[clears throat] Yeah. See me after the meeting, Tom. Okay. calls the city council meeting to order. Roll call. Mayor Ree here. Council member Os here. Nelson here. Gilbertson
here. Gardner [snorts] here. Davis here. Butterfield here. And Sheldix here. Council member Faggerly is excused. So we have eight present, one excused. Please stand for the pledge.
To the flag of the United States of America and to the stands, one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Any additions or deletions to the agenda? Motion to approve the agenda as
presented. Second. We got a motion and a second. Discussion. Roll call. [clears throat] Council member Osk. Hi. Nelson. I. Gilbertson. Hi. Gardner.
Hi. Davis. Hi. Butterfield. Hi. And Shel. Hi. Seven. I's zero nos. That motion passes. Call on our city clerk Verne Larson for the consent items.
Mayor Ree and council members, tonight for your approval, I have the city council minutes of November 3rd, 2025. The Human Rights Commission minutes of October 28th, 25 as a draft. The Planning Commission meeting minutes of November 5th, 25 as a draft, the Wilmer Municipal Utilities Commission minutes
of November 10th, 2025, the public works snow pusher purchase, and the accounts payable report from October 30th, 2025 through November 12th, 2025. For your information, I also have the director's reports, the monthly building report
from October 2025, the finance report through October 20 31st, 2025, and the women municipal utilities financial report from September of 2025. Motion to approve the consent agenda.
Second. Got a motion and a second to approve the consent agenda. And any discussion? Can we pull out item E? I'd like to ask a couple questions on that. Right.
Further discussion. Roll call. Council member Nelson. I. Gilbertson. Hi. Gardner. Hi. Davis. I. Butterfield. I. Shoulders. Hi. And Osk.
Hi. Seven eyes, zero nos. Motion carries. Um, Steve, you want E? Yeah. Thanks, Mr. Mayor. I was just curious why we have one regular business item that is moving funds around that is half
the price of one we're doing in the consent agenda. I was wondering why that wouldn't be a regular business item like the the slide is. What's the distinction there? And then is this item is it on our capital improvement plan? I don't remember
seeing it. Maybe I missed it. No, I didn't see it either. So, I just was wanting to know more about it since I didn't see it on the capital improvement plan and I was wondering why it shouldn't be a regular business item instead of a consent agenda item. All right. Who's who's going to handle
that? Good evening, mayor. Good evening, council. Uh, the public works snow pusher purchase, uh, Wyatt is on the agenda tonight, not included in previous capital improvement plans. Initially was not identified as a capital improvement
purchase. However, uh the crack fuel crack fill and seal coat budget came under budget which allowed uh public works to look at other equipment that was um uh desired for the removal and moving of snow. Um this is considered
more of an attachment but could be classified. It will be capitalized uh because of the amount of the purchases in why it's uh under consent and not regular business. Uh I know the pool has been a topic um that the council has
undertaken or has has had uh throughout this year uh and thought it would be more relevant for that pool item to be at least be on regular business since it has been a topic that the council has had previously this year. Um other than that there is not a a a
standing that uh agreements or contract purchases would go to regular business or consent agenda but we can make it a practice to have to make sure that's included in regular business. But the reason reason being the the uh pool items are is because they have been had
been talked about at the council table table previously this year. Was there a reason this wasn't in previous Did I miss it in the capital improvement items somewhere or is it on that list somewhere? Yeah, that's a great question, Council Member Gardner. Uh, to the best of my
knowledge, no, it was not included in any CIPs up until this point. Is there a higher priority need? Uh, I don't know if I would be unfortunately I have to give the answer. I don't have the information tonight. I would have question um sit down with our
public works staff and itemize and prioritize which needs that would need that they would foresee for the rest of the year. Again, because of the um how the budget turned out with the crack and seal coat, it gave them an opportunity to place a smaller item um in with the
20 remaining budget in 2025. That's why you're seeing this tonight. But um if we can absolutely follow up with staff and get that answer to you and the council. Thank you. Justin. Yeah. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Um can you
explain without a department head there right now? Um like where this request would have come from? Like typically it would have been from uh the public works superintendent uh to the public works director. Um and then
administrator Valian or myself would have met with that with the department head to review the request. So I did have an opportunity to sit down. Uh we do have weekly meetings with our public works superintendent, our public um wastewater superintendent. Uh and this was brought up this morning and I did
review that with them and that was the explanation that was given to me this morning. But I don't I think it was maybe brought up a week ago. Yeah, I'd like to address that too. This was brought up to the public works director earlier when they found out where the crack and seal coating was,
but because we didn't have final numbers on crack and seal coating, we were not going to bring this forward. We now have final on crack and seal coating, so we know where we're at. So, this is an operational cost. Crack and steel coating is an operational cost. So, so
it's not anything to do with bonding or anything like that. It's operational. Fits within our operational budget. Thank you. If you want to make a motion. Uh make a motion to approve uh item
number E, public works. No push or purchase. Second. Okay. We got a motion and a second. Discussion. Roll call. Council member Gilbertson. Hi. Gardner. Hi. Davis.
