Good evening. With it being 06:00, we'll call the meeting to order and start with the pledge of allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of The United States Of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you. And quick roll call around the horn, please. Peterson. Laura. Steichen. Nash. And Olsen. With that, that does move us to number three. We have our agenda. I I didn't see any additions or subtractions. We good? I will entertain a motion. Motion to approve. I have a motion by Nash.
Second, Steichen. And a second by Steichen. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion carries. We have our, consent. Any questions on the consent agenda? Questions, comments, concerns? Yeah. I have one. Can we pull four e? And we wanna move that to I don't know. We'll just we'll go down to City Hall. How about limit 12 b? I could just lead it off in 13 a if you want. Does it 12 b works. 12 b? Hold on. My only concern is that if it falls under 13, is it still an actionable item?
I don't know. It Should be. It's on the agenda. Right? Yeah. Let's make it 12 b. Yeah. 12 b. Alright. Just for easy note taking. Any other questions, comments? Alright. I will entertain a motion to approve the consent agenda as amended. Motion to approve. Motion by Nash. Second. Second by Peterson. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion carries. With that, it does move us to number five. Peyton, has there been any request any formal request to speak before council this evening? Number c. Once again, remember to encourage the public to participate in our process.
We can continue to make progress. With that, it does move us to number six. And six a is tenured service award to the administrative assistant, Stacy Pritchard, Dorothy Police Department. And, of course, duty calls, and Stacy is now with us this evening as she's continuing to work and serve. We are gonna continue to move on. We are gonna recognize Stacy. We are gonna say thank you. Man, ten years, but it's gone by fast. And I have this suspicion that, yes, she has to work, but she's also, modest in accepting awards as well.
So I think it's important to say thank you, Stacy, for all that she brings to our department. I know there's a million things administratively she does for all the police officers that I have no idea about whatsoever. But I do know that the community outreach that she is, a significant contributor to, the mastermind, if you will, whether it's lunch with the cop, shop with the cop, night to unite, local days, Halloween, festivities. I'm I'm trying like, we see her commitment to our community in all of those events.
I know I'm probably missing another half dozen or so. Mhmm. But I know our our police department is well served, by Stacy, and our community, is gratefully thankful for all that she does in terms of outreach and developing that relationship between our police force and our community. So I do plan on stopping over and presenting her award and saying thank you. I'm just not gonna tell her when's because I know she'll be at work. So we'll go from there. Peyton, am I forgetting anything? Great job, Stacy. Yeah. Great job, Stacy, for sure. For sure.
So with that, we will you and I will coordinate, and we'll just pop in, chief. Alright. Perfect. But then we can move to number seven. And seven a is we have our annual city investment report. We have, Kojo Mensa with us this evening, Bremer, for Bremer Bank, and he'll be presenting. Sir, the floor is yours. Thank you. Thank you for having me. Certainly, it was a pleasure and a privilege to be in front of the council to present how the City's investment account is doing when it comes to the assets that we manage here at Brammer Bank. And so look forward to going through the next couple of slides,
just going through the details with the council on how things are performing. And these numbers are predominantly as of 12/31, so end of last year, in terms of numbers that we'll be going through today. So I'll have us go to Slide three, which is a slide that highlights kind of how Breva approaches our public entity clients and how we work with them from looking at from it from the banking side to the investment management side. And on page four and five, kind of speaks, high level to the public entity approach we have within Bremer Wealth itself.
This is based on, state statute and what we allowed or not allowed to to hold or invest on your behalf. Obviously, Breba's goal is always to have, highly rated fixed income holdings for your portfolio, and that's been the goal since we've had these accounts, over a decade ago across a decade ago. On page six, just a quick, highlight. I'll probably spend all the time reading through that. I know you you folks will probably do that, but it's a quick highlight of last year and how things went from an economic perspective. It almost feels like yesterday or now because of everything that's going on today and
which I'll touch on in a little bit about 2025 and our outlook for 2025 and obviously how that impacts the portfolio and how we manage the portfolio and how we continue to monitor things on behalf of the city to make sure that we are always putting the city's money in the best position for the city's best interest only. So in terms of 2024, quick highlights obviously from an economic point of view, pretty solid year. We came into the year with anticipation that, we'll be going to a recession. Obviously, that did not happen. We came into the year anticipating the Federal Reserve might cut interest rates about six
times. Unfortunately, that happened ended up having about three interest rate cuts. The main reason or the main driver behind that was the fact that the economy was pretty robust. So therefore, the Federal Reserve didn't have the wiggle room to cut interest rates as anticipated or as the market anticipated. We had a fairly similar theme coming to 2025, which I'll speak to in a little bit as well. But with that said, wage growth was pretty good. Inflation depending on the inflation gauge you use moderated significantly from prior years when it went all the way as high as 9%.
