good evening ladies and gentlemen i'd like to call to order this regular city council meeting of April 8th 2025 it is 700 p.m if you're able please rise and join us for the pledge of allegiance
i pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all thank you next we'll move on to the open
forum during the open forum individuals may address the city council regarding any topic to speak at open forum comment cards are located near the entrance to the council chambers please complete the cards to any staff members and it was
pointed out that if we have the information on the card you don't have to sign in on the sign-in sheet so that'll save us some time so if you filled out a card you don't need to do that individuals will be called to speak by the by I'll call you up to speak you'll approach the podium state your
name and address for the clerk's record and limit your remarks to three minutes city council wishes to listen during open forum and will not give an immediate response to comments um council may direct staff to provide a future report on the topic or add to an
upcoming opening meeting so I believe we have one um person here in person and we also have somebody that um wrote ahead of time so let's take the inperson um comments first so we'll call up Kathleen Baliban
thank you and first and foremost thank you for not having to have to repeat it you know anyways my name is Kathleen Baliban i live on 65th in Stevens and I'm here to
discuss or comment on staff report number 47 which is pertaining to the city council procedures and decorum for the council now this is the first time I've seen this and I did reach out to the city manager earlier as to not being
able to find this anywhere under the city code andor excuse me I do have a slate code and or charter it's but when I look at it it is very very similar to city code you know our number 205 which is
administration and when I asked about this excuse me I was told that this was created in 2001 and the last revision was in 2017 and when I went back it you guys not you
thank you but the the city council just said yes to it on a consensus calendar event but really this what this is is I'm really pleased to see this actually because uh this really speaks to what I have been searching for and looking at
for a very long time um on the executive summary and so forth and so on in here what I'm asking you guys to do is exactly what I asked you to do a few weeks ago or a month ago and that is to look at your charter look at your code and put it together to see how we can
govern ourselves even more efficiently and effectively so it is it's a beginning and what because I say it's a beginning I do not wish that the staff shortens it okay it says here they want you to authorize all of this that
they've got on here without your input and even with your input in two weeks this is not a two-eek job this is something that you really need to look at and also when I went back and I asked the city manager how come I couldn't find it anywhere she said "Oh because
it's a resolution." Resolutions aren't part of city code now it looks like it was city code to begin with and then we turned it into a resolution and then we were kind of picking at it as we went along so no more this is not a resolution something
like this this should be code okay so I'm asking you to really look at it and then when they say "Oh the only way you can find it is to go back on to the city council meeting on 2017 on such and such a day." Well it's no longer out there on the website you know so I'm I'm
really to me this is code not resolution and I'm asking you to as earlier work with the city charter and um not be led okay and I do mean this i want you to create it not the staff i want my
elected officials to create how you want your council meetings to be run and how you want to be fed the information rather than being led please please make changes now for the future council members whether they
be you or anybody else this is hidden stuff that to me should be out as part of the ordinances and found by citizens and council members such as yourselves thank you very much and thank you for what you do for us thank you
thank you is there anyone else that's here present that wishes to speak okay we did have some submitted comments so um city clerk Friedrich is going to read those thank you mayor uh we received one
comment via email from Blue Deau at 6728 Russell Avenue South i am addressing the city council in support of initiatives for more housing in Richfield to support a growing metro population in recent weeks our state legislation
has been working on zoning policies that would permit the construction and development for more homes and the and the further development of walkable neighborhoods with accessible commercial and residential amenities these policies have been introduced as part of a
broader legislative agenda known as Yes to Homes and they've arrived at a crucial time as we are short over 100,000 homes across the state of Minnesota and families are being priced out as home costs continue to rise unfortunately the greatest opposition to
these initiatives has come from suburban city representatives i am a resident who moved to Richfield with my family in 2020 precisely because we were seeking a walkable community that has invested in shared public resources and access to the metro's public transit system
minneapolis proper had become a struggle for us to afford during a financially vulnerable time and Richfield has proven to be a welcoming home base without us needing to leave our jobs networks and communities behind richfield must lead the way in supporting these yes to homes bills and continuing to make the city a
welcoming place for new residents thank you for your time blue Deluquante thank you is there are there any other comments that were submitted and we'll ask one last time if there's anyone in the audience that wishes to submit
any then we will close item on our agenda is approval of the minutes of the city council work session meeting from March 25th 2025 the city council regular meeting from March 25th 2025 and the cler clerical date
revision of the minutes of the city council regular meeting from March 11th 2025 i was going to make one one amendment oh okay go ahead so the city council meeting uh 311
2025 bottom of page three uh my name is spelled with an E um should not have any typographical error maybe it was uh because it was um someone trying someone trying to make me Irish on a on a month that's it would be appropriate to be
Irish but unfortunately I'm not Irish uh there's no way at the end of my name so okay so without objection that would be two clerical errors to be fixed in those meetings minutes rather i can make those clerical minutes thank you all right so is there a motion to accept those
minutes with the two corrections so moved second it's been moved and seconded to um approve all of those minutes and make the two corrections is there any discussion all in favor please say I i all opposed
and we've approved those minutes next we have three proclamations and so I'm going to be calling them up one at a time and go through the procedure so our first presentation or proclamation is for Earth Day and I'm
going to call up Rachel Lynholm who's from the staff and are you wanting to speak to it after we read it i can say three words all right awesome thank you whereas Earth Day will be celebrated nationwide on Tuesday April 22nd to
