Good afternoon everyone. I'd like to welcome everyone here in the room and um online to the August meeting of the housing redevelopment authority H. Um busy agenda today. We we'll start off just with very with a perform with
Chairman Gabler is running a few minutes late. So I'm Chris O'Brien, vice chair, and I'll I'll run things in his absence. Uh first, are there any uh questions about the agenda? You all have the copy of the agenda in front of you. any any suggested changes to that or otherwise
could I'll get a take a motion to approve. Yeah, we do have one resolution that came to us kind of late and so Bill had suggested that we do add that at the end. Great. As resolution number 25-16. Perfect. So noted with that amendment any other uh changes or can I get a
motion to approve? Um um move to approve agenda with that inclusion. Okay. Second. A second. Okay. All All in favor? I. Okay. Uh that passes. Um next likewise
approval of the 20 of the July meeting minutes. Um any um comments or can we all can we likewise have a motion to approve those? Move to approve. Seconded. Okay. Um all in favor? I I. Um now we've got a opportunity for
public comment. And I know welcome Kristen. Thank you. All right. I just wanted to stop by today and thank all of you um for the work that you do for Cook County. I'm the new um Cook County administrator. My
name is Kristen Trouble Helersma. This is my third week here in Cook County. I'm excited to be here. It has been a great experience so far and I trust that it will continue to be so. Um, so again, just wanted to stop by and introduce myself and also let you know that I have
moved into the Gunflint view and um have found it just to be lovely. I'm really enjoying my time there as well. So, thank you again for all you do and thank you for offering me an opportunity to say hi today. Thank you. Thank you. We look forward to working with you.
Thank you. Okay. Um, one next, we are going to move one thing item around in the agenda. We have a presentation um about the uh this is a a joint project for the uh pilot efficiency the envelope and uh envelope
and energy grant pilot project and Andrea um is here to give us a walk us through that um program. Andrea, good afternoon. Thank you. Uh my name is Andrea Orus. I work for
Cook County Public Health. I do uh a lot of prevention work, but I also work in our healthy homes program with my c-orker Andrea Toi, who will be here shortly, but we'll get started. So, today I'm just going to share a sort
of um highle overview of our envelope and energy grant pilot project. We have been working on this collaboratively with the HA, Cook County Public Health and Human Services, CCIP,
and then the city of Grammar. The project history um so back in 2021, we were awarded a grant to do healthy housing assessments and mitigation. And part of the grant deliverables were to create a sort of advisory group for um
called the healthy housing network group. So it's different sectors of the community um that get together. Right now it's quarterly I think um to go through our uh meetings the data that
we collect and then to talk about some of the most prevalent concerns that are present in the assessments. when we came to um you know towards the end of our first grant period we compiled all of
those concerns and what we found was that the bulk were related to envelope and energy issues. So Jason, the previous HR director suggested a potential pilot project with uh funds
through the HRA and so um we formed the pilot project group which was those entities that I already listed and then you all fantastically approved the use of that first round of funding in our pilot group. Um, Andrea Toy
through public health does the healthy housing assessment initially and then if the person is interested in the grant program then she forwards them to me or I work with the homeowner on verification of eligibility. I work
through the grant agreement process um and then just sort of general assistance um in figuring out the grant the contract as well as you know trying
to help mitigate some of the contractor difficulties that people have um in I should say finding a contractor not difficulty with their contractor. Um, and then I also track how much funds go
in and out of the program. And then Jeff is uh the signatory on the grant agreement and processes the contractor payments. Tony from CCIP reviews the bids when they come in. And
then Shane Steel with the city of Grand Marray uh gathers the images and testimonials after a project is completed. So, where we're at right now, we have five projects that have been fully completed. We have four projects with
signed grant agreements. Two of those have approved bids. Um, and the other two are still looking for a contractor. We when I made this PowerPoint, we had funds available for two additional projects, but I just reached out to two
participants this afternoon to see if they were interested and shared the information. So, if those two homeowners decide they're interested, then we will have expended most of our funds. There will be about $2,000 left.
Um, our project locations vary across the county from Schroeder all the way up to Graham Portage. Um, and some of the homeowners use those funds for standalone projects like just replacing two windows. And some of them use the
funds as a as part of a larger project that you know they provide the additional funding for such as like redoing windows and insulation or if they are redoing their roof they could use the grant funds towards that
uh project funding sources. So our healthy homes grant is through the Minnesota Department of Health. No, let me try that again. Minnesota Department of Health. And so we are did our first round from 2021 to 23 and then we are in
the middle of our second round right now for that grant. And that grant provides Andrea to go out and do the healthy housing assessment and then up to $750 of uh mitigation funds towards whatever
Andrea identifies and the homeowner uh wants to prioritize. That program is actually available to renters also. It doesn't have to be just homeowners. And then our pilot project funds through
the HR in March of 202. That's not right. Must be 2024. Let's say March of 2024. Uh the H board allocated $15,000.
Um and all of those what we did was uh we reached out to eligible participants from the round one of our healthy housing assessment grant period. So people who received assessments from 20 21 to 23 and so all of those funds were
allocated right away from uh those individuals with three homeowners on a wait list. In dis both of those are 24 in December of 2024 um we were allocated another $36,321.
So, we were able to take the three homeowners from that original weight list and get their grant agreements in place right away. And then three additional agreements in place April, June, and July. And then hopefully within the next couple weeks, we'll have
the other two in place. Um, deliverables of the pilot project. We have had people use the funds for window and door replacements, roof work, siding improvement, and insulation work has been the bulk of the uh
work that's been done with the funds. And then prior to the payment of the contractor, Shane goes out and collects images and then that testimonial. So um these next few slides will just be some images of some of the projects that were
completed. So we have windows insulation um more insulation and uh that outside actually that project in the top left corner is the windows. That is what they used their funds for. But
that's an example of somebody wrapping it into a larger project. And then we have some testimonials from all of the participants. Do you want me to read them? Okay, great. Because that feels happy.
