Okay, let's call the April 28th, 2025 uh council meeting to order. To the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for it stands, one nation under God, indivisible and justice for all. Make a motion to approve tonight's agenda. Second. Have a motion and a second to approve the agenda. All those in favor? I opposed. Unheard. That passes. Can I bring something up? Aren't weren't we supposed to change the other to add the fire department? Are we supposed to do that now? That can be brought up under new business. Uh Mr. Luke wants to bring it up in a staff report. We, Mr. Mayor, we can bring that up under other number nine. Okay. Thank you. Okay. Uh, presentations. No county. Good evening, mayor, council members. My name is Scott Wickland and I a sergeant in the patrol division. March had a total of 371 calls for service. Deputies handled three thefts, two burglaries, and two damaged property reports. Uh deputies made a total of 34 arrests uh for miscellaneous offenses, 242 traffic stops resulting in 43 traffic citations. Um some notable calls that are deputies made. First one on March 1st at 9:54 p.m. Deputy Patrick stopped the vehicle near the area of Viking Boulevard Northeast and East Bethl Boulevard for a driving conduct. Vehicles also called in earlier by a concerned citizen who believed the driver might be impaired. While speaking with the driver, the deputy noticed signs of impairment consistent with the consumption of alcohol. A driver admitted consuming one beer before leaving work. Deputy Petridge had the driver step out, perform SFSTs or the fuel spory test which he ultimately did and failed. The driver refused the PBT and was subsequently arrested. He was transported to ACSO where he provided the breath test which resulted in a BAC of 0.20, much more than one beer. Uh, the driver was transported to jail and booked on thirdderee DWI. On March 7th, 2025 at 9:49 p.m., Deputy Graham stopped the vehicle on Highway 65 near Sims Road for an equipment violation. Deputy Graham spoke to the driver who had no identification or registration on the vehicle. The deputy collected the driver's name and date of birth, began running checks on the driver and the vehicle. Upon running the driver, Deputy Grahams noted that the driver didn't look anything like the picture of the person who he said he was. Deputy Grahams later learned the correct identity of the driver learned that he identified himself as his brother because his license was revoked. Uh deputies arrested him and transported to jail where he's booked on gross misdemeanor false information. On March 14th at 1:17 a.m., Deputy Martinez stopped a vehicle near 189th in Buchanan Street uh for suspicious activity and a moving violation. While speaking with the driver, Deputy Martinez recognized both occupants from prior contacts and believed that neither had a valid driver's license. Deputy Martinez ran checks on both drivers or both individuals to confirm that the occupants did not have valid driver's licenses. Uh, Deputy Martinez decided to tow the vehicle and began an inventory of the interior of the vehicle prior to towing it. Inside the vehicle, Deputy Martinez located a scale, several baggies. In one of the baggies, he located a white powdery substance that field tested positive positive for the presence of cocaine. He also located other baggies that contained a similar substance that tested positive for the presence of methamphetamine. A gun, $1,600 in cash, was also recovered. Uh, the occupant was arrested and transported to jail. The total weight of their narcotic seized was 4.31 pounds. On March 20th at 9:00 p.m., Deputy Forest stopped a vehicle near 229th in Durant. After running a plate, he learned that the registered owner had a probation warrant issued by the US Marshall Service uh for possession of dangerous drugs. Deputy Forest contacted the driver who matched a description of the mail with the warrant. He advised the male he was under arrest and took him into custody for the act of warrant. During the search of the arresty's pockets, 10 grams of a white powdery substance that later tested positive for methamphetamine was located. Several other drug related items were recovered from inside the vehicle and replaced the evidence. The male was arrested and transported to jail and booked on the active warrant and thirdderee possession of a controlled substance. We responded to 10 vehicle crashes last month, which was significantly down from the past months. Uh with the warm weather fast approaching, we anticipate we will see more vehicular traffic on the roadways. So everyone buckle up. Uh stand to the speed limit limit and call 911 to report any egregious driving conduct. So on the the drug stop, I'm assuming 4.31 pounds is uh a lot of drugs. That's a significant amount. Yes. It's much more than um a normal traffic stop. That's very rare. Or you might have a couple baggies of something. And so 4.31 pounds is a good score. Yeah, usually it's 4.31 grams. Uh this one is pounds, which is Yeah, it's a rare rare stop and a good job of the deputies who are always out working and trying to find this kind of stuff, get it out of the city. Good. Is there a dollar value on that? What's that? Is there a dollar value on that? Uh don't know. tests haven't come in. So, a lot of that had to do with like fentanyl pills on that one. There was also like that found in the car. So, it it was a large I had to look at the report to make sure all the weights were right when I read this and I had to double check to make sure there wasn't a typo and there was not a typo. Oh, good job. Any other questions from the public or anything? We appreciate you. We appreciate you. All right. Thank you, sir. All right. Thank you. Fire report. Mayor, city council. Good evening. My name is Jerry Strike. I'm assistant administering the fire department. Uh so far in April, we've had 58 incidents. We've had three daytime structure fires. The first daytime structure fire was involving a recreational fire that was left unattended overnight. the wind swept up, burnt their grass to their very nice pull barn and burnt it down, lost everything inside it. The next one was a chicken coupe fire, which was a larger chipper uh chicken coupe fire and one recently we had on the island at station 3. We had a cabin fire there. Um the chicken coupe fire was caused by a heating lamp. If you have chickens, I've been in the business almost 37 years now. I can't tell you how many times the cause of a chicken coupe fire is a heating lamp. So, do everything you can to make sure that that heating lamp is secure and that there is a 3-foot distance from any combustible. Uh, and make sure your chicken coupe is away from your primary residence because if that starts on fire, so too will your primary residence. Uh recently the the cabin fire on the lake uh was caused by a space heater that was uh underneath a kitchen table. They set their clothes on top of a chair which fell onto the space heater and after a period of time we ended up having a a structure fire. We've uh assisted with two structure fires. It isn't uncommon for our fire department to assist other agencies primarily with water because a lot of the communities don't have hydrants. When they don't have hydrants, we bring them a portable hydrant on wheels. We call it a tender and we get a bunch of tenders in a row and we drop water in a big swimming pool and the truck sucks water out of the swimming pool. So, the goal is to keep the swimming pool full. So, they call their neighbors. We went to two personal injury accidents. 