increase awareness about the need to care for the environment environment and whereas in 2022 Minnesota's climate action framework sets state targets to reduce emissions 50% by
2030 from 2005 levels and achieve net zero emissions by 2050 and whereas Richfield has written and passed a climate action plan with goals and actions that work to reduce the city's greenhouse gas emissions and strengthen the city's overall commitment to
improving the health of our environment and whereas in the past year among numerous other actions the city has conducted an electric electric vehicle fleet analysis study applied for and was awarded several federal sustainability
grants hired a solid waste specialist retrofitted LED lighting in several municipal buildings and whereas staff have been sharing information with residents about a variety of environmental initiatives including energy efficiency and
electrification waste reduction and reuse alternative landscaping tree planting and maintenance and more and whereas the community of Richfield is encouraged to participate in citywide litter cleanup efforts to demonstrate
good stewardship of our green spaces and natural resources and whereas Earth Day will be celebrated by the city of Richfield through planned cleanup events as well as an Earth Day resource fair at the community center on April 26th now
there I for Mary Supple mayor of the city of Richfield on behalf of the Richfield City Council do proclaim that the city of Richfield observes Earth Day as a way of promoting environmental stewardship and related community
events thank you and you have the floor thank you mayor thank you council uh so we're bringing back our annual Earth Day proclamation and also recognizing that we do have a variety of planned events this month um including our annual staff uh council and commissioner cleanup on
Tuesday April 22nd um and then another uh as Mayor Supple mentioned another event at the community center on April 26th from 1 to 4 there'll be a vendor resource fair with free giveaways uh family activities um the Richfield
Baking Club is having a you know coffee and bake sale all sorts of fun things so we encourage everybody to come out to that um and then the Sustainability Commission um led by youth commissioner uh Helen Burke will actually be hosting a uh another litter cleanup on Sunday
the 27th so lots of activities lots of ways to get involved um and just wanted to thank you all for your support obviously there was a lot of uh items listed in that proclamation that we've been working on and continue to work on and your support has made a lot of that happen all of that happen actually so
thank you um and we hope to see you at Earth Day events this year thank you thank you so much did anybody on the council want to add anything she wants a picture and thank you so much for all your efforts it's been interesting we've been
going around and speaking to diff different classes and the youth of the cities um totally support these efforts that seems to be the questions that come up in all the different classes and they're different questions in each class so it's kind of an organic thing that has come up so thank you for all that you're doing and to the
sustainability commission for all they're doing next we have a proclamation on ArabAmerican Heritage Month and I'm going to invite the human rights commissioner michael Zazera up to ac to accept the proclamation
whereas ArabAmerican Heritage Month celebrates the beautiful intellectual and cultural heritage of ArabAmericans and all their achievements and contributions to the rich to Richfield Minnesota the United States and the world and whereas ArabAmerican Heritage
Month began as an initiative in 2017 with only a few states and cities it is now being recognized on a national level beginning in April of 2021 as President Biden became the first US president to proclaim ArabAmerican Heritage Month and
whereas 3.5 million Arab Americans have contributed to many facets of American society including arts business economics education and social services and whereas we celebrate the accomplishments of such distinguished
Arab Americans as journalist and speaker Nor Tagori and Representative Rashida Talib from Michigan and whereas Arab Americans have faced and continue to face discrimination racial profiling and violence both domestically and abroad
and whereas the city of Richfield is proud of the people community and business of Arabameans and is looking forward to the continuing success of Arab Arab Americans in our community whereas the city the Richfield Human
Rights Commission supported a proclamation celebrating ArabAmerican Heritage Month at its April 1st meeting now therefore I Mary Supple mayor of Richfield on behalf of the Richfield City Council do hereby proclaim the month of April 2025 as ArabAmerican
Heritage Month in the city of Richfield and call on the people of Richfield to observe this month with appropriate programs activities and ceremonies and continue to honor the contributions of ArabAmericans throughout the year there you go thank you very much congratulations and if you'd like to say
a few words yes all right hello thank Thank you mayor and thank you CI city council members i would uh just say that I would encourage our city and community members to consider our ArabAmerican neighbors uh Arab-Americans are integral to our
society and contribute to our rich culture uh throughout my life I have witnessed um inflammatory rhetoric directed at ArabAmericans and I have found that this rhetoric is often rooted in ignorance misunderstanding and fear
uh I believe this rhetoric holds us back as a country uh if if we are to get past this root ignorance misunderstanding and fear uh we must build relations with Arab Americans in our community and listen to them so that we might learn
and grow thank you again thank you very much did anyone on the council wish to add anything um Council Member Burke please thank the Human Rights Commission for for that proclamation and for what you just said it's a good reminder that u we need to
pay attention to all our neighbors wherever their heritage is from so thank you thank you thank you did you need a picture as well thank you and for our third proclamation I'm going to call up Pixie Pixler from the
Advisory Board of Health to receive it whereas the week of April 7th to the 13 2025 is National Public Health Week in the United States and the themes are climate action health equity public health advocacy and strengthening the
public health workforce and whereas the city of Richfield's community health board was established in 1977 offering public health services to residents now for 48 years through a collaborative partnership with Bloomington Public Health and whereas
since 1995 the American Public Health Association through its sponsorship of National Public Health Week has educated the public policy makers and public health professionals about issues important to improving the public's health and whereas Americans live an
average of 35 years longer today than they did 150 years ago when the American Public Health Association was founded and whereas preventing diseases before they start is critical to helping people live longer healthier lives while