Yeah. Um, yeah. So, the general overview is that without the funds, people probably would not have prioritized making those improvements or even made the improvements at all. Um and then
let's see there is um savings on energy bills. We always appreciate to hear that we were very responsive and helpful. Um yeah, thanks for your excellent work.
and acknowledgements and the end. Thank you very much. There are questions for questions for Andrea. Yeah. So, is the difficulty often times finding the workers to actually do these
projects? Yeah. So finding a contractor that's available to do the work is probably the most difficult. Um throughout the process we've sort of initially when we developed the pilot project we said that
from the signed grant agreement date you had 6 months to find a contractor and then a year to do the work which some people you know found really difficult. So we just we changed it to 18 months overall. you have 18 months from the
signed contract to do to find the contractor and get the work completed. Um, which has been helpful. I did have one uh recipient who was going to back out because he ju he was like, I don't even know where to start and, you know, he
kind of just pushed it off for a little while. So, I helped him with a list of contractors and he found somebody and then, you know, he was able to move forward. I assume you're looking for licensed. Yes. Yep. Everybody has to be they have to be a licensed contractor and they
have to provide uh a bid that um is reviewed and approved prior to the work beginning. I ask because there's a lot of people out there who have either dropped their lensure and insurance but are fully
capable of doing this kind of work, right? and they're available. Yeah. Yeah. Um, so Jason was the person who developed the grant agreement and I'm assume I'm not a lawyer but I'm assuming because of certain liabilities
that it has to be a licensed contractor. Has there been any discussion with the Arrowhead Electric or with um the Gramar APU on how this might dovetail with some of their efficiency efficiency programs? You know, there has not directly related
to this program. We have had those conversations some in the healthy housing network group itself but um short answer is probably just no question.
Yes. So question that um I had related to searching for contractors. Um are we looking only at contractors in Cook County or do we also expand to look to Lake County or St. Louis County when we're searching. Yeah. So, people can choose any
contractor they want as long as they're licensed. Um, one of the services was provided by is it Home Depot came and did the window replacement. Um, so it can be anywhere. We have a service
resource list through the healthy housing network group that provide that has like contractors and electricians and you know when people are looking for resources that we can share with them and we go uh we try to include everyone
in the region because sometimes Cook County doesn't have a service like a radon mitigation service or something and sometimes we could have contractors but they're not available. Well, I just asked that question thinking for example, the Heights right
now is in the process of of being built and we know that there's all kinds of contractors connected with that project. I'm wondering if if maybe they would be willing to take on some of those small projects since they're already here. So, just an idea that maybe we could um share that contractor list.
Well, that's interesting. Yeah. All right. Thank you. Yeah, thank you. Do you know the uh as far as the requirement for licensed contractor? Do you know what informed that? And have we
tested that at all? So, what informed having the requirement of a licensed contractor? What informed that decision when they're talking about this program or whatever that what informs them? They say somebody might say for instance they'll
say you can only use union on this. The only way we'll support it is if you union the only way we'll support it if it's license and whatever that discussion was that informed that decision because if if we if it was negotiable we we could say that um uh
it's difficult up here to get contractors and the timeline on things is you just have to do a lot of babysitting, right? So, if it would be a two-prong thing where we would find very capable individuals that have let their
license go, they wouldn't mind a bit of work and if they have meet certain requirements, it would provide income in the local community and it would also move up the available potentially
provide additional. So it's like if negotiating, but normally you have to say what informed the decision initially in order to be able to qualify that, right? Well, so I can't tell you the answer because Jason Oh, you got you know the answer. All right, good.
So has to do with finance, right? Yeah. Well, it's in the word I'm about to say. Minnesota Housing Finance Agency. Um it's basically tailored off of their program. They have a couple of different programs out there and this is basically tailored off of one of them or all of them I should say.
Um the licensed contractor bit. Yeah, I mean I I understand what you're saying and I would like to see local people get the get the jobs right wherever we can. Um and so there might be some opportunity for us to change that in the future. We can re-evaluate it, right? So we just did some strategic planning as a
as a committee and so that's maybe something we can talk about for next time. And I think that often times when these things are introduced, they sort of have a cookie cutter mentality, meaning we do a generic overview and so we just sort of stamp
that overview and there's a uniqueness that exists in different counties. So I think having that discussion respectfully can maybe provide opportunity. Yeah. My understanding is that it's the uh it's depending on the source of funds, it can be in the statute.
Correct. in which case there's no wiggle room or if it's not in the statute you can you can do it but it limits your recourse if the work is done poorly or not at all you know that's true I mean there'd have to be some criteria the selection but I think
even when they have statute and we've seen this because you look at a statute and you'll see how many times it's been altered based upon new information kind of thing I'm I'm just saying that often times we're encumbered by some of these challenges and if we respectfully you know see Is there an opportunity to
explore options without compromising intent? Yep. Yeah, I think as uh Jeff said, you know, we had a sort of strategic planning session and we're moving out of the pilot phase. I mean, it's pretty clear
that the program works. Um we just need to keep looking for more funds for it. So, as we move out of the pilot phase, you know, what do we want to change? What worked well? What didn't? And that's something that we could look at. And I would mostly rely on Jeff because
Jason did all of that work. I don't I don't lawyer things. Well, thanks for putting that on him then. Yeah. Yeah. Right. Well, he offered so. Yeah. Tony, did do you have something to add? What about the possibility of contacting these contractors who were previously
licensed but aren't now to see if they would get relicensed? you know, to be able to do the work because it sort of provides insurance that the work is going to be done, you know, and there's no fall back on it. I
mean, other than maybe a lawsuit or something, you don't want to have to do anything like that. So, maybe that's some other way to approach it, trying to work with the contractors, see if they can get relics. Not sure what what that would take. if there are some classes or something, you
know, through CC clip, they offer builder workshop on an annual basis, you know, maybe through community ed could offer something to help them get rellicensed. Yeah, thank thank you. So, I think the uh congratulations on the pro on a
successful pilot program. It sounds like um you the projects were well completed. the you know kind of the um critical issue of uh you know finding contractors was identified. You know we've had a good discussion about
the um ways to potentially address that in the in in in the next phase of the program. So congratulations and thank you for the presentation. Yeah, thank you. One final question if I may. Sorry. So I imagine if somebody's uh looking into a program like this, they already have a defined need in place. Like you know if
your crawl space is drafty, you know. Yeah. So the first step of the process is that Andrea will go to their home and do an assessment um under our healthy homes assessment program. And then Andrea will identify those needs and
then outside of the mitigation funds for that program, then if they're interested, she would refer them over to me with a copy of their assessment so we could figure out what if they make sure they're interested and eligible and then
what they want to focus their grant funds toward. Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense. Um I was speaking with U Jason Hail previously uh about this general topic where uh when you have finite resources it's often difficult to decide where is the uh the
best improvement uh to be made uh and can we be sure that we're not introducing unintended consequences. For example, uh spray foam insulation wonderful at air sealing depending on the choice of material and thickness more or less vapor permeable. And of course a house works as a system. So,
um, you know, sometimes with things like this, the, um, you know, the the engineer brain in me says, "Let's make sure that we're we're not creating some other problem down the road when we're doing some of this stuff." And I know Jason was very, uh, aware of that danger, too. Yep.
One thing I'd like to quickly point out, so, um, and maybe you both could address this, um, it seems to me that this program isn't available or ready a lot of places in the state. And in fact, didn't you give a presentation recently
or not too long ago about this sort of topic and a lot of people were taking an interest in it? Yeah. So, we did we presented at the rural healthcare conference. Rural health rural health rural health conference. Um, and we did
a presentation on our healthy homes assessment program which included then the offshoot of this program and our presentation focused on how, you know, sort of as Commissioner Gamble mentioned, you know, a lot of things
start as a cookie cutter, but we really focused on what do we need this program to look like for our county and came up with our own assessment. Um, and so we did all of the training and due diligence around creating the program very well-intentioned for our county.
