This longer term, right, goal because we we talked about this ten year horizon in the initial, what we want to be true ten years in the future. And we can get to live within our means today, next year, but set ourselves up for an unsustainable situation ten years in the future to a different council and a different version of this community. So those are some of the pieces that aren't clear enough yet in in this for me to make sure that people have options. Right? Depending on who they are in our community, whether that's somebody who's starting their career or somebody who is looking to stay in
their home later in life. Because that's gonna be a different part. And I I don't feel like we're we're talking about equity, which to the mayor's point, I I agree with sustainability. It's confusing to me in foundational principles because I've heard also that it's not a strategic priority. But then I look at social equity, and I I see that too as, well, it's a foundational principle, but sometimes it doesn't seem to interact with the strategic priorities when I think about, again, accessibility in our transportation system and our housing. And I that's just a confusion for me in this process and in this pyramid.
Council member Palmer. I'll go back to what we budget for. The quality service is is in the budget, and and the reason that it reflects that is, like, public works, you know, we plow a certain period of time because that's what our public expects. Our public parks and trails are are set up, and and that takes money, and and that's where that quality service comes in. Responses is is an entirely question, questions and and and responses. We did the three one one service, which cost money, which is in the budget. And and so, I mean, if somebody calls us and we say we'll get back to you in a month,
is that is that what we think is the quality service? If we plow a road, do we wait two weeks to plow the road? Is that a quality response? Because quite frankly, we could do that and save a lot of money, but but I don't think our public wants that. You know, do we have enough fire personnel to show up to a fire, or do we say, yeah, it's close enough? Those are all things for me for quality services that has to be in the budget. And if you don't have that and have a set standard you think is important, I don't think that that you should be able to expect every route road to be plowed in an hour. It could be done, but would cost us a lot of money.
I go back to the single family dwellings and I go back to affordable living. You know, we did the Maxwell study. They were now in the third one of those. If if you do a study and the study says that you're short on single family homes by a lot, then that should be your focus. If it's not gonna be your focus, then no good study. And and, you know, when you look at at the growth management, what does that mean? And and to me, that means that we manage the growth. We don't let other people manage our growth. And so we don't go willy nilly where we're gonna put sewer or where we're gonna put new roads. We do it on a on a plan that works for the city of Rochester,
to help out with that. So those those are my items on on those two right now. Council member Fredericks. If this not to oversimplify, but if this is just giving you the basis upon in which we make our decisions, You know, public safety, community safety, same difference to me. Fiscal responsibility based upon facts and hearing including all of our community members inputs. Just like council member Palmer just said, certain things are gonna come up where, you know, something's gonna be a front runner in that particular deal.
You know? There's a lot of examples we've built over most recently. It was the Peace Plaza. And there's a lot of different views on how that was seen. What was the overriding concern in that one? What would it boil down to in that one was safety? Okay. The next thing it might be sounds really bland and not looking nice. It might be from a heart lens. We have to look at it, make this thing appear nicer, more appealing to the general community, so on and so forth. Each thing has to be kinda weighed out, and you have to lead with what particular thing is the front runner on that
issue. So it's hard to just throw a blanket or, well, these are our three three things we're gonna do on all things. It's almost impossible. The next thing might be, you know, with, council member Goering's gonna have a lot of things. You can come at things just like, council member Miller said. It depends on the circles you're you are in and you're hearing from. You know, who you surround yourself with is what you're gonna hear the most of. I couldn't agree with that more. You know? Council member Dorian brought up a lot of things that, personally, I wouldn't think of right away. But as he brings them up, I'm like, of course, that's important. So,
you know, that's how you gotta come at each thing from a different angle almost depending upon what the situation is. So it's hard. I mean, we could debate this all day long, and next week and the week after. So, you know, that's that's just what I look at it. Safety first. Fiscal responsibility is huge without sacrificing quality of services. And, hearing our hearing our community members, you know, and and making decisions based upon, you know, not who has the loudest voice. What is the largest consensus? Because the people there's certain people I've seen in a lot already in my short
time on this council. It's like the loudest voices get the attention. Okay. Great. But doesn't necessarily mean that's the largest consensus. Alright? That's all I got. Go back to the the the prior slide. So I I do have a quick one. Oh, I was just gonna recognize the name. Yeah. I was just gonna add. I I think what I'm hearing from everybody and and some of the same frustration is you could put quality services down, but what to what level are you holding that quality? That's you know, you could so that's the frustration,
I think, for all of us, interpret all these things differently. We all may have different ideas about what quality is or what affordable living is, and that, you know, that's the frustration with this. And and I'm just gonna follow-up with with Andy's comment. What you have said is why we did the Rochester visioning exercise. That's why we did it because we hear from the same 10 people all the time, and they're loud, and they get in front of us, but they're not the whole community. And so my goal the reason I did that was so that everybody had a
chance to say what they wanted for their community. And so I literally am going to bring something from that survey to you at every meeting for the rest of the year. Sorry. But that's what it's there for. They've told us what they want. They've told us what their concerns are, and it's not the STPs. It's not the same 10 people. It's everybody, and it's statistically significant. I've gone back to them. We've gone through it. And it wasn't a survey where people had to choose things they wanted. It was open ended, so they told us what they wanted. And that is different from a survey.
It is like a large focus group, in fact. So I will continue to bring that forward, hopefully, to help us remember what the community at large says as opposed to the same 10 people. I'm gonna connect what the mayor said and what, council member Frederick said, which was council member Frederick pointed out listening to the public. And one of the the items on the focal survey that stood out to me when it was presented was and I looked at it again,
last night in preparation for today. And the biggest gap was in public engagement. I think the the the number was forty three forty four felt engaged, and the expectation was 16 or something like that. And so, I think there's something there when it comes to us being able to really know what our citizens want. And, you know, I, you know, I had a master class last year and,
many of five of us here did the same thing. And so we have a sense of our public, but we really wanted state to have a have a finger on that pulse going forward as we make our decisions. Council member, can you One thing I wanted to add to the discussion, you said that quality services thing, and this is a little bit of history or as I approached this when we were doing these four years ago. There's most of the initiatives that come in front of the council are project oriented. They're new things. They're not operational.
They're not the things that go on in public works on a regular basis, or police or fire, or, you know, basically the clerk's office things. And that was the reason we had quality services. That was that idea of, like, looking at the operation of the city, not just the operation of the city council, to say, do our strategic priorities really address the way most citizens touch the city of Rochester? And most of it is through the operation stuff that, frankly, we as a council don't deal with on a regular basis. So that was one of the reasons on there.
And if you look the way it goes down into action plans, and I don't wanna get into this, but that's where we were try then then those things we're dealing with the operations and trying to say, you know, what are our, key indicators of the clerk's office operating efficiently? Are the key indicators? And and that was more that was focused on that idea of, like, when council member Paul Moore says, what are the main things we do? Public safety, public works, and then, you know, parks and library. That idea of, like, the amenities and these other things. That they're not the the things that come in front of us all, frankly, annexation and development and things like that.
So a little bit of history with it, but also that point that if you wanna know more about what the individual words say, you've gotta look sometimes in reactions to follow-up. So Can I talk can I talk more on that? It's the illustrator's But when you look at just the this visual here, when you get your counsel packet, you get some three areas that have some of the definition that is probably informing some of how people view these things. But just going to affordable lending, the areas of focus, at least when this was originally adopted, was housing variety and affordability, transportation options and access,
equitable, right, underscoring landscape, and creative incentives, access to opportunities and amenities, owner occupied, affordable housing, increasing ownership opportunities for black indigenous people of color and seniors. So we might not add individuals, but we're prepared. I just think it might be helpful for this discussion too because I feel like that's maybe what we're wrestling with is what does a short priority title mean, and is it still appropriate? And maybe it's not to take it to the next slide of your work,
but I feel like we're getting stuck in there. And so quality services does talk about some of the things that council president Schubert mentioned in different words, but and some of the things that council member, Fredericks, and Palmer were talking about. And it, I think, tries to integrate some of the foundational principles to the priorities. And so if you were gonna change the words of a priority or add a priority or switch a priority, you would still need to be defining what does that mean.
Like, where how are you going to enforce that? How do you expect staff to influence that if regulatory framework's off the table probably shouldn't be assembled? The question that I was gonna ask that that I hear in this conversation a little bit is there seems to be some overlap or perhaps fuzziness between the foundational principles and the strategic priorities. Because I heard in the foundational principles, you've got environmental stewardship, fiscal responsibility and sustainability, public safety,
and so on. Three things that some of you have mentioned that are critical issues that you all believe are part of that that perhaps, again, not to put words in anyone's mouth, may bleed over into some of those strategic priority territories. And so Okay. We're gonna Curious Customer progress and then the mayor. You told us to focus on strategic priorities. So I was doing such a good job, and I didn't even see it was above it. That's serious. I hope I look at NCO. So yeah. I I do see that. So now I now I look real great. Thanks.
