good evening and welcome to the Rapids City Council meeting for Tuesday March 18th 2025 if you could please rise and join us for the pledge i pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the
republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all please call the role council member here council member Butler here council member Novak council member Gisler here council member Armstrong here council
member Carlson here mayor Cook here one absent Novak all right thank you first thing then this next or next thing I should say is to get our agenda adopted so moved second motion by Gesler and a second by Carlson is there any discussion or corrections
hearing none all in favor signify by saying I i opposed and the agenda is adopted uh next would be the first item on our agenda which is to approve the minutes of the March 4th 2025 meeting i move to approve the minutes from the March 4th 2025 meeting second
wow um I'm going to go motion by Butler and a second by Griscoiaak is there any discussion or corrections hearing none all in favor signify by saying I i i opposed and those minutes are approved we have five
items on our consent agenda this evening the first one is adopt resolution 2544 setting a hearing date for miscellaneous assessments 2025-1 levy uh the city council must set a public hearing as required by state statutes at
that hearing the city council may refer appellants to the board of adjustment and appeals and the board of adjustment and appeals will then give their recommendation and the board of adjustment and appeals is expected to conduct this hearing on May 1st and make a recommendation to the city council at
the May 20th council meeting staff will incorporate the process in the required mailing to the property owner and these assessments include services provided the taxpayers in most cases code enforcement violations the terms of repayment are determined by the amount
being assessed and the proposed assessments are categorized by the number of years to be assessed and the interest rate recommended uh so we're looking to adopt resolution 25-44 miscellaneous assessment declaring
declaring the cost to be assessed ordering preparation of the proposed assessment role and ordering the public hearing for April 1st 2025 on the proposed assessment role next item on the consent agenda is
approved nominations to the Creek Wershed District Board of Managers it's been requested that the city council make recommendations for appointments and we have we've received two nominations so we're putting forth uh Mary Campbell and Ethan Campbell as
nominations and one Mary Campbell currently serves on the board both candidates are Kunab's residents interested in serving on this board and a summary from the candidates is attached so we're looking to make a formal nomination to the Kun Creek Wershed District Board of Managers
um next item on the consent agenda is uh to approve a contract between the state of Minnesota and the city of Rapids for the ICWC program and that is the
um inter institution community work crew i always like to read those out once um the ICWC crews generally work under the direction of public works supervisor staff uh supervisory staff and complete a wide variety of maintenance and minor construction projects throughout the
city um we're looking to approve the updated contract between the Minnesota Department of Corrections and the city of Rapids for the two-year institution community work crew ICWC program item five is
to adopt resolution 25-49 accepting grant funds from Creek Watershed District and approve the water quality cost share agreement um and this is all about our uh our goose management program our annual contracted
goose management activities from high population areas along impaired creeks to reduce E coli and phosphorus loading to Creek and the city was awarded up to $10,000 of the project's total cost or 50 50% um also we're doing a
leaky sewer service investigation and this will continue last year's project led by the utilities division city staff will reach out to property owners in proposed and future city uh street reconstruction areas to televise private
sewer lines at no cost to residents in an effort to identify potential issues within the private service lines that could potentially lead to contaminants leeching into aquifers and wells findings from this investigation will inform the scope of future infrastructure improvement projects and
the city was awarded up to $26,100 of the project cost again to 50 cents or 50% wow the uh Creek wershed agrees to disperse 80% of the approved cost share amounts
28,880 upon execution of the attached agreement the city will implement the projects by December 31st 2026 and the the CCWD the Creek wershed will disperse any additional remaining funds upon upon proof of completion uh so
we're looking to adopt resolution 25-49 accepting grant funds from the Creek wershed district and authorized execution of the water quality cost share agreement item six and that's the final final item
on our consent agenda and that's our receive the schedule of electronic payments minnesota statute requires a list of transactions made by electronic funds transfer be provided to the city council at the next regular meeting and we're looking to receive the schedule of
electronic payments from February 27th 2025 to March 12th 2025 and that is the end of the consent agenda Mr mayor council member Carlson motion to adopt the consent agenda second
