Good evening, and welcome to this City of Falcon Heights regular meeting of the city council on Wednesday, 06/25/2025. We'll call this meeting to order at 07:00AM. Roll call. Gustafsson. Here. Meyer. Here. Milke. Here. Leahy and Wossenberg will be absent. Linehan. Here. And approval of tonight's agenda. Any changes to to the agenda? Is this the same as as amended on the website? Yes, ma'am. Basically. So the agenda has been amended to include item,
k closed session. So we did amend that as of Monday. It was included in our, weekly newsletter as well just to kind of include that. It's been updated on the website in the door. Okay. Do I hear a motion to approve the agenda? So moved so moved by Meyer. Further discussion? Hearing none. All those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Aye. Motion carries three o. Don't have a presentation tonight. We do have approval of minutes. We have our 06/04/2025 City Council workshop meeting minutes, and our 06/11/2025 City Council regular meeting minutes.
Motion to approve. Motion to approve. Further discussion? No key moves. All those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. All those opposed same sign. Motion carries three oh. Tonight we do have two public hearings. Our first is on our bond series 2025 a tax abatement, bonds. This is concerning the issuance of tax abatement bonds and the abatement of the city's share of taxes for parcel number 212923120008,
otherwise known as Larbinter Manor. The process will be as follows. City administrator Linehan will provide a brief overview of the topic and introduce Todd Hagen of Ehlers, our financial consultant, to help present the topic. Following the presentation, we'll then open the hearing to the public and the public process is not a question answer but rather comments. Each person will speak up to three for those that are here and after all of which speak to Dunso. Then we'll move on and we'll ask, open up the floor to council members to have a discussion on the topic etc.
The, so further ado, we'll, introduce the topic here. Administrator Linehan. Thank you, mayor and council. So tonight's public hearing is regarding our tax abatement bonds for upcoming 2025 series a. In total, it's kind of a combined bond between, both our general obligation road bonds, which we're quite familiar with, and also a tax abatement bond. And so as part of this tax abatement bond, we're essentially asking for, the ability to borrow little over a million dollars, so 1,050,000 in tax abatement.
And this is supported through the city's tax levy. Essentially, to kinda simplify this process, it is fairly complex. But what we're doing is we're abating the property taxes that the city receives on a select parcel. And so to identify parcels, we wanna look at parcels that, could benefit from the park, are in close proximity to it, but also, looking at the tax capacity of those parcels, making sure that it generates enough to be able to support and finance this bond. So looking at it, you know, we look at kind of larger multifamily has kinda fit this bill quite well,
and so identified this property. Now as it relates to Larpenter Manor and any of the, you know, the residents that live there and the owners of that property, generally, they won't notice any real difference in kind of how things go. Basically, instead of taking their general tax capacity, for example, in 2025, their taxes payable to the city will be about 71,000. We just remove that from our ability. So no longer do we get their 71,000. It goes towards this tax levy to support it. So, basically, instead of just kinda taking the whole city and financing,
everybody takes a little bit. They take it, but then we take that off of our total. So it's really a lot of kind of moving around money in that regard. They will not be paying more for it, and they won't notice any, considerable difference. But as part of this process, we do have a public hearing. We noticed it appropriately in the Pioneer Press, and kind of went through that process. And so now we do have a public hearing that if there is objection, either from the property owners or residents, this would be their opportunity to do so. So with that, you know, I'll also introduce Todd Hagen from Eller's.