Yeah. And I would say and that's a constant frustration for me because they're there, but they're not always down here. And when you wanna pull them down, even when you put something on the an RCA, it says, well, which of the strategic priorities is it? Well, no. I'm talking about a foundational principle, and and so I don't wanna be made to feel like those foundational principles don't have a place because it wasn't one of the three things we chose. And that's been a frustration for the last several years, particularly with environmental stewardship, which has been you know, that was my key point of running.
It's something I wanted to focus on. It's what the community expects. And yet I always feel like it's not there. And it is. It's it's in the bigger version. And the question is, it's still maybe there's, you know, displacement. May I ask is, particularly for those of you who maybe have more history with this strategic plan, how how do you envision or how how was it envisioned that the foundational principles and the strategic priorities would be utilized? Do you do you have a sense of of how they're different?
And is that a clarification that this body wants to make? Council member Keith, go ahead. Sure. I I can only respond to how I view the time, and that part of it is I I think the strategic priorities have more of a point in time feel to them, where the foundational principles do not. They they persist. I have a question for Administrator Zones. Can you talk a little bit about how you use you and your staff use these for preparing for budgeting going forward?
How does how how does the staff do these? Well, I can speak for how I want them to do it. I think it's similar to what council member King said in in the just interplay of foundational principles and the strategic priorities, and I see in how they show up in the areas of focus is that's how they sort of intertwine is to deliver affordable living based on making sure people that the way we look at programs and services is that we have there's access to opportunities and amenities. That might be programs,
that might be services, that might be employment, that might be we've talked about childcare before. So it could be more specific. It'd be helpful, and I would appreciate. But I look at them as these are the things that if we're talking about investment, investing in resources, that that is where we should look first. And if something doesn't seem you know, these are pretty broad. It it doesn't seem like it falls within that, or if it falls within, say, economic diversity, but it doesn't need the some of the foundational principles of equity, social equity, or financial sustainability.
Like, good idea. Let's think about how we might do this idea differently because I can't spend $4,000,000 on that in, you know, a year. I it's not fair to or in my view, it's not fair to bring something like that to the city council and now you're wrestling with this huge number publicly, unless it's super clear that in your strategic priorities, you're okay spending a lot of money on certain parts of the priorities. Right? And and what sources of money are you okay with that being? So it's I would say it's sort of the guard it's not the legal guardrails,
but it's sort of the in the spirit of guardrails of what is something reasonable to bring forward because it requires a lot of political chips when you vote on the increase in the budget. Some of which are part of being a city because we have a lot of for a general coordination, a lot of it we do see their service contracts or human beings that are deployed by the city. And those other investments, if they're not on time and they're ongoing, as council member Miller pointed out, it could set up a future council for hard consequences of something seeming sustainable in
the moment, but we didn't think about the long term that once you start something, one of the hardest things to do with government is stop doing it. There's a constituency for everything. We usually use horseshoes as the example in leadership forum. Like, even if we change a part to be a more current use, there will be someone who plays horseshoes that will miss the horseshoes then. And that's challenging. And the other side of that is that sometimes you have to spend more money in the current time in order to get the savings down the line.
And that's the other piece that we always struggle with because it's you know, the upfront cost for x, y, or z are really really high. But But if you look ten years down the line, and I think I go back to the, RPU when they did all the street lights, you know, they changed them all into LEDs, but they had to make that initial investment in order to see the savings that was gonna play out for the rest of forever. That was before in this year. So But that was actually a public interest investment paying RPU to do it, to get the city the savings. Right. So both can be true. I mean, different sides at the same time.
I guess that's where why I think the both the foundational principles and the strategic priorities are important, and I view because I view the foundational principles as not changing much right now. That would be a much bigger change than strategic priorities. Even though those might not change in the way they were, the description of where you're at and how you're gonna continue to move is important because we we may have accomplished some of those things or it's underway as now it's about sustaining the program that was built up to do its good
work. That helps. Thank you. So given that, now focus on the the light blue and the yellow. If if if that is how the staff is utilizing the foundational principles and the strategic priorities, priorities, are there adjustments that this body wants to make to any of those? We have to define them. Absolutely. But given what you know to be true today, are those the right foundational principles, guiding principles to use? It's I as I heard the administrator talk, it's almost the lens with which they they view things that come before you and
then the strategic priorities. Council member Miller. Sorry. Just curious. We we also looked at the strategic priorities and areas of focus. I feel like that's a more tangible area as we look at limitations looking forward. I start to wonder if we should maybe adjust those and then summarize them with a theme. I feel like we're working in this vague space between how these are defined, where we really the definitions of these three areas today are the areas of focus. And it feels a little more anchored in something we can tweak.
So we're gonna pull that next one up. Are you continuing, council member Bill? Well, and and I only look back to to these the future opportunities, the limitations, challenges, and community organizational strengths, and and just wonder if those are well represented in those areas of focus, if there are key ones that are missing, and if that feels like a tangible place to come to the consensus of should that be reflected. And then maybe we redefine affordable living or quality services if there are themes, or maybe a new category starts to emerge that's missing today.
Council member Palmer. I think you could move the, quality services into the foundational principle because I don't think that's ever gonna change those other items. I'm I'm I'm reading the first one under quality services, and I don't think that we've achieved that. So that's an area that I I think we need to work on. In this in this conversation, I think it would be helpful for me, if someone would define every time the word access is there, does that simply mean that we're going to offer a program or we're going to make sure that that program is accessible to everyone?
I, I I I would really appreciate that clarity in this discussion. Can can I respond differently? Because I I think I know where you're going with that. But I think what that means is, would you get consensus from this group that we that that is a strategic priority to get that? And I think that's what you're asking for. I and and as as opposed to saying, we should put it in there, we have to see if we can get consensus to that. And Absolutely. Yeah. Okay. Alright. That that's similar to the way I was doing this. I was kind of coming in with the idea of this time bound thing and looking at the next three years and saying,
what do I think the city is really what's the most important thing for the city to do? And I'm going back to, you know, quality execution. I I don't know if anyone agrees with that. I haven't heard any support for it. I mean, if if but but I mean, I don't mean no. Everyone wants it, but everyone just assumes it. History tells me it's not gonna happen with an assumption. The last three months has told me, we have gotta stay focused on this. And if our real focus is other places, I I would submit that that's a bad place to start 2025. So I've heard a,
a, one thought of moving quality services off of this list and move it up to foundational principles. And then I've heard, a a call to keep it here because it's important as a as a priority. So I think Yeah. Just to clarify, I'd go with council member Palmer saying I I could I don't need it to be quality services. It could be but it should reflect if somebody you know, it's one thing for us to say, well, then you look underneath this. But realize most people scan the top things. And if they don't see those priorities in there of, like, we have to do things well.
And and I'm not in this case, I'm not talking about the normal services. I'm talking about these huge investment projects that we've never done before. It's not like the thing with, like, running the parks and running these other those are things we do on a regular basis. There's always changes, but I'm talking about making sure this staff and this council are are agreed that we are going to do everything we can, and the main prop is going to be keeping BRT and, the sports center and these other things,
and 20 and the Broadch Sixth Street Bridge on schedule. We're not gonna say, like, oh I shouldn't say we're not gonna say it. It's going to be a big deal when someone says, like, yeah. We didn't make that deadline or there's this other thing. I want that to be a big deal. I think that's a priority, a strategic priority. And I again, I'll if it doesn't make it or if it's under married under, you know, quality services, that's okay. But I want to make that clear in this discussion or with my peers. So I hear that that's something different. That's not really how quality services is right here.
