Steve. Steve mentioned anything? I have not heard from Steven. But you have a quorum? We do. We do? We should. Okay. Well, two members are Dan, two members are not present. K. We have, changes. We have, move nine b adding senator Nelson there fast. I I I did talk to senator Nelson this weekend, and I had planned on her being here. It was either August or September, and she thought she was coming tonight. So I'll leave that one kind of in limbo. We need to add a sewer declaration,
to, the agenda for Bearwood Estates North final plat. It's a a stand alone, approval. It would go under, new business. Nine I. Nine I. And I wanna make you aware that there is an attachment, a change in the development agreement for each East Village fifth. The attachment in your packet is not current. The one on your desk is. So just be aware of that when you get to four J. And then there's a nine a also? In nine A, there's an attachment that is there was not an attachment on your packet.
It's on the table in front of you for the Bearwood Estates North, development agreement. Sure. And four k correct. Motion to approve. Second. Yes. Yes or no? Yes. That's approved? Yes. Yes. You there? Yeah. Dan, can you talk? Can you not hear me? There we go. Now we can. Alright. I say yes. Okay. Consent agenda. Like I always do, I'll read them all up, and then we can, Council minutes, July 8. Alright. Hold on. Park board minutes, May 27. Planning zone in minutes, June 3. Approval after payment for 212211924 and some change.
Warrant list, 911615 and change. Release of infrastructure, East Village Fourth. 2025 Street utility improvement pay request, snow contracting for 404311. Wastewater treatment plant, pretreatment improvements pay request. The Magni construction for 244124. Ford I is capital improvement project, preapproved dump truck. Ford j is, development agreement amendment, East Village Fifth. And what we just talked about is the parade,
homecoming parade, on the agenda for approval. So any discussions on those? Just a note, mayor, on the homecoming parade, they did submit an agenda request. Staff failed to get that on their form, but they are just going typical school to school, like our normal parade route. Yep. Any other discussions? Motion to approve the consent agenda. I'll second the motion to approve the consent agenda assuming that the East Village fifth edition is the corrected version. Okay. We have a motion to second. Any public comments on this? Any council comments?
Roll call vote. Yes or no? Justin? Yes. Me? Yes? Yes. Steve? Yes. Dan? Yes. K. Consent agenda approved. Communication reports, petitions, incidents and calls. Byron, deputy voucher. Kinda give us an update. Yeah. Pretty good. Nice. Alright. Any other question? Okay. Thank you. Probably should order a lot of signs. Yeah. What's that? Said you should probably order several signs because all the park hours are the same. So Yep. There really should be one at every park. Oh, yeah. No. Wait. They are. Yeah. Or multiples at some bigger parks. So. Alright.
We're moving to the community newsletter. A lot of good things on there. State Farm opens a new office in Byron. There's ribbon cutting tomorrow night. Right, Greta? Yep. We got that. Night to unite, don't get a lot of activity environment on that one. But Rochester does well, and others do well. So it's just it's out there, and we just we had one, but it was out by, out in the country. So and then the next page, good old brew barbecue barbecue company. Yep. Lot of beers you see in there. And then the last one is the the rock the donation of the, basketball by the youth,
basketball. Nice little plaque and stuff there. So good to go. Being used nicely. Awesome. Awesome. Alright. And then, Fire Relief, Association. Mister Wilde is gonna present some good stuff. Good evening, everyone. Thanks for allowing me the opportunity to come. Scott Wilde, for those of you that don't know me. I come yearly so hopefully everybody knows me by now. So we just had our, audit, completed for the relief association. So, I just wanted to give you guys the opportunity to hopefully get a chance to look it over to see if there's any questions that you have. It's kind of a boiler template year to year.
It's the same verbiage. The numbers change, obviously, with how many relief members are on. You know, right now, I think we currently have 31 active firefighters, 11 that are fully vested or partially vested and four that are fully vested. So, what that audit does, it goes through and looks at our, income expenses for the entire year to kind of show you guys where we're sitting. So, with that, I just want to, bring that up here for you guys to look at and see if there's any questions and if we could get an approval on the audit.
And once I get that, then I have another question for you. So first I'll take a we could have a motion just to accept the, audit for the relief association. I'll move that we accept the audit from the Fire and Firefighters Relief Association. I'll second. We got a first and second. Any public comment on that? Any other council comment on that? K. Roll call. All in favor? Aye. And I'll second. Roll call. Yes. Daryl, yes. Yes. Steve? Yes. Dan? Yes. Okay. Called it approved. Alright. Thank you. And then the second request I have, in front of in your packet,
you should have the what we call the s c twenty five. What that does, it goes through and shows, really, full list of all the firefighters. Like I said, we have, 31 firefighters currently. And then it basically shows, where we're at. We've been doing very well with our investments and fundraising the last several years. As you can see, we're about at 1,200,000.0, in our fund. And again, that's, a lot of the money we get from the state. I think our state aid contribution every year has gone up. The last, I think this past year, we received close to almost $80,000
I don't know the formula now, maybe you do, but I don't know the formula on how they go through and calculate that. But every year, it's been going up and up. So, it's hard to say what we'll get, at the end of this year. But, things have been good there and like I said, our investments have been doing very well. So with that, the other thing that we did just talked about with Al at our meeting is we've been using Smith Schafer as our audit firm for since I've been doing it. So that's probably twenty eight years now. And, as we're talking, you guys use ABDO or ABDO. I don't know how you pronounce it. But, so I did reach out to them and talked to Kimberly a couple weeks ago
and she's putting together an estimate for us as far as all the work that needs to be complete. So I'm hoping, that maybe we could, get a little relief there as far as since they're doing city stuff already, doing our stuff, maybe we can get at least some, competitive pricing. It's getting very expensive with Smith Schafer. Maybe that's the going rate. Been talking with Kimberly, she does about 60 firefighters, so very well versed at what they do. So, as I was talking to her, I had her look at our, our SC25 just to see where we're at. And each year I come to you guys,
I'm always a little skittish to ask for, more money for our benefit. But, we are a 100 currently a 146% funded which, is very well. We're at the top of the, scale in all relief associations, within the state of Minnesota. So we're very, very sitting very good. So with that, we're currently at, dollars 3,000 per year of service for current active firefighters. So that's a defined benefit lump sum that they get per year of service for twenty years of service or more. If they,
have ten to twenty years and they go off in that, it's a prorated amount. If they don't put in at least ten years and they leave, they don't get anything. So, so with that, I did work with our auditor, ran the numbers and, what I'm asking for for next year, so 2026, would be, a $500 increase up to $3,500 per year of service for active firefighters. With that, we will still be sitting at 143% funded. So we're still so no city contribution,
no nothing that the city has to worry about. The only time I tell you guys you may have to worry is if something happened, the stock market crashed, but we have a very good investment adviser who keeps our money safe for us. So with that even going up $500 we're still at 143% funded. So, so really what we're doing is just catching up from years past and again, it's, there's some firefighters or firefighter departments around that, I mean, they're excessive. We'll never probably get to that.