It's now between that 2.5%, three point five % range. Obviously, we have some market analysts wondering if you're going to run to a stagflation issue, but that's something again we'll talk about in a little bit as well. But all in all, 2024 was a pretty solid year and the portfolio shows that we did have a pretty significantly good year in 2024. So turning to Page seven, this is just a highlight of the investment portfolio in terms of the holdings we have. And again, we have highly rated fixed income. We do have apportioning in cash as well and cash back then cash has come
down a bit, but cash back then was paying over 4%, probably about 4.5% and that's come down a little bit. So if you see that over there, what the cash pieces and the average life of the bond portfolio and the duration of yield to maturity, all over 4% or over four and a half percent for when you look at yield to maturity, when you're looking at, that's a very important number. You're looking at yield to yield to maturity number because, obviously, that shows you the value you're getting for those bonds. We at Breva have been looking to keep that duration pretty pretty low in terms of how far out our bond or the bond portfolio overall is.
So what you'll notice on on page eight is we have a mature quite a bit of the portfolio maturing on page eight, this year, which is, which is pretty healthy, and that's what we wanna be. The nice thing you'll find out when you look at the reports a little bit closely is a majority of those low coupon bonds actually maturing this year and next year. So those 1%, two %, quite a few of them are maturing this year and in 2026. So the hope is as they mature, we get these cash proceeds, we can turn around,
look at the fixed income world, which is still paying in that four plus range and lock in some good rates, good coupons for longer. So that's that portfolio change or transition we've been working on since 2022 when obviously, markets took a notice there because of this inflation and how high interest rates had to go up. And so that's what's going on there. Any questions about the bonds maturing on Page eight? Otherwise, I'll skip to Page 10. Okay. Here in line, you'll see Page 10. This just gives the annual view of how the portfolio did and where we started
and where we where we ended. And I'm actually happy to report that as of, market closed, yes market closed on Friday, Actually, our portfolio is up about 3.541. So actually, 66,000, gains so far year to date. Obviously, that's not reflect reflected in our report, but but that's '20 that's 2024 report. But as of market closed on Friday, we had about 66,000 gain. And that's what's driving that predominantly is being able to transition to those higher paying bonds and the fact that if rates do go down, the bond prices will increase.
So that's what you're seeing there with that price appreciation. Obviously, you don't actually look to purchase bonds for price appreciation or market appreciation. We look for it for more of an income stream, but it has performed pretty well from that perspective. And I wanted just to point that out that we've added quite a few more dollars to the portfolio since the end of twenty twenty four. Now if you go to Page 12, you'll see the performance. And if you notice that the performance for your year to date or one year is the same and then your two year, if If you go all the way down to your benchmark,
so if you look, the fixed income is about almost 4% for your one year. Two year, almost four point six four point six three. And then if you go all the way down to your the index which we follow or track, we are completely, we are beating those indexes. As you can see, The U. S. Aggregate bond index about 2.47 for the one year, three point eight two for the two year, and then The U. S. Aggregate bond index is about 1.25 for the year today and 3.37, and we are above that. And even from a historical point of view, we are above the the the bond index aggregate since 2015 as well.
