WEBVTT

METADATA
Video-Count: 1
Video-1: https://webstreaming.ctv15.org/meetings/FHCC_2026-05-27.mp4

NOTE
MEETING SECTIONS:

Part 1 (Video ID: https://webstreaming.ctv15.org/meetings/FHCC_2026-05-27.mp4):
- 00:00:59: Call to Order, Agenda Approval, Neil Kwong Award Introduction
- 00:03:19: Gary Kwong Discusses Volunteering and the Award's Purpose
- 00:04:29: Award Recipient Catherine Fisher Discusses Volunteer Work
- 00:05:16: Award Presentation and Remarks on Heritage
- 00:09:53: Approval of Meeting Minutes and Consent Agenda Items
- 00:12:03: Discussion Regarding City License for EcoATM Kiosk
- 00:14:08: Environment Commission, Community Engagement, Other Announcements
- 00:17:21: Personal Recognition, Parks Commission, Highland Bridge Project
- 00:22:03: New Website Launch, Web Address Transition to .gov
- 00:22:40: Community Forum Closed, Meeting Adjourned


Part: 1

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Thanks, Ryan. Yep. Good evening and welcome to the, regular meeting of the City Council of, Falcon Heights on Wednesday, 05/27/2026. We'll call this meeting to order at 07:00. Roll call. Gustafsson. Here. May. Here. Boggan. Here. Milky. Here. Wossenberg's out. Linehan. Here. Here. Okay. Do we have an approval of the agenda as, as written? So moved. So moved by Morgan. All those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Aye. Motion carries four-zero.

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Tonight we have the the joy of the 2026 Neil Kwong Award recipient, feature of, to this and, Gary Kwong and, Chris Kwong are here and their family to present the 2026 Neil Kwong Youth Citizenship Award to, Catherine, Fisher. This award was established in, after the tragic death. Yeah. I'm sorry. Of, Neil Quang, who passed away at the age of 15 in the year, 1998, 2000,

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somewhere around there. The award recognizes Falcon Heights youth between the ages of 12 and 19 who display outstanding leadership, volunteerism, or citizenship in this community. And, we have, a well deserving young person to receive this award in Katherine Fisher, who's been nominated. At this point, I bring the, Gary to, to the podium to talk about Catherine and, tell us what's all going on with, with your family and with this award. So Catherine is a good nominee because she volunteers.

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And sometimes over the years, we've had people say, well, what what what is the reward? And I said, but there's no point in giving a cash award to somebody who volunteers because it kind of defeats the purpose of talking about volunteering. And I'm on a group of different nonprofits myself, and that's one of the things we often discuss is how do we get people involved? Because they may believe in a cause, but what are they going to do and how do we get them involved? And things change with generations and they change on what funders are looking for,

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so it gets to be very difficult. And volunteering in your community, for those who think that city council members and the mayor all get rich, well, I don't think that really holds true. So but a lot of people don't understand how it works. And I that's why we wanted to have the Neil Kwong award because Neil liked to volunteer, and he grew because of what he came to understand about working with other people. And that's what we try to give the award for is people who live in Falcon Heights and volunteer in the community. It doesn't have to be Falcon Heights alone.

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And that's an important part is where you live and who you know and how you decide to serve. And so Katherine has done a good job, and I would like to have her come up now and talk about where she volunteers and how she decides to what to volunteer for. Hi. So the majority of my volunteering recently has been through the Norway House, which is a cultural institution in Minneapolis. It's pretty close to my school. I volunteer through a lot of their, events like the gingerbread wonderland that they have every Christmas.

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A lot of the reason why I do it is because I'm Norwegian personally, and it really helps me to, like, connect with my heritage a lot and just to sort of share my culture with other people. And I think that's really important. Thank you. Well, good. Thank you. We would like to present this to Catherine. And it's simply a plaque, your name on it, and it's spelled correctly. That's always one of the problems we have when you get a nomination. How well does how well do the people nominating understand how you spell your name

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and what does it mean. And as we talk about your heritage, that is a big part of our heritage is what our name is. And I used to wonder, why do we have Johnson and Swanson and everything else? It all comes down to your heritage. Gustafson. Anderson. So thank you. Found her. Nice. What number? Oh, we have we may have to sign this. And then we also have a, One you can take home. We often would have had a few moments and tell you our our workshops before the meeting so that,

