States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Uh tonight we have uh the swearing in of four uh Winstead Le Prairie police
officers. So we'll start start off with that tonight. If Emily could come up your left, raise your right and uh repeat after me. Um I Emily
B solemnly swear will support and the constitution and to discharge of the office of the office. [Applause]
Um, if Aaron could come up. Okay. Um in the constitution discharge. The city of [Applause] Travis could come up [Music] next. Travis, please repeat after me. I
the constitution. Please [Applause] Larry, if you could come up on the Larry, please support
United States of the offic. in the cities. The [Applause] best want to stop here before you leave to give a sign on these. Appreciate it.
You guys come on. Come on. I think I signed. Welcome. 15. That was cool. It was You probably start. All right. So, we'll proceed with the
consent agenda. Uh items listed below are considered uh routine and non-controversial by the city. There will be no separate discussion of these items unless requested by a council member, staff, or citizen. If removed, the item will be discussed at the end of
the regular agenda. So, we have item number A, Winston Municipal Airport design and bid administration proposal. uh authorize the city administrator to execute a proposal from Carvakaco to prepare an independent fee evaluation
for design and bid administration services for the multibay hanger design project at the Winstead Municipal Airport for an amount not to exceed $3500. Item number B, client agreement and authorization. Clark Environmental
Mosquito Management Incorporated. Authorize a city administrator to execute a client agreement authorization for an environmental mosquito management program with Clark Environmental Mosquito Management uh incorporated for eight bi-weekly treatments per season
for the 20 2025 through 2027 seasons. Item number C, volunteer fire assistance grant agreement, Winston Volunteer Fire Department. Authorize the mayor to execute a grant agreement/ federal subawward agreement between the state of
Minnesota and the Winston Volunteer Fire Department for the purpose of providing fire department assistance to suppress wildland fires. Item number D, temporary on sale liquor license Holy Trinity Windstock Country Music Festival.
Approve a one to four day temporary onsale liquor license for the Church of Holy Trinities Windstock Country Music Festival scheduled for June 19th, 20th, and 21st, 2025 at the Windstock grounds
3233 230th Street, Winstead, Minnesota. Item number E, uh, application for exempt permit, Winstead Baseball Association, Inc. Approve an application for exempt permit submitted by the Winstead Baseball Association Incorporated to conduct a
raffle on July 19th, 2025 at Dennis M. Campbell Field, 535 Andy Avenue West, Winstead, Minnesota, contingent upon the organization providing all necessary documentation to the state of Minnesota Gambling Control Board. Item F,
resolution R-25-15, Winstead Volunteer Fire Department donations. Adopt resolution R-25-15 accepting a donation from the Winstead Summer Festival to be dedicated to the Winston Volunteer Fire Department
capital improvement plan. Item G, Security Bank and Trust Company pledge securities. Approve approve the pledge securities that security bank and trust company has purchased for the city of Winstead for the month of March 2025.
Item H, building permit report March 2025. Approve the building permit report for the month of March 2025. Item I, financial report February 2025. Approve the financial report for the month of
February 2025. And item J, uh, claims, approve the claims list for April 15, 2025. That is the consent agenda. I would, uh, Mr. Mayor, I'll motion to approve the consent agenda as presented.
And I abstain from voting on item G. We have a motion. Is there a second? I will second. All in favor? I. Motion carries. Um, next we have a public hearing. Um, res resolution
R-25-16 Minnesota Investment Fund Agreement Amendment. Uh consider a motion to adopt a resolution R-25-16 uh authorizing the execution of an amendment to the grant contract between the city of Winstead and the Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic
Development to implement a project on behalf of Milliburn Manufacturing Incorporated. Um do we have to open the Okay, so you're going to have to open the public hearing. Okay. Uh, so we'll uh open a public hearing at this time.
