Does it >> struggle since all the laptops are up? Probably. >> There we go. >> Ready? >> Okay. I'd like to call the regular city council meeting to order for November 24th, uh, 2025. Uh, please stand for 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.
>> The city council members are here to serve the city of peers. We expect expect uh respectful conduct at all times. Slander or inappropriate language will not be tolerated. Please speak only when addressed one person at a time. Each speaker has a 5m minute time limit.
Uh thank you for your cooperation. Uh first I'd like to get approval of the minutes for our city council meeting for November 10th, 2025. >> I'll make the motion. >> Donnie makes a motion. >> Second it. Uh Lynn second the motion.
All in favor say I. I. Opposed. Uh motion carried. >> Uh next I would like to get a motion for the approval of public hearing amending chapter 8 on for November 10th, 2025. >> I'll make that motion. >> Uh Lynn makes the motion.
>> Second it. >> Gary second the motion. All in favor say I. >> I. Uh the last one uh would be the a motion to approve the city council special meeting for November 19th, 2025. >> Make that motion. >> I makes a motion.
>> I'll second it. >> Tony Seconds. A motion. All in favor say I. >> I. >> I. Opposed. Motion carried. Uh next we go to um additions and or removals of the uh from the agenda. >> Um anybody have anything at all? Are you
good? Good. Okay. Uh then I would like to get um approval of the agenda. >> Donnie makes a motion for approval of the agenda. >> I'll second it. >> Now Lyn second the motion. All in favor say I.
>> I. >> I. Um opposed. Uh motion carried. Uh the next item we have is a public hearing um to assess unpaid landlord charges
uh to uh 2026 property taxes. And um at this time I'd like to get a motion to open a public hearing for assessing unpaid landlord charges to 2026 property taxes. >> I'll make the motion. >> Donnie makes a motion to open the
meeting. >> Second it. >> Gary second the motion. All in favor say I. >> I. >> I. Opposed. Uh motion carried. As of October 27th, the proper notifications have been sent by the city of Piers to property owners notifying said property
owners that a public hearing will be held to consider uh certifying unpaid landlord utility charges and associated fees to the respective properties. 2026 property taxes in accordance with the
Minnesota statutes 429101. Does the council have any questions? Nope. >> Does the city administrator have any written comments to present? >> None. >> Does the public have any comments or questions?
Okay. Um a call for the council questions to clarify the information. First call for comments or questions. Second call for comments and questions. Final call for comments and questions.
At 7:03, I request a motion to close the public hearing and resume the regular city council meeting. >> I'll make that motion. >> Al makes the motion. >> I'll second. Sarah seconds the motion. All in favor say I. I.
>> Motion to approve resolution 2025-1124-1 certifying unpaid landlord charges to the property taxes for 2026. >> I'll make that motion. >> Okay. Lynn makes a motion. >> I'll second it. >> Gary second a motion. All in favor say
I. >> I. Opposed. A motion carried. Okay. Uh next we go to uh payback resolutions. So the first resolution is 2025-1124-2.
It's a reimbursement um from the golf course to uh the our electric fund um for payback of uh some of the the loans uh for $17,28725. I need a a motion for that. >> Make that a motion.
>> Gary makes a motion. >> I'll second it. >> Lynn seconds a motion. All in favor say I. >> I. >> I. >> Opposed. A motion carried. Uh the next resolution is 2024-1124-3. It's a payback resolution to the from
the golf course to the our solid waste uh division. Um and that is zero. So if I could get a motion for that resolution. >> Make that motion. >> Okay. Gary makes a motion. >> I'll second it. >> Donnie second the motion. All in favor say I.
>> I. >> Opposed. Motion carried. Uh the third resolution under our payback resolutions is resolution 2024-1124-4. It's a payback from the golf course to our storm water uh department for uh
2025 and that is also $0. If I could get a motion uh for that. I'll >> make that motion. >> Gary makes a motion. >> I'll second it. >> Lynn seconds motion. All in favor say I. >> I. I um motion carried for resolution
2024-1124-4. Uh next we have the approval of tobacco licenses. And Laura, you want to cover that quick? >> Yep. We have Red Auto, Piers Foods, Casey's Retail Company, and Lloyd's Liquor.