Hi. Butterfield. Hi. Schultz. Hi. O. Hi. [clears throat] and Nelson I. Seven eyes's, zero nos. That motion passes. Next is uh the aquatic center pool
filter insurance claim. And uh Kyle, you're up there, so go for it. Perfect. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Uh tonight the council is being asked to adopt a resolution approving a quote from Horizon Pool to replace the sand filters at the Dorothy Olsen Aquatic
Center for $123,000. Included in your uh council action request, you can see the overview of the agenda item. Uh going back to May of this year, uh city staff discovered that there were two out of the three sand filters that run the DOAC were broken due to pipes uh freezing over the
winter. Uh staff contacted the pool vendor to assess uh the damage and repair. Um however, the supplier was unable to u obtain the necessary parts prior to the pool opening up uh this year. Uh staff worked with the health department, Renville County Health
Department, um requested a site visit and during that inspection, it was determined that um the filters could be potentially repiped to restore functionality for the 2025 pool season. However, uh public health indicated that if repiping was successful, the pool
would be operational for this year, but we would need to replace those filters entirely and the piping entirely prior to the start of the 2026 season. Uh staff were successful and repiped and were uh repiped the sand filters and were able to allow the pool to be
operational this year. Um, we did reach out and filed a claim with the League of Minnesota Cities. Um, and that has been accepted and approved. Uh, we did obtain three quotes for replacement of the project from Horizon Pools. Um, however, for $123,000,
the city's insurance deductible uh is $100,000. there would be a an $8,000 cost uh cost increase to order the pool filters if we did not do that or the council did not act before January 1st of this uh next year. So that's why it's before you
tonight. Um and then we are projecting or um asking for the um there's the $100,000 insurance deductible and the cost for replacement. the additional 23,000 that we would get back would be coming out of
the sale of the Rice Home medical building dollars that council had previously set aside earlier this year. So again, uh this is to the action tonight is again adopting the resolution from Horizon Pool to replace the sand filters at the DOAC for $123,000.
I'll pause there. Mr. Mayor, I have a motion from to that effect. I'll make that motion. Second. We got a motion and a second. Discussion. Carl. Uh, regarding the pipes freezing, have
steps been taken to ensure that that won't happen again or why did they freeze this time? And yeah, that's a great question, Council Member Schulus. I don't know if we'll ever know why uh they did not freeze, but we'll uh staff will ensure that the proper cleanout and winterizing of the
pool is done um every year to make sure that we don't run into any issues like that in the future to the best that we can. That was my question. Audrey, um just in curious about the insurance
claim, should we have filed that claim before we fixed the pool last year? Would that have made any difference to no um the amounts or Yeah. I mean because we had costs involved with fixing it
and now we have to do it again and so I'm just curious if we should have filed a claim before. Council member Nelson, we filed the claim almost immediately and started working with the league. So we were in in uh working correct throughout the entire process.
Thank you. I read it wrong and Okay. I'd like to point out that in the car that we will be probably approximately another $3,000 will be in from the insurance claim also on the repairs and repairs that we did for the temporary
fix. It's the last sentence in the car. Yep. Okay. Any further questions, discussion? Roll call. Council member Gardner. I. Davis. I Butterfield.
I should I Osc Nelson. I Gilbertson. Hi. Seven eyes, zero nos. That motion passes. Next is the aquatic center pool slide replacement. And I'll call on Kyle once again.
Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Uh for tonight for your consideration this evening is a resolution approving the purchase of a water slide from Horizon Pools for $20,183. Uh again, this was a part of the CIP tour that the council took earlier this year and has been a topic of
conversation for the last couple of u uh budget cycles on replacement of the of the frog slide. Uh it has the current frog slide at the DOAC has undergone undergone three prior repairs and due just to normal wear and tear uh repair is no longer feasible. Uh so within your
packet you can see a quote from Horizon Pools which is replacing the frog slide with a new pelican slide on the zero depth um side of the pool of the aquatic center. Uh and then what we are asking for council to consider uh this is not
going to be coming out of capital improvement uh because of the uh budget with the with the DOAC this year. Uh we do have room within the operating budget to make this uh capital purchase possible uh for 2025.
And this was 20,283. 20,183. I've got 283 on mine. So yeah, this one's wrong. Yeah, it should be 183. Okay.
Duly noted $20,183. Call for a motion to adopt the resolution. So moved. Second. Got a motion and a second. Discussion. What's the question? Audrey, does this mean we didn't lose money yet?
at the Dorothy Olsson Aquatic Center this year. Did we lose money? No. I I [snorts] not sure how you want me to answer that, Council Member Nelson. No, we have 25,000 remaining in the budget. We are under budget. We're under budget, but did we lose
money? I do not know off the top of my head where revenues came in for the pool, but I can we can follow up. Only expense budget that you're refering. This will be coming out of the expense budget. Correct. Any other questions?
Roll call. Council member Davis. Hi. Butterfield. I. Shoulders. I. Os. I. Nelson. I. Gilbertson. I. And Gardner. I. Seven eyes, zero nos.
Motion carries. Thank you, Kyle. Thank you, mayor. Thank you, councel. Next is Sakura Con Consulting. And I'll call on our city administrator, Lesie. Minute here, please. Good evening, council. So, tonight I'm
presenting to you um a proposal with Dr. Robert Sakura. And excuse me because something is missing. Dr. Robert Sakura is the head of Sakura Consulting which is a uh transforming
government in uh processes and provides um every municipality with the opportunity to enhance the way it serves its customers and citizens creating meaningful and lasting impact. We have been introduced to Sakora Consulting, an
organization that specializes in clarifying and aligning purpose and strategy across departments and roles linking to your interest in mission, vision, and outcomes. Strengthening trust, internal culture and engagement,
which supports performance and service delivery equals budget, CIP, infrastructure delivery. Build leadership capacity at multiple levels, not just executive which is reliant revolent for municipal staff and
crossf functional projects. Enable continuous improvement of processes, team dynamics and customers, citizen stakeholder experiences. Their work supports organizations and transforming their performance and delivering even greater value through council and staff
goal alignment, seeking out effective budget processes. Um, I would also like to point out in the car that it says the total is $140,000 and 50% of it would be um
paid in from the budget deposit um that is not quite correct and um the 50% deposit actually is based on the first phase and
such but Um, I'd also like to point out to council that if you approve this project, um, that we would be paying at least 50% of the project this year so that we would have less impact on next year's, uh, budget. And, um, we do have
the funding within this year's budget for this process. So, at this time though, I'd like to introduce Dr. Robert Sakura, and he can, uh, then enlighten you on his processes. Yes. Thank you.
Welcome, Mr. Sakura. Good to see you again. Good to see you, sir. Does it look like it's popping up? Okay, good evening. Um, so
when I am asked to take a look at an organization with my crew, uh, the first place we go to is the overall mission and the purpose um, of the organization. And when we went online to look at the city of Wilmer, um it was a very
well-ritten, welloutlined uh set of uh purpose statements, vision, mission, and value statements. Everything we do is in alignment with the organization's mission and vision and values. And we're here to work to enhance that um and to help to allow that to to be maximized.