managing health related costs and whereas climate change impacts both physical and mental health through rising temperatures poor air quality extreme weather events and disrupted ecosystems and whereas being an advocate for public health has created laws that require the
use of seat belts vaccines that prevent illness food labels that tell us what we're eating and laws that keep smoke out of public places and whereas addressing the root causes of health inequities can reduce preventable diseases and improve overall well-being
and whereas the strong and resilient public health workforce is key to keeping communities healthy and addressing the community's most urgent health challenges now therefore I Mary Supple Mayor of Richfield on behalf of the Richfield City Council do hereby
proclaim April 7th through the 13 2025 as public health week in the city of Richfield and call upon the people of Richfield to observe this week by advocating for public health initiatives be aware of local climate education
efforts engage in equity conversations with friends families and civic leaders and support a strong and diverse public health workforce proclaimed this 8th day of April 2025 and then you you didn't want to say
you wanted go ahead i just like to say thank you for the Richfield Advisory Board of Health it's uh it's been a very interesting experience being involved in that and your support is is very important thank you
thank you and I think they want a picture of us as well thank you and did anyone on the council wish to speak all right council member Burke again again it's nice to have a reminder the importance of things like public health and that government can do
good things with public health and especially when I see other parts of the country and what they're struggling with it's it's nice to have uh very strong and vigorous public health uh here in Minnesota and especially in Richfield so thank you and thank you to everyone who received
the proclamations and for the groups that put them together next we'll move on to approval of the agenda i move approval of the agenda second it's been moved and seconded to approve the agenda is there any
discussion all right all in favor please say I i i all opposed and we have approved the agenda next we'll turn to the consent calendar and I'll turn it over to city manager Rodriguez thank you Mayor the consent calendar contains several
separate items which are acted upon by the city council in one motion once the consent calendar has been approved the individual items and recommended actions have also been approved no further council action on these items is necessary on tonight's consent calendar
item A consider approval of the bid tabulation and authorize the mayor and city manager to execute a contract with Boulder Creek Inc for lift station 7 replacement project in the amount of $194,964 and authorize the city manager
to approve contract changes up to $175,000 without further city council consideration item B consider the appointment of a youth member to the Human Rights Commission item C consider approval of the city of Richfield to enter into an
agreement with the in with independent school district number 280 to administer the 2025 and 2027 school board elections item D consider a resolution designating Fidelity Investments as an official depository for the city of Richfield in
2025 for the purpose of receiving a bequest in the amount of 70,000 for Woodlake Nature Center and I submit these items for your consideration as part of the consent calendar is there a motion to approve the consent calendar
so moved second it's been moved and seconded is there any discussion i would like to welcome our um new youth commissioner for human rights commission it's always very exciting to when we get youth commissioners and so I'm looking forward to meeting this young gentleman
and I want to put a pitch out there if there's anybody else that's interested we do have some commissions with vacancies so thank you to Mr wilson for volunteering for this and I also want to thank whoever the mystery donor was that donated money towards Woodlake Nature
Center that was very kind of that anonymous donor to help us out any other comments or questions okay all in favor of approving the um consent agenda please say I i i all opposed and we've approved the
consent calendar next uh we will move on to the city manager report city manager Rodriguez yes thank you Mayor um I just wanted to uh thank Mayor Supple uh also the school district policy makers and their staff
and especially Clerk Friedrich for all their work in finding a path forward so that the school district can switch to evenyear elections um it will be a more cost-effective and efficient uh process for everyone including taxpayers so thank you to all the to all for the good
work and that's all for tonight thank you and I'll echo those thanks to the school district and all the staff from the city that worked on this and came up with the language to move forward next we'll move on to a council
discussion of the review of council meeting agenda order and process so as part of the ongoing software upgrade to prepare and manage city council agendas it's an opportune time to review the city council meeting order
of business and processes staff have been reviewing a document that governs city council meeting procedures including agenda order and are seeking input before presenting for approval at the April 22nd 2025 meeting the council
last updated the Richfield City Council rules of procedures and decorum on February 14th 2017 we must develop meeting agenda templates for the new agenda management software and are proposing options for
the council to consider two sample agendas are attached as exhibits that reflect the new format using the Civic Plus Select software exhibit one agenda is the current order of business and exhibit 2 agenda is a proposed option for council to consider the exhibit 2
agenda includes the following updates it shifts the approval of agenda to item three after the pledge of allegiance it changes the presentations item to presentations and proclamations it moves the approval of the minutes to
the consent calendar items and it moves approval of claims and payroll or dispersements to the consent calendar items and hats off to hometown hits includes other council discussions such as we're doing right now council authority remains to put pull any
consent calendar item for further discussion and any consent calendar item pulled would be decided as a regular agenda item including council discussion and a vote on the item please note that the current rules of procedure and decorum will need to be updated to
reflect current practices we are seeking council input on these inconsistencies and other possible changes one of the things is should we continue allowing open forum comments on agenda items that are not on the that are that are on the agenda so that's something
we've opened up since the last time the policy was revisited should we limit the open form time to 15 minutes unless extended by a majority vote of the city council that's also something we opened up should we continue using first names at work sessions and we've switched to
that policy as well and we need to formalize whether or not we want to continue that should we require unan unanimous approval to allow a council member to abstain from a vote unless the member is required by law to abstain and finally to continue a