I mean, you look at Pine Island, I think they're about 8,000 per member per year of service. They do different things than we do, but, so we're not asking to, jump that high. But for next year, we're asking for that $500 amount to get up to that $3,500 for twenty twenty six. So, do you have one, any questions? And then two, if there are no questions, I'd look for a motion to approve that for 2026. Questions, counsel? For Scott? Yeah. K. Motion to approve the 500. I'll make a motion to approve the 3,500 starting in 2026. Second. K. We got first and second.
Any public comment on there? Any other council comment on there? Okay. Roll call vote for approval. Aye. Zero yes. Yes. Yes. Dan? Yes. Approve. Alright. Thank you. Appreciate it. Thank you. I do. Appreciate it a lot. Next on the, the agenda is senator Carla Nelson. But before you you can come up here, but I got a letter from the League of Minnesota Cities I wanna read. Senator Carla Nelson, who represents our city at the state legislature, has been selected as a league of Minnesota City legislator of distinction for 2025.
The league of the league's board of directors recognized a total of 28 legislators this year, including six house members and 22 senate members for the actions and leadership in a wide variety of legislative issues of importance to the cities across the state. Nice job. Oh. Well. Yes. Okay. Thank you. Oh, thank you, Mr. Mayor and Council members. I was very pleased, to receive that distinction, and I just found out about it myself in the last few days. But, the League of Minnesota Cities does a very good job at the legislature,
and they bring the items of importance to us, and they're always well researched. You can take what they say to the bank. I know you're all nodding because you know that. And so, I'm pleased, I'm honored to represent you. It is, a great privilege, one I don't take lightly, big responsibility, and I will be brief. I love how you run your meetings so quickly. And I could talk on and on about what happened in this legislative session. I'll try and be brief and just touch the things that I think are relevant
right to you. I should note, the committees that I serve on, so if there's items of particular interest in the future in these committees particularly, reach out to me. Of course, any in general. But, I'm in my fifth term in the Minnesota State Senate. I serve on taxes, bonding, jobs, transportation, pensions, and about four or five other, statewide committees. But, those are big committees, important committees that are important to all of our joint constituents. And, you know, we serve the same people.
We have the same constituents, and we're just your partners at the state. I know sometimes it can seem like we're a little bit at loggerheads. And, I will just note, this year was an unusual year for sure, And I'll just highlight a couple of the things that I'm sure you might already know, but I want to make sure you do. It was, as you know, we came into, well, the previous budget, the, session, you know, there was an $18,000,000,000 surplus and then we ended up with $10,000,000,000 in taxes. And then when we got to 20, 25,
of course, then looking at the budget, it was kind of like a shock. Like, what, dollars 6,000,000,000 deficit? We should not have been shocked, quite frankly. The numbers were there all along. It was a 40% increase in spending, so you can think how your constituents would feel if Byron increased its budget by 40%. So that's what we went into. I started, of course, a little bit late. You know, we had the boycott over in the House. What I didn't realize was going to happen there was all of the bills. Many of us had, you know,
worked ahead of time, we had our bills, had them, jacketed, so you know, you have the House jackets, the Senate jackets, and always wanting to be prompt, of course, I sent my, Senate jackets over to the intended House member, know, that was like the right person in the right place on the right committees that was gonna be able to take these things forward. What we found out that happened though, was because of the boycott, which really, we hadn't really seen before like that, all of those bills that the House introduced, during the time when there was the boycott, three weeks later,
when the, other party came back, all those bills were dumped, and they had never been introduced. So then, they were in a rush to try and reintroduce those House bills, and sometimes they didn't even get the right Senate author on them. So, I would just say it was a little bit chaotic, there. But, at the end of the day, it is good that we were able to, get a budget passed this year without going into a shutdown. And so that was important. The things that, well, I'll just tell you the one thing that was incredibly disappointing to me.
Even though in the prior session, we had gotten the funding for, design preliminary design and planning dollars for Highway 14. You've got these two intersections right here, County 3 and County 5. And, I mean, you know, your constituents know better than any, how dangerous that has been, and it's the last stop lights, I think, all the way to Mankato, perhaps. And it was shocking to me that those were not funded in the bonding bill. So, we didn't get a bonding bill right away.
There was the special session, and then this bonding bill appeared, you know, like that. Presto. And it was shocking, it's still shocking to me that the shovel ready project was not funded. And I just want you to know that, I will continue to work on that. Special sessions are not the best way to get good legislation, actually. It just kind of it's like a few people in a room and no public input. So, very frustrating there. We should be at the top of the list. I mean, these are shovel ready projects. So, in fact, the bills are already being,
updated as needed, and I've asked that these projects be on our bonding tour. So, you might get a call, the Senate bonding tour will be coming. Now, they might say, Oh, we already know these projects, Carla. They're shovel ready. Okay. But I, we have to ask for a, for a bonding tour stop. And, hopefully, I think it's good to get a bonding tour stop. So, kind of, stay tuned for that. We're glad about that. Just a couple of the things that I know were, important to the cities, and last time I was here, actually, you were, I think one of the things you were discussing was the whole on cannabis thing,
and how are we going to implement this new mandate. And, you might recall at that time, there was a 10% tax added for cannabis, and 5% to the counties, 5% to the cities, so it wasn't supposed to be an unfunded mandate. Well, as you know, they increased the tax to 15%, so you might be thinking, Hey, this is good news. But, I can tell you already know. Well, they took away all the funding. There is no cannabis funding coming to help you, with this unfunded mandate. So, that's a little bit, frustrating as well. And have you had a presentation from the League of Minnesota Cities just about some
of the key items? I'll just touch on them briefly, and you'll give it We only had a handout, not a presentation. Okay. Well, you can give the major presentation, but the things that I thought the city council members might want to know, some things about data practices. So government entities now, you know, sometimes, mostly school boards, I don't know if the city councils were getting in as much, but they were getting requests for lots and lots and lots of data, public information data, and it was costing a lot to, get all of that out,
and yet the people who were requesting it, for FOIA requests were not looking at it, in some cases. And so, the new law just says that if they have not inspected the data that you've already sent to them, you don't have to send anymore. Okay? So they got five days, which, some people might say is a short amount of time, but I'm just saying, I think that's a positive thing for local governments. This, I hope, doesn't apply. I hope this never does apply to you, but right now, with the new law, a public official for disciplinary purposes,
if there's some discipline with a public official, now it applies to all cities. Originally, before the law changed, it only applied to cities over 7,500, population. So, now it applies. What's Byron's population? Just under seven. Just under seven. So, well, hope you don't have any of those disciplinary things. But now, the law applies to you as far as disciplinary disclosure. Another issue that I thought was interesting is, body camera footage must be unredacted, that must be given upon request.