motion by Carlson and a second by Butler is there any discussion mr mayor yep council member Gisler uh Miss Lesar do we need to rev uh read in the amended uh resolution for 25-44 mr mayor Council Member Gesler that
would probably be good okay yes um so uh we received an amended resolution slightly changing the numbers that are here uh I'll read the first paragraph here whereas cost to the city for abatement of code violations securing and monitoring fees for vacant property mowing of weeds utility
bankruptcy and other unpaid fees with total costs incurred for the improvements being $98,481.13 and administrative fees of $7,920 making the total cost of the improvements $16,41.13 that those are the amended
numbers and then in bullet one uh the number that is adjusted there reads $16,41.13 thank you all right anything any other discussion Mr mayor council member Carlson there's your motion to amend well there's no there's no change in the motion the
amendment's good now okay yeah because that was that wasn't that was just referred to as a resolution number so I I didn't bother reading the amounts okay okay any other uh
discussion hearing none all in favor signify by saying I i opposed and the consent agenda is adopted item seven is to conduct a public hearing for vacation of drainage and utility
easements and consider resolution 25-48 mr brody your honor we did uh have this matter before you about a month ago we're asking for a public hearing and then a resolution to adopt the drainage and utilities this is for the project
now known as Creek Commons um as part of the redevelopment of that site or the development of that site we're asking that the uh drainage and utility easement that kind of cuts across the property be vacated i believe we're getting new easements for uh for items when the when the final plaque comes
through with that project all right does anybody have any questions of Mr brody of this before we open up the public hearing all right if anybody is here to address the um council we'll open the public hearing for the vacation of
drainage and utility easements and consider resolution 25-48 this is for the property at 1210 117th Lane anybody here to address council for the public hearing and anybody here for a public hearing
we're going to close the public hearing and council what are your wishes Mr mayor council member Geisler I move that we adopt resolution 25-24 to vacate drainage and utility easements for one uh 1210 117th Lane Northwest second
motion by Gesler and a second by Armstrong is there discussion on this hearing none all in favor signify by saying I opposed and that motion carries item eight is to consider water
tower decommissioning contracts and resolution 24-22 sub8 accepting bids and awarding the contract for the Foley monopole mr hammer are you happy yes Mr mayor uh we did come in under what our estimates were i would have liked a
little more competition but I think we got some good prices uh we had three separate contracts one is for the demolition of the existing tower the other is site preparation and that really just entails removal of some of the footing materials and the underground vaults and piping that serves that tower those two items
contracts A and B are water utility fund costs they're related to the old tower and then contract C monopole construction would be in the uh was it revolving construction fund and um all of these fall within what was estimated
and budgeted will also have a cost for engineering services for uh construction administration and inspections on this so it appears as if the total costs hitting the water fund are roughly 228,000 and the revolving construction
fund would be about 341,000 and that includes the engineering fees that go with it so I'm happy to answer any questions you may have but we are uh recommending award of those three separate contracts uh one to General Construction Services in the amount of
179500 for the demolition dave Perkins contracting in the amount of $15,300 for the site preparation and Vinco for $291,7729 for construction of the monopole and I'm happy to answer any questions all right questions for Mr
hammer mr mayor Council Member Butler uh thank you Mr hammer i I saw in the discussion that it mentioned that all the work would be completed by November 2025 but I was curious if we approve this tonight how quickly would the water tower itself be going down council member Butler uh we still have to get
back with McDonald's as we had an easement with them uh it needs to be warm enough temperatures it needs to be non- windy days because there's sparks and other things we got to coordinate with Enoka County on possible road closures uh the strip mall so we had always estimated probably midappril
start but the way the weather is one day it's 80 the next day it's 20 so I'm not sure what the next month is going to hold but um the sooner we get in the better nobody's um locking in and waiting for anything so as soon as the weather turns we get contracts executed
we negotiate and get things settled with the land owners uh we'll proceed thank you and Mr mr hammer the uh contractor that's going to do the demolition will be aware of how much time we've got with the McDonald's is going to be closed for
one day two days what was it maximum of one day Mr mayor maximum one day yeah that was all included in the um specifications so they're clear we We tried to limit road closures to no more than three days so they have a set of criteria they have to follow one of the contractors said "I may not even have to