limited member discussion to continue to limit member discussion to two comments on any question or for no more than five minutes each time if requested by other council members or the mayor so those are the things that we that came up that we should discuss there are also if
there are other things that council members would like to bring up this is wide open so we're looking for input here before we open up the discussion since we're not going to actually vote on this it's just a discussion i was wondering if staff wanted to add anything
yes thank you mayor so uh thank you for making time during the council meeting believe uh our work session agenda has been more full than our council meetings and so we're just looking for guidance tonight and then we would be bringing it back to you hopefully in two weeks um
and I am going to invite clerk Friedrich and uh attorney teach in as we discuss um because they have been working on it with us and uh we're eager for your feedback and on these items that I've highlighted and then anything else that
you have questions or concerns about thank you thank you so as the first part of the discussion um I was going to ask to draw everyone's attention to the proposed agenda so exhibit
two and see if there's any um can if what people think about moving the approval of the agenda either to item two or item three so Council Member Burke to me it seems appropriate that the
first thing that should be done after call to order is pledge of allegiance uh it seems that it's appropriate to you know state our allegiance to everything that we uh that we do pledge our allegiance to in that before any business is done so seems to me right
after the call of order uh pledge allegiance should be second okay so you would like that moved up to item number two and then the approval of the agenda would be item three yes all right other feedback council member Hayford um I don't feel strongly about pledge of
allegiance versus approval of the agenda but I am very glad to see approval of the agenda first um it seems like maybe this isn't a concern anymore but I saw a concern over email about arguably having the approval of the agenda after open forum but I think given the fact that we have the ability to pull things from the
consent calendar at that time I prefer to keep approval of the agenda as early as possible and I'm delighted that we're doing this because it's been bugging me my whole time on council so other comments about those first three items no I agree that the pledge of allegiance
should become should come before the approval of the agenda as well i agree with having that also with the pledge of allegiance before the agenda and I would would concur with the rest of you that if we do the call of order
then the pledge of allegiance then the approval of the agenda is there any problem with doing proclamations and presentations i'm not hearing anybody all right so then the the next item that's um appreciably different what do
people think about putting the council minutes and the dispersements and claims as part of the consent agenda um I guess I have slightly excuse me um I have maybe slightly slightly mixed feelings about putting minutes there just because it does seem like there are
often corrections on there if that's not going to in staff's opinion hold up the process that would be fine or maybe if that would encourage us to make sure we get our our stuff in in advance to get those minor corrections resolved uh I do think claims belongs there other than the symbolic fund of sort of virtually
signing the paychecks it is uh I think it makes more sense under consent so I would like to clarify if we put those there and there is something we want to like um amend on the minutes or something we could then pull it off of the consent calendar make
the amendments and approve it afterwards is that correct that's correct you could place it into the consideration for items that you pull from the consent calendar you can also just make a motion when you review and say we'd like to make a clerical
correction to the minutes as we did tonight as part of that approval process okay thoughts on that go ahead to be quite honest I'm not sure how much of a difference it makes um I think we all know that we can pull
something out of the consent calendar uh I think there it is there is some importance in reviewing the minutes and making sure that it's right um and I can we've certainly have had you know citizens concerned about the use of the consent calendar and so maybe for that
sake to show the importance of reviewing of minutes that we pull it out of the consent calendar to show that the council is is taking it uh seriously and that it's a matter of importance i think in practical terms it doesn't really make much of a difference
okay other thoughts feedback i agree with uh Council Member Burke that um you can take anything off the consent calendar at that point but um just to include it with it would be good
so if we do that then it would be looking at call to order pledge of allegiance um approval of the agenda open forum and then we would do minutes is that what you're saying i would prefer
to do it right after agenda just because they're kind of a the similar structure it's usually fairly routine so do approval of the agenda do the minutes and then go to open forum that'd be my preference okay it appears that there's consensus
to get the business side of it done first and then I would agree basic business side okay so then I would go to open form proclamations and presentations and then consent calendar and everybody's okay with dispersements and claims being part of that yes okay okay and then moving
down are we okay with the name change to council discussion and hats off to hometown hits so we could have discussion as we are now yes okay and then are people okay i test
did a test run on the um open forum verbiage for what we say ahead of time are people okay with what we did tonight yes okay so does that answer the questions on the agenda portion of this
discussion okay so that would then bring us back to the document that we have about let's see if I get the right name for it here the rules of procedure and decorum so first of all
um is there anything in here that we would like to discuss or talk about are for instance open forum do you want to continue having the change where it's wide open because on the original document here it says that
you can only discuss things that aren't on the agenda and we've opened it up to allow discussion of everything go ahead can I uh first clarify from the city attorney i thought we couldn't like regulate what people are allowed to say in the open forum can we say people cannot speak because they're talking
about something on the agenda um mayor and council member I think that's really more just about you're not really regulating the content so to speak but when they could when they can speak to it so it's really in my opinion
more about process than it is about regulating content of speech okay so there's not a concern either direction on what we would decide on that right i I think it's within the council's discretion to decide how to work the how to set up the agenda um as to when they're allowing people to speak but