This is really about delivering on the commitments or at least the conversations Yeah. That the council has had about major initiatives in the community. So, Michelle, I'm bringing that to the table. I wanna be careful. I'm not there's no consensus of that. And and maybe someone else would read it. That's already up there under this. But in my view, that needs to be what I would call the strategic priority, not a not a line on the thing. I don't care if it's a line, but I gotta find some way to say, is that important to us? Because I'm communicating that that's important to me, and I I think it's important to our reputation over the next two and three
years too. So I think that's certainly a question then for this group. Is that something that you want to see as a strategic priority? We can work on that more than that. Yeah. And I, yeah, I I like what I'm hearing from council member Keane, but I have a different perspective on it. I I and I think your perspective, what I'm reading you say, I think is extremely important. But I also think that if we're going to focus on those initiatives that are gonna be major projects over the next five to seven years that that how we
navigate the, the, development and how we communicate with our residents on street closings and buildings going up and and, and the the whole process as we're going, and that's that community engagement piece. I think that needs to be a major focus of that. I don't know if that lands in an area of focus on a a strategic priority that, is in that area or somewhere else,
but I think that's important. Council member Palmer. I I would agree with mister King. I I think and I'll say it maybe a little bit differently, but, we have to take care of what we have. And what we have right now are three large projects coming up. What frustrates me is is when we get a a notice that the roof is bad at the rec center, the roof is bad at the library, or the roof is bad, and we don't have any money for it. And so if you take care of what you have, and so if you take that bucket and say these are three things that we have, that we need to complete and do in a timely and and and phenomenally great,
fashion, then that's, I think, is is what I agree with. So Can you repeat the three things? Or it's CRT, Sixth Street, and Sports Center. Those are specific projects, but I think that ex that idea of execution, I I could add into the parks thing. I could, add in Eighteenth Avenue Southwest. There's a lot of things that I'm there's just a lot of stuff. That's what I'm there. Yeah. Sure. Yeah. That's how we do it. Yeah. And even in the other side of that is with all this work mails going on, are we going to that's I'm I'm too informal here, but, I mean,
are we going to be able to keep up and make sure we don't end up stalling that project for two months because of something that wasn't done right? I I want our focus to be on that. That's what I think is a strategic priority. I don't I don't know how it reflects on these three on bullets. I'm I'm not there. Just to clarify, I I saw it more broadly than the three. Okay. Council member Woff? At least in partial support of council member Keane, And I think that we do a pretty good job on that, in large part, due to a good administrator who keeps our agendas focused on council work.
That is, we have seen, I think, around the country and particularly a couple of cities nearby, that have, allowed their council to stray into areas that simply, do not work. There's a scathing editorial in today's Star Tribune about one of those states. So I I do appreciate that we need to be strictly focused on our council work and what's going to move us ahead. A few weeks ago, a former council member came and stood before us.
His view did not prevail in our boat, but one of the things he said was, you know, I sure hope that my kids stay here. And isn't that our priority as a council is to create a Rochester where, next generations can, be housed, where they can raise families if that is what they choose, where they can find employment, and I think we've got the full employment act for the next thirty years. Mhmm. We're right ahead of us. So I I would really love to see a focus on the work that is
immediately ahead of us, especially if we're only talking about a four or a six year time span for a strategic priority as opposed to a foundational principle. I mean, we can change that in in short order. Council member Miller. I'll just add that I I hear some agreement in what council president Tubring and what council member Keener are saying in this. We have to be represent recognize that local government is the most responsive in the state and the federal.
We know that limitations and challenges are navigating the changing federal planning landscape. Some of these projects are big projects that are federally funded. If something happens there, we still have to go to our constituents, be responsive, good communicators, and meet those expectations of transparency and trust. So I have to point about the public engagement. I think that there's an element of that of being responsive and adaptable to changes that we cannot control. I mean, to the mayor's point as well, there are things in the affordable living space that are beyond the scope of the
city to control, but there are things that we can do and and focus on the basics of where we allow housing to be built at what density and how that interacts with the infrastructure investments that we make. So I could agree with quality services being moved up to a foundational principle. I think it's right in line with what we've heard about public safety from council member Palmer and others as being chance bound to our our budget setting. But I think that there's some areas in this area that focus under quality services that aren't in that high service delivery,
optimized, etcetera. I think those, for me, feel beneficial. And this cultural and recreational opportunities and reflecting, the needs of our community in this changing demographic feels different. It feels forward looking planning. And I don't know if that's being responsive to all of these changes over the next five to ten years with Unbound and other major projects or the demographic shifts or how those interact. But I feel like that's a different area than just the high service delivery of our existing departments, all the core of others.
Other comments at this point, we've been at this for, I think, ninety minutes. Do we want a five minute break at this point? Yeah. Okay. Sure. Five minutes. Okay. Where are we going? So what I heard you talking about, before the break was this concept of, well, two two ideas. One, moving, quality services that's currently the strategic priority up to foundational principles. As, foundational principles are really the things that change less over time,
but they truly are foundational to how the organization, how this government operates. And the others are important to maintain. We haven't tested that yet, but that's generally what I've heard so far. The other items under foundational principles are are critical to maintain to maintain under that category. And then, rephrasing quality services that was strategic priorities to really something that's more aligned with delivering on transformational initiatives or some some wording again,
I don't wanna get too too minor in the words just for a moment, but but something like that. That this, this body has made a commitment that that are important to maintain, an, a strong focus on in order to deliver on those major initiatives, transformational initiatives that are out there. So I wanna test that with you. I also heard, something important around community engagement that perhaps I don't know if that's a foundational principle or if that's a strategic priority, that all of the work that is done, is reflective of engagement of the community and understanding what's important to the community as,
as in in your roles to hear hear what the what the residents what's important to the residents. So those were just a couple of things. I I wanted to put them on paper so it was easier to see as you're having some conversation, and we can continue to add to this. What are some of those other strategic priorities that you all find important? But let me pause there and certainly ask if that begins to reflect some of the conversation that you all have had so far. I was thinking during the break on the community connections as well, and I don't wanna lose it.
And I tend to and I don't know what my colleagues think. I tend to think it may be more of a foundational principle than a strategic priority, but I I think from certainly from a council member standpoint, that's that's the touchstone that I look to is making sure that I have the best community connections and that I'm listening to a broad spectrum of constituents. But I also see it as important to our city administration when it comes to
communicating those transformation initiatives. So I think it goes across the organization. So but I would just so we don't lose it, I would put it in foundational principles if I was one of the advocates for it. Yeah. And I agree with that. I think think it should be a foundational principle. And we've been using the community co design methodology, and we have learned that when we don't do that, we make mistakes, and that happens. Right? So I don't wanna while it's a foundational principle,
I also hope we don't lose sight that for these strategic priorities, we go back up and say we need to pull that down and make sure that we're using a community co design or a really broad base because it's a foundational principle. Right? So I I I guess I'm saying I agree that it should be a foundational principle, but I don't want it to get lost like I sometimes feel like those do because they're just a given. So it'll be our job to make sure that we're saying, have you lived at social equity? How does public safety? Have we communicated with the public?
What are the things that are strategic goals? And just to pick up on that later, I also I think about it perfect examples, council member Palmer mentions three one one. That's a communication tool. The, Rochester construction update that just went live last week. I don't know if I have had it right. But that's a communication vehicle. So have having as many communication vehicles that match the demographic of our public and
what they expect from other, other organizations that they pull up on their devices. I think expectations for ensuring that we're at, top focus on communicating. Under the strategic priorities that you have handwritten on the post it note, I'm having some problem with the language transformational initiatives, and I'm wondering if it could be, like, transformational capital projects instead of initiatives. Because in my mind, any strategic priority that we indicate is going to be transformational for some.
Some so if we have someone who can't live in a home now and we work on a living and they're in a home, that's transformational for them. But that's not falling into the same bucket that that my, my, fellow council member was talking about earlier. Go ahead. If I may introduce a different strategic priority. I mean, I think affordable living feels consistent with what I've heard, but calling out housing as the foundation of affordable living feels I mean, especially with the Rochester Vision 2050. I heard that over and over.
So let's let's maybe take that one. You have currently affordable living. There was a lot of conversation about, needing to better define what that means or at least having an opportunity for creating some clarity there. What I hear is perhaps changing the language and it's not just a form of living has something to do with housing. So if two questions, I guess, is a two part question. Number one, is something around housing an important strategic priority that this body wants to to see?
And then if the answer to that is yes, what would you what would you what would you call that? Go ahead, council member. I'll just add, I don't wanna lose transportation in that because I feel like, to council member Palmer's point, you know, looking at the annual cost of car ownership, it's rising. It's maybe not the highest area of the budget, but if housing is affordable, I mean, the the other frame of drive fleet qualify, I mean, people could end up miles and tens of miles away before they find something that they qualify that that fits their budget.
So I I don't wanna lose the the idea of affordable living. I think that housing is the highest priority within that planning. Like, if we don't have enough housing, then we don't meet the other goals. The other goals are so important. Transportation and infrastructure investment. I I would agree with council member Miller. I think housing needs to be called out as a part of a strategic priority if it's even and I would be comfortable even if it was its own. I think we have more tools to,
to impact housing. We all know that we're behind in the number of housing units that we should be developing. And as council member Keane mentioned earlier, we're not alone as a municipality in that front, but I think it's it's in the data in that, you shared today in everything that I know I heard last year and, the first quarter of this year. It really does deserve to be a a strategic priority.