close the road or I may not have to close McDonald's." So there's just different ways they attack it some want to cut it and drop it others want to cut it into pieces and bring it down slowly others will put a crane on and just bring it to the ground and then dismantle it so um once we get contracts
awarded we'll sort some of that through pre-construction but but none involved hooking a chain to it and driving with a pickup right like that Missouri one okay good let's hope not all right any other questions of Mr hammer on this mr mayor Council Member
Armstrong just it seems like an odd question for you for me to be asking but uh this Dave Perkins contracting um $15,300 when the engineers estimate is at $40,000
did I I scratch my head and go huh council member Armstrong you're not the first one that's asked that question um Dave Perkins they do a lot of work in the city so I called him personally and just said "Uh Renee you understand the requirements." And he said "Well yeah I
just got to cut off 3 feet of each of those footings i got to I'm going to crush it." He goes "It's less than a day's worth of work for me i'm trying to save the city money." And I said "Well I also know that sometimes you don't always read those specifications so please tell me that I won't be asked for additional money you are going to do
exactly what's in there for 153." and he says I will do it for 153 knowing him and the fact that we have relationship not only does he work in the city but he does work for the city u makes me a little more comfortable that u I I can make sure
that he adheres to this otherwise there might be no other options for him going forward your comfort makes me comfortable okay all right that was actually a very good question and a very good discussion because we have four civil engineering
students here watching the council meeting so that's probably a good little exchange for them to overhear all right um Mr mayor Council Member Gresco question on the budgeting for this um are we fully budgeted for this
you mentioned that it came in under the engineers estimate which is good but it still seems like it's coming in higher than what we anticipated when we started talking about the water tower project in 2023 council member Goviac I'm trying to pull
up the budget quickly maybe Miss Hansen knows the numbers off the top of her head um and as you're looking that up and just for the sake of the audience and the and the in the community we we talked about taking down that tower and
building this mono pole so we have good cell service and things like that in our community and it's a it's a big number here we're going to be approaching a little over $400,000 but uh it actually gets paid back to the city over time because we lease those antennas on that so it is coming back to us but there
seemed to be like about a 20% difference from the questions that I was asking when we were talking about the water tower so okay Council Member Goliac um the revolving construction fund we had 450,000 for the monopole um construction
and then the water fund we had 350,000 for the removal of the old tower okay so we're 85 we have 450 okay we're close 340 uh for the costs compared to
450 and then 228 compared to 350 so we're roughly 200,000 under what our original estimates were yeah I was I was kind of wondering because I was looking I was looking at the engineers estimates were 592 or so and we're getting it done
for quite a bit less than that but again when we were talking about this in 2023 we were looking at a cost of 400 so right does that sound 400 just for the monopole and those numbers are 340
ah okay there's two funding sources part 240ish or two what were my numbers again uh 228 is going to go to the water fund and we had estimated 350 and 340 is going to the revolving construction fund
and we had estimated 40 or 400 450 and then we upped it to 450 when things kind of got crazy with steel and some of the other costs that are out there inflation okay that clarifies what I had questions on thank you all right but we're still
not going to build on this actually makes a motion council member Gesler uh I'll make a motion to uh award the contracts and approve resolution 24-22 sub8 accepting bids and awarding contracts for the Foley monopole second
um have a motion and a second now what am I looking at here why don't I in my recommended motion yeah I've got award a contract to general construction services in the amount of
$179,500 for water tower demolition mr may I'll amend my motion to uh as listed here award a contract to general construction services in the amount of $179,500 for water tower demolition award a contract to Dave Perkins Contracting Inc for in the amount of 15,300 for site prep and uh adopt
resolution 22 24-22 sub9 awarding a contract to Vinco Inc in the amount of $291,7729 all right second we have a motion by Gesler and a second by Butler is there further discussion on this
hearing hearing none all in favor signify by saying I i opposed and that motion carries item nine is to consider resolution 25-46 reallocating the 2024 general fund budget and amending the 2024 and
2025 budgets council member Scoiac's got a couple questions here i'm sure Mr mayor no actually I had my questions answered earlier oh perfect yeah miss Hansen thank you Mr mayor city Council um attached to your agenda packet is an