Do I need to read that again or No, we won't need to read that again, but um just want to ask it. Is there anyone here uh that wants to speak on behalf of the public hearing? I make a motion to close the public hearing. We have a motion to close. Is
there a second? Second. All in favor? I. Public hearing is closed. Um Okay. So, I can explain this a little bit of of what we're looking at here. Um back in when Milliburns was
granted some money from deed and uh myth funds basically they came with some employment um responsibilities I guess for lack of a better term but some minimums that they would need to hit. I they originally it was thought that they had
hit those minimums and they they did but they didn't have them classified the same way as what the state would like them reported. So really all they're doing is requesting a couple of extra months from the state and from us in order to get those numbers in line and
get the reports the way that the state would like them. There any questions? No questions. I'd entertain a motion. Mr. Mayor, I'll make a motion to adopt resolution R-25-16 authorizing uh the execution of
an amendment to grant a contract between the city of Winstead and the Minnesota Department of uh Employment and Economic Development to implement a project on behalf of Millerburn Manufacturing Incorporated. Have a motion. Is there a second? I will second. All in favor? I. Motion
carries. Uh we'll go to new business item B. Uh, resolution R-25-17, Winstead Public Cemetery Transfer. Um, consider a motion to adopt resol resolution R-25-17, a resolution to authorize the
city of Winstead to accept the transfer of the Winstead Public Cemetery and the transfer of its property and funds from the Winstead Public Cemetery Incorporated. So, yes, I'd like to um just ask Aaron Kubash from the Winston Public Cemetery
Incorporated to um come up and talk us through what the the process looked like and how we got here. Yeah, thank you. Um we realize that in a couple years probably we will run out of funds. Uh we will be forwarding
some funds to the city to take care of maintenance. main thing always is the grass cutting and uh so um we just realized as a um a group that it was, you know, the writing was on the wall. It's it's going to happen sometime. So
um and as previously talked with Mr. Schlaggel, the city of Lester Prairie takes care of the cemetery there. The city of Howard Lake subsidizes the cemetery. So this isn't really nothing new. It's just um we think it's time. So, we've been talking about this for a
couple years now and stuff. So, um I I just found an interesting quote and I've been trying to live by that. Benjamin Franklin said, "Show me your cemeteries and I will show you what kind of people you have." So, I think it's important to have a wellgroomed, taken care of
cemetery. And uh I uh uh I plan on keeping involved. um you know, if if you want me to keep uh selling um graves when they you know, become necessary for families and stuff, I know I can keep on doing that and we
can talk about the length of time and all that kind of stuff, but I'm not going to just drop off the book and leave you hanging. I I will work with you the the city I I had a meeting with Chris Bar out there kind of going over that and he has done that in the past in the city of Lester Prairie. So, you guys
have somebody that's on staff that can definitely go through the transition and it should be pretty smooth. Are there any questions or anything? No. I just wanted to thank you and your family for all the years that you've
cared for this public cemetery. Yeah. Well, thank you very much. Yeah. Thank you, Tom, for that. Yeah, I think we would all agree that having a a a welltaken care of cemetery is is respectful to those that lay rest there and and to their families and loved
ones. Yeah. Well, yep. Well, I again, thank you and uh we'll be talking again, so it'll work. Yep. Thank you. Thanks, Aaron. Um entertain a
motion. U Mr. Mayor, I'll make a motion to adopt resolution R- uh 25 Pardon me. Oh, that's uh I'll make a motion to adopt resolution R-25-17, a resolution to authorize the
city of Winstead to accept the transfer of the Winstead Public Cemetery and transfer of its property and funds from the Minnesota, excuse me, Winstead Public Cemetery Incorporated. I'll second. All in favor? I I I. Motion carries. We'll go to item A, year 2024
audit report. Um, hello. Thank you. Good evening. My name is Justin McGra. I'm with CDS and I'm here tonight to present to you your December 31st, 2024 audit report. Um, and you probably got a few different products from us.
Uh, what's up on the screen is the format I'm going to follow tonight. It's kind of a summarized version of your audited financial statements and uh the management letter that we um provided. Uh and I'll jump right in on page one. So I'll start with our independent auditors report kind of what it is. Uh
it outlines the responsibilities of both parties, us as the auditor, you as the city and describes the intent of our audit, which is determine if your financial statements are are free from material misstatement and the auditing standards we follow to come to that conclusion. uh in big bold letters at the top there. Uh we feel your financial
statements are free from material misstatement presented fairly in our opinion. Uh so really that means a couple different things. One is that um you can use your audited financial statements for future decision-making purposes as well as um for looking at
the performance of the city overall. Uh and then on page two uh in in addition to our independent auditor's report, uh we also uh reference uh some required supplementary information that are in your finan financial statements, excuse me. Uh one of the bigger ones being your the management discussion and analysis.