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you can be more of a It Alright. And then, this is on behalf of So thank you very much. Congratulations. Thank you. That's work. Keep going. Thank you. So thank you all for coming. Anybody else wanna talk on this afternoon's behalf here? Or do that. Okay? Thank you. Well, you're welcome. And thank you for coming out tonight to, get while I do this. Okay. Okay. Well, there we go. So back to, so that's our presentation for tonight. Our Neil Cohn award recipients always kind of

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touching. Next we have approval of our minutes, from our 05/13/2026 City Council workshop meeting and our May thirteenth twenty twenty six City Council meeting minutes. I move to approve. Okay. Elke moves to approve. Further discussion? Hearing none, all those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. All those opposed same sign. Motion carries four-zero. We don't have any public hearings tonight. We do have a consent agenda consisting of seven items. We have general disbursements through 05/23 '20 May 23 payroll through 05/21/2020 $4821.4.63

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wire payments through May 21 We have city licensing as noted in the packet. We have approval of Resolution 206, accepting the resignation of Eric Brenton from the Parks and Recreation Commission. Number four is approval of Resolution 2,647, appointing Catherine Merriam to the Parks and Recreation Commission. Five, consideration of ordinance twenty six zero four,

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assigning a street address for PID 212923110029. The, we have approval, number six is approval of resolution twenty six forty eight identifying the need for funding to complete the 2050 comprehensive plan update and authorizing an application for planning assistance grant funds. And number seven, we have approval of Resolution 2,649, exercising the City's authority to opt into and support the Ramsey County Economic Development Agency

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or EDA. I move, consent agenda. I have one question. Yes. Jack, could you just tell us, it's so vague, this city license that we're approving? Page 29 in the packet. Do you recall Yes. So this license is for EcoATM, and so it'll be located within the Speedway. It is a, recycling. So, essentially, you can recycle your old electronics, through it. And so the understanding was that they did need a business license based on how it's structured. It's different than most mobile vendors that it's operating as its own business there without a separate license.

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I believe it was somewhere else, and so they needed this license here to be local as well. So they're getting a local business license to operate in the Speedway as a a kiosk to turn in phones and other items. Okay. Thank you. I I had some questions about that too. Like, so the person would put their device in this box or whatever and cash would come out? That, I don't know. I can't answer the specifics on how it operates. Yeah. Yeah. Might get that clean. Okay. I I could gather that if you would wanna pull the license from the agenda.

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We can pull it from the consent agenda. Yeah. No. No. It's okay. Well and it's based on if they have to have the necessary documents. Oh, you have received that. Okay. Yes. Yep. So we've received everything. They're otherwise compliant. It would just be the issuance of it. But Okay. Thank you. Okay. Motion to, I You made the motion. Consent. I made the motion. All those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. All those opposed, same sign motion carries four-zero. Next are policy items where you don't have any,

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information and announcements. I'll throw out. Quick meeting. Quick meeting. The, get, all of the protocols carried and, and taken care of. Looks like Georgiana's ready to go. Okay. This time I'll be ready. Alright. Well, from the Environment Commission, we're recruiting gardens for the July 18, lawn and garden tour, so please sign up if you have a beautiful home garden. Oh, or What if it's not so beautiful? No. We said they're learning gardens. Oh, oh, sorry. Disseminate people. Alright. Beautiful in the eye of the beholder.

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I sorry. It also can be a great vegetable garden. And otherwise, the Environment Commission is focusing on identifying more immediate goals of the climate action plan that we can carry out. And we're and we're distributing trees or finding homes for trees across the city, hoping to, reduce heat islands, that is areas of low tree cover. Let's see here. Otherwise, I did go as a an observer to the, first meeting of the community advisory committee, and I think they're off to a great start.

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And we have a great crew there that'll do a good job for us. Outside in the broader community, I just remind people that the, candlelight vigil at the Peace Garden is on July 6 in the evening. And then on July 7, we have a unity day gathering here at City Hall. And, we very much appreciate the support that the city gives us for those things. Yeah. Okay. Council Member Melky? Sure. The Community Engagement Commission helped plan the spring together that was held May 16, which went really well over at Curtis Field.

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Thanks for the orchestra, the Heights Orchestra for performing, and, we had a really good attendance and beautiful day. And Jim Westenberg probably needed a shower afterwards when he was wearing cotton candy, but, it was a good time. And then also nine North met last week on our board, and the deadline for making websites, etcetera, social media compliant has been extended into 2028. And, has been extended into 2028, and, Nine North continues to work will need to be adding closed captions for meetings and they're working hard. They can do it on record it,

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but they're still struggling on figuring out how to make it, having the software to do it when it's for our live meetings. So continue to work on that. And then, event coming up is, Falcon Heights Neighbors Night at the Goldstein Museum of Design. I don't have my date in front of me. June 18. Thank you. And that is from five to 06:36 thirty, and this is on the Saint Paul campus. Their goal is to bring more community onto the campus, and our goal is to strengthen ties. That's what all dovetails nicely. Very good.