[clears throat] our organization [cough] um we guide organizations of all kinds uh to um create employeeled cultures of engagement and performance. So it's looking at the human side of the organization uh to drive whatever the
operational side is all about. So it's looking at both both parts of that ultimately it's to build trust with purpose. So we look at the purpose of your organization and through uh the most valued currency that exist trust we help to drive that within the
organization. Um when organizations come to us there's usually one or two of the spokes of the helm uh that they're having issues with. It could be u a lack of vision. It could be a lack of uh leadership development. A lot of times we we we we're asked to come in because
there's trust issues within the organization or the teams aren't effective. whatever the case might be. Um, but what we realize when we go in is that it's not just one of the spokes, it's usually all spokes are somehow impacted by this. Uh, so when we're
asked to come in, it's a lot like if you have a a pickup truck, let's say, and you know that there's something wrong. You hear something uh that's an issue and you go into one uh service deliver and they're they're letting up the timing's off or whatever the case might be and they're kind of guessing at what
it is. uh when we come in, we're asked to look at it from a diagnostic standpoint. We come in and take a look at all eight spokes. So, it's it's like getting a really good tuneup, but you've got the diagnostics, you know, where the area or the issue is. Um we get asked to, you know, come in and take a look
because leadership is dysfunctional or it's not functioning the way it needs to to align to whatever the goals are. Um but when we do the diagnostics we find out there's other systemic issues there's uh process issues and then there's things that might be happening at the dynamics within the teams. So
when we go through that discovery process we're able to provide uh the organization with a with a prioritized list as it were of the areas of opportunity and then the organization is left with the decision on how do we want to proceed and we've got the tools by which to go ahead and help in that
process. So that's what the helm is. The Helm is a model that exists uh and it it's applicable to every organization we've ever worked with across the globe both profit, nonprofit and governmentwise. And so that's the first phase that Leslie was mentioning that we
come in and we help with the diagnostic side of collecting data here to clearly be able to show where the areas of opportunity are within uh the city. uh and then from there it becomes a prioritized u discussion on where do we want to go uh to to help to improve uh
the performance of the organization. So any questions with that we also look at it from an individual perspective. So it's not just the organizational operations but we we get into uh understanding ourselves as leaders uh and allowing individuals to
make uh to have the greatest impact that they can as as employees within the organization as well. So that's the individual helm and ultimately what this provides the organization is uh the impact in these different areas as it relates to uh human performance, talent
uh and employee engagement, operational uh and uh organizational process uh excellence and then the impact that it has on the community and the customers that you serve. Uh so everything ultimately relates to a better product and service for the community uh at at
large that you serve along with hitting the the financial goals that you're looking at. So the investment becomes an investment to make the the engine as it were uh more effective [clears throat] um both currently and in the long term. And that's one of the reasons like we do
like working with city and county governments is because unlike uh for profit where it's always and which we work with as well but you know looking at the quarterly gains you're looking at things from a much longer perspective the legacy uh generational which is uh wonderful. This is the crew um that we
have that helped to serve myself uh Michaela Alt uh would be kind and we've got Dr. Keil Walton and Cammy Summers uh that would also be helping behind the scenes on the data collection and the analysis. Um the way in which we outlined the
project uh to uh that's consistent with other cities and and counties that we worked with. Um we'd be looking at a formal kickoff uh for the program where everybody understands the why uh what it is that it's expected of them and the impact that we're looking to have for
the city. uh everyone gets involved as change champions in the communication of what it is that we're trying to do uh and the impact that we're have trying to have. Um we conduct interviews um appreciative inquiry and data collection again to get really clear on where the areas of opportunity exist and where all
the and one of the questions I like to ask is where all the success is happening uh and making sure that we're reinforcing it and and bringing even higher value in those areas as well. So we do full themema analysis. We do the data collection, the collection of that. Um, but we also assess the leaders uh
from uh different perspectives of of uh personality style, EQ and things of that nature to really understand how we all operate as individuals and collectively. If there's a need for focus groups, we bring focus groups in as well being clarity uh around the work that we're
doing uh the the analysis and then the design. Ultimately that culminates into an off-site where the leaders come together. We look at the data. We interact with one another. We get clear on the different dynamics of the relationships building trust amongst that having breakthroughs in a lot of
different ways. Uh and then looking at the data and starting to prioritize and work through what is it exactly that we need to work on and what is the process for that. So the discovery phase is what was mentioned that's the phase one. Okay. And from there, you know, the cost
