and I had to go work and then I came back I got go before I go [Music] my head hits the table I'm pretty good let's call the meeting to order and
we will begin with the pledge of allegion out of my chair I to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for it stands one nation under God indivisible
with liy and Justice all right so uh we'll begin with the open public forum is there anybody who would like to address the council yes would you like me to come up
on up yes please um I'm Shel this um I'm here to talk to you about a property that I still own and chall but I was thinking on the drive out here that I think my only other time coming to the C Council when I was probably about 12 years old and I collected about 25 or 50
signatures on comptition and uh wanted that I wanted a new Surface on the tennis courts right cuz we started playing tennis and was all so I had this petition right and Council said oh yeah yeah you'll get you'll get your wish I drove by there today and I want you to know that it has a new service on
it I was say it didn't and it did when I was what when I asked for it really P up but so anyway I wanted to talk to you about this property that um that my family has owned in in in winter but on 4 414 West for Street what right on the Main Street so um it's been in my family
since I don't know probably the 30s um you know I grew up there graduated from wi high school and um um my uh mother and sister lived there after that for a number of years until she passed away in in 2007 and my sister lived there for a couple more years but she really
couldn't take care of the care of the place and so she actually ended up at Su Le States and and new Kelly very well there um and uh but you know the house is you know was hard for her to take care of and after that it really became even more difficult and
just you know didn't really get kept up and I've been trying to do some things to do that and I think I reached out some you are you Michael we we've communicated a few times and you know I I very much want to want to take care of it and get it get it satisfied to
everybody's um um satisfaction so I just thought I'd come out and just kind of talk to you directly about that and and let you know where we're at so um yeah when my sister was still alive she passed away in January um and she always still felt like that was her house you know so it was hard to get rid
of the house but uh now it's time to do it and my goal is to make that happen this this year for sure um and um I tried a few things in the past uh you know had a couple people interested but never came came through with a sale and tried to I give it away I've actually
contacted Michael about the city taking it over as a gift but um uh there wasn't enough interest I guess and then um the development company or the Development Group in the city I forget the name of it they trior and I had talked a little bit about that uh
but they didn't have the 501c designation so I really wouldn't have even gotten a tax deduction on that didn't seem to really make sense um and then uh the the Peace Lutheran was was interesed too thought maybe we could make something happened there uh they were even thinking about doing like a
you know a park or an entrance to the you know to the church or something there cuz it's right right in front of that property uh for peaceful with but uh and that's still I guess a possibility but I think the one that that um that I've settled on is with the Habitat for Humanity um and it's the
it's the group out of Mano that kind of works with this area and i' reached out to them and they were really excited about it because they didn't I don't think they might have had one other project in wi I'm trying to remember or at least in silly County I think they said might not have been in winr you probably know no I I don't I don't think
they have anyway they they were ready to to close on the deal and then uh their their attorney who works for them started doing the title paperwork and he came to realize that since my sister and I were on the title from when my mother passed away um that when she passed away didn't
have a will and needed to go through probate so that put a little bit of a drag on it for me and actually ironically the probate hearing is tomorrow it takes a while Tak him a while to get all that paperwork on but the hearing is tomorrow so that'll be that'll be done then they'll they'll appoint me as the administrator for it
and that but it has to be posted for a certain number of months uh for you know any creditors who might have an interest in you know her estate to to contact and since the property is really about doing peace there even though it doesn't have a lot of value somebody might you know come up with something so that's the way
it has to play out so I'm I'm kind of held up here for you know about 3 months or so until I can get that that finalized but um that's they're they're to go on it and they I'm working with their attorney out fact he's actually handling the probate case as well
tomorrow um so you know we had uh I think I think I've worked with you all on things as you as you've asked me to do things in the past had the garage taken down a few years ago had a little shed taken down a few years ago there's some trees around it had those all taken down and trimmed up maybe two or three
years ago that was a pretty big job um had to contract that out obviously and then you know it's regularly mowed and trying to keep up on all of that that and I think like I've told a number of you I'm more than willing to respond to any questions you have wanted to try and resolve anything that needs to be taken
care of and I know I know M you have my name and number and email and address and all that stuff so happy to talk to anyone and give you that information tight if you want it for me directly too but um so I just you know we had an inspection done on it a while ago too obviously it's got a lot of issues uh
and my my my ask would be that you not take any action on that to prohibit me from I don't know it would but I don't want to jeopardize this this deal with habitat you know my deal with them is I'm going to I'm going to give them give them the house and they will come in and
do what needs to be done obviously they're not going to go against any wishes that you all have if you think it needs to be taken down I'm sure that's what they would do um and build new my my feeling is that they're going to have the resources to do that right they've got the contacts with people who can do
the do the you know the mili and and site clearing and all that kind of stuff not only the resources or know the people but they'll have some you know people who donate some of that to to haveit that so um they'll be in a much better position you know with the expertise and construction and all that
stuff that I certainly don't have to kind of make all that happen um and I know I had even alluded to in a letter I think I sent to some of you um you know there's a possibility they might even because the lot is fairly large might even put two homes on there which would be a nice opport opportunity for new you
know new construction for a couple of families in the area to get into a habitat home I don't know if that's something the city's interested in or not but to me it's a I don't I I remember exactly what the lot size is over the years we sold a piece of it to I think two different pieces of it to to
piece with and so they could come a little bit farther on their parking lot so it's gotten the lots a little smaller but uh it goes it's pretty deep they're back to basically to the to the parking lot of pece Lutheran there so it could be potentially a two a two lot thing or
um or a two home lot if that's something the city does I don't know but um but I think that'd be a real nice addition to the to the city make it make it look nice and it' be you know better for the property taxes obviously the taxes right now are very low they're at like 25,000
I think I actually just had an appraise uh the appraise L came in at 40,000 which I was a little surprised that it was actually over the property tax but um so anyway that's my just wanted to let you know I'm I'm very interested in making it happen and that's certainly my
goal I wanted this is a year for me to kind of get be done with it too and I'm kind of the last one to have to take care of it in the family my father died when I was a kid and um so I'm kind of the last last person there to make it happen but um like to be able to do that and and it would it would be helpful to
me just to you know work with the deal and I'm not hiding anything from habitat they know you know the condition of the house and but I just feel like they're the ones who are going to be in a position to make that happen and if I could have you know till the end of this probation um probate period with the
with the U my sisters EST State I'll allow me them to make the transaction happen so happy to answer any questions say thanks for the update yeah great thanks sure put an effort into it yeah absolutely no I I
mean I you know I I wanted to uh I was hopeful it was going to work out with the church cuz I thought that would be kind of a nice nice use for the property you know after all these years and um you know some typ of park or something like that but uh and you know if they reached out to me and made that happen I
guess we could but you know ke dad already has already agreed to do it they're ready to um to make the deal and it was really just a matter of this title that kind of held it out so housing is good yeah so any questions for me no I think if you do want to
contact me feel free to reach out in any way shape or form call me text email whatever thanks a lot thank right have a good even good night all right anybody else for the public forum going once tce all right moving on
um need to approve the agenda do we have anything to add anybody no anyone here Michael I do not all right someone would like to move to approve so move Mo by Kelly is there a
second a second second by um any discussion any discussion all in favor say I I same sign motion Carri consent agenda which contain the minutes and financials motion
approve motion by ad is there a second I'll second second by John any discussion any discussion all those in favor say I post same sign motion carried public hearing abatement on the Henderson property
28454 Brown Street South uh mayor and Council so this is a property that we have been working on um for quite a while with compliance issues um currently um the Henderson family has um there's well there's a number of
issues but uh primarily um large containment issues they have old Machinery junk metal um I will say that um in general the property is kept up you know there's a lot of
Mowing and the weeds are taken care of um but in general what we're finding is the land used for this property is zoned residential is R1 and it's being used as what I would classify as a salvage facility um they
go and buy large things of metal signs maybe old containers whatever it might be um and then either find a repurpose for them or sell them um the police department has been in contact
with them multiple times and um we just felt like we weren't making any movement forward and so uh Logan Chief Anderson decided to start following the full process um that legal process would include
abatement and building findings um there is actually a property a home on the property that is very dilapitated it poses a risk to the public health and safety of our community um especially now that there's a daycare located
directly across the street um so we are right now only focusing on the chapter 8 uh nuisances which is kind of the junk the old Machinery but it will not be probably the only public hearing that we have on the property this is probably
going to come before Council multiple times um there is um non-compliant storage containers on the property um there's a house that needs to come down um it's just uh there's just a number of things right now we're just asking
