely no sense to me to put this off till 2027 if it even happens then that's all I have Mr bevans thank you Mr thank you any further discussion chairman o day yeah I I I think I understand Mr chik's concern um in discussions about this project there's a lot of things that came up so we we budgeted for it this year at about half the size of the project that it was supposed to be um it would be nice to get it done this year it would have been great turns out the recommendation is to reline or or to line a pipe that's about twice as long from what I understand is what it was originally uh the bigger part of this is doing all of it at once or doing it half and half or smaller chunks and every time you do a smaller chunk or the entire thing the entire part that you're doing has to be bypassed now that's that's that's actually the more expensive portion of this project so doing it all at once is what we want to do in the long run that will actually save some cost inflation will drive the cost up if we push it back year by year but we don't have the funds in our account right now now as far as I understand uh so instead of going into debt we can push for some State bonding money in a few years that's the way I understand it uh I've already brought it up to a state representative um it's in discussion we'll see what happens that's no guarantee either but pushing it out makes sense to me even with some inflation um because in the report this pipe was not failing right now there's no the the pipe is actually sound there's some some Roots growing into it that needs to be fixed when when all this is fixed but from from that study uh there's a lot of other issues that need to be fixed before we attack this one doesn't need to be done today but if something were to happen that were catastrophic we can shift some things around and get it done as soon as possible because we would have no other choice that's all thank you Mr chair chairman Johnson yeah I I agree with Alderman chz on on a couple of his points you know first of all I would say I don't agree that there's a such thing as excess reserves or this fund being overfunded because we don't have the money to pay for the projects we need to do now we know this project has been or this fund has been not in not good shape for years so excess money is overfunded seems a little little obscene to be saying I I also think we plan for these projects and 5 year or 10e Capital plans for two Reon not just for one reason for two reasons for internal planning for budgeting items and lining projects up but secondly we hold a public hearing on these it's to communicate to the public when we are doing a project when we are going to be tearing their street up when we are going to be redoing their sewer lines and we tell them years in advance and they so they have time to prepare so switching it up I don't really like the idea of it however we budget $400,000 a year for projects out of this fund this project is significantly more than 400,000 so I think we do need to push it back and identify how we're going to pay for it you know and it's not going to be out of excess reserves because they don't exist it will be bonding and perhaps I think we should look at increasing rates in 25 instead of waiting till 26 but I will support this motion because we don't have the $1.4 million to do this project right now thank you thank you Mr chair any further discussion Mr bevans Mr T just kind of a clarification I I appreciate what you said Gabe it's not 1.4 that'll be 1.4 in 2027 it's 1.1 today and uh you know the bonding um that's always a good option but you never can count on it we've looked at bonding requests going uh nowhere already and just in the last year or two um uh so I the whole thing about the information provided in there about having 800,000 um to cover this I I mean it it it just seems like um everything's got to be paid for and if we can bond in 27 we can bond in 25 you know so uh let's get it off the ground and move forward with getting this project done but again that's not the motion coming out of committee unfortunately so thank you Mr chz any further discussion I I would just like to Echo M chairman Johnson's uh suggestion that we relook at our our current our sewer rates much sooner than anticipated um it it it it seems like The Prudent thing to do uh I I guess I have to trust staff that this could make till 2027 it doesn't seem as Mr chz says like the like The Prudent economic thing to do but on the other side of the co I understand we can't do all the projects at once a a and so I'll support the motion but I really would like to look at our sewer rates much sooner so I mean we heard from Danny lock you've heard some of the rates that they're looking at so any further discussion chairman o day I'll just I'll just comment that I the comment that Mr chazak just made about bonding it sooner than that I'd definitely be open to discussions about that if the council wants to revisit what our bonding priorities would be for 2025 or 2026 or however we want to look at that I'm open to looking at that getting done as soon as possible if we're going to bond it not right now I'm just saying for future discussion right I I'll take my second shot too okay you you got it m when I when I mentioned bonding I meant issuing bonds issuing de debt to pay for it on in the name of the taxpayers I wasn't talking about asking for State bonding like for my comments at least that's what I was referring to well and I believe the motion just doesn't really say anything about that it it just says that we will continue move forward with rates as per the rate study recommendation so it doesn't this motion I don't think actually has a payment it's more setting it in to the capital Improvement plan 2027 right any further discussion hearing none all in favor of the motion say I I I oppose same sign I and the motion passes please proceed and a report uh thank you very much item 7B is personal and finance committee chairman Gabe Johnson thank you Mr President we have 10 items I'm hoping we too can get done in less than an hour the first item we have is to accept the resignation of it data analyst Abigail Sova and the motion is to accept Abigail sova's resignation effective December 2nd 2024 and I so second we have a motion by Johnson a second by stunich any discussion chairman Johnson this is over in the Water and Light Department staff has is not asking at the time to backfill this position they are now hiring the business office support specialist we've been talking about for years and director Evans thinks that should be able to help in the office for now until they assess what needs they have going forward with this open position thank you any further discussion hearing none all in favor say I I I oppose same sign motion carries thank you please proceed thank you next up is uh motion to ratify the hiring of Mr Colton gut Cal effective December 4th 2024 on step one of the police officer wage grid and ISO move second we have a motion by Johnson a second by Terry any discussion chairman Johnson is this 27 is this 26 what is 27 we're full contingent to police officers now gutov this is amazing mhm all right any further discussion hearing none all in favor say I I I oppose same sign the motion carries please proceed thank you next up is a motion to ratify the hiring of Lisa asbach effective December 23rd 2024 further that should be placed on step one of the administrative specialist Public Works wage grid and ISO move second we have a motion by Johnson a second by stun any discussion hearing none all in favor say I I I oppose same sign the motion carries please proceed thank you next up is to approve an Mo MOA with ie and the motion is to approve the attached MOA with the iuoe Local 49 Union to adjust wages effective July 1st 2024 July 1st 2025 and January 1st 2026 and ISO move second we have a motion by Johnson a second by Terry any discussion chairman Johnson this was the first bargaining unit to uh accept a a contract with through 24 through 26 they accept it at a little bit less than other units have agreed to so we're just going back to amend the contract to make them whole with the same percentage increases at each uh each interval thank you president bevans Mr chesk what's the employee group called I I heard the letters but what's the the street division thank you thank you any further discussion hearing none all in favor say I I I oppose same sign motion carries please proceed all right now we got a big one we have two actions on this one the first one is a motion to approve the attached 25 through 27 tentative agreement summary between the city and lels number 65 Union representing our police officers and IO move second we have a motion by Johnson a second by stunich chairman Johnson okay so they accepted the same wage increases other unions