Thank you. Welcome everyone to the 01/22/2025 city council meeting. We begin, each meeting with the open comment period. This is an opportunity for anyone from the public to speak and on items that we will not be taking hearing later this, in the agenda. Each person has up to two minutes to speak for a total of twenty minutes. I will keeping will keep track of time through a a variety of methods. We have a a, stoplight here, so please know that I may need to cut you off,
because of the time limit, we want to be sure that others, have an opportunity to speak. I'd also request that each speaker be concise to allow more people to speak during the designated time. Participants are further encouraged to limit comments generally to topics that are within the scope and jurisdiction of the city council's ability to affect policy. Council members and staff do not respond to your comments during public comment but will instead follow-up on any specific requests separately.
If you have any materials to share with the council, please give them to clerk Giesler over here to my right, and she will distribute them. You will be invited up in order that you signed up. Please state your name clearly and make sure that the clerk has your information if you need for us to follow Harden and I am a disability rights activist. Welcome, is Paula Harden and I am a disability rights activist. Welcome new council members. Please include the needs of people with disabilities when you are doing strategic planning and
formulating future city budgets. In the decades since the ADA was passed and amended, previous city decisions on issues often excluded people with disabilities, such as for budgets, programs, and services. Be proactive. Do the right thing. Do not wait for federal or state government to provide laws or regulations to stop discriminating against people with disabilities. Everyday details can form barriers to people who have a wide range of disabilities. While affordable housing is a crisis,
accessible affordable housing is an even bigger crisis. At the national level, less than 1% of housing stock is accessible despite the seven minimum requirements of the FHA nineteen eighty eight. And even though Minnesota state has a visitability law, if you haven't heard that word before, come ask me to define it. Like the Fair Housing Act, it has many exceptions, exemptions, and other get out of jail free cards that render it toothless despite it covering
all dwellings. Stop using these excuses. Here's a thought experiment for you. What if the city budgets reflected the percentage of people with disabilities in Rochester? It's time to stop trimming the budget by excluding people with disabilities from the programs and services provided by our city government. It is time to stop excluding people with disabilities from city's strategic priorities and vision statement. I want to add, I did a review with word checking of the comp plan.
People with disabilities aren't mentioned. Okay. Once. Thank you, miss Harn. Next up we have Vicki Hagstrom. I'm doctor Vicki Hagstrom, and I'm here to represent child safety. Recently, an adult male in this community brutally raped and tortured a six month old baby girl in order to produce porn, to distribute for profit to a bloodthirsty global market place. I'm here to find out what this city council, this city leadership, this mayor, this chief of police, and beyond this room, leaders in the political, medical, business,
and religious communities plan to do to make sure that this never happens to another child, tween, teen, or vulnerable adult. That is all. Thank you. That's all I have on the sign up sheet. Are there any others who wish to speak during open comment period? Any others wish to speak? Seeing none, we will close the public close open comment period, and I'll ask, clerk Giesler if you could call call the roll. Council member Keane? Here. Council member Miller? Here. Council member Wall?
Here. Council member Fredericks? Here. Council member Palmer? Here. Council member Dohring. Here. Council president Schoebring. Here. Mayor Norton. Present. Moving on, to our city administrator's report. Administrator Zelms. Thank you council president Schoebring. Mayor Norton, council council members, members of the public. I always start this by thanking our teammates for acting with respect, integrity, safety and excellence in everything that they do. So I'd want to thank folks for that. Also our partners at Experience Rochester and businesses around town, are in restaurant week. So we're all in restaurant week.
That's also a partnership with Rochester Public Transit. We have a new opportunity in town with RPT Go. So if you wanted to try that out, you could try that out. You could take, the bus. You could drive wherever you're going. There are takeout options and, in dining options available. It's a slower time of year for our restaurants and we know, how important it is for, them to have patronage at this time and how much they they appreciate the Rochester Restaurant Week. Also did wanna have a shout out for our teammates in Parks and Recreation. They are the recipient of a little over $475,000
for a grant for the Corey Hill Nature Center that is going to be focused on, accessible parking, accessible trails, some interpretive signage and other, improvements of cultural opportunities at the park. So congratulations, to them for being awarded that funding for improvements there. Also, we have some things upcoming at the library. So on Friday, January 24 from 10:30 to 11:30, the super awesome dog man party is going to be at the library. So you might assume that that's for youth and families.
It is, so you can go there and have that social gathering and experience at the library and the auditorium. And then our partners over at the Rochester Art Center are going to be having, children's activities, free family day on Sunday, January 26. So there'll be a story time and some youth and family programming. So eleven to four, there are opportunities throughout. Check out their website if you are interested in more information. And that's what I have for today. Thank you, Administrator Zalms. Moving on to the mayor's report. Mayor Norton.