With that, what I'll do is I'll skip to a few market slides, if that's okay, with the council. Mhmm. And that that will start on page 19. Oh, it's not looking. So on page 19, it just shows, 2024, what kind of year to date, the different fixed income buckets, fixed income assets and how they're performing since as of March 14, obviously, you have a 2024 number. High yield being what it is, that's obviously another term for junk bonds is obviously performed very well last year. But if you look at kind of aggregate the aggregate bond was 0.3
and if you look at this year, right now, treasuries are performing very well at 2.2% whereas high yield is kind of inverted and is not performing as well. And and that talks about just the fact that the the range between high quality and not so high quality is is is still shrinking. So there's not a huge need to go into a junk bond when you can still get a a pretty attractive rate on solid investable investment grade type holdings. So that's where you see it on that fixed income chart. And then if you wanna go to page 22,
it talks about unemployment rate. And obviously, that's still, that's part of the reason why, obviously, the economy didn't go into recession last year. We have the majority of people employed, people that are employed, the companies that are holding on to them longer. And so that all bodes well for the economy in terms of people having jobs and being able to take care of their daily needs. Once in obviously, you're watching for 2025 to see if there's any softening in the labor market, Just, obviously, with, with the downsizing going on, on the federal level, obviously, and then also with the tariff conversation going on,
where does that all play out? Obviously, we'll see how that goes. And the fact that the Federal Reserve is also gonna keep interest rates as as they've told us pretty high. Right now, we are pricing in potentially the first interest rate cut in June. I would not be surprised personally that ended up being in September. Again, we came into this year. I think there's gonna be another six or so cuts, but the Federal Reserve actually showing two right now. So we'll see how that plays out. And the reason why that may impact unemployment is due to the fact that we have obviously, companies whose debt will be coming due and either going to be refinancing the high
interest rates that could obviously hurt cash flow. So that's something we are watching for in terms of any softening in the labor market and obviously in capital in terms of how capital is deployed in the economy. On Page 23 just talks about job openings. We still have a pretty substantial amount of job openings, 7,700,000, average openings about 5.4 historically. And then when it comes to average quits, that's kind of moderated back to near average. We have about 3,300,000 quits going on, on average about 2,800,000. Obviously, the main driver of that is we have, majority of baby boomers generation retiring.
I think it's about 10,000 a month retiring, if my memory is right. And so that's playing into that. And also we have different things going on within the economy in terms of, maybe one parent staying home as an example, or perhaps starting a new business or people staying longer in college, or we have those situations where maybe someone may retire but may take a consulting job on the side. So we have all that playing into that job openings issue. And then we do have skills. Right? If if you have the skills, you find a job. If you don't, you have to kinda get retrained, and that's what's driving that, job openings because we need to get people into that skills that is,
that is desirable or wanted as well. And so kind of bringing it down to landing here, I'll go to page 26, if you don't mind. So we keep an eye on this and actually this has been got recently updated last week when the Fed Chair spoke. If you notice, this is a compilation of the voting members within the Federal Reserve Board and their thinking as you look at the economy on where interest rates would be. As you can see in 2024, there was a there was a most of there was a coalescing around that, two or so interest rate cuts. And in 2025, there was a bit of a dispersion.
But again, we've seen that two or so interest rate cuts. We have quite a few members at our two rate cuts. We do have we do have some hawks looking to keep rates steady. We do have some doves, one each, looking to cut rates a little bit further. So we'll see which is a kind of a give a pull and tug thing. So we'll see how that goes in terms of who is right when it comes to interest rates and how many rate cuts we do get in the year. And so that those are things we are watching for in terms of your portfolio. As I said before, the nice thing is we do have some low coupon bonds coming maturing this year
and next year. So if rates do stay higher, we can lock in those better coupons for deal with. Any other slides you want to show or you think that pretty well covers it for us? That pretty well covers it unless every pretty much what covers it. Okay. I can obviously go granular more if if needed. Are there any questions from counsel? Just one. Kevin? You do our presentation for the fire relief board too. So I don't can I get one of those pamphlets? Or did did you bring paper? Or I can give you this one. PDF? The PDF, but I'll give you the oh,
I think it's the one that I sent them. I'm trying to think if that's the I I just I do better with it. It doesn't have to be right now. I can print for you too. We can get you Okay. Yeah. We can we can take care of that. Okay. Thank you. Are there any other questions? My mine is more of a policy and procedure question as as our, coupons come mature at the lower rate. I mean, what's the process of going through and reinvesting? Is that an administrative function or does it come back to us? I can't remember. Does it come back? Usually, it come back to us, doesn't it? And we decide how we're going to do this? Or I I don't know.