have for 25 and 26 this is the first unit to accept into 27 and that's at a 3% wage adjustment in 27 thank you Mr chair any further discussion hearing none all in favor uh this is just the agreement yes all in favor say I I I oppose same sign motion passes please proceed okay there's a second item on this one and we need to adopt the attached res resolution setting the ls number 65 wages for 25 through 27 and I move approval by Johnson second by was it Terry yes any discussion on the wage resolution hearing none Tony please call the role stunich yes Terry yes Stang line yes Johnson yes chesak yes ode yes bans yes that resolution is adopted please proceed thank you next up is authorization entering a contract with Raz rat Wick rosac and Maloney and the motion is to authorize staff to enter an agreement with rat Wick rosac Maloney for 25 and 26 services and ISO move second we have a motion by Johnson a second by stun chairman Johnson so there were uh some minor changes to their hourly wages and the retainer amount of a couple thousand dollar over the last 10 years it's been about 70 to $80,000 a year so we expect with the minor changes it'll probably stay in there and we think if we can stay out of like lawsuits and arbitration and stuff it might even be lower app so far no good any further discussion all in favor say I I I oppose same sign that motion carries please proceed next up is an authorization to enter an agreement with CLA for the 2024 audit services and the motion is to authorize signature on the statement of work audit services with CLA for the 2024 audit services and ISO move second we have a motion by Johnson a second by Terry chairman Johnson this would engage CLA to do our audit again next year it's a we really couldn't do an RFP if we wanted just with the tight timeline that's something we probably need to talk about in June or July so we'll come back and talk about that next summer and see if we do want to do an RFP for a different audit firm thank you Mr chair any further discussion Mr chesk um maybe uh chairman Johnson knows it when was the last time we went out for an RFP on the auditing Service uh I was on the council but Mary cop was too so it wasn't that recent but we went out and we interviewed three or four firms probably 2017 is that's what I'm thinking thank you any further discussion hearing none all in favor say I I oppose same sign motion carries please proceed thank you next up is the sulfur update and this is just informational or no we did actually make a motion staff needed direction there's information on where we are on these arpa budget funds that we allocated to Police Department parks and a number of projects on where we're at a number of the projects are done some aren't quite yet done we need to have all of the money committed by the end of this year the motion out of the committee is to stay the course and bring it back in two weeks and I so Move Motion by Johnson is there a second second by Terry any discussion chairman Johnson so we are paying some bills this week and we'll have a better view of what it's going to look like on 1216 and if we need to commit some funds before the end of the year we'll do that at the we may not have any funds we may not have any funds to commit got it Mr bav Mr chz um and then on the 16th do you anticipate if there are funds left do we have to uh debate to discuss or I assume your committee will be looking at those and making recommendations then if there's money that we have to jman Johnson yeah I imagine if there is money Jeff I imagine staff will come to us with a couple of options recommendations the committee will will pick one and bring it to council it'll probably be something real basic like offsetting police salaries or something like that just to make sure the money doesn't get CLA back by the federal government but we'll see in two weeks we just want to make sure that we're not reducing our Levy I was reminded of that that the Lev is not being reduced use the to reduce that um so I think staff's recommendation would be to use it for additional capital projects that we've already spent the funds okay thank you we might just have that debate right now all right got a little scared over with so the motion is to bring it back on the six 16 correct all in favor say I I oppose same sign motion carries please proceed thank you this is the budgets for the nonworking funds which isn't part of our general operations as the city trans it's informational only it's the transit fund Library fund recycling fund City parking lot fund permanent Improvement fund mayor's contingency fund sanitary and storm sewer funds if you notice the library was increased by 2% this year radio ads contingency fund was held flat again but it's just informational if there's any questions I direct them to Connie thank you any questions on the non-working funds um Mr chz I'm no I'll pass okay thank you please proceed thank you Mr President our last item is discussion of the 2025 operating budget in Levy Connie's got great news we can walk out of here with a 0% but I'm going to get let her give a little presentation first and then we'll we can have discussion as a council we had no recommendation out of committee we kind of wanted this to be a full Council discussion item and I just want to reiterate that nothing tonight needs to be decided that the final Levy will be set next meeting um you know so staff provided an updated 2025 proposed capital and portion of 30-year Capital plan based on the council's action from November 18th and since that meeting staff has received Personnel Services has updated Personnel Services for conditional job offers made and updated ated a couple health insurance elections the good news comes when we received our workers comp renewal on Monday the 25th and updated the budget the preliminary Levy was based on information provided by the league of Minnesota City's budget guide and included a 5% increase in rates and experience mod adjustment of 1.07 with the renewal the rates decreased and the city's experience mod was 889 and it was .97 for 2024 so the renewal lowered the budget for the working funds by about $135,200 also last week the league of Minnesota City sent out an email with updated rate information for the general liability insurance and this lowered the estimated budget for the working funds by about $27,000 so this means that the current recap shows that to achieve a balanced budget for 2025 the levy would need to be increased by $2,765 or a 37% increase over the the 2024 Levy this item again is informational so it's on the agenda for discussion staff did list a couple options in the agenda packet you can set the final Levy at the 375 increase um or at the end of 2023 the city was not in compliance with this fund balance policy and so we could remove using the fund balance in the amount of $3,188 and this would then be a 2% increase over the 2024 Levy could set the final Levy at a range between the 37 and the 4% increase we could restore the capital Levy increase the permanent Improvement Levy or just increased fund balance to get in compliance with our fund balance policy and have a more steady increase rather than Peaks and valleys in the overall Levy when I look at Personnel Services increased by 6.4% at 513,000 and services increas in another 374,000 with the reduction to the debt Levy and capital these are onetime reductions and what will the levy look like next year so those are just my thoughts thank you any comments Connie's thoughts are always Doom and Gloom Mr first one was at7 she's still celebrating Halloween president bans Mr chz could you just repeat that last item you said uh there onetime reductions and give me a little break uh just be more specific about those onetime reductions and then I understand that you anticipate them back so you're talking about Peaks and valleys but just explain what those two items were that you talked about at the end there so I don't know Sean if you can pull me back up again so I just look at our Personnel Services the total cost was $513,000 that would be a very significant increase to our Levy just to cover the increase in Personnel Personnel Services for example it would be almost like a seven between a 7 and 8% increase in our Levy however we didn't have to do that this year because we reduced our Capital Levy by 100,000 we reduced our debt Levy by 212,000 and then we also decreased the airport Levy by 145,000 so that kind of netted it out and we don't need that high of an increase but next year if we anticipate the same amount of increase basically for Personnel Services how are we going to cut the cost of that increase and the two items you said at the end there were specific that you didn't I'm sorry I'm capital and debt capital and debt that's okay and then the airport Levy can be added in there too thank