Welcome to our bound city council meeting. It's Tuesday, July 8th, uh 602. Can we uh do 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. All right, got our agenda. Do we have any amendments? No. Okay. Can I get a motion to approve the agenda? A motion to approve the agenda. All right. Got a motion. Can I get a
second? Second. All right. Any discussion? All those in favor, please say I. I. I. I. Those opposed. All right. The agenda is approved. I got the consent agenda. Um, and there's a disclosure here, but
uh, items listed under the consent agenda are considered routine in nature, then evaluated by staff, recommended by staff for approval by the council, and will be enacted by a roll call vote. There'll be no separate discussion of
these items unless a council member or citizen requests. So at this time anyone present who wish to offer dissenting comment to any items on the consent agenda is invited to identify themselves and the item of concern.
Um so I have our consent agenda. Can someone go through A through E? I can do that. Um consent agenda items A through E. A approve payment of claims. B. Approve minutes from um June 24th
city council workshop and June 24th June 24th regular meeting. C. Approve resolution 25-61 approving request from Molly Williams for substantially similar use determination at 2378 Wilshire Boulevard
planning case 25506. D. Pay request number two in the amount of $319,000850 319,853.60 60s to concrete idea for public works project 25-08 and 25-09
and e miscellaneous pay request in the amount of $29,330 to Klein Underground for 2024 manhole rehab project 24-05. All right, we got A throughE on the consent agenda. Does anybody want to
pull any of those? No talking. Okay. Uh, can I get a motion to approve the consent agenda? Um, I make a motion to approve the consent agenda A through E. I got a motion. Can I get a second? Second. Roll call, please.
Council member Heric. I. Council member Mciny. Hi. Council member Pew. I. Council member Castellano. Hi. Mayor Holt. I. All right. That's all approved. Uh number five, we got comments and suggestions from anybody that's their item is not on the agenda. If you want
to come up, you get uh three minutes. Can you explain? Come on up. Give us your name and address. Of course. Tyler Piper, 5504 Church Road. Nice to see you all again. Um sorry, cat hair just flew off me. uh coming up as a
private citizen because when I made the proposal for Edgewater, I was not yet on the parks and open space commission. So that was part of how that whole grant was laid out in ter in terms of how I was going to kind of organize and kind of direct the duties. Well, I was happy that today I finally received
confirmation from Henipin County that that grant has been accepted. Nice. So, um very happy it was I think 34 applicants and 13 were accepted. So, Edgewater Park is one of them. um as uh I believe it was in January, I can't remember the exact meeting, 22nd or
11th, um there was a request for $1,750, which was the city's contribution, and then we'll be receiving $5,000 as a part of that. Um I spoke recently with the neighbor, which was a really nice experience, Chuck. He says him and his
uh believe significant other sometimes visit and uh pick the strawberries or, you know, enjoy the flowers and stuff nearby. So, kind of let him know I was in the early stages of hearing about it that it was on the horizon and he didn't have any complaints and seemed to welcome it and I plan on doing rounds
with the the rest of the neighbors. Um, so more to come. I'll be kind of funneling stuff hopefully through the parks and open spaces commission just to save your guys time. But if there's any decisions or um kind of deferring to, you know, how how does the city of Mound
want to use that 1750, whether it's for signs or whether you feel you'd rather put it on, you know, for this side of um the proposal, it's kind of has to be stuff that was already allotted and agreed to by by all of us really here. But um that would be the decision that, you know, should it be a concern, I can
always remove myself as a vote from, you know, that parks and open spaces commission decision if necessary. But really, I'm just excited to get plants in the ground. Uh because of the timing, it's probably going to be a fall planting. And I know I'm running up on three minutes, so I'm keeping it short. But I just got the I just got the uh the
email today. So, I just wanted to share the good news and thank you all for, you know, going with me through the process. It was like a December to uh January to multiple meetings, I believe, in February and March and April. And so, thank you all very much and just looking forward to communicating more on that.
All right. Thank you. All right, number six, we got Orno Police Department. Were you on the consent agenda? Can we go now? Yeah, you can go enjoy the the beautiful weather. All right, number six, we got Orno Police Department with the June 2025
activity report. Good evening, Mayor Council. Uh, so the last few weeks we've been pretty busy. Um we've had a lot of activity um a lot of people coming our area. So our calls for service are up. Nothing that's alarming. It's just more
people in our area, more people um taking part in activities around us. So it's one of those things. Uh summers kicked off and we've seen it. Um this weekend was busy. Um the officers were call to call the way it sounds. Uh two
weeks ago we got uh very very fortunately we got hit. We got the best that we could have got from a storm. There was two tornadoes on the ground. We were working. Um, they were very close to our area, but we ended up with just a few trees down, just a few wires
down. We got her all handled. So, I think uh we were very fortunate. We were happy that it happened the way it happened. So, we got that handled. Uh, just some things from our office. Uh, Spirit of Lakes is pretty well set, I'm
told. Um, and they're just putting a few final things in place as of right now. Uh, new officer Colton Beck started yesterday. I just got done on the range with him. Spent all day out there. He's doing really well. Um, he's got a lot
of, uh, good knowledge of the, uh, job, so he's going to be doing fine, I think. Uh, K9 Onyx is going to be sworn in next Monday, the 14th at in Orno for our police department. And so he'll be there
um receiving his badge. And then we have a new intern that started with us. She is interested in the profession. So she'll be doing some stuff around the PD just trying to experience our our uh career. And then we also have a new reserve that started and we're
looking at him to maybe move into replacing Colton Beck who was our cadet. So other than that, that's all we have at this time. If there's any questions, can I try to answer them? Council, have any questions? I think so. So, you guys, you aren't
there's no open positions right now or just the cadet? I want to say there is we do have room for one. Uh, but it's one of those plus one officer deals where it's somebody's got to come from the community, no background in law enforcement, and then
we send them to school to learn. So, but that's what we're kind of waiting on to try to use that. Thank you. All right. Thanks. Appreciate it. Thank you. All right. Number seven, we got receive
final plans and order advertisement for bids. Lastly, comments phase two. And just a caveat to this, the next one we'll talk about number eight will be phase two and a half where we'll focus
on the artwalk part of this. Welcome. Thank you. Good evening, mayor and members of the council. Matt Bowman, city engineer. Uh, so I was here two weeks ago meeting with you guys and kind of discussing the plans at the 95% stage and we talked through some elements in there to to keep and and to to drop and
some tweaks to that. Um, I also want to point out to the fact that unfortunately we did have a a error in our calculations last time. The the estimate was was off on that. Um, what we have for you today that incorporates everything that you brought up and then
um we did we had another meeting yesterday. So, you have another estimate in front of you um where we we tweaked the numbers a little bit more, tighten them up on the electrical side and so they're they're slightly lower than what's in the the packet for you there. Um so in the well I'll just go over some of
the items in a little bit more detail. So items included in this portion of the project the concrete paving of the plaza um north end and the seating area and south side installation of lighting area installation of lighting elements and electrical around the park um finalizing the landscaping generally around the
perimeter excluding the that um southeast portion of it. And then interpretive signs and wayfinding sign updates. Uh then some items that are included as alternates are the decking replacement at the performance area, chairs at the plaza, trail upgrades, the concrete on the southeast side of the
park. Um and then one other there's a wayfinding sign that was damaged and completely removed and we also moved that down in an alternate just so that we have some option to keep keep this all within the budget. Um and the next piece there goes over what we pulled. So
potentially for the project two and a half um the art installations, hammock posts, um landscaping of the artwalk, I think that generally covers it. So um within the the city's long-term financial plan, the budget for this year was 884,000.