He's our financial adviser. He presented at our previous meeting, but is also here available for questions and comments. So, Todd, any other things you wanna add? Thanks again for having me, mayor and council, remotely. I do have a little issue with bandwidth here, up in Duluth, so I'm gonna go without video. I see it's going up and down a little bit. So, hopefully, you can hear me okay? Yes. Sound okay? Yep. So Jack did a nice job of introducing this tax abatement. It's, it's a tool that we use, quite often for financing recreational facilities like the park improvement portion of the new bond
issue, that's coming up. He did detail the, the specifics on which parcel we're gonna use and, and how it really doesn't affect that particular parcel in any way, shape, or form. It's our ability to levy taxes throughout the city. So I just want to mention too that the proposed abatement bonds will not affect tax rates for the abatement parcel or otherwise impact taxation of the abatement parcel differently from other parcels in the city. The abatement is was stated in the notice as as,
not to exceed fifteen year estimated at, a little north of 1,190,000.00 which, gives us a little bit of cushion for that particular, portion of the bond issue at 1,000,050. And and so and and, again, it's for fifteen years. So we're not, you know the bond issue is gonna be coming up on July 9. This is just one of those preliminary proceedings we need to go through, to get to get the job done. Hopefully, we had explained it a little bit at the presale meeting on June 11, kind of the process here and and the reason for,
finding a parcel that, we could use to abate. And we just found one and it fits perfectly, within the program. Like Jack says, it was due process, put the notice in the paper, pioneer press, and, we're here now tonight for the the public hearing. So I'll yield for any questions also, if there's any questions from counsel, or anybody that, is attending the the public hearing. Thank you. Thank you, Todd. Okay. And at that point, we'll open the public hearing and, we'll call the opening of the public hearing. All those who wish to speak on this issue come forward
or if this would be the time to read, comments received from from people? No comments received. No comments have been received via mail or email on on this topic prior to the meeting. So we'll do the first call for people to to speak, do the second call, and seeing nobody here for the hearing, we will close the public hearing. At this time, I'll open up floor to discussion of City Council members. Any comments? Or anything? Pretty straightforward. Pretty straightforward. We talked a lot about this at our last council meeting when Todd was here
in person, and I think we covered it quite in-depth. Yep. And the workshop before that? And the workshop before that. So, it's just gonna be a clean, easy way to to run the dollars. So the, do I have a motion to recommend adoption of resolution twenty five sixty five approving property tax abatements for parcel number 212923120008. So moved. So moved by Council Member Meyer.
Further discussion? Hearing none, all those in favor of adoption resolution twenty five sixty five signify by saying aye. Aye. All those opposed same sound. Motion carries three oh. Thank you, counsel. Thank you, Todd, for putting this together. Yeah. Thank you very much. And I'll maybe run into you tomorrow in Duluth. Yeah and then we'll see you guys back on July 9 for the bond sale. For the bond sale. Thank you very much we appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you for taking time out tonight. Thanks Todd. You bet. Thank you. Okay.
We'll see you. We'll see you. Our next item of business is a public hearing on our Comcast franchise agreement renewal consideration. The, we do this by ordinance and we'll, for consideration extending the Comcast franchise agreement an additional five years. Again, the process, we'll do a review, open it up for for comments, close those comments, and then open it up for, council comments. Administrator Linehan, can you provide us a beef brief overview of the, Comcast franchise agreement,
discussion. Yeah. Thank you, mayor and council. So the existing Comcast, franchise ordinance. So anytime a, private utility wants to operate in public space and public right away, the city would kind of administer and oversee that. For most of our Comcast or for most of our cable franchises, it's been adopted throughout the state of Minnesota to do a franchise agreement. So the franchise agreement essentially spends certain rights to that, provider, but it also has certain requirements too. And so when the state adopted franchise agreements,
they give municipalities a lot of ability to improve their communities. One example is that in the original, ordinances, it allowed and expanded the requirements that if, utility wanted to come into the city, they had to provide equal access throughout the city so that they would even if it wasn't financially viable, if they wanted to come in, they would have to provide cable for any new customer that wanted to come in. So we've had this franchise agreement for a significant amount of time. It was completely kind of rewritten and adopted in 2017. It was an extremely strong agreement. It goes through 2027.
So Nine North, kind of the North Suburban Communications Commission, kind of, one of their bodies kind of as part of Nine North, has essentially, negotiated to do a five year extension on this agreement. It's a very good agreement, benefits all parties. And so this is kind of that formal process to do in a five year extension. So this is kind of our opportunity, to review and, you know, comment on it and see if there's approval and also an opportunity for the public if they have concerns kind of with, Comcast, continuing to have this exclusive right kind of in some of the, right away. So Okay.