And then because it was so successful, we were able to build into this pilot program. Um, and it was very wellreceived. People uh really appreciated the information we shared on the healthy homes assessment project
itself. um and really happy to hear that we were able to build something further from, you know, those grant funds. And I think that was uh a solid for when we applied for round two of the healthy homes assessment
grant program through MDH. You know, being able to show that we built something more from it was really important, too. And people were impressed that we were able to collaborate so closely with the HA and the city and Cclap. Um,
and you know, all of the different organizations in the healthy housing network and the community members and I mean I don't know of any other programs like this, but so it's safe to say that you all and
everybody else in this room created a model that other communities can use um to also help their constituents and citizens as well. And as we look to the next round of funding uh that I'm committed towards finding uh for this program um you know more opportunities
are still there. We haven't erased the problem. And so um there might be a time when there's a waiting list until we get more funding, but we're going to continue to keep working in the community to help the folks out in this realm. Yep. Great. Commissioner Gamble.
Yeah. I I think it's important to acknowledge the uh collaborative work and the integrity of it because a lot of times grant monies come in, we have an expectation or a hope and then we get those monies and we oop we better do something and we really haven't done the
hard work to build integrity into what those dollars are intended for. So I think it's important to note that that the collective efforts and the integrity that was built into this that others learned from is is worth noting.
Yeah. And that thanks and that really is what makes both projects successful is that collaboration between all of the entities that you know have helped. Great. And word of mouth. And with that too there's the internal
controls. We get audited each year and so this is part of our audit to make sure that all those dollars go to the right people and are spent properly. Yeah. Good discussion. Any other comments? Well, maybe I could Yeah, I could just um talk a little bit about the rural health presentation and just
highlight that the title of our uh presentation was um housing and uh community partnerships to like uh overcome housing constraints or something like along the lines. I can't recall exactly but we were highlighting
it was like under the the domain of community partnerships and so we were like telling the story of how the program came to be who were the organizations that were like main collaborators and then the different things that the
healthy homes program um brought with the fund like that were beyond the funding. For example, we collaborated with the soil and water to bring the free wellwater testing so we could so we supported on that grant writing and then
said this will be great and it will support the healthy housing program and helped write all that and then like that you know then the pilot project came to be and so on. I think like the data that
we collect it can be used to like tell a story and then request you know like evidence that we why we need the funding and why it's important to support the community health. Yeah, that great. Thank you Andrea. Well, thank you both very much and and
to Tony as well. Let me I want to give a introduction to the next set of uh resolutions that we have on the agenda uh for and that's u these are all related to the strategic planning process that the board went
through in June and July um that was a hard work done by the board and u uh to come up with to revisit where the where the organization is um I I think it was 3 years since the previous uh strategic plan had been put together. And so out
of that came a strategic plan that's included in or summary that's included in the agenda packet. For those of you that are online, you can access that um on the uh website. Uh but I wanted to highlight that you know there were five
new priorities identified um in the strategic plan. They include developing a plan to create new opportunities in assisted assisted living and elder housing. Uh second, the creation of a local housing trust fund. Third, community meetings to promote new
housing through the adoption of residential over residential open space overlay district in Cook County and that's the innovation that's taking place right now led by Neva Maxwell. Uh promotion of high efficiency and low operating cost housing now and into the
future. And finally, the development of a countywide housing plan. And so I want to u so the uh first resolution that we have here is uh related to just the adoption of those of the strategic planning report. Uh that's resolution
2510. But then you'll there are a series of resolutions after that that I want to uh commend uh Jeff as as being quick out of the box followup on that strategic plan and just uh identifying specifically what we're going to do as a
board um to fulfill the objectives that we laid out in that strategic plan. So uh with that uh the first uh resolution is uh resolution 25-10. Maybe Jeff I'll give you a sec. you can maybe provide an overview and then
yeah so resolution 25-10 is basically um adopting the report of the strategic planning that took place on June 18th and July 16th and um you know uh we had a facilitator Mary Somnis previous board president she did a fantastic job of
keeping us on track and right on the right timing for the the meeting and so we were efficient uh we talked about our priorities we talked about the the mission the vision this all the statements ments that get to the the heart of who we are as an organization
and everybody at the table including uh chair Gabler were present at one point or another and we got to the point where we are headed in the right direction uh but now we're also adjusting with five new priorities as well and so this uh
resolution just basically adopts the report and we will be talking about each individual issue that we um added to the priority list Next after this I'll move adoption of resolution 2510
and I second. Okay. Any further discussion? All in favor? I. Any opposed? Okay. Resolution passes. Um great. U Jeff, why don't you your uh
would you mind introducing 2511 and and continue on from there? Yeah. 2511 would allow us as a um housing and redevelopment authority to help create what's called a local housing trust fund. U local housing trust funds used to be dedicated towards
a city or a county of which we are. Um now they've added a couple of extra groups of people that could also be in a local housing trust fund. Primarily what this does is it allows us to be in a better position financially to maybe help with predevelopment costs
or to help with um uh stabilizing rent in our communities in in Cook County or to help with rehabbing homes like as what we just talked about through energy efficiencies and other mechanisms or possibly redevelopment as we consider in
the future in Cook County as well. And so a local housing trust fund um has a series of steps. I believe there's 14 different steps in the process. And at the end what we do is we create a new organ organization within um the HRA
that would kind of monitor and be governing board of this local housing trust fund. It could be made up of uh citizens that don't have any experience. It could be made up of board members of the HR. It could be a combination of that or anything else. And basically
what we will do is as soon as we create the local housing trust fund, it allows us to go out and fund raise a bit. And in 2023 at the legislature, they passed some legislation that allowed for matching grants for local housing trust funds that start and I believe there's
still some money left over. Um, I actually I authored the bill and Liz Balden was the senator that carried it in the Senate and we got to the finish line and Has in general have been really helped by this particular type of legislation. I know our organization
will also help out with that and I'm looking forward to doing uh more things to locally provide some of these resources as we look to the next sets of development in our area. But this what this will do will start us down the road of creating that local housing trust
fund. Motion to Mr. Chair, if I could you could just make a comment. Um I'm wondering if uh based upon the provision of the the funding mechanism and how that's organized the trust fund if Ir
could be approached in that regard. I and I I say that in the context that our revolving loan for the county. Mhm. Uh that seed money came from my triple RB that has been a huge asset to our community and and I think if if an
appeal was made uh that uh it could be even in the context of of seed monies that on its earnings would annually contribute so that we keep that in place as a funding mechanism which we can grow
but if it's designated and restricted in that guard regard our investment opportunities would contribute to the growth of the fund. You absolutely hit the nail on the head and there are plenty of organizations that are not just regional but maybe even uh you know across the entire uh
nation that might have an interest. We have a really unique set of challenges and um unique set of differences from a lot of the other communities that would set us in a more competitive realm I believe but we really can't do that until we create this local housing trust fund. Once it starts, then we can start
reaching out to the Irr um our senator, our our representative, our federal officials, and then also reach out to some of these national organizations that might be out there as well. The Minnesota Housing uh uh the Minnesota Housing Partnership I'd be working with
to create this. They're kind of the uh experts in this realm, but they also keep kind of a list of people that we could reach out to as well. So, uh, they'll be providing some resources and and I'm really hopeful that we can find maximum resources to our benefit in our communities. And and once you define purpose and
intent and the structure, then you basically are looking for anybody and everybody has similar shared values and intent so that you can maximize maximize your opportunities. And I believe too, we'll also be looking at we did receive about $90,000 to the
Cascade Vacation Rentals. We might be earmarking that money specifically for this. in which case it'll go to those different priorities of redevelopment, rehabbing, and um creating new development. That would be a good news story, too, to get others that might want to step in.