Wonderful. Thanks. And it's fun to see our supporting our youth with our, activities right off the bat. Appreciated that. I thought I would just let you know I came back a day early from the conference given, weather and what was going on in Washington, DC. It was a crazy time to be there. But I did present at the mayor's innovation project on the city's lead and copper service line replacement program. It was very well received. That was at the US Conference of Mayors. At the Mayors Innovation Project, I presented, Advancing Local Wealth and and Opportunity and talked about some of the initiatives that work
we have going on in the city. So, that was great. Also, I was, able to participate in the Mayor's Alliance to End Childhood Hunger, of which we're a a city that's, supportive and work and we partner a lot with the county on ending childhood hunger here in the community, and a reception for climate mayors at the ambassador of Netherlands office. One other thing that I did wanna mention, and those are just a couple of the things, that I was that I participated in. But the one that was really interesting and timely for us had to do with immigration and immigration, issues that cities are gonna be facing. I know the county had a presentation here in this room earlier this week about,
that the sheriff presented about, how law enforcement is going to continue doing what we've always done here, in the community from the county's perspective. And I I thought maybe this is the time to just say, we have a new council. And if you ever want more information about what's happening with law enforcement, we're happy to do a study session at some point. But that again, Rochester will continue on with the the, procedures and policies that we have always been doing here, with regard to, law enforcement, and and immigration. So nothing has changed and just letting you know that in case that comes up.
And we know there could be, changes ahead and we will deal with those as they come, but we will be, we will be business as usual here in Rochester. We also have, the international relations committee continues to do its work, and I thought you know, I've showed this a couple times now. There will be an informational meeting on Thursday, January 30, so a week from Thursday at 06:30 p. M. At Little Thistle and Edventures is hosting that to answer questions and to inform people about how to participate, what's involved. And, we're really focusing in on this,
trip to Japan about, a reciprocal project that we can do. So I think most likely, it feels like it will center around peace building and peace. So, any ideas or things anyone has, please, let us know. We'll come to a little thistle on the thirtieth. Winter Salt Awareness Week is coming up, March. So, the public works department's been doing a lot. It's an initiative dedicated to raising awareness about the environmental impacts of salt use during the winter months and promoting strategies to reduce chloride pollution in our freshwater systems.
There is an I have two pages of things that are being held, whether they be, webinars or I'll I'll be doing a proclamation, Friday here in the rotunda, the twenty fourth, at eleven, about that. But there are also classes that you can take online. And so at the very bottom, the last bullet is wintersaltweek.org. And if you go to that, you will be able to sign up for or share with your constituents. Or if constituents are interested, they can sign up for classes that are free of charge and and informational for for the community. So, a lot of smart salting information on that website.
So I think for day for today, I will leave it at that and, yep, we'll pass this on to council president. Thank you, mayor. Moving on to our order of the agenda. Are there any changes to the agenda this evening, staff? Seeing none, is there a motion to approve the order of the agenda? So moved. Moved by council member Wahl. Second. Seconded by council member Fredericks. Any discussion? Seeing none, all in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed, say nay.
Passes unanimously. Moving on to our consent agenda, we have, council member Palmer has pulled item f seven. Are there any other items that are being pulled? Seeing none, we will, then, I would invite a motion to, approve and block items F1 through F6 and F8 through f nine. So moved. Moved by council member Dorian. Second. Seconded by council member Miller. Any discussion? Seeing none, all in favor say aye.
Aye. Aye. Any opposed say nay. Passes unanimously. Moving on to our public hearings. We have one public hearing on tonight's agenda. Before we start the public hearing, I'd just like to clarify the process by which public hearings start. Staff will make a presentation and then the applicant or applicants representative will have up to ten minutes to discuss the application, then, I will open the public hearing. Members of the public have five minutes, to, to discuss the item and we ask that,
you keep your comments brief, concise and focused on the item before us. With that, I am going to turn it over to mister Elliot Mueller to give us a presentation on g one. Evening, council member excuse me, council president, mayor, members of the city council. I apologize. Usually, I'm so used to you guys introducing it for me. But, I'll be giving an introduction for a comprehensive plan amendment, CD twenty twenty four. I'm trying to be concise,
mister Moore. CPU. I knew that you were going to talk about it yourself and so Thank you. Which is by SHS Construction, and the location of the site is, South Of Marion Road Southeast and West Of Pearl Court Southeast at two thousand two hundred and twenty one Marion Road Southeast. The request tonight is to change the land use designation of approximately four acres from low density residential to small employment development. So just some background information, a comprehensive plan amendment is the process by which local government changes part of its existing land use plan, which outlines how land within the jurisdiction can be developed,
and accommodate new development with changing community community needs. So some background on this specific site, in 1993 the property was zoned in the county at the time, rural commercial, and then in 02/2009 the site was annexed into the city of Rochester, and it was given the zone of r one or residential zoning, as well as a underlying land use of low density residential. That being said, the property was used as a commercial site and continues to be used as a commercial site to this day. It's a RC race track and I think it's called everything hobby,
within that building. And so the land use plan amendment, is being sought to make, make congruent, underlying land use as well as the use on the site today. Some reasons why city teammates are supporting it as well as the planning commission would be that Marion Road Southeast is designated as a excuse me, a strategic arterial roadway through the Rochester Olmstead Council Of Governments long range transportation plan. A strategic artillery roadway is not necessarily compatible with low density residential, but it would be more compatible with, the small employment,
development land use, as well as, you know, around this specific area there are similar uses. There's a mixture right so there are some single family homes but there's also, some repair and maintenance shops, there's also some heavy commercial services so it wouldn't necessarily be out of place. With that, I'll answer any questions that you might have, and I know the applicants in the audience tonight as well. Thank you, mister Mueller. With that, we will we will hold questions until after the applicant speaks and the, we have the public hearing. If the applicant is here,
if you can step forward and introduce yourself and you have ten minutes. Good evening, Mr. President, Madam Mayor, members of the council. My name is Vanessa Hines. I'm an engineer with WIDSETH. I'm here tonight representing the applicant. We've worked closely with Elliot and the rest of the the planning team, on this application for several months now. So I just want to thank them for all of their time and effort that we've put into researching the history of this lot. This land use plan amendment is the first step in the process that we're trying to go through right now. So we are at the land use plan amendment and then ultimately looking for a
rezone of the parcel to be consistent, with the underlying land use as well. With that said, I'm happy to answer any questions and, we look forward to your support tonight. Thank you. We'll call you back after the public hearing. Thank you. At this point, I will open the public hearing, and I do have, one member of the public who wishes to speak on this item. If you could step forward, Molly Dennis, if you could step forward and, speak to the comprehensive plan amendment by SHS.