I would also agree with my colleagues there, and I would label it as, affordable, accessible, equitable, and sustainable housing for Reactions or concerns or questions about having a strategic priority around housing? Council member Miller. Partly one question for for administer zones. Does this redirect someone? I mean, how I almost think of it as affordable living housing first. Right? That, not losing sight of the other aspects of affordable living, when we look at general, what is somebody's highest cost of living?
Probably, how do you know this is the top of it? We don't keep in mind those other aspects of where the city influences cost of transportation, access to amenities. Those other elements that go with housing. I feel like that's still missing for me there. I guess the question would be, do you keep affordable living and add affordable housing? And maybe define So it draws more on, not just economic diversity from the perspective of, like, with business on board, but a community member, their place in the economy, and also affordable living.
But it's an awesome conversation. Could we see, as we're talking about this, could we see the the current strategic priority with their areas? Mister chair, can I go back to Yes? My desire for this community, which has to do with active transportation, environmental issues. It gets to, you know, work and we've done. A lot of it through a policy setting, but unless we keep it in front of us, I'm afraid it's going to disappear. So I don't know what you wanna call it, but something having to do with, being environmentally aware, and and that includes active transportation and all those other things that create an environment in
the city that addresses, you know, that responds to the future needs of the people and and look looks ahead, not behind. So I'm I'm open to whatever people wanna call it. I just feel like it's missing from all these things, and they've had it spelled that way for a couple years almost polished. Council member, I'll just add the reaction that I agree. I I don't know what it's called either if it's grouped with another strategic priority or combo. But I agree that feels like an opportunity, especially as we look forward to what we want to be true ten years of the future, the complexity that's been innovative,
planned well, and our housing needs. And I think that there's a sustainability element to all of those. Is it is it part of growth management? I'm I'm wondering if that's if that's some of the wording that you all are, and I don't know if those those area of focus those areas of focus reflect what you're thinking. I guess, I and I'll speak to it. I I think it should be somewhere. I've definitely sustainability. I think of it in two different buckets. There's our what we control, the city of Rochester, our services and being sustainable there.
I think there's more control there, and so that is an area. But then there is the public, you know, moving the public, which I think is a maybe a second point in there. But, I think I think we need to tease it out between what we can control and what we can influence. Council member Palmer? The affordable living one for me, reading everything here, I agree with, and I think transportation is important for fair affordability. I think the last one is really important that we have that that ownership.
It's about, 26%, BIPOC community on a whole. They're missing out on that that ownership opportunity, that the growth of of wealth of their families. And to me, that putting in transportation also makes it makes it I go back to that as being important for affordability. My only problem with sustainability is what does that mean? How do you define sustainability? Somebody? Council member Miller. Go ahead. I don't know if the mayor was at I had a a thought about what you said about ownership, opportunities, and both building. So I'll say,
I think sustainability is is the plan for I think we're already seeing, just in the national space that geothermal projects are rapidly improving and declining the cost. And so when we think about even affordability of our energy, heating, and cooling, I mean, in years from now, it's gonna be a drastically different space. Today, I know our view is doing a lot of energy transition work, but I just think some of these emerging technologies that came up with AI innovation, I think if we don't focus on the transformational work and there's a sustainability lens to how we plan for housing,
where housing can be built, where it can rely on existing infrastructure to the tax base leveraging our tax base, planning for the future tax base, making sure that we're not disproportionately impacting seniors and other people who are, paying increasing property taxes. I mean, all that planning feels related to me, and I think of sustainability as the unified lens of our planning, transportation, housing and building some wins on the financial sustainability side. But I I almost don't wanna link those, and I know they're hardlinked to the, foundational principles because I think they're they're related,
but they're separate focus. Council member Palmer. I'm confused by mister Miller. What I mean, you started out with geothermal, and then you started out with what we can and can't do or what's gonna happen in the future. And then you went to where it can be built. And and I don't I don't quite follow that conversation. I know that looking at our census that in the last ten years, we've only grown one square mile. And so are you saying we're not gonna grow at all? Are you saying that we're gonna grow what do you mean by sustainability and growth? And I I I use this as an opportunity to,
in affordable living, say that building on what you said with increasing ownership opportunities for people who are long term residents, I think we are missing, people in our community who are renting either because they're here for a short term job. They're, you know, starting a career. How are we making affordable renting? Like, again, I'm not saying that the only people that get affordable housing are those that we're building ownership opportunities for, but how are we focusing on this population? We've been a, you know, a family that's moved for educational opportunities.
We have a large a significant part of our community. That is in some field of medical training, either as a student, as a trainee, others. And I don't see that represented here. And what I see in the sustainability, point, council member Palmer, is that people are increasingly looking for opportunities to live close to work, either for sustainability reasons or simply for convenience. And I think it intersects here where we're allowing additional housing, density, other projects to be built as we're looking forward, what kind of community we're becoming. So,
again, these are going to cross. Okay. Now, council member Palmer, you have your hand up again, but maybe we maybe we want to. Well, I'm just I'm just going off the facts. In fact, the Maxwell study says that we do well in apartments. I'm not against apartments. And and that we need to have more single family dwellings. And and I think that the the wrap now for me is when public works says that we're prohibited with sewer in this area, and that's where development's going to go. That makes sense to me. I don't want to say we're gonna put it in x.
I don't wanna go over here at c because somebody says I wanna be over and c. I wanna do it smartly and and move to that. But to think that our borders aren't gonna increase, you're not gonna have more single family, which if you have a study that says you need more, then we should we should follow that study. That's that's where and sustainability to me would be more of a if I'm building a home or an apartment building, am I putting in geothermal? Am I putting on solar on the panels? Am I doing something? On this on the other flip side of that is, Minnesota is the second best energy code in The United States.
Period. It's the best. And it started in the early nineties. We've insulated our homes. We've invested in that because we saw as a as a state that that was important. That's sustainability to me. And so that's why I'm asking what the definition is. Do you wanna add I'm sorry. I can I can put my 2¢ in? Two words, though. And then you can pick up your time. I guess, I I think now we got three words up there. Sustainability, growth management, affordable living. I think of sustainability in the environmental sense as,
you know, what we're doing at RPU, what we are doing, if we, if we have a strategic priority on sustainability, are we using sustainability as one of the chits for, our tools in, in in with developers. And are we our services, are we moving to EV vehicles? Are we, putting solar panels being, on our property, our city properties. Growth management, I see as where I think council member Miller's points out as far as a smart growth that
where we the growth management is focusing on being able to do in more infill development and on on some of our sites that we're not able to because of our infrastructure issues there. So so I think there's overlap to those two, that I don't know if they need to be teased out or do we need to tease them out more? Council member Miller, Brian. Just to add on the sustainability, looking statewide at our greenhouse gas emissions,
transportation is the biggest source of KSU emissions. So making sure that transportation is part of sustainability in my view. And I think that the energy efficiency of homes of building structures is important. I would also just add that, council member Palmer, you mentioned single family homes or apartment buildings. There's there are formats between those that I think are important. And I would talk about, ADUs. A couple years ago, the council adopted an ADU incentive program. I checked this out recently.
I hope I'm not misspeaking anyone. Please correct me. But zero projects have qualified for that incentive program. So we indicated a a preference for some infill, some flexibility in the housing space we haven't gotten there. So is that a longer priority or should we evaluate that in our strategic priority where we're encouraging and incentivizing infill development that doesn't require new sewer investment into any of the sectors, but could be supported by existing infrastructure. And that's what I mean by sustainability too. We're we're being sustainable with the investments we've already had made and maximizing what housing
can be built on top of that. What I wrote here is just in trying to hear or to summarize a little bit of what I heard. I wrote sustainable growth management, and what I what I believe I heard was that, at least in concept, this is really about planning for how to ensure that you have the right planning in place. And that includes transportation as well as a lot of the other issues that were mentioned. And then I also heard in in the conversation, some interest in maintaining a strategic priority on affordable living.
It may not look the same here. It's in addition to something specifically about housing, but how to, how to maintain a priority around affordable living. So this is just me trying to capture some of the thoughts that I heard, not saying that there's clear consensus on these things, but would be interested in in your feedback on on that as a summation of of some of the comments discussed. Fair. Yeah. I would say, yes. I have zero problem with sustainable growth management. I think it's something that is absolutely necessary as we go.
But what I'm talking about when we talk about sustainability and environmental stewardship is bigger than that. And it's difficult to define. The sustainable development goals that we talk about broadly, there's dozens of them. It's it's a big area. The the place where it does fit with affordable living is if we don't do these things, if we allow homes to be built that are done cheaply or we don't do some of the sustainable, development things that will help, whether it be trees and not having heat deserts and some of those things, it costs those who have the least ability to pay for it.