So that unredacted, if someone is, in a collision. And, the last one is I think this is like a teeny tiny step in the right direction. You know, we've been, unfortunately, our state has been just plagued with fraud, And, we see it over and over and over. When I first started talking on this about two years ago, it was half a billion dollars. It was $500,000,000. Now, we are well over a billion. And the fraud just, you know, they're just grifters, and somehow they're coming to Minnesota and taking advantage of our very lacks.
And so, this, I'm glad to say that now the government, I can't believe we needed a law for this, now government entities, including yourself, are able to share data related to confirmed or suspected fraud in public programs. Imagine that. Somehow, some people thought fraud was protected by data privacy. So, anyway, there was a end there. So, those are just, a few of the things. I know you'll get more directly from the league. I don't want to spend too much of your time,
except to say it was really disappointing. I think it was a lot of missed opportunities, quite frankly, especially when it came to that bonding bill. There was no project of all of Olmsted County's, all of Rochester's projects, all of Byron's projects, Dodge Center, not a single project was funded in that bonding bill. This has just not happened. Oh, I'm wrong. Another case of misplaced priorities. There was a skate park, funded in Rochester. Okay? So, that's it. But I would say, we hope for better things going forward,
and I will say I'm part of the civility caucus. Last week, there were, I think eight of us, bipartisan, bicameral, that met and signed a civility pledge. Quite frankly, I do think things have gotten rather heated rhetorically in the legislature. I think we're better off if we talk about ideas and talk about, actual differences in what we think might work, but we have to stop this dehumanizing of one another and the violence that we have seen.
And so, I'm hoping that by the time session starts, we'll have all two zero one legislators signing the civility pledge. I think it's a step in the right direction, much like what I see here with you. So, I will stop, but thank you so much. And, if you would like, Mr. Mayor, council members, I'll be glad to answer questions. Good. We can't hang up the hill. No? We're good. Thanks for the update. Thank you very much. And and thank you for the recognition too. Good job. Thank you. Mister mayor, I I forgot to introduce my husband, Terry Nelson, my driver. Glad to have him here.
Want to ride him? No. We've got another speaker. We just added two more people out there by one. Thank you. Thank you, sir. Thank you. Alright. Moving to no public hearings. We're gonna move to the resolutions. We got about three of them to go through. First one is 2025, 27, variance request, 1524 Seventh Street. I heard there's a lot of discussion on the planning and zoning. Al will have to break this down a little easier for us. Yeah. At this point, this variance request came, with a recommendation for denial from planning and zoning. I will tell you that, the council is facing two options.
City code in +1 52155 +1 05, excuse me, states that the council shall not approve a variance for a nonconforming structure or use, period. So you have no, legitimate right to approve this request regardless of how we feel about it, in any way. I would propose to you that, staff recommend a tabling of this variance until October 14. It will give staff a chance to work through some issues in our code,
consider a possible amendment to our zoning code, and and there's some other things. This is a complicated variance because the variance has to do not only with the structure but also with the use. And, it's not as straightforward as what most variances are. So, at this point, I recommend a tabling of this variance until October 14. I have talked to the applicant who, has agreed to this table if you're willing to do that. So how are you going to handle that from a P and Z standpoint?
Because in my opinion, it should go back to P and Z any changes for a vote in P and Z because there, they made a recommendation. And the recommendation was because and the code is very clear. Because it's a nonconforming business, you have a nonconforming situation there. You can we cannot. I I sympathize for the to the person because when they purchased the property, they may have been conforming, but they're not anymore. The business was not conforming at the time of the purchase.
So so they said they're not operating, but yeah. I I am Yeah. And bottom line is we're asking for a sixty day, to table it for sixty days because it has to go back. This whole issue has to go back to P and Z for them to review and determine whether or not they're willing to recommend to the council to make some or any changes at all. Okay. And and so, you're gonna have to have all you're gonna have to have new public hearings? Yes. Absolutely. I wanna make sure that's my thing because, I mean, because the people that were there
are deploying to, you know, there's going to be an expectation that, you know, there's new public hearings. I concur. Some new notices and everything else. Correct. But again, that won't happen quickly. And so normally, if we tabled this, it would either be later in this meeting or the next meeting. That's thirty days. That won't I mean, this process will not happen in thirty days. That's why I'm asking for sixty. So my question is what do you believe is the advantage of doing that versus rejecting approving the rejection of the variance request and doing and putting the proposed changes
to the ordinance through on their own? A variance is gonna be required no matter what we do, period. I think that there's also an opportunity for an interim use permit. If PNZ chose to make that recommendation to the council in the ordinance. So the variance doesn't go away. There will be a variance to be considered no matter what. So you're looking at pretty major changes to the ordinance in order to allow the an interim use permit because an interim use permit would not be allowed as because
it's a nonconforming. It depends on how you define major changes. The the language is not as significant as it sounds. The intent is probably more severe. The I think the intent is very severe. But Yeah. Without making any guarantees, it just at this point, the variance comes at a cost. Yeah. And we feel like tabling this would defray the cost of the variance to the applicant, whereas if we deny it, they come back, they ask again, there's another cost. The IUP also has a cost.
And because of that, our recommendation is give the guy a break and no promises. It may come back that we change nothing. But if we vote on it today, you only have one vote that's already determined. Conversation? Yeah. So you need a motion for us to Yeah. I need a motion to table or a motion to deny. Make a motion to table it to the October 14 agenda. May I have a first? Second. I have a first and second? K. Any public comment on this? Any council comments on this?
No other comments? Roll call vote for approval of the table reading till October till October 14. Yes. Zero yes. Yes. Steve? No. K. Dan? Yes. K. Four yeses. Motion's approved. Table till 10:14. K. Alright. The next one is twenty twenty five twenty at Bearwood Estates North final plat. Bill, Al, anyone? Come on, Joe. Go ahead, Bill. Al. I think I think this might be agenda item by committee. So, in your packet, Kelly had a memo in there. We have, I think, five different things attached,
for this plat. So this was a little bit of a unique project and that, this is a city led developer project. Meaning, the developer requested the city to lead the design and preparation of plans. And after approval tonight, it the city will step away and it'll then it'll become the developer's responsibility to bid the project and construct it as we typically do. So, so in your packet, you have the final plat, you also have the zoning review letter, the engineering review letter, and there's a third item or I'm sorry, a fifth item. Oh, the resolution, in there.