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Very good. The planning commission is has, canceled their, meeting next Tuesday. Nothing on the agenda for that. So nothing to add there. I I do wanna thank, the Kwongs, for coming and doing this. I, I wanna use a little personal privilege. Neil Quang was an Eagle Scout and, was something that, I think was very important to to him and his family. And my, son just was, earned his Eagle Scout on the fourteenth. So, my pride is, also there. Other than that, I don't think I oh, I I did wanna,

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related to that, anybody that is, out there that earns their Eagle, their gold star for Girl Scouts, anything else like that. I would very much, like to recognize them during city council meetings. I know a lot of councils do that. So if, one of yours, becomes that way, please contact me and we'll, try and coordinate some recognition at a city council meeting. I just wanna add to it. It's also an emotional time because my son received this award. Yeah. Danielle Cohn. Mhmm. Thanks. The, Parks and Rec Commission is, spending its June meeting,

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doing individual audits of the of the parks. So if you run into a commissioner, of which will have a vacancy, for a one one spot open tomorrow. So we've got a spot on on that for you to, to join. But we're going to, audit the parks and do that. So if you see a commissioner out there and, you'd like to note something about the parks that's, that you'd like to gain attention to for repair or whatever. Like, last week, we did the, they lowered the fences at, community parks so that the tennis balls won't go through and won't go out.

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And, they got that, public works. Thanks for, your ingenuity doing that to get that happening. The parks are we'll have probably an update from, administrator Linehan on officially what's happened at, at the park in the last two weeks since we met as a council, but, it's all going and it's all going well. We hope to see you at the ice cream social of the, on July 16 to, to make that part and make it, make it kind of fun. So and again,

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I'd like to to thank Gary and and Chris for coming out and, doing a once again, show the good works of one of our youth and administrator, Linehan. Yeah. Thank you, mayor and council. So just a couple other updates on that. So, as the mayor mentioned, community park construction is going well, staying on schedule. They had a couple delays, but they're making up for it in other areas. They're looking to they poured concrete for the curbing, the last couple of days, and then they're going to that's cured enough, and then they'll be doing the parking lot likely later this this week.

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If as long as the concrete's ready to go, they can get the asphalt poured. Everything else then is kinda clean up, plantings, but it looks great. So I encourage if people have a chance, it's fun to go out there and see kind of the the work and the vision coming together. Just a couple other notes. As mentioned, our community advisory committee, the first meeting last week went well. Our next meeting will be June 17. We will be inviting the council, if you're interested, and residents out for, a tour of the Highland Bridge project. So it's the third Wednesday of the month tour of the Highland Bridge project in

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Saint Paul. The old Ford plant as it's known. A good opportunity to kinda see in a walking tour. Bolton and Mink and then Barr Engineering, one of our subcontractors, were the, especially the water resource engineers for that, and so they have a very good history. They give tours on the site, so they'll give kind of a development perspective. That'd be very relevant for us of planning out major projects. So it'll be a good way for us to see that. And then afterwards, they'll talk about, the engagement for next steps. Other than that, I'll leave that at that for now. Thanks. Oh, wait. One other thing. Sorry.

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This is what I was remembering. The new website. So working on we're clearing up kinda some final stuff. We'll be launching the new website, within the next week. We're gonna be transitioning to a new web address as well with it. There'll be a redirect, but it'll be, falconheightsmn.gov. So as part of the new, election requirements, municipalities that that have elections, even though we outsource it, we still are an election agency in that regard, do need a .gov website. And so it's a natural transition for us to meet that deadline while we're also, developing our new website.

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So residents will still see it the same way. A lot of nice new features on it, and we're excited to go with that, and get that together. Okay. Great. Well, this would be time for, community forum. Gives you an opportunity as a resident to address the council for three minutes or so, and, we'll listen to what you have to say, maybe ask a few questions. We won't take any direct action at the time, but you can still come out and, make things, appear for us. So that we, it's always good to hear from the public, but, so we'll close our, community forum since there isn't anybody here to talk about it.

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And, on a beautiful, May night, I'd be, open to having this meeting adjourn. Anybody want to move? So moved. So moved by Melky. All those opposed or all those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. All those opposed, same sign. Thank you very much for tuning in. We are adjourned.