Council to obate the nuisances that exist which include old Machinery metal objects um structures that are just poorly maintained um and relocating the buildings and containers
that are he's using for storage right now um in the property I will say and go on record by saying um multiple neighbors and um specifically um the businesses including the daycare have raised concern over this uh property in
the past so just keep that in mind um attached are the photos um from from Chief Anderson's visits myself and chief Anderson have gone out multiple times you can see there's old trailers and Machinery kind of strewn about the
property again well organized um there's good piles but um again this also speaks to the issue of land use um and so we just we are looking for
council's um Direction on where we want to go with this and when the administrator is done speaking I'd like to speak on the subject y you can it's a public hearing so don't mean to interrupt I just can these
containers um can they be used as a shed I mean if they're they can't they're not compliant with Minnesota Universal building codes um and a lot of it is because they're they're seaworthy vessels so um a lot of
the times they have lead paintt um they're not bolted or anchored to the ground anything over 200 square F feet has to be anchored and I think the other thing is you know a lot of these containers because they they ship multiple things
in them you know they're sprayed with pesticides um to keep bugs from getting into our country um that's why they're they're not they're not they're not made for residential storage I've cabins yeah yeah so what what do we need
to do tonight to pick so this would um Abate the the metal and I would say the large sums of product old junk Machinery metal items um we would give Mr Henderson um
10 days to comply um and after that compliance is not held we would send Public Works in to Abate the problem well if you like to Yes Should I stand here come up or that's fine yes um I guess I'd like
to start off by saying um you know when this stuff was brought up I have been making progress the best of my ability um I'm a stay-at home dad with two kids that has so much time on his hands um I have been making
progress um on the stuff that is being called scrap um there are a couple of metal racks there actually there are three metal racks that are consist of um good material that I use for different
projects whether to fix something or fix something for somebody else but you know if that needs to be moved that's understandable I guess um and uh I guess one of the other points is you'd said several times I guess you
had showed up twice and then we had had some meetings that were postponed and cancelled and I haven't been able to get in touch with you on some things so um I had talked to and you maybe had heard a different side of things or whatever as
far as um you know the storage containers um or shipping containers or storage sheds or whatever the accurate description would be um you know it's uh I talked to Darren and one thing that he
had said and and maybe I need to talk with him again to get more specific details but he had said that um if if there was an engineering sign off on something like that that could be um you
know the the you know made up to code and I mean there's no problem with you know strength or or any any Hazard there um as far as lead paint um I haven't tested it but I did buy a test kit I
haven't gotten over to actually try it but it can be painted or whatever it might be um you know these are things that have been around for several years and I guess um like I said what like I had said to
you I had looked up the city codes and the state codes and I hadn't found anything at that point um but you're you're saying now that uh it's more about um not about what the code says but
whether it or what it doesn't say but what it you know specific points but I guess the way I see that is um you know and is you when you're when you're putting up a building or something like
that um you know say for example uh when I had built my my garage in the back of my property um they wanted anything over 1,000 square ft to have Frost footings well it was 1,80 Square ft and and the
city had told me well if you get an engineer to sign off on that that's fine well I guess I see it as the same way if I can and that's kind of what I had heard from Darren is you would need an engineering sign off I mean is that a is that an issue that you would have or the
council would have or are are they allowed in the city of wi no currently they're not did you check before you brought them in I did check there is no code that says you can't use uh a specific container it's just a matter of
um you know they're they're overbuilt for what they are I mean they're built to handle 400,000 lb there's no no safety it's not going to crumble on you and I mean you go to Menards and you get a 6x6 plastic storage shed and
apparently that meets code but I I I just I don't know I don't understand where um as far as the storage sheds where the the disconnect on meeting code is um and and that's something by all
means we can discuss or whatever um I've been very open to uh Logan coming he's come the last four weeks and Michael was there uh he showed up twice um and you know I've been open
to you know making progress where I can but it's a matter of um you know you can you can do so much at a time and the other thing is um what is called Old Machinery is uh
you know I've got tractor out there that I use to maintain my property um and I bring them in town for maybe 3 months out of the summer it's not like they're sitting and looking like garbage and then I've got attachments for these tractors
um I guess I don't call that un no I you know I forget exactly how the code is phrased it says something about unusable machinery and that's not what that is there certainly are things that need to be cleaned up and like said I am making progress on
that so I guess um you know I'm just trying to move forward and do the best I can with the time I've got um as far as the house I did uh submit a
um oh what is it called a um a building uh building or request to demolish the house uh that is something that I brought up when I bought the house and
um basically at that time the county assessor said not to demolish it because it was still good enough to rebuild and anyway um I did put in a a building permit to demolish that house which I'm waiting
for um a signature sign off to say that I can get started with that process um then the I guess the last thing I would say say is um to one of those buildings that I had
brought in um was actually going to be used to you know empty the contents of the house out so that I could demolish it I mean at this point um cuz uh these two gentlemen stopped by the day after it was put on the ground um so I had
planned on starting to empty it from that point so that I could demolish it um so I mean at this point it's it's just a tool to progress forward uh you're talking about the shipping containers uh no there's um
there's the white the white storage buildings uh if you've got pictures there they're old like [Music] trailers I guess I'm certainly not as good at speaking as the last guy but um if you have any questions I'm certainly
open to whatever needs to be discussed like I said I it's not like I'm um hiding or or not doing things it's just a matter
of um you know the the amount of time I get to do stuff and I mean I I get time to do stuff it's just well how large is your lot out there uh it's 2.3 Acres between the two
two lots so how long has loan been working with you uh last year summertime is when we had our first conversations I advised uh Michael at that point that this was probably very likely to become more of
an issue moving forward I advised him at that point to start working on cleaning up the issues that we' discussed um fast forward into the beginning of this year we talked at the beginning of June with uh administrator L as well about the
issues um you know maybe it wasn't expressly stated uh these things have to happen immediately we also gave uh Mr Henderson a month to start working
towards improvements um and I told Mr Henderson at that point that when we came back about a month later that I was expecting more of a change there frankly wasn't hardly any change um and so then we had
more conversations and I advised him that we're going to have to start taking the all of the proper steps now because we're getting substantially more complaints about this property um and at the beginning of last week I had a
conversation with him that I wanted to at least see see a a substantial change in the property especially in the two different areas of the city ordinance violations or the uh structures that are there that use us for storage I didn't
so them I don't care which one you pick but at least it shows good faith effort that you're making an attempt to clean up one or the other um he did clean up some of the stuff on some of the trailers that were on there but not
necessarily the other issues around the property um so and that's where we were at last Friday um and then we talked again yesterday as
well something to add I have removed uh one full trailer I hauled in for scrap for just things that you know we're were good things but um as a good faith to scrap them out I haul the load in New Alm it was 3,000
just over 3,000 lbs I also hauled in two or hauled away two 18t trailers where the stuff to my father's place um to also clean up the property um and uh at the beginning of June when we had talked uh the biggest
concern was the storage containers or the the uh sheds um or whatever definition you want to give them and the the the problem at that point I was told was it
didn't have foundations and I verified that with the building code that it didn't need a foundation so I guess I wouldn't take it back to the beginning of June because I had the wrong information what is the footprint size
of those orange shipping containers uh they are 8 by 20 so it's less than 200 ft 60 ft doesn't matter they're not a does it specifically say you you can't use and the uniform building Cod it doesn't address them because they're not
building structures period it does not address them M because they're not building right shiing [Music] containers oh and then I also spoke directly with Darren as well um
regarding those and um I got a different perspective than what Michael had or Mr Henderson had um Darren made it very clear to me that they're not an approved
thing um the state of Minnesota hasn't uh had any ruling on them yet but just because there hasn't been a ruling doesn't mean that they're not allowed they haven't had a ruling in favor for
them is what is depiction and and the difference is so you go to Menards and you go to Dakota building right and you bring that home well there's an engineer and an architect that works on those things right they get them stamp for approval it goes through a process the
state approves them you put an electrical panel in some State inspector has to come out and improve it what's happening with these storage containers is we don't know who's engineering them we don't know how they're built we don't know anything about them they're coming from overseas going into the open market
and people are putting like Mr during in town electrical in them they try to put Plumbing in them they are a public nuisance in and of themselves and then Darren also reiterated too that it's the original Builder engineering engineering
plans it's not just a any Engineers plans it has to be the original Builders and these Maritime containers who knows where they're built and Darren said good luck trying to find the original builder of these to get
actually it does have a t on there um which probably has the original Builder and that's what shows that they're rated for 470,000 Pb yeah but the point is that it's not for a building it's not that's not what