Absolutely. Can I have a motion to pass resolution 2511? I move. Okay. Is there a second? I'll second that. Okay. Um any further discussion?
All in favor? I Okay. 25-12. Not the first time that we've talked about residential open space overlay district. Um and it surely isn't the last time people in Cook County will hear about it. Um, and so if we pass
this resolution 2512 today, what this will allow is for uh myself and Neva Maxwell to co-host a series of five organized meetings across the entire Cook County by commissioner's district. And so you'll all be invited. You can
either attend all of them or the ones you represent or none of them if that's the case with your schedule. But I have a flyer that we've published and we're starting to send it out to people. Um we're also we're also paying for a mailer that will go out to specific people in our districts um across the
county that have 15 acres or more and qualify for this. And so we've got a curated list uh through our um our our land services and our GIS departments and the mailing will go out and it'll be bright chartreuse with black print and
people won't be able to miss it. It'll be in their mailbox soon. And then there's five meetings. You can go to any one of them you like. It doesn't have to be the one at the shop community center. It doesn't have to be the one at Schroer Town Hall. If you like to come to the courthouse, that's an option, too. People can really make the best judgment
on what's best for their schedule. If there's a softball game that night or volleyball or whatever the case is, they can go at a different time. Um, also, Neva Maxwell really wants to be available and so she'll take phone calls. Her information and details for contact are also on that flyer. It'll be
going around in the community. Um, I'm sure we'll be having a conversation with local media about this very shortly. Um, what I really want to do in this process is when we have uh meetings, I would like to really make sure that our realtors are involved, our local contractors are involved, and also our
local bankers, because these are great opportunities to not only just attend the meeting and figure out what that acronym means, R Oo, but also to figure out how that might benefit them and maybe even see a banker there or a realtor there or a contractor about,
hey, this maybe works for me. what do you think? How could we do this together? So, I want this to be kind of a way for that partnership to start evolving early. Um, and so, uh, again, all the information, I'll I'll forward you the email with that digitally. I know, uh, Commissioner Lamar asked about
that. And I want to make sure that you all take a look at that too in your schedule. Hopefully, I can see you all there, too. I have a question. Yeah. I've lived here my whole life. I've never heard of the shop community center. Oh, that is fire hall number one on the Gunflint Trail.
Okay. officially. I uh got the email from Neva uh yesterday. Did you all know Okay. I printed off, hung it up at the Hogland Post Office this afternoon. It's Tuesday, so it is. Yes.
Yeah. Looking at my calendar, that's less than a week away. I'm assuming that the commissioners are going to try to go to their district meetings and or attend some of them. We got that in. Is there any news media coverage and not not of the event but in
prior to just for awareness? We have previously discussed this for the strategic planning at like WTIP. I'm sure tomorrow when I have my time to go in and interview about what we did today that'll come up and it'll probably be a local story pretty quickly. It'd be good to get as much
exposure as you can on the front end of it. I mean it's a great opportunity. A lot of people it's a matter of them knowing. Yeah. Yeah. And in addition to the WTIP interview, um they generally will put it on the community calendar and you can
also put it on the boreal community calendar. Y good point. Uh move to approve second. Any further discussion? One thing I would just like to point out for the people at home that are wondering what the heck are they trying to do? really this is another
opportunity for us to start looking at our housing crisis to what we have and maybe reduce the red tape, you know, speed up the permitting process and get more homes online for our community and our needs across the entire county. And so, um, if anybody has any questions
about that, Neva or myself will be happy to answer those questions. Um, and you know, we want to make ourselves available at these meetings so people can understand this, but also to help out with their sol out if they have, you know, some some area where they can put together a duplex or another single
family home to really help us get to that 600 units that we still need. Yeah. And this is what I and this is potentially a solution that is applicable throughout the county, which is I think part of the part of the appeal. Yep. Um with that all in all in favor of
passage of 25-12 vote I I fantastic. Um terrific. Um 25-13. Another one. Hey, we're running we're rating right down the list. I said this
I I I like the fact that we're make explicitly following through on the strategic plan. This is great. So, this particular resolution 25-13, what it will allow us to do is to really uh unlock the ability to have conversations in our community about specifically assisted living and elder care. You
know, I don't think that we're going to be going out and saying, "What do you want someday? What do you want someday?" I think we're going to be a lot more strategic than that about this process. But, you know, I've already had some conversations with our local partners. You know, talked to Julie Wilson Care Partners yesterday. I talked to Kimber
over at the hospital. Um, I've been talking to people here and there and everywhere trying to schedule appointments. Um, trying to collect data, trying to understand the issues a little bit more clearly. And you know, at the same time, you know, I think a lot of people are in the community
understand that at some point you age out of Grand Marray and have to move somewhere else because there's no assisted living. We have a we have a great quality uh nursing home in town, but that isn't for everybody. And so sometimes people are looking for assisted living and and frankly sometimes people are moving out to where
the children live and the grandchildren are. And so there are plenty of opportunities for people to move out of grammar. But I think that we have the ability through creating a continuum of care starting at age 50 55 with independent living and going towards um
assisted living and ending up with the nursing home to have a continuum of care here in Grammaray. I don't know specifically um how to get there by myself or as a board, but I know that there are wonderful partners in our community and other people across the
state that are paying attention to this issue that we are having and are starting to take notice. And so through the series of conversations we're about to have um through um keeping you apprised of what's going on in these community conversations to possibly getting to the point where we're looking
for a request for proposals for a combination of either assisted living or elderly housing or both. In that process, um we're going to we're going to have a conversation or two. Um we're going to probably bring in Mary Sness to
facilitate again. and she had expressed some interest at our at our board strategic planning meetings and be strategic about the conversations we're going to have, but get to a point where we can understand the full needs of the community now and into the future. And
um you know, some of those challenges we've eliminated. We've got workforce housing where we haven't had before. Uh but some of the challengings re challenges remain with the affordability of that housing and how it matches up with some of the things that we need and some of the people we need at a place
like an assisted living. I'm thinking of like home aids or not home aids but like just a regular nursing aid, you know, and where do they fit in the spectrum of housing? And so as we get through this process, I really want to have some great quality conversations with people in this in this county. And so by
allowing this to happen, we'll be getting to that point where we can have some town hall style meetings and get to that process. Approximate timing in your mind. If you're asking about approximate timing for meetings, yeah, I would say that will definitely happen
before next summer, between now and next summer. The challenge we have is how do we get things off the ground fast enough that we don't miss our snowbird population that will leave and come back. um but also have the conversation with people that maybe have left and want to come back and have those conversations with us. And so I would
say before summer, we should have completed those meetings. Now, if you're talking about an RFP process, it's probably a little bit further than that if that happens. Yeah. And I would say there's no guarantees that we get to the proposal process, but
there's also a need that we can't ignore anymore. And hopefully we get to a point where we are matching that need or meeting that need. Commissioner Gamble, I appreciate you giving us the opportunity to provide input, but anytime you want us to button up, you can just let us know. I'm saying that
that humbly, but I've had 15 years of experience in in managing the section 8 housing and many families come in and because they are needing the assistance on the healthcare. When we first started, we had the emergency pools. Sure.