unuded statement um of revenues expenditures and changes in fund balance for the general fund um showing a favorable experience compared to our budget um part of our year-end process uh we do two things so we look at actual versus budget and our legal level of
budgetary control is set at the category level within each activity um so we are presenting um for your approval to reallocate budget um between those between the categories
and the activities so that our actuals are in line with the the budgetary amounts within those um the net impact of that is a zero impact um secondarily we are um asking you to approve carry forward so we have um mostly capital
items that for one reason or the other did not get purchased in 24 or the delivery didn't happen until after the year end and so we're asking to carry forward those amounts into 2025 um the amount is $10,000 in the general fund
and then $9 million 127,730 and other funds most of those are projects um so obviously those tend to take longer than the fiscal year um and those budgets were approved when we approved the projects but we just want to kind of memorialize that in our um
current operating budget and I'm happy to answer any questions right any questions for Miss Hansen mr mayor Council Member Carlson make a motion to adopt resolution 25-46 reallocating the 2024 general fund
budget and amending the 2024 and 2025 budgets second motion by Carlson and a second by Armstrong is there further discussion on this hearing none all in favor signify by saying I i opposed and that motion
carries item 10 is to consider resolution 25-45 authorizing the transfer of funds um hit the highlights whatever you want to do here yep thank you Mr mayor city council before you is a list of
transfers that were budgeted and um or took place or needed in 2024 um so we're asking for formal approval for these um so that we can wrap up our yearend reporting um descriptions or reasons for the transfers are outlined in the memo
but I'm happy to answer any questions you may have that was that was succinct yeah any questions mr mayor council member Butler i move to adopt resolution 25-45 authorizing the transfer of funds for
2024 second motion by Butler and a second by Carlson any any discussion hearing none all in favor signify by saying I i opposed and that motion carries item 11 is to consider renewal
of a joint powers agreement with the Minnesota Department of Public Safety for Human Trafficking Investigators Task Force chief Steiner thank you Mr mayor and Council members uh in 2018 the Rapids Police Department uh became an affiliate member of the State of
Minnesota Human Trafficking Investigators Task Force it's in conjunction with the Minnesota BCA and the purpose is to identify and arrest those involved in human trafficking in Rapids and our surrounding communities as part of um as being a member of this team we
would participate in um occasional investigations uh some of these are in Rapids many of them are in Rapids some are in our surrounding communities and they would in turn reciprocate when we have u resources needed in Rapids
affiliation with the human trafficking task force will ensure that the police department stays trained and informed and ready to assist our most vulnerable victims when they need it uh the agreement is for 5 years it just recently expired we've been operating under or operating under the agreement
uh since 2018 um the detective assigned remains under the supervision of the Rapids Police Department and doesn't get housed off you know outside of the police department also as part of the team uh we would be reimbursed for any type of u any type of
uh details or investigations that occur in conjunction with the human trafficking task force and there is no cost to be a member agency so we are recommending that we renew the joint powers agreement with the state of Minnesota department of public safety and authorize the Rapids
Police Department to continue being a member of the human trafficking investigators task force very good any questions of Chief Steiner mr mayor Council Member Carlson make a motion to renew the joint powers agreement with the Minnesota Department of Public Safety to authorize Rapids Police
be a member of the human trafficking investigators task force second motion by Carlson and a second by Butler is there discussion on this Mr mayor council member Carlson i'm very uh proud that our police department is active with these investigations it's a
horrible horrible crime that impacts so many people and Rapids is certainly not exempt from it and any victim that we can get out of the situation or any perpetrator that we can get arrested is a good thing very good other discussion hearing none all in favor
signify by saying I i opposed and that motion carries item 12 is to consider adoption of the active transportation plan mr brown and you want to Yes good evening i will provide a quick update i know we've talked about this at a few
different meetings so just to recap uh we pursued this grant opportunity from MINDOT over the last year or so our main goal uh in doing this work was to one update our rather outdated sidewalk and trail plan that was in need of an update
and we thought uh if we can get some free money to update it that uh that would be a good opportunity uh also uh it's it's important to have a policy framework in place for sidewalk and trail and other pedestrian and bicycle