So, yes, that helps with affordable living. But I if we just do that and we don't call out or pull down that environmental stewardship, and it's bigger than that. It is really about sustainability. It is about building codes. It is about city design, and it is about RPU and the work that they're doing. If we don't call it out differently than that, it will be lost again. So do you have do you have some suggestions of what what that might be called? Just to understand the difference Sustainable Sustainable growth management.
Sustainability and environmental stewardship or something. It because it's it gets to energy. It's it's about what our RPU is committed to the policy that the previous board and this board, I think, supports for, you know, having been, you know, a % renewable energy. We have that by 2030. We're we're heading in that direction. And so it's bigger and broader than just the things you have, but those I don't have any problem with those. I just I'd have to give a little more thought to a name if we're looking for that name that makes sense.
I I just don't wanna lost. Again, I'm writing these down just so we don't lose lose the thoughts. Yep. And that environmental sustainability is a good placeholder. It it may be behind the file. I I don't know. And this is in addition to the foundational principle of environmental stewardship, or are you suggesting it get removed from the foundational principle short term strategic goal for the next five years, whether it stays up in foundational principles in a different format. I mean, I don't that's not bad. Sustainability isn't bad,
but it needs to be actionable just on the short term. I agree with the mayor's point on that. I and I'm an advocate on community connections, and I did advocate for putting it on foundational principles, but I worry it's gonna get lost. Mhmm. That I think I think there's a and it's not I think it's all of us. We think that's already done, or we're doing that stuff. And so the way I look at the strategic priorities are a little more actionable.
Mhmm. So I would advocate for that. I would keep my community connections where they are, but maybe two years from now, I'm gonna move down. They can move. Administrators offers some historical context. So not on either of the tribe that you're seeing, fiscal discussion at the council where the the last strategic priority. There was an underpinning sort of one that wasn't a strategic priority, wasn't foundational principle, but was the strategic governance and inclusive decision making. So what that talked about was decision making is a more of a citywide communication
and engagement strategy with diversity equity inclusion at the forefront. He makes great action plans and annual commitments. Right? Communicate them. Policy and operational actions reflect equitable community investment. Like, I think it's like eight point Where is it? Where is it? On this dialogue. Mhmm. It's on the very bottom of the page. Oh, there we go. Okay. I don't think it's in your slide, though. Because it's not in his step, I think. Oh, it's too numerous. Yes. So but it just didn't in this discussion last time, make its way to a priority accommodation. It made its way on the page because we made the graphic that's not cool.
Alright. Other thoughts? Anything new that people don't see either reflected in, the previous strategic priorities, and found a funded fund foundational principles. Council member. I think at least three people, two to my left and one to my right, have, talked about, I think, in the area of affordability, affordable living, living within our means, I think I heard. I heard taxes from a couple. I think that, that, being able to stay in your home as a retired person,
I think that really is a part of our affordability as well to keep, high in in mind for our council. Can I ask a verifying question? Is that referring to fiscal financial sustainability of the city organization, or is that for individuals within the community? It's it's for it's for individuals so that they can afford to live here. So part of affordable living is ensuring that people are able to Probably that it's named. I think it's important that it's named for our council,
that, our our fiscal responsibility, which is number in the blue, also becomes really a a strategic priority for us as well. Mister Keane, you know, to live with our means. And I'm sorry. I'm just clarifying myself. So this so under affordable living, you wanna ensure that residents are able to live within their means? No. That we are, that that we we are paying attention to our decisions so that people are able to afford a living in our community.
Got it. Okay. Okay. I'll make a comment here that, again, we have that on our strategic priorities. When you expand what it means underneath, it doesn't always tie directly to that. But I think you bring up a good point that just carrying it as our strategic priorities is an important communication thing too, and it should affect our decision making. And and with any of these, god help us, if it doesn't have to, we can ignore them when it comes down to it. But that that's what we're trying to do here is put guidebooks, not just for staff, but much more for our decision making. Alright. I'm gonna comment on the, environmental sustainability. I wanna make sure,
and this is where it gets down to magic that the staff and these your group will have to do afterwards. But, I can I could look at strategic priorities and say they're a conflict because the strategic priorities of housing and affordable and affordable, a lot of times what we see as sustainable is driving cost in some of those things, and that's gotta be balanced somewhere there? I don't have a problem with the idea of, like, carrying it, but I I could also read it as conflicting. Yeah. The other thing is we we have our sustainability, you know, initiatives,
and it appears that we take on some of them, and they're big. Like, we'll do the geothermal. And it was a, you know, major thing. And then you've got RPU trained to work towards this, you know, energy, development program that's that's expensive to do. But it appears that as soon as you make that decision, the next question is what's next? There's another one on the list, and it doesn't seem to ever end. So I worry about having it in the strategic priorities because it sort of will apply to somebody that we're going to do all these things. And at a decision making thing, I worry about that.
I think your point about conflicting priorities is a really important one. And I don't know that I've ever seen a strategic plan for a community that didn't have conflicting priorities because you have a very dynamic community. And that's that's why you have a robust conversation around these topics because there are lots of different opinions and ideas and needs, in your community, and some of them will certainly conflict. Absolutely. And you have to you have to weigh those as you as you make your
decisions that come before you as a body. I'm gonna do a time check here. So it is twenty minutes to six. We have one additional agenda item. Our, partners from DMC are here, and I, let them know that they can have a half hour, and that would be six to 06:30. So, we've got twenty minutes for this. That doesn't mean we can't come back to this and some other session. Session. I'm looking at the administrator zones for an affirmation on that.
Pretty sure that we have affirmation. So, we've got three minutes further, for discussion. So if you have something that's not on there or you want to stress your point, I think there I I think the format we're putting a lot down here, on here, and we may not all agree. We're not voting today on this. But if it's not up here in twenty minutes, it's gonna be probably more difficult to insert something new. So with that, council member King.
Again, we've spent about a hundred and twenty five minutes of us in the electives. I guess I would like to go to some professionals and if it's probably city administrator zones, but are there big things we're missing? Are there things that we, should think about as far as the and and with this idea of time scoping the next three years, the next thirty six months that, we we will that the what kind of things would help us to guidance on things? And if there's somebody from your staff that maybe in your discussions sort of disagreed with this or want something else, is there any sort of, like, counterbalance that you could provide just to help us think about what we're doing?
I guess I would say maybe two things. One is more in what the more on sensor space, which is be thinking about, like, within some of these like, there's there there are some conflicting like, there are some things you could push on across the organization that would be challenging for some people's worldview, but might change how, like, the private development world develops affordable housing relative to infrastructure and things like that that doesn't necessarily align across all of our different service areas.
So, like, how I think it would be helpful to understand, like, what are the levers that you're looking at at in your lens of pushing the needle here and what your lens can kind of take on as policy topics within this. Secondarily, I noticed a lot of Post it notes over here, so I don't know if there was maybe a thought process that the facilitator would facilitate, kind of like you did last time. Kind of good discussion, but is there a way to if only one post it note ends up on some of these Yeah. Does that tell us something about a word that's not aligned there?
Or I don't know. Usually, post it note being something. May I go ahead. Yeah. You mentioned the So it was the community connections sort of That's obviously fine. Okay. And it made its way on this sort of underpinning of how you would approach your decision making because these are conflicting priorities from them. So that was a question for the group. Should it end up as a priority? Is it okay to have it? Our thought at the time was this should be standing how, you know, this is gonna come back to you and be thinking about that the durable in
this each time you get a decision before you move in a policy item or something is, you know, does that resonate with the elected body? That that's how you hope to look at decision making collectively. If it's not, it probably it needs to be tweaked or taken off. I just don't mind that getting lost because it's Yeah. It's up there. I didn't know if that was yeah. That was enough of it. Okay. Yep. Yep. Okay. The community connections. Yeah. But is it a foundational principle, or is it on how you approach your work? How this council, which might be different in ten years or five years,
while students play the lens within which you're approaching your decision making into government. I guess this is since I was one of the advocates for that, how I would explain that and why why I wanted either foundation of principles or strategic priorities is not so much on how we think the seven of us and the mayor, but on how how you and your staff think about it. Because for me, I can speak for myself.
I'm an elected official. I connect with the residents, those constituents. I will do that in my own time. I want our team to be thinking about those community connections as well. Not at the same level or in the same way that I do, but when we make decisions, when we, when we inform our residents that there are shifts and changes to, how they get to work and back or,
or any of the multiple services we provide. So I wanted to be in a place where our team sees it. That's Veronica priority that where I presented. Other things that folks want to address? Can I have a little clarity on what you're asking us for, council president? What I'm asking for? Yeah. You wanna just throw stuff out on on a sheet of paper so it's there. So we can talk about it further at a different I guess I would I would defer to our facilitator what works for for you and for,
for our administration to have enough for us to come back with. I I will go back to certainly, I'll go back to the question earlier. You currently have three strategic priorities. Are there others or are there are those the right ones? You all have spent some time saying that some of them need some tweaking. You've moved some at least for purposes of this conversation. You've moved quality services over to a foundational or principle. You've somewhat replaced it with delivering non transformational capital projects.