Relatively straightforward small project. This is going to connect Seventh Avenue to Seventh Street. The only real unique thing is we have four lots on the North end that are not serviceable like gravity sewer, so they will have pumps. The development agreement does contain a provision, that they're privately owned and maintained and that will be recorded against the property. So, couple of challenges here is we have a project that's abutting Seventh Street, which we're, as you recall, we have a grant in 2029 to rebuild Seventh Street. So there's just some timing issues and some coordination.
So we may be coming back to the council on just some coordination on stormwater and various items. But again, we'll get that figured out. So we just we're just trying to be efficient, so we're not tearing something out again. And two, if we build that project ahead of time, we're not tearing something out, we just put in or the developer or the city. So real high level, I guess I'm not planning to go in any other details unless Al or Tom there's anything specific to address. The only item that I would draw to your attention and we're asking for
stand alone action on is a sewer maintenance declaration. Because that is recorded against the property, I felt like that should have its own specific council action. But it is tied to this development agreement. It's referenced in the development agreement. And that will be coming later in the agenda under new business. K. So what I'm seeing now is for that first resolution twenty twenty five twenty eight Bearwood Estates. It's, approving the final plat of the Bearwood Estates contingent on all the items? Yes, sir. Okay. Yep. That's what we're looking for a motion on.
Tom, move approval of resolution twenty twenty five dash twenty eight for the plat final plat of Bearwood Estates North, contingent on all the items in the zoning engineering review letter being addressed. Execution of development agreement, submission of letter of credit, and proof of insurance being provided. Read that nicely. Thanks. I'll second. Got a first and second. Any public comments on this resolution? Any other counsel comments? K. Roll call approval. Yes or no? Yes. Zero yes. Yes. Yes. Steve. Dan? Yes.
K. First part of that, twenty twenty five twenty of Bearwood Estates, motion approved. Next one is, accepting pickleball donation. $250. I move approval of resolution 25Dash20 9 accepting pickleball donations. Second. K. Any public comments on it? We got a first and second. Any other counsel comments? Okay. Roll call for approval. Yes or no? Yes. Zero yes? Yes. Yes. Dan? Yes. Okay. Well, I guess we can bring up a new business later. 2020 529, accepting the donation approved.
No unfinished business. We got quite a few new business items on here. So we'll start with, again, talking about the Bearwood Estates North. So The revised development agreement is on the dais in front of you. It, cleaned up some language in there that, did not make it into the packet, and that would be the version I would ask you to, consider. Okay. We're talking this one? No. That's it. It's the amendment. There's a one page amendment. That's the amendment. Yeah. Okay. There's an East Village amendment and then the bare wood development agreement. Oh, wait.
We're talking about bare wood. Sorry. Okay. That one here. The bigger, thicker statement. The bigger one. Yep. So what was changed? Full development agreement. So what was changed, generally speaking? Just the numbers. Cost numbers were put in, so there's some cost on the water main, cost sharing and then the inspection fees. Okay. Good. So pretty straightforward. I move approval of the development agreement with Fairwood Estates North. Second. Okay. We got a first and second. Any public comments on this resolution? Any other counsel not resolution. Any on the new business? Any other counsel comments on there?
Alright. Roll call vote. Yes. Zero yes. Yes. Yes. Dan? Yes. K. Development agreement approved. We skip over nine b. We're going to twenty twenty five twenty six Olmsted County Sheriff contract. These are, three contracts, standard for the Byron City contract and the Byron Cops contract. You'll recall that we also have the, school resource officer contract that we amended, for a period of time, that's on here, where we are picking up 50% and the county's picking up 50%, for the next school year.
These contracts are needing to be signed and approved by the city so that the county can finish their budgeting process to ensure that their money, also gets into this. There is a cost of living increase based on their collective bargaining agreement. Otherwise, no changes, and, we would recommend approval of all three. Let's get one question on the resource officer with the new superintendent in place. We had a discussion on it. We're paying for it. I'm not saying we're not paying for the the 50%, but do you think that would change down the road? The agreement was that we would cover this for two years and give them a
chance to pass their referendum. The referendum initially failed. It is, coming back this fall. So they'll have a decision to make, this fall based on in part But we're in a two year right now? Yes. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. But that that discussion about whether or not, you know, the school's involvement, it is tied pretty tight to the referendum. Can we go ahead and approve all three contracts? Yes. Okay. Great. So I move approval of the 25, 26 Umstead County Sheriff's contracts, which is and includes the law enforcement,
the cops, and the school resource officer. Second. Okay. We got a first and second. Any public comments on that? Any other let me Go ahead. Let me, correct. We call it the '25 26. I wanna point out 2627. 2627 by their, Alright. 2627, but, yeah, we called it the 2526. Yes. Just so there's not confusion after the fact. Sure. I'll amend my, my my motion. You have to amend the second there. Second. K. Got a first second. Any public comments on this? Any other council comments on this?
2627, Olmsted County sheriff contract. Motion for approval. Yes or no? Yes. Darrell, yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Dan? Yes. 2627, Olmsted County sheriff. All three contracts approved. Organizational chart modification. I wanted to point out in this, and we did discuss this at personnel committee, we are proposing to eliminate the lead foreman position at public works. It's a bit of a redundant position and the current member in that position is open and willing to change titles,
in essence. We are also, proposing to split out the deputy clerk from the accounting clerk position. I apologize. I put accounting technician in here as a title. It should be finance clerk, not accounting technician. And then creating the position of deputy clerk, which merges utility billing and the deputy clerk duties that were under the, finance, clerk's job title. And what we're trying to do is streamline. We're finding some areas where we have some inefficiencies
and, this, again, more streamlines our our workload between people and cleans up our our org chart. K. Anything else with that before we go into the motions? No. I I will make a motion to approve the personnel appointments or I'm sorry. The organizational chart modification. Second. K. We got a first and second. Any public comments on this? Any other council comments on there? No comments? We have a first and second. Approval? Yes or no? Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Dan? Yes. K. Organization chart modification approved.