65 is a culprit of a lot of those. Uh, seven grass fires this month, wildland fires. Uh, and I've said this before, but I'd rather be inside of a structure fire than have to be on my in the woods fighting a wildland fire. They're they're very physically demanding, but we work closely with the DNR and our partners. East Beth's equipped to fight wildland fires. The rest of the calls were medical related. I do want to let everyone know that we're having information session on how to become a firefighter for the city of East Bethl on May 14th. It's a Wednesday. It's going to be at 6:30 p.m. at our station 1. If you're interested in being a firefighter for the community, bring a significant other. No children, please. uh because we're going to talk about the reality of what the firefighter does. We'll put you in gear, show you how to how to stay in good standing, how all that how training works. We pay for all the training, all the equipment, and uh we'd love to have you there. So, if you're interested or know someone in the community who wants to be a firefighter, minimum age 18, we all have a high-end high-end age on it. So, um, if you're sitting at home looking at Tik Tok videos and wondering what you could do to add some purpose in your life, here you go. Come on and join our team. Um, we are currently implementing a new records management system. So, the reports that you've seen in the past and the the information, we're sort of trying to get good data in this new system. So, drawing it out. Uh, in fact, all the firefighters are at the station right now learning how that new system works because after every incident, we report everything that happened. We have to put names and everything in there. So, this uh this month, we've had a total dollar loss of approximately $370,000 uh in fire loss. Any questions? All right. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Item 50, public form. Uh Derek Lind, please got paper copies. Uh thank you, Mr. Mayor. My name is uh Derek Lind. I'm with ASIT NOA County Election Integrity Team. Some of you I recognize from being here in the past. Um we've been operating for three years now. We started uh Matt members us from three years ago, March of 2022. Reason I'm here tonight is to talk about just your poll pad agreements. The poll pad is what you check in on on election day. Uh it's an electronic roster. Uh these came out in 2018 and there was an agreement that was pushed out. Our recommendation to you is that you cancel that agreement. We think it's a a bad deal. Um, I'm also asking for the opportunity to come back and be a little more specific as to why we think you should cancel that. I can't really get a lot done here in the public forum. Depends on how much time you give me, but we just kind of gave you the short version here. If I could run through this real quick. Uh, so this agreement that you guys entered was back in June of 2018. Two cities in ana county have already cancelled this agreement. Oakrove and Ramsay canceled this agreement. Um Ramsay is saying they don't want to go back to use the pole pads anymore. But if you could turn to the first page there. The pole pad agreement was never properly approved. The vote from the um Anoka County Council Board of Commissioners was to purchase the pole pads, but they never took any votes after that. And then you guys never took any votes either. And this is something that um both parties should have voted on. So, that's one reason we think you should cancel. As as of right now, we can't find any vote that you guys ever took on this. If you can look at the next page, there's some risk associated with that. Um, and because of that, we think you should cancel this and start over. You know, take a closer look at it. Uh, the Ramsey County Attorney, he said, if you look at the bottom there on the bottom left hand side, he said, "This agreement is very one-sided in favor of the county and not a good deal for the city." Uh, you know, just one one comment on that. I think what happened is in 2018, of course, I wasn't there, but you know, the the pole pads came out. We didn't know what it was. It was new technology. The state was offering money or money for this and it was just kind of pushed out and everybody said, "Yeah, we'll do it." So, it was kind of a sloppy deal. That's what we think. That's why we're we're going around now to all the cities saying, "Hey, take another closer look at this." If you can look at the next page, there's a lot of statutes that govern the use of these pole pads and there could be some liability there and those are some things that that you may want to look at too. That's it. If you want to get a hold of us, contact information is at the back of this. One other point I want to make and this is very important. Uh the Ina County Board just voted on this a couple of months ago. I think it was in January, January 29th, two commissioners voted no not to purchase the pole pads again. It was Commissioner Heinrich and Commissioner Reiner. Third commissioner did not vote. I believe that's your commissioner Roststead. Does she represent this area? So, the politics is changing on these polls. They're not real popular right now. So, just asking you to take a closer look. Want to bring it to your attention in person. You guys have any questions for me while I'm here? If you want to bring our our group back, we can we can go more in depth on this. So, thank you. What other options are there? Paper. In fact, in the Sani County, um they have 19 precincts, 17 of them paper. You use paper until 2018. So, through the 2016 election. Our recommendation is go back to paper. But for this purpose, we're just saying cancel the pole pad agreement. Maybe you decide you want to continue to use these electronic polls. That's up to you. Get yourself a better agreement though. You got to represent your city. What happened before it got pushed out by staff and it was met by staff on your side. We think in most cities, every every city was a little bit different. At one time, we thought 20 cities hadn't voted on this. But this was a major change to the election system. You guys should be voting on it. They should be voting on it. And it was just kind of rushed through. Again, I think it was just sloppy. Everybody thought it was a good idea and was free money at the time. So, any other questions? All right. Thank you. Thanks for your time. Have a good night. Uh Sarah Mclofflin. Thank you. Um Sarah Mclofflin, 1148 231st Lane. Um I am back again. Um just to uh follow up in regards to the last meeting on the 14th um regarding the neighbor that I have and the um issue that we are having at the address 120 231st Lane since um I was last here. I am not sure if you council members have come up with any solutions or any courses of action to take towards this. Whether or not that's something we can discuss now um or if uh you just want me to go forward with the information that I gathered in preparation for this um second attempt to talk to you guys to give you an update. I have talked to the deputy and deputy has talked with the fire chief and the city administrator. Um there is a plan of action that is coming together. Uh I'm not sure if we want to discuss that in public, but uh I'm sure you could be updated privately on that. Okay. I would I would appreciate that. Um as I received all of the incident case reports from Monoka County Sheriff that have been had at that location since 2023. and the findings in here and the information is just it's mindboggling to me. Um the information that I find and the things that I see um stated were passed over to you guys uh for evaluation and that is starting back in um February of 2024 and we still have no resolution. I know that we're working on it, but expediting it would be um something I know our whole neighborhood would be begging you for. Um when looking at these reports, 32 of these reports had nothing to do with the homeowner out of 53 reports that have been filed since 2023. Um today, this