And uh that meant if something happened, but the directive and HUD itself says you don't want to because of the risk issue, we had to get remove all of those things. But we would say because we have care partners, because we have nurses and we have people who can. So I I think in
looking at this it's talking to the different various partners and and we take a mindset of just being realistic on what we can do and what we can't do in providing that service. As a suggestion in this research, I would say if you can find a county that is small
or any entity that has pursued something like this and learn from their experience because when you're looking to sort of work out of the regular context of how you develop these things, we want to be innovative. We want to learn. We want to be resourceful. So we
might be able to learn from somebody else's experience that informs, you know, where we what we do. Yeah, absolutely. I think that that's important and I'll be reaching out through um either NARO or Minnesota Housing Finance Agency or Minnesota Housing Partnership. There's a lot of
good housing partners that we have at the state level that we can reach out to and I'm sure there there's some some things we can learn from some of the other counties. Couple of things that come to mind that I know about Cook County that makes us a little bit of an outlier. We are the oldest county in the state of Minnesota of all 87 counties,
which is really impressive. Also, we are the seventh lowest when it comes to population amongst 87 counties. And so, those two create some unique challenges that we can't ignore. And oh, by the way, you know, u we've got these problems and we've had these problems for a while, but we're not
we're not getting to a resolution any other way. We've previously had, I think, three different plans. one is down in that temperate trails area by Tufty. Um and then also two of them are here in the community of Grand Marray and we've gotten so very close to just
getting over the edge and and having it happen but it hasn't quite happened and so um you know some things have changed. We've got again some of the workforce housing we didn't have before. There's still some challenges that haven't been eliminated quite yet but um we're getting there I think. So be interesting
to see what other counties have done. I get a motion to approve resolution 25-13. Also move. Second. Okay. All in favor? All right. Any further discussion? All in favor? I I Great.
Moving right through them. 2514. Yeah. 2514 is is another unique opportunity for housing in Cook County. And this creates a comprehensive plan um to meet the needs of housing across the entire county. So um I do I think have
somewhere here maybe not. There it is. Yes. So uh the the county itself has a comprehensive plan with a bunch of different spokes and uh one of them is water, one of land use, one of them is energy. right there. Uh, one of the, uh,
seven different, uh, wheel spokes is housing and the county itself doesn't have quite a housing comprehensive plan and part of their comprehensive plan overall. And we're going to help them get there. And so, what I'd like to really do is this is a proposal that we
had in strategic planning to create a comprehensive housing plan. And when you say comprehensive housing plan, that's pretty dambulous. What does that mean? Well, what I'd really like to do is have some communications with people in different uh townships and and
communities and really get to the crux of what is the housing challenge there now and where do we want to go in the future and I want to involve everybody that lives there and and to be part of the process for one so they can be part
of the plan itself and I think that that's going to help us get to a point where we know uh where we're going. We have the ability to attract new developers. And we can also use things like GIS to point out where do the
utilities now reside, where is the future of development for each of the areas that we're talking about and get to a point where we actually got a blueprint for success in Cook County. Uh right now it's kind of if a developer comes up to me and says, "Jeff, I want to build 30 units of housing. What do I
do?" Um, you know, part of the process is going to be completing those forms that we um had previously asked new developers to to to complete, but also it would be really nice if I could defer to a plan and say, "Look, 30 units of single family housing. We've identified
a location specific to that need. 30 units is going to be a little bit overwhelming for septic. So maybe we want to look somewhere closer to a city that has the infrastructure already in place." or if a person wants to build 16 units of development duplexes where I put that there's a there's the ability
to do that and we're meeting the needs across the entire spectrum of the county um all the way uh to the end of the gunlet east west and and I think we're going to get there and this is going to help us get to that. So that's the conversation that we want to have now so we can avoid challenges down the road
and we can get developers to develop and get to those 600 units. Jeff, what's the um what do you foresee as the time frame for this process? I believe that this can be done in in about a year. Um it will take some conversations. It'll take some going
back and looking at some resource opportunities with u maybe some grants to help facilitate some of the the things we'll have to do like uh generate GIS maps and that sort of thing. But I do believe that we can get there in a year.
Okay. Any Well, first, can we have a U motion to approve 25-14? So, move. I second. Second. Um, any further discussion? Any questions? One, one thing I would point out in having some very brief conversations
with Minnesota Housing Partnership, they've kind of articulated that we have a lot of the stuff already. It's just trying to stitch it together. We have a we have um um a study, housing study. we have some of the things that we we need already at our fingertips and ready to go. So, it's going to be a matter of
stitching some of the stuff together. We do know a little bit about where our utilities are like city for instance and so it's interfacing with the city to make sure that they can give us the information and we can put in a map. Um we do know where some of the septic
stuff is. We know um Schroeder um Tufty has a sanitary district so that's that's infrastructure that we can add to the the database as well. So, there's some things that are already there and we can start to kind of piggy back off of that information, too. Thank you. Yeah.
Any further discussion? Okay. All in favor of passing 25-14. I I Okay. Uh, last of the strategic plan resolutions is 2515. Jeff, you want to lead that off?