Um that's with the inflation. So the the number that I had presented to you last time in that table was our initial draft from two years early in 2024, I believe. So the budget's 884,000. Our total estimated project cost without the
alternates is 790 um as of now. And then uh and then with the alternates is $860 or $861,000. on the last page of the of the um
estimate that I handed out to you kind of breaks down some of the pieces in a little bit more detail as far so there's removals, earthwork and hardscaping, a landscaping section um wayinding and interpretive and then electrical and so if we aren't comfortable quite with the
budget that we can cut through some more potential pieces to drop out and and save for future phases and then um so I got a blank spot there for art additional landscaping is two and a half. And then I pulled together kind of a rougher estimate for the
future phase. So that would be the getting the um open air shelter installed and then the rest of the concrete up in the the plaza area and a little maybe a little bit of additional there. So and then so at the bottom you see that that total estimated is 500.
The long-term financial plan if we were to build it this year that dollar amount would be 651,000. So there is theoretically some room there to work with. Um that were because we'd swapped some pieces between the phases two and three. Okay.
Can you pull up the map quickly? It's on page 9. Okay. So, just I know we're going to talk about the art part in a second, but the trees on the right side of that's in the current bid. Yeah, those are all in the current bid.
Okay. Um those ones there cuz that might change depend on what we've talked about in about five minutes. Um Okay.
Well, because if we do our I mean it it might kind of screw up what our plans are for the walk part. Um, you know what I'm saying? Yeah, I guess it depends on how much plans. Yeah, maybe you suggest it. Well, and maybe we table this and come
back after the Arwalk and then do the whole thing or something, but um I I just I want I want her to show her vision. I guess I I couldn't remember if we kept all those trees there, but I thought we were going to take half of them out and just leave
Yeah, the four or something. Yeah, the four. Okay. The So, so these ones are meant to be evergreens. Yeah. In frontier. Keep those. Okay. And then these are kind of deciduous a mix there. I don't know the exact um species off the top of my head with this map. And they might be there, but I just
before we approve it, I just don't want to I want her to show her Yeah. thing before we get too far. Um So, yeah. You guys can bring me back up if that's what you want to do. We could do that. What are we approving exactly? Well, the rest of it. The rest.
Well, I I have some questions and concerns about what happened in our meeting last night because I mean last two weeks ago, um, one is I think we made decisions as a council that should have been in a working group and shouldn't have been part of a council
decision because people were making comments based on personal knowledge and not necessarily expertise. So like saying what kinds of trees we should talk to an arborist around that you know as to what makes sense for trees to
plant environmental we decided to not do as many native plants and the comment was made it's too much maintenance for public works public works didn't say that we said it on this stat when I went to league cities I found out that uh
Victoria and Delano do natural planting things and have no problems with it being extra the first two years. Yes, it is more work but after that you know so there were things like that the mention of doing anora I can't say it anyway the
chairs those chairs are not accessible and I got a lengthy letter from someone with disabilities who've said that they felt that we dishonored older people in this town and people with disabilities by identifying that kind of chair which clearly is not accessible and I did
raise that at the meeting and it was sort of pushed aside side it is not you know so as a council we should be setting um standards we should say we want it to be universally accessible we should talk about having environmentally appropriate
plantings and things like that instead of identifying and and trying to design the plan you know that's why we had the consultants design it we should be giving the overall vision and the guidelines um for it and also um something I just
got exposed to which I'd like for us to look at would be the use of solar l light lighting in the park which we could potentially have significant cost reduction for us in operating that that system um and
stuff and plus I've been back to that park three times this week on my I do a onem walk every day so I'm becoming known as the lady in the w walker in town um But I think that there are things that we missed. Um,
there are some historic plaques in the park that were part of the road system. No one quite knows the history. I had asked staff and we were going to try and find out. But we we need to be more mindful as a council what our role is,
not as designers of the park because I think that we've steered some things that may be inappropriate and making it uh the park that we want. Any other com comments? Well, to Sherry's point, that's one thing. I don't consider myself a subject
matter expert on plantings, but however, I do consider myself a taxpayer and I think we need to think long and hard before we spend money on something. I mean, I know darn good and well that those evergreens are not going to make it. It is way too windy over there.