evening, it looks like there's already four more people moving in um as they have brought two more um trailers full of junk and are unloading them in the back where the police can't see them as they drive by. Yeah. Um so I I'm glad to hear that there was a resolution or there is something being worked on. Um, we did have a deputy tell us that, but I will say um, I have been told that uh, for the last two years and um, I just really haven't seen any action. So, I am going to keep these give these reports to you council members. Um, and just know that if you would like that living next to you, maybe you can we can move a little quicker on it. Yeah, they're all colorcoded. Sarah for a year. Sarah, I've talked to Deputy Peters also. Okay. And believe me, if there was something that we could do right now, we would do it. It's unfortunate in my opinion the way our laws are. It's sad that it appears to me that the people that are doing stuff illegal have more rights than us. and total totally wrong in my opinion. But believe me, whatever we can do, we are working on it for sure. I know we talked to uh Corey on the planning commission. He brought that to us as well. And we are aware of it. And if I could do something like right now, I would. But it's unfortunate that our laws protect the bad guys in my opinion. But we aren't going to give up on you. I let you know that. I appreciate that. I think reading some of those incident case reports um it seems that sometimes there was just an assumption made of who was allowed to live there and who wasn't um due to the severity and the you know drug use that's happening at the residence. Um I know the officers put themselves at risk every time they walk into that house. Uh but it just really seemed unfortunate reading through those th that detail was sickening to me and my husband um just to really understand what's happening next door to us. Mr. Mayor, just by way of an update, I did speak with I believe the owner is Dan if I'm not mistaken. His brother has been heavily involved in this. Um they are looking to potentially form an LLC and put the property in an LLC. So, there's a board now that can make a decision in the event that the owner is not on premise or in jail or whatever the case may be. Um, and um and they're actively looking to trespass people. Some of the trailers you might be seeing is actually stuff getting hauled out. Um, no, they're they're dropping them off. I Yeah, because this gentleman told me that he is actually in there with trailers removing things as we as we speak. Yeah, that's not the case, unfortunately. Um I I I'm right next door and I can see it clearly from my balcony, my deck that um they're just pulling it in there, dropping stuff off, and then leaving and then having trucks full of stuff, unloading it, and leaving it. Um and then there's three pickup trucks there that are all, you know, just not not welcome, shouldn't be there. Um currently, like at this moment, like before I came to this um meeting, we were watching them. Okay. Can uh I talked to an attorney and I don't know if this is accurate. Maybe this attorney knows and I think I messaged you this, but the owner can get a eviction and within a couple of weeks based on illegal activity and then give it to the police and within a couple of weeks that place should be able to be cleared out. Yeah. there. Um there's in the in the case reports it it states that um they lost their eviction notice in 2024, but they didn't do it they did it based on in a 30 squatters and but they they don't need the 90 days if it's based on illegal activity. They can immediately evict. It just takes the courts a couple of weeks to get it all processed. I think they're a little uh timid from losing their case, which they were under the assumption that this was the appropriate course of action um in the first time and then the money wasted and the loss of the case and allowing more people to move back in. Um I get it. Yeah. So, if you want to talk with the fire chief privately, uh he can update you on what's been happening and uh inform you and hopefully within hopefully soon we can have some resolution here. Well, you'll see my shining face until then. That's fine. That's fine. You come to every meeting. All right. Thank you. All right. Uh Dave Kefir. Yes, I was before the council last May the towards the end of May about a neighbor with roosters and I don't know if you remember me or not. We have nine complaint forms filled out and we left them with you last time. I kept copies of them just in case you didn't have them anymore from our neighborhood. We're in a development and these roosters crow night and day. I mean, two in the morning, I've got audio tape and from we have we we ended up having to put out uh trail camps because to get proof that they're crowing at 2:00 in the morning, they're growing at4 to 6:00 in the morning. They're, you know, crowing all during the day. And last year when I dropped these off to you and talked to the council, the consensus with the council was you were it was a it was a noise nuisance and noise pollution, whatever. The the noise ordinance from from the city would go in there and say, "Look, you got to get rid of the rooster once and for all." This was towards the end of last May, May. Is this in the area of uh Viking and Jackson? 92nd and Jackson Street. Okay. Yeah, I I remember it. And I have I have these. Oops. I'm sorry. I'll pass those over to you. I have those. Those are the complaint forms from the different neighbors. I think I believe there's about 22 25 houses. And I've got nine of the neighbors who, you know, wanted to put their name on the complaint form and complain to the city council so that something could be done because especially now that it it's getting nice, you can't sleep with your windows open. you I mean they're just all night long and we are we implore you to please do something and now this this winter we there's often times we can see with our binoculars there our properties butt up to each other and I've got two and a half acres I think they have five acres or something there it's 716 192nd it's on there I think Lane Avenue and it's Yeah. And 4.87. Yep. And I'm not I'm not prejudice whatsoever. I have my the best man for my wedding was a Mexican. And so that has nothing to do with But it's a Mexican family. And we've had the the sheriff go over there. We've had the city go over there. And um you knock on the door, they don't answer. They won't answer their door. They're home. They won't answer the door. And and they only speak Spanish. So the only way I mean I I don't know if you guys sent a notice to them or if you talked to him personally or but I know that the city was over there and then they ended up whoever it was ended up saying, "Oh, you can keep one rooster." Well, now they're up to two or three roosters again and it's worse than ever. And in in a in a development like that, they should not I mean, they there's no reason to have roosters. First of all, the the the chickens can lay eggs without the roosters. So, there's no reason in a in a housing development like that to have roosters. Dave, last year when you were here. Yes, sir. And you had your complaint there. Myself and Councilman Miller went out there. Yep. And I know what you're saying. We knocked on the door. Nobody would answer. Right. But we couldn't find a chicken nowhere. Yeah. That's I mean, do they hide them or what? They they have them way out on the back of their property. And of course that's right by mine. But but the neighbors on either side and even the neighbors across the street 192nd and then the first round up to Viking Boulevard again. That's where a lot of these complaints come. They can hear them there. Really? But yeah, they'll hide them in especially