Alright. Based on that, we'll, our next step would be to open up the, public hearing. We'll, open the public hearing for people who would like to comment on on this procedure and find out, what's going on. So we'll call once for members of the public to speak on on the issue. Not seeing anybody here. Have we received any written, comments from, citizens on or anyone No, mayor. On this. Okay. So we'll make a second call, third call, and we will close the public hearing and open the,
the Florida city council members to have a discussion on the topic. As the representative on the nine North board, it was, just big relief and appreciation that there was no change and to extend it for five more years. So this was a big relief. So, yeah, it's good news. I was just curious that, the last agreement ran, ten years and this one's five years. Any reason for the difference there? I would say it's because it's an extension. Okay. I would think that would be why. Yep. Yeah. I think kind of the a new versus a new one. Yeah. Yep.
I think some of it, that's kind of the uncertainty right now too around kind of these franchise agreements with kind of the the cord cutting of cable, kind of in the industry. There's been a lot of pushback from the industry on these franchise agreements, which kinda tells you which side, you know, why we wanna support them, is that the industry doesn't like them. They kinda make it more difficult for them and their claim, because there's also, things that they have to provide. Right? So it's kind of a benefit to the community. So to be able to get this extended for five more years is kind of a a win for our residents in that regard.
So I think that's probably the longest they wanted to go out. So that's my understanding of it. K. Now this five years will run at through the conclusion of the current contract in '27. So it'll be '28, '29, 3031, and '32. Yes. Okay. The, from counsel, do I have a motion to recommend adoption of twenty five zero four authorizing the extension of the Comcast franchise ordinance for a period concluding 06/30/2032. So moved.
So moved by Council Member Melkief. Made the motion. Discussion on the motion? Hearing none, call for a vote. All those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. All those opposed same sign. Motion carries three zero. Alright. So we've got a franchise agreement. We've got a tax abatement hearing and we're in good shape. The next we have our consent agenda tonight. It consists of three items. We have general disbursements through June payroll
through June 17 of $25,004.18 Wire payments through June 17 of $16,164.98 We also have approval of a resolution 25.65 supporting the application for a Be Active, Be Green bench grant consideration. And third is approval of community park stormwater maintenance agreement between the Rice Creek Watershed District and the City of Falcon Heights. Do I have a motion to pass the consent agenda?
So moved. So moved by Mayor. All those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. All those opposed same sign. Motion carries three-zero. The highlights on on this one for people who didn't read through the packet and all of the great information considering the, our stormwater agreement, how we can safely handle the water that's going to be generated around, the park, including some of the new we're gonna have a new retaining pond as part of, part of that process, so that'll be there.
And if I understand it, our be active, be green, bench, we have we received seven of them for the park last year or the year before or at some point. Now we're looking to to acquire three more, and, these would be at Grove Park. Yes. Correct. Okay. Which is good news. Their benches are tough. Yeah. Yeah. It would be really nice to, get those replaced with those nice, be active, be green, ones. So those are all that step is put into motion. That's so that we can apply for the grant.
Right? Yeah. Correct. And kind of a little bit on the grant too. So, you know, usually, it's, pretty straightforward. We're able to get them. This one, you know, I think that, you know, that one challenge is that we, lease the park. So we continue to lease Grove Park from the University of Minnesota, kinda working with the, you know, the the county and kind of on this grant. We think that it's still pretty probable that we have kind of a good long term lease on this. There's not a indication that that's gonna transfer kinda during this lease agreement or, sorry, the grant agreement, but, that might be the only thing.
So we'll kinda see, but we think it's worth trying to do because they're nice really nice benches. If anyone's seen the ones we have at Community Park, high quality benches and the current ones there, yes, they need replacement badly. So Cool. Alright. Well next we'll move on to the policy items. Tonight we've got, two of them. Our first one is ordinance 2,505 updating our city commissioner code. Administrator Linehan, I'll leave you to maybe highlight and bring tell people what this is all about.
Sure. Thank you, mayor and council. So kind of the the start in the history of this is during our 2025 budget process last fall. Kind of one of the, council directions from council member Mielke was, you know, the request to look at, compensating our commissioner. So that kinda kicked off this, you know, this look at our code, kinda how we need to go about and do that. We adopted that as part of the budget. We included additional 21,000, assuming that we paid each, full commission for the full year. We knew though that there was additional work that needed to be done just to kinda plan for this.