you so much appreciate it thank you any other questions on the 2025 Levy Mr President y m uh carer I don't have questions but I do have something I want to say com sure okay so to go back a little bit and I was was n sure where to put my comments um in during the course of this meeting so I'm going to do it now um when we talk about double taxation for the airport Levy um that is not correct terminology and I want to clarify because double taxation makes a good campaign slogan but it's not accurate so double taxation would indicate the city is taking $1 of taxes and the county is taking $1 of taxes that would be double taxation that isn't the case while the city is taxing its residents let's say $1 for example the county is taking approximately 6% of that dollar so that's about 17 cents so technically it is not double taxation is it right no is it double taxation no is it something that should be remedied yes as the dispatch article noted in um on 11:21 the county increased their Levy by the taxable amount for the citizens of Brainard by $942 and the city lowered their Levy by that same amount while that's not a perfect solution it did show a good faith effort by the county to help with this issue I'm not sure if um folks are aware um of the county budget process but as an employee of the county I am fully aware of the budget process which begins in March we start having discussions and then we start vetting out the budget in May so it's a really long process we have very little time to to rest before the next budget discussion starts but the Commissioners ask us to start early on have the discussions work through all the line items in our budgets um much like the city does the discussions start earlier in the year and as we work through the year we progress with the initial Levy which is set and you can't go up from there and then we Whittle it down um to where uh where the the Commissioners note that they want it so um for a council member or our Council to bring up this issue now within the last minutes so to speak of the budget process um I think that's a shot at the County Board who has who has already set their preliminary Levy and our discussions have went from March and now um so to bring it up at toward the end of the levy discussions with the county I think is um incorrect or unfair what I've heard and can correct me if I'm wrong is that one council member on this city council pushed this issue so hard with a County Board member that the discussion is now completely off the table they did this without the consent of the entire Council and did it on their own so now there is one vote gone from the County Board hopefully next year uh they'll reconsider and as we can take a more planful and earlier approach to having this discussion now there's just a couple more items that I need to address because I can't be quiet um first I want to address um the issue of the discussions um with the pissing contest and yes I did use that word um we're in now with the County Board and the $1,000 allocation to the airport what message do you think that that sends to our airport staff who are now questioning the funding of their employment how much confidence does that give to those staff who work hard to ensure we have a fully functioning airport well let me tell you it doesn't make them feel secure or like their work matters especially this late in the budget season and there's one more thing that I need to address it's this conflict of interest business that folks keep raising around my position on the city council first there was the conflict of interest raised about my work with the homeless population and working community services and somehow I have a conflict of interest in trying to help homeless people not be criminally charged for being homeless secondly related to the airport someone brought up that I have a conflict of interest um related to the airport vote uh this was brought to my attention that someone feared I may be influenced or pushed to vote um for the county on this two things I have to say God forbid that I would have my own mind my thoughts my beliefs the data the community input to make my own decisions on this issue but also I have integrity and I would not be influenced to to vote for something I don't agree with Debbie Erikson our new County Administrator she also has integrity and would not ask me to do that and you know what our County Board has integrity and they would not be asking me to do something like that I find this conflict of interest thing to be quite entertaining and interesting as I have been the only one questioned on my conflicts of interests when we have Sitting council members who own small businesses within the count within the city and no one has questioned their ability to make um recommendations or to vote on anything having to do with small business in the community there's a member of council who has a wife who's employed by funds from the city of and I haven't heard any questions of conflict of interests on her no offense to anyone I have abstained from every visit Brainard vote since I've been on the G and I get that but nobody has brought forward this no one has brought forward any conflict of interest questions on anybody else except me so I just want to clarify I have no conflict of interest for this airport vote and I do not agree with setting the levy for the airport at the Thousand it's too late in the game it's ridiculous it does need to be solved yes indeed but let's take a more planful approach to doing so with the 2025 year ahead of us and having that discussion in a thoughtful and planful matter and not have a pissing contest with the county board thank you Mr President thank you chairman Johnson thank you I have a motion when you're this item is about the 2025 operating budget and Levy and so Connie's looking for direction we could go as low as a 37 we could go up to four which was was presented tonight we're not going to move on this until the 16th she's got to have a budget prepared on the 16th right you want some direction on what to have in the packet on the 16th or not it would be nice yes okay all right but we could change it again we could change it again but then she'll at least be presenting what she knows at one at one point in time something we wanted right perfect so you got it can I make a motion let's let's make a motion I would move to direct Connie to set the budget the levy increase at 2% and take that $113,000 of fund balance and leave it in fund balance as was recommended in one of the options and I so move second we have a motion by Johnson a second by oday let's talk about comments on the motion only for now any comments on the 2% good you just explain how that's being used again just it's just a it's just to set it so Connie has direction of where to set it for the December 16th it's not actually setting the when we make the it's not actually setting the levy amount well there there is some direction there there is some direction there if you wouldn't mind repeat the motion if you would please yeah so it's 2% increase and putting that $113,000 that we were going to use back into fund balance and that is money from last year where we increased the levy more than we needed because we weren't certain how expensive the compensation study was going to cost us this is that money that's essentially left over was not needed to implement the Compensation Plan initially we were going to use it in the 2025 budget Kanye really wants it to go into fund balance so sounds like you do it so that's a two our finance director recommends it so not judging Connie don't worry that's a that's a 2% Levy increase correct yeah thank you right and this is not setting the levy this is just telling Connie what to come back with on the 16th thank you okay I want to make want to make that very clear any other comments I mean I this is fantastic but I I think we're probably if we do this I'm I'm hesitant to say I support it on the 16th cuz I think there's probably a few other things that should be put back in there I would tend to think we should be more at about 3 and a half% but for now I I mean since we've changed this many times over the last few days I'll certainly support it now Mr BAU of course of course you believe that there are things we could find money to spend new pink shirts for everybody and shoes more cookies all right we have a motion we have a second all in favor I I oppose same sign I okay so that passes now let's go back to Connie's discussion was there any more comments on that do you need any more Direction con need any more Direction okay any more comments okay then let's um let's move on to where are we eight yeah end of report here yeah thank you we are on 8 unfinished business 8A call for applicants we'll turn it over to the honorable mayor bedau thank you president bans