they're made for they're made for maritime use not same same with the box truck things those are not built for being a storage container on property they're built to be on a vehicle driving down the roadway in that was one of my thoughts too I
mean all the other building code things aside you know to have three or four or five trailers or storage containers or wherever they are sitting on on a yard doesn't necessarily seem like a good plan
either well I think that uh he hasn't mentioned yet but his original plan was to put a shed back there so we wouldn't need these but in order to get the house removed he needed to have a place to put the stuff that's in the house th the storage containers came in play because
they're a quick solution so that's kind of put this whole project of putting up an appropriate shed on the back burner yeah it's kind of one step at a time like I did mention that I had bought the the one the last shed just to empty the
house out and literally the day after is when uh these two gentlemen showed up and said that they have to be removed because of the Foundation or they don't have a foundation there put a lot of effort into this and it's going nowhere
yeah and you know expense Step One is is get the house down um and and I have intention of putting up a a 30 by 48 shed in the back um
because um you know that would house a lot of this stuff um you know to to make it look look better um but at the same time I'm not going to spend $20,000 when you know I
don't know what's going on with anything else and that kind of thing um and the other thing I would like to bring up is um you know basically that you know being used as a commercial property um
the the property this the second property is only 50 ft wide you can hardly put a house on that I think it would be um more of a an accurate thing to to Zone that as commercial because um
I you know sell things for people and lots and wind are 50 ft wide just FYI and we can't spot Zone something a residential area we can't pick a lot and say well this is commercial yeah
um but uh the one thing and I'm not trying to sound rude um you know in that area it's surrounded by um commercial businesses I mean you've got the daycare you've got the um SI Estates you've got the uh Assisted Living behind me is a
agricultural next to me is agricultural four houses down as agricultural I mean it's it's debatable if it's really residential I mean there's just retial on the tax R that's currently yeah y
currently how many of these can containers had you moved in for the to put stuff from the house in uh one okay yep the other uh two of them have been there for 3 years as a kind of a a place
to put stuff that I'm selling for people and one of them I framed off and put a a walkthr door um I was thinking of siding it so it looked a little nicer and that's got all my kids stuff in it um
and different wagons and trucks and strollers and things like that what's with all the box trucks and trailers and uh do you mind if I look at your pictures um
so this yeah so this is a trailer um that's uh just a usable trailer um like an enclosed trailer um that's a I know what that is I'm talking about these truck that are these
are these are um storage these are storage sheds they're being used for storage sheds I did have a conversation with with uh Mr Henderson as well um you know as maybe a temporary solution to this is
to start that project to the house is to clear out the house still use the contain containers the way that he intended them to use to fill them up and then bring them to a County property at that point because out in the county you can do that um so I don't I don't
necessarily see it as a huge hurdle to still continue to use these containers the way that he intended them but to fill them up get them off that property which is in town and move them to a County property for you know cuz there's
less regulations I guess County I think that that's a really relevant Point there's there are things you can do if you live out in a a rural area that you can't do in town and you know I think for example the the tractor and
lots of attachments is is a good example of that you know most people in town don't have equipment parked in their yard um yeah there's only a handful of us but I mean
sometimes yeah yeah I'm not arguing I'm yeah just saying that uh I mean you do what you got to do to get things done sometimes and um I like it I the the way the code reads is kind of what gets me
on on the running tractors it really baffles me that a running tractor would be against um unusable Machinery or whatever however it's phrased we have neighbors that have various
Farm small tractors those kinds of things but they all keep them out in the country and every time they need them they either trailer them in use them for the day and get them back out there or they're driving them back and forth but they're not stored where everybody in
the neighborhood is looking at them all the time so it's only while they're us using them that they're there and then they go back to their home in the country okay and are not just on the lot and our ordinances have limits on the
number of vehicles you can have parked on your lot and there's there's rules about how long something can be parked even on a street you know not something not supposed to be parked on a street for more than 12 hours consecutively and I know this isn't on a street but
um I think some of that same idea comes into play that if we ask most resid it's not to have you know a couple of cars parked in their lawn then it's difficult to make an exception and say well you can have a tractor and trailers and
other things parked in your yard y I agree with Logan I mean um if you were going to fill the trailers up with the things from the house and then was your intention to haul it somewhere after that um so my immediate um intention uh
sorry I got uh just concussion issues uh my immediate attention intention sorry again um was to empty the house get rid of the house and then empty the shed and
I had intention of getting rid of the container or the um the storage uh the the one that I got from the sale at Russ's um and at least one of the other shipping containers or
storage units or whatever um I had plans on getting rid of both of them and then getting a um approximately 30X 48 36x 40 something built um to contain you
know the the different attachments and tractors and things like that trailers um I guess that was my plan I you know I'm certainly not trying to you know you know be a mess like and and and one
thing that Logan had said the first time he was out there is you know I've got a lot more stuff than everybody else but it is a lot more organized you know I do my best to to keep things orderly and clean um I guess uh so in in the interest of
keeping things moving um council do you have any wishes on this more confused now after listening to him and at the beginning of yeah and counselor I think the reason that we went this way is because um his
plans are very provisional um meaning every time we talk to him they seem to change and um that's why Logan and I had that discussion after we spoke to him the last time is that we need to start moving forward and showing the public that we are taking care of the matter
and that their concerns are being addressed um and whether Council wishes to aate or not um is completely up to you I I just want to reiterate if your neighbor had six storage
containers on their property would you be happy with that absolutely not I just to clarify a couple of things I have talked to uh my closest neighbor uh the only one that's on the property of those storage containers and she doesn't have a
problem with it um I I think it is more than just the the neighbor right yep yep no I'm just clarifying that and it's it's not six it's four um you know I just not to be nitpicky but um you know and and I
understand like I said I'm I'm trying to get things cleaned up and I have I have goals and well you know what I I've heard enough I we got to move forward here with this are you making a motion I am making
a motion um first this is a public hearing so we to CL public hearing there's another public hearing for the property of 801 North thanks for keeping me on track that's okay all right then um let's move on at this point to the
second part of the public hearing we'll actually take action on the abatement later on in the meeting okay um moving on to 5.2 The batement of the Muckle property 801 Main Street is there anybody here to speak to
that all right that's in your packet um Michael you want to give us a quick rundown on that uh this property um specifically the garage um is where we have the the largest concern um it
abuts the alleyway um we did if council members we did aate this property last year we mowed took a bunch of trees down um hauled out a lot of um old cars and such um the garage is bowing pretty hard um and we're really afraid that it's
just going to fall over um they did put a tarp over the entrance to the garage to stop rain from getting under it but you can tell it's in pretty dilapitated States
um so uh there's also some some wheat issues but our our bigger concern is to get someone else out there to look at the garage and the condition of the property and then we'll come back and uh take it down if
necessary and the order also includes the house roof yeah the house roof does have some holes and wear and tear that is a concern also yeah I've seen it when I'm not walking do anybody your wishes on this
one our motion oh that's right we can't we just if there's no one else to speak you can close the public hearing all right anyone else speaking in public hearing then we'll close the public hearing and move on to new business 6.1 is the resolution about the
library budget so the administration uh admin committee met uh to resolve some budget concerns over the library um I want to bring you back to last fall when we didn't have a library director and we were just kind of shooting from the hip
on what the library was going to take um we didn't properly probably budget the part-time and we had some inexperience on scheduling so there was some scheduling going on that was just not
necessary so what uh the admin committee is proposing is that we take some money from the book budget and from the programs budget um which are UND spent and put them into part-time wages so that we can get through the rest of the year um you will go through the budget
later this meeting but um that'll kind of save us for this year it'll be about a $110,000 variance to the budget um but it will not impact the overall spend of the library um and that's kind of our main
concern you need a motion on y so move my Kelly second um any discussion any discussion all in favor say I same sign motion
Carri all right um 6.2 Second Street utility and Street upgrade Brian is not here tonight he had some prior commitments just a few things sewer is done so it is done from Brown all the way to the Interceptor pipe uh they are
working um hopefully later this week to get to Main Street that's really what we're hoping at some point not now uh Redwood will be closed to traffic and Main Street will be the only one you'll notice on Main Street right now there's
some very large storm sewer pipes kind of blocking half the intersection they ran out of room and when they can get delivered they're delivered they're also concerned because they actually come from the East when the highway gets closed um which also got delayed just in
FYI now to the 19th not the 12th um uh so there were concerned so they were bringing that in so that they had the materials to keep going they have not worked since last Friday because of the rain so we'll keep the public apprised
when that Clos there are some additional signs coming um to get traffic detoured to Main Street but the the stone sewer pipes will not be on Main Street when they close Redwood so that it's open to the okay good um other than that things continue to move along honestly if it