Everything from, you know, our current payroll is, essentially the, you know, the 11 city staff members, a couple you know, the five council members, for kind of the monthly payroll and then, part timers. But our commissioners are, you know, there's about 30 plus additional commissioners. So there's just different considerations we had to build in. But because we're amending code anyways, this was a chance to clear up some stuff. We ran into some challenges just with commissioners. It was a lot of, kind of past practice was how we did a lot of our appointing commissioners,
how we determine terms. And so we really knew that it was a challenge for our staff to kinda figure this out every time we'd come across a new issue with commission appointments or, you know, kinda commission standings and rules. So what we did is we actually created a new section in our administrative manual, all about commissioner appointments. And so that's in here. We did do a couple little changes, kinda had mentioned. One change is we did add some language. We've gotten requests from commissioners who let's say they serve their two, three year terms. That comes up. When can they come back? Right?
And so and we've had that happen historically. We've had commissioners who come and they serve, take a period off, and then they wanna come back to the commission. And so we kinda created a little bit of stipulation there. They need to take a year off just so it's not like, you know, a thirty day waiting period type of thing. So we built that kind of in throughout this, kind of this code. The additional one we wanted to do too is we looked at youth commissioners from the council's direction at our past workshops. There was a desire to kinda bring back the youth commissioners. We struggled internally from staff's perspective. There just wasn't any language, you know. Were they a voting member?
Are they an additional? What ages are considered youth? So kind of adopted that throughout this, and then kind of also looked a little bit more at, some of the other policies, quorum and other issues that we've had. We tried to kind of, fix through this. So in the packet, you'll find, there's a draft ordinance, and then there's also summary ordinance, and then as well as our administrative manual, on commissions, which is kind of our guiding document. A little bit about, you know, kind of I know the council's aware, but just so someone's watching, the administrative manual. It's kind of an internal document.
We have city code, which is law. An administrative manual is adopted by the council. It's policy, but it's not necessarily, like, the public law. It's more of a staff guidance. We use this kind of as a determination of, like, you know, how are we gonna rule on a certain issue knowing that we have the council's direction or a once upon a time council for a lot of the administrative manuals. So kind of that's our history of this. We think it sets up well. Council's talked about this at a couple different workshops. We've just kinda taken time, amended, and the biggest thing too was just planning for the pay of commissioners.
In this, we're we state that the pay would start 08/01/2025, giving us, again, additional time. The next step is, at all the July meetings and kinda working through, we're gonna need to collect all the the pay information from the commissioners, you know, getting, w nines and, you know, essentially their, direct deposits and stuff like that. So, also we'll mention the pay is voluntary, so some people can choose not to take the pay as well. And it's $50 per month. Per meeting. Per meeting attended. Per meeting. Yeah. $50 per month. Yeah. Per meeting. 50 per month per meeting. I appreciate all the work that was done to on all these different gray areas.
So, yeah, I'm hoping that pay will be an incentive for youth and for others potentially remove the barrier for being on a commission. If they can cover their childcare or or get takeout or whatever they need to do to make that get to a meeting at 06:30. Makes sense. Yeah. Or just feel valued. Yeah. Yeah. I like, any move we make to make our city government more inclusive, accessible to Falcon Heights residents. It's a good it's a good move. So I'm really happy with the final product here.
Yep. And, $50 isn't a lot of money, but it's enough to make it worth your while to, to do that rather than all volunteer. The, I think as well. So any, did this can also so so future edits to the, to the manual. Those come before the council as well, don't they? Yes. Correct. So as part of things. So find something doesn't quite work, we can always go back and look at it again. Mhmm. But otherwise, it does provide a a nice starting point to answer all of those questions that we've had,
and it'll be good. Do I have a, motion to approve, ordinance twenty five zero five updating the city commission code and the, summary ordinance twenty five zero five, for publication? So moved. So moved by Melkie. Further discussion? Hearing none, all those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. All those opposed same sign. Motion carries three-zero. Our next item for policy is consideration of July 4 City Hall holiday in '20 beginning on July 3.