before my call for applicants I would like to give a nomination I would like to nominate one Mary cop for the library board move approval second we have a motion by Johnson a second by stunich to put Mary C back on the library board welcome Mary any discussion hearing none all in favor say I hi I oppose same sign motion carries mayor B hopefully they put her on the radio ads uh we have recommend or we have excuse me we have the following positions available on the following commissions the airport commission one term expiring 2027 Charter commission two terms expiring 2025 two terms expiring 2026 three terms expiring 2028 that sounds like basically the entire Charter commission housing Redevelopment Authority one term expiring 2029 the transportation advisory committee for four terms expiring 2026 as well as the Eda The Economic Development Authority one term expiring 2026 oh excuse me Park and Recreation one term expiring 2029 Public Utilities Commission one term expiring 2029 as well those are new thank you Mr Mayor and as council president I have three terms for the plan or three positions open on the Planning Commission one term to expire in 2026 two terms to expire in 2027 and I would like to make a recommendation for Justin I don't wish to mispronounce his last name is itula grula uh to the Planning Commission move approval second we have a motion by Johnson a second by chz for Justin for the Planning Commission any discussion hearing none all in favor say I I I oppose same sign motion carries welcome aboard Justin and Mary next up is item 8B consider Expediting the it integration Workshop uh this is Mr BRS our city administrator what would you like to add thank you Mr President the integration workg group met on November 25th of of this year just last month and recommends Expediting The Joint Workshop between city council and the commission to specifically discuss and consider integrating on the it the two it departments integration work group also recommended that the meeting be held sooner rather than later Thursday December 19th is a date that that staff is suggesting however this date can be changed based on the availability of the council and the commission members so staff would recommend uh a motion to expedite and schedule a joint Workshop between the city council and the Public Utility Commission for December 19th at 6 pm to discuss and consider integration of Cityside and public utilities into one it department so Mo second motion by chesk second by Johnson and this will eliminate then the February it Workshop correct yep so that needs to be part of the motion to cancel that one and they approve the 19th of December is the workshop between the public utilities and city council and to uh remove the date of uh February 10th as our uh preapproved plan accepted any discussion hearing none all in favor say I I oppose same sign motion carries item N9 is new business item 9A is considering an interim use permit renewal for the short-term rental at 502 uh Juniper Street James krvi our community development director anything you'd like to add to what's in the packet yes thank you Mr President uh so Michael fish has applied for renewal of a short-term rental at 502 J Juniper Street the property owners have been operating the short-term rental for a year and staff has received no issues no one showed up to the public hearing with any concerns Planning Commission considered this request at their meeting on November 20th and unanimously recommended approval of the iup with sta St conditions uh sta recommends approval of the IEP with the following conditions the interm use permit shall terminate on 1231 of 2026 so since they had it for a year this is a 2-year renewal per um zoning code upon sale or transfer the property the interm use permit is no longer valid and submitt of the city of Brainard monthly lodging tax form and I can answer any questions any questions of Staff hearing none we're looking for a motion to approve the inter move to approve by Johnson I'm sorry it was down here on this end je and then Mike chz second by Mike OD day any discussion hearing none all in favor say I I oppos same sign motion carries next up is item 9 B considering a inter imuse permit renewal for short-term rental at 524 North 8th Street Mr cranic thank you Mr President so miss Nita girl has applied for renewal of a short-term rental at 524 North A Street the property owners have been operating the short-term rental for nearly a year and there have been again no issues with this uh short-term rental the Planning Commission considered this at their last meeting and unanimously recommended approval of the iup request with staff's conditions uh so staff does recommend approval of the interm use permit request with staff's recommended conditions any questions of Staff hearing none is there a motion to approve move to approve tzk is there a second second by Stang line any discussion hearing none all in favor say I I I oppose say same sign motion carries we'll move on to item 9 new business 9C is consideration of an interm use permit renewal for a short-term rental at 203 Hawkins Drive uh Mr cran thank you Mr President uh so Mr safy and Miss duramo have applied for renewal of their iup for a short-term rental at 203 Hawkins Drive uh the property owners have been operating this short-term rental uh shortly over one year and there have been again no issues with this short-term rental commission considered this request at their last meeting and unanimously recommended approval of the iup uh so staff recommends approval of the iup request with staff's recommendations the one difference with this one is uh continuing with the recommendation of allowing two um off or would be on street parking spots for this one that was brought up as a concern about a year ago from from neighboring properties so with that I can answer any questions any questions of Staff uh chairman Johnson one question I noticed this property was listed on the market I don't know this summer or something what did they end up not selling it are these the same two individuals that initially acquired they are yep they ended up not selling it okay thank you thank you any other questions of Staff hearing none we're looking for a motion to approve move by chz is there second by Stang line any discussion hearing none all in favor say I I oppose same sign that motion carries item 9 D is consideration of a conditional use permit for a brew pub at the last turn Saloon 214 South 8th Street Mr cranic thank you Mr President so Ed Matson on behalf of Matson Properties LLC has submitted request for a conditional use permit to operate a brw brew pub at the last turn Saloon uh the Planning Commission cons considered this request at their last meeting and unanimously recommended approval with staff's conditions uh staff is recommending one additional condition as a result of a question that came up from the commission uh the primary discussion at the meeting Senator around if would emanate from the building uh the applicant in his application did not believe there will be an issue and has experienced uh that the operator is operating yasher kombucha so it's familiar with the fermentation process as well as any orders emanating uh so with that staff is recommending approval of the conditional use permit with the following conditions prior to the brewery operation the building official shall perform inspection to ensure no orders from the brewery are precipitable beyond the property line and number two which is added uh a recommendation from staff is the Brew Pub shall be properly ventilated so no orders associated with Brewing process shall not be precipitable beyond the property line uh with that I can answer any questions the applicant um was unavailable an issue came up at the Planning Commission but he is here now um if you do have any questions from him and I can certainly answer any other questions perfect any questions of Staff or the applicant Mr tzk are there any uh sound concerns about this operation no sound concerns you any other questions to staff chairman Johnson uh what happens if in two years somebody complains about an odor crossing the property line so we'd have to review it from a building um perspective to see if there's any type of significant issues with it by putting it actually in the conditions you can actually revoke a conditional use permit then right now it's in the allowed use section as one of the requirements so you could find you know a potential property owner from that but being that it's in the conditions um obviously first we try to remedy the situation um if that's if it if you know an applicant's unwilling to do that we have to go down the road potentially revoking thank you I'm not concerned that there are I just wanted to hear the answer yeah well and he's already Brewing right