would just stop raining and they could get storm sewer done um they would actually be starting to lay some road down they're that close so they they just need storm sewer done and they they could rock and roll so just an FYI there
will be two crews in town so if you see like there's RNR people everywhere there are two Crews coming to town when they can fully get the storm sewer done through Main Street thank goodness all right it just stop raining
uh moving on to 6.3 Police Department taser purchase so uh a little backstory and how started looking into this um currently we carry the x26 PS for our tasers that's uh three generations old
as far as taser goes um our tasers all of them except for one are outside of waranty at this point um so I got in contact with an axon rep uh just to see what our options
are um in that conversation um you know I learned that there has been uh a drastic change for the better as far as taser technology in the last year or so
um I was looking initially at it's called the the taser 7 um but they recently came out with the taser 10 and that's what the quote is for um the technology is vastly superior to Old
tasers um and without getting into the nitty-gritty details on it um it is it's the way of the future for law enforcement as far as tasers go um if we go down a a different Road a
little bit cheaper Road of the older Styles um we're going to run into potential problems with uh it being as effective as it should be the taser 10 kind of um makes it so we don't have to
deal with those issues in the future um really cool thing with this as well axon has recently started um their VR R technology so virtual reality incorporating with the taser and so this quote also has that in
there and that allows us to do real world style trainings in virtual reality in our training room downstairs um and it also comes with a handgun attachment and uh taser attachment so you can we can effectively
train officers without the uh cost of every single shot of about the taser uh for example this one cartridge right here um Tas this one this one C costs
$50 and to train an officer every single year each officer has to shoot two of these every single year that's a pretty substantial amount of of money that's just going into training um axon's not
at the point yet where we can qualify through VR but they are working on that um since they're in the Primitive stages um with this 5-year contract we're also getting the VR at a substantially lower cost than it's going to be 5 years from
now when they are going to have that technology did you talk about the training from the with our current ones though that training is ending correct so um right now our taser instructor is through gayer police department they
have the instructor um they don't have x26 PS they have taser 7s so frankly they're um they're doing us a solid by teaching us but they don't have to and to get that uh yearly
or not yearly I think it's every 5 year certification so um that's going to be expiring and I want to get ahead of the game before we're scrambling and trying to find pay an instructor for that this also gives us five
um vouchers to have instructors go to the class and uh teach so initially right right off the bat when you get these the x10s they have axon will send their own representative to teach me and Aon how to be the
instructors moving forward um and then we can teach on a yearly basis from that point and then using the VR hopefully in the future specifically for qualification and then certainly for yearly trainings as well just for
scenario Based training what are the differences when you're you're talking about these are they all they shoot the two wires out and all of them except for the the taser tens the taser 10 is a completely different platform but that's
not the one you're the taser 10 is the one that's on your quote okay so and so that one's it has 10 darts in the assembly I guess you say so you have up to 10 shots why I was talking about being
effective and that kind of stuff with the previous models including the ones that we have now is two darts come out when you pull the trigger two darts come out if those darts don't seed into the person's flesh the taser doesn't work um
it's completely useless essentially it's you might as well just throw the rest of it at them and that's that's it with the taser 10 you have 10 shots with them say you miss the first shot it doesn't get into them right you still have a follow-up shot eventually you hopefully
in 10 shots you can get at least two in um and at that point it's it's the the being effective it's much more effective to have those extra follow-up shots where right now if I was to use my Taser
I only got those two darts if they don't work I'm going to have to reload a new cartridge and that's the same thing with any of the older models the taser 10 does not have that problem so can you tell us about the purchase price cuz it looks awfully good on here I mean if the
full purchase price is 36,000 I I was very surprised at the number um I've had a lot of misconceptions I guess about axon being extremely expensive from what I've heard and I think they maybe were in the past but they've um come around
on especially targeting towards smaller departments that have lesser budgets so um with this it's a 5-year contract breaks down to a little over $7,200 a year um that includes you know the VR all of the training cartridges for those
5 years for all the officers um so it's not something that right like right now I had to just order $700 worth of new cartridges for these ones because we ran out um they are going to give us a credit
back we're going to send back the old cartridges um and then they're also going to buy back at $200 a piece our old um tasers as well so and it does say this in the console packet but it will come out of the fines and forfeitures
account which is usually pretty flush so sounds like a good deal they like to make a motion I make a motion to purchase the tasers second second by Wanda any
discussion any discussion all in favor say I same sign thanks Logan thank you than for doing all the homework yes okay here point four now we are on to the resolution for abatement on the Henderson
Property so we did discuss this during the uh public hearing does anyone like would like to make a motion so we can discuss I want to make a motion to move forward with the abat okay we have a motion by Jenny is
there a second is there a second to move forward with the abatement I'll second it but I I would like to extend his time to 30 days okay so we have instead of the 10 days if that's okay with you
because he is making progress Logan said he's he's doing some stuff 10 days very long yeah there's quite a bit of of things that need to be moved and absolutely there are got 30 days to pack
up the stuff get it off the property correct but okay well we can't disc you're both on on you're in agreement that's the motion yes okay now do we have discussion yes we want that house taken down I
that's your intentions with it yes I have a building permit that house and my question if we if we make him take all of this out what is he going to do with it in the meantime I mean can we allow a couple of the containers to stay there until the house is down and
then you know set a date um it's kind of hard to take a house off what's what's in the house uh there's different things that belong to people that I'm selling um there's
well there they were going to prolong it again he's got to well it's if it's 30 days it's 30 days I mean I guess I I was thinking you know right or I mean I mean what what do you have to take out of this house to put into a
storage container I mean if I was going to tear it down of house it would be empty ready to be taken down it's not empty you could probably get a semi loaded stuff okay so what's in the house I asked that question tools and just a lot of stuff from auction sales so he
used the house for storage yes okay so I mean we're just looking for a reasonable timeline there's there's a lot of stuff is 30 days it's it's not my plan I'm just saying I'm looking at it from the outside and I'm saying how do you move
all that stuff in that amount of time just want a reasonable timeline for him to 30 days is a reasonable timeline to empty the house that's I don't have my permit I don't know when the permit comes back I I don't know how long the process takes to get the
permit right but the point is but the point is to empty the house get the storage container full and get it out of there yeah yeah um I mean 30 days is that's I'm not going a lot more reasonable than pen and
I think the um the other thing with the Demolition permit so that's that also goes through Darren I assume but I am not certain that he's probably going to have to Abate for asbest if I remember correctly the roof
was fine but the isn't the siding uh the siding is I believe then Asus um so what I was told um from uh one of them certified uh lead
dis best this kind of guys um that the and this is also what I had heard from the past uh about 3 years ago is basically you get a dumpster and you line it with 7 mm or not millim 7 mil uh
thick uh plastic plastic I I apologize again um you line it with this 7 mil specific stuff and then you put it in that and you fold it over and you tape the seams and then it goes to the same
uh landfill but it's it's marked off specific for being bested okay so it would be I would probably have three or four dumpsters uh to get rid of uh some stuff in the house that
I'm just going to let go of and and demolish the house and fli the stuff in the D in in the house uh and the house demolition yeah so if we have a motion in a second to move forward with the abatement giving him 30 days to make
appropriate progress can I can I amend your motion just a little bit um so why don't you do it 30 days after the demolition permit has been approved that at least gives him maybe a little bit extra time I don't I I'll be honest I
didn't know the building permit existed um Darren and I haven't communicated about it yet normally he goes through and just looks at the condition of the building and says yeah this thing probably has led by order of the you
know you need to evade it um I think that would be appropriate if if Council feels our teams that's appropriate it's building permit number 77 and you will want to very quickly contact whoever you're getting dumpsters
from because I know scheduling wise they're not going to show up tomorrow with that so you're going to need to get that scheduled and get that delivery date for getting that on the property if you're planning to use dumpsters and
having them clear stuff out um because it usually takes a week to 10 days to even get it there that's a very good point actually what um what my plan would be is I would call them um this week uh probably tomorrow and get uh I'd
have to see how many I can fit uh in that area and I would have them drop one or two of them off right away so Jenny you made the motion add you seconded are you okay with the amending it 30 days from the time the permit is issued yeah
the demolition the demolition to take the house down okay and then about all the rest of that so I would think some of the rest of the cleanup should start immediately yeah but that shouldn't have to wait for the demolition app okay so we have motion a second Is
there further discussion on that any further discussion otherwise we will um call motion all those in favor say I I opposed motion carried all right um moving on then to 6.5
resolution 3 three abatement of the Lo property again we discussed it in a public hearing what are your wishes councel make a motion toate it second second by Jenny to evate set
property any discussion any discussion any discussion all those in favor please say I iose same sign motion carried all right moving on to the budget yay the budget you can follow along in your packet or