Yeah. So, you know, when we're talking about housing itself, the price of housing in general just isn't going down without some sort of a subsidy somewhere in the process, whether it be local, county, state, federal. And in that
process too, we also have a real need for um you know, looking at strategies for energy efficiencies. we really have a need for looking at opportunities to lower the cost of operating a home once it's built. And you know, when we're
talking about public dollars that are being flowing that are flowing into projects, um the board itself looked at the opportunity to say, look, if there's going to be some public funding, maybe there's um additional conversation that you have to have about making these
things more efficient, maybe making these things a little bit more um on the on the front end lower cost of of of operation. And so I've already had a couple of conversations with some organizations that are local. I'd really
like to involve them in this process. I'd also like to involve some of the organizations that do things at the state statewide level like U MCE, the Minnesota uh Center for Energy and Environment. Uh I'd like to get them involved as well. And I think between
the folks at the local level and some of the partners at the state level, what we could really do is maximize some of these opportunities as we start building the next phase of development to look at how do we create some more of those efficiencies in the front end when they're being built, when it's the
lowest cost option is when they're being constructed versus later on when there's a higher cost for more labor and more materials to get to where we need to be. So I think it's really important when we had that previous discussion about the energy and envelope program. I also
think of that as being part of this strategy as well. Um there's a couple of different programs that are available through the Minnesota Housing Finance Agency that would allow us to work with um potentially a local bank or somebody at
the statewide level or possibly even the local housing finance um u trust to or the local housing u finance um I'm blanking right now acronyms um to to help u support some of that down the
road. And so, um, I'd really like to get us to the point where we don't have a a waiting list that's too long and that we are are also funding some of those, um, developments into the future so that way we can kind of reduce costs. There's some opportunity to partner with our
local energy co-op for instance on some of these things as well. And I'm looking forward to the having those conversations. Um do you see is is the product of this well first do you see the conversations being ones that are um conversations that you have
with individual stakeholders or is it do you foresee these as community conversation events and and then um last question is you know do you what's the end product of this is it is it a is it a guide for um
I'm just curious what the Yeah, just if you could just flesh out a little bit what the process the process of deliverables look like. Yeah. Well, first I'd like to have some conversations locally with the organizations and people who are really interested in this issue. I think it's really important. Um I think second of
all, we could start looking at some of these statewide um opportunities to create some more innovation in our county when it comes to constructing. And so maybe there are unique and and different opportunities for us to look at septic or um water conservation as part of that as well. Um that we can
reduce the cost over time and not just mandate people only have to do it a certain way. Maybe there's other opport alternatives as well. Um and so technology there's a lot of cutting edge technology out there that can create some different opportunities for us. And I think finally to get to a point where
we're having engaging conversations with the developers about what we want in our county, what we want in our communities, what we want for the people who are going to end up moving in there. Any further? Yeah, if I may. Thank you. Um
I I think that to your point that when we have a discussion that is generically saying we need housing and so we have people come in and they build housing but we need we need to be more inclusive in what our intent is and uh years ago I
attended a conference in New York that was put on by the hospitality industry and it had to do with for financial institutions. How do you build your financial institutions with a population that is graying? Sure.
And so in other words, it's not just building when you're going to build a financial institution. It's realizing that the demographics are changing. Build it with that in mind. And so I think if we're specific relative to intention and that uh has been well researched and
thought out that we're inclusive of that. So we're not just saying build it. It's built with these parameters which are intentional which are reaching our objective basically to be to try to reduce on the long term the costs and
and create a healthier environment. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. So that you know I think it's simple common sense and arithmetic that energy efficiency is really really good idea. I don't think anybody in the world disagrees with that. But every time
something gets built, people say, "Yeah, that's true, but we just got to do it on the cheap, you know, and then we built something that costs down the road multiples of what it would have been to to do it in the first place." So, we
need to find that that point and erase that objection. Otherwise, we're just going to be doomed to repeating the same thing over and over again. Yeah. And uh that's unfortunate because you know the greatest gift we can give to the future is energy efficiency. It's just it's just simple arithmetic. Very
easy to figure out. No magic to it. And most of it's pretty mundane. But when the time comes inevitably it's like well that'd be really nice but we're not going to do it because we have to do this cheap. Yeah. So
so I I like the conversation about uh efficiency and operating cost. Those are all very logical uh points. Uh I'd also like to address uh occupant uh health and safety. Uh when we consider that houses aren't just a Mr. Potato Head of
a bunch of different pieces stuck together. They work as systems. And when they're designed as systems, they work better than when they're, you know, built, whether it's for um cost or other reasons and then added on to renovated uh reworked. uh it never works quite as
effectively as if it was designed and built as a system from the start. Uh and that that it does absolutely affect the bottom line of uh operating cost uh robustness that goes much further though in my mind and it affects the health of the people who live in the house which
really like that's to me that's a extremely high um threshold for you know where you don't want to be cutting corners. So yeah. So I think it it strikes good point. It it strikes me that the as far as the HA's role goes, I mean, one is just
education. So to provide more information about the available options to save energy to improve the systems approach to design um and then it comes down to sort of carrots and sticks and you know and are there incentives to
reduce the upfront cost? are there requirements that if you want funding from HRA you have to do certain things and so so I think that you know I don't think we have our arms fully around that I think that I see this initiative as as
a way to just flag the importance of that and and and to develop a framework that makes sense and I think if you can explain it to them that it is well reasoned all of the points as opposed to being driven by an ide ideology or something that's new on
the horizon that people are sort of gathering to that we don't want to be unreasonably because our intent is to build homes but we want them to be built with this awareness and that's we know this because we've researched it
any f is a good good conversation any further comments uh I can't remember if I I'll take a a motion to uh pass 2515 I move ahead is there a Second.
I will second. All in favor? I I Okay. Okay. Then we have one final resolution that uh was added to the agenda. Um I think you've got copies of that that Jeff handed out. Jeff, do you want to introduce that?
Yeah. Um so 25-16 is before you. There's also a letter from John Peters that uh requested that we take a look at writing a ILR grant application for the for the Burjburg project. Bjork project has
changed significantly from its original concept uh in 2024. Um and most recently in 2025 there was a conversation about something very similar to that and now it's it's drastically changed to sixunit development. But there still is a cost
in involving uh hooking up the utilities particularly the water and sewer um in the community of Grammaray and um he has asked us to look at um up to $220,000 in grants um for this uh opportunity.