improvements uh just because when we go to apply for outside funding opportunities uh having a competitive policy in place is really important for instance we've had some success with the state safe routes to school program over the years and others um so having that policy
framework in place uh allows us to have competitive uh funding applications for those programs uh so over the last year or so we partnered with uh other public agencies the county the school district received uh some online engagement from
many of our city residents to put together this document uh a draft was completed late last year or so we we met with the council uh in a January work session on it based on the feedback at that work session we made uh and worked
with the consultant to make several changes um and then distributed that revised document to the council just a few weeks ago so we are asking tonight that you consider adopting the active
transportation plan i can answer any questions uh Mr himmer and Mr hansen are here as well and we're deeply engaged in this process all right very good council have any questions for Mr brown or Mr himmer or Mr hansen
wow mr mayor council member Carlson motion to adopt the active transportation plan second motion by Carlson and a second by Geisler is there further is there any discussion on this Mr mayor we've had a lot of discussion on this council member Gesler uh that that's
actually just what I want to bring up i I thank staff for taking the input and making adjustments to this and including more things um there's a great opportunity here uh with active transportation funding being having specific funding forces now at the state uh from things that uh men did for us uh
as a whole so there's there's definitely going to be bigger pots of money or different pots of money than what we're used to seeing and so I'm very happy to see a fully fleshed plan i encourage anyone to go out and look at it if you want to learn about walk bike and roll and how the community looks and all that
take a look it's only 113 pages so uh have fun but uh yeah that's it i thank you again staff for putting together a great document Mr mayor all right Council Member Butler i I also wanted to thank staff and I also just wanted to say for neighbors of mine who lived by uh Sand Creek Elementary School there's
a lot of great information in this plan just about uh survey results related to the uh bike demonstration that they had over the summer so I I know a lot of folks kept asking me questions about it and gave a lot of feedback and I just encourage folks to see what their neighbors submitted to the city on it as well
all right any other discussion on this hearing none all in favor signify by saying I i opposed and that motion carries and we are at the open mic public comment portion of the meeting you guys here for open mic either no all
right this is your chance all right um I don't have any reports on previous open mics and we're to other business mel well Council Member Gesler uh thank you Mr one of the things that I
did want to bring up um is there's a series of bills being under consideration right now uh that are addressing how land use and zoning will work in cities uh from the state level um many of them are focused on uh
housing affordability as their main thrust but there's a lot of pieces and a lot of very deep mechanics in them um one of the things that I was going to ask staff in general about is understanding what this will do to our code if these do pass um some of them
appear to also interact with each other quite significantly if one or more pass at the same time um so I'd like to understand that um and just have a have a good sense of what would we be looking at as far as how would the community
change would we have to plan infrastructure differently what is that um I know this is not a new topic um that has it has come up before but the the bills are slightly different than last time and so understanding what would we have to plan for budgetarily what would we have to plan for otherwise
if these do pass considering they do seem to have bipartisan support Mr mayor um Council Member Gistler those bills are a significant concern to not only Rapids but um
to all cities really is you know we all have our individual takes on how we we go about city planning and zoning and what when that community looks like so um when the state legislature continues to sort of threaten these preeemption
bills we do get very nervous about some of the more draconian measures that are included in them um a similar conversation that we had with council last year about um these very same topics the League of Minnesota cities and metro cities are asking communities to contact their local legislators to
let them know what those concerns are um and if council's interested we did put a letter together uh last year that we didn't approve officially at a council level we just asked that if anybody was interested in signing the letter that they could do so just to bring attention
to the issue um so certainly we can do that again um individually as and and more on behalf of sort of our legislative policy groups like League of Minnesota Cities um we when I meet with legislators individually I will mention to them some of the concerns we have