Well, thank you. So I am Molly Dennis, and I think that it is wonderful what the work has been done to connect with the staff and, when, you know, meet the meeting changes of our community with this, change in the comprehensive plan. So I have nothing really to say specifically about that. However, there is another, item agenda that's coming up in public in reports and recommendations that is not a public hearing that should have been So miss Dennis, miss Dennis. That issue. Miss Dennis, the the public hearing right now is regarding the comprehensive plan amendment by SHS construction.
Yes. I did review that. I think that's a wonderful, plan. I have I have no apprehension about the decision of this council on this. Want to speak to that item? No. But I do wonder why h two is not in public hearing Miss Dennis why that is not an opportunity to speak during the open comment period on any other item on our agenda I couldn't that was not yes. You could With the utmost respect, council president, I cannot speak on that. And that is for another reason because you spoke at an earlier council meeting this
year this month. So with that, unless you do not have any if unless you have other, information about this specific item, I'm gonna have to ask you to, sit back down if that's okay with you. Okay. So I'm not allowed to speak? Unless you're gonna speak on this item. Okay. I I will speak on this item. I I think that it's important for residents to have the ability to speak. I think it's very important that public hearings are held and issues that are really impacting their lives. I believe that this impacts many lives,
but also other issues also impact residents' ability to have their future heard by their voices. So I, think that public hearings are very important for our city and, open comment, obviously, and other ways of, the residents, citizens to communicate with their elected officials are important. So I, I think that this public hearing is I get I probably don't I don't have my timer on here, but I'm not sure I have five minutes to speak on the Marion Road.
I think, that is Miss Dennis, do you have a question? Take all five minutes either. So you can be concise. Okay. And it's a little bit hard sometimes for me to be concise. But I I feel the need to, say that, these meetings right now that are recorded, these meetings right now that are live streamed, these if they're a meeting, if they're a training, a study session, anything that we wanna, you know, characterize as the definition, I think it's very important for that that our residents of our community have the
ability to be informed and engaged in their government. So Thank you, miss Dennis. Alright. Thank you for silencing me, and have a nice day. Thank you. This is a public hearing. Anyone who wishes to speak on this item, please step forward. Anyone who wishes to speak on this item, please step forward. Seeing none, I will close the public hearing, and I will invite the applicant back up to, to make any closing comments. And, and then you are up for questions. So Thank you. I I have no further comments. I'm happy to answer any questions that you may have.
Okay. With that, I will invite my colleagues to either if they have questions for the applicant or for the staff. Council member Wall. Thank you. I note that around this property there are single family homes. Would we anticipate over time, decades, that those single family homes would turn over in land use as well? Thank you for the question Councilmember Wall. I would, yeah, they could, or they could not. I think it's a fifty fifty or, you know, it's a it's an even split. We are evaluating, you know,
as you may know with our comprehensive plan update various areas of the city, to ensure that the land use is, reflective of what's happening today. But, for speculation in the future, I would not be able to give a concrete answer. Council member Keane. Yes. Thank you again for staff. Obviously, the way this process is set up, we need a super majority. There's we're our process is set to be very protective from, doing these sort of changes. Can you talk a little bit about why that is and what the risks are with these sort of rezone, which these are changing the underlying usage? Yeah.
Thank you for the question, council member Keane. So really, yeah. Again, just the idea that land use is, there to guide, future development. It's not the the teeth, I guess, so like that's zoning. But yeah, we shouldn't be changing, the underlying land use, you know, on a whim. It should be, with frequent updates such as the five year comprehensive plan update that we're doing and then that's kind of the vision moving forward into the future. So, I mean, we we we have these tools so we can change land use but it's not something that we should be doing every, you know, meeting every day.
Okay. And then a follow-up when we got this specific request for these specific four acres, was there any, possibility of looking at the area and saying other things should be changed or we just that's not part of our process? Definitely, there were some other properties that came up that could be changed, similar to this one, like I had said, there are a lot of uses in this area that, don't match the underlying land use, but the way that it just so happened at this moment is that the property owner came forward, as an individual. Okay. Thank you. Any other questions from council members? If not, is there a motion on this item?
Council member, Keane? Yeah. I'll I'll move to adopt a resolution approving the comprehensive plan amendment CD twenty twenty four zero zero four CPA by SCH Construction to change the land use designation of approximately four acre parcel from Losette Densee residential to small employment development located South Of Marion Road Southeast and West Of Pearl Street Southeast at 2221 Marion Road Southeast. Second. Moved by, Council Member Keane, seconded by Council Member Palmer.