And really that's you know if you look at your financial statements, there's a lot of numbers in there, a lot of schedules, a lot of statements, but this is a more of a narrative format that gives your team here a chance to explain some of the operations, the activities, the changes you might be seeing in your balances during the year. um and and not
so much numbers, but why it happened. Here's why these numbers are changing. And I'm going to cover cover a little bit of that tonight uh as well. So, on page three, I jump into the numbers. Uh your statement of net position. This is the overall balance sheet of the city, if you will. And starting at the top,
looking at your current and other assets. These will be items like your cash balances, accounts receivable balances, uh prepaid expenses, those types of things. So you can see here uh your current assets decreased in in 24 compared to 2023. Um and a big part of
that is uh the note receivable balance. You mentioned that um uh amount from deed from the missile investment fund that was came through the city to Millerburn. Uh you know that we took that loan balance off as the compliance requirements were largely met by Millerburn uh in 2024. Obviously they're
going to wrap up that closeout report with the state. Uh and you'll see the same thing on on the bottom half uh with your current liabilities. that was $725,000 from from the state through the city to uh Millerburn. Uh your capital assets or non-current assets uh just
below the current assets. These are primarily your your capital assets. So infrastructure, buildings, equipment, those types of things. So you did have an increase in those capital assets in 2024 compared to 2023. Uh there was some purchase of new equipment uh and
infrastructure. the um county road 5 extension was a big one uh that you saw during the year. So that county road 5 extension um uh really uh helped increase those capital asset balances in 2024. I touched on the current liabilities, you know, these are you
kind of thinking routine bills, things like accounts payable, salaries, wages payable, uh and then that amount owed from Millerurn through the city back to the state um for the for the deed grant. uh your long-term liabilities, primarily
your debt balances, bonds, um PFA loans, those types of things that are owed from the city back to the state or or the lenders. Uh you did have a decrease in your non-current liabilities. The one item on there, your net pension liability that did take a decrease and uh the big reason for that pension
liability that uh it decreased is, you know, that's that's through the public employee retirement association. And they were pretty well funded in 2024. I think they're about 90% funded for what they project to pay out in future benefits. Um we'll see how 2025 comes out, but that's the main driver of that
decrease you're seeing in your pension liability. Uh and then your other long-term liabilities, your debt balances. So, um you know, with uh no new debt in 2024 and your scheduled payments on your current outstanding debt, the expectation was that those
balances would go down and they did. Then at the very bottom, your net position. So if you could pay sell off all your assets and pay off all your debts, this is what you would really have left over. And there's a few different classifications. That net investment in capital assets, that's really those infrastructure, buildings,
equipment that you own, less any debt owed against those. Um, so with the increase in your capital assets, you saw an increase in that net investment in capital assets. And you're even you're overall in that position. It's kind of continued that trend of increases uh that the city has has been seeing over the past couple years. And this is all
funds, all operations, all activities of the city kind of rolled up in one slide at one point in time, December 31st, 2024. On the next slide, we'll jump into some of the individual funds starting with the general fund. The general fund is the main operating fund, excuse me, of the city. Uh, and we look at your
cash and investment balances. So, we look at not only 2024, but the prior four years. So, you can see where that trend has been. Um, and you had a pretty healthy increase in your cash balances in 2024. Uh historically the CA the general fund has been the fund that has
borrowed cash to other funds primarily project funds um to cover uh interim financing until either financing for that those projects come in um or uh like debt would be an example or a county contribution or a state
contribution. So uh the big one in 2024 was the county 5 extension. So, we had a bunch of project costs in prior years. In 2024, Mloud County uh reimbursed the city for part of their share of that project. So, that money came into the uh county road 5 project fund. It was able
to help pay back a portion of the amount it had borrowed from from the general fund. Um rule of thumb, general fund balance should equal at least six months of operating. Yeah. So, on the next slide, if you want to go to the next slide, um you have your fund balance on
this. you have your revenues, your expenses, and the overall fund balance. So that lighter blue bar is your fund balance as of December 31st, 2024. And that's a good metric that we like to use as auditors. And the state otter kind of has the same recommendation. Um, you're looking at about 6 months worth of