next door okay and there hasn't been a for you can't talk from the audience I'm sorry thanks for the answer Mr we got it Mr Mr OD Day is next and you yeah is there a way to measure smell no been through this there was okay yes there is we we had this presentation previously and there me oh it is a gun that smells things we were presented that at one point smell gun oh the it was a stink gun yes okay good that's all I wanted to know Mr chz I just want to wish these folks the best of luck in their Endeavor it's thank you any other questions of Staff or the applicant hearing none staff is recommending the approval of the conditional use permit motion by chz second by Johnson any discussion hearing none all in favor say I I oppose same sign motion carries next up is new business letter e consideration of a considerable use permit in variance for a mixed use building at 722 Laurel Street Mr cic thank you Mr President uh so Dave peringer has submitted a request for a cup to convert the main floor of commercial building into two commercial units currently Bob and Fran and the second floor into seven apartment units the variance request is from the parking requirements um partially some of the new requirements from the a street parking ordinance uh which would require um seven units uh or so this property has seven units of additional housing and one additional commercial space uh so with the addition the owner would be required to have um parking on site or obtain leases for eight spaces the applicant is requesting a variance due to being a historic structure that's built out to the property lines and certainly historic structures un um unavailable to provide the underground parking uh so with that the planning commission and the public had some concerns regarding the variance request uh one business owner contacted myself um concerned that the tenants May Park in his private parking lot uh staff did include a condition uh within the variance request to help alleviate uh this concern uh the BN Credit Union showed up to the public hearing had some concerns about uh General generally in parking uh potential for dogs and then grills and lawn chairs outside of the apartments uh Mr peringer was online and stated that the dogs are not allowed in his downtown Town Apartments U nor are outside accessory items allowed and that he has had a lot of experience in professionally maintaining his downtown properties and has had no issues uh the Planning Commission considered um the concerns and unanimously recommended approval of the conditional use permit and recommended approval of the variance request with the following conditions tenants are prohibitive from parking in parking lot facilities without approval from the property owner number two the applicant will apply for four spaces in the alley parking lot with the city of Brainard and secure a lease when they become available and then um from uh because there's a cup and a Varian staff does recommend making these as separate motions and with that I can answer any questions any questions of Staff okay I have one yeah M Mr OD chairman OD the alley parking lot with it with the city that's one of our parking lots it's one of our parking lots so that's the one that would you know really be used if a resident um you know if one becomes available it's one that would be used um it's kind of along the Laurel Street parking lot along that alley area there um our other parking lots have availability if the tenants want to get a space there they there's certainly availability but it's a lot further you have the Maple Street one down by the library and then the uh uh Burlington Northern parking lot so availability if they want them but uh not requiring Mr peringer to to provide leases there so if they if they were to obtain a lease in a different lot they could use that as opposed to two one from our lot either way is okay yep okay thank you any other questions of Staff okay so we're looking at two motions the first one is staff is recommending approval of the conditional use permit for 722 Laurel Street is there a motion motion by staying line is there a second second by stunich any discussion hearing none all in favor say I I oppose same sign motion carries and the second item on this is staff is recommending approval of the variance request for 722 Laurel Street with the two following two attached conditions is there a motion to approve motion by stting line is there a second second second by JZ any discussion hearing none all in favor say I I oppose same sign motion carries next up is item 10 public forum time it is 7 920 I will open the public forum this is time allocated for citizens to bring matters not on the agenda to the attention of the council and we usually ask you to keep it to 3 to 5 minutes if you are online and wish to participate uh star 3 notifies us that you are wanting to speak and star six will unmute you Mr bons can I make a motion to turn the heat up nope it is a little chilly public forum I'm getting called I think I'll ask for a second call for public forum and I'll ask for a third and final call for public forum and I will close the public forum at 9:21 we'll move on to staff reports we'll start on my right to fire chief Holmes nothing thank you all right act acting chief for us tonight Tony Ry anything from the it GIS Department not tonight online I think we've got our HRA director sharpener anything to add tonight nothing this evening Mr President thank you Connie hman Finance director Mike Habor our Public Works director James kvick our community development director thank you Mr President a few items here so just want to note the Thrifty White is scheduled for demolition on December 9th what wa they were talking uh the Thrifty White building downtown is scheduled for demolition December 9th um so that's uh building permit has been issued so something to make the council aware of um obviously moving closer towards potential construction of 805 uh country maners requested additional tax abatement and the Eda will be reviewing and providing a recommendation to city council at the next uh Eda meeting um and then finally the Planning Commission at the next meeting will be conducting a public hearing uh regarding the design standards and mixed use potential on Washington Street and then we'll begin working on a crypto ordinance and that's everything I have thank you Mr langle our City attorney can I ask him a question uh Mr do you need it to be tonight um well he did mention the taxi batement from uh Country Manor we we've already given them a taxi batement correct yeah so so the original taxi batement was I don't have the exact number 700 something th000 at 10% or at 45% over 10 years um based on some of their projected numbers which will be in the Eda packet um interest rates have certainly gone up from their original request as well as as construction cost so they are going to be requesting additional tax abatement thank you thank you Mr thank you Mr Lang our City attorney anything the Robert's property is scheduled to close day after tomorrow yeah it [Laughter] is is that a holiday you know it's not B it's not nice when Mr Lango gives his first and only report in 15 years and every single one of us laughs that's that's got to be a little hurtful he is smiling though look at that I understand HR Director Schubert and Chris Evans our Public Utilities director nothing to add thank you and Mr bral's our city administrator no sir nothing to add my goodness we need to go back to that that taxation report all right next up is The Honorable mayor bedau yeah I'll go quick tonight I just want to thank everyone for coming out on Saturday for the downtown small business Saturday the hometown holiday uh it was cold it was very very cold so we kept it brief but there was a a very nice crowd for the tree lighting ceremony I hear Rumblings that maybe next year we are going to redecorate the tree with some new things hopefully so I think uh that probably has dollars attached to it so I'm sure there'll be a request at some point for some kind of funding for something along those lines but I want to just thank everyone involved including the parks department for getting that tree up and going and keeping it going CU that's our big problem we get it all put together then the squirrels eat it and then we light it and it only does half of it so we've learned our lesson check it check it check it check it check it and so I just want to thank specifically Troy for coming down and being there on Saturday make sure that baby was running you guys were checking that up until like 5 minutes before so when I flip those switches they go and we know it goes but thank you to everyone involved with that Legacy Cal for singing carols and for everybody for coming out and uh bundling their kids up and having a good time so end