They're just not going to make it. I guess I would defer to I mean to your point, too. I mean, I we picked, you know, where we want trees or we don't want trees, but where shouldn't be designing the park? And I mean, I would defer to the experts on that. I want there to be trees, but I don't want to pick what kind they are,
right? I don't know, you know, but I don't want to I don't want to have no trees, a lot of sun. How do you guys pick that those evergreens? Are they going to last? I mean, yeah. I mean, we have landscape architects. They're they're not necessarily trained arborists, but they
understand what what grows well, where. Um, and then the ones that we pick based on what the aesthetics that we want for the site. And then, um, specifically like the ones in the north, we want to make sure that those don't get too tall, but they're still evergreen, so they can be decorated for for the winter. Um, and
going back, we we actually all of the the flowering plants. I believe almost all of them are still native plants, but they're ones that are not going to be spreading and suckering, and so they're not going to be over they're not going to overload public or public works park staff on maintaining those types of things. We did
clear all that up. Um, so that every everything in there is kind has been vetted between all the groups that are going to be taking care of it. Are we still doing that concrete wall on the top there? The on the very top. Yeah. Up here. Yeah. And that and that one's kind of
just because, you know, we wanted to get this lower and flatter that. But you can sit there and it and it's accessible, right? That's kind of why we kept it. Yeah. Ideally, that was going to be accessible. If we don't keep that in there, we're going to have to have a fairly steep piece of concrete to match into what's going on with the back of
the um the Three Rivers Park sign stand there. Now, it's accessible as in you can sit on it, but there is no handles. It's just a piece of concrete, right? It's just a piece of concrete. Yep. But we do call it accessible. It's a correct height, maybe. Is that
what you're Yeah, it's it's going to vary. So, it's going to be fairly short. It's going to kind of be like kids height on this side and then adult height on that side. Oh, okay. It kind of So that that this one this one varies. This one down here in the um
performance area will be um I believe 18 in. Will we have spaces where someone could bring a wheelchair in? Will there be open like areas where someone might say I I will my wheelchair here or a walker could go in and people sit on their
walkers? Well, that's the whole other part of concrete. Yeah. Over here at the I mean obviously the the a chairs. I'll call them. Yeah, I can't say the word either. Aderondac. Aderondac chairs. Um yeah, they are tough. I mean, even I
have a bad back and so do you. You can't get out of them. Well, I can't I don't think we should be deciding either. Yeah, but I don't I don't Does it have to be perfect for everybody? I mean, I don't I
think you you try to make it so it's accessible, but that's but that's why we left a concrete wall in last time I thought cuz that had accessibility features. I I think I even said I there's no way I'm going to sit on a concrete piece of whatever but but it is accessible I guess. I don't think we should get into like
the minutia of that like you know we shouldn't be choosing the chairs when and defer to the experts like council member Pew said but you can have both. I mean, if you go to the commons in Excelsier or go to Isizetta, they have like the chairs or like a table with four chairs that everyone can get in and out of and then in a separate spot maybe under a
tree, you can have some aderondex or whatever. You don't we can have multiple types of seating, but I would I would leave that to someone else's. Right. So, it' be a combination. We'd have the eight chairs up around that what was going to be a fire pit. Yeah. And then we can discuss further what
other types of seating we could use down there. But I think to Sherry's point, the area that's going to be used for presentations and stuff would be accessible to a wheelchair as well as a walker. Yeah, it's going to be cement. I mean, you're going to be able to wheel or walk or
it'll be very very accessible platform, but yeah, I mean, you're not going to sit, you know, sit on the ground on the concrete. So, you're not going to have a chair be on the concrete wall that you could sit on, right? So, but I guess we
could add other feature. I guess accessible feature or maybe they have those chairs that are easier to get out of maybe like a higher level. We put one integrating. It's like when you go into a movie theater now, usually when the
level you come in, there's a row and there'll be handicap seats and there'll be empty spaces in between so that one or two wheelchairs could fit in. or orchestra hall in Minneapolis, they have a row in which there's like a a table
and there are fold there are chairs that sit there, but then if people have walkers or wheelchairs, they just move the chairs out and they can roll right into it. So, you can incorporate it. I'm just saying, you know, we want to make sure that there's access.
I mean, these chairs will be movable. So, I mean, hypothetically, we could leave one open and a wheelchair could come in and there M and that I mean would that be considered accessible? I don't know. But let's say if you have a walker and you're coming and you want to sit down, you ain't sitting in those.
Then you're going to go on the on the wall. Some people do sit in the walkers. Yeah, the walkers have No, I'm saying Well, yeah. I guess the Mine has the Yours hasn't. Yeah. I feel like we're a ways off from having to make those kind of decisions.
Well, that I think that that's why I'm just saying we need to just leave that to the design team to make sure that those are incorporated and that we shouldn't get into the specifics of the furnishings and pitch us their ideas.
What about the designer? I don't know if that's you or No, I'm I'm I'm more of a roads and water man type of guy. So, Matt, I do have a couple questions that came to when I was looking through this. Um, we've had a lot of wiring stolen out of, you know, lighting poles
and stuff in St. Paul and Minneapolis. Do we have anything that'll protect our w copper wiring from being disturbed in that bid? Copper wiring um for being like stolen after it's installed. Yes. Yeah, I believe. Um Okay. I'm just asking. I want to make
sure. And then um the outlets that we're installing, will they be locked or So, we that was one of the the changes we made yesterday when we met. Most of them are going to be part of um like the lighting poles or the ballards. And so they're going to have a Okay. We call a weatherproof cover on there.
And then I believe we're going to have that controllable with the breaker if necessary. All right. And then lights on the gazebo thing. I don't know what to call it. We're not touching anything down there. Do those lights work or do we know? Do you know, Ryan? There's a little round
portal looking lights all around that. They do not. Then someone has strung some lights up and ran an extension cord down the back and it's plugged into one of your outlets. They're just those green garden lights with the light bulbs from those from Christmas.