if they know that somebody's coming to inspect their property. Yeah, cuz we never told them. We just showed up. But we couldn't find a chicken anywhere. No, they're and they let them run loose out in the back there. uh they usually stay on their property, but now in December, we had one on our property, and I've got a picture of of that, and I've got a picture of what that rooster looked like, and it was in horrible shape. It was uh all the tail feathers were ripped out of it. It had lice. It cuz it had been out for at least a week in my yard, and it was eating bird seed, which is not good for chickens. We feed the birds and the bird seed falls on the ground, and that's the only thing it had to eat. and they never came looking for their chicken. And so we called the sheriff to try to we didn't know what to do. You know, what do you do? You got a chicken running around your yard that's freezing cold out there. This was December 13th, 15th, somewhere around there. And had the sheriff out and he said, "Well, if you catch him, call me back." You know, and he documented that he came out and saw the the chicken. And we've got I've got pictures too if you want to see the the condition that the this poor chicken was in. I mean he So we ended up we finally caught him about 3 days 4 days after we tried you know catching them. We finally caught him and we brought it to us a sanctuary where they get them vetted and they put them on a farm where they can't be abused anymore. And she said she had I have a report here from her. She said uh this We we named her Glattus. And she we love animals, so we hate to see this these animals being treated like this. But she said this it was covered in lice and suffered frostbite. This is from the the lady with the chicken sanctuary that we brought it to. She said it was covered in lice and suffered frostbite uh before we rescued her and all of her tail feathers were pulled out and she was infested with round worms. And she said she she weighed about three 3 and a/4 lb or 3 lb four 4 oz or something like that. Um she also said it lost one of its toes due to frostbite because it had no shelter. It had no water. It had you know it was just and they didn't they had no concern about where it was. They never looked for it. And our like I said our properties but up to each other. Um, and I wasn't going to bring it back over there because I've seen the condition of from my yard. I I haven't been inside their barns, but I see the the way they're being just left to run all over the property back there and onto our property. And so, uh, they also she also said this is a a game hen, like an old English or an American game hen. And they're not really, um, egg laying chickens. They're They're she says they are uh they only lay typically 120 eggs per year where a good laying chicken a good breed of chicken will lay anywhere from 250 to 300 eggs per year. So she said these are typically um let's see what she say here. She said they're typically used in cockfight these this breed in particular. They're not they're not used for anything but that. Now, I don't know anything about what goes on at the property. I know they had big parties on a Friday night during the summertime every so often and they've had where they had a vehicle out back that started a brush fire. I know the fire department showed up to put that out and the car was just buried back there in the tall grass and started the fire from the the mufflers. But I don't know what goes on because I have not been on their property. You know, I I've seen it for my property because we butt up against each other, but I I don't know what goes on inside the barns and so but I do I I've seen the condition of this poor chicken and they let their dogs run constantly. They the garbage cans are out front of their house and they leave them out there. They own a they do own a Mexican restaurant down in Blaine right off by by the police department in Blaine. And I don't know, you know, I know that One of the neighbors says they're bringing all the garbage from their their business out here so they don't have to have a garbage disposal at their business, but they leave the garbage cans out on the street all all week long. And this stuff is blowing onto the neighbors property and all around the neighborhood onto the street and and that I know that two neighbors on either side are just beyond frustrated with that and the the noise from the chickens, you know, the roosters, but their dogs run loose. Couple of the neighbors on a complaint form said they they brought the dogs back to them number of times before they ran out onto um Viking Boulevard up there and you know the the two young kids speaks a little bit of English and you know just said we're not supposed to tell you about those people in the basement whatever that meant I don't know what that means but so I just the big thing for us if we want to be able to open this has been three years three years that We put up with non-stop roosters, you know, day and night. And I've got audio that that's timestamped here if you want to if you want to hear it. 2:30 in the morning, the rooster's crow. And I can play it for you if you want. We've got We believe you. I I that's why I brought this up. We've got our game cam stuff and you know we we've got them on 2:30 in the morning, you know, crowing away and it's loud and you know, so if you could address that and please don't let them keep even one rooster this time. Last year they were allowed to keep one rooster, but there's no reason for them to have a rooster. Not not in the development. So please please give us some relief in the neighborhood. you know, the neighbors on either side of of that property, they're the ones who are the closest to the noise. And the one just died, not just recently, passed away from a heart attack. And I don't know if this was part of the stress, he's been fighting it for three years, you know, and and the other one is at his wits end, too, you know, with with the noise. And Dave, your property butts up to them from the rear. Yep. Yep. So then the front of your Which road is Jackson Street? So you're on Jackson? Yep. I'm on Jackson Street and my property goes all the way back and our properties but up against each other. Okay. And then the neighbor the the neighbor who lives it would be towards Jackson Street on 192nd there. His property comes butts up to mine and runs along part of his too. So then do you face Jackson? I do. You do? Okay. So that comes in Yeah. Goes to the west. Y Okay. Your property. Yeah. That's Yeah. He's He's on the west side of my property and the front of my house faces street. Okay. Even with our windows closed during the winter, we've got we just put in triple pane windows last last fall and we can still hear them through the windows at night. So, yeah, it's just it's really frustrating. And who wants to run air conditioning and and the furnace all the time, you know? I when it's nice out. I want to have the windows open this thing. And my neighbors do, too. You know, there's, like I said, there's nine of us here on the complaint forms. A lot of the other ones said, "Oh, I don't want to get involved. I don't want them to come after me." And this and that and the other thing. And I I tried to assure them that these won't get back to who to the the family that has the the roosters. So, please help us. So, I'm asking us to to do something to give us some peace in the neighborhood. Mr. Look, can we take some action on this? Mr. Mayor and Council, I know that Nick has been out to the property. I think he experienced something similar where there weren't any chickens around. People weren't answering. So, um we will address this in the next uh staff meeting and see what options are available. If if you