Any further discussion? Council member Palmer, go ahead. I'm just gonna note that it's Pearl Court Southeast. Thank you. Yeah. Yeah. Just just You want to say? Yeah. I'm just gonna you know, the site looks like a prime example of like a mismatch from the current use and this was in the packet. It does it I mean the process is set up to not be doing these willy nilly. They need super majority. But I am I'll be watching as we go through our review and resetting if we're going to try, as the staff talked about, Tanya. Should we be matching the land use the current usage to what the zoning should
be? Because this is an area where there's r one housing, property bordering this in four or five places. So this one, I, you know, I I drive over to this area. I know what it looks like. I I'm good with this one, but I I think that time we we do wanna be protective when you have residential, adjoining properties. That's a lot of what we are trying to do with the comprehensive with the recent, unified development code. Any other discussion? Seeing none, all in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed say nay. Passes unanimously. Thank you. Thank you, miss Sines. Moving on to our reports and recommendations.
First on our agenda is the h one, which is the downtown property preservation program funding request request for 330 Broadway Avenue South. This item is back before us as the mayor has exercised the veto power on this resolution passed by the council at our January 6 meeting. The city just a few notes. The city just a few notes. The city charter requires an item that has been vetoed to be to be returned at the next meeting for reconsideration and a vote. The the item must be taken up as is and cannot be amended or changed
at this time. Approval of the item by overriding the veto requires a super majority of the body to pass, which is five, I votes. Otherwise, the veto is sustained and the item fails. With those guidelines in mind, I turn it over to the mayor to speak, to the veto before I invite questions from my colleagues. Mayor Norton? Thank you very much. And, I want to start out first by extending my apologies for not having caught this item earlier. And for those who feel that this was a surprise decision made at the last
moment, It sort of was, because the the mayor has five days to sign contracts. It came before me. I had to wait to talk to the staff, and we were up against the final hour before I got some information about this. And and to Josh Johnson, who was the presenter of this particular document, he laid it out very clearly, but it was in a consent agenda item. We had certainly talked about, at DMCC, the idea of creating this. We've talked about it, this fund, this historic preservation fund.
We talked about it at this table in the past as well. I was one of the cheerleaders for this program from the beginning and strongly support the idea of having a historic preservation fund. Where the mismatch came in for me and what I missed was clearly outlined that said this is the program and funding source under request. I did not I did not see that. What I saw was adaptive reuse, which was what this building is, adaptive reuse, and that was under the revolving loan fund.
So it wasn't until the contract came before me to sign that I that I fully understood that it said grant. And philosophically, I will just say, while I'm I've been supportive of the historic, preservation program funding and the three types that we have, which are clearly outlined in the document before you and was at the last meeting as well. There is an infrastructure investment program, which is a grant. There is a revolving zero interest loan fund, which specifically states that it's for adaptive reuse,
which is, like, where I thought this was going to be housed, and then a prerenovation grant program, for what it says, you know, prerenovation studies. So I guess, philosophically, I struggled with, at the last moment, understanding why we would not be using the revolving loan fund, which is could come back, be utilized for, the repair of the Second Floor, in this instance, of the building, particularly when it is going to be utilized for an apartment which will be an income source ongoing from there forward for the person who has applied for
the funds, instead of, why that wasn't more appropriate, instead of a grant fund, which is giving someone cash to renovate their building that they then are going to make income off of. And it just seemed most appropriate to me that the language that said adaptive reuse would be most appropriate for this building. So again, my apologies for not catching this sooner. It was on the consent agenda item, and I truly did not see it until it came forward and realized that it was not coming out of the revolving loan fund.
Fund. So I did veto it to bring it back partly because of my philosophical concern about not using a revolving loan, but giving cash, for a money making venture. So there was that, but also just this idea of, having it be on the consent agenda and having not had the discussion about it prior to. So I just decided to bring it back, make sure everyone was aware of the two, you know, that this was, in my mind, an adaptive reuse pro, you know, venture, but that it was not funded under that,
and you may all well have been aware of that. I missed it, so I just asked to have it come back and be put on the agenda so we could have a discussion about, the appropriateness, of using cash grants for ventures like this that will allow the building owner to, have a new cash income, as a result of its use, as opposed to generally historic preservation, which would allow for tuck pointing and roofs and, keeping a building up to its historic standards, which is, I thought, the part of the point of of,
this fund. So that's what I have. Again, my apologies for not catching it sooner. I wish I had, and we weren't at this point. It was not meant to catch anyone off guard. It was it was truly to bring it back and just let you hear my concerns and rationale and bring it before you again. Great. Thank you, mayor. Discussion from council members? Council member Keane? Okay. Yeah. Again, I, was aware this was when we it was on our agenda two weeks ago. I have a slightly different again, putting the the historic district was approved just about a year ago.
Six months later, we did have this new, funds for helping this. But a lot of what I thought the focus was was making sure that the area that we're we've identified as a historic district was economically viable. And that is a big concern with this because there there there is this, we have this contention here between private so I was aware that adaptive reuse that ends up leading to economic viability is a valid part of this. So I was comfortable with approving this, and we'll see where this goes tonight.