Were they there from Christmas? I don't know if they had green. We did that walk through. No, they're just still must have come back up. They were down. They were down at some point, but they were there last week. So, I don't know. But yeah, there's an extension
cord. But anyway, just an FYI. Um, and then we're replacing the wood on the flooring, but I went over there and I looked at like the column. This thing is deteriorating rapidly. In fact, one of these bases to these columns, you can literally pull wood out. So, if we're
going to fix the floor, I think we might want to take a look at repairing or conditioning the actual structure. I don't know what that's called. I'm assuming we're calling it a gazebo. Well, since that's existing already, is
that like kind of in our CIP? I will add that two years ago we did some rehab to it and this is where we're at with it. We don't have CIP to replace it because it was a part of where we want to go with this and we
we haven't had that on the list yet. It's pretty bad. So now that it's part of the new park or like we, you know, think it will be, should it be? Is that something that we should probably be added to go into design of what we want to see there? Yeah. Well, a quick fix. You guys could
fix it. Yeah. It's not a fix. It's not fixable. It's not a fix point. It's in pretty money into it two years ago to get it to this point. I'm just talking like way later. Like you get it fixed and then it's like, okay, well in 10 years what are we going to do? You know, every every piece of something in the park,
it's rotting. It's 200 24 years old. Would it with the trail or did it go in with the the canal? This whole section coming out. I think it's 2001. Yeah, we don't we don't have that included. It was
That's Yeah, that's why I was bringing it up because it's in I don't know. Go down and look at it, Ryan. But in my opinion, it's I mean, literally, there's wood coming out. There's parts that have rotted away. There's the column itself looks like it's still in decent condition, but what it's sitting on is rotting.
Yeah. The foundation is a problem. Yeah. And then if the lights don't work, I mean, I'd kind of like to get those lights working that are the little port hole lights. They look very nautical. I didn't even notice they were there till I walked down there and really looked. Are they the ones that are like three feet high? Uh, they might be, but
they're in the column comes down and then there's a base and they're in the base. You can see that I mean, I don't know if they're repairable. Probably not. Plus, they're probably not LED if they're 20 years old. Correct.
Right. So anyway, yeah, do we want that added into our estimate? I realized if it has to be fixed, I mean, we don't want it falling apart with a brand new $2 million park.
I mean, is it falling like tomorrow going to fall apart? I wouldn't say tomorrow, but it's literally there's pieces coming off of it. Like I can lift it in the CF. So we can do the CF for next year. So we could save some money if we something else at this point. Yeah, we could simplify it.
Is it cheaper to do it as part of this? I wouldn't think it would be cheaper to do part of this, would you? No, it just timing. Yeah, the kind of why we didn't touch too much of that space down there is because we didn't performance area improvements was kind of an open-ended, right,
item as far as what the what the community would want down there. And so we just figured the decking would be a good make sure that's good good and safe and it's an alternate so we can keep it or pull it at any point or maybe that all just gets held off until fa phase three. I think the railings are fine, aren't
they, Ryan? I I didn't. So I don't think it's a safety issue. Depending on which one. Yeah. Yeah. That was the problem. one of the railings rotted and then we had them rebuild one and touch up as much as possible to hold it together for if we
realistically put it in phase three and we did the decking at the same time I think that will be the realistic end of life for if it's say five years out I think that we could put that you like
you said put it out into the future the humanities council admin Minnesota has these sort of co c cultural heritage grants of 150,000 and more and maybe we could look at going for a grant like that once determined how we're going to
use the deck to fund that kind of rehab that does the floor have to go under that foundation I yeah that that's what I was yes that's the end of it so the floor would have to go in underneath that.
Okay. It's sitting on concrete though, but I don't maybe I don't know. Ryan, do you know? I know it's sitting on concrete and the boards. I don't think there's footings underneath that sits on.
Okay. Do we want to do we want to pause and Yeah. Do you have any Did you bring anything? I do. I did. And if you'll indulge me for a moment. Well, do we want to pause on this and then go to number So, pause on the resolution on
Yeah, we won't. Not that we're tableabling it, just pausing on it and then we'll come back to it. Okay. You want me to sit down or sit down here? Sit down, man. Stand. Why don't we do for this for Robert's rule of order? Why don't you just make a motion to move this up the agenda? Okay.
The the other item. Uh I make a motion to move number seven which is receive final plans and order advertisement for bids lost lake commons phase two move it from seven to eight
and move number eight which is lost lake commons park phase uh phase 2 and a half to number seven. Uh that's my motion. Can I get a second? Second. Okay. Any other discussion? All those in favor please say I. I
those opposed. All right. So, now we're on number eight. Uh well, which is number seven then? Yeah. Last lake comments art walk phase two and a half. Go ahead. Well, again, if you'll indulge me for a moment, I um
I want to leverage our history of Tonka Toys, and I'm going to pitch that we use that side of the park as the artwork to give a tribute to Tonka Toys, give Mound it some identity. And and again, I'm not a
I'm not an artist. I'm just a conceptor. So, I literally just put this down as a concept to see if to see possibilities and the possibilities are pretty endless. You know, if we would agree with this, you know, you'd work with the historical society and find an artist,
what have you. But I just was having fun trying to put put together some things that could give mound a little bit more of a landmark feel. And I'm going to hand these out. On the back is kind of my mockup. And on the
front, you're gonna have to get oriented a little bit because I flipped the map around. I'll be so like this is the way you've been used to looking at it. And then I flipped it. So this way cuz I did the This is the section I'm working
on. Okay. Where the sculpture garden was going to Yes. So just so you're oriented when you flip it over. Um, that's kind of what I was drawing out some. I mean, there's so many ideas. I can't
stop myself, but I'm also not an artist. So, um, but you know, if you read through this and all of the the amazing history that Tonato has brought to Mount, um, I I think we could have a lot of fun
working with an artist um to come up with some kind of cool landmark type things. And if you go to the back, this is so you're at you're at the street looking this way. Okay. Mhm. And and this is where it turns off to
the Andrews Trail. So, as you're going down the street, it'd be fun. This is the welcome to Mound, Trucking Capital of the World sign that they put on every road from Spring Park into Mound during all of the 70s. Yeah.
And so, I thought it'd be kind of cool to be able to give that some notice, maybe. And again, I'm not an artist, but whoever knows who the artist is, something cool to catch your eye. And then um
to to to enter I'm calling it Tonka Lane for lack of a better term, but to enter into Tonka Lane, you know, maybe have kind of an entrance that's made out of a crane because that was our first toy off the market.
Um again, these are just ideas. I'm not I'm not a park designer, but I'm just trying to throw some. Can they get some? Oh, yeah. Oh, I'm sorry. Someone come up. Yeah, here. Pass them out. Maybe if there's more for the audience.