Thank you. Thank you, Al. Now next one, personal appointment personnel appointments. I'm asking you to approve, John Bosman, John Bosman's appointment as maintenance superintendent at grade 10, step five. He does not lose money in this transition. That was a, an effort of ours. Robbie Horstman to the finance clerk position at grade six, step four. We are proposing he would stay at his current wage until 01/01/2026 and then go
through the process, at grade six. The deputy clerk appointment, there is no appointment to be made. The incumbent has declined the position and so we will come back with an appointment at a later date. We will be asking for authorization, to advertise for that position. Well, I'm not ready to advertise today. So if you wanna give us authorization, I'm I just I'm not ready to go out for, for that advertisement just yet. I think there's some things that we have to take a look at, to make sure that we have our ducks in in a row and have our
house in order so that we, can present the position fairly to whoever might be interested. So are you do would you rather, as part of the motion, we authorize you to advertise when you get your ducks in a row, or do you wanna come back next month? I would love it if you would authorize us to advertise the position when we're ready. That's what I you were kind of wishy washy there, Al. So I will, Well, there's three on this one. John Bosman and Robbie's in the And then, yeah, the authorization. The other one is an authorization. So I will make a motion to approve the appointments of John Bosman to the maintenance superintendent,
Robbie Horstman, to the accounting technician as stated on the end to allow advertising for the deputy clerk appointment or position when city administrator feels that they're ready to advertise for it. Nicely done. Alright. Well, second You want to repeat that? No. But I will say it's finance clerk. It is finance clerk. Okay. Thank you. Okay. So we got a first and second. Any public comments on these three? Any other council comments on these three? Okay. Approval, yes or no? Yes.
Zero yes? Yes. Yes. Dan? Yes. K. All three personnel appointments approved, and got a bonus on this one, Al. Thank you, Steve, for that. Appreciate that. Alright. Nine f, ICE report, fourth, tenth. It's been a survey of some type. That will be mister Angerman's presentation. Thank you, mayor. And I have now, given our current political climate, every time we write ICE report, we this name existed a long time ago. It's intersection control evaluation. So, we did we did discuss this at, public works committee.
The public works committee does have a recommendation, which we'll talk at the end. We did review the full report in more detail. Tonight, the intent is to give a shorter summary. What we're looking at is the Tenth Avenue Northeast and Fourth Street Northeast Intersection. What is precipitating this is, we did put rectangular rapid flashing beacons in a few years ago, that intersection is pretty wide. We also added a refuge island in the middle. And the question is as this area in the East Side of town grows, is that the adequate long term solution? And as I mentioned earlier, the Seventh Street project,
we received the grant for 2029. Our goal current goal as a city is to advance construct that to 2027. So our staff is asking ourselves, okay, in order to facilitate basically Seventh Street being closed down or a portion of it for most of the year, what other projects, need to be done to support that? And this would be something that we would if we're if the council so desires, to complete in 2026. If we're going to have anything done, we want to have it done before that Seventh Street project. Again, but in order to do projects,
particularly intersection evaluations where public perception oftentimes differs from maybe engineering judgment or engineering opinions, we did, intersection control evaluation because we ultimately, the council has some leeway on your discretion to approve things. But when it's engineering or science based, it's way easier to justify that to the public, it's way easier to justify your costs and also, make your decisions defensible. So with that long introduction, we're just gonna jump through some of the highlights.
So Robbie is gonna help me slide through here. So so again, number one, as I mentioned, you know, with that Seventh Street construction, but, really, we're looking at what's the ideal long term solution. The Byron City Council, you've had a history of being proactive in your in your problem solving. So, for example, the inter the roundabout at Tenth And Seventh. K? You did that what the DOT considered maybe slightly on the early side. But as a city council, you've said, we would rather be early than late. Meaning, when we first see problems, we wanna resolve them.
We don't wanna, you know, wait until they're a problem because it takes a while to develop these projects. So that was the goal that we identified. The second part of the study, again, just what are we following? Well, so we're following the Minnesota Uniform, sorry. Minnesota Manual of Uniform Traffic Control Devices, that's a mouthful, and the Highway Capacity Manual. Again, this is so we're maintaining a record of why we did this, what's our sound decision making that we're doing. And then last one at the bottom, as you progress through an intersection, you have uncontrolled intersections, meaning nothing, then you have side street stop,
which you currently have, then you have multi way stop, you have a traffic signal and you have a roundabout. And, obviously, the last two traffic signal roundabout, it's a lot of dollars. So again, we wanna make sure we're making sound decisions. Okay. So as we're looking at this, what we're looking at is, okay, what what do we have existing? You know, our current controls, I mentioned, is that side street stop. So, we look at something called warrants. So basically, you have to you should. You don't have to be, but making sound decisions and to limit your liability, we have to make decisions based on warrants. So warrants are what's your crash history,
what's your level of service, you know, what are the existing conditions. So when we look at that, we look at crash history, you had 13 crashes. We also look at the development of forecast. So we're looking at, okay, not only what do we have now, but what do we have twenty years out? What kind of growth are we going to have? What we look at is typically in Byron, our traffic has grown about 2% to 3% per year, which is pretty aggressive. So for this, what we looked at is a more traditional 1%, but we have some specific developments we actually assign traffic values to that. So we're using actual numbers for our growth projections for our 2025.
And then what we do, is we run all four of those scenarios, side stop, always stop, roundabout signal through those future conditions and we say, do they pass or fail? And under future conditions, the side street and the multi way stop, they fail the criteria. So they do not meet our level of service criteria, so they get a score of an f. So, again, that's important to note, because one of the things we ask you could be asked is, well, why did you spend the money why don't we just put all stop signs up? Well, because we failed the criteria for stop signs. Okay.
Next one there. Okay. So, some back more on the warrants. As we look at so we also look at, okay, when you put these items and when you put a roundabout in versus a signal, because now we're making the assumption we're going to do an improvement, what are the differences? So, signalized control, they reduce crashes by, you know, this is literature, that traffic engineers use by about 23%. Roundabout, much higher, they reduce crashes by about forty four percent and injuries by eighty two percent. Okay. Why do we care about this? Ultimately, we're going to assign dollar values to this because the prices aren't the same.