Thank you, council member. Council member Wahl? I agree with the mayor that the project I agree with the mayor that the project qualifies for another program but believe that it also qualifies for, the program for which it was originally, approved by the council. The council spent months and months, before establishing the historic district to ensure that there were incentives that would not disadvantage downtown property owners. Most downtown buildings are intended to be revenue generating, not all, most, by providing extra housing downtown I think that everybody wins by giving cash.
The property owner is also putting up the same amount of cash, so it's not, a freebie, for the property owner, but instead will cost about $125,000 on the owner's part as well. So, I will continue to be in favor of the council's original action. Thank you. Councilmember Fredericks. Any improvement made to any property is in in a business district is about generating revenue and adding housing to downtown just benefits the the whole community in the downtown
whether it be a small family that moves into building like that and so on. Tuck pointing a building, working on the facade, that generates revenue as well. It attracts our inner. It it it's all generating, revenue and bringing, you know, bringing favorable people to our our downtown. So, I'm that's that's where I stand with, this. Thank you. Council member Miller. So I appreciate the opportunity to to bring this up because of its kind with this funding source. It's gone through DMCC. I've listened to the old recordings and I feel comfortable supporting this.
I was also aware, that this was coming through the DMCC GSIA dollars. I'll also say that I've been thinking about this as with the new historic district recently having been approved an initial set of incentives to create the the the the change in downtown, creating new economic models, housing being one of those, so that after this initial five years when the funds expire that there is a viable way to maintain these properties, reinvest in the historic district, and I think this is a great way to understand how investment in our public
infrastructure and that human infrastructure of new economic models for support it. Council member Palmer. Well one of the things that we heard from business owners downtown was that they don't need another loan, they're looking for grants and and so the DMC heard that, they came back with the grant. That's one of the reasons I supported it and I'm I'm excited for it. I think that these businessmen who own these, business people who own these of these buildings take a big risk and and and having some skin in the game for the city or the DMC with a grant, I think is is is more than appropriate. That's why I I, supported it last week or two weeks ago.
Council member, council member Keegan? Yeah. I I'm just I'm going through our discussion, but I think it's time we get a motion on the table that I'd like to move to adopt the resolution authorizing the downtown property preservation program funding in the amount of $125,288 for the project that will include the Second Floor renovation of the apartment unit in the property located at 330 South Broadway. Second. Moved by, Council Member Keane and seconded by Council Member Palmer. Further discussion, come on. Just some points.
Again, we've talked about the economic viability, but it's important to me too that this is not a pure grant. This is a matching grant. So this is again, I think this is the way it was configured to be set up. So it is there is a distressing thing here when you start talking about commingling public money with private money and we have to be careful that we don't do that just without those sort of controls. I would have liked to seen a but for sort of standard for this that the work wouldn't be done without the grant. I don't think that's a part of it,
but I think it looks to me like the grants are helping move these things into the into 2025 because people want to participate in these in these grant things. So in that way, it's getting the work done that we were hoping for. Mayor? Yeah. And I can see where this is going and that's perfectly fine. As I said, part of this was bringing this issue forward and having a discussion about what we're doing with city tax dollars and and, state tax dollars. These are taxpayers' money that we're using and I want to make sure we're very clear on how we're spending them and what we're spending them on.
And so, again, I would say it's more appropriate for the revolving loan fund and I'm not sure why we have it if we're not using it for something like this that's adaptive reuse, which is what the line says it's for. So I'm a little confused about how we're gonna determine the difference between the revolving loan, the grants, or the the projects, I'm sorry, that are most appropriate for the revolving loan fund versus the infrastructure investment program unless we just expend all the money out of one and utilize and then shift everybody to the other. But the other point that I did want to mention here is,
there are other downtown businesses that do not fall in the historic district that need and would love to have access to these funds, to funds like this. And so when we that that and that's been part of my, a little bit of my concern in reservation with moving in this direction because this this need that we're talking about right now, you know, building out apartment on a Second Floor is something that we could be doing in many, many of our businesses downtown, but they're not gonna qualify as historic. So they're not gonna qualify for this particular fund.
So I put that out there just so as we're moving in this direction and we're thinking about what we need in our downtown area, we might wanna think about expanding these opportunities to other buildings downtown that are maybe not going to qualify for this program, but would very much like access to this type of, program. So that's it. Thank you, Mayor. Council Member Doreen. Thank you. I actually, am going to be the outlier, I think, of my colleagues here, and I am going to vote to support the veto on this item. As the mayor brought forward, the veto, I engaged in deeper study,
and I agree that this particular project falls into that revolving loan category much better than the grant category. So I plan to vote no against this item. That's my rationale. I understand the argument for economic vitality. I understand the need for downtown housing. I think the mayor has made some some pretty compelling, some pretty compelling points. So I intend to vote nay against this particular item. Thank you, council member. For me, one, I wanna commend the mayor for her,
holding to her principles and her transparency on this, issue. I will be voting to support, the, vote that we took, two weeks ago on this. And it's one I one I really wanna say first, I think the work that we've done as a council in the past, I wanna commend my, colleagues who were on the council last year on working on this issue. I know it took a long time. It took years to get to this point and to have this program come to
fruition, in the first week in, January 1, I I I think is amazing. I think it's a great program. I think that it's a program that that DMC worked in collaboration with council members on a I know for the last year to really get to what kind of, of, functionality that that program would be And to have three projects in our first agenda item, I think, is, really, amazing.