just to be clear certain items they would not be able to speak on at all then if we did not allow this like most items that are not public hearings right that's true but I I still don't think it's a concern because you're Yeah I think it's okay okay i guess I would just say the only thing I don't like about it is I worry that some of our
items that like the planning commission conducts public hearings for people don't attend those figuring oh I can just give the council and they're the final decision makers and I I do want people to take that seriously but I also haven't seen people really abuse this and I think it's it's a little bit it puts us in an awkward situation of being like "Oh excuse me stop you can't you
can't talk about that that's on the agenda." So I prefer to leave it the way the way we're doing it although I'm open to revisiting this if we had a situation in which every public hearing became a 2x public hearing with the council and I believe our practice has been to remind people if you're here to speak for the
public hearing wait and speak till then and people have honored that we haven't had anybody abuse that in the past so but you know sometimes there are other things that aren't public hearings that people really want to weigh in on and I I would agree that it's good to hear
them other comments questions maybe it could increase the the attendance at the city council meetings if we put them at the end the open forum well it and and if you read through this
document it's like after 15 minutes you say "Wait you have to talk again at the end." And they do formally move it to the end so that's actually our next topic do you think it's okay to just let everybody speak at the beginning i I do I I think again you in the short
amount of time I've been here I haven't seen an abuse of the opportunity for the public to make their make their voices heard here and we should encourage that as much as possible regardless of what they want to talk about i mean they may bring things to our attention that we may not even be aware of and they may think this is the only forum to do that
we shouldn't deprive them of that opportunity i guess I do wonder if it's helpful to have some I think 15 minutes is probably unnecessarily short but if there should be some upper limit at which we would by default suspend till the end um because I don't want a situation
which we have two hours of of open forum and we have nothing to point to to say we need to cut this off i don't know is it improper for the mayor to just kind of at her own discretion cut it off without a time limit or I guess that's a question for mayor teach uh mayor and council member I think
that's really just a council decision it's it's your meeting i think that you have the ability to decide how you want to run it um so there there really isn't any rule or law about you know that particular question and I think it's
really just more about um if you as a council want to decide or or approve it as a motion or just give that power to the mayor to say you know we're going to we're going to cut it off after a certain certain period of time i think that's really up to the council
other thoughts i guess my my preference would be to leave the provision but change it to 30 minutes um so it' be a really kind of extreme case and we just have something to point to that's defensible right i would agree with that as long as the council have the opportunity to extend
it necessary right okay yeah so so what we're saying is switch it to 30 and if we decide we need to let it go longer at the beginning we could let people continue speaking if they wanted to because I can only think of like maybe
three times where it's gone past 30 minutes and that's been in six years so it's not like it's happening very often um so then it would say that after 30 minutes we would suspend it until the end of the agenda does that mean then we
have to add another spot down in the agenda for open forum if it continues on the agenda software i I don't think you need to do that because you're you're amen you're using your discretion to amend the agenda and add it to the end so I don't think you need to do that okay
there was a section in here about open forum that talks about um that if there's a whole bunch of people wanting to talk on the same topic that they um find somebody to be their spokesman and I know that happens at the planning commission i've seen that happen i
haven't seen it happening here so are people okay with having that as a possible recommendation if we think there's going to be a lot i don't have the langage i'm looking for the language is it required that the mayor or the city council would require them to do it
or is it at the discretion of the council to to have them have a representative says subdivision seven and I've got page seven of 10 of the but I think that this is the actual rules of
decorum so I'm not sure what page what exact page it's on but um oh I can read it i think it's worth having spokesperson of re uh multiple people who want to
speak to narrow down to so that one person can get their point across instead of having to be redundant or repetitive i think the language is a little vague because it says it shall be proper for the presiding officer to request um would be nice if it said um
that the presiding officer may require or may request um showing that the council has discretion because the language here it it's a little vague whether the um presiding officer is required to have them pick a
representative or if it's discretionary so it would be nice if it was discretionary and make it clear that it's discretionary i can't figure out what page yeah I'm sorry this is at the middle of page I'm sorry page seven subdivision seven so
you're saying that it may be it may be okay for the instead of shall be proper yeah instead of saying it it shall be proper for the presiding officer to request it maybe would be better for it to say the presiding officer may request that a spokesman be chosen to give the
presiding officer discretion instead of requiring them to do it so like if that would be a case if we had a stack of 20 open forum comments and they were all on the same topic to say "Hey pick can you please help us out here and pick three spokes people?" But the nice thing is that the presiding officer wouldn't be
required to do that i mean they may want to we may want to hear all 20 people so okay i'm I'm fine with that what do the people think yeah I agree i agree there was um one other I don't know why
I'm so fixated on the pledge of allegiance today but uh page three section 5 subdivision 3 the order of business um it would be nice if um pledge of allegiance is mentioned in there as we've already discussed it' be
nice if it's placed in there somewhere we we've already noted that it needs to be added there it's in the template but it was missed there so thank you very much council member and so can I assume that this will be updated to fit with our whatever
whatever agenda we approve all right um so for work sessions are people okay with continuing to use first names because in here it says we will use the formal at all times and I agree it
should be formal at the council meetings so what do people think about work sessions i I will say I you know I've been doing that for like three years now it does seem a little bit awkward to change our especially when we do the group work sessions with the other commissions and