on a screen however you want um I just thought it would be easiest to go this way then try to figure this out um let's start on the very beginning though very so our job just so Council
remembers is basically to get our preliminary estimated certification of our Levy done by September 30th so there are some proposed dates in your packet Don I put them in here just for you uh August 19th we'll do a work s session if
you can't if you can't uh attend that's completely okay attendance isn't mandatory but um I did uh I I do plan to have the department heads we better do a quick poll who could be here on the 19th
Wanda you said you can't joh can't I I can call in but I'm and I could be here if I have to but I'm planning to be out of town so let's cancel that one then we have enough time between the September 9th meeting and
16th we should be F I think so so the August 19th is canell canell all right do we want to schedule something else before the September meeting I am gone on the 26th I'll be at the State Fair do we have to do it on a Monday
night we don't have to do it on the Monday night you can do it whatever and then Labor day is the 30th that's Labor Day weekend yes and most people will be gone about on a Wednesday um when do you leave um we leave on the 17th and we're
home on the 25th okay so if you did it the 28th or I think that the 14th the 14th doesn't work for me
28th sure I think I can do the 28th what time uh can we do 7 or what do you want to do I the only thing I have is I might be moving a kid into college but it's a boy he's going to say see you
mom he stand up on the street and cry no so what we say seven seven okay I'll send that out need to 20th 20th 20 Wednesday my hearing is I'm seriously
and then September 9th is that okay that's after Labor date um we'll do like we are tonight just a regular session with work session in between and then September 16th we'll do the same thing except we're going to meet a little bit early
um at 600 p.m. we'll do the work session and at 7 we'll go on regular Council and verify just that item for the preliminary hearing so that I can send it to the county okay that's the 16th you said yeah September
16th and then not that we're all planning ahead but November 4th will be our official truth and Taxation CER 28th was 7:00 right yes well call it 6 you can said November 4th is see yeah
November 4th will be our first meeting November and that will be truth and Taxation and that's when we final the let me dumb okay yes Michael I guess so okay oh let's get
into the fun fun the fun things so uh a few things about the budget um you know last year we cut expenses by almost 6% this year we're trying to cut expenses again because our revenue is down and the state hasn't funded some of the programs that we normally tapped into as
well well um so our operating budget that is all of the categories um we cut by quite a bit um we qu cut it by 12% we're putting that in other categories um some of that not the majority but
some of it um we're asking Council to reduce the amount of cap X that we're putting in we did raise it last year we're asking you to lower it this year to help with the levy um that will be get 11% decrease from the year year prior of
$22,000 our total um expense budget uh would be $27,000 less if we didn't um if we didn't include some other things so our revenue is down if you noticed we'll be
missing out on about $160,000 worth of Revenue this next year so some of that is Storm sewer storm sewer is now its own Enterprise fund so storm sewer will act just like our electric account just like our water account it is no longer considered a
revenue of the city so you're missing that uh from this Revenue budget that was done on based on dda's recommendation that it become a revenue um account um and properly audited and
then some of the small City assistance that we got from the state of Minnesota has basically discontinued there's also some Tiff dollarss in here that we are no longer getting so UF sorry Harland corn products Tiff is no
longer so we won't be getting that money back into a revenue stream honestly it used to be a wash but it would it used to be considered a revenue even though we paid um their taxes um when you look at the services for
Bond and Debt Service um that is the levy that we should be paying out of the eneral obligation fund so we have split all of the bond payments up between its respective um Services between electric
water sewer and storm and then our general obligation so General obligation would include by two minutes ground um General obligation would be things like sidewalks and so we took that from all the bonds that we have including Second Street and that is the
$170,000 that we pay every single year from uh eighth Street's bond from all the improvements that we've done over there that's how much it costs us as a general obligation and this includes the Second
Street this includes Second Street yep so uh obviously that's a little bit different than what we've normally done so you might ask yourself where was this $170,000 before it was getting paid for by our Enterprise funds so our total Levy right now um as staff
is proposing is a 14% Levy or $122,000 more than the year before I am going to skip all the way to the council section um you guys have this General government one in your spreadsheet if you ever wonder what that is that's literally just all the general
government go accounts allinone we just didn't split them out to by department and did it that way so we can total things a lot easier that's easier to bring it into the system it is also a Michael proof so that he can't touch formulas yeah she locked it down she locked it down from me good to have
somebody watch dogging it is so council's budget looks um very similar I would say to the year before your giant wages and salaries stays the exact same no raises for Dawn
um we do um have some General Public Notices that we're going to continue doing honestly some of those are required by state government you know we have to give our budget we have to um do public hearing notices those types of things um so that budget will stay
primarily the same which page are you on for our reference oh boy I'm not fing and at the top you guys will notice that there are titles on the top that say Council oh they're there um so I'm
on page 52 two 52 53 there we go went right by that Su there it is um so when you look at the city clerk budget this looks a lot different and um there's a lot of
reasons why um we got we received our audit back from um our auditing firm and our Enterprise funds lo and behold are really flush so what we're proposing is that we're
going to move some wages off the general obligation um of the city and put them towards Enterprise funds so Heather primarily do does and deals with utilities so you'll notice in
line 410011 on page 53 that's going from an annual budget of $95,000 of wages that is all getting shifted between Enterprise funds so water sewer um electric and storm so those
accounts will now start picking up some of that $95,000 do you want to talk about that last year yes okay but until we got the audit we couldn't for say okay our accounting software made it much easier to make sure that water was going into
water electric was going into electric and that when they audited it was actually ual it was very concrete um for instance we we knew for a fact that electric was now losing $77,000 a year it seemed very unlikely um turns out we made 300 and some
thousand on electric which barely scratches the surface on catbacks to tell you the truth but it's enough to help with some of the wage Levy that we have problems with um we are still taking some employer paid health and taxes out of
the go funds um to help pay for those technology and service agreements um again that is a combination between our um Financial system Tech unlimited and some
of our server operations Professional Services um that is a wide variety of people but um Tech unlimited is in there again and so are like the way we clean our bathroom CEST who does our
rugs and bathroom cleaning um comes out of there as well telephone RS fiber is not getting any cheaper um we raise this because this is what we've been actually spending the last 3
years um travel expenses we did up that a little bit um as you'll notice we haven't used a ton of that this year but we will be traveling a little a little bit more upcoming to conferences office equipment rentals and
advertisements that kind of stuff we put under Professional Services so we zeroed those accounts out miscellaneous we just kept a miscellaneous we haven't spent any money this year dues and subscriptions um Heather remind me they all move to
Professional Services yeah so where we used to have a spend of $25,000 a year we're combined that with Professional Services um we haven't had any Capital outlay expenses no furnituring we
basically have used all of these Furnishing and things and we put them under small tools and supplies and computer supplies I'm going to pause you for a second one thing that we're really looking at doing as you can tell from
that General government sheet there are millions of account numbers that don't get used there's in some of the categories you'll see there's like six different repair and structure repair or like three different small tools instead of this one's for a
building this one's for a toilet this one's for the wall this one's for yeah it's kind of redundant yeah and it has helped honestly control expenses it has by a lot cuz we monitor One account now
instead of 16 any questions on city clerk um elections we didn't budget anything um on page 54 U we haven't budget anything we don't plan to have a special election
please um auditing services so this is um Carlson SV this is who audits us um we assume their services will be about $20,000 next year um to do our yearly audit um the actual is not actual in here yet
I don't think I updated this from when they just sent us the remainder of our bill assessing um so the county oh Sam's not here anymore the county does charge us for assessments um when they come through and assess the properties to get our tax
lby um that cost was about $114,000 and then we have some additional assessment fees uh generally they're for commercial buildings so like every time Heartland corn products or DFA does a
project a defin assessor that is not Sam comes out with Laura comes out and she assesses the commercial buildings and then they Char us for that so we'll spend about $116,000 on assessments from
the that's p 55 um 56 uh has our attorney fees so this has changed significantly since we switched attorneys um we were spending upwards between 20 sorry 30 to $40,000
every year um currently um we are at about $166,000 I think I just I just looked at that update um we're about $16,000 into our $40,000 budget in it's August um so we're going to save a significant amount by switching attorneys um that incord includes his
court fees it includes his counseling fees um he's Johnny on the spot when I call him or when Logan calls him we've been pretty happy with his Legal Services AB but that's about half of what the budget was last year Planning and Zoning um you know
this one is always hit or miss I will tell you that we do plan to have projects in 25 when it comes to building permits so where this category gets um where this category kind of balloons is
when Heartland corn products or DFA do a commercial industrial buildout um these permits cost Darren quite a bit of money to go to the state and that's where those professional service fees really come into play um do we make some of that up
yes we do we make Revenue off building permits to offset the cost of hiring a professional person that does our code enforcement but last year he not Daren the permits themselves for Professional Services cost us about
$43,000 I would say 18 to 20,000 of that is just harling corn products when they did their expansion in the rail line so if you notice our actual versus budget this year we assumed Heartland corn products and they just P pulled a