I look forward to, joining the mayor on the DMCC board, in February. And one of the things that I will say to my colleagues is that I will, be very transparent as the mayor has been today with the the deliberations that are happening on the d DMCC board and bring it to, to my colleagues here. So with that, seeing, no one else wishing to be heard, there's a motion on the floor. All in favor, say aye. Aye. All opposed,
say nay. Nay. The motion passes six to one with council member Doering voting, nay. Moving on to item h two, which is a study session meeting location update, and I'm going to turn it over to, city administrator Zelms to, fill us in on this topic. Thank you, council president, council members, mayor Norton, members of the public. Four items under one item here. Today, you might recall at your January 6 meeting, there was discussion at the end under other business about where things were with Room
104, desire by some to be in that room, wanting to have some better understanding about how and when you might be there. I think there's probably a lot of different viewpoints on how and when you might like to be there. There has been talk for quite some time about, trying to be around a table. And in fact, the prior council did take some action providing flexibility for that, for different types of meetings that you have, For example, coming up, this coming Monday where it's a facilitated strategic planning session, you can expect sticky notes and to be moving around during that meeting.
So all that to say, you currently do have some flexibility in your rules up to and including if you wanted to. I would suggest vote if you wanted to be in, Room 104. Some of the limitations until we have the final updates for the upgrades that we are getting much closer to, are that we would need to have a stationary camera and be uploading that. The live stream capability just isn't there with the interconnections from our prior vendor that were created. I believe we were within a couple of weeks of sort of a final, idea of when we might be able to get connected.
We have a lot of teammates working on this and have for some time. Really appreciate the partnership, with Jeremiah from the library, Karen from the library. I I don't know all the titles I know of, director of library. Jeremiah wizard from library, and, Clark Giesler and her team. But all of that to say, we are getting much closer. I can't give you an exact date because we are awaiting that final, design from our new, vendor who we are grateful for and hopeful for, AVI. All that to say, you have many options. All of those options are really at the will of a common council.
You do already within your rules have some options for flexibility depending on the type of meeting that you're happy having. But since we've come through an unprecedented time in the country, there are also a lot of different expectations that people have for being able to have video, etcetera. And so with that, we do have folks that could answer really detailed questions if you want them. But really, it is a conversation, I would say, for the common council, the mayor, others to weigh in on. Thank you, administrator Zelms. Who would like to weigh in on this first? Okay.
Well, I maybe I will. Okay. So, so I look at, I think we're moving in a good direction. I I I think having, the ability to have this room to be as fully equipped so that we can live stream here should be the priority. So I think, I agree with that. I think also when it comes to our study sessions, I think I look at study sessions. It's a time period. It's a period when all of us are together,
but we're not, not taking votes. And I know it has some history. It used to be something else. And, and, and so I look at that time period and I say, okay. During that time period, we have a variety of types of information that come to us as a council. There are as, as we had last week a session that really trained all of us on, you know, how to be a council member and how to make sure we are following the guard rails legally for the citizens of Rochester.
So we have training opportunities. We also have, opportunities to, to do some strategic planning where face to face direct contact is very important to getting to a place where, one, we're building our team and moving moving to, to strategic priorities that we, we see synergy between us. So that's one kind of set of, of meetings that I see are those training and, orientation teamwork.
With that, I do not feel that it is as important that we have live streaming. On the other set of meetings, which I think and I I would like to hear from staff on this. I think it's the bulk of our study sessions, and they are updates on items that will be before us at future council meetings to make decisions on. And those are extremely valuable sessions. They they, they go in very deeply on issues that are important to our community,
and they are are watched by members are of our community. And the ability to see those live and also to know who's speaking, who's asking questions, I think is an important piece of what we provide to, our residents now. And so I don't know that we're ready for this move if we cannot provide, live streaming for those type of study sessions for our, for our the members of the public.
So with that, I will let my colleagues speak. Council member Miller. I appreciate those comments and I I appreciate the process that we're clearly on in this project. I I understand the the need for times where we have a little less formality and an ability to move around even doing a facilitated session at this table would be very awkward. I appreciate that, I appreciate the former council setting rules that give us that flexibility. At the same time, in being a newer council member, I've relied on many recordings, of prior discussions that do lead to policy considerations,
and I'm very grateful for the quality of the recordings and prioritizing this space, to be able to produce those. I've also watched some recent board and commission meetings that have taken place in one zero four, and while the majority of video and most audio is there, clearly not at a place where we would be able to guarantee as high of a quality. And so I also agree with council president Schubert that maybe, this is is a a possibility, but when we have more information. And so I would, be really interested when we have more updates from this AV project specifically on timelines
to consider what capabilities one of four can give us at that point, but at the same time, I would prioritize keeping our our meetings in a space when their policy policy development, in in a space where we're able to produce high quality recordings that provide information about who is speaking and what they are saying at high fidelity. Council member Keane. Yeah. Thanks. Again, I've heard there's like I said the four different action items on here, but it really is more that discussion. And, I think one of the things I come here with is the idea like we do have currently we have our rules have some flexibility.