And I'm only bringing this up because um Jesse and I have been in touch with Tonka Toys to try to get our usage. Um I've requested using our logos between the years 1946 and 1983.
So, honestly, I don't think there should be any problem with it because they're not even registered anymore, but because we're a city, we kind of had to go through. Did you see the letter I got from the historical society? I think I sent it to Jesse, didn't I? I haven't seen it.
Yeah. Shared it with Scott. Yeah. Because I I think the issue was because it wasn't for us. It didn't Right. Yeah. I mean it was to give you a sense of historical society tried to get some usage of Tonka toys and so it's a
letter that they finally got from Hasbro on it just recently. Well, no, they got it I don't know when. Probably five 10 years ago. Oh, okay. Well, has it's in Hasbro's hands now. Yeah. What did it say about Well, it it
basically limited and gave the historical societies what's use of the name kind of, but it was for a very short ge calendar time. I mean, I you know, I think that it's it's important. I mean, I've raised this before too that
Tonka toys people don't know the history of it and it was a major employer. It made mound a regional economic center. Yeah. So, it's really key to the history. I I but more so what I I I I would love to give mound some historical identity
which we you know yeah we talk about the Indian mounds but nobody knows what they are. Well but I think it would also we have to be sensitive about that. Yeah about you can't raise that issue because you don't want people going around trying to find the mounds well that digging in them.
Right. So, but um again, I just think it's just something to noodle around while we're working on this next phase because Sure. Um as we're waiting, I noticed right before I left, Jesse, that we got an
email from Basic Fund saying they're still waiting from Hasbro. But I'm hoping that Hasbro goes, "Wow, that'd be cool." and maybe they have some fabrications already that we could use or they'd want to be part of a grand
opening. You know, we're just waiting to hear. So, but I'm just throwing it by because it just going through mound. This has bothered me since I've lived here that there is literally no acknowledgement of our
literally our leading employer for 37 years. I mean, we lost 3,000 employees when they left. And when I moved here in '89, we were still digging out of that. So there's a lot of Tonka toy fanatics out there. I think even if we worked
with um the historical society, if you recall, that one employee, I can't remember his name. He he volunteers at the museum. Yes. And he's he worked there his entire career. He was one of the designers of the first. So, you know, I think they'd all have a
lot of really great feedback. And I also on the back of this I ran out of time to put some quickly together. But so I I'm talking about this strip right here. And then you know cuz that's where you walk in the Tonka Toy Lane. And then this strip right here. I think it would be
cool to do kind of a water taxi history because those are the two um really the two things that brought us all of our dollars that made Mount for the most part. So, that might be kind of a cool
thing to introduce the um history of the water taxi, which they they brought you in there. They picked you up at the depot, which is now Minnesota Banks. Okay, that's where the depot was. And then they pick people up there off the train tracks. Then they take you out
to your cabin or to your usually it was cabins back then. But it really did have a a huge economic There is a plaque for the trolley. Well, that would be cool. It's um on the on the corner where the post office is.
There's a little cutout and there's a plaque there and there's another plaque down farther for the um train and then across the street there's one for um what was it? Steamboat.
Steamboat? No. Well, there are three different ones and um it's where they're I call them cutouts. They're little um like viewing stages um on two are on the north side of Lake Street of the Lakeshore
15 and one's on the south side and they have these built in very nicely done plaques but we don't know who did them. Oh that' be fun. Well, anyway, just I don't want to take up a lot of time, but I just, you know, like if you look at this, um, it'd be kind of cool when you
walk into I think this just my idea because I've read all these Tonka books, but start with the first years of Tonka Metalcraft, you know, and showcase their logo, talk about the founders and everything they did. Um maybe on the
other side we there are four four or five stages of the logo years that they used and each one of those years um it was the 70s that they were the most profitable moving into the early 80s
and then each of these and then maybe I just did this as like you know how you go to every cool restaurant and there's an oversized aderonda. I thought it'd be cool to be made out of metal and then in the shape of a truck and then you know
the logo would be there and you know welcome to the hometown of Tonka Toys or what have you. And what got me started on this when Jason asked if I would work on some um welcome to mound signs for the trail I'm like oh my god we don't have a tagline. So that's
when I went, okay, it could be welcome to mound, you know, hometown of Tonka Toys, birthplace of Tonka Toys, you know, whatever. And that's when I asked Jesse and Scott to reach out to uh basic fun. Jesse ended up reaching out. So
again, another correlation between the two that would bring some nice um cohesiveness. And again, I don't want to overdo this because nobody wants Tonka toy fatigue, but a couple really cool pieces of art. You know, maybe in here
you could have some sand, you know, like the toys we used to have those at Surfside, you know, the diggers. All kids love those. And it could be cool to be replicated in the first, you know, the first two toys which were the um steam shovel and the crane,
the first produced of the I I just think there's so much um that could be utilized here with a artist and with the what was his name over at the um historical society.
Oh, I I can't remember his name. Well, anyway, he he was so fascinating when we went for the tour. Um, and you know, he's been there his whole life, so he might have a lot of he might even know fabricators, you know, because there's so many people who are Tonka toy fanatics out there,
right? Um, so this is a little bit rough, but I just wanted to try to show you there are so many possibilities that could give us kind of I guess that attraction, destination attraction. And I'm I' I
think it would be a missed opportunity not to use for this portion of the park. And I would love to as we're driving in, you know, just to see some cool something honoring Tonka toys. Whoever does that, whoever crafts it, whoever fabricates it, I don't know. That's
something we would have to talk about. Didn't the sign coming into mound used to say home of the truck built or something? That is the sign right there. Is that what it said? Yeah. Okay. that was and it was 2 feet by three feet. Sure, you probably remember those signs coming in, but they
were huge and um they were there for all of the 70s. So, anywhere you drove into Mount um there was a lot of pride and I would love to honor those three gentlemen
and all the employees. No, no, no, but none of them are alive. Okay. But they they still have family You know, if you see anything on Facebook in historical anything and you put something in about Taka Toys, everybody and his brother worked at Taka
Toys in Mount and they all have great fond memories. They all have lifelong friendships from there and that's when I say honor the family members. I was just curious. Yeah. So, I don't know if anybody has any
thoughts, but I'd like to consider it. Does anybody have any comments or I guess I have a few comments and thoughts and it kind of goes back to what council member Pew said before about how we kind of got into a lot of the park at the previous meeting. Was that two meetings ago? The last meeting.