I can't remember. Right. Not necessarily. We have I guess, we've been delegated the authority as the coupons come in. Well, you can explain the process typically when something's coming from maturity, how it normally works, what we do. Sure. So what I normally do, I send an email out to to Perry and to Peyton just to let them know that the bond is maturing and what would what would the city council or what would the city like to see happen next. Obviously, there are times where we want to hold the cash and we do. And obviously at times where it makes sense to reinvest it and we go ahead and do that and we'll scar through the fixed income world and look for those
appropriate, bonds that do meet the requirements of state statute and purchase those for the portfolio. I just wanted to make sure because we have a lot of things going on and how how it all comes into play will be important moving forward. So that was my only question. Okay. Any other questions from counsel? Thank you so much this evening for coming out this evening, and we look forward to seeing you again in the future. Alright. Thank you. Yeah. Have a good evening. Thank you. Thanks. Alright. So with that, it does move us to number eight, planning and engineering in eight alpha is the consideration of the tax abatement agreement with Farmington North LLC,
for a five year business tax abatement. Peyton, who's filling this one? This would be me. So the formal documentation is before you for the tax abatement for the former VFW business or building. As you can see well, not in this image, but if you've been driving by Highway 10 over the past several months, you can see that the developers, property owners there have made substantial investment into remodeling the current facility. The city council held a public hearing recently on awarding the business tax abatement to
them and was approved. And so this is just the formal contract acknowledging the tax abatement contract that, Don, put together and signed off on by the property owners. They are here in attendance this evening. So if they would like to come up, they can give the council just a brief update on where they are with the construction, the reconstruction project, and when they look to have people occupying space in there. Well, first of all, I'd like to thank Mr. Mayor and the council for your consideration and for,
I'm assuming, improving this project tonight. I also want to say that, Peyton, Don, Becky, and the rest of the staff that we've had interactions with have been very easy to work with and very helpful, so we appreciate that. The, project is close to completion. In the next probably two weeks or so, it should be done. And the, the public defenders are they will take possession on April 14 as their projected date. That's when they move in their, their equipment, furniture and such. And I believe that they will be open for business about the first of,
May. There will be, 15 employees to begin with, possibly more. I don't know if we want more employees. That means there's more crime in the area, I suppose. But but anyways, so you're gonna be 15 to start. And, again, I just wanna thank city staff and the council for your help, and we look forward to maybe doing more projects at Dilworth. Questions? Any questions from council? I'm excited. Yeah. Like, I'm excited to have that occupied and, you know, bring employees to the door. So Good. That if we don't have any questions, I will entertain a motion for that,
tax abatement agreement with Farmington North LLC for that five year business tax abatement. Second, someone. I got Peterson by a hair. I got a motion by Peterson. Oh, I'll second it. And a second by Stegman. Alright. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion carries. Alright. Thank you very much. Thank you very much and look forward to, maybe doing more projects in the future. I like that idea. Sounds good. All right. Have a good evening, sir. Thank you. Who knew? Like the evolution of that building and I think a fantastic use of the tax abatement dollars to repurpose state green steps,
right? Repurposing existing infrastructure in Phil, I love it. With that, it does move us to number nine and we have nine alpha bravo Charlie, we have some resolutions. Chief? Nine alphas, resolution twenty five twelve. Chief, you wanna fill something on that one, please? Very simply. Mister mayor, council members, one of our officers was on a call for service. Miss Winter presented that officer with a check for $200. And if you know miss Winter, she would not take no as an answer. So therefore, we graciously accepted her $2 check, or $200 check, I apologize. I spoke $200 I don't wanna upset miss Winter.
Any questions for the chief on that one? Alright. Hearing no questions, I will entertain a motion. So moved. I have a motion by Nash. Second. And a second by Borra. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion carries. With that, it brings us to nine bravo, resolution twenty five thirteen. Chief. Alright. Earlier this year, we did put out our mailer request for some donations for some of our community activities, and we've had multiple responses, including from FM Asphalt for community outreach, and they gave us $200 So thank you again to FM Asphalt. Alright.