need proof, I've got I've got the the audio, you know, and it's all timestamped, the dates and and the time of day it is, you know, 2:00 in the morning,4 to 6:00 in the morning, 3:00 in the morning. It it might work best to uh come by during office hours and and give that a copy of those to staff. Sure, I can do that. I like you I said I it's just so frustrating because I I understand you know it's been three years now and we're not able to enjoy the you know and I love the sound of the birds and mother nature and all that stuff but we'd love to hear that but we can't even enjoy that because the rooster is gone. So the roosters run around in your yard even this was this was a chicken that was in our yard but we've had where they just not they're not always running out loose but there's been at least four or five times where we've seen them all of them just running around the roosters and the chickens running around. How many would you on the back of our How many do you think they have? Do you have any idea? So I was going to ask how many this much. So I saw I mean I was with my naked eye from my window. This was from our living room window out to the trees on their property. And these these birds looked as big as turkeys. I thought, "Oh, those are birds." But they were roosters and they were running back and forth. So, they weren't on our property, but you could clearly see them running under the trees there because the deer eat up the pine trees. So, do they have a chicken house behind them? Way in the back. Yeah, it's right directly behind. I didn't see. I didn't see nothing in the back. She has pictures of the the barn and stuff there if you want to see from our house. Yeah, you pull it up on the GIS. You can see the barn. You can see if you're looking out our window, the barn is just this big white spot right behind some trees and that's where the chickens are housed. The roosters they move because you can hear it once they'll they'll crow back here and then all a sudden they're crowing up here and then the when they have their parties it's right usually right next to the the barn where the chickens are. And we have I mean you can see the flames they go almost as tall as trees. That's how big these fires are. I was like if I see it again I'm calling the fire people because that's insane. That's all dryass. when our property backs up to them. We've got outuildings back there, too, that we don't want. We've had it burned across our property when somebody left a a fireended years ago. And and to see those flames shooting above the 30ft trees up there, you know, it's it's scary. It's really scary. My guess is they probably have 20 to 30 chickens and probably my guess is maybe three to four roosters right now. It did go down to one when you guys somewhat addressed it, but it never went away. And now it's slowly creeping up again. Now we're up to three. And I can distinctively hear, you know, one crawl here and all a sudden another one call over here and then another one called you can hear it in a different barn. So they have different out buildings, but the big barn is where all the chickens are. And you can't see that from the road, but they're like up here and then the farm goes down. Mr. Mayor, I know that the council has discussed chicken rooster ordinances in the past as it relates to how many roosters you can have per acreage and the unfortunate reality with roosters is that they will fertilize eggs and within two to three months you'll have more roosters. Just the way it works, right? Um so when you have a situation where people might not be managing their flock, so to speak, um who knows how many roosters you're going to have, you know, eventually. Um so it's this is the challenge when we when we bring these type of ordinances forward for you know analysis on determining how many roosters if there should be roosters at all. These are the potential problems that we're going to be facing at some point down the road. I mean there's some that will comply and there's 99% that won't. So it's just it's frustrating especially in a housing development when you know one house is going to ruin the whole neighborhood you know for for having your windows open even even if you're just during the day I mean it's non-stop and at night especially when you want to sleep with your windows open and this thing is just crawling 2 3 in the morning midnight we've heard at 11:00 12:00 at night you know so yeah and I do have the report from this this uh chicken sanctuary, the lady who is a specialist if you want to add to it. Um we can leave it with Mr. Look for the record. I thank you. I appreciate all your time. Hopefully we can get some resolution on this. Really appreciate. Yeah. Thanks. Thanks for coming forward. Thank you. All right. Moving on to 6.0. Make a motion to approve the consent agenda as presented. I'll second and I'd like to pull item G. Have a motion and a second. Any others need to be pulled? Okay. So, we have a motion to approve this. All those in favor except for G. I I opposed. None heard. Item G. Item G. I just have two questions on this um JPA with the BCA. Um the first question is is this a renewal of this contract or is it a whole new contract? Because I thought if it were a renewal it would say renewal, but it's Mr. Mr. Mayor and council members, the best of my knowledge is this is a renewal because it's a um joint powers agreement for the city of East Bethl that our city attorney uses. And I don't know if our city attorney can comment on this, but in order for them to access the information from BCA, they need these following agreements approved um so they can act as an agent on our behalf or prosecution. I I figured that, but I've just wondered if we already had this agreement and it's an an a renewal. And then my other question was, is there is it there a cost increase or is this cost the same as it was because I didn't see that in there when I was looking through it. Mr. Mayor and Council, my understanding is there's no cost to this. It just is the authoritative vehicle to allow Ecber and Lamers to access the information they need for prosecutorial services. Okay, I have to check something else before I go because I had another comment. Um, nope, that's all I had. I thought there was it was talking about a cost in there, but I didn't see any dollar signs. So yeah, call reading that. With that, I'll make a motion to approve item G on the consent agenda. Second. Have a motion and a second. All in favor? I post none. Item 7 A, final plaque. Uh, good evening, council and mayor. Uh I did not prepare a slideshow for this as this is a final plat and development contract agreement which is all provided for you in the packet. Um keep it short. Nothing has changed from the preliminary plat that you approved last month or two months ago now. And uh everything meets code. Anything that needs to be resolved has been added to the resolution as stated and has been reviewed by the city attorney. Um, the development contract would still be negotiated as still working on what's included since there's no public improvements proposed with this small subdivision of three lots. I'm available for any questions. Thank you. make a resolution or make a motion to approve resolution number 20 25-23 uh final plat and development contract for Blanco Decola Praa for three lots located at P 2633 23 320012 and 2633 2323 30001. Second. Have a motion. Second. Discussion. Okay. I just have a comment. On page 41, it says the planning commission held a public hearing to review the preliminary plat at their XX meeting. I don't like that XX meeting. Yeah. Yeah, that's been noted. I will add that to a review for staff to look at before the reports go out. I apologize for that. Thank you. That's all I have. I think that was to