permit so this could go multiple ways that permit could not get paid until 2025 or it could drop on us this year and we have to pay Darren then so it looks like we way over
budgeted I have reached out to DFA and Harland and neither of them have projects indefinitely for 2025 but that doesn't mean that's not going to happen so we felt comfortable at 40,000 and then if we don't spend it
good but that's where that number is coming from um so Darren has to pay fees and permitting fees to the state of Minnesota especially with industrial and then he passed that cost on to us and then we in turn pick up some of that
cost in a revenue account Municipal um page 58 for those following along um you know a lot of this is electric utility uh we are guessing um that our new windows will
help but we're not counting on it um we've already spent about $12,000 in electric where it gets really expensive is that November October December time frame when our when our Energy bill for this building really
skyrockets um will new windows help I don't know because it was a really mild winter with not a lot of wind you get a 30 mph wind and it's really cold I don't know what the building is capable of now so we left it uh at 25,000 we we did cut
it $110,000 from the year before based on Trend um but I wouldn't feel comfortable going below that because it gets pretty expensive to heat this building there's some most most miscellaneous categories in there that we probably
could cut you know our operating supplies I will say this um probably could go down but again if we we just ordered paper for utilities which will come out of our utility
account but you know the envelopes and paper that we decided not to Source um which by the way we have saved thousands of dollars on but by doing it ourselves um we just ordered a new round of them they lasted us about a year and
we doubled the order so it lasts Us 2 years and it's cheaper per unit um property insurance that is a pretty concrete number it'll cost us about $14,000 am I boring you is that you're boring
them um police so police um I don't know why that's not staying up so police budgets plus car allowance um you know it's every year it seems to go up um this year we're budgeting
full-time employees at 375 um non-comparable just a reminder to council 2022 was a non-comparable year actual um we didn't have full staff or full officers um we had just hired Logan I think in
May April may may may Yeah we actually pay him we do pay him once in a while um you'll notice that the part-time employees budget is really high I don't think it needs to be that
high I think if we adjusted that we would be safe um but we know that we're going to have some turnover um um we know that Reed is looking for other employment so that might change some of our outlook on
part-time employment which we could code them fulltime if we really wanted to but that is a category that we could definitely cut I think we'd be safe um employer play paid Health um I forgot to mention that our employee paid
to health is up 20% this year our work comp insurance is up 23% and our liability insurance because we added our substation which was not currently insured went up about $16,000
a year which if you look at a levy that's about 2% of our Levy that's where a lot of this is coming from is insurance work comp insurance and our actual liability insurance um so yeah we can go line by line in the future but just so you know
we the rest of the police budget for like Professional Services we tried to condense some of them so it looks like we're ballooning the budget on Professional Services but we actually um condensed some of those categories and made it a little bit easier to read and
it's easier to manage we did um training we did up travel expenses and training um we did up because we'll have new officers obviously Nick is at training right now um his is fully paid for by the state of
Minnesota for Dr uh but we still have to pay for hotel and mileage and meals that type of thing that one was actually just redistributed the money came from the training category and went down to expenses okay our travel expenses um you know small tools and
equipment and repair we we just we left that at 1,500 for the year we felt it was appropriate um but yeah the police budget is the one that Ines probably the
most SRO um on page 61 we did not plan for an SRO and really um those discussions have gone to gone nowhere um until we get a non- interim superintendent this will probably be
blank it is I would I I'm not speaking for the other administrators or city council members of other towns but unless the school district ponies up and pays for the entire thing I don't think anyone is interested it's
um it's a it's a big burden especially if they choose our police force to drive over their every day to make sure that it continually is staffed um you know we have turnover just like everyone else and when that person doesn't show up to work and they leave we have to find out
what that plan is what's the plan b so um I don't think any of our police departments right now are positioned well to say yes we're going to have the SRO and yes we want to bring it back and yes we're just going to put it on our budget
um that is something the school district really needs to consider and think about so if there's not an SRO program it's the new school building is in given does given have to respond resp and it's going to become a considerable burden
for that small Police Department a lot for a small Police [Music] Department right streets civil defense should be in there too I don't know why that one didn't print oh yeah there it is um civil
defense this is just our warning tornado sirens we have we have a yearly inspection that comes every year it's about 6 to 800 bucks kind of depends on what they have to do that's about it that's all okay
streets uh you know this is one of those categories that we did reduce um the burden on the on the levy and put it towards um Enterprise but we obviously work on the streets but some of that um
between the county and the $15,000 that we have budgeted it's it makes up for what we were charging so the county does pay us about $116,000 a year to maintain the county Casas in town um you know
between that and street sweeping it's about $30,000 a year is what Staffing wise we spend on streets um we're still taking out health and Medicare and life out of this fund
for the go obligation again if Council wishes in the future to get the levy below we could put that burden on the Enterprise funds um noting that it would decrease the amount of money that we have to pay for future
projects um streets materials and maintenance uh which is line 4310 224 it's a 224 line um we did up that a little bit so we do plan to have
Grant Street corrected um we are kind of waiting on the detours to stop and then we'll do it so when Second Street gets paved um this next spring we do plan to
take significant amount of cuts cement down and then we'll do an actual seal coating on Grant Street so that's where that $65,000 is partial part of which one's Grand Street uh the one the last one oh
yeah thank for don't make one more detour I'm not making one more detour I don't want that many phone calls no um Professional Services uh we did leave that $88,000 in there um there
are things that we do for streets if we have to get something fixed you know we do take it to a local repair but those things do happen not going would they haven't yet we took all engineering Fe fees out of streets and I will tell you
why so we did get back from indot that they are not going to go ahead with the full reconstruction in the city limits for 2029 um so we don't need to start engineering now I would suggest to council we cool it for a couple years
and then in 27 maybe 28 we engineer Nicolet and Renville to connect um so that's what my recommendation is so I don't think there'll be much engineering going on in streets so I took all of it out um this year for Second Street after
the bond passed we haven't used anything so that'll be a cost savings at the end of the year so if we need to we can carry some of that over but I I just don't think there's going to be a full need to do any engineering um the rest of it is repairs on equipment and maintenance um there
was some significant repairs done um this year I I don't foresee that happening again hopefully any questions on streets there was some big changes on that
one snow removal okay so it looks like we're doing really well on snow removal but I will tell you you never know what November and December are going to bring um right now it's it's way under bu you know we budgeted $38,000 we've only spent
17 uh I don't know what will happen uh yeah the trend is not so we'll see I do recommend to council over the budget um you know you could cut wages out of this a little bit um you our actual is
only $3,000 but the year before it was 10 the year before that was eight and I think in 21 it was around 11 so we could cut that one that could be a cost Savings in the future but again snow is always
hard uh street sweeping uh you know honestly they got it repaired last year um we did put some additional repairs in there because there's a vacuum problem with one of the components on the street sweeper right now I just told them to
deal with it but we'll fix it next year um so that budget could go down a little bit but note that the repair cost will probably be about $2,500 Parks Parks is significantly different so uh the wage line in Parks
has completely disappeared um comparatively last year uh Heather and I did that for a couple reasons number one it is a small amount and they deal with a lot of utilities they do abatements they have stepped up so we put all of
their wage under utilities um and that it was a cost Savings of about $2,000 to the general budget uh we are still suggesting um for operating supplies of motor fuel um to go
up and the reason for that is because almost every single year we have we have spent it property insurance uh remained about the same about $112,000 even though we had two claims um which is good buildings maintenance and repairs we probably will have to paint next year
again we do have some leftover paint but we'll probably have to get some new paint paint brushes that kind of stuff and Guster them up um it's a cost savings to the general budget um budget to budget not actual the budget um of about
$220,000 trees my favorite category so trees uh this is for removal and planting I did set the budget at $15,000 uh for 2025 after the increased wind that we had last week I think now everyone
understands the Aging Boulevard trees have got to come down or else they're going to come down on your house which is going to happen sooner or later to someone um so we we do I would say we have six requests now queued up for next
year so that money will go back but go by pretty fast what does it cost to take a tree down just depends on the tree what is it it's by size 2,000 it's about a 2,000 sometimes sell iner if it's a really small one um you know Alleyway
trees you know they get those spindly feral trees that grow wherever they want those are pretty easy he charges us like 600 to take them down shred them and get rid of them Library okay so the library um
has ballooned um this is because Michelle's going to go over there to the library um we had some wage problems um and we are proposing that uh we increase the full-time and the part-time wages in the library to keep
it running we did take things out of programs we did take things out of the book budget don't glare at me Julie I just felt it um to try to offset some of those costs um the the real full cost of
running a library is getting pretty expensive um including health insurance which is almost $40,000 um the library we can explore at another work session and maybe we can break it out and talk more about it the library is my probably my biggest concern along