You've talked about housing as being an important strategic priority. I I would like to just ask for some clarity around sustainable growth management, just to understand a little bit more about what that meant as you all talked about it. You talked about affordable living, similar to the way that you currently have it with some modifications and a focus on paying attention to the decisions that the council makes to help ensure that people are able to live within their needs. And then you've also talked about a potential strategic priority around environmental stewardship and sustainability.
So the question I would have then is, are there others back to your three that you have? You've talked around those. Are there other other ones that you haven't discussed that you think are important to raise to the group as priorities? For example, I don't know if I'm going to see it doesn't show up in the currently setting up. Right. Well, there, but we had talked about it at all today. So does it stay? I if I were trying to assess what happened to me, I don't think he does. Oh, I would certainly Can can we go back to the the,
areas of focus so we can see that. I had a discussion with administrator Zones at the break on I wanted to know the history of why economic vibrancy and growth management work together. I think I so growth the sustainable growth management, I think, is an important strategic priority. So I'm good with that there. I I'm not clear on our role in economic vibrancy, and I don't know. I look at council member Keane as the historian on this.
So why is it there? Yeah. There there was a lot. Some of it is the the point in time. There was a lot of things about, like, is there, you know, the one we're the one industry, community, and we shouldn't be. And there was that so I think some of that was dry in. But in in this that that and man growth management, the emphasis was on management side. It wasn't on growth. It was on making sure it's, like, it's not out of control. It wasn't this idea of, like, yeah. Come come here and do whatever you want. It was it was because of the impacts to neighborhoods.
It was the impacts. It was things like that going on. So, I don't wanna try to, you know I I don't have the things in front of me when when everybody was speaking with it. And and and but, yeah, and frankly, part of this is you've got our people we've hired to listen to these discussions and our staff have to come back and sort of boil this down to something now. And then at that point, we'll have to look at it and say, yeah. That's that's what I was thinking as opposed to, like, oh, no. I had it coming back differently. But that's that's why I've been here for them. And I would add on the economic virus. See, I think we need to remember the time frame that we're talking about.
This is post pandemic. Indeed. We were doing this at the time of the pandemic and post pandemic trying to say, how are we gonna come back? I think we're still there. I don't think we're done with this. I think if you talk, like, this morning, the downtown businesses, they're they're still struggling. They want us to continue to do things that that keep our economy vibrant, not just downtown throughout the whole city. But I I don't think we're I would feel uncomfortable taking it out where we sit today post pandemic because I think most of the businesses would tell you we're
not where we wanna be right now. So that I'd have I'm afraid it would set set the wrong message. That's fine. Member Doreen. Yeah. So I'm gonna follow the lead of, council member Keane and just throw something out there, because it's resting on my part. Public safety should be a strategic priority. Public safety, we certainly need to, make sure that we continue to, provide resources to our first responders, but we also need to make sure that everyone in our community feels safe. The circles that I run-in, our BIPOC community does not feel safe.
Our LGBTQIA plus community does not feel safe. Our immigrant community does not feel safe. How are we cultivating a culture where everyone feels safe? Thank you, council member Jordan. Council member Miller. May I just add under quality services? The first area of focus, I don't see necessarily represented in these. I think it goes to council member Doreen's point where people are able to connect and build community and cultural recreational opportunities and provide access and equity.
Remember, you know, other drivers of economic vibrancy, there's been just holes, you know, people being able to do events in our community. Don't necessarily cost the city a lot of money other than just authorizing that use of public space. I think it's important somewhere in this, you know, does it rise to a strategic priority? Is it maybe representative community engagement, community connection somewhere so that the lens of how we're doing these things is reflective of our community. I don't know. I just wanna highlight that. I feel like that's important because I I think it showed up in data diversifying
the community, changing demographics. I just wanna make sure we don't lose sight of needing to provide public space and, enable community connection. We want everything. We want everything. Any other comments? Thoughts? Go ahead. In the in the subtext of the, equity inclusion, again, I think about accessibility in that white space below. Just highlighting accessibility before lens that we're looking at this. I know, again, we have social equity. It doesn't quite see accessibility,
but it probably spiritually belongs there. Right? But I I think it's important that we think about where that fits in and our strategic priorities and how again, I to council member Doran's point about housing, right, their additional maybe those are part of it. Maybe those are foundational principles, but just thinking about the accessibility of our public space and accessibility of housing, accessibility of transportation. Okay. Well, any closing comments? I think what we will do, based on this conversation is, work with staff to, take what we've written as well as what we've heard and put something together for
you all to react to. Certainly, it is draft and needs to be in in your in your words. You all need to, be comfortable with it, but at least we can take a good conversation that you've had today and give you something back that you can take a look at and, make make additional changes if that's the time. Alright. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thanks for being just give you a little bit of more that this slide that, Tom's number came into, it talks about, like, creating a definition and what the outcome of the flag within that thing.
Maybe have that on your mind after the discussion today. Mhmm. I like between now and the next time we have. Alright. We are going to take a three minute break and come back at six and hear from your partners at CNC. Patrick, please go ahead. Thank you, council president, Shubhring and, members of city council. I wanna just thank you for, Allison for, working to make space on your very busy set of study sessions, agendas, schedules coming up. We know that you had a a full discussion today,
and we appreciate it being here to listen and sort of tag into that. I do wanna acknowledge, I have two of our staff who are here just to make sure that, you know who they are. Jamie Rolfi, many of you have interacted with her and Mike Flynn who, some of you have met and worked with in the past. I do want somebody said to me, is this flight deck out of work? And I just wanna start by saying thank you. I just wanna start by saying, thank you. One, for the opportunity to be here. Secondly, for the, incredible partnership and collaboration we've had with your staff over the years and for,
several of the city council members and mayor who have been my work very closely over the years and now, the new members of city council whom I've spent time with individually. So starting with saying thank you for that collaboration and the work together. And, and and then I again, seemingly out of order, I really wanted to just get questions on the table so that I understood what's on your minds and make sure that, whatever presentation I I deliver gets to the questions that are on your mind and that you're not patiently waiting me for me to get through slides to really get
to the questions on your mind. And so with your indulgence, president Schubert, I thought we might just take a moment and just, for me to hear from council members questions that they have so that I can be sure to feel those or address them at some point during this. Well, I'll I'll start. I wonder if you can talk a little bit about and, council I'll give council member Fredericks, credit for bringing this up at a council meeting, a couple of sessions ago. The cadence, between decisions that happened at the DMCC board and the city council,
the the cadence and kind of you know, what what is the best practice as far as as far as as decisions arise, where they go, and to DMCC board, which the mayor and I sit on, and come to the council? Yeah. I am I'm aware of that, and I generally hear that comment from a couple weeks ago. Sign up. They know what you're referring to. Council member Wobble. I sent, some questions beforehand and got a really nice response, but I had only time to run, just to do a brief run through.
And it's really good information about projects, that that we probably haven't talked about at the council level, very much of late, and would encourage, that information to be shared with the whole council. Okay. Thank you. Questions about Riverfront, Sixth Street, North Broadway, and West Transit Village? Yes. Thank you. Yeah. I've sent a few questions beforehand too. I, I was particularly interested about the Birkman and the Brick, and that the private, private partnerships there and whether affordability was built into that. I know on the Brick website,
it talks about affordable units, but those affordable units don't seem to be occupied at this point, if I was looking at the data correctly, last evening before I sent that the question. So I'm just wondering if that if affordability is can be baked into future, future developments in terms of of housing. And then the second one was regarding the heart of the city, development. Again, I'm getting, bombarded, maybe five messages or so a week about the Peace Plaza, and and I'm on board with trying our temporary fix. But just what is the capacity for the temporary fix for the the proposed fix
doesn't work for DMC to partner with the city to create a more equitable solution for the community? Yep. Council member Keane? Yeah. So my one thing I'm interested in today as a Ken longer term observer of, DMC. I watched in 2015 to 2020 what the sort of types of projects and the priorities were with discovery and with public realm. And then and also, hospitality, growing the hospitality industry so that we could have a destination medical. Over time, it's changing, and we're twenty twenty five, 10 years past,
ten years to go. And I feel that there is some new priorities in there, and I'd I'd like to feel that I could leave you a better understanding of assets. Great. Mayor? Yeah. I just wanna it's more of a statement than a question, which is I just wanted to provide a little history perspective, with regard to the destination it's very quick. Destination Medical Center decision making. Attorney of DOL. Initially, when the bill was written, it had zero approval by the city council. It was initially written so that the DMUCC board and the DMUCCEDA
could decide on what they wanted to do as long as it wasn't in as long as it fit within the city's long term strategic plan or it was in there. It it didn't violate any of those. You know, it was it had nothing to do with it. So we, through that sausage making that happens up at the capital, came up tried to come up with a middle ground, and so we're kind of an experiment. They didn't want it to be the iron range I triple r b. They didn't think that was working. I think it's since been changed. They're trying to find a way to make sure that the council had some control
over it, but this is, like, in a in a way, it's an experiment. For, you know, Patrick and Lisa before, and the team is trying to figure out how to do this in a way that works so that the city council has a a say about what's happening. But I think to the question that was raised is, what's the what's the right timeline to weigh in so that we don't get too far down the line where money is spent? And so I'll be interested to see, you know, what your your thoughts are about this, but I just want to lay that perspective. What Patrick and the team are doing is something that hadn't been done before,
and it may not be perfect. So, you know, Patrick, I think you can go ahead with that, but I just thought I'd give you the first the history perspective. There was no input on the initiative. Zero. Any other questions, council members? Well, more may come up, throughout this, and and I know we we have until 06:30. And, so let me just, first of all, start by saying, the work we're doing is a team sport. And so while today we're talking about DMC, just know that I fully understand that, nothing gets done in this community without lots of people working together.