Any questions or two? Alright. Hearing no questions, I will entertain a motion for resolution twenty five thirteen. Motion to approve. A motion by Nash. Second. Both. Second. Second by Bora. Bora. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion carries. With that, it does bring us to nine Charlie, resolution twenty five sixteen. Chief. And following that same donation request letter, a Dean Family Dentistry gave us $300 for a family for our community outreach program. So again, thank you to everyone who's participating given the the police department's money to per our community outreach programs.
It's absolutely fantastic. Any questions for the chief? Hearing none, I will entertain a motion for resolution twenty five sixteen. Motion to approve. Motion by Nash. Second. Second by Peterson. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion carries. Thank you chief. All right, thank you. With that, it does move us to number 10, public safety and 10 alpha is resolution 20 five-seventeen, designation of public safety aid dollars. Peyton, you start with us. Yeah. I can take this. It'll be quick here. So the public safety aid dollars came into our possession towards the end of twenty twenty three.
It was a onetime appropriation that was done by the legislature to provide funding for local municipalities or local government agencies to be used for police, fire, and EMS services. There were a few catches to it on things that you could and could not use it for, but the definition of what you could use it for was pretty broad. There's been a subcommittee that has met over the last six, seven months or whatever it would be periodically to go over all the different purchases, and some of those have been approved already at the city council level.
The final there's a small remaining balance from the last time we brought anything to the city council, and the subcommittee had met and determined where those funds were predominantly going. And so what this resolution does that you have here, it more so just closes it all out to show that the city council has gone through all the different funding, or all the different expenditures that are gonna be going out between the police and fire department. Both departments did a great job.
The chiefs did a great job of working with one another and kind of horse trading determine who gets what because as some quotes weren't that, you know, would would have to be updated. For example, like in the server room over at the police department, those charges were a little more than what they're originally quoted as, depending upon timing and some added features that we had to add to it. But there's a few things maybe in the fire department that came in a little cheaper than what the original quote provided as they're they went through and made necessary modifications. But in all,
again, both departments, Perry and the whole team there, did a great job of working together to come up with a workable solution. And there is a small remaining balance, I think, of, like, a hundred and something dollars, that we will still have to term, I guess, where that goes. But we felt it was close enough for the time being to bring to the city council to, to put a seal of approval on knowing where all these funds have gone to. Any questions? I'm spending that $100 Community outreach. Alright. If we have no questions, I will entertain a motion for resolution twenty five seventeen.
I'll make that motion. I mean, this was an amazing, program that we're be able to be a part of, and I'm excited for you guys to be able to utilize all that equipment. So I make the motion to approve. Motion by Nash. I'll second it. I, we were part of the, group that discussed some of these things. It's it's pretty neat to know that Dilworth, with the leadership of, chief, Rawson at, I got his name wrong last time, so I apologize. It's not Rawston. It's it's not mister t. It's not t bone, it's Roston. But it's nice to know that the city police is equipped well,
and proactive on different things and kind of the leader in a lot of the ways in the area for so I do appreciate that. So I'm gonna make that second. I have a motion by Nash and a second by Steichen. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion carries. I'm just hoping we get to cut up cars in the parking lot. And I did miss the firearms demonstration, so I'm hoping there's some other toys that maybe I get to play with later on. It's coming around. I love it. I love it. Alright. Again, that does move us to number 11, planning and engine and engineering. Obviously, move. 11 alpha is resolution twenty five fourteen.
Peyton, you taking this one? I am. With any federal project, transportation project, monies have to filter through the state in order for us to receive the funding, getting back to our the our RFB project that goes through a state program or it's federal dollars that goes through the district four office here at MnDOT, and then we collect those dollars. They have to be the gatekeeper of the dollars. That was a project specific contract that we had with them.