associated with future uh engagements is based upon what is the work that you want to do um internally. And then the quarterly pulses allow you to continue to measure and maintain uh and monitor the work that has been done to ensure that the the improvements continue to
happen, the investment sticks and you're able to have the long longitudinal impact of that. And that's the quarterly piece. Um there's always the opportunity to go deeper in the assessments. Um we do a lot of 360 work uh with leaders and really gaining uh better insight again on how they can become more effective as
leaders within uh the organization as well. Um and that's what gets into a lot of what we call kind of the ad hoc uh opportunities. But when we looked at this particular project and we priced it what we call the discovery phase in the program kickoff um there's a lot of work
that goes into that along with the assessments. So that was the uh estimate there. Uh from there it's implementing the programs. It's implementing the different aspects of the prioritization of the work that you're looking at. Um it's really it's training the folks on on on site to do, you know, to be able
to do the work. We don't set it up so that we're part of your organization that sticks with it. We certify and train people uh to be able to do the work that we do. And then ultimately uh you get into the quarterly measurement and the pulses that allow you to maintain and monitor uh the work that you're doing. Those are additional
services. We did estimate um what it would look like. Well, here's the impact. [clears throat] Uh going back to the uh return on investment, uh greater alignment to your uh overall purpose that we talked about earlier. Uh it's ongoing leadership development, effective leaders throughout the entire
uh city. Uh leadership uh continuity and stability within the leadership ranks. Uh building trust with purpose as we mentioned. Uh creating an intentional culture, one that really aligns to the overall strategy. uh building effective and strong teams and then the work
performances looking at uh the services, the programs uh that you provide for your community. And then there's just again a long list of other uh benefits. When we work on the human side of any organization, there's a lot of soft dollar impact we call it. Um the ability
to be more um effective from an engagement standpoint, a performance standpoint. It's taking the investment that you've already made uh into um salaries and and and earnings that people have in producing a better result from that uh and in in the processes
that you've already invested in. So again, it's looking at what you've already invested in saying, okay, we're making a little bit deeper of an investment to allow for greater impact both currently and in the future. Uh and that's ultimately what uh what is the work that we do. Um we did put together
a bit of a tighter what we called focused investment uh looking at coming in doing the discovery work maybe doing some targeted leadership development based on some of the needs that was already identified. Um this was what was presented to us initially and then we uh we stepped back a little bit and we said
okay is there uh uh is there other things that are going on within the system we don't know and that's where the discovery process uh really comes into play. So that's uh that's the presentation. It was it's a little bit of a modification from what I presented earlier when we had the uh the calls,
but uh just wanted to offer that again. Any any questions? Questions from the council. [snorts] I uh like to believe that our performance
is good. I don't I reluctant I don't know what does the rest of the council feel and I think I think we got to take some time to really digest this.
I appreciate the word that you use that that the performance is good. um where probably some of the areas that I relish the most in working with organizations is where we go from good to great. And there's those it's that fine-tuning and and really being able to maximize um
what we're able to do because a lot of times we don't know where we can become great. Um and that's just that's just part of you know the continuous improvement and raising the bar. So uh but yeah, you know it's I'm I'm not here to say that you need to do this. Um, I'm
just here in response to a request that there was opportunity within the city to be able to do some work on from a leadership perspective and a cultural perspective. And this is the approach that we use and one that we have incredible impact uh and results on
every time we've done it. So yeah, when when we deal with organizations that are broken, obviously there's a huge intervention opportunity, but when you are good, it's definitely an opportunity to go even greater. Sorry. Well, I I think we can take some time to
review this and address it at another council meeting. Sounds great. Right. Thank you. Very good. Thank you. So, any announcements? I have one
which I don't not sure if anybody has heard, but the big turkey giveaway on Saturday that Geneo and the food shelf did was a very huge success. They gave away 5,000 turkey breasts. And so, thanks to all the volunteers and
everybody that did all the work to go into that. Thank you, Leslie, for pointing that out. That was uh a nice write up picture in the West Central Tribune.
All right. Well, we go into close session. The agenda item is a non-anual evaluation of the performance of city of Wilmer city administrator under Minnesota statutes section 13D.05 05
subdivision 3A. The employee is Lesie Valiant. This portion of the meeting will be closed under such statute. I will now entertain a motion to close this portion of the meeting. So moved. Second.
Got a motion and a second. Any discussion? [clears throat] Roll call. Council member Butterfield. I should I Osk. Hi, Nelson. I Gilbertson. Hi, Gardner. I and Davis.
I Seven eyes's zero nos. That motion passes. Now go into close session here in the city council chambers. Only the city council and designated officials may initially attend the closed session.
Miss Valiant, we will proceed initially in a close session without you in attendance at this point. So, please leave the room and inform us where you will be. Then we will get you for the portion of the