And DMC oops. Sorry. So d m DMC is one of many players, and I don't have everybody on here that we partner with. So I'll just say that upfront, but these are many of the partners that we work with. And, so just understanding I know and appreciate that, and I know and appreciate that this is a collaborative effort that we're going through. And so I use this slide as a reminder of of why DMC. And this was, really the origins of DMC was,
here we are, home to, the number one hospital in the world. And I'll just say that again, the number one hospital in the world, here in Rochester, Minnesota. And it was intended to grow, and, it was committed to growth, but it needed and and the city felt it needed support to enable Rochester's growth to keep pace with Mayo Clinic's growth. That was really the origin of the DMC initiative. How can Rochester grow to be a better version of itself in keeping with Mayo
Clinic's growth? I do wanna go to the the, a couple of slides that I think help tell the story of of the sequencing of decision making. And and this is, perhaps more bureaucratic and convoluted, way of it's not really convoluted, it is what it is. But I think what I what I really wanna say is that there should not be there should not be a surprise. There should never be a surprise that city council related to a DMC, action item. And and the way that we can ensure that there isn't a surprise is,
sorry. Managing this. There is, sort of a way in which we approach our work. One is we have a development framework that was created in 02/2015, updated in 02/2020, and going through an update right now that is a joint effort between the city and DMC to create a framework, a set of recommendations, a belief system about, about the future development. And it will lead into the kind of strategic planning discussion you're having today.
It'll lead into the twenty fifty visioning work you did with the community. It will tap into the growth plans of the University of Minnesota Rochester. It will reflect, pull forward, unbound in its vision and its direction. It will reflect the waterfront planning that's been done. Lots of so it itself will not stand alone, but it simply will be additive to all of the great work that's happened over the last several years. So that's the beginning of how we are ensuring that there are no surprises. And then annually, there is a budget that is created between DMC and the city,
and that budget is, you know, an interactive process, the joint work group, city staff involvement, mayor and council president. And that gets approved at GMC. It gets approved as city council. So again, another checkpoint. Are we on path? Does this ladder up to this development plan we created? And then and then that becomes ultimately projects that have to happen executing on those on those projects. And again, there, it's work between our staffs, your staff and the DMC staff. And, again, we would expect that as we bring it to DMC,
that DMC is not surprised. As we bring it to the city council, you're not surprised. So I think that's our way of trying to reflect on and ensure that we're not getting too far out ahead GMC and we're also keeping up with the vision and goals of the city. And I can give you some examples where I think it's worked really well, and it's been an evolution from the beginning. I wasn't around for the legislation legislative journey, but certainly in the early days, I think there was growing pains about how does DMC fit into the decision making
process of the city. And And I think we are in a much better place today than we were certainly ten years ago. I'm wondering if that helps answer that question or if there's comments or questions about about about this. Sounds good. I wanted to just clarify, I'll call it a question. But when I look at a chart like this and see DMC plus the city DMC EDA and the city working together on something, and then one group approves of the yes and yes method. I I guess I wanna clarify, DMC is a planning organization or DMC EDA is a planning organization.
The city or somebody else does the boundaries. Is that accurate? Yeah. That's absolutely accurate. Okay. Can you talk to that for a second? Because I think there's even when I first saw things come forward, it was sort of like, oh, DMC is doing this, and I hear those sort of terms. And the fact is I don't think DMC doesn't build the the Peace Plaza, the city nuts. Yeah. I think a good distinction. DMC really does two things. We steward through recommendations the $585,000,000 of commitment that has been made,
of which much of that is portion of that has been committed, about half of that has been committed to date. And so our job is to steward that, and then the other half of our work is to attract new private investment to Rochester. And that, the private investment leadership work comes from Mike Flynn, who again, many of you have met, not everybody. And our stewardship of public funds is this process that I'm describing. But, yeah, we don't have a construction department at DMC. Yep. And I just I wanted to make that point because I I I mean,
again, it's probably clear to everybody here, but I I don't think it's clear to everyone in the community. It's almost like things that DMC does, and they do things, like, with with, as an EDA would do. But when the project is done with, DMC funding, it's done by city employees. City employees go to private sector. As long as I have this slide up and it's pursuant to the question council member Doreen had asked about, Birkman and Greg in affordable housing since this since testing image Can you go to, council member Palmer to I just wanna give a good example.
We've talked about this before. Mhmm. But soldiers feel full. We did a plan. We said this is what we wanted, and DMC said we will fund up to this amount. So you were a partner in doing that. And to me, you never once said we want you to do this, this, this. You said come up with a plan. We'll help fund it. Yeah. If I could put a little, nuance to that. So, so that's an example of a project that was found in the DMC development plan. So the starting point was that it was in the DMC development plan. This idea of creating high quality recreation and and,
outdoor activity venue in that in that area was in the DMC development fund. So that's the starting point. And then, you all said, we're ready to go with this, and because we have federal money identified. We have this parks referendum money, we have some other state money. So we're ready to go and we can make it a better thing if DNC can would be willing to participate. And then it got into our budget. So, it got into our budget cycle, and you all presented a plan that met the values of DMC around
equity and inclusion and accessibility and lots of things that you said are important, which you came back with. And and that's where it landed into this approval. So that's a really good example. And I think an evolution of where we were perhaps ten years ago with, Peace Plaza, and I we're gonna get to that topic. But Peace Plaza being an example where I think we were out front and we were leading, and and even though it was a joint project, it may not have felt that way in the same way that Soldier's Soldier's Field
does. So, so could I go to a question that you asked about affordable housing? So, DMC and the city together have been involved in about 10 or 15 housing projects developments in the downtown downtown adjacent area over the past less than ten years. And, they're they're really and some of those projects are were done with, using tax increment financing as a tool.
And in the early days of of many of those projects, we did not we, I say we meaning, the city or the or DMC or the city, did not require, affordability in all of those projects. But there were many that that were first having flats, flats on Fourth, but in a list of money that had an affordability component to it. Borgman did not. That was, one of the earliest projects. Didn't get delivered until 2020, but it was one of the earliest projects. Break on Broadway, in fact, the entire building is,
developed at an affordability. And that affordability is a very unique model in that the commitment was by the developer that the entire building, all of the units, would be at affordability levels of 50%, sixty %, and 80% AMI. And and they, they have been successful with the 50% AMI, and they've been successful with the 60% AMI. And they've had difficulty with the 80% AMI, and they've come back to the city and DMC because there were conditions put onto
it. So to your point, there were conditions, so they had to come back. What they said is, the incomes in Rochester have increased faster than the data. So meaning, salaries went up for a number of of sort of middle income positions, entry level positions, perhaps at Mayo Clinic. I'm gonna not be quite precise about this, but the so they're getting applicants who are slightly above the 80%. And the data lags in terms of what represents 80% AMI.
So the data is behind by a couple of years to the reality. So what they said is, we think we have units that are vacant because we don't have enough people earning 80% or below. Would you be open to increasing the income eligibility to 110% while keeping the rents at 80%? So they are not benefiting financially from having this, income eligibility expansion. But, because they can only still only charge 80% of the amount.
So I think we're all looking for solutions about how to much of your discussion today was about affordable living and affordable housing. I think we're all looking for solutions. And as somebody said, this is a national problem. This is, this is not a Rochester only problem. And, so people were all looking for what are some solutions to get more, price sensitive housing on the market. And this is this the downtown is going to be largely multifamily. It's really not a single family, you know, area that's single. Thank you.