And when I say our rules, I mean the staff can make some decisions to say this needs to be in this would be the best option one zero four. This best option would be, in at the Dyer. So this best option would be off-site. And I want to we have those in place and I think we should continue to use them. As far as getting into this AV and like the technology one of it, I would rather stay away from that and just let the staff kind of work through that and get to the point where you'd say, we think at this point one zero four would be a viable option with good
recording and potentially live streaming. I don't think we're there right now. I guess I also get into this like looking at the we're talking about study sessions, and there are many types of study sessions. I think, Council President Schubert, you just brought up to me one of the main ones and it's when the staff is basically on a path towards some sort of policy recommendation and they're trying to see, you know, get the council's feedback on that. I think that actually works pretty well in this room compared to, roundtable. There's other things like, education or the team building that don't lend themselves to this environment.
But I I have not seen the big problems where, the staff has made the wrong choice of going to another place and all of a sudden we don't have that recording and and we did some things. There's some examples out there which says it's too bad some of these things weren't recorded. But by and large, it's working. I think what we're watching for is to get that technology up to the point where we'd have those recordings, and I think that's the path we're on right now. Council member, Zelms. So there's been some questions on the timeline on could you talk a little bit more on your
expectations for a timeline on this room and then potentially 01/2004? Council president Schubring, I wish I could give you a better sense of this, but we are finalizing the details with ABI about this the upgrades that need to happen for all of the equipment in the chamber through which one zero four will need to patch. So being able to update this, making sure that we still are able to record in here when we do have meetings and when our partners at the county have meetings, sometimes create some challenges for,
being able to schedule enough time for them to get to an endpoint where they can record two days later, then we have to test it and do all of those things. So it's because this is a live active room, I think we will do everything that we can to prioritize that. If for some reason there is something that we could spend two weeks, we could ask our partners and ourselves for some study session or period of time to move to another location and record differently because we're gonna get to the finish line.
But our goal is to move as quickly as possible, but to do it right with this group that has discovered some fascinating ways that people connected equipment. And quite frankly, much like the prior item that you talked about, once you touch something that's been cobbled together for twenty twenty years probably here, hundred years in a historic building, you find you start to find other air problems where different parts of the system you start having to replace because the new piece is overpowering the old piece and it starts to create this trickle effect.
So getting this room correct has to happen either before or you have to get it to a certain point for one zero four to actually be able to be untangled and retangled into, that is my not AV professional explanation of how AV works. We do have, a teammate in the audience that might be able to describe that more eloquently, but I have a feeling based on where we're at, untangle and retangle actually might be accurate. So I think it's concise, and that's what I'm looking for. Be able to give you more information, I would say,
within the next month about what we really think is happening with the time frame, what all needs to happen, where certain meetings fall within that, and what that likely means for a march towards the finish. Thank you, administrator. Any other comments on this? Council member Wall. So I am, one of those who would, yearn for, greater collegiality and be able to look council member Doering in the face better than I currently am, as as we are able to to discuss various issues, and would encourage our move to,
such a table as quickly as we can, understanding the problems that we have. I suppose the biggest frustration for me is I'm starting my third year and and we have the same problems today that we had in January of twenty twenty three. Five years ago when we went into a a virus time, I served, in the church, an industry that needed to communicate immediately, with people and within days, maybe weeks for some,
we had to pivot in order to be able to broadcast, A word that we thought was important for, the community for, a city with with, great staff, and to have, such a incompetent, contractor, working for us for so long, it's just really unbelievable to me, I would have we did it with volunteers in my church and I would have fired those volunteers if if, we were still working on the same problems two years later. So I'm I'm frustrated. I think we fired them just maybe not as soon as we could but we
needed the room to work before. Thank thank you for that administrator Zelms. Yeah. Thank you for your very gentlemanly frustration council member. Council member, Council member Palmer. I'll be sure I agree with Mr. Wall and I agree with the frustration and he says it much better than I would've. Any other, any other comments on this? Council member Doreen. Yeah. I would just like to commend the staff for coming back, with information on on on such a timely basis, for this. I also share this frustration, as a member of the general public.
I have been actively trying to watch city council meetings and pay attention to commission meetings, committee meetings just as, councilman Miller, suggested, and and some of the quality in those recordings is lacking. So I appreciate, we're that we're working towards a solution. I'd be a little bit more grace filled than maybe, council member Wahl in this case would would have been. But I also haven't had to deal with that frustration at this point. I do also want to just say I appreciate the members of the community who have reached out, who shared, their concerns about this as well,
wanting to slow roll this so that so that we can make sure we have a, high quality functioning system before we we do make the switch. So, again, I'm just grateful for city staff for compiling the information they have, and I look forward to a brighter future ahead. Thank you, council member. Any anyone else? Well, I what I'm hearing is, I I don't know that, we're looking for an motion on this, but I'm hearing that that, administrator Zellms will come back to us at some point with an update in two
months. Did I hear March in there maybe? Council president, council members, mayor Norton, members of the public, I think that we can have a basic update for you, say, in a Friday update, probably within a month month. Would that would give you a time frame, and then we could plan a time frame to revisit this conversation. I do think you can't really underscore enough a few of people said this that, improvements to 01/2004 beyond what we have always used, which is, like, a Mevo camera and, like, there's a lot that has to be done by staff in order to utilize that room now. There are a lot of other things that would benefit from that,
you know, even if you decided you never wanted to move back there, most of your meetings should be here. There are a number of different committee meetings that happen there that are not ideal right now with how, the setup works from a time frame, how long it takes to upload, and, and, like, the consistency of the pieces of equipment. So there is a much broader value beyond whether you move, all some or none of your study sessions into Room 104 and also for this, meeting room. So appreciate that and appreciate the grace in how we move forward.