And so um there's the letter and there is the resolution and I'm happy to answer any questions you might have. Jeff, are there um competing applications for this funding? Does if we if we do this, does that preclude
doing infrastructure development for another six how six unit development someplace? Yeah, you might recall back in um in June or actually it was in May uh we passed a resolution authorizing me to write a grant for the Norris Skogan
project. Um and I have successfully done so. It's been submitted as of July 30th of last month. Um, and it's done and it's there for them to cons consider. Um, so that would be a competing um, application perhaps. Now they have about
$6 million that they will u issue each year through the Tachinite authority area. The taa cookies is in that tackite authority area. And so we arguably should receive some of that money for our our needs. And I believe there was a
request last month at the EDA meeting for a different project for economic development. And so they're considering doing something like that as well for economic development. Um and so I would I would hope that we get some money. Um
and I don't know I can't guarantee I can't say hey I'd prefer this over that. We just have to submit these applications and let the folks that are deciding these these projects um decide based on the merit of each of the applications. Okay.
So, I'm not sure I'm ready to vote on this having just seen it now for the first time. Would it cause a big delay if we tabled it till the next meeting? Well, to answer that question, I know that their their grant application was
through uh July. I asked for a consideration for August, and so I don't know if getting into September will eliminate our opportunity for this or not. Um, but it is something to consider. I'm struggling a little bit to even understand it. It's one place it says
220,000 for building six homes and then the narrative says 12 homes. um minimum of 12 homes. And then he also mentions that they'll be sold only to full-time residents of Cook County, which I think is illegal under fair
housing law. I don't think you can stipulate that. Yeah. Telling it they can do whatever. They can let it sit empty if they want to. Right. Right. Um so those are those make me reluctant to vote on it today until I really understand the
project. I mean, for instance, if these are six, if this is six $800,000 homes for high-end professionals from the cities to own and live in during the summer only, I'm not sure it's an appropriate use of
subsidies from the RR as compared to some of the other projects we could do. I'm not saying that's the case. I'm just saying I don't know. Yeah. Y So, I don't want to rush into something that comes back later to be like, why did you subsidize this crazy thing for millionaires, you know? So certainly I don't know.
I too would like to see what the plan is. Um okay. Yeah. Get more information out before we go ahead with this. But um generally I'm in support, but I I would definitely want to see the plans. Okay. You know, from the standpoint of
the the community conversations and that sort of thing, there were some unknowns at the city council level. they're more administrative in in concern than it would be for the city council. But um there are still some concerns about the overall development of the project and what that will look like. Uh I I could I
can make sure that you know we can set up a meeting with John to flesh out those questions and get the answers that you need to feel comfortable or not with the with the request. Um I could check in with the triple R and see what they would be doing in September if they'd still be taking applications or not. Um,
I just know right now it's through the end of August. Yeah, I'm sorry. You know, I would like to I would like to support this and I think it's you know, I was in support of the original project, but I'm just not I don't feel like I have enough
information. Okay. And we could always um schedule a special meeting if we got that information in in a relatively short period of time. And that's what I was going to suggest if possibly we could set up a meeting um
and go from there. The thing about it is we need to have a resolution as part of the application process approved by the organization the the HA board um to be part of that R application or it's not even a a valid
request for funding. and and can we uh approve a resolution in a special meeting? That would be a good question for um you know special meeting. I don't know that we've ever had a special meeting before
um for this HR board, but maybe I'm wrong. The board the board does that. I mean, if we have things that are timely and need to be done, we we certainly do that. So I think as far as protocol that that legally you can do it 3 days advance notice
you just yeah just note it and then and then do it and post it. I I would I would applaud the the reluctance to move forward. Uh too often as commissioners we have organizations come in last minute and threw it down
and there's an emotional response as opposed to a a fiscal response and a dutiful response. So I I applaud the fact that we want to build integrity in process and still not use it as a mechanism not to move forward.
Sure. Okay. Well, then we could consider having uh what I'll do is I'll consider um one the I'll check to see what the calendar looks like for all of us and we'll get together with the developer and uh we'll go from there. We can get it done this
month. That might actually be helpful. I do need a little bit of time myself to provide the application to be constructed. There's a lot of requirements and that sort of thing. We have a lot of the stuff from previous requests that Ir um but there's some updated stuff that the developer would
have to get us as well. So question I have is would this be a housing grant or would this be under public works? M um I had asked that question and Sean her husky over at the triple R said this would be more of a a housing type of a
All right. Yeah. Now that's interesting because this this the product of this would ultimately be owned by the city is my understanding. Um yes the developer builds it and the city takes ownership.
That's right. Yep. Good. Well, why don't we move on? U Jeff to your give a director's report and just try to keep Yeah, we'll keep it going here. Uh the first one on the list of conversations for today is just temperance trails
update. Um I wish I had a bigger update than I have right now, but things are developing. Um things are still we're still having conversations about things like density in the area. They've they've done some engineering and some some look looking at the soils and the
moisture in that area of the of the county. And the goal would be to create a a a housing development with more density if they can. And so they're working with Neva Maxwell over at land services and they're working with the engineers to see if they could increase
it up to 20 22 units or so. Um so um that part of the conversation has been done. Also, you know, I think the other part of the conversation is frankly uh we're right now out of our agreement our developers agreement with the uh with
the current developer and um you know we we extended the last discussion until July and well I look at my calendar it's August but by next month I believe we're going to have a much different conversation about this project moving
forward and so I'm looking forward to giving you some more details as soon I don't have anything concrete. I don't have anything in writing right now, but um there might be some something in the future for you. Should we put a for sale sign up? Well, I would uh argue that I need to
drive down there and take down the sign that says coming fall 2024 cuz I looked at my calendar and it's not fall of 2024 anymore. You want a resolution to that? But what I'd really like to do is I'd like to give you a concrete date here at the next meeting. Okay. So that's
Temperance Trails for now. Uh as far as the heights goes, well about maybe half hour ago, five more modules drove through town. Um Gary let me know that there's there's five modules on their way and I let the radio station know so they could pro get some video for a new
story. Um cuz I was here of course and couldn't take the video myself. Last week I was at um a restaurant in town on Highway 61 and I saw them drive by. Quite a parade of uh uh to behold. State patrol vehicle, five one and a half lane
sized pieces of housing driving down the road, wide load, the whole shebang. It was really interesting. I think the more interesting video would be to see them going up Glenn Scoop Road. Yes. Yes. Well, there's 36 of them in total, so there might we might get that
opportunity. And keep in mind, they're traveling from Detroit Lakes to get here. So, that's quite an impressive feat. Um, and they're going to the old airport for now for storage. Every time I drive by the heights, I'm always looking to see the first one pop up, but not quite yet. But they're still working on that site and getting it prepared.