expenditures in that general fund is what you would like to see in your general funds fund balance. So as of 2024, you're about 9 to 10 months. So, that's a pretty healthy um I guess it' be a reserve or a balance carrying
forward into 2025, not only for large unexpected expenditures, but uh if there were more inter fund borrowing that would be needed for other projects that do come up, the general fund is sitting in a pretty healthy place to to fund those items. And then looking at your
revenues and expenditures, um you saw a similar trend in 24 as you've seen in the prior years of your revenues exceeding your expenditures. Um and you know one thing that's also in those other financing sources uses is is transfers amongst funds. So you had higher transfers in 2023. Um water sewer
received some transfers. The county road 5 received some transfers. Uh you had lesser extent of that in 2024. your transfers were still a little bit higher than than your budget probably or primarily for uh capital equipment stuff uh related items, but um overall you saw
a decrease in those transfers which is is causing your revenues to exceed your expenditures and an overall increase in your fund balance. And then if you go to the next slide on page six, so we'll look at your revenues in a little more detail. Uh and we look at this by source. Where does
the general fund get the money that it spends? Uh property taxes historically have had the lion's share of the revenue in the general fund. That's no change in 2024. Um and you know property taxes saw the largest increase in your sources of revenue along with your
intergovernmental revenues. Um so and and then those intergovernmental revenues largely increase due to the increase in your local government aid that the state uh uh did hand out and uh the small city assistance grant um had gone away for a couple years. They reintroduced that and funded it in 2024.
So you saw some of those funds uh as well in the general fund uh this year with the uh the state projecting a billion dollar budget next year. Do you perceive or is the scuttlebutt local
government aid will go down? You know, I I think that's on the table to reduce local government aid. I think the uh the governor's office trying to put his budget together is looking at all options. I think schools are also in the crosshairs a little bit for uh a potential decrease in in state funding.
So until legislators or legislative session is complete, we'll have to wait and see what they come up with, but it it wouldn't surprise me they've done it in the past. So um I I it wouldn't surprise me at at the end of that session if that's one of the things that may come back down. That small city assistance grant that they funded in 24,
that may come back down. Um, and you had some of those one-time items, the public safety aid, uh, that came in, uh, at the end of 2023. Uh, I don't think you'll be seeing a lot of those one-time fundings going forward. I I I don't have any connection to any legislators, but it wouldn't
surprise me. It seems to be the lowhanging fruit when it comes to to budget cuts. And then on page seven, we look at the expenditures. All those revenue sources, the funds that are being brought in, what are they spent on? department is using those funds. Um you
can see public safety, general government have have largely been the larger departments uh of the city. That's really no change in 2024. Um but one thing that you do have some control over are those transfers in transfers out. I mentioned earlier transfers out had decreased uh slightly
in 2024. Uh so you move those funds to other areas of the city to support those activities, support those operations and and capital needs can have a a pretty big impact on which department is using most of the general fund um uh revenue. Uh as projects come up, you know, public
works, streets, those types of things all have an impact on kind of the proportion of which department in the general fund is is using those revenues. And then if you go to the next slide, uh we move away from the special revenue funds or excuse me, the general fund
into the special revenue funds. So special revenue fund is typically set up to serve a specific purpose uh within the city and and hopefully be self- sustaining. So you have a couple different special revenue funds out there. Uh the fire department did see an increase in its overall fund balance. Um
in 2024, I touched on that state public safety aid that you received at the end of 2023. uh you had some expenditures that qualified for the use of those funds. Uh so you saw that increase in that revenue in 2024. Uh the airport saw a decrease as um repairs repairs were
done out there. I think it was runway lightning repairs that were done during the year uh from the result of a lightning strike. So you saw use of that cash uh to fix those items. And then your TIF funds, you got TIFF 2-9 that's sitting out there. It's a relatively new fund. It was new in 2023. uh it's still
incurring expenditures related to getting that tiff district uh implemented and off the ground and it hasn't received any tiff revenues yet. So until those revenues start coming in from that tiff district uh that'll probably still sit at a a deficit fund balance uh going
forward. Then on the next slide, capital project funds. So you've had several capital project funds over there. Usually a capital project fund is set up for maybe two different reasons. one is to capture all the revenues, expenditures, financing sources for large projects. And then you have some revolving ones like your capital