This contract right here, they felt was more appropriate for us considering that we're gonna be receiving more federal monies. They don't normally do it for a smaller community, but with us being part of the TMA now and opening ourselves up to more federal funding dollars, you know, we have a couple of projects upcoming that are in the MTP that will be receiving said dollars. This should cover us for any future project for the foreseeable future. Once the contract itself, it will become obsolete at some point.
They said there'll be certain federal changes and everything. And then at that time, we'll get a revised agreement. So this contract here does or this resolution here gives the mayor and I the authority to execute the document, and we'll get submitted to MnDOT, and then they'll pass it along to the federal people from there. Questions for Peyton? Alright. Thank you, Peyton. Hearing no further questions, I will entertain a motion for resolution twenty five fourteen. So moved. A motion by Nash. Second. A second by Borra.
All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion carries. That does bring us to 11 bravo, resolution twenty five fifteen, improving Clay County, project within municipal corporate corporate limits. Peyton? Thank you, mayor. Any project that Clay County is working on from a construction standpoint within city right of way, but it's a county roadway, or I guess technically county right of way, but within the city limits. The city has to approve a local jurisdictional, resolution, basically providing its lending its support to the work that's being done.
And as you may or may not be aware, Seventh this is actually County Road 45 that comes in at Seventh on the South side of Highway 10 at Seventh Street Southeast, loops around Second Avenue and up Main Street. So this little bowl cutout u shape here is actually a county roadway. It's set to be mill and overlay this coming summer. In order for them to go out for bid, they have to show municipal consent on this project, and that's what this resolution is for.
Next year, there'll be another project that's slated to be done, and that'll be the mill and overlay of County Road 9. So we'll be doing a similar resolution at that time as well. Questions for Peyton? Alright. Hearing no questions, I will entertain a res entertain a motion for resolution twenty five fifteen. So move. Motion by Peterson. Second. Second by Nash. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion carries. That does bring us to twelve, and twelve alpha is the public hearing on resolution twenty five eighteen. And with it being 06:33,
we'll call the public. We'll open the public hearing and call for a staff presentation. Peyton. So this is for a unpaid curb stop jetting at 111 Main Street North, unpaid invoice. K. And is that the end of the staff presentation? That is. Is there anyone here to speak, in favor of this resolution? Second call in favor? Is there anyone here or online, to speak in opposition to this? Second call in opposition? With there being no public comment, we'll close the public hearing at 06:34
and go to council discussion. Council, questions, comments, concerns, considerations? None? Outstanding. So hearing no conversations, I will entertain a motion for resolution twenty five eighteen. So moved. A motion by Nash. Steichen second. And a second by Steichen. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion carries. With that, we do have our 12 b, which is, from our consent agenda, which was originally labeled four e. We are to receive and file the resignation notice, from our pay maintenance department. Mister Peterson,
you wanted this one pulled? Yeah. So, as you know, I'm the liaison to the maintenance department and get to know those guys pretty well that that you all don't know them. But, Jeff Berg, worked for the city of Delworth for a long time and, you know, kinda helped us through some some tough times when you know, with the unexpected passing of Don Bogle and, stayed on, you know, and and kinda showed Mike the ropes when he first started going. And I just, I wish I wish Jeff and his family nothing but the best. And, you know,
I'm I'm happy for his his, his his new life challenges, and I just thought that, I would like to formally thank him for his service on the record. So that's that's all I got. Well done, KP. Kevin, any other comments or questions about our 12 b? Again, I think that was a a sweet move and the right thing to do. I'm assuming we're gonna do something. We'll talk after the meeting. We'll go from there. Again, great gesture, Kevin. That's simply outstanding. So, with that, we're gonna move on to 13,
council members' concerns and committee committee updates around the horn. Well, we have an opening in the maintenance department. So if you know anyone Great transition. You know, if you know anyone, I would highly encourage them to apply. I believe the deadline is this Friday, or was it last Friday? This this Friday. You know, so the clock is ticking. It's it's a highly sought after position. So, make sure you get your applications in early. Starting to get nice out, so make sure that, the maintenance crew can access the streets as they need,
and local days is coming in July. So that's all I got. I just wanna say congrats to Jeff on his retirement too and thank him for everything he's done for the city. So that's all I got. Yeah. Mister Steichen. Yes. Congratulations to Jeff Berg. Appreciate his work. I don't fully understand everything Bremer does, but I know they are on top of things with the help of Perry and Peyton and city staff. So, I'm sure they're they have the best interest of our city, and I'm not sure if they need to position ourselves for the things we have
come up or not, but I'm confident in their ability. So, I had an orientation in MetroCog. I wish I could just download Julie's brain, vice mayor's Nash's brain because it's just so complicated on the inner workings of this organization and how it all comes together. But I'm slowly getting it figured out, but, people there are really friendly to work with. So, basically, I learned that they're closing out the books for the 02/2024 season and there's a lot of unspent money and how it gets turned back and you can't just carry
it over like you would think. So it's kind of a strange convoluted way it happens but and it's all at the how that the powers of the decided from farther up above. So, sounds good. Slowly learning it. The public input meeting at the school I think was was good and it's always fun to hear ideas from people. You know, sometimes it's common themes that keep reoccurring. You know, but least we're getting input hopefully more input, and whatever leads to.