So not only looking at our cost as a city, you know, what's the cost for a signal roundabout, but also the traveling public because there are when you have accidents, there are costs. So typically, when you look at this, you build that in because not only do we wanna pick what's of value for the city, we wanna I'm sorry, for the council and our budget, but also what's the general traveling public, what's the best value. So again, a lot of what we're doing is what's value based in addition to safety. Okay? I'm sorry. Keep stay back there, Robbie. Third item there is also then we have to make sure our warrants are meant
to justify it. So both the roundabout and traffic signal, we do meet the warrants. And then, oh, also, we looked at the railroad crossing. Are either of these gonna would impact that? And, the railroad is far enough away that we will not have issues with the railroad. K? Alex. Thank you. K. So on the cost side and looking at the design comparison, so a signal is definitely cheaper, initial cost. K? So initial capital cost is in the 350 to $450,000 range. When you look at the life cycle, again, that's what you look at the life cycle,
the length of that, and you look at also cost, crash reduction savings about 1,100,000.0, roundabout much more expensive initially, but on a life cycle cost, it's about even with a signal. Okay. So about the same, but crash reduction saving significantly more. Okay. Way less crashes, and now with that, way less severe crashes. So capital cost roundabout signal about the same when you do life cycle, but significantly better for the traveling public. And then we also have to look at,
do we have the room to put it in? We have the room to put either in. A roundabout is a tighter fit. We would not put a what we'd call a full round about like we have at, tenth and seventh. We would put, a compact. So we'd still have the middle green grass area, but on the medians would change. One thing Stephen had asked us is, we will look at during design, again, if you guys have us move forward, we'll look at some maybe some alternatives to that. But in essence, it will behave and look like a full roundabout. So I'm good luck in the cast, and you got the really ridiculous one,
Valentine, which you could drive over the top of it. It's probably like the one It's like the two we have now, basically. Yep. So we have the full middle with the grass raised portion. One of the things we talked about is staff, Tom, and I. I prefer that style of roundabout. I prefer the you can't drive through it, you know? Yeah. You know, and we have the room to do it. And that that's what, Dan and Steve, Steven felt the same as well. Yes. I love I want the idea of the roundabout, but I see it's not gonna help safety for people walking across wherever they're walking
across. The traffic's always going. Yes. It does. It absolutely it absolutely helps them. Yeah. What it does is it it it it gives them shorter distances to walk and All the pedestrians are, generally speaking, looking the same way. So the line of sight for vehicles is much better for pedestrians. So you have four designated crosswalks, and I saw the map, and I just want that's what that is. Yeah. Yep. Okay. Yeah. Yep. I mean, it doesn't make sense that way, but if proof shows it, I'm fine. Yeah. It's also it's also for if a pedestrian does get hit,
your cars are traveling at a much slower speed. So Okay. You have a much higher survivability and a lower injury rate. But yeah. It is counterintuitive when you first look at it that it's safer, but you only have to look one direction while you're crossing as opposed to looking multiple directions for the, vehicles that are approaching. Thanks for the explanation. I appreciate it. Yeah. Okay. So, public works for me, we did discuss this much longer. And, so kind of just kind of summarize this. So the safety factors, more safer, long term savings,
the performance warrant, the geometric criteria, all the things that we really engineering wise, we do meet those. And our recommendation is to move forward with a roundabout, versus this well, I'm sorry, we have do nothing as a choice. We have installed a signal and we have installed a roundabout and the recommendation from staff and public works committee is to proceed with a roundabout. The direction was specifically then to move this forward as a 2026 project. So I'll pause there. Tom, Al or Dan or Steven, anything to add? I will say that my only concern was about some of it about the size
and the future traffic. But if you look at the fact that we potentially are going to have, you know, North South traffic, we're gonna have County Road 3 and County Road 5. The interchanges, Tenth Street traffic is going to go way down sometime in the future. We just don't know when that's going to happen. So, you know, that's gonna change that traffic pattern quite a bit. And I think the roundabout, you know, helps today a lot. And even as the traffic pattern changes, it is going to be beneficial. I would also like us to look at once we assuming we move forward with
the circle, can we speed control the stuff on the North Side between Fourth and Seventh. So it's only posted as a 30 mile an hour speed limit as opposed to the 40. Sure. That's it. I know we there's some state requirements, so I'm I'm I'm asking for some creativity potentially here. Well, I was we will save that discussion for another day. How's that? How about this? Comment noted. The thing is I don't think this is I'm just speaking it from a teacher's point of view and off from the school point of view.
This is often if you see it on Facebook and the social media, this is an often complained intersection in regard to student pedestrians, scooters, and it's and on on school mornings, it's gonna be busy. Regardless of where the interchanges go, it's gonna be a very busy intersection during school hours. So, the safety aspect, I think, is incredibly important and valuable to the project. Favorable to students, is what you're saying? Without it. I mean, going back to the comment about pedestrians, you know, you get hit going 15 miles per hour on your scooter versus forty,
forty five or however fast people are going on that road. It's it's gonna make a huge you know, heaven forbid, it never happens, but those scooters aren't going away, you know, and this is often a very complained intersection for those. So Yep. And I really think that, you know, anecdotally, you can kind of look at how how much of an improvement there was to traffic safety or perceived traffic safety. And when we put the roundabout in on Tenth and and Seventh, I mean, that really did improve the safety for people crossing at that interchange.
Because if you look at how it was before, you were, you were playing hopscotch Yep. Or whatever it is. Or a frogger, I guess. Yeah. Just to note too that, you know, the south side of that intersection on Tenth Avenue, you'll be cutting from four lanes down to just two lanes. Yeah. Right now, northbound, you have a right lane, through lane, left lane, and then a front line. Turn now. Which is the reason it fits because we have those extra lanes. We can Right. Use that extra road with. Very favorable more favorable for snow plowing than the current setup. Just throwing that duly noted. Oh, man. Oh, yeah. Yep. And no more people running over the little embankments over there in the middle.
They'll still they'll still try to run over stuff. It'll be harder. It'll just be a little harder for them to complain too much about it. So, we're looking for a motion to approve this. Yes. Recommendation from Public Works Committee is to approve the intersection control evaluation report. And I'm gonna send go ahead. I'm gonna I'm gonna save this document too when people complain about another roundabout because you know what's gonna happen. I'll just, like, take a look at this. Here are the stats. Yes. Yes. Absolutely. So I move approval of the I hate calling it the ICE report as presented, but we'll call it that. Call second.
K. We got a first and second. Any public comments on the ICE report? Any council comments? Any more comments? Great discussion. Awesome. So, approval? Yes or no? Yes. Zero. Yes? Yes. Yes. Dan? Yes. ICE report, as presented, approved. Thank you. Thanks for bringing this up so quick. I mean, we're talking, hopefully, like, in the next year. Yeah. Awesome. Perfect. The next one is approving engineering for it. Look at my ad. Let's go to that one. Any other discussion on there? Well, now now if you wanna move forward, now, yep, this is the next step. So I move approval of the professional services agreement for Fourth Street and Tenth Ave
Intersection. I second. Okay. We got a first and second. Any public comments on this? Any other council comments that we haven't touched on? Okay. Approval, yes or no? Yes. Zero, yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Dan? Yes. Okay. First, you can look at the professional service agreement amendment. Approved. Now authorized, authorizing for for pickleball. The I got my handwriting all over it. Pickleball, authorizing the bid. So you wanna discuss how we're doing that? We would like permission to advertise for bids on the, pickleball, court construction. The plans
are largely complete. We just have a little bit of fine tuning to do. But, in order to speed this up or keep us on task for this fall, we would ask for that permission tonight. Yep. Sure. And we have been working, fairly closely with the pickleball group. I won't tell you that we a 100% agree with everything each other is saying. However, I think in principle, we have a an outstanding design. It will be unique to, our region, and I think it will also fit within the prescribed budget or that's what we're shooting for.