equipment fund that are there to handle a lot of the capital equipment needs uh of the city. So the capital equipment um fund specifically, you had an increase in 2024 um with transfers into that fund. So the increased transfers we saw transfers out, excuse me, we saw out of the general fund, a lot of them went to this
capital equipment fund to fund future capital expenditures. uh the county road 5, the airport projects that you see up there, they all have deficit fund balances as of the end of the year. Um as they've incurred expenditures related to those projects, but they haven't been fully funded yet or all the proceeds
from the financing have not been received for those projects. And I know a lot of your airport projects have been sitting there for a while um going on. We're kind of waiting for that final close out from MIDOT and state figuring out everything that they're still going to cover or they're going to reimburse the city for and what they're not. So
we're hoping that happens here in 2025 and some of those project funds can be closed out with those projects largely being completed. And then on the next slide uh we move away from the governmental activities uh of the city into the um enterprise funds uh which really are
utility funds starting with the water fund on page 10 there. Um so we look again cash and investment balances. You can see where that water fund cash and investment balance has been steadily decreasing with capital improvements that have been made uh over the years. Some of the items you had in 24
were working on new well, excuse me, a new well pump, the Herald Journal extension. Those items have all used the cash of of the water fund. And I understand you have some financing coming in in 2025 here, debt financing uh to help pay back some of those costs you you kind of prepaid. So, um, but
that is something always to be, uh, cognizant of when you're looking at your water fund, water and sewer fund, is where those rates are set at, um, to be able to cover not only just those current operating costs, but the anticipated future capital expenditures that you're going to see to maintain or
improve those systems. And then we'll look at the activity on uh, page 24. As you can see here, you know, we we're talking about that decrease in cash, but you're not necessarily losing your your net position or you're not falling behind um
you know, with um your operating expenses. You know, that they did increase slightly in 2024, but so um and you had a small you had a smaller increase in your operating revenues. So that's why you're seeing a smaller increase in net position. Uh but you're not losing that position. So you're
you're fully funding your depreciation or that wear and tear of uh your existing assets. And if you can fully fund that, you're you're almost building that reserve for their eventual replacement or or repair that may need to be needed. So um so while your cash balance is going down, your capital
asset balance is going up as you're making improvements uh within the system itself. And then on the next slide, so this one we look at uh again that kind of that that net income amount you have from the water fund. We remove some of the
non-cash items like like depreciation expense and we compare it against the debt service requirements of of the fund. So it's it's really to kind of give you an idea of how the fund is doing to be able to bring enough cash in from operations to make its debt payments. So you can see here in 2024 it
it brought in enough cash from operations to service its debt. So that's kind of the the goal you want to see with these utility funds is that your rates are set at a level. I'm going to keep hitting on rates. Rates are set at a level to bring enough cash in to maintain the system and pay the debt on
the system as long as well as to cover operations. I think you have 14 years remaining on your longest debt in that fund currently as a 24. Obviously a new debt issuance we'll add to yours uh as well. And then on the next slide, similar to the water fund, we had the
same slides for the sewer fund. Sewer funds you fairly healthy cash balance. Uh you had a slight increase uh as that cash provided by operations was sufficient to cover the capital needs as well as the debt payments of of the sewer fund. So um this one's a little
bit different story than uh what you saw with the water fund. And if you go to the next slide, we'll look at the operations of the sewer fund. Um again looking at revenues being brought in the expenditures of that fund and an overall increase in your your net position in
2024. Uh your revenues decreased slightly but your your expenses um only rose slightly. So you can see it's it's eating into that change in net position. Again it's just a reminder to take a look at those operating expenses of that fund um and adjust rates as needed or
accordingly uh so that that margin doesn't get too narrow. And then the final slide for the sewer fund. Um you can see here again the sewer fund is bringing enough cash from operations to make its debt service payments. Uh there's 13 years remaining
on your longest uh sewer obligation. Uh one item to note in 2020 uh that 2020 principal amount does include a payoff of your 2012A bonds. So it's a little bit skewed because you had the cash on hand um in 20 I think it was 2019 to