they're not accustomed to that that seems a little bit weird staff also I mean not so much uh the city manager but other staff seem to be sort of uncomfortable sometimes addressing us by first names um I I think I'd be fine with the the normal procedure going back to last names but understanding that
like if I if I call the city manager Katie it's not meant with any disrespect um but it does seem almost more awkward to try to do the first even several times today we refer to ourselves as as council member so and so so so and so
I'm sorry yeah as long as we're consistent with it i mean some people do the first name some people do the full name as long as there's some consistency to it that would be good yeah and I will admit that I was used to doing last names and so I
still haven't gotten rid of the habit and switched over so I'm probably one of the inconsistent people mine's super long so I just Yeah same here keep on just keep on so this is unfair of council member Coleman Woods and Council Member Hayford to expect last name
addressing hyphenated last names parents for someone with the shortest I I'm okay with continuing to use uh last names i'm okay with the consistency okay so so switch it over to so to be consistent with the policy
to use last names and and stop trying to be informal at the work sessions but if I could just give one clarification we did have a thing around the same time when we switched to last names where we were addressing staff i like their full title even if it was a very long title and I would just express that I hope we
don't go back to doing that um so for instance instead of saying community development director Palman you just say director director Palman and particularly we've done like sustainability coordinator so and so like that's just not a common title like I think director manager or anyway I I
don't need to micromanage this but I guess I would say again it is not meant with disrespect to not use somebody's full title but to perhaps use Mr as if the title is rather unnatural to say orally any any other thoughts no I think yeah this the I don't want to
curtail people's um accomplishments and their their staff uh titles but we can keep it somewhat shorter right and I think some of the titles have been shortened up a little for a while there
there were a couple that were like five words long that got but I think that's been changed already um on our list also here um talks about that it would require unanimous approval to allow a council
member to abstain from a vote unless the member is required by law to abstain and um I'm going to ask county attorney Teen can you speak to that a little bit of why that might possibly be there
um Mayor Supple actually after um city clerk discovered in the city code um that this is actually a requirement in city code so um if the council wanted to change that we would
have to go through an ordinance process to remove that and then we could incorporate if you did want to change it we could incorporate a a different requirement into these new rules
okay um Council Member Burke so my only concern is um where it says unless the member is required by law to abstain um so is it the burden of the member to find to cite the rule of law or the law
that requires them to abstain i mean they may may not know what the law is but they may say you know what I just feel this is a conflict of interest for example and so I mean how does that happen right and so Council Member Burke I think as a practical matter if there's a conflict of interest you're likely
going to reach out to the city manager who's going to talk to me and there may be situations where um there's a contractual conflict of interest or some financial interest that would require a council member to abstain so I think it will be pretty clear ahead of time if
that's if that's the case and we can and we can advise the council member of that well that's assuming that council member has the forethought to to talk to the city manager about these things and I've already demonstrated I'm not the best at that so my concern is if I for example
if I come to a to a meeting or a session and then realize you know there's a conflict of interest of some kind um you know and but if the rest of the council members unanimously say "No you're going to have to vote."
Well we would have to analyze that at the time and um if I feel if I felt that there was a legal conflict of interest requiring you to abstain from voting then the council would not have to approve that but I think it would just have to be done on a case-by case basis
all right um Council Member Hayford Liry yeah it it was news to me that we have this provision and I haven't seen um any of us or any previous folks I've served with kind of abuse this but I have seen this in other cities where there are certain people that will abstain just as a matter of habit like to make a point
and I do want us to discourage that even though it hasn't been an issue with our group um this is kind of an aside and I don't know if our current rules restrict this but I think it's particularly inappropriate when people participate in discussion and then abstain from the vote and if we don't restrict that I would like us to um that if you're going
to abstain you need to be completely out of the discussion and not commenting and influencing that item at all um so anyway I I am okay with the current standard i certainly understand council member Burke's consider consideration but I think the fact that either the basically the city attorney could excuse
them or the council could excuse them does enough to encourage people to vote appropriately but still gives them reasonable reasonable exemptions okay um we also have a section here that says if a
council member or the mayor requests we can limit member discussion to two comments on any question or no more than five minutes each time so that's at the discretion of one of us making the request and as you were saying um Council Member Hayer Liry I haven't seen
anyone here abusing that i have in the past meetings where people do go go on and on and on just to belabor a point and and it's I don't think it's like everybody's fixed in their positions so it doesn't really help move anything
forward and so a lot of times people then call the question etc etc so um it's another question of whether we want to have this in the rules or not but it does say if requested so so could I just clarify the procedure
particularly of other council members asking it so like if I just um is it like automatic or do we need like a vote on it like if if I just disagree with council member Coleman Woods can I just personally be like no you're cut off or is it like I I want us to make a motion and then we'll vote on
if we're going to have a discussion because I guess I don't I don't think each of us other than the presiding officer should have the power to just unilaterally cut off discussion like that i know in other meetings I don't know if it's how it works with Sturgis but like
in Robert's rules if if you've been going on for like 45 minutes and you're kind of just circling around the same question someone can call the question and then you vote on whether or not to end debate and then you end it but I don't know if that's
