All right, we'll bring the May 12th, 2025 city council work meeting to order. First item on the agenda. Gimple IUP discussion. Mr. Mayor, I'll um I'll have the attorney set this up and then we'll get into some of the details. Mayor, council members, first agenda item for the work session is the uh Gimple uh interim use uh permit. Tammy Gimple has three interim use permits. City attorney, strike that city administrator has provided me two. One has to do with the use