make that big payment in 2020 to pay off that debt. So just one item there and that is all the numbers I was going to cover this evening. In addition to auditing the balances of the city, we also audit the city's compliance with a few different rulemaking bodies. The
first one uh being the state of Minnesota. So Minnesota legal compliance. We look at things uh like conflicts of interest uh repository of public funds, contracts and bidding those types of items um to to measure the city's compliance with state statutes. So, we came across no issues
and non-compliance with state law. That usually tells us auditors, a couple different things. One, that your team here knows what there are and and two, they're making sure those laws are being followed. So, great job to everybody here for making that happen. Uh cuz there's a lot of them. And the second one is government
auditing standards and internal control within the city or how financial information flows through the city and who does what in that process. And if you heard my presentation before, you've probably heard me discuss these, the one of them being the audit prepared financial statements. So while the products you have in front of you are all derived from your financial records,
we do put them in that format and we disclose that uh back to you. The second one is limited segregation of duties. So this is a common one you see with entities that are have a smaller office staff where it's difficult to break up every part of that financial uh
recording process. So one person is not being asked to do one or two pieces of that. Um, and it's it's really just a risk mitigation thing to pretend uh prevent fraud or uh mistakes from happening or or to catch them if they were to happen. So, I kind of like to use a
reminder to you at the the council level, you know, when you're looking at your council packet or your hearing discussions um with the your full-time staff here or in in meetings. If something doesn't seem uh right or if you have questions or if you see unusual vendor or an amount or a bill, you know,
feel free to ask that question. you can be another check and balance to help mitigate that risk. And then on the next slide, uh in addition to the audited financial statements, we also issue a letter to you from us as auditors to you at the governance level, let you know how the
audit went, any changes in your accounting practices, any difficulties we encountered or disagreements. Um and you know, we we do ask a lot of your team here when we come out for the audit, but it's not just people internal to the city. We ask a lot of your banks, your vendors, engineers, state, the
county. So, everybody was very helpful in getting us the information we we requested so I could be here today and and deliver the audit report. So, we're very thankful. Thank you everybody for all your help throughout this process. And then sometimes we'll have recommendations or umformational items
in here about new accounting standards coming down the pipe. We don't have any of those this year. So, if you're coming to my presentation looking for that, I'm sorry. there's no big change in accounting standards uh as of today. So, we'll see what the government accounting standard board comes out with for next year. So, um with that on the last slide
is my contact information. So, if you're looking through this in your in your free time and you you say, "I wish I would have asked Justin this or I wish I would have asked him that." Feel free to call, email, or or stop by our office if you're ever in lunchfield. So, um does anybody have any questions right now?
Thank you. Thank you very much. All right. Thank you. Easy. Uh, right. Next, we'll do our department report. Do we need to make a motion to accept the I'm sorry. Go ahead. entertain a motion to accept the 2024 audit. Uh, Mr. Mayor, I'll make a
motion to accept the year 2024 audit report as presented. Second. All in favor? I. Motion carries. Sorry about that. Department report. Uh Winstead Westbury Police Department. Thank you.
Thanks, Chief. Thank you. Right, Mr. Mayor, members of the council, thank you for having me. Um, the last time I was here for my department report was November 6th of 24. Uh, since then, I'll just hit a couple of the highlights outside of our responding to calls um items that we
have taken part in. In November of last year, we held annual reviews for the full-time police officers. So, those were the u existing less furry police department officers that we were bringing aboard. Um officers attended annual defensive tactics and taser and um OC training. OC is our chemical
spray. So, in November of last year, we did that with the sheriff's off Mloud County Sheriff's Office. Um we each year in the fall, we do a safety meeting and sort of an update meeting, get to know people meeting at the security bank and trust. So, we did that in November.
Administrator Schlaggel and I attended a merger meeting with Lesprey uh city staff. Um and also in November, um I started coffee with a cop um with um in the Vulmer room. It's the second t or excuse me, second Thursday at 11:00 each
month. So, I encourage anyone with questions to come or just have coffee or um it's it's it's actually been very well attended. Um, so I I do encourage uh anyone that wants to come to come who attends. Um, it it's a variety. It's
sort of in the senior bracket of our community, but we also have people from Waverly, Silver Lake, Lester Prairie, and Winston, okay, that have been there. Tom would fit right in. He'd be a welcome uh Thank you, Jeff. You're welcome, Tom.