remind someone to put a date in there. Our apologies. Any further discussion? All those in favor? I opposed. None hurt. Motion passes. Uh staff report. Mr. Mr. Mayor, I have a few items to uh to to cover here uh this evening. First of all, just want to say that we've started our union negotiations and uh we've had a first good uh meet and greet meeting and uh kind of chatted through some of the issues that are out there. We're going to be bringing this to the finance committee uh to um to discuss the proposal that they're going to bring forth. So, more to come on that. [Music] Um the uh I want to give just an update too on the abandoned house that is at 105229 229th Avenue rather northeast. This is behind I believe the the house that was in question here this evening. Um we I did some checking with the county and in fact um the the owner of the house passed away. His son then took ownership of the house and um passed away from an overdose and the house is currently in um uh behind on taxes and it'll it has to go through its normal process of tax forfeite and and uh and everything else and uh before the county can step in and sheriff sale that property. So unfortunately there's the law requires a time frame for these things and um and so in the meanwhile uh we would just ask the neighbors to keep an eye on uh on the property, make sure there's no nothing funny going on around there and that they would call the sheriff in the event that there is. Uh again, we would love to post a deputy out in front of the house, but that would burn up resources that we can't necessarily afford. Uh but we can respond in case there's any sort of nefarious activity going on. Um third item is uh uh the finalist, the fire chief candidate uh that will be meeting uh tomorrow with the uh firefighters. Uh we'll take kind of a tour of the station, the equipment uh stand for questions of firefighters. I think this is a good opportunity for folks to get to know him and uh it is uh after a successful negotiation um we're looking at about a 27th of May start date. So um but there is a lot of positive feedback we're getting uh changes that are happening at the fire department and um and kind of people at first didn't quite know the need for it but are kind of starting to realize that these are positive changes, good changes. So, that's a good thing that will help kind of pave the way for the new individual as he comes in. Uh I want to also mention uh with regards to landform uh that we just met uh today and we're going to be kind of transitioning away from the officing on Mondays um and uh moving to more of a remote uh meeting weekly uh for for Grace if she has any questions on some of the um uh the uh cases that she's going to be working with. So, we we kind of started off with the um Kendra was here every Monday, meet with residents that would be coming in, schedule those meetings, then we'll move to more of a phone call uh with Grace so that uh she can run through these are the cases I'm working on, make sure everything is set up and ready to go. And as we start to phase phase out to um to then finally a an on call type of need. So if if let's say down the road Grace has a issue that she just does not know how to deal with, she can reach out to Kendra and Kendra can bill us on an hourly basis for that. Um I think uh I think that is all that I have for updates today request that'll be under other All right. Thank you. Council reports. Reports. I have some things to say. Um first I want to say uh talk about senior stuff. I would like on a future um agenda put on there the approval of serving alcohol uh wine and beer over in the community center area. Um last time it went through all the stages and the council approved it, but then when it went over there the seniors disapproved it. So this time we got the seniors to approve it. So now we want the council to approve it and then we're going to get into the the cost of insurance and licensing. And for right now we've have um route 65 going to be the sole provider. So anybody who wants it, we also got our our mill a million dollar insurance uh policy for over there. So now when any resident in the past any resident who wanted to use it had to go out and contact their insurance company and and get their own additional one mill $1.5 million extra insurance and they don't have to do that anymore because the seniors got that insurance policy. So I wanted to talk about that. The seniors would also like it to look over that copy of the cleaning contract just to make sure that because they're feeling like the guy is not doing what he's supposed to be doing. And I told them because I looked at yours, but they want to see it themselves. So maybe if you could email that to me, I can bring it to the next meeting. Um May 3rd, that's this coming Saturday, I think, um is going to be the fix it clinic up over here. So if anybody has a small 25 pound or less item, a microwave, a vacuum, a toaster that you need to have fixed, bring it on up and put those guys to work. Um the senior dance is Friday, so if you're a senior, please come. Well, you don't even have to be a senior. Come and dance. It's old poker music and stuff. It's uh country. It's a lot of fun. So, come on up. There's refreshments and um I'd love to see you there because I'm going to decorate and if you're a mom, you might get a rose. Um and that's all I have. Oh, and I did get a few complaints about the town hall meeting and I think I will talk to Mr. Look oneonone with those complaints and maybe we can spoof up the next one a little bit. That's all I have. Anybody else? What time on Friday? 1 to 4. All right. Nothing else being heard. Let's move to other. So, uh, Mr. Mayor, this evening, uh, um, acting fire chief Jerry Strike presented, uh, three proposals for us, um, to, uh, to consider. uh the to the right page here. Uh the first is uh to uh essentially move to a duty crew model uh with during the daytime hours and uh and transition. The second one is transition of position uh Ben's position fire chief to deputy chief uh by removing the uh overtime that hourly gets paid moving to a full-time and then also reducing medical calls uh by the calls that he had indicated highlighted as the um non-emergent calls. He believes that uh those those last two by reducing the calls and and transitioning that position that there will be a cost savings uh to uh employing um a a duty crew for the daytime hours. Um, again, one of the the reasons for that is uh the responses uh during the daytime have in his experience have been one firefighter in a in a in a truck and um and he doesn't believe that that is um adequate enough to once you get on on scene to be able to operate that vehicle by yourself and and effectively uh take care of that uh situation, gain control of that situation. So um essentially under other um the if it is the will of the council uh you could motion to approve uh one or all three of these and um and staff will start that and if that passes staff will start the process of implementing that. I want to remind everyone too that um everything is is fluid here in terms of we can try this if it doesn't work we can we can try a different model or go back to the old model or do whatever we see fits. Um I think um I think in his experience he's seen these models work. Uh again he's indicated that as as we grow as a community as we have more and more demand you move from the volunteer model to the duty crew model. the duty crew model if you're doing both um uh daytime and evening can be very expensive or a lot more expensive than we are currently covering for for volunteers. Uh but a lot of communities are in fact doing that and so you have you have firefighters that live in Golden Valley and essentially work on duty crews in different