different with Sturgis and I also have the question of can this be done right in the middle or does have to ask to limit the debate before the debate starts it's not legislation i've seen that at other like non-governmental things too where they
they to save time say You know we've been in session for five hours we're running out of time so we're going to limit debate and they'll do it before they start the new topic you know first and second gentlemen that sort of thing sorry well
they have they have specific rules and like one of the rules is that you can't sit down and you can't leave the floor and so he followed all of those rules and he said he had like a verbiage that he said to keep it legal so what we're determining is what our rules are going
to be so if somebody wanted to go on and on and on what's our rules and so I don't know if the county attorney or the city clerk can clarify some of that for us um mayor you know it might be it might
be helpful um to go back review Sturgis and see how that would um um play in with what these rules currently say and then we can bring back something back to the council on that point um because I do think there are
procedural ways just under the Sturgis rules to end debate limit debate um you know call the question i mean you there are available motions just under the rules of procedure to accomplish I think
what this is attempting to accomplish yeah like I said in recent years I don't know of anybody that's abused the debate process so right and I can't recall anybody ever making such a motion so but those kinds of motions would be
available you know whether you have it in this document or not you've adopted Sturgis and those those procedural rules are available to you those kinds of motions okay so looking at this document
we've discussed a lot of the things that um might be possibly changed um it does have sections in here about during the emergency and special meetings and all of that um we asked
about and for the viewing public um what this current document agrees with what our city charter does and our rules so there's not a conflict there is there anything else that anyone wants to talk about in any of these
subdivisions uh mayor can I just clarify i'd raise that additional item about abstensions if that is addressed currently or if we'd like to address that that a member who is abstaining plans to abstain from a vote would not participate in the discussion for that item is that something that is allowed
now like could could I um or sorry if if if we were to if I had a reason to abstain by law or if council had granted me permission to abstain because I want to could I still participate in the
discussion on that item if they're required if a council member is required by law to abstain then they're required to abstain from all discussion okay any voting if it's a um situation where a council member wants
to abstain for some other reason where they're not required by law to abstain I think the council could I think it would be within the council's discretion to have a rule that would say that council member cannot participate in the discussion i I think that would be
permissible okay so I would prefer to add a rule like that i think that would also just be clear about what the trade-offs are if if you are choosing to sort of request um a discretionary abstension from the whole council that you are you are giving up your ability to speak to that item and you're off the
hook on on casting a vote on that i think it just becomes a clearer standard and then people aren't influencing things that they don't intend to take a take an official position on all right other comments on that so just for clarity and I understand what you're saying i think I understand what you're saying but so if someone during the
course of the discussion after hearing the discussion then decides to abstain how would that operate so or would they have to abstain before the discussion and they only get to abstain before a discussion i'm just trying to work I I guess my opinion
would be that that's a a unique case in which it's probably not that like a good comment but if it were I think I don't think we would strictly enforce that i don't know if we need to write in that kind of exception but understanding that people will generally know in advance but yeah if there's a rare situation which the discussion reveals the
conflict yeah that's different all right any other discussion on that i have a otherwise I have a question on section five subdivision 7 um we just had the commission trainings and we were talking about that you have to give public
notice and So in subdivision 7 it's um page 46 of the agenda packet it talks about that you can consider an item not appearing on the agenda as normal business if a council member does not raise an objection um and then it says you can't
consider any action item that requires a public notice or hearing so what would be an example of something that doesn't require a public notice or a hearing that you might just add to an agenda at the last minute and you don't need to answer this right now but I was trying
to think is does that happen very often i can I can maybe respond to that first of all this is one section I think we will need to amend because really what this is saying is you're amending
the agenda right you are wanting to consider items that aren't on the agenda so I think it's just a motion to amend the agenda but one example of something you mentioned might be just if there's a council discussion item that the council
wants to add to an agenda that doesn't require a public hearing it doesn't require a um separate public notice but it would just be an addition or an amendment to the agenda i think that's what that that subdivision is is
addressing right go ahead a possible example could be um if if one of our council members had reviewed a current bill and decided it was imperative that it was discussed at the council meeting and it just came out the day of the council
meeting that would be an example of something you could add under council discussion there wouldn't be any action but it would be basically to say "Hey we should be aware that this is happening." Okay that makes sense uh mayor so just it does seem like the way it's written now that you would just kind of
unilaterally just start talking about it and I I would prefer that we use the amending process at the beginning of the meeting to set those items so I think that's okay could that also like if something came up during open forum you could add it
later too yeah I don't I guess that's a question about like Sturge just said if if after the agenda is approved if something came up again is there is it proper to do another motion to amend the agenda later or how does that work that is a good
question um yeah I I think you know I that's a good question i would have to check the rules to see if there's anything i don't know that Sturge Sturgis gets that detailed about the order of the agenda
or the approval of the agenda process but I can certainly check okay mayor can I clarify your question because we've been really consistent that open forum is just a time for people to address the council and we will not take action on
it that same night so are you suggesting that we would move away from that no I was just trying to think of when it could possibly that there could be a time where something would come up after we'd approved the agenda i was brainstorming to be honest okay so I