with um some of these provisions because I think well some of them appear to be well-intentioned i think they really will limit um a city's ability to do it which is intentional is city's ability to control their zoning housing you name it um all in the name of affordable
housing which really I don't know that that's going to move the needle too much um so a lot to dive into you know don't necessarily have the time tonight to to do that but Council Member Gisler and I exchanged a few emails but certainly we can probably next week even at the work session give you a little preview of
what those impacts might be if they were to come to fruition yeah clearly League of Minnesota cities and metro cities are working on this all right Mr mayor council member Krisco maybe to to to the management when you
say the League of Minnesota Cities is working on this I understand that that the Minnesota League of Cities is kind of opposing a lot of these measures that they're trying to put in force with us uh you know preempting our ability to make coding uh you know zoning decisions
for the for the city so um they they've got a big long list of why we would have concerns and how the impact would not be so great for us in uh short-term or long-term planning so I would like to see u a letter or something drafted i
would be on board to get to let um our legislators know formally that you know a lot of the stuff that's in there right now would wouldn't work for us mr mayor okay council member Carlson this is to Mr stem letter is know is this something that we could u bring to
the uh the uh work session next week the a letter I just I just feel like it should be sooner than later yeah sure mayor and council um absolutely i know there are Yes I think that's probably our next opportunity to have you all read something and then sign it if you
so choose um there are some Senate hearings even i think Monday is the next Senate hearing on some of these measures so it's it's moving along um you know certain things have already kind of um moved forward in the house so doing something within the next week or so in
terms of communicating if council members are interested their concerns about uh some of these bills would be probably the best thing to do is by Tuesday or Wednesday next week just so it's not too far gone by then yeah it'll be interesting to see how
that bipartisan support hangs on i know some of them are greater Minnesota they're not impacted by this i think they're using it as a bargaining chip oh yeah sure i'll uh I'll get on that um All right any other business to come
before council oh what mr hammer mr mayor council uh we conducted our pre-construction meeting for Trunk Highway 10 construction project uh earlier this week actually it was late last week and construction is going to begin right out here uh starting the end
of this week and into next week tree clearing will be happening over the next two weeks they'll start with bypass lanes and some of the detouring uh happening at the end of the month with construction in Earnest probably starting that second week in April so uh spring has sprung on this project and uh
Highway 10 will start construction to add that third lane in each direction between Round Lake and roughly Hansen Boulevard and and Mr hammer where's going to be the best source for people to look for project information is it going to be the county or it going to be Mindot or There's a Mindot website um I
can work with our communication staff to get it up online i can route it all to you as well yeah I think that would be good because I would think the chamber is going to want to get that out for everybody that's passing through Rapids and Rapids residents of course are going to want to know mr
mayor council member Grisco to that point are we going to are we going to see any impact to lane closures or anything like that or ramp closures uh that will all occur as in in phasing there are like 17 different phases to this project so there will be
intermittent closures of of access as well as lanes and so that's what they'll everything is required 5 to seven days in advance to have the signage out telling you five days from now this is going to start so pay attention to those signs because they they do get out in
advance gotcha mr mayor Geyser and uh I I've looked at other ones but if you sign up on mind.site you can actually get email notices of things going on there when you on the project site you can sign up and just have them sent right to you every time that there's a major update or things happening so excellent
all right miss Lensmire did you have something i'm good thank you oh sorry mr mr stew mayor councel uh property value notices are arriving in mailboxes if you haven't received yours already you will be if you own property in Rapids u
the purpose of that is to give folks a preview of what the value that's been assigned to their property is for the purposes of taxables taxes payable the next year in this case 2026 in that in that notice is um sort of dates at which
people residents can attend to contest their value which you are is certainly within their right to do in our case we're holding our local board of appeal and equalization on April 22nd at 7 p.m right here in the council chambers however I would strongly advise anybody
who has that and has big questions or concerns about changes to their value to call our city assessor's office now because nine times out of 10 once it's explained to you the process and what happened to your property you better understand it and usually people move on