Can I ask, though, the second part of your question that I think I heard and and maybe the answer was there and I missed it, but that it isn't full? Do we know if that's the case or are did the change allow them to fill the building? My understanding is, like, I did I tried to reach out to the developer today and I didn't, I didn't connect. My fault, not his. But my understanding is the 5060% has been full, and they have had success in, leasing the 80%. Five, two, two now. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Thank you. And, of course, match day was last Friday,
which is a big, day in Rochester from a rental from a housing rental, environment. And so, they wanted to be ready for match day as they would they like a lot of people, just they know they'll be able to get influx of inquiries. I'd like to get to, as long as I'm here, the second question regarding Peace Plaza. I know there's lots of discussion in the community about Peace Plaza, and it is not as perfect as I would have hoped it would be. I don't think it's as imperfect as some people make it out to be. I think we do have an obligation to try to remedy
the experience, yet this summer, and and the city staff are committed to doing that. And we need to lean into really being committed to making that work. And I know some people have already predicted it won't work. And that's a pretty difficult environment to work in. I understand completely. Pardon me? I understand completely. So, but I know the city staff are very committed to the improvements. And I think some things get conflated about the experience in Peace plus. Some of it has to do with some of it is design, some of it was execution,
and some of it is maintenance. And I think we need to address all three of those. And I think, we'll come back in September and have a conversation about how is that working and what are the next steps. And I think we've proven to be a, faithful partner to the city and and all of these initiatives. And can't promise anything, but I can promise, partnership. Looking at the questions, council member Wall asked for, some feedback. I I know you were traversing between city hall and here and so forth. So you didn't have a chance to read your emails. Yes.
I will. Yeah. I got a chance to to, experience processors. It was closed nearsighted. Twice. You got to you got to experience twice. Yeah. I wouldn't mind the mic playing. So there were, questions, updates that, customer wall requested about Sixth Street Bridge and and, waterfront. And, Cindy, you rightfully responded given the city is taking a lead on on those two projects in particular. The third one, that was asked about is West Transit Village, and I'm happy to tackle that one. Thanks, Cindy. Sure. And I apologize. I realized I missed West Transit Village in the response. So in terms of Riverfront, lots of,
lots of work happening at our staff level. Kind of, just really quick rundown, and I'm happy to provide this kind of follow-up information, to the city administrator. And that is, of course, in your legislative priorities, we have requested additional riverfront planning, money. The goal of that is to, is to better, enhance the connections to not only downtown, Lamar, city services, regional attractions, leverage the downtown as the destination, kind of tie together the planning work that's happening around the government center as well as around some of our other,
riverfront assets like, the Ambi site, which is a privately private development. In terms of the former Ambi site, they currently have a general development plan for that site. They have inquired they they have a lease with the city for parking that goes till 2027. They've made an inquiry to the city about I believe the limit in other parking spaces. They want to revise that. Ryan Answers running point. On those negotiations, we have, a lot of questions around what that would look like and what requirements we would contemplate to even consider an expansion of temporary parking on that site.
I would also note that the north end of that site is the location for the easternmost, transit, location for Link Rapid Transit. So we've acquired almost all the remaining parcels. Expect that to be completed soon. And, and then there's some other stuff related to six here that I can talk about. In terms of the Riverfront site by the former Legends site and Mister Humber site all around the government center, Steve Snapsabroenter, director of construction submitted an application in partnership with our consultants in DC, Sustainable Strategies DC,
to the state MPCA office. They have too many to give up statewide. We got $500,000 of that. And that goal is to do some interim activation, including a bike node on the, a portion of the former Legend side where, there's a lot of, hardscape right now and introduced screenscape as well as the bike node. One does not exist along our trail system outside of the parks, and so we see this as a real, really great opportunity to leverage the course prep, and we particularly tune on our students. We are working we have, an analysis an economic analysis,
that we received helped funded by DMC from the Hunden group to help us determine what kind of actions we should take related to this redevelopment site, particularly in the, economic climate that we're in. These are the more recent impacts of the executives and how it might be activating, or impacting development. RDA and EMC, with RDA leading, are helping us plan some other interim activities, not only interim activities that we want to do as a result of the, the interim development, the MPCA grant, but interim activities to activate that riverfront at night and weekends,
particularly with the proximity to MPCA or with UMR. And so lots of conversation and, dollars already programmed to begin and implement that yet this summer. And then adjacent to it, these working led by, Irene Wilbert, the development department is the planning for the historic district and its connection to the riverfront. Recently, winter process and awarded to Mend Collective as the firm designed the streetscape effort for there. In terms of sick, Sixth Street, Riverfront, and Neighborhood Safety Improvement Program, we're actually planning to come to you at the April 21 city council meeting.
Our goal is to come under the reports and recommendations and provide you with an update on the, extensive neighborhood engagement that we have had since last summer fall, how it's informing the design prior to coming to, And there's three main components to the design. It's the bridge design. It's this complete street design, and it's the design of, the riverfront amenities. We're gonna walk you through that. Prior to that, however, we are scheduling a battery internal manual engineering session. Might have you know, some some of the recent bidding environment,
we wanna do that to make sure that we're in alignment with, project goals and budget. We have to do this work. Ultimately, we need to submit to the MnDOT in December 2025 because there's an inductivity that happens with this project, and all of those things have to be completed. I would also note that this project is, has federal funding associated with it. We are currently not under contract with we do not have an agreement yet with the feds related to this project. We still feel very positive that we will have an agreement, and we're we're calling in that guidance on that.
I continue to call in that guidance on that. And then I would also say, lastly, there's a rail spur that, trying to traverse both riverfront redevelopment sites. We've had some really good conversations with the railroad as well as the two businesses that, that use the rail spur and how that may or may not be impacted by anticipated development of those areas over the next couple of years. So at a very high level, that's where we're at with the reference and the Sixth Street projects. Mister chair, I could just have a couple more minutes, and I understand, our goals your goal is to be done,
by 06:30. And I think this may go to in part to council member Keane's questions about evolving priorities. One thing that we don't give a lot of visibility to at the council table or at the council discussion is our role around attracting private investment. So, if you think about the infrastructure that we steward is to position Rochester to grow. This work is to help act help, intentionally, pursue and attract growth. And we're really focusing on three domains. One is the med tech space, attracting companies,
to Rochester and growing companies in Rochester in the med tech space. Housing and hotels, this is the infrastructure we know the destination medical community needs is, is hospitality environment and housing for its workforce. And then retail dining and entertainment, again, we know that there's an appetite for more investment in retail dining and entertainment in the downtown. We have what we call our grow our own strategy and attract new strategy. And so our work really focuses on how do we facilitate and support existing businesses
in Rochester. So think about things like the, Main Street Grant Program that we have now successfully received a third, round of funding for and getting that out to our community. The historic preservation grants that we've, deployed to help property owners to position their properties for reuse. And then so grow our own, and then attract new. How do we attract new investment into Rochester in order to diversify our, very anchor dependent economy? We know that we need to attract new businesses to Rochester,
really leaning into the med tech space as the place where it's sort of the low hanging fruit if you want to start or grow a business, where Rochester excels beyond most any other community is in the med tech space. So we spend a lot of time in telling the Rochester story to potential, startups, that are working in medical device, medical biopharma, etcetera, who want to be in a community that is supportive, wanna be connected to Mayo Clinic,
wanna be in a state that has a strong ecosystem. So and then just finally, there's lots of things we do that are about the culture we're trying to create. And a lot of the discussion today is about the culture, that is, trying to be created. And that is, part of our commitment, things like community co design, business forward, prototyping, these strategies that help strengthen the capacity of our community. And again, I'll just end with examples of how we are going out to attract new investment into Rochester. These examples,
the BioConference, is an example of one of many places we are at in telling the Rochester story and making connections to Rochester. The Real Estate Summit, this year on April 16 and historic district investment as an example of supporting downtown property owners. And I'll just end by reminding you that we, don't deserve or take credit for all of this. We play a role and we want to be partners with you and everybody else on this slide deck. So, I tried to get to the questions that I understood to be on your minds
and and hope that I achieved that. And and just know that I have a open door, relationship with, with any of you. I'm happy to have further discussions. Any further questions for Patrick while we have him here? Seeing none, thank you very much. Thanks for coming in. Thanks for staying at the end of our program today. Thank you for the opportunity. Thanks for the connections. Any further business for today? I would just remind you that next week is the fifth Monday. The way that lands by the calendar is if you don't have a council meeting, so congratulations. Thank you.
Our first vacation. Is there a motion to adjourn? So moved. Jared?