It I think we're going about it definitely in the right way and looks like we have the right team to lead this forward. So, however it might look might be totally different than what we think it's gonna look right now or it's gonna be very similar. I'm not sure but, so I did appreciate all this help from staff getting things figured out. You know, if mister Clemonson and his crew has some desire to build out there, we could probably fit him in the building as well. So and with his work on the old VFW him and his wife here,
Do appreciate turning that building into something useful so hats off to you. Stacy and her ten year award, I learned a few years ago that when there's an event going on, don't talk to the chief, talk to Stacy. Stacy knows what to do. Stacy has it figured out. Stacy, chief gets his orders from Stacy on those events. I I mean, she does very well. She does a excellent job of taking care of those behind the scene things that gets it organized and and everything.
So I do appreciate the work she's put forward. So I'm not sure if, assistant chief Kohler needs to add anything but the at the last fire department executive board they talked about the trip to Florida and it's a lot more involved. I mean we were kinda wondering why four people had to go and two extra besides the two that were covered. But I think it's valuable. I think Mayor Olson said that if we can avert a problem, if we could head off something so everything's figured out exactly how it should be
going in. It's not just a truck you buy off the lot. It's a lot of thought has gone into it and I forget how many line items is like 400 or 500 line items. They had to go through each one specifically and so we're gonna it's everything cost a lot of money obviously but they're gonna get what's needed. And what's important and what's gonna be efficient and how it all works together. I mean they got it figured out with the help of the experts down there. So hats off to Chief Co Assistant Chief Kohler for
his leadership in the in the fire department and be fun to see the final product which I know it'll it'll be good. So and with that I think the the Fire Hall is very close to becoming occupied if I remember correctly April 7. Is that kind of the tentative date to start start operating out of there? So that's pretty amazing when you think of a year ago the old place was standing basically. Now a year later the new place is ready to roll. So be fun to take a tour of it to see what's what's what's all
in there. So thank you for chief Koehler and his team that is getting things moved taken care of and set up and figured out. So yeah. Appreciate it all. Julie? Thank you, mister Steichen. Nash? Okay. Yes. Congratulations to Jeff on his new position, but we're gonna I mean, that's many years of service to our city, and we appreciate that. Hopefully we bring in some many talented applicants but, and same to Stacy many years of, dedication to our city and really appreciate her work.
Some reminders. We have kite day coming up with the police department on April 5, and it's getting a lot of hits online. So, could be a really huge event. It's kinda fun. First time we've done it. So, hopefully, it's a beautiful day for it. Ally Connect, thank you for your supporting that. That's going live on April 7. So excited to see how that works out. And, police department has some they did taser training. Right? And has some, training with the state, patrol coming up as well, a two day training.
So a lot going on with our police department. And then we have our walk through. Isn't it tomorrow? Tomorrow. Yeah. So kind of excited. We get to go check out the fire department tomorrow. So looking forward to that. That's all I have. Alright. Thank you. Peyton? Yeah. And with that walk through and as council member Steichen was mentioning the official move in date, it's practically one year to the date when we had the final community center event. The contractors have done a tremendous job. The council has done a good job of being on board with all necessary changes.