Is this for 2025 or is this for subsequent years? Just for, I just want to make sure. This is for 2025 given, the holiday falls on a Friday. To to have have the holiday hours here begin July 3 at, 01:00PM. That city hall would be closed and staff members are able to, take the holiday. Is that right? Yes. Administrator Lindenhall, let you better describe the, No. Yeah. That exactly is it. So, essentially, it got brought kind of our to our attention as we were talking among staff,
just planning schedules, that, you know, this year, July 4 is a Friday. A lot of people, that's very exciting. But for us, kind of in our summer hours, you know, it is a nice benefit to staff, but kinda looking at it, we also do kind of as part of our personnel policy, another part of our administrative manual, is the, kinda holidays. So that's where council adopts which holidays. We just added Juneteenth, you know, a few years ago to that holiday list. Staff appreciates that. But, traditionally, you know, we assume that's eight hours of holiday pay provided. And so kind of under this, the request would be that, you know,
we just reduce because there's four staff will come in for normally four hours on Friday that essentially to close four hours early on July 3. We're bringing this as a policy item just because I, you know, I didn't wanna just throw this on the consent agenda. Just wanted council to be able to, give direction on this one. You know, I would say if if this is something that, you know, it's not a big deal, we could look at this and bring this forward in the future in a personnel policy manual update and just include that and say, if a Summer holiday. Summer holiday because this could happen on Juneteenth as well.
That would make sense. The Juneteenth one. Because we do have language like, you know, if it falls on a Saturday, for example, we celebrate it on the Friday. Sunday, we celebrate it on Monday. You know, Monday. Yep. So kinda have that spelled out, but we don't really have summer hours. I'm sure the city's ran into this historically. It just hasn't happened in the last with this group of staff, essentially. So, that would be kind of our our request and recommendation if the council approves. Makes sense to me. Same. Same. Alright. Do I have a motion to, let's see. Do we does this require a a this isn't a formal item,
is it, that has a number? No. We didn't do a resolution for this. I would say, I take that, you know, the council could consider that as a friendly amendment, to do for 2025 just to kinda specify that. You know, I think that we would understand it that way, but it might be good. So we would just request just a general motion of approval, to, you know, recognize Thursday, 07/03/2025 as the start of the fourth of July holiday based on our work schedules. For, so the, Thursday, July 3 at at one 1PM. It's the start of the 07/04/2025 holiday And would for staff members.
And would you want to add a friendly amendment so to modify it for going forward if a holiday falls on a Friday during the summer? That's a yeah. A very fair point. I think, what we could do with that is if kind of, you know, knowing if counsel's supportive of that, we'll bring that I'll put a note in for our future personnel policy update, and then we'll include that in the personnel policy. So if everyone's kind of on board with that, we'll next time you see the personnel policy, which there will be changes in the future, we'll include that as one of our items in there.
Yep. And we we make an annual approved statement of what the holidays are going to be. Correct? Yeah. Yeah. One thing the council does too is kind of in December we approve the, calendar for the next year. Calendar for the next year. And so that's something we can kind of include as that too. Yeah. Make this as part of that in the future so that we're anticipating it and looking ahead instead of Catching it mid first. Catching it mid first. Okay. Has council provided sufficient direction on that one for the motion?
That sounds good. Thank you. And my apologies that it's a little, little loose there for that. So appreciate the, friendly amendments. Okay. Let's see. I'll get a chance. I'll move that one. There you go. Further discussion? K. All those in favor signify by saying aye. Aye. Opposed? Same sign. Okay. There we all get a chance to, to get one on there. Let's see. Information and announcements. Council member Melki? Sure. The state fair task force met last week and it's our the annual attendance of Christy Noonan,
marketing director, and Mike Hagen, the operations director, to talk about changes that the fair is making for the the upcoming fair and improvements that they've done. I think it's good news for Falcon Heights residents who enter the North Gate off point that they will be widening that. They had also if you had anyone went last year, I mean, the lines were all the way to Snelling. So they're widening that gate and adding an extra metal detector. And they're also increasing police presence on the fair,
taking more measures for safety with kind of the change in social norms, and, yeah, seemed open to a discussion for a joint powers agreement with our city similar to what they do with Saint Paul and Roosevelt and agreed to a meeting on that topic, which would be good news for our city. And also that was a good discussion. Otherwise, I just really appreciated the opportunity to attend the Strong Towns Gathering in, Rhode Island and just many great sessions and discussions, the duration of it. So I was grateful for that.