But But that's why it's taking a little bit longer on some of the plans to work through just those final details. And this is at the soccer fields on the west side of the west entrance where the community gardens currently are sitting. And I guess our recommendation would be, to authorize us for going out for bid. But how long do the process bids and everything else before you can actually put that that drawing out there, the rendition out there? Well, I think that'll be as soon as we can finish the We'll probably have stuff out next week. Yeah. So Okay. Yep.
And the goal is to have bids, collected and brought to you at the next council meeting in September. And I think we're kind of what we call what we heard was it won't be completed, but it'll be good base setup for the at least the flat stuff. We agree that, with what's recommended for construction and paint and what have you that we, weather permitting, flat work is done. Next spring, when it warms up, the painting and the final touches are done. And, we're proposing a completion date of June 1. Right. Yeah. If I could, June 12. Or June 12. Yep. Sorry.
Thank you. By the way, on the manage the expectations part here, you know, we like to give contractors some flexibility. So if we say you have to have so much done this fall and they're busy and they don't bid it, well, that doesn't help us. But if they think they can get all that done next spring, well, why wouldn't we give them that option? So we are gonna be Tom and Al and I, we wanna be a little more flexible than maybe the pickleball group wanted because we believe it's ultimately theirs in our best interest because it could be cost or cheaper and we get better competition. And then also we have to deal with we have gardens out there and we
can't just plumb up. We gotta wait. So there's there's some considerations that we're I don't know some count on all, but you guys have your company WHS has Bell County Bell County Hookable Courts already? Hundreds? Not hundreds, but 20 may yes, we've a lot. Several of them in Rochester recently. We do Rochester's court design for them. We work for the park. So I mean, and I think that that's part of them understanding the expectations. I mean, it's it is in everybody's best interest.
I mean, if we're shooting for it to be done by early June or mid June, you let the contractor decide their schedule. Now, hopefully, the contractor gets in there, but it's up to them too and does some of their earthwork this year or it maybe puts on the base. So it settles over the year, but there's ways around that too. And, yeah, I mean, they could hit it first thing in a normal spring and still it's not that big of a project. Right. It's you know? So Mother nature is still gonna have her say. Yeah. No matter what you say, if we had, you know two two years ago,
you could work all winter. If we have this year, well, the spring sucked. So once the bids and stuff are awarded and the contract, whatever, now it's up to them to decide how much they can do this year? And then Yes. Obviously, we'll do as much as they can. Yeah. We're gonna leave But if the winter gets, it's gonna be less and more early next year. Okay. Yep. Exactly. Yeah. They could also just say, we're not gonna do anything and we're gonna we're busy this fall. We think we can hit it in May in May 1 and get it all done. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Cool. Alright. I'm still curious about the design.
Anything close to Rochester that I can we can I can look at, you know, what you've developed? Any You know, Cook Park is probably well, some of that has six courts. This one, we're gonna have phase bid four with the option to do six. That's probably the most comparable. It's this is actually gonna be a little unique. They're gonna have a viewing area. So it this is this is a unique one. Good. We like that. So It'd be awesome. Yeah. Always stepping up above the our neighbors. I like that. It's gonna be great. It's it's gonna be the best one in the region. Good. Awesome. And, again, the numbers too, we still have the what's the five at the the ice rink and then another
six here. Is it going six? Well, now we're gonna base bid four with the option to do six. Okay. Okay. Yeah. How we bid that, we're still working through the strategy. You know, do we we're gonna make sure we do we optimize our potential for good prices. Doing a you do a two different line items. Buy an a and a b bid. Yeah. So the the bidding the guys in the room here, you know, so Either that or you have an a and the b is just the extra two. Correct. In that way, you can it's an optional. You can pick up b and Yep.
It gives the council discretion on what to award to. Yeah. Sure. I guess my whole point of that was not a lot of cities or our size has five roughly anywhere from nine to 11 courts. So that's pretty awesome. And yeah. Oh, sorry. They the pickleball group posted constant plan They're ahead of you. Watch out. Of their viewing area. Watch out. So well, I'm hoping that if when this one's done, it reduces some of the tension between the pickleball group and others on the ice rink. But, you know,
because that you know, you say you list that, but there that's a multipurpose thing. So we gotta be cognizant of that too. No real issues this summer. Did we have anything? Not yet. Sorry. Not yet. Summer's not open. Yep. And I had, and there was some people that are asking, where is there tennis courts in town? Because all the tennis courts are taken up by pickleball. So alright. You need approval on this? I move authorizing the bat to for the bids for the pickleball court. I second. Hey. We got a first and second. People are leaving. Any other comments? Any other council comments? If not,
approval, yes or no? Yes. Zero yes? Yes. Steve? Yes. Daniel? Yes. Okay. Authorize the bid to get the bids going on the pickleball. No public comments? No. What 9F. 9F. 9I. 9I. 9I. 9I. I got it on here. We have a sewer maintenance declaration that's on the dais in front of you, for Bearwood Estates. Bearwood Estates North. And this simply states that, the four lots in question will maintain a private sewer service to get it to our gravity feed line.
I have to have some I mean, it's about to have a flood of funds. Yes. Yeah. Yep. I move approval of the sewage maintenance declaration. I'll second. Okay. We got a first and second. Any public comments on this? Any other counsel comments on this? If not, motion to approve? Yes. Zero yes? Yes. Steve? Yes. Daniel? Yes. K. Approved. Now I can go to public comments. Any public comments? One more time for public comments. Okay. Let's go around. See what's everybody up to. Justin? Let's see. I didn't make it to the first responders meeting.
I was out of town. Park board, didn't make it to that. Is there a a pool conversation, Tom? Not yet. Just a little bit about have we because we missed the meeting before. It was an update on, you know, what where we were at with the school wise and and ideas of plans for moving forward. So Very, really early, though? Very, very, very, very early. Okay. Let's see what else. The barbecue, August 23 coming up in a couple weeks here. Less than a couple weeks, week and a half, almost. We're set there. I we got a meeting tomorrow night to kinda finalize a few things. We've got a it's a fundraiser,
of course, for the pickleball group. Mhmm. We're kinda eased with knowing that they've definitely made their goal and then some. So any any funds made during this event, icing on the cake. But we got everything set up. We've got, three bands, three vendors. We've got five people entering our ribs contest. Nice. So you'll have some ribs to eat them there. I'm going for it. Yeah. But yeah. So we're just kind of in our last kind of plan in here. Talked with Brian Jourdle from Fairway. They're hooking us up with some ribs for that event. I see. We've got Pure Rock Studios,
Ryan Utterback helping us out with, PA system and stuff in connection with that help me out. What was it Spearman? Was that the the group that was your last it. No. It is, I'm sorry. Yes. It is Spearman. It is. The battery people that were here at the last meeting wanted to contribute. Oh, nice. So they're donating money for, like, a professional PA system for the live music, and we're gonna make them kind of our stage sponsors, for the event. So that was kinda cool. No. I August 23, twelve noon to four.