We have some uncooperative weather, but then cooperative weather to back it up. So really proud of the work that's taken place over the there these past twelve months and look forward to the end result, which is a new fire hall. So we're going through some of the final details right now, ordering furniture and doing some other things. So really excited about that opportunity. I did email over to the city council hour, hour and a half ago the strategic plan. I just I just went through the document,
took all of our whatever. I I emailed over the strategic plan to you. So if you have any comments or feedback, anything you'd like for me to add to that or if I missed anything, please let me know. A lot of it was from memory. I had some notes, obviously, around the wall, but did my best in trying to summarize everything that was discussed that evening. And our intent is still to hopefully have a follow-up short slash long term planning meeting. We're gonna really emphasize transportation projects,
city facilities, you know, kind of where we're projecting us going in the future with municipal buildings and spaces and property in town and other, type long range planning initiatives that will be in the works. So we're looking forward to that when that comes about. Still waiting to hear back if we will receive any type of funding for our safe routes to school grant. I did recently submit another grant as well for community facilities, basically, a community center grant. Did get the rejection on it.
Of course, that one was about a 94 foot heave if you're on a basketball court. So I I I didn't like our chances with it, but you never know till you submit your name. Anything else, Peyton? No, sir. Great analogy as March is getting bad here, so I'm well well played. Starting with the fire department, as as we all know, it led us into tearing down the community center, and that public input meeting is so, so very vital. And we had good turnout, some good insight, but I would like to, put out a public plea to get you know, they talked about words. Like, what words do you look to describe?
I'm and I right now, the tours are for me are, like, generational flexibility. It was great to see, the participation. Mhmm. There's a lot of opinions and a lot of ideas from people about my age. Mhmm. Right? Ballpark. I I would encourage anyone who has just moved to the city, who has young kids, kids that aren't in high school yet, brand new to the city, been around for a while. The diversity of ideas is gonna allow us to build, a center that has that is really future focused. And that that public comment, that public participation is so essential to get the right
combination of ideas. And I think the more diverse our ideas are, the better product that we're gonna receive and and that we're gonna be able to to to build. So I wanna emphasize that public comment because there's at least one, if not two more opportunities to meet in person. There's some online things. So, again, as as we're moving this forward, we had great support to do the local option sales tax. I want I'd love to see the same emphasis and the same support to say, this is what we want to see done with our money, because ultimately, that's that's where it boils down to.
Peyton? I'm sorry to interrupt you. Just before before I forget about the local option about the sales tax, local sales tax. These aren't options. It's not it's not an option before we pull on That's that corrected. It's not an option anymore. Yeah. Yeah. There it is. That's set to begin one week from today. And so this is for anyone operating a business. All the local businesses have been notified, but any of our food vendors, anyone else selling products in the community, they'll be given a document, basically saying, hey. Don't forget, Dilworth has a local sales tax.
So be mindful of that as you sell products within the community. And services. And services. Minnesota does a great job of taxing everything. They do. I mean, taxing services as well. All right. Anything else, Bain? No, sir. Thank you. So with that, just quickly and with the utmost respect, thanks to Jeff. And congratulations to Jeff. But what also strengthens I think it's gonna strengthen our relationship between communities. So, I'm thankful for that is as his efforts, you know, they they really reach home. So thanks again, Stacy. I'm gonna come and find you.
I I do appreciate that. The the public outreach is outstanding. And I'm also gonna say, one different congratulations to, the Morehead's Bud sixteen j g junior gold, hockey team. They are also the state champions, and I bring that up because there's three kids from DGF and from Dilworth specifically who are on that team. Drew Martin lives in Dilworth on that team. Colin Wakefield, and Chase Olsen are on that team. And those members of Dilworth brought home a state championship in hockey. So that'll be my last comment, with that. To that end, it does move us to the bills.
We got bills to pay. Any questions about the bills? Hearing no questions, I will entertain a motion to pay the bills. So moved. I have a motion by Nash. Second. Second by Borah. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Opposed? Motion carries. And with there being no further business before the council this evening, call this meeting adjourn.