with police um we did skimp and save I mean again we down 14% in expenses and that's a large majority of that is Wages going over to um the Enterprise
funds um Michelle has been working three out of the five days in the library for programming and helping the public so what's with the c reimbursement yeah so they do pay a cost
of I don't know where that is on here 75,000 yep so they they give us next year they're supposed to give us $882,000 they tried to turn that but I think yeah all right y so that comes from the state it's they thought they
were going to just it's state allocations all right yeah that they give us for running the library and we can break Library out more if we need to uh the Eda um just so you know the Eda
is requesting less money this year um their facade program although has been really well received by the the business Community um they're probably going to have leftover uh that they can roll over to the next year so they're going from
110 um to asking for about 60,000 that is going to go to their facade Grant and GAP payments just so you guys know that is loans it needs a new name we'll rename it uh that's the loan category I to
rep uh fire um any questions about Eda sorry um fire uh has remains steady uh we're going from a budget of 56,000 to 56,000 um Adam didn't really request to
require any additional funds ambulance um we so ambulance is kind of a weird one so there's different Revenue sources that we get from different places one of those is runs so when they go out to an ambulance call
we we charge people and then they pay us back sometimes sometimes they don't just kind of depends and then the other um item that uh we're getting in this year why did we put $62,000 worth of
contributions that's that one time yes thank you from the state of Minnesota state um but the other thing that we're we'll also be getting this year is um the townships are paying
their fair share um so they are getting getting charged $65 per section that we cover um so among other things ambulance not anything to do with Ed but
the supplies for ambulance has exploded the cost of oxygen insulin everything in that field and in our rigs is extremely expensive um not only that but they're at an all-time high for runs and so
think about motor fuel going out um 55% of the runs are in Wind Through up 45% are outside out of the city limits so 45% of the time they're going more than 2 miles and then they're going somewhere else right either a hospital or the Twin
Cities or wherever they're transporting them so those costs are just getting increasingly more expensive um I will tell you that other municipalities who have contracts with uh outside services like
Ridge viw or Alina um are seing triple digit six digigit increases like 120 $140,000 extra this year versus last year so um this budget will be really
interesting to watch the actual at the end of the year actual um spend right now is only 18,000 but that's not updated um it it'll be significantly more than that uh when you include wages every time they go out they we know we
have to pay people so um it'll be really interesting I'm I'm dying to know what it ends up at because the the actual um cost of doing business for ambulance has has gotten very expensive what what is this on the side
rge view increase billing so Ridge View actually charges more for um ambulance interconnect fees have gone up they double them you like inter intercepts interconnection it's
not a highway and if we if we use gayer or Arlington for The Intercept that's Ridge View the in Al's increasing theirs too yeah but Al significantly less money it is Alina is usually generally they're less
expensive we do Bill that extra whether it gets paid or not it's yeah it's a lot of times it's Medicare A lot of the times it's Medicare and that problem as you may remember from other previous conversations um is on a it's on the
federal highlight list for this next legislative session because it has become a burden that's why the state is giving us $62,000 extra is because they realize that they we've gotten shorted from Medicare and Medicaid so often now we're going to get into
Enterprise funds which are my favorite category ever so on page 72 we have water so um water did really well um as an Enterprise fund last year you're going to notice
um a few things to water um we as a municipality generally don't like to budget water um profit very high meaning the cost of water cuz it fluctuates really
really heavily in this town every time harling corn products our DFA reduces the water amount that significantly impacts our budget um but what we're trying to do is make sure that our Enterprise funds
expenses are in line so I would I would ignore the water sales but that is the least of our concern even in electric right we know that we're going to make more money um especially now that we have some of the formulas fix figured
out um what I want you to realize is that the full-time regular employees is going from 102 budget to 117 so those are those dispersements coming from all those other categories into your Enterprise
funds um end of the year budget for water they're so long um is we plan to spend around $100,000 more than the year prior because it'll wash
out when it comes to sewer um you know the same thing uh sewer wages are going to be expensive and the one thing that you'll notice on all of them they now have the debt principal service um
amounts meaning that's our bond payment so Water and Sewer all have Bond payments that they're supposed to be making this one now we physically have it in the budget and we're budgeting for that so um sewer is uh at
$242,000 that includes Second Street um full-time employees for this one significantly goes up it almost doubles from year-over-year um other than that I don't have a lot for sewer uh we did budget um some
repairs um but we we haven't budgeted a ton so we actually start making the payments on Second Street in 25 in 25 y rubbish is technically not an Enterprise fund but we treat it like one
because we do make um we do make money off of it um we didn't and we are not proposing um an increase to rubbage at this time we have not gotten rates back from gayer sanitation or the main trash
facility if that does happen um we'll have to analyze but every year we've made okay money um on rubbish but in that I would also like to
say that we spend about $8 to $10,000 now doing fall and spring cleanup which I think the residents have enjoyed um this year it's in September the same day as the garage sales so when people are done garage sailing they don't need their stuff we'll have a giant dumpster
by the Department right um so electric uh made around $200,000 that includes them paying their um all their expenses so the wage line for electric is going to look a lot
different that's the 101 line um they almost double on the wage line so that includes all the summer help it includes our full-time employees um but again that is to lessen the blow of the actual General obligation debt
and I would say that electric can handle it electric also doesn't pay bonds yeah that's why we electric Bond that's why percentage wise we we put it towards electric and not the rest of them electric interesting enough has
probably the most in its savings as well Storm so storm is red because it's the new guy on the Block um with council's approval of the rate structure that we have identified through our financial advisor uh will have storm sewer sales
sales I don't know if you really call them that an income of about $100,000 um their debt principal is $229 that means we have a gap of about $131,000 so we still have a lot of work to do when it comes to storm sewer we're
not there yet and that's why it's red rates um I included this in your email but uh also um just so that we can go through it um I we tried to give you an example of a home that has two people in it which is pretty common in winup
between their 2024 Bill and their 2025 bill and the proposed rates increases so the 2024 rate for electric is 01211 our uh proposed rate change would be .125 54 for
residential we would eliminate the electric base rate of $5 for water um we go from 0295 per gallon to 0035 per gallon and again that is still much below almost
anyone around us um the water base fee would go from $12 to $15 and that $15 would cover all of the bond payment for that year that's how we based all of our base rates that pays for the bond
payment so what you have for the increase in the water rate is is wages and um benefits sewer charges um we're going up 210 of a cent so 06 to 8 the base sewer um base charge is going
from 1350 to 1539 again 1539 covers our actual debt services on the sewer account storm um again I would highlight this as red we're not right there yet
right now we charge $810 this is where it's going to go to 1853 I want to remind Council that that suggestion was made in 2015 and we didn't move it and so what really happened in those situations is the
general obligation Bond was paying the storm sewers debt obligation so we're taking that out of the goo and putting it on into its own Municipal account so anyway the 2024 bill on normal usage for a twers house
is about $164.4 with the proposed changes that same usage would go to up would go up or increase to 1843 or a little under $20 a month what this solidifies is we are paying
our debt obligation with our base fees and we're increasing the rates to continue to pay um employees and the rest of the the debt obligation for those accounts you might ask yourself um what are we going to do with storm we uh
we're still analyzing storm um storm is probably the most significant cost any project it was in 2015 when they did um igh Street uh that storm probably should have been about $20 per household at
that time because it is it is much like Second Street it has a an enormous storm sewer system and it it is a Subway tunnel of 6 ft it's 72 in on that as well so um any wishes from Council with the
budget uh anything that you want us to look at um in depth more at the the next work sessions no my thought on the rates it's it is so difficult to say oh we have to
raise rates but like Michael said we talked about this in 2015 I was new on the council and we kept kicking it down the road and if we had just done some small incremental things then we wouldn't have this large increase looking at us now
and as uncomfortable as it is I don't think we can kick it down the road any further because that's just going to create yeah it's going to create more issues in the future and we're still below um so in 201 uh
17 the city did a rate study and we're still below the rate study when it comes to rates for water and um for electric so um I think as long as council is comfortable with you know them
making the minimum am of Debt Service payments and to ensure that we're covering our costs with the funds I think that's where we can go right now that's I think one giant leap for the city and I think the reason that we're so under on storm is cuz we didn't want
to hit the citizens quite as bad because our recommendation that we got from DDA was like $24 yeah so we were trying to do it in increments all right any budget suggestions any categories that you want to look at
during the work sessions I think we have to have some conversations about the library but I'll probably come visit you about that before the before the next budget session okay employes
hey what's that please yeah I and I think you know police budgets across the state have have really um you know to have a police department is increasingly more expensive Personnel wise and Equipment
wise um and what we're seeing across the state is the cities will go with the county Jenny close your ears uh the city will go with the county and then that County later on just starts hiking up the fees uh I mean it happens over and over again you go to
you go to Carver County and go ask those towns and they're like man we wish we would have never got rid of our Police Department because it's costing us $400,000 now just to have Comey coverage well we don't want to get Washington is a same yeah still water