The park was last meeting. Okay. Time flies or crawls. But um my mom worked there forever. A long time. So, I mean, I I like I like the idea of it and like you said, you don't want to get Tonka toy fatigue and, you know, there's a way to
like look at it and design it and do it right and like relook at it and then look at it again and just but like the little the digger like little toys. I mean, having Tonka Toy Lane, I think that's really cool. I like trying to explain myself to our friends on the park commission because of we kind of
picked apart some things at the last meeting, but my real main motivation was that for that was just that so it can be really well thought out. You know, I don't have a problem with the art or the hammock grove in general. I was just
thinking it's something that we can table. You know, we don't have to rush. It's not like we have to do this now or never. we can do um everything else the resolution was you know omitting I think the hammocks and and the um the fire pit and the artwalk and not saying
we don't want to do this we just we don't have to decide right now for the this part and we can pay for it later for this part only. So like for this I think it's a great or the the Tonka toy thing I think it's a great idea. uh in consider for budget, you know, going forward and
to find the right people to do the less is more and do it perfectly and pristinely. Like I don't really want less trees there than there are now, but I think like this fits right in it. I can see the trees are all still there. Um
I didn't get very specific. Yeah, but I mean it's just, you know, like I'm I'm just saying I think it's a really good idea. I like it and I I think it's just something like we can do. It's like we can finish phase two and we can decide what we want later. It's I think it's more feasible than
trying to manage um like rotating art and I don't know how we're going to or if we need to, you know, keep up on that. And I just think it's something like I'm not in the previous meeting I wasn't saying I don't think we should do it. I think we should have we should just kick it down the road a little bit.
But I think it's I think but while that's being kicked down the road, my brain was working overtime and I just thought well like this should be part of part of it, you know, like I think it looks good. Well, that's why we call it two and a half. Yeah, that's Jason and Mayor Hope called it two and a half. But it it just seems
I just don't want to miss an opportunity to give put mound on the map and we were worldrenowned. Well, it sounds like we'd have time and resources on our side just based on our of course the location mound for Tonka Toys and the historical society to
you know take the time to think of putting something together there. I guess also seeing if Hasbro and everyone is favorable of us using all of their logos and everything but well there none of those logos are registered anymore. Okay. They don't even look like the Tonka and
but the whole point of history is to introduce the logos that did make Mount Metalcraft and Tonka toys. You know, it does. The last thing I was thinking about again, I just wanted to explain kind of more myself from the last meeting too of saying like I don't think we should not do AB or C. I just
think we should, you know, like tweak phase two and then like consider these for later. And I mean the Tonka toy thing would maybe lend to a lot of really fun annual events or something, you know. I don't know what
you'll collect them, but you know, stuff like that. I mean, it's Oh, I see like like like people like land marker destination, but you know, you can kind of build like people bring their cars. Yeah. Build a calendar to the park. build a calendar around, you know, you could you could really
build a calendar of events around I guess whatever would be in the art walk thing, but the Tonka Toy thing could be like an annual, you know. Well, and also I think there are so many people, new people who live in mound who have no idea
that we are the birthplace of Tonka toys and just the historical interest alone I think would be really fascinating for people. So, I I would say we should say let's Well, I'm I guess you want to talk first.
No, I I agree. I mean, I like the idea. I think the concept is good. I've got a good friend that works for Mattel and she was like, "Oh, that is the best idea ever." She goes, "I can't believe Hasbro would turn you down." She said, um, it would almost be like a rebirth of these trucks because they're not super popular
right now. Well, they are going back to metal for their anniversary right now, but you know, they've gone to plastic and yeah, I I truly am hoping Hasbro go, "Yeah, that'd be an awesome photo op for Hasbro, you know, and maybe
fabricated items already that they've used in toy shows and you know, we'll see." So, I guess the question I would have would be for Matt, and I'm putting you on the spot, um, we were scheduled to put some sort of power over there. Will there be lighting poles over there
already? And we would look like if we were going to do one big thing like this tower item that would need power probably because we want that lit. But what else over here would need any kind of specialized lighting? You know, if we had a couple stations where they would play or sit
just going to put conduit in there with it later. Yeah. Is that going to take care of that? I think that's what we were going to do. Yeah, that was Yeah. In case there was other art there power to all the lights. Um there's going to be outlets there and then if we need to to break a circuit and add a hand anhole, we can put some up lighting. Okay.
Kind of as needed. So So my suggestion would be we take basically all those bushes out or the trees, right? Or whatever whatever you guys want to do, take some of that out for phase two.
I think it would leave if we ended up whatever route we go. Whoever is going to be concepting that area shouldn't shouldn't be shouldn't be having to work around bushes that we just put in for the sake of putting bushes in.
Um or trees. Those are all trees and this two and a half. I mean, we're not can we're not pushing this out 10 years. Yeah, we're No, but I think it would give us time to really find the right people to be involved to give us
great feedback and um um so I would suggest getting rid of those trees basically. Um you mean this year before we they're expensive. When we go back to our phase two conversation, I'd say let's scrap that
whole right side for now. So they have a blank slate. I think so. Yeah. approve the rest of it if we want to approve it. Yep. And then behind the scenes, you guys in parks and Jesse and whatever can work on what does that look like? And this would
be like a next year thing, a spring or something next year. And I think the first thing would be to meet with the historical society and and and in Hasbro. They might say, "We have the coolest stuff here. Take it all." Yeah. So I have a question though if I'm understanding this right. I kind of like
the resolution you know like on 1771 like approving phase two as it is like this. Oh like with the tree with everything that's there and then we just deal with if I'm reading this right though these evergreens are between 500 and 600 bucks a piece. So I don't know that we want to
agree to spend that money. But the trees like I don't want to have zero the trees aren't you know what they're going to be tiny. It It's nothing's going to be different than little 2-in trees. So, nothing. I'm trying to visualize it right now. I mean, right now there's
nothing there. Would it be just grass? I mean, the grass looks pretty rough. Am I on the wrong side of the side of of the lane there? Is it right now? There's nothing there. There's nothing we're going to have. Just open grass. There's All right. There's where those um the trees in the middle.