communities. So, um, if this is something that the council would like to, um, pursue, uh, we would just need a motion, second, and and vote on that this evening. I'll make a motion to approve duty crew, deputy chief for Ben, and reduce medical calls. Second. Okay, we have a motion and a second. Discussion. Uh, I do have a question for Mr. strike. I didn't see him there uh wi with making this change and as you've probably heard from uh rumor mill or otherwise that obviously people are very concerned with appearance of drop service, change of service. Um, can you put out some sort of education for residents to explain the changes that the there will not be a um a lack of service? Uh, because we I I think with the change like this that there needs to be some education put out there to explain what's going on and that there is not a lack of service. Sure. We're actually reducing what we are calling a service, a non-emergent service that's been in place for many years in order to save the service in order to actually balance out the volunteer model so we can hold this model as long as possible because time has become the new money. We'll balance it out now that or if you all do decide that this is a avenue you want to go down, I will then have permission to work with the staff to figure out what's best. And maybe it's gradual, you know, but but uh having permission will allow me to help find the balance. So when the new chief comes, they're taking over a program that is balanced with a council who understands the service delivery model. They've got a report that's a year old that's making recommendations. You're educated on it. You're brought up to speed and you just made a vote or about to make a vote on this is the service we want to provide our community. And based off that, it's always monitored. There's no greater bear uh weight on a a shoulder of a department head than of the fire chief. They're up at night wondering who's showing up. What's the storm going to bring? You know, we've been talking about that for days. But uh because the responsibility is the community expects the service even though most of them will never use it. Yep. But yes, we can market it. We can talk about it. We can Facebook it. We can have a video on it. Yeah. Even put together something that you can provide to the city that they can absolutely advertise it. Y Mr. Mayor, and what I'd suggest too is before we get our newsletter out here, maybe we draft a an article on that kind of detailing some of those changes. So, and we can pick a date to, you know, this this won't happen tomorrow, right? But it gives the new chief and I an opportunity to talk about everything we just talked about and the the council's wishes and then we implement it over time uh for better service or at least the equal service. It's not fair to have 20 show up on on one, you know, at 5:00 and two show up or one show up at 5:00 a.m. So try to find that balance. Your call volume is going to continue to go up. If I didn't say it, I know I said it at the pre uh previous meeting, but since 2020, we've had a 47% increase in medical calls since 2020. 47%. That's a lot. I think uh my opinion, Jerry has explained it really well. I personally have talked with Jerry with different things here and definitely when I hear we have one firefighter show up with one vehicle on a fire, that's not good at all. I mean, that can go south. Even when you do have multiple firefighters, one is the safety of the firefighter and the safety of the residents big time in my opinion of that. So I think the duty crew thing I was kind of against him at first, but then I didn't really understand him until Jerry and me have talked about it and it makes sense. Plus he can save us money by reducing the calls that we don't need to go on. But if they do change, we can be sounded out right away and we can be there. So the residents need to know and I want them to know that we are going to still provide the service for emergencies, heart, breathing and stuff like that. We are not going to ignore that. We'll be there. So this is just a way that we can make our department better and safety for our firefighters and safety for our residents. Mr. Bear, could I just make a comment too? Saving money. We're actually not saving money. It costs $93,000 for the duty crew. However, the the overall impact in the budget because we'll be moving line allocations around is $15,000. So, we're not saving money. We're but we're taking line allocations, moving them around to pay for this new delivery model. And keep in mind, we're we'll have a faster response time during the daytime. And uh it isn't uncommon to see duty crews save lives like right away because we don't have that turnout time from home to the station, assemble, and then go to the call. They're out the door in one minute. So, they're doing CPR in a matter of minutes. We're not waiting. In fact, I think our uh our well, I know our policy says you have to live within 10 minutes of the closest station. So that means you can live as far as 10 minutes away just to get to the station. And we're brain dead in six minutes. That's that's science. So time is important. So So out the door right away. Chief can rest a little bit knowing they have people coming. They're they're at the station. They're going in route quickly. And uh much like everything else in life, it's a it's a revolving monitored system. And to to the administrator's point, we change it when we need to. And that's why you have department heads to bring you expertise and opinions and recommendations and you get to make the choice on the best delivery you want to provide. So, so I do have a question on the um inspector to assistant fire chief. Is that going to be the same rate of pay that he's getting now or is this a pay increase or and is this all budgeted already? That kind that's information is needed. Uh Mr. Mayor, council members, on that sheet that was provided uh to us this evening, I believe it's this sheet right here, um it shows that he is currently I think he's currently making 38.92 an hour. promotion would be to 40 48 um and then you start on a step system at that point. So uh there would be you know the the challenge that we have right now is we have a a fire inspector doing a lot more than a fire inspector should be. So he's not being paid for the work he's doing. So this would more accurately reflect what he's currently doing um and put him in that job classification that that he should be in as it is right now. Uh the other the other part of this too is um you know I think the you know Jerry and I have spoken about this and and perhaps others as well but um you by doing this also you have a continuity plan. Say say the new fire chief comes in and says you know I'm moving to Florida. Sorry folks. Um, you have a continuity plan where you have a deputy chief now that can he's kind of been in these roles. He's been brought into that that inner circle of of managing and controlling department. He can now step more seamlessly into that fire chief position if it's the will of the council at that point. So So and is this coming out of the fire department budget? Is this budgeted for already or do we have to get some more money from somewhere else? So, this is this would be part of the fire department budget. This these are dollars that are as interim chief assistant the chief Bob the temp guy as he indicated we're kind of moving pieces around the puzzle board to account for these increases that we're going to see so that it's not an increase to the levy. So, if you're saving on overtime, but this cost is going up, you know, you're saving and kind of you're kind of breaking even. Yeah. Okay. Thanks. I'm good. Any other questions? M I'd just like to make sure that uh down the road here, maybe