and yeah still water yep yeah so it's this double-edged sword yes the immediate is hey we're reducing in our budget and then 2 years swing oh while we're at the exact same amount
that we were when we started or more yeah and do they really get paid what they deserve I mean you think about what they do for for us they really get paid what they deserve so library and police is what I have anything else you don't want
to know to off for you guys I'm sure there's plenty for discussion but yeah okay well we'll start there and then we'll go from there um does council have any guidance for Heather or ey on the the amount of Levy
that we're comfortable with this would be our preliminary I mean I know in my brain there's some things that I think we can definitely cut or look at I would like to say this under 10% I think that that's doable I would caution there are some categories that I
would say we have to be really careful especially that street category that is the easiest category to cut but it's also the one where like if we don't start moving making some movements if we're not going to fully reconstruct every Street in the city I mean we have to do something with Grant well we can't
continue to cut our way yeah to to uh no increases I mean we've had increases yeah yeah we have to offset them somehow and I think that you'll see the cities around us too will have pretty large increases especially when you have the
increases in things like Insurance you that's what I'm saying there's no control right okay good thank you thanks for sitting through that good job Ed okay sitting through it or what yeah where we at
committees uh Michael what else you got yeah I I don't um have a a ton uh for Council updates other than we've been working on the budget um we've been working on some new businesses that are in town and um we've been working really
hard on rev with the southern Minnesota initiative Foundation I don't know if you guys have been up aate on that but the tailor grants are now hitting out and there's just they're throwing money everywhere so we are applying to everything will we get it
all no but gosh we're going to try so what about the grant for the water that one was denied by the D and so was the little park no what was the other city that got denied and there
Island Bird Island got denied Henderson got denied they got it the next year they got a smaller portion the next year so the DNR um after review said well maybe if you only asked for 30,000 they would have considered it oh so smaller
chunks we'll try next year great anything else on Ed or anything no okay fire nothing Library um we met the the programs for
Farm City FunFest uh the Raptor Center and the musical program and the bike raffle or giveaway thing were very successful um they were in the parade uh lizards at the library last week seemed to be
popular um and the summer programming continues between the authors they've had coming cookie decorating crage uh watercolor painting whatever there's quite a variety of things happening they are um Emily does have a new job so
staff changes there and they're scrambling a little bit to to cover hours and um things with that shifting around to do that but uh she was like the activities person but that was part of where the overlap issue was so it's a
good thing and she's also very happy with her new position so it wasn't a controversial thing for her to do that um and then uh they're looking at the grants that we get um we have one
coming up that we need to do in October November and they're to use that before the end of the year and um they're looking at probably something to do with mental health and um uh CPR and some other kinds of things
that might be able to be uh different kinds of things happening like kind of like the night they did the garden thing where they had more than one thing going on so they're looking for some speakers and some activities for that good I just got to say nice job on the
story time with EMS Logan I heard I heard very good things about that and it was really nice I don't know if you all knew that the it was raining that day they did was supposed to be and they you know took the ambulances in the fire trucks to the daycares which was
fantastic way to go great PR did you do did you do Sam the stop sign again oh of course my they were perfect he's practiced that one mem he's got he's got to memorize it so he doesn't have to learn new
words yeah that was really really well received um Public Works the only thing uh that I think Troy would probably say is I think they have most of the sticks and branches picked up thank you thank you thank yeah they're starting to uh
Street sweep now um they were out today the other thing is is the project um if you go through wi through up right now on Fourth Street Highway 19 the lights are sometimes on sometimes they not so we did order new LED lamps we were
waiting for Highway 19 to be shut down to do that project but we're kind of sick of waiting so Troy might start working on that sooner rather than later it's really dark on Fourth Street or Highway 19 going through town and especially with all the construction we
want to get that fixed some of the wires are just shorted out they were never put in conduit so we we're working through some of those issues but mindat knows about it but it's not their problem so we'll work through that oh wonderful okay Planning
Commission um they are going to meet I believe in 2 weeks so they haven't met yet okay we are we are you are it's going to be so much fun I'm waiting for our attorney RS fiber is not we have a meeting at the end of the month I'll let
you know how that goes utilities I don't have anything ambulance times up H so uh I guess the biggest thing that happen you guys probably saw in the
newspaper we got a donation from central region Co-op they uh give uh Public Safety or ambulance services in their territory uh donations about every other year um we've gotten it I think the last four or five times
I've done it so um Michael's working on another Grant uh application um to uh put towards a piece of equipment that we'd like to have an our backup rig so it would be more it
would be in line with what the main rig has so um other than that call volume uh continues um not as bad as it has been or as busy as it has been knock on wood that's not
really what about any new Curts um cuz Ela has the free class coming up here yep so Ela has a free class coming up we're in uh talks with u Ridgewater um about having a class in
one through now we need 10 students I think we have two have said they want to um Sam has really taken recruiting to heart and she's out there and she's talking to people and trying to get
people to uh take the class so um the state has a paramedic Grant right now that uh we have one person that is on our uh Reserve crew that's interested in doing that and uh hopefully if
she does go through that she'll actually moved to town and inste of Fairfax so things are going well um keep recruiting Because uh say it again
yeah yeah yeah and I don't know Michael if you want to share a little bit from that conference call you had or the emsrb conference call yeah so
um so right now the territories how ambulances ambulance in the communities function uh will change January of 25 um so they're getting rid of the board completely and they're going to a
commission apppp appointed position just like deed Public Works and so um the governor will appoint that person they will have a review board I would assume it's doctors and paramedics and that type of thing um
but they'll be the ones that ultimately decide um you know can you expand your territory you need to have these types of licenses hey you need to stop operating that way uh we would assume that we're going to
start seeing more State regulation with this it'll be easier for them to pass right now when they're governed by a board there's rural representation right and they understand our conditions and they understand what's going on out here um they know that we're not all going to
be ALS and it's just going to change um significantly I think and you know that's why um when we're looking at building a new fire and ambulance Barn we're looking at other states we're
looking at Illinois who's already passed some of these regulations OSHA standards which are extreme I mean daily checklists monthly checklists and they have to be filled out um and it's not that we don't check our equipment it's just that we don't do
it we probably don't do it daily right and so um we'll see what this brings but there wasn't a lot of uh happy faces on the call uh because the commissioner will basically have
ultimate Authority so um if just for instance if they feel like one ambulance service is not doing very well they'll just pull their license there'll be no review board they'll have authority to do whatever they want so
it'll change it'll change the way rural ambulance is functioning what about like if R viw has sker and see will they have control over that too I would assume that the it is going to be the commissioner's goal to
increase the amount of area that ridg viw and Alina cover because for them and in their mind it's a professional service that always has coverage that uh is more responsive to their regulations meaning the companies are more
responsible because they get fines it's really harder to find a city volunteer team unless you really 25 miles from right where theend is coming from so it it's it'll it'll change and I'm sure we'll here updates come March and April
during the legislative session okay Logan you got anything for us [Music] things uh Mikel touch on a little bit earlier but uh officer ien is uh currently at Dr school right now last
week and then this week um so we're pretty excited to have another Dr part of our community um where is he doing a train it's in mountains view and then in early September he'll
fly out to Philadelphia for certification get that done so um National L out tomorrow hopefully see some of you guys out there uh we're going to be rolling up some hot dogs and
whatnot so uh excited about that um you going to be on the dog T again um in the dunk tank no uh we decided no dunk tank there were too many injuries last year uh across the board with uh cuts and
bruises and everything so uh xn that but you know it's going to be I think kind of fun this year cuz we're going to have all multiple departments working together and making it fun for the whole community so um Aaron is working her tail off with
ordinances uh give her a shout out it's a absolutely thankless job and uh she if we didn't have someone with that amount of attention to detail um we wouldn't have the progress
that we had so um lots of kudos to her for that and um it just helps out the efficiency across the board and and we've seen some drastic change which is really nice so good keep it up than that
it's all got okay thank you C commission um yeah we haven't met for three months okay Park committee what's that nothing um we met and
basically needed to do some prioritizing Ed would you say about what our our goals are for timeline and everybody agreed that the water park was
the first priority bathrooms and park playground equipment and things like that will be the next phase um with that we're looking at some other vendors for the water park to compare prices to see
if we can get a better deal than what we've been given so far for a bid um I know Katie and um um we're working on letters to the organizations and businesses asking for donations and
those went out um and we're continuing fundraising efforts I know they're looking at some activities for the fall here now um with things and continuing to
um Express that even if um we get the water park there will still be needs after that so this is going to be an on going project and that's where we're at good okay do we have anything
else make a motion toour by a second Kelly Paper say hi hi hi both same sign we are