It's good. Cool. Looking forward to the ideas that spring forth from that in the coming year. Or, you know, as it'll happen. Yep. Cool. Anything else? No. Oh, yes. I should I want everybody to sign up, register their garden to be in the garden walk. Okay. This is on July 19, but you can go to the website. It's pretty easy under the residence column. It says lawn and garden tours. I think that's one of the items that you can check on and register your garden. And you don't have to be home if you want to. You can have a QR code and bring people to a description.
Oh, but best if you can be there and host it. Okay. Share what you know and what you've learned. Well, that should be fun. Great. Council member Meyer. Yeah. So we had planning commission meeting last night, kind of finalized, some changes to well, not not really not a lot of changes to city code, really. Just cleaning things up, modernizing them, making it easier to read and and and clearer and, just a a more useful document, I think, to anyone that, wants to build anything or,
do anything in our within our city. So yeah. Or I just forget her title. The commute what's Hannah's title? Community development. Community development coordinator slash planner. Community development coordinator slash planner. Hannah Lynch, has has done a really good job just diving into that. And, yeah, council will we'll see those code changes, I think, in our next workshop. But they'll I yeah. They they make a lot of sense. And, yeah, just another testament to our our staff, constantly trying to actually improve how our city functions,
not just run the city, but, like, make it more efficient and more user friendly for residents and anybody who wants to do business here. It was a good meeting. Cool. That's it. And it's great to have, citizens who like to be policy wonks to serve as volunteers on the planning commission to, go through all of that that fun stuff about, oh, what if we use this word instead of that word and the implications that, happen with it. It's, fun fun commission. Good question. No. I just without Melanie here, I just wanna make sure we remind people of Unity Oh,
yeah. And and, yep. July 6? July 6 is is, restoration. Restoration day here in Falcon Heights and Ramsey County. And, the opportunity to reach out to others and restore relationships, I think, is probably the best way. Either thinking on one's own or reaching out to people that you may have a disagreement with or difference of opinion and try to restore your civility is one way to to view it.
And, kind of the focus of that. It's an introspective and yet outside one as well. And then Unity Day on July 7 will be the chance for everybody to get together again and, and really work towards that more unity. And there will be a barbecue, I believe, here at City Hall on the on the front lawn that, Valerie Castillo hosts and, puts together for everybody. It's one of those, things to help, commemorate and look at,
the death of her son, Philando, back in 2016 on, that time and how to how how we move forward and, and get along with unity with each other and, make make the world a better place one relationship at a time. So that, that'll be happening here at City Hall, on the front lawn on the seventh, which is a Monday. Correct. So that'll be Monday evening, the seventh here. I think at about six, 05:00? Yep. Yeah. 05:30. 05:30. There we go.
Halfway in between five and six at 05:30. Stop on by and talk and celebrate. So there's that that's going on. The, say, we'll have city hall closed on Thursday afternoon and Friday this week or next week. The, there's a other things that are happening. I'll be up in, Duluth at the Minnesota League of, Cities annual conference that'll it's going on now, and that's why Todd was up there. The, and then, all kinds of different sessions, you know. I should have you look through the, that only have usually,
if there's two or three of us there, we can split up the 15 different sessions that one could go to and choose from. And, go you take this and report back. So, if you have an interest in one, I can, can attend it. But, that and I know that a lot of excitement and conversation over the, announcement on the Les Bolstad golf course sale that, is kind was kind of an interesting window of opportunity opening for the for the city of Falcon Heights and the surrounding area that,
we'll see what happens in the months and years ahead on that one. But, probably for an update on that, I'll turn this over to administrator Linehan for things that also are going on. Yeah. Thank you, Mayor and Council. Just a couple updates. Council covered a lot of it. Head back to the fifties this weekend. Obviously, high heat kinda, you know, I don't know if that dropped through those cow crowds, but overall went very well, from kind of, you know, signage and everything, was fine for our staff. And we didn't receive a lot of complaints to city hall, which was good.