Should be pretty cool. I was reminded a couple I think it was in mid July. I Facebook always has those memories. But it was, the city advertising about the one basketball hoop we have out at the ice rink. So and and how we're we got pickleball courts there, and then we were advertising how there's more pickleball courts out at the middle school. So I think it's really cool. And that wasn't that was two years ago. So I kinda see the progress that we've made from bragging about one basketball hoop to this really nice basketball complex at the Valley View Park,
and then now, you know, breaking ground on a on a pickleball complex too. So just a testament to Al, Tom, city staff, collaborating with the different community groups. It's has been pretty awesome. A lot of progress made in the last couple of years. Great. Cool. Yep. Alright. I'll segue on that with community stuff as, good neighbor's day. Great hit. Oh, it's it's so fun. It was really good. Well attended. So many great compliments on there. We added, like I said, the two things, which was surprising. A petting zoo was a hit. You know, I just yeah. A petting zoo. And then we did the,
the toddler town, which is very nice at ages one to three. The kids can be in there. I can't swim in with the dog fence. But it was plenty of room, and the parents loved it because they could sit in the bleachers there, and this is the kids' place. So we finally gave something for the one the younger ones, which is awesome. And in the pitting zoo. I was surprised. But, no, they'll be back next year. So that was good. And now we finished our third concert. Unfortunately, we couldn't do the balloon because called me in the middle of the day with, you know, twenty, twenty five mile gusts. Yeah. You know, they said,
you gotta understand is, you know, the balloon is like 100, 150 feet high. Then you gotta go go up higher too. So there's another layer up there that we don't see down this far. But they're very cautious, I'm sure. But it is what it is. We we weren't out anything. But, anyway, the concerts were great. Can't wait to go next year. And then we had the personnel, couple of things we talked about personnel earlier. That's what I have. Mayor, I do have a school board update. Oh, my god. When everyone else is done, just come back. Public works, we discussed, obviously, what we presented here tonight. Yeah.
And then Good Neighbor Day Parade. Justin, myself, and Daryl So good to see the kids there. Walk through that and hand out candy and barbecue flyers. And I just poured out sweat because it was so hot. Always hot. Other than that, I don't think I have anything else. Yeah. Thank you. Steve. So the we discussed planning and zoning, and we discussed what we had there. And then, also, you know, had public works. And I while I was not, you know, walking the route for the parade, I enjoyed driving and pulling the float that I was pulling.
So, you know, you know so And it I don't know. I mean, it did seem it was a little less attended on the parade route than normal, but I don't know if that's you know, there's no way of really parade route than normal, but I don't know if that's there's no way of really knowing. It's kind of anecdotal as far as where you see the people. I see. Actually, the viewers though? The viewers along the parade route, I mean, it just seemed like there was a little there was more spots that there wasn't a lot of you know, there wasn't people. So They were on the parade. No. I mean, it did seem like, you know, especially the group I was pulling the parade for, we had more kids than we, you know, than we've had in a while.
So and so maybe there was more. There's always more people they saw in the parade. 10 or so plus, additional floats. We did increase increase those. So hang on. Okay. I one quick item. Sure. So I'll share this with Al and Tom here in the next day or two. But, Rocog, the the county does have a safety action plan, and, I just got the results today. Actually, they had a pop up event at the Byron Good Neighbor Days as far as looking at pedestrian traffic safety within the county. Byron has been very well represented, so we're just getting some of those results. It's a year long planning effort, I think we're in month three.
So Al is on the steering committee and I'm on the technical advisory committee. So I'll get those results over to you guys. So but, again, Byron had a good participation during good neighbor days, which is which is great to see. Thank you. This side of the room? I had public works committee and park board, We pretty much touched on all that. I have a couple of items. One is the farmer's market, volunteer driven event this year has outgrown the park and ride. And, so we have, I think, successfully moved the farmer's market to the BCRC parking lot.
Oh, nice. I was wondering where the signs are up there for. Yeah. We're we're working really hard to get the attention to the BCRC area because there's more room. There's more places to park, more vendors, and and, they've far exceeded, what they thought they were going to have. And so as we move forward, our goal is to eliminate these events at the park And ride because that has become, a lot busier with the Mayo bus and and people actually utilizing for for what it was designed for.
So we're excited about that. The metal recycling event is still going to be there this weekend because they had asked for that before this came about, so we're gonna work through this weekend. But, again, we're going to try and move as much as we can to BCRC. And I appreciate everybody's patience with that. Otherwise, I don't know that I have anything else to add. Rod, anything for us? Oh, we got a school update. Yeah. Just an update on the referendum. Let me see here. It just goes here, bullet points talking about, how we got into the situation that we got into,
you know, funding not keeping up with inflation. Let's see what else. Underfunded mandates, some erroneous assumptions when setting budgets for future settling labor contracts. But, anyway, the big deal there is they are going to a referendum. In November, it is asking two questions, a $700 per pupil operating levy to sustain our current offering of programs. And if that question passes question two, a $250,000 technology levy that we use to update and sustain technology systems, and stuff like that. So, kind of a big deal.
I know a lot of what we do here at the city level, especially when we're talking about the pool issue and all of that And a lot of other things that we do, we try to keep taxpayers' interests at hand and, try not to ask them for too much when we've got, the the school district, referendum coming up, which is important. And as we know, strong schools equals strong cities. So, personally, I'm on the, vote yes committee for that. That'll include a lot of, phone calling, door knocking, and stuff like that. So if you know of anyone who wants to get involved in,
you know, getting this referendum passed, you can send them in my direction. So So two questions, you could do the first and not the second. Right? You can yeah. If number one passes, yeah, if you vote yes for number one, yeah, then the second one. So the essentially, yeah, one could pass, two couldn't pass, or they will pass, or they could will fail. But, we're hoping it passes. So Okay. Thank you. Anything else? Okay. Not a motion to adjourn. Motion to adjourn. So seconded. First and second. Any public comments? Any council comments?
We're adjourned. Roll call. Oh, roll call. I just missed one. That wasn't so bad. Yes. Zero. Yes. Yes. Yes. Dan. Yep. Thanks for dialing in. Alright. Oh, shoot. Yeah. We're adjourned now. Sorry, Dan. He's probably already had three margaritas. Yeah. He didn't want an update. He's a I was just gonna say the keg has been open for an hour. Just kidding. Have a good night, guys.