>> Okay. If I could get a motion to approve. Can we do them all at once? >> Yes. >> I'll make the motion then to approve all one, two, three, four. >> Four, right? >> Yes. Four. >> Four of them. >> Second. >> Lyn makes a motion. Sarah seconds the
motion. All in favor say I. >> I. Opposed. A motion carried. >> Uh the next item on our agenda is the Piers Lion Ball Park Helfield. Uh they have they're going to have a raffle uh for on 65 of 2026. If I could get a
motion to approve that. >> I'll make the motion. >> Uh Donnie makes the motion. >> Second it. >> Gary seconds the motion. Um all in favor say I. >> I. >> I. Uh opposed. A motion carried for the Piers Legion Ballpark Helfield for 65 of
2026 raffle. Uh the next we have on our agenda is the annual uh designations and appointments. If I could get approval. Um, we'll get a motion for that. >> Can we have discussion first, John? >> Um, I don't care. I don't know. I don't
know. Do we We necessarily don't have discussions, I don't think, for designations. >> Can I speak on this a little bit? Um, I mean, I think uh couple of us guys have terms up and we haven't been notified. I heard rumors around town, so I kind of
like to know what's going on. >> Yeah, I think we do publicly we do publicly post them. I think Laura, right, designation on the website. >> Okay. Um I don't care. Go ahead. I You got five minutes. >> All right. Thank you.
>> All right. I don't know. I don't know if you can hear me, but thank you all for listening. Um I don't know if you um who's all name is on there right now. Uh I think uh my name came up
uh this year. My term expires this year. I think Cody's expires this year. Uh Neil Corf expires at the end of this year. Um I think I can speak for myself. I don't know for Cody, but I know we're still interested in continuing on on the park
board. We haven't been asked by anybody. Previously, the mayors have asked us if we want to be involved, and nobody's asked. I haven't seen any publications in the city that you're looking to renew fill these two vacant positions because
well Neil's my understanding Neil's on there. I don't know who's all on the list. It's also been brought to my attention that Gary and Lynn were appointed in January of 20 for starting 2025. January of 2025. Those are
three-year terms. So they'd run till December of 27. It's under my understanding that these people are not on on that anymore either. I don't know if that's true or not. If we want transparency, this is not the way to go
about being transparent. We need to keep everybody informed on what's going on. We're very interested in this position. We uh I think if uh I mean if you're wanting to appoint people on to the park board, uh pick and choose who you want,
I think that's on fair justice. you should advertise in the city that you know we have openings. There was ex uh there was time up or their terms are up. If you want to apply reapply if you don't want to uh or anybody leave it
open for anybody in the city to come up. But to go from seven or eight down to five is what I think you're going to. I can't believe that the city uh can just do that without uh without some kind of resolution. I
don't know. That's my time frame and that's I just hope wish you guys would consider because I I know I'm still interested. We got a lot of invested down there at that golf course and I think we're making great progress. We we need to have consistency. this is not the way we go about having
consistency down there. So that's my two cents. >> Thank you for your time. >> Yep. Thank you, Todd. >> Council, I hope you guys take that all into consideration before appointing approval. >> I just want to let uh let you know,
Todd, uh per our uh our form or our protocol, you can have five to seven. So you can it is all written into our policies. >> We have seven, >> right? So you can go to you can yeah so you can go to five. >> However, John, you do have to do a resolution to change it. And here it is.
You can't just change it from 7 to 5. We actually have been in the wrong since Dale went off. We should have changed it at that point. That's a state statute. >> So >> and I just found that. I did not know that. >> So what what you obviously you got it. What does it say since you've uh
>> Well, it says if we want to go if we want to change the number of people on that board. Yeah. Yeah. And it only talks about park boards specifically. You have to have a resolution and the council has to approve changing the number. That has to be in place. And like I said, I had I did not know that.
I phoned that accidentally. >> Yeah. Um >> because otherwise I would have brought it up when Dale went off. >> Uhhuh. >> I was not aware of that. So, uh, I guess, um, >> and I guess I mean, if I can finish my
part of it, you know, I was elected to a three-year term on that board, and I would like to finish out my term. >> Sure. Yep. Um, so then I guess we're going to either we got to table it then. >> Would we be able to do rip sauce?
>> No, we can't. If we can't do it, we can't do ripsaws either. So they're going to have to they're going county is going to have to wait. So we'll research it, I guess, and it'll come up in come up in two weeks. You'll have to notify Bob Bob Gruber that uh that it's not going to it's not going to
go. >> What would be the reasoning for going from 7 to 5? Is there reason for it? >> Um this is something the council is going to discuss. Todd, you and we can talk about it. If you want to call me afterwards, I'm more than happy to talk
to you afterwards. >> Call me about it. >> Okay, I'll call you. I'll call you about it if I want to. Uh, so then I guess we're going to we're going to table that. Can I get a motion? I guess. Do I need a motion? I don't. Okay, we'll just table
it then. Uh, so then we will um we'll skip the approval of the RIPOD agreement. No, no, we can. Yeah, we'll skip those. So, we'll go to 12. Uh that's the approval for RIPSOD agreement for shared uh shared services. Um if I
could get a motion for that approval. >> I'll make that motion. >> Okay. Lynn makes a motion. >> I'll second it. >> Donnie seconds the motion. All in favor say I. >> I. >> I. >> Opposed. Uh next we would that motion carried.