report thank you Mr Mayor uh item 13 is our council member reports let's start with our two chairs Mr OD you want to go first I got nothing tonight thank you Mr Johnson I I have one question of Staff if I may yes Mike are we flooding hockey ranks I was going to ask that you took my thunder wi you can talk about Thanksgiving yes we have yes we chicken giveaway do we uh have an ETA if the weather holds up we have an ETA when the kids will be skating oh I really would rather not anticipate that to get that date out there but soon process yes you will be the first to all inform hit the ground Tiffany stting line no nothing for me ter Terry Chief stun the turkey event was phenomenal 15587 meals we delivered between law enforcement police and anybody else a, and one meals wow so thank you to everybody that participated bigger and better next year 1587 holy that's more that's I think that's more than I had trick-or-treating Halloween and you know who showed up D help Tony's everywhere always she loved it wasn't it great fantastic job thank you and Mr chz I have nothing thank you thank you I just have one quick thing I I attended the funeral today of Betty Alderman if you remember Betty and Jim owned Alderman's Hardware downtown for since I think it was the late 40s until it burned down into 19 19 the late 198 I was there yeah you were there for the for the fire not the funeral and anyway just uh uh what a asset she the alderman were and Betty to the community and she will be missed uh that being said we're looking for a motion to adjourn Mo so move by stunich is there second yep second second bio day any discussion hearing none all in favor say I oppos same sign we are adjourned I know that's s so this just all --------- ##VIDEO ID:N7s4qeJ9ShY## all right we'll call to order safety and public works this city of brainer it is December 2nd 2024 700 p.m. in council chambers we have five items tonight first item is approval of payment for improvement 22-8 for South Brainard reconstruction and it looks like this is Public Works director Mike abacor thank you and uh so this here we are just requesting that final payment be approved of the staff is uh requesting that the payment be approved for the South Brer reconstruction project with the completion of the project majority of it's already done it's just really the turf that is remaining and uh the overage on this re regarded several things a couple tree removals that we didn't anticipate some extra Paving that we had to do for some potholes and uh so we are asking for this to be uh that we authorize this to for us to complete this payment and it's a little bit over and then we're going to be keeping about 1% uh we're going to hold that hold that back and that's based on uh State Statute uh that after it's all completed then we'll um pay that but we're asking for this to be paid any questions move to approve staff's recommendation on this Mr chair second Motion in a second any more discussion hearing none go to a vote all in favor I I motion passes I have no number two we have a final pay estimate for improvement 24-02 2024 chip sealing again this is uh Public Works director Mike cabor so the FI the final project was 159,000 and some change uh we're over about 10,000 and the the overage is really due for that wrapping every intersection when we surveyed this we didn't anticipate you know that wrapping and you need to do that the contractor brought that up to our attention and U so that's really the main concern with that but you have to wrap every intersection when you're going down that road the other concern with with this and then the next item is we didn't really have any contingencies and I know it's our standard practice not to have contingencies but when you're doing projects like this you there's so many unknowns that it's nice to have contingencies but uh nonetheless we're just asking to uh recommending the final payment to to be made with this project Mr chair yeah explain what wrapping is again if you want so when you're going down one road and there's um side roads you have to just bleed that into those other side roads so that it's just not your one street that is being paved so as it goes down the road you're making a cross versus just a straight line yep so is that about three extra feet on either side each intersection yeah and that just adds up when we didn't anticipate that but it's a good thing that we did that because now the project is 100% complete and done properly is that brought up by the contractor during the bidding or during the project after okay and that was a little bit on on our side when the staff surveyed that we needed to include that in and that's in our recommendation down here uh Jesse and his crew uh for the future will be looking at those tighter and looking at all those variables okay I move to approve the final pay request for improvement 242 2024 uh the chip cealing project in the amount of $9,746 so second motion and a second do we have any more discussion any more motions okay good try hearing none go to a vote all in favor I motion passes item number three we have final pay estimate for improvement 2315 and 2327 Evergreen Bluff resurfacing project again uh Public Works director Mike abor so this really went down into two different uh projects it was on the bluff and on the Evergreen on the bluff side what really uh threw this off was one tree we had to replace it was a larger tree and then when we took that out there was a major drainage issue so we just couldn't leave a drainage issue on a neighbor so we had to really take that on that affected the curb we had to redo the curb and that was on the bluff side and then on the Evergreen side there was just uh the contractor when they're uh striping they indicated a number of arrows needed to be we needed more arrows for pro proper uh traffic flow and so again to do it properly we had we decided to do that and um that were the issues with these two projects going over the first the previous item was just a you know less than you know about 5% overage this one here is a is more than that um but again when you get into the tree removal on larger trees and it affects the drainage and now curbing has to be done it really threw this one out of the budget um was was there any wrapping on this one no there was this one here was well it was resurfacing too but when we estimated that there was enough for whatever reason the contractor was was within that line item that he didn't do that whether he took this upon himself and saying hey I'm just going to throw it in the project because I'm already asking for 26 um which is you know um has been done before other contractors do that thank you yeah I did see the size of the tree it was a giant cotton one that right next to the curb basically growing I would move to approv staff's recommendation on this Mr chair second have a motion and a second I just have one question um I don't know if maybe I missed it on here be there's two separate projects it doesn't say necessarily how much overage was on each side or was it all on the Block portion it's in the attachments when you drill down into those attachments there thank you Sean he it's Sean's drilling I like that you'd have to take out you know when it comes to down to the tree curb add up those and then the arrows and then add up those for that one that other project arrows what do you mean by arrows those uh directional arrows that are painted on the and they were just recommended that we do more of them for proper flow so we wanted to concur with our contractor what what are the arrows directional arrows like a turn signal sometimes you'll either have two or three for one turn area and other times you'll just have one two it all depends on the flow of traffic and again we just follow suit with our contractor all right his license is on the line motion and a second any more discussion hear none go to a vote all in favor I motion passes item number four we have a approval of a layout uh for the low safe routes to school project again Public Works director Mike abor we talked about this last uh council meeting just regarding the detour that we're just going to let this uh play out and we have a contractor here thank you uh Paul for joining us just regarding the layout of this so we're just really looking at the layout and approving the layout so from here I'll turn it over to Paul all right uh thanks for having me tonight members of the committee so um L will safe Frost the school so sorry sir name and address Paul Sandy 9416 Northtown Street BR thank you sir um so you can see the layout um that we inevitably landed on up here on the screen here tonight um so the project located on H Street between 3rd Avenue Northeast and 4th Avenue Northeast City entered into a contract with us WSB to design and facilitate construction of this safe