occasionally uh you bring information to the table that the city assessor might want to look into uh perhaps they haven't been in your property for a while and there were assumptions made about improvements in your in your home that maybe aren't accurate um so usually uh the city assessor's office is able to
work through those things and then if they agree that maybe their value is a little high um they might adjust it down that doesn't always happen sometimes they maintain their recommendation nonetheless it's always good to have a conversation with them you can show up that night um but then
usually there's just some confusion for the property owner about how the process works so I just like to take a minute about this time every year to encourage people call now you'll save yourself a lot of time um and then if you decide that you still want to contest it terrific you know that's fine that's why the process is there but it's good to be
a little more educated walking in yeah to to your point please call the assessor if you question your value because when you just show up here the night of the board of adjustment and appeals it's really difficult for us to do anything then because our assessor
hasn't doesn't have his research with him you don't have an appraisal with you probably right um so the assessor is very good to work with that's absolutely the way to go call them call them and talk to them them
all right Mr mayor council member Carlson I had a been a while since I had a solicister at my door but they're out there and I I I had a very brief conversation with the solister yesterday i'm not opposed to door-to-d dooror sales and I'm certainly boy I'll tell
you I know sales tough job and but they just have to do it right and I was just wondering Miss Lensmire if call on you just to briefly describe what our expectations are for our solicitors Mr mayor Council Member Carlson anyone wishing to solicit in the
city of Rapids is required to be licensed and a part of that process is we do run them through a background check before we let them out into the neighborhoods most importantly though they need to display which means wear their name badge that we issue here in
the clerk's office and they need to produce the license when they're asked for it so if you've got someone at your door that cannot produce that then uh feel free to call clerk's office and let us know or 911 and we'll get a police incident report and we will work with
that um they are to be respectful of the no soliciting signs so if I get a report that they are ignoring that kind of thing we can contact the company that they are with and we can make some recommendations that they stop that or
risk no longer being licensed so we keep a list of those that are approved out on our website if you have questions you can take a look at that or give us a call and we'll let you know uh Mr is is the company licensed or the individual licensed mr mayor Council
Member Gesler we are licensing the individuals but we hold the company accountable because they sign a letter indicating that the person soliciting for them is allowed to do so so we expect to it's easier for us to use that
hammer right we call them and say "Hey you know you've got a guy out there that's doing something please make them stop." So so you just because the business is listed that person would still have to have their individual badge correct yeah yeah because that
individual has to have passed the background check because we've had companies before where individual employees of theirs didn't pass so then the the company's appealed it and it's like Mr mayor Council Member Carlson we have
had people um less than honest on their application yeah yes we have yeah and and I think last year seemed like there was a big problem with just being rude um some folks they were they were licensed but they were rude oh and so it's good to let uh Miss Lensmire know
about those things thank you had the one guy come to my door and that was so bad i said "Where's your light where's your your solicitor's license?" "Oh I got one." Finally pulls it out of his back pocket and it was Blaine it's
like I live close to Council Member Gesler there's not much margin between us and Champlain you know i mean it's we're about as far from Blaine as you can get in Rapids he came to my door 10 minutes later and I asked him the same question and he ran away pretty quick
might have been a different guy this guy tried to sell me yet i'm going "Oh come on just go." All right anything else any other business come before council tonight mr mayor Council Butler I I just wanted to say Council Member Carlson and I got to tour the Ina County Jail earlier today
we we thought it'd be good just to go because there's so much discussion about how you know they're getting a new jail in town and depending on uh you know when the timing of that happens it would impact property taxes at the county level so Council Carlson and I went we had a great tour just learning about the current facility the needs of why
there's going to be a new facility that new facility is probably going to be in an NOA but I know there's all sorts of fun discussions about that and I just wanted to thank Chief Steiner for helping set up the visit all right any other business
motion to second motion by Carlson second by Gesler to adjurnn all in favor signify by saying I we'rejourned