There's some trees kind of right right in that area. There's three trees. It's not as big of a space there now and the rest of it's just open. I think there's a few scattered trees. I might even consider getting rid of all those trees except for the main tree
that's there. If you remember from all the surfite stuff, people didn't want trees in the middle of their paths. You know that middle tree, the little mini the middle tree. That's the existing tree right now. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. Yeah.
And then get rid of the other two, too. I'm just too with it. I need a little bit of shade. I guess now that I know that there aren't I I guess in my head I mean I walk there all the time. It's just like when you put yourself there. I didn't realize that there was nothing there right now. So I guess I can be fine with
that. But I like to leave the rest of the trees. But yeah, there's a piece of art and just a couple on the existing. Yeah. and then like you know approving this or authorizing bid for phase two as it's laid out and then you know taking the time to look into
everything else and you know it could always have a cute sign that says coming soon. Yeah. You know under construction. Under construction with a crane holding it. That's funny. Yeah. Um
all right. So we good with we good? Yeah, it's a cool idea. All right, so let's So we're now we're done with two and a half. Let's go back to number seven, which is now item eight.
Huh? Which is now item eight. Which is now on number eight. Sorry. Okay. So now you're going to come back up. Yeah. And so basically what we're talking about is we want to make basically make a motion to approve
everything Sands that area. Yes. No, no trees on this south for now side. Okay. Yep. Okay. Any changes with the decking or anything like that or No, we're going to we're going to have to add that to the CIP like for next year. Okay. So, because I mean this could go any way
like if we don't do if we decide to do this or different art or put the trees back. I mean, that can all be it all can be reconcepted. Yeah. It's not now or never. We can work on it over the winter and do it in the spring. Yeah. That's why I call it two and a half because the three might be well
like 2.6 and 2.7. Yeah. Well, and I and I also think too that just joking. Um, you know, I'm being cautiously optimistic here, but I am really hoping that Hasbro has an interest and really does, you know, all the toy shows and
your I mean, they've got to have in their warehouse so much cool stuff. Being able to build events around it is kind of exciting, you know, it's it would be so, you know, you could have your class reunions there. I mean, you could do so many things and on the devil's advocate, too. Let's
just say someone's watching this and they're like, "That's stupid. Why would you do that?" It's not going to be the whole park. It's one little art. That's where our art walk was. And it's one little walk to give a huge tribute to a huge part of our economy, history and history,
right? Okay. So, let's someone make a motion for this. I have one more question. Okay. Sorry. Go ahead. This says hydraulic mulch with seed mixture residential turf, I think. Is that just touching up? That's touching up where we need to disturb to do the other work. Yeah.
Okay. So, back to the current turf. I wasn't here. Did we approve? We haven't paid for that yet. Yeah. And that is really bad. So that that's part of the process of the seed though is they got to get the seed growing through and then on it once it's big enough and strong enough then they can spray the weeds and then cut
the weeds and then it is generally takes better and is much cheaper than putting in soft. Did they receat it again? That's not they did reseed it again. I remember cuz I asked you about it earlier and you were like haven't been paid. Yeah, they did it last fall. It it didn't take very well. They did it again
this spring. So, that's kind of why it looks the way it does, but it it should look pretty nice by What did they spray? What did they spray these weeds with to kill? Uh, I can't tell you for sure. I don't I don't know. I don't think they've done it yet. I think we need to make sure
something. It's not nice soft green grass. There's no way. I mean, usually what they do is they do total kill, let it sit for x amount of amounts months and then they seed. because I have kids have all I've all been in landscaping and I own a company that
sells all that kind of stuff. So, it seems like it was done backwards. Usually, you kill all the weeds before you put grass seed down. Was all dirt. Yeah. There was nothing growing before they put the seed down. It's not even dirt. Yeah. Yeah.
And it just was kind of a tough winter for getting that stuff to take. So, well, we'll keep our fingers crossed and hope it looks pretty. Well, the sprinklers were on the other day. They're running twice a day right now to make sure. Yep.
Trying to get that seed to come up and be established enough that you can take care of the weed. So, this is just a hard time. It looks terrible, but when it comes in established enough, then we can actually treat it and then get the weeds out of there. And I've talked to
Dustin about it multiple times and he thinks it's going to look outstanding. It's just a matter of time. And okay, this is what you get if you don't put sod down. But in the long run, not having to deal with the sod and the kill off with the
sod and how much more watering we'd have to do, we think this will turn out fine. It's just getting it to that point and having to deal with it until how it looks until we get there. Well, the helping with the 95 the other days and that's why we're watering twice a
day now to try keep it maintained. So when should it look presentable? Do we have an ATA on that fall or next spring? I mean probably at least a month out. Yeah, I haven't stopped there and looked
in a couple weeks, so I can't say for sure, but soon they should be able to mow and then they did cut it sometime in I just saw they did cut it. Yeah. Okay. Just recently. Yeah. I think before the fourth because they were doing the crew was out there. They were doing a lot of great work
around the streets, cleaning up the beds and mowing lawns and stuff. We We haven't taken ownership of that grass yet, though. Well, someone cut it. Well, someone cut it. Yeah, that was a lot higher. That's whoever that Okay.
Okay. Well, we got our resolution. Can someone make a motion? I can do that. Okay. Um, I would like to make a mo a motion approving a resolution receiving plans and specifications ordering advertisement for bids for Lost Lake
Common improvements project phase 2 resolution 25-62. I got a motion. Can I get a second? Second. Any other discussion? And that do you have to indicate that we're not doing anything on that side of that?