wasn't advocating for anything well I think attorney Teen was saying that I think does need to be amended because we don't and we would we usually uh have that open forum and we don't discuss the work behind it or the it's
not a working meeting right as I'm understanding the question is whether once the approval of the agenda is done can you then later on in the meeting amend the agenda again i
think that's what the question is right i'm lost now but I think regardless we don't like the way it's currently written it seems like you can just change it in the middle of things okay and then one other question in section 8 under enforcement it refers to
a sergeant-at-arms is who's the sergeant-at-arms uh yes uh thank you uh I think there have this was predates me but I think there were times when they
brought in um the some someone from public safety just to stand in the back of the room because it was a it was a contentious issue however attorney teach is reviewing uh both the decorum section and the enforcement section uh because
there have been uh updates uh uh legal legal updates and case law as I understand it so we may have further uh changes to bring back to you and we'll we'll summarize that in the staff report did I summarize that correctly yes that
is correct we will be reviewing that more closely so that we're in line with um current law all right Council Member Burke so then this is something that we will not be voting on April 22nd but we need more time to discuss this further
well we we may need more time yes okay yes i know that council's eager to get this approved and I know staff is too but I think that we should take a little bit take the time that we need to to get it updated
properly and that might that might mean pushing it to another meeting yeah April 22nd would be because doesn't this go right into the doesn't this go into the charter as well after it's been revised
no as like part of our code doesn't this go into the charter after it's been revised no this is really more like a policy um this is will be adopted via resolution of the city council okay mayor yes the the the timesensitive part
of this is the that order of business so I feel like we got pretty good feedback on that because we're putting together the templates for the agenda management so we we will proceed on that and then if we sounds like we do need more time for this um procedures and decorum
document and so we but we will bring it back to you to pass at a future meeting so we could split it apart and vote on the agenda format and do the decorum at a later date if we need to we can do that if we need to we may not even need
to do that because the the go live date with the new agenda management software isn't until May something ju June yes so I think I think we have some time but we but we got good feedback on it for the
templates thank you are there any other discussions of items on the decorum and procedures manual all right then we will move on to the hats off to Hometown Hits so um Council Member Coleman Woods did you have
anything to add i do not council member Christensen yes we uh had the opportunity uh some of us had the opportunity last week to uh take a tour of the new revised improved
Augsburg Library and which actually is opening to the public on Monday April 21st with a uh public ceremony so to speak of uh I believe it's on May 3 um but the library is great it's
it's well needed it's Henipin County has put a lot of thought process into it and uh it should be very uh useful to the public i know a lot of people in the community have been asking about it when it's going to be open since the Southdale library is closed for major
renovation this will improve um usage and affordability for people who uh would really have access to this so All right council member Hay for Deliri um I will just say I also really appreciated being able to see that
library tour and it's great to see the progress and also to say I'm enjoying the start of street sweeping season so if you have an opportunity to park off the street this is a great time to use your driveway and keep the streets clear so they can get fully swept all right Council Member Burke I will
second the street cleaning i they they cleaned my street today or yesterday and uh I greatly appreciate all the hard work so um but I want to thank the mayor for reminding me that uh the Human Rights Commission is seeking nominations for the Gan and Mary Jacobson Outstanding Citizen Award and so I'm
encouraging the public to make those nominations you can go to the city website and submit names for the Outstanding Citizen Award and please do that thank you thank you um earlier today um recreation services director Hu
Miller and I had the pleasure of speaking at three classes at Richville Dual Language School and the fourth graders had really really good questions and so I just want to do a hats off to the fourth graders at Richfield Dual Language School for their excellent
questions um I also would like to do some uh shameless plug for the Richfield Foundation's fundraiser they do a toast to Richfield and it's going to be Thursday May 1st from 6:30 to 900 pm at the Woodlake Health and Office Center
Rotunda and you can buy tickets by going to www.richfield foundationmn.org and they do excellent work in the community and fund some really great things and this is their major fundraiser so please consider
attending that and then finally um we also have um applications open for the charter commission so the charter commission is responsible for the continuing study of the Richfield Charter and Government it has 15 regular members who serve
four-year terms and if you're on the charter commission you can be on other commissions as well this is the one other commission that you can be on if you're on charter commission you could be on any other commission normally like if you're on community services you can't be on human rights but if you're
on the charter commission you can be on other commission so it's open to everyone including current commissioners um and if you're interested in um applying for that you can go to the city of Richfield website and go under city government then you look at commissions
and boards and then go to charter commission and there's an application that you fill out and the applications are open until April 24th and I didn't write this down but if memory serves me correctly there's like five or six people whose terms are coming to an end
six thank you six people whose terms are coming to an end and so they may want to reapply other people may want to apply and then the Henipin County Chief Judge I believe is the person that makes the decision on who gets to be on the charter commission so it's a very
important commission and I encourage people to apply for that is there any other business to come before us i will second the uh applications for the charter city commission i have served on that commission for several years and it is an important part of our uh our
community here and um you will have the pleasure of serving alongside me so that was it that's my shameless plug thank All right thank you anything else that anyone would like to add all right
then it is an order to have a motion to adjourn the meeting so moved second it's been moved and seconded to adjourn the meeting all in favor please say I i all oppose we stand adjourned
thank you