I think we feel very confident with our new vendor that they have given us a lot of information that they can act on and that, will make the investment valuable for the future. Alright. Council member Keane. Again, just looking at the agenda and we had the action requested action of those four. We've talked about three of them. The one we really haven't spent any time on is that discussion on whether alternate space is desired. And again, I'll just weigh in here that, I think that I did consistently being somewhere is got as a value.
And I'm fine right now with the way the our rules had leave the flexibility that if there's something unique that we wanna have at the DSIS or something at the library, we can do that. But I don't think we want to re claim another space as the correct future space for our for our study sessions. That'd be my input. And I sessions. That that'd be my input. And if Go ahead. And if I may, you always do have the study session calendar attached to each study session. So if you would want to look at something and say, is this something that you think maybe would be valuable in a different space or
that this, you know, something else, there is an opportunity there during, the end of your study sessions to have those conversations more regularly. Regularly. Alright. Okay. Thank you everybody. Great discussion. Council member Doreen, go ahead. Yeah. I just have I have one more question maybe for for staff and that is when we have sessions that are off-site that aren't recorded, how is the public informed about what was discussed? How are notes of those meetings provided to the public council president. Council president, council members, council member Doreen. So, typically, when we don't record a meeting,
it there's some specific purpose for that. Usually, it's to prevent maybe kind of a cooling effect on your ability to be, collaborative and discuss things. And so while, of course, we want to be transparent, we try to achieve that by keeping the meetings open to the public as they have to be in accordance with open meeting law. And otherwise, we do not take notes as a rule for any meeting, whether it's recorded or not, because clerk regurgitation of what council members say cannot and will not ever be objective,
and therefore, we don't do it. We only report what happens, not what was said. And when we don't record what was said, then your option is to attend the meeting in person. I Follow-up. Go ahead. Yeah. I appreciate that explanation. I think it was good for me to hear as well as members of the community to hear. So thank you. Thank you. Any other, comments on this item? Well, as I as I said, great discussion. We'll hear more. Moving on to item, h three, which is the purchase of front end loader plow attachment. This was pulled item by council member Palmer.
Council member Palmer, take it away. Yeah. I'm just gonna make a motion not to approve this, request. Is there a second? Anything else you want to add, Council Marler? I'll make a motion to authorize the purchase of the metal press as presented in agenda item f seven? Is Second. A motion has been made by, council member, Keane and seconded by council member Doring. Discussion. Yeah. I think council member Palmer brings up a good point here about how, you know, when you have that sort of, like, extra funding, how does it get used and which is the way to go about it? In this case,
I looked at public works. I know that we've had discussions before about the light winter last year. But to me, when I look at that and saying there was equipment on that, on this team's budget going forward, that couldn't be purchased and pulling it in. I find that to be a good use and sort of like, an opportunistic staff that I want to support in that type of request. Thank you, Councilmember. Councilmember Palmer, go ahead. Well, first of all, we do a budget and as we're going to find out here in November that we spend money now than we regret spending in November.
If we had a horrible winter so far, they'd be in here asking us for money from the general fund. And we'd also, gosh darn it, we got to give it to them because we see all the snow. Since we don't have any snow, in this piece of equipment, we let them buy one last year, which is what we did. I don't see the necessity to do it now. It also sets up a scenario and I'm not saying this is what happened, but they could then decide not to spend so much money plowing snow and buying equipment. And we want to have safety first for our plowing of our roads and taking
care of our roads. And so it's up to the city council but for me it's an item that it should go back to the general fund, because that's where it would come out if they were an overage, but I don't think I'm going to win my argument. Other discussion on this item? Seeing none, all in favor of the motion, to, which which is the motion to approve the purchase of front end loader plow equipment, say aye. Aye. All opposed, say, nay. Passes unanimously. Thank you. Moving on to, ordinance first readings.
Mister Spindler Craig, take it away. Thank you, council president, council members, mayor Norton. There's one first reading this evening, item j one. An ordinance rezoning approximately 2.39 acres of land located South Of Highway 14 Southeast at 4140 Highway 14 Southeast from M MXS, mixed use street oriented, to MXC, mixed use center, and amending ordinance number four four seven eight known as the unified development code of the city of Rochester,
Minnesota. Thank you, mister Spindler Craig. Moving on to we have no second readings of ordinances and, no tabled items. And I don't see any other business. Any other business? Mayor. Thank you. I just wanna thank the council for indulging my, my veto. That was a very difficult thing for me to do, but I felt it was necessary, and I very much appreciated the dialogue. As I appreciated, council member Palmer for pulling an item that he felt he needed to make a statement about too. And so when we're able to do this in respectful ways,
it allows all of us, and for me in particular when I have no formal vote, at this body for me to be able to share with you my issues and concerns is very much appreciated. So I just wanted to say thank you. Thank you, mayor. Any other comments? Is there a motion to adjourn? Make a motion to adjourn. Moved by, council member Fredericks. Second. Seconded by council member Wahl. All in favor, say aye. Aye. Opposed, nay. Thank you very much.