Um, in December we completed our annual reviews of our police officers, assisted with the Winston Festival parade, participated in the action review and safety committee here at the city hall and then we also uh had a city staff meeting that day. We also in December
held the first board meeting uh for the police board and um I started attending youth task force meetings and social events in Lester Prairie. So let's pray has a youth task force that's made up of the school, religious organizations, the business association and students from
the school. Um and then there's a social event that's held uh each month as well. Officers attended inservice medical training uh with our fire department at the fire department for our EMTs and our emergency first responders. Attended the windock
planning started attending wind planning meetings. start the process for possibly imple implementing a new scheduling program. So currently right now we use essentially an outlook calendar program and it is can be cumbersome. It does work but there's other programs out
there that can uh with technology and applications for your cell phones can make the streamline this. So we're working on demoing that now. Um and as January 3rd um is the first day we actually had the new
officers starting to work. So uh our one department became effective at the start of the year. February officer Vak Vasi started the DARE program at Lesbury School. She currently has 36 students is working towards graduation here in the next couple weeks. And then um I did present
a safety talk with students from the Lester High School at the Lesbury City Hall as part of the youth task force. March officers attended county attorney training sessions. We attended night firearms qualification shoots. Participated we participated in the body camera audit. So we have to do that
every two years. Um here this was actually our third one. Um so happy to say we did pass that audit. Lyn Lipkkey does our audit. um she's done all three of them and she's a great to work with um because it is actually quite entailed audit and then the findings of that
audit are sent to uh a committee that's made up of legislators and uh in St. Paul that do review the audits as well as part of the state statute. We assisted in the nights Columbus fish fry at the blue note doing
money escorts and I did attend this year. I I did years past and we had other officers do it as well, but we're back at the women's expo at the Blue Note and it was been probably five or six years since I've been there, but it was very well attended. There was a steady stream of folks coming through and um I think it's a very good
opportunity to answer questions. April, we assist the Ml County Jail with child fingerprinting at our three schools, Holy Trinity, Winston Elementary, and Lester Prairie schools. and we presented or excuse me, last week I presented the Lester Prairie 2024
Police Department report at the Lester Prairie City Council. So I compiled their numbers for last year and presented that to them. And then uh we had a staff meeting last week as well. And then I am and my officers are working on there was a handful of cases left over from the West Police
Department that had were active investigations and we're we're down to about four or five of those cases that we're working through yet. So, I anticipate a conclusion of those coming soon. I did hand out the 2024 Winston Police Department activity report for
last year. Um, you know, for those of you that have been here in the years past, I've done graphs and a lot of different fun stuff in there. This year, I just paired it down just so numbers. Um, the graphs are important to show important to show, you know, where we're at and I can do that information or show you that information if you'd like to
see it. But, a couple of highlights. Um, in the 2024 report, we issued right around 120 citations. So, that's a ticket, right? And we arrested eight people for traffic violations. We issued 883 warnings. So, if you look at it, of
the contacts we made, the violations we encountered, approximately 13.5% of those violations resulted in a citation. So I think it's just accuracy and and numbers are important you know and 2023 likewise our rate was about out
of all the violations encountered about 17 folks got uh or 17% of the folks got a citation DWIS we had five DWI arrests in 2024 that's up from one in 2023 in 2024 we responded to 14
accidents and this number actually really stood out to me 20 last year we had 14. 2023 we had 36. So I haven't really looked at the times. Usually you know that December, January we have more accidents, but that that's a drastic
change. Um and that could just be sort of maybe the luck of the draw too. I don't know. But hopefully that number stays lower. Um now that those are accidents in our city proper that we handle. That's not if there's an accident just into the county and we're assisting on that is not in that number.