Gosh, these rainstorms that we've been having lately haven't helped, I guarantee you, but we're going to get to that point soon. So, it's exciting. Also, uh, we did receive the $630,000 grant from the R. Um, and that was uh uh an invoice that we received from um the
Heights developer. And so we submitted it, received it, and that also triggered the $200,000 in ARPA funds that we set aside as a match to that 630,000. And so that money has gone through to the to the developer and is taken care of now. So, um, if anybody's paying
attention to the details, a lot of money has been sent out of our our our, um, uh, bank account in the last couple of weeks, but they are going to where they need to go. Uh, the next one is the energy and envelope uh, grant program. I just wanted to put that out there again
to say we're really helping people in our community that that do need it. Um, you can see the testimony there. We've got a lot more testimony and I I really do believe and when we had our strategic planning, I discussed an opportunity that we might be able to partner with a
lender, whether it be a statewide organization that provides lending or hopefully a local lender that I'm about to have some conversations with. Um there's uh Minnesota Housing Finance Agency has some different financing options for what they call the Energy
Plus program and that would allow 3.5% u lending up to $30,000 for a lot of things that we would provide at the program that we've created as well. And so the money would um I think provide some real opportunities for our
community in terms of rehabbing homes and keeping the housing stock healthy where we need it to be, but also to really spur some of that stuff and also get some more contractors interested in and involved in our our community. In the past, I've I've sent some money for
the energy program to Superior Wisconsin for a contractor, but it would be really nice if we started looking at u mechanisms in place perhaps to entice some younger folks to get into the trades. We need plumbers, we need electricians, we need roofers, we need
all of that stuff. And um we have some of it, but we could use more of it. And so by doing these projects and having that money to infuse into our local economy, we're also providing some opportunity for our future generations to get involved in this stuff. They have the jobs, they'll do the jobs, I
believe. And so whether it be construction projects or the smaller things, some real good opportunities. Uh strategic planning conversations. Boy, we've talked about that enough. I think we're good. Um Roso meetings. I just wanted to point out there's the
flyer. We're gonna go and have some great conversations across our county. Yeah. The next six weeks or so. By the end of September, we'll have completed all of those conversations. Y and then that's all I have for today. Great. Great. Uh committee reports. We had the
the finance committee had a brief uh meeting uh right before this meeting. Um couple things that just in reviewing the financials that one of the one little nit on the um financials that are included in the packet is that there's a project development expense of 200,000 listed and that's been recategorized.
That's the ARPA funds that were paid to the Heights project, but otherwise everything's pretty straightforward. Um we have talked in the past about um a um a project dashboard basically a resource for the board to just remember you know
these are the projects these are the funds ways in which the H supported these funds uh Jason had drafted a document like that uh that's useful a spreadsheet that summarizes that Jeff has updated that
the plan is to uh then migrate that to uh to to a sharable platform like um Google Sheets um with you know this group having access to it. So if anyone that wants to look at it just to remind yourself you
know what what that project was what what funds to be contribute that'll be readily apparent. Um and I think that was it on the uh uh financial report uh the the um uh financial committee. Um,
any other any commissioner items? I have a a brief item. Um, through Jeff, I got in touch with a gentleman named Aaron Jensen, and he just built a home on in the Heritage at the Golf Course in Luden, um, that he built with the
intention of making it a short-term rental and a income generator for himself. And, um, he reached out to us. Uh I don't know if he heard about it on the news maybe and um but he reached out
to us wanting to contribute to the HA portion of his rentals. His plan is to to donate 5% of the direct bookings that he gets. So he's listing it through VBO and Airbnb and then we if somebody books
through those we don't get anything. But if they he's also setting up a system where they can book directly and he said typically that happens over time because people can avoid the fee by booking directly. Yeah. Uh so if they like staying there and they stay there repeatedly they'll make direct bookings. So he said over time
that'll grow. And u he's pledging to donate 5% of that. Said in the first year he'll make a personal donation to kind of make up for the fact that it's going to be a really small amount of money. um he indicated so and we told him where to send the check
and he's also interested in building another one. Mhm. Um he's he mentioned that he's interested in the concept of building a short-term rental and then building a ADU in the on the same property that would be long-term rental
and that the the uh income from the short-term rental would finance over time the long-term rental. And so it's that's a concept he's model. He's exploring. Yeah. And interesting. Seems like a bright guy and spent a lot of time up here vacationing and just
wants to be involved. And so I didn't do anything to discourage him. In fact, I encouraged him. Um and I saw the house. Actually, if you go up the ski hill road when you get into the heritage area, it's the first driveway on the
left. There's a new gray light gray house there. That's the one. Nice. Wonderful. That's all I have. Commissioner G, I would just mention I don't know of if you're receiving these or not, but we're getting as commissioners, we're getting a a number of notices on uh meetings
relative workshops, whatever relative to housing. Mhm. And we've been getting a lot of them. And uh so um whether or not you're seeing those, Jeff, or not, um I've I've seen a couple requests for bids, but I haven't seen any workshops.
Yeah, I forward. Yeah, move forward because I think it'd be good information, but I've been just seeing my goodness, there's a lot of them coming. Okay, there was one today and uh but there's multiple. Okay, great. I'll take a look.
I had one item and I' I've received um I've gotten several comments to people concerned about the aesthetics of the Gunflint View uh development. And I don't I don't know what our Gland what the H's role in in is that but but you
know there's someone's put up like a skeleton on one of the on one of the trelluses and some Christmas lights and there's you know the gr the vegetation the grass that they planted has never taken taken root. So you know it as you're driving up the trail as a sort of symbol of the HR. I'm concerned that
it's uh potentially tarnishing the the brand of the HR. So I I don't know what leverage we have or what the recommended next steps would be, but I it's come I've had several different folks approach me and they say, "Yeah, I know what what you know what to do about
that." Now we have I mean we have in our in our policy our policy and I addressed that a month ago with an individual and that that we can't have anything in we can't post anything in windows or put anything out on the yard or whatever. I would I would look at what the the
housing agreement is that they sign with their lease and because some people just they're they're not familiar with it. But if you politely just say our policy is out of respect or whatever that addresses the posting issue, it doesn't address the grass issue. But
yeah, I can definitely um look into that and look into it. Yeah. Good. I just wanted to share it. You it come up a few times. Okay. context of the grass, there's still an issue I think with the county with the highway engineer about drainage. I don't understand what it is, but I've heard him say he has an issue
with the drainage. Okay. So, they may be planning to do something with that. At least you could check with Robbie and see if that's Yeah. the case and maybe that's where the grass is. So, what I understand um it that is not the issue with the grass um up at the top, but the drainage um issue was
corrected. It was that the shoulder um was at an angle where all the water was draining off into the road and it was not draining into the culvert and that has been repaired. Okay. I didn't notice that was an issue in the winter time when it was becoming springtime, right? I remember that.
That's when it showed it. And obviously they're not going to grow grass now. So, right. People need to be patient with that, I think. Okay. That's in your job description, Jeff. You have to go dig a ditch.
wouldn't be the first one. We'll we'll do it. That's all the business we have. Motion to adjurnn. Motion. Okay. All in favor? I I Everybody, thank you. Sorry for being late. I was on the boat and then of course went to city hall.
Okay.