routes to school project the city got some grant funding from the state of Minnesota similar to what um occurred on Harrison uh on Oak Street uh for a similar type Improvement um when we were laying this out there were two options that we did consider the one that um kind of bubbled to the top after some meetings with the school district is what's shown here tonight but I can go over both option one and option two um to kind of tell you what the differences were between those two um option one um this included uh narrowing of the street to basically reduce the pet Crossing distance so similar to what we did on Oak Street um that uh median Refuge Island uh on H Street that reduces the P pedestrian Crossing distance um from north to south across the street and also uh from east to west on certain streets um so option one um which is the one you're looking at here um includes that narrowing of the streets to reduce the pet Crossing distance and bump outs at all four intersections on the north and south side of H um I will point out that after we met with the school district um we presented this option one to them and uh another option which we were calling option two had bump outs at all the corners and um that would really impede their pickup and drop off procedures at this school um they claim um that a lot of times the traffic is queuing on 8 Street between third and fourth in that parking Lane for pickup and drop off times and there's also additional queuing that happens west of third on 8 Street uh for vehicles waiting to drop their children off those bump outs cause a little bit of a problem when it comes to queuing because traffic has to move around the bump out um across the intersection and then back into the parking Lane to drop their children off to stay out of the lane of traffic so that's why can I I'm sorry do you mind if I so when you say on Third Avenue they want a queue to drop off their kids are they dropping them off on the west side of third then because if they're is that what I understand no so um the way I understand it is Vehicles will travel up third North on Third Street right turn the corner on to H um going eastbound and they would have to move around that bump out but they' drop them off on the north side of the school yes correct that's that's what I didn't okay thanks actually I I use this for uh pick up and drop off we actually uh will queue up along H H Street uh traffic heads East and that line backs up all the way across Third Street yep along H Street and so instead of going around bump outs on H Street both before and after third and then again at Fourth getting rid of those bump outs the the line actually wraps all the way around the block and drop off and pickup happen on the south side where the front door is now located yep so this works way better yeah so um we don't have option two in the packet but you could you I can explain the differences option two basically had all the bump outs at every corner except for one I believe and that was the corner of um fourth and H in the southwest quadrant was the only one that was missing off of that layout but the conversations with the school district really um uh made us reconsider that and not include the bump outs on basically all the corners of J into the school to allow that queuing and pick up and drop off um so like I said we had some meetings uh the comments we received from the school district were um that queuing issue that I brought up um other comments included they considered closing that North driveway um you can see it here on the drawing um at the school here that yellow um driveway shown Sean if you can point that out on the south side of 8 Street um they elected that that was a useful driveway approach to have um for I'm assuming deliveries of certain Natures to the school so they wanted that returned um the other thing they said is that they support all the features that are planned here uh to make uh improve student safety um with especially crossing uh the busier AG Street um at that pickup and drop off time um some other features of option one uh there are two two rfrb flashing systems they're shown um here they're the North and South Crossings um at 4th Avenue it would be the north uh the west side of the intersection those blue dots right there those are those rapid flashing beacons like you see on Oak Street similarly on the Third Avenue side there's a set of Rapid flashing beacons there also uh the 8T median as I was kind of saying um that 8T is kind of a minimum standard uh for Ada uh purposes so that um students that um of all abilities are able to use that pedestrian Refuge to cross one lane of traffic at a time they can fit a wheelchair um in that pedestrian refuge and look both ways before they cross the next Lane the parking lanes are maintained on both sides of H Street at a minimum uh 7 foot state aid um this project is a state aid funded project so that 7 foot is a requirement of state aid funding um a 16t clearance between the bump outs is included uh between the curb and the median Island for maintenance and snow plowing um and then the Ada requirement uh the ada8 the the project the Southside sidewalk in front of L will be getting replaced with this project that pink on the South Side there uh will be getting replaced with this project um I think that's all I had um if there's any questions I can answer those at this time only question I have looking at on the south side of H Street on on the the lane where all the cars are queued how much distance is there you said 16 feet or is it's a minimum of 16 so um where there's for example on the way East End of the project between the bump out and the median Island that's a minimum of a 16t distance so along the school okay um when you talk about the flashing lights um as I'm approaching the intersection from either direction where exactly are those going to be located are they well in advance east or west of the intersection as I'm going either direction or where I I misunderstood what you described there yeah so you have to cross so for example if you're on the north side of H Street um you have to cross third or fourth without those rapid flashing beacons the rapid flashing beacons are only for the H Street crossing yeah East and West that the you only see them traveling East or West no you would see them Trav well yeah yes you would if you're in a vehicle traveling east and west but as a pedestrian where are they located at so the first rapid flashing Beacon is just uh west of 4th Avenue to cross North and South across 8 Street just to the west of fourth okay and then the other one is to the east of third okay that that's what I was on thank you I I thought they'd be more in advance of that but they're light so they don't have to be obviously so Mr chair yeah I would move that we uh accept the uh recommendation here for this design for the safe R the school project at Lo school second motion and a second any more discussion Mr abor yeah I just like to indicate to Paul if you could just con just send my thank you to all your staff uh regarding just reaching out to the school that's just huge uh that that engagement and with that engagement we got a better design so thanks for all your work on that appreciate it thank you thank you Mr Sandy any more discussion hearing none go to a vote all in favor I motion passes final item we have for spw is a discussion on the sanitary Forest main sewer lining project and Sewer rates again uh Public Works director Mike ababor we from last week our last meeting we met with staff with uh Chris and BPU and our city engineer and their staff discussed the priorities and we are still recommending that uh this project be look at the 2027 and there's just a lot of variables that uh and along that time along between now and then if we find out more information as we go we can pivot and we can readjust these priorities as we go but with the information that we have right now we're still recommending the 2027 that we stay with this and we're still going to be working very closely with BPU staff and really making sure that our two projects the streets and and the underground uh the all the different utilities that we stay close in communication and working together as one team just moving forward to get this uh 10year plan completed thank you any questions um yeah if on the agenda request uh Mr haboc course okay uh at the very pretty much the end of it before it says the recommended action the very last line there Steph is anticipating rates may have to be adjusted over 25% over the next three years to cover the cover $800,000 after that time rates would be at a a level where either a new large project with the continue to identified regularly or the sanitary sewer fund would be overfunded and I've ask this question what is the what are the consequences of that