Um that would be an agency assist. Uh we had 59 related theft related burglary calls in 2024. That's up 17 from last year or excuse me 2023. So that number is somewhat concerning
that we you know we're going to work on to keep those numbers down. 2024 we responded 236 medicals. So those of you that have been here for a while know that number has been slowly going up or steadily going up. 236 medicals was
again an all-time high. Uh we had 229 in 2023, but in the first quarter, so we're we're one department now providing uh police services to Lester Prairie and Winston in the first quarter. So that's 3 months, we responded to 94 medicals
already. Um just a little bit of a comparison. So we had 236 last year, Winston PD, Lester Prairie had 80. So 94 in 3 months is a lot of medicals. Yeah. Um and we we're fortunate to have a very good fire department in both communities
that help us on those medicals. Mental health calls are still on the rise. I know I've talked about this for a couple years. Um but a lot of our calls, it could be a domestic call, it could be a bar fight, it could be a domestic or excuse me, a disturbance call. Um a lot
of it boils down to mental health issues. Even our substance related uh calls for service, intoxicated persons, it still boils down to mental health calls. So there's still a need for services for folks and if if anyone needs help, we urge them to call the
Mloud County Crisis Line or call our police department and you're not in trouble when you call the police department. Maybe you just need to talk or want somebody to help you get to talk to a doctor. We're happy to do that. So I'd encourage that. Also, I just want to let people know to use caution um when
driving around schools during the pickup and drop off times and also um just be mindful of the construction. we have road construction. I won't get an opportunity to talk to the counselor or the city before that starts, but County Road One's going to be um under construction this year and just be mindful of that. That's a major artery
in our city which is going to put stress on other areas of our community. So, just be mindful in your operating motor vehicle. Upcoming events, winter parking ban is over, but just a reminder that are 72-hour limit. So, you can park a a vehicle uh RV, boat, trailer on the
street for 72 hours. We ask that you remove it within that time or you could get a citation primarily because it does cause damage to the roadways. Public works has to get through street sweep. Um just please please uh be respectful to all of us for that. And then the bike
rodeo, we'll have the Winston bike rodeo on May 20th and the Lester Prairie bike rodeo will be on May 22nd. Ours will be at the Winston Elementary School. Lester Prairie will be at their school. They'll both be at 6 pm. We got very generous donations from various organizations
including the Chamber of Commerce. Um, and I would encourage all children to attend. Any questions for me? The officers are meshing well. Very well. Yep. The uh the merger is going better than expected. Um, and not that I didn't expect it to go well, but there
is a very strong team atmosphere and um, it it is a very positive environment to be part of and I'm sure that in the old world the Winstead officers now they're learning about less prairie and where's what and what where
and Yep. And to vice versa to encourage that um, we are alternating what cities officers work in. So, one night you might have officer Wakefield um in Lester Prairie providing you services and then if you need the services of the police department, the next night it
might be officer Moon. So, we're that way everyone gets accustomed to each community. And the officer that came from Brton that's a member of your force now. He'll be um involved in Wintoka. Yes, he will. Yep. Yep. He's worked out there before. Oh, has he?
Yes. Okay. He was a part-time officer of Lurry, was he not? Correct. Yep. And he was Sorry, I was going to say he's previously employed by Brmpton uh city of Brmpton as a police officer and then he was on the Mccclair County Posi for a number of
years, too. That's how he got got out to Wintock. Got it. They're excited about Wintock. I think they've heard about it. Cowboy hats. That is yet to be determined. Um, another question, and I'm sure that
this is cared for. If you're not here or incapacitated, is there one of the officers that would take over for you? Yeah. So, we I have I'm a big believer in cross trainining. It's somewhat limited in this position, but um Officer
Lamers has a lot of the accesses I have for stuff that has to get done now, but uh if I wake up dead tomorrow, I would anticipate uh the city should look to the Sheriff Langfeld. Okay. Yep. Well, thank you for all you do.
Yeah, absolutely. Been fun to watch. Going well. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. um come to the open forum part of uh of the council meeting. It would appear that we don't have anyone here uh to participate in the open forum. So we'll
go that city administrator update and announcements. I just have a couple of things. uh brush site will be open tomorrow and on Saturday morning and uh going forward the evenings on Wednesdays
and Saturdays for the time being and um looking to expand those hours at a different time. And also I I think Chief might have touched on it, but um starting with the the blight enforcement around town
and just um making sure people clean up their properties. now that it's springtime and getting nice and we can get outside. Lastly, like to thank Raquel and her team for the great job that they did with the audit and going through
that. That's a big undertaking for for them and uh obviously as you heard today, they did a great job. So, good job. Congratulations. Thank you. Tom, do you have anything? I do. I have a question. when um the consent agenda was approved and I
abstained on item G then technically was item G approved because we only had two councilmen voting in favor it would not be then so we can add it to the next agenda okay good
catch him nothing from me please thank you and I don't have anything I entertain a motion to adjurnn motion and to adjurnn. A second. All in favor?