So hopefully everyone enjoyed it and had a good time. We have the ice cream social. We'll be here Thursday, July 17 from five to seven. So city hall's new location for it. Definitely, kinda some pros and cons with having it here. One of the pros is that we have air conditioning, and a little bit better weatherproofing, and bathrooms. So, all of that, we're hoping that it'll kind of have a good event. Working on that with kind of staff. So please come out five to seven. And then we just had our kickoff meeting last week with New Look Contracting, our selected contractor for the community park upgrades. Got the timelines from them kind of on the start dates,
kind of the good news, bad news. The good news is is they're all ready to go. Very good contractor. We have lots of plans. Everything dick is dictated right now based on the delivery of the shelter materials. So if we recall, we have the shelter restroom building. That's currently scheduled for mid September. And so what that means though is then they kinda start the process about four weeks prior. So we're looking at about mid August will be our kickoff. So staff's working right now. We're disconnecting all the utilities. So working with Excel to get all the, gas electric lines out,
clear the building out of all the surplus stuff. We've been using that as our storage bins, so now we have to it's kinda like moving. You have to, figure out where you're putting your stuff next. So clearing all that out. But demolition of the building will be, they estimate one day. And so it'll be we'll have that date. And so if people are curious on that, we'll kinda share some updates as that goes. And then kind of going all the way, the project goes until November. And so everything looks pretty good. There are a couple of those kinda question, like, the final layer of of pavement for the the new, parking lot, and then also the rubber surfacing.
Those might be two of the wild cards. It might be spring, same with the splash pad, surface or splash pad cement and insulation. So luckily, what I think what we'll do is likely we'll do some sort of grand opening in, the spring or late you know, kinda early summertime next year. But everything's on on track for that. That's great. And then, myself, finance director Olsen, assistant finance director Lambert had a call today with Standard and Poor. It was a interview, basically, trying to determine our creditworthiness. So, the city's maintained triple a bond rating,
which is a very good feat for a city of our size. There aren't many our size that have it. So we'll find out next week if we're kinda keeping that kind of ahead of our bond sale. So a lot of work went into that. Kinda one of those behind the scene things of all the prep work and materials and answering questions for for them. So it was very thorough. So glad we have great finances. Shout out to, you know, our staff for doing a fantastic job of kinda getting us prepared for that. So, that went well. And then, again, kind of echoing the previous comments, we're still working. I have some meetings with kind of,
the various stakeholders and partners in the Les Bolstad Golf Course over the next, couple of weeks, and then, we'll kind of announce the council's first official review and action will be, coming up in the future. So we'll make sure to include that in our communications for residents and others in the area who are interested. So but no formal action has taken place beyond, the announcement of the sale. And then prior to that, the adoption of our Larpenter Snelling Corridor study. So continuing to update the community on that will be something we'll continue to work on as stuff becomes available. That concludes my update.
Cool. Was New Look receptive to the environment commission's input on the landscape plans? Yeah. We've taken that. We've brought it over to WSB, and I think they're kinda trying to incorporate. I think they're overall swapping different materials, I think, should be fine. So that is helpful to have for sure. Alright. Well there we go. That, we'll open up the, information announcements. Hopefully those that are watching found out what's going on in the city because a lot is happening. Open this up for community forum. I don't see anybody here for community forum.
It's too maybe it rained too much today before the, nice weather broke. Everybody was afraid of, coming in here. So at, we'll open and close community forum. At this time, let's see. Did I have a I don't think I have an official type statement for, entering into closed session, but, Oh, it's just a good comment. Yeah. If you wanted to read, just kind of the statement on it. This. As part of the the item and Okay. On item item k tonight will be a, closed session of the council where,
we'll close this. Closed session is to review confidential or protected non public appraisal data and to discuss an offer for the purchase of real property located at 1407 Larbinger Avenue in Falcon Heights. Pursuant to Minnesota State Statute 13 d, point zero five, subdivision three c one and two. We will, enter those discussions. We close this. We do keep a recording later and, should any action happen.
The only action that will happen after this period of the closed session will be adjournment of, of the council. So hence, those watching and, and on recording will, consider this the the adjournment of of tonight's meeting. Thank you for joining us at, virtually at at this meeting. And we'll now enter closed session.