six months or whatever, we get a progress update on how this Absolutely. this is all going, right? So, we're all on board and keep going forward. I agree. And uh I'm I'm hopeful you'll see the fire chief in front of you more than they've ever been. And the assistant chief deal was part of the survey recommendation, too. So, yes. All right. And Mr. Mayor and Council, I think we're all proposing this because we feel it will be a better system than we currently have, and we intend to make sure that that's the case. Any further discussion? All those in favor? I I opposed. None heard. Motion passes. Entertain a motion to adjurnn. Make a motion to adjourn. Second. Have a motion, a second to adjurnn. All those in favor? I I meetings closed. We have an H meeting. Yep. Yep. Okay. I'll call Thank you for coming everybody. Let me pull it up here real quick. Thank you. Uh, I'll call the H meeting to order. April 28th, 2025. Thanks. Second. Can I have someone? I'll make a motion to adopt the agenda. Second. I have a first and a second. Any discussion? All in favor say I. I. Opposed? Motion passes. Minutes number three, approval of the minutes. Motion to approve the minutes. Make a motion to approve the minutes from January 27th, 2025. Second. We have a motion and a second to approve the minutes from January 27th, 2025. Any discussion? Hearing none, proceed to vote. All in favor? I opposed. Hearing none. Mr. Look number four. Mr. Chairman and members, um I just wanted to bring up a preliminary budget proposal and financial update for uh 2026. We have to put in a uh a budget in accordance with a procedure in the city here. The HRA levies an amount of $77,000 in 2025. And um in uh you know as far as the expenditures go um we can I can just get into this. The maximum amount that we can levy uh is uh um $345,000 600 $345,631. We levy $77,000. So um again we we've had these conversations before of you know functions of HR and and limited uh resources. So, um uh you can levy up to that amount. I don't know that that you would necessarily want to, but um as far as 2025, uh 32,000 of that 77,000 gets transferred to staff uh for time spent uh both uh in setting these meetings up then also for uh the finance uh requirements to manage the uh the finances on this. And uh essentially we are left over right now with a a balance as of uh March 31st, 2025 of $292,685. You'll see here the 32,000 the gap of 45,000 would go into that account. Um so uh essentially what we're looking for is a direction and approval of the HA levy amount of 77,000 be included in the preparation of the 2026 city budget. This is the same amount as 2025. Make a motion to approve a H levy amount of $77,000 in preparation of the 26 budget. Second. We have a motion and a second to approve the $77,000 amount. Any discussion? I go ahead. I have a question. If we have a balance of 292,000 plus, why do we need to levy anything? Uh, it keeps the H active and it builds up a fund for future projects. I just don't think that's a good enough reason to levy anything if we have a balance. I could see if we had a something a line item to spend that money on, but we don't and we have a a healthy balance. So, why levy anything? Well, when uh oh, I think it was when we did Taylor Street that opened up that property by the church there. H funds were used and it was able to be feasible to open up that and do that project because there was a substantial balance in that. So rather than putting out a levy that well we need to levy for a million dollars put this road in those funds were available and they were acred over time rather than all at once. That put a burden on the residents. I'm not aware of that at all. I don't know anything about that. Mr. chair and members that was before my time here but um but just an example yeah I you know I I always use the um is it every man's treasure is that I think it is you know um what if that were to become available you know would the city move in and buy that raise that and make that available for an Aldi we're this is just crystal balling it right um how would you do that you need some sort of dollars to do that And does $45,000 get you there? Maybe in 50 years it might, but it that really doesn't give you a whole lot of um flexibility uh to to kind of um uh take control of a property like that. Now, you could say, well, then you're competing with the market. Uh that true. Um essentially, the market could come in and put a used car lot there because it's zoned for that, you know. um that may not be what the city ultimately wants there, you know. So, the city may want to be in a position where they could take control of a of a parcel somewhere um and and make it available for something that they get from their, you know, feedback from the residents. This is what we want here. You know, you hear a lot about grocery stores or whatever. Um, you know, maybe it's a, you know, maybe it's a splash pad or maybe, you know, there's all sorts of different projects, you know, cities can get into, uh, and spend money on, but, you have to have that money to spend. And it's not that you're levying dollars for the sake of levying. I think it is good to have uh, goals of of what um, you know, what you want to head down the road and try and accomplish. she set a goal out there and and achieve that goal. Um I think this is just somewhat of a lifeline right now, just keeping it going, adding a little bit of dollars every now and then. Um but if the city were to take a stronger um position on housing and redevelopment, they would have to levy more dollars in order to do that. Okay? And otherwise, you're going to bond for it, right? take out debt, which is what is um exactly what staff support activities is this 32,000 going to well um some of so the time essentially it breaks out the amount of time that staff is involved with the HR so it's putting together these packets it's um it's managing the finances it's um uh presenting here this evening. Whatever time is involved, um you know, we we we take that and we put a monetary value to it, which is the 35,000, if that's correct, 32,000. Um and and I want to be clear, this is not well, you guys are already getting paid. Why are you getting 32,000? because we're we're paid in the general fund budget and that's reduced by 32,000 because you have HR dollars coming in. If HR dollars weren't there, your general fund budget would have to go up to offset that difference. Um so it's taking money from one pocket and putting it on the other. There's no additional monies uh involved here. Um, but these services uh are something that can be build to the HRA by law and um and it's been standard practice in the past. That answer your question, Suzanne? Mhm. Okay. Okay. This is just new to me, so I'm just learning this stuff. But the only question I have is it says it's unudited. Why wouldn't this be audited? Because I would You know, there's since the audit, there's been additional cash or interest on that account. And so once that account is audited next year, then that would be considered audited at that point. I just saw the unodudited. It didn't make much sense. I think that's that's just the the official way of saying that, you know, as more dollars go into this account, it needs to be audited again. Okay. In the next sequence of audits, which all these accounts go through audits. Yeah. Um, it just threw me for a little. Does that answer your question already? Yeah. Any more discussion? We need a motion here to approve this. Already made. Okay. Motion's been made. First and second. All in favor say I. I. I. Opposed. I. One opposed. Motion. Motion passes. Make a motion to adjurnn. Second. Motion's been made to adjurnn. first and the second. Any discussion? Proceed to vote. All in favor say I. I. Opposed? Unheard.