fund being overfunded it makes it sound like that's a problem and I still haven't got an answer for that so if somebody would be willing to explain why that's worded that way is oh sorry I'm not sure of the technical reasons why it would be overfunded are the ramifications of that but I do know that we have a number of projects that are in a large dollar amount that would I would have hesy to indicate that we're going to be overfunded if we start doing these projects and we get them lined up with our two different work units and getting in in sync with that um we could easily avoid that problem I think would be pretty easy but again Chris do you have anything Mr Evans well Mr chair I've asked this question it looks if you read that it looks like it that's not somehow appropriate it's not allowed it's there's a consequence to it and I and I still don't have a an answer to why it's word this the second time we've seen this exact same wording I I asked about it before our last meeting and I think Mr Royals uh you indicated to Connie in an email to let us know what's up with that and I still haven't heard from on that and I I it it looks like it's suggesting that we can't do this because we can't have that account overfunded and I and I'm just not happy with that answer I know this seems like a a small detail but there if it's not if if it's if you're not worried about an overfunding then why is this memo before us twice now this this meeting and our last meeting identical wording Jeff maybe I can shed some light on that I might be looking at it a little differently but um from what I had conversations with uh Jesse on this one recently it gives it gives us time to raise that money without shifting any rates is what I'm kind of reading into and to be able to do it on our own with those funds in three years from now we've also talked though about the possibility of State bonding for this project as well and in that in that case we would we would definitely have what would be referred to in this memo as overfunding but I think we have plenty of other projects to spend this on we have miles and miles of pipe to fix and replace and line and everything like that so I think this is a a safe way of raising the money ourselves or possibly State bonding doing it uh so we don't have to go further in debt but I don't I think maybe the the the way that it was written in there is a little misleading I think that's maybe what you're getting well if I could um I I appreciate your I guess your uh attempt at explaining that but the one thing that bothers me the most about this is this project was scheduled for this year we all know that right mhm and the price comes in at all three times what they anticipated but now we're willing to jack it up another 25% by waiting two years I I just can't I can't stomach that I we always talk about what's in the best interest of our taxpayers and this project uh this program if you will as it's worded here first of all it's called a it's called The Force main there's no Force main work in this project at all but we got it labeled as such in our agenda item that's a one thing um this goes into a a drains into a lift station which then goes into the Force main is there any work on the Force main being proposed on this Mr haar I'm not sure of that exact thing but as uh projects are prioritized every set of data that we receive we reprioritize those projects just as I indicated earlier that if we get more data this may recommend that we move it sooner and it and so forth we just have to Pivot as we get more information as we get that and right now right there's other collapsing issues that we have going on with the city of rinder underneath our streets that are putting in our staff's recommendation a higher priority that we should do versus this one and this one needs to be done yeah don't get me wrong but when we have collapse sewer lines happening and other stuff that even hasn't been surveyed it's hard to put this on the top of the priority list when we have other things that are going on well I I will say that this was on the priority list for this year and what styed it was the cost that that was what Mr Dean told me when I talked to him about this a month ago or whatever it was and when it comes in this high and uh we say well let's put it off another two years or perhaps almost three and and um and we just put it on the taxpayer you know what the heck I mean it's only 3 400,000 more what the heck I mean I I I just don't know I I don't agree with that at all I I think we have this project is it the staff doesn't have the time or what I I heard that as part of the information that I receiv received from Nick uh they were burdened by a a resignation and there's a lot of other stuff going on this is first of all we had an estimate it was completely shot out of the water from 400 some odd thousand if I'm not mistaken to 1.1 million and now we're pushing it out to 1.4 million I I don't understand that rationale and we talk about bonding well let's just pay the interest let's just cover it over time and then it just doesn't make any sense we we know there's a problem it's been on been looked at for 20 years so we just keep kicking it down the road who knows in two years maybe we'll just kick it down the road another two years it just doesn't end so I'm not in favor of this recommendation at all yes so we have a list of projects for the next 10 years of every project so regardless if we use if we move project C to two years from now and we bump up another project we're going to be having projects every year that are a list of projects so whatever project we do 3 years from now is going to be three times higher and so forth three years from now 3 years later it's going to just going to be higher it just is so whatever project we we move in front of this or behind this we will be faced with the same pricing Dilemma on every project so pricing in my opinion won't deter a project or move the priority pricing because pricing is pricing we can't we look at the issues that are underneath the street and we have to look at all those variables and not just one testing this was this was prioritized for this year it was on the agenda on the Sip for this year right that's what I keep going back to so there was a prioritization of this project right and now the price comes in and we'll just kick it down the road we just charge 25% more we can bond for it yeah and and and and I'm sorry but stay bonding you know what the legislations like this year Mike I I'm sorry that's yeah it's not a guarantee no it never is I think right now we just don't have the funds in that in that fund available but the thing is is that we have other we have other utility items that need to be addressed more critically in our staff's recommendation we have projects that are more critically that need to be fixed than this project and they all need to be fixed if we had a a money tree we would do all 80 miles of this project we do all 80 miles this year I don't buy that it was on the list for this year then then we can move it this year that's fine but then other projects that are moved ahead of this what are those projects what's that what are those projects we I can get those to you yeah I want to see those anyway I'm not in favor of this recommendation so that's where I'm at okay we just keep kicking the old can down the road the size of the project doubled as well that was part of the recommendation from the study um getting it done all at once instead of bypassing that flow in two different sections is a huge cost save so if we're able to push it down do it twice the size of a project was a big part of pushing it down the road as well originally it was about half the distance and then it went I never read that anywhere that's what I was explained well so that was a big part of doesn't say anything about that se part of that also said that there's no parts of it that are failing there's there's some issues with roots growing in and that's part of what needs to be fixed during this project but none of the pipe is actually failing and if that does start to happen heaven forbid then it's an immediate fix but we don't want to have to bypass that flow more than once because that's the most expensive part of the whole project okay okay do we have a motion I will move the we go forward staff's recommendation to include this project in the 2027 in 2027 in the 10year CIP and continue moving forward with the sewer rates as per the rate study recommendation so second motion is second any more discussion yeah I'll be voting no okay any more discussion heing none go to a vote all in favor I I all against same sign I'm sorry I meant to say that's what I thought that's what okay thank you all right motion passes two to one and we can sorry about that uh reconvene at the council meeting