Next to approve for RIPAD mutual aid agreement. If I get a motion for that. I'll make the motion. >> Donnie makes the motion. >> Second it. >> Gary Seconds the motion. All in favor say I. >> I. I.
>> Opposed. Uh motion carried. So then we're going to go to 14, which is approval of hiring a public works director, a direct reporting discussion. Um Laura was nice enough to have we have something put together by pro resources
um on the procedure for that. Um if anybody I think we need why don't you explain we need to make a resolution for that right >> um due to who you are planning to hire y
>> tonight uh there after speaking with the attorney and pro resource they had put in place a conflict of interest since it is a >> family member okay >> and since I would be his direct report they have recommendations on how to move
forward with that so I would like to put this in our current handbook that just states where Rick would fall to. >> Okay. >> And this covers anybody going forward,
not just him, but it would be anybody who would be hired in the future. >> Yep. >> So, if maybe I get a motion for approval of that. >> I'll make the motion to add the new conflict of interest um into our current employee handbook. >> Okay. Lynn makes the motion.
>> I'll second it. >> Gary second the motion. All in favor say I. >> I. >> I. >> Um opposed. Uh motion carried. >> So um next >> hire. >> We actually have to do the hire now.
>> Yeah, let's do the Okay. So we have uh approved for the hiring of the public works uh director. >> So I'll I I'll give an update there. >> Oh, good. Awesome. >> So we had 10 applicants. Our board narrowed the 10 down to five. From that
five, we went down to three. And we brought all three last week to council. And council interviewed all three of them. All three of them got a tour of the city to look at uh everything from the buildings to the golf course to the
salt shed to all over. They they travel on every street. Um after a lengthy discussion once that was done uh unan unanimously um we all agreed to offer the position
to Rick Wacker and I called Rick that night and went into negotiations with him and he said yes and now he is after we make this vote he is our new public work director. >> Would you like to make a motion? I'll
make the motion to hire Rick Wacker. >> Okay, Donnie makes a motion to hire Rick Wacker. >> I'll second. >> Sarah second the motion. All in favor say I. I. Opposed. Uh motion carried. Congratulations, Rick, if you're watching. >> So, next we have uh city council.
Actually, we got an update. Laura, maybe why don't you cover that? >> I just have a quick update. Um well maybe it's not that quick but a reminder is that the truth and taxation final levy budget will be presented at the next meeting December 8th and then we
have a small we were going to decide you guys were going to decide if we wanted to accept the match grant from sourceville for the park and I believe I sent a lot of information with there are definitely some steps that need to happen but um after the information I
had sent out speaking to our auditor and the source well individuals. It's up to you guys if you would like to accept it. >> Yeah, I think it's kind of it's a nice deal. So, I think the gist of it is we don't have to do $260,000.
All we have to do is just to match that $40,000 grant and Lynn's working on getting some donations for that. Yeah. >> But don't we have to if we accept that if the if the bid isn't more than this 175,000 that we can just do it
>> or we going to are we going to try to backtrack and get that whatever the whole bid process done. >> We would have to do the bid process per the auditors. Um and source had said you know if we needed to amend our recurrent application
>> we could amend it and then just use it further down the road. Okay. Perfect. Yep. I agree. >> Yep. So, um, if I suppose we should probably get a motion to approve it. I think that's got to be in December 1st, I believe. So, right. >> I'll make the motion then to approve the source wall grant for the playground equipment. >> Lynn makes the motion to approve it.
>> Second it. >> Gary second the motion. All in favor say I. >> I. Opposed. A motion carried for that. Um, do we have any other uh updates from city council members at all? Everybody's good. >> Okay. Um,
>> Dr. I would like to give one more yet. >> Yeah, go for it. >> So, um, we approve this conflict of interest just so the people out there know cuz it's here unless they go looking for it. Um, what that means is
the two people that serve, the two council members that serve on public works is who Rick will report to and who if there comes a uh where we have to do anything disciplinary or
anything that would fall on those two people. For right now, that is Lynn and myself. But that's what this conflict of interest thing that we're putting in there. So, it will always go to if if we end up hiring somebody uh at the golf
course that would be a family member of somebody um that would go to the two people that are serving on the golf course board >> or be the same I guess if it would be in in police department. >> It would go to the two people that are
on that board. Just so the public knows that transparency is is Laura doesn't have anything to do with him. Uh it will be Lynn and myself for the next uh calendar year. So that's all. That's the only thing update I had.
>> Perfect. >> Okay. So if I >> Nobody else down that way's got anything. Okay. >> I mean >> I'll make a motion to adjurnn at 7:20. >> D makes a motion to adjurnn. >> Second. >> Gary second. The motion. All in favor say I. >> I. I.
>> Motion carried.