I I've got it in the notes. Make sure it happens. Okay. Okay. No other discussion. All those in favor, please say I. I. Those opposed. All right. That that's approved. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Um I Okay. Now, number nine, we're going to
go into a close session. Go ahead. Okay. Um, mayor and members of the council, regarding agenda item nine, the city council will be moving to a close session pursuant to Minnesota statute section 13D.05 subdivision 3 under the
attorney client privilege. The property that is at um that is part of this closed session is uh located at 1737 Wildhurst and is currently subject to uh city code enforcement for non-compliance with the building code. The city council
requires the item to be closed for more than routine legal advice to allow for a candid and open discussion about the decision to move forward with litigation and the related issues including claims, counter claims, and possible areas of reconciliation. Nothing is presently pending before the
city council regarding the decision and discussing the matter in open session would be detrimental because it would take place in front of potential litigants and a closed session would benefit the public because any financial liability um for this matter would be taxpayer
funded. And with that staff is looking for a motion to adjourn to the close session. All right. Can I get a motion to adjurnn for close session? Motion to adjurnn to the close session. All right. Got a motion. Can I get a second? Second. Any discussion? All those in favor,
please say I. I. I. I......................................... Those..................... All right. For the close session. We'll be back. Back from our uh close session. Uh now we got number 10. We got council uh reports. Council Pio, do you have
anything? Well, um I went to the legal cities state conference uh the last week in June. Mhm. Uh learned a lot of exciting things. Uh one of which is that one of the laws passed will allow us to do video
conferencing for board meetings. So in the future that may be an option for us. Um there there are some stipulations as to how you do it but uh but it now is something that that can be done which
you know during co um would have been nice like for commissions. Yeah. For well for for board for for council like say you're in vacation in Florida you have to be in a public meeting public spot and you got to know people got to know where you're at
but you could be via a zoom or teams. So that's changed. U there were a lot of good workshops um and um got to talk with a lot of vendors. Talked to a vendor who does splash parks and talked to one who did solar lighting um
and saw our consultants that we use. They were all there too. Um and um got to um talk with a lot of city um council people and and staff. Matter of fact, um what is it? Um I'm trying to
think. It's just north of Duth. Um two highs. No, it begins with an H. Um Herman, Huntington. They they I was talking with them and they use their website and Facebook as a way of collecting input. U
they have a system in which they get a lot of chatter and feedback from residents in their um neighborhood. and I got to meet one of the new Orno council people and tomorrow we're going to go and look at our water um our um
what do you call it our gardens rain gardens yeah rain gardens together so it was really um good conference I'd encourage others to think about going to it next year um a lot of good information and
sharing that um you can get out of it and I think that was it Okay. Uh, Council Me, I just really think all the flags lining the street look great. Thank you for getting that. And I wanted to say thank you to Ryan and the guys, Jesse, for
getting them all up. They look just great. You can just thank me. Yeah, thank you, Jesse. You hung them beautifully. They look just awesome. Yeah, he's been he's been on that one big time. Really looks nice. That's all I've got. We found some funding, too, I think. Noah. All right, Council Member Costano. I
don't have anything this time. Okay. Councilor Heric. Um, I went around and visited a lot of the parks in my spare time. Um, I appreciate Jason's patience. I've been sending him emails right and left. Um,
other than that, not much. All right. Thanks. Uh, I just have two things. We have the Orno Police Department meeting on the 16th or next week. Okay. Look at the date. Uh two things. Spirit of Lakes uh is coming up before our next
our next meeting. Um so we'll see you all there. And then uh our water meeting is going to be on the 22nd at 6 o'clock. So if anybody wants to come out for that, we're going to give an update on the water uh our funding and and what our next steps are. So any other
discussion? Do you want to use the boards that we used two years ago? Because I have a fresh set. Yep. And then do you want to have a couple of the stands? I can bring them over to your house. Uh or just give them to Jesse because they brought them. I can bring them to city hall then.
Perfect. Yeah, public works. Yeah, they've set it up. Okay. Uh we had the we had a park one too. Uh I don't know if you have a phase if you could blow that up what we're doing phase two of the park. Sure. Well, hypothetically, we haven't approved it yet, but
anyway. So, I mean park water, you Do we need any updates to the park or the water one? Sorry. The what? Any updates to the water? Well, that's what we're going to say. Water say water board. We're going to do the QR codes. So, I
think honestly I know how long those things take to put together with good information. I don't think there's time to get something beautifully done. But I do think, you know, you and Maggie and Jesse or J mayor, I know you're really
busy doing all the water stuff, but I think it'll be better if you can get that updated on the website so at least they can go there and really have an understanding and feel informed after they read it. Who's going to do the handout? Are you going to do that for them or do they
need to We'll get it pulled together. That'll have the QR tag on it. Maggie's going to get me a QR Oh, no. Design. All right. On the water tab, too, FYI. Uh, can you do a link to all the water meetings we've done? Like I think usually it's
March, but I don't know if there's an easy way to find all of them, but I know March for the last since I've been mayor, but yeah, we do. We have the access to those old videos when we thought when we from LMC LMC.
Yeah. See? Well, someone's got to have them somewhere. I don't know. They should. Those links aren't working. If nothing else, at least we we need to put the one, you know, the la last one this because I I don't see it on there. I think that's something that when we have the meeting, we need to reinforce
that we've been at this for six years, right? Yeah. Yeah. Um, okay. I'm going to shut up in two seconds. Uh, I pulled together all the newsletters that since I've been mayor
anyway, the last two years. Um, and eight out of 10 we say something about the water and more or less in depth about it, too. So, you know, we're it's out there. Come see us on the 22nd. Come see us on the 22nd. Okay.
Uh, do you guys have anything number 11? I'll just mention that the the library is now moved to the city hall lobby area. It's it's a pretty cool setup. People have been it filled up with books like instantly. So, people definitely are using it. Um it's pretty slick. So,
other than that, do they have someone who's in the lobby or somebody comes by? There's should be daily because they'll stock and stuff. Um but no, it's got a little kiosk so you can walk in, you can check out a book or you can return a book. It's
basically just like what they had there only um here. Need. All right. I'll take a motion to adjurnn. Motion to adjurnn. All right. Can I get a second? Second. Any other discussion? All those in favor, please say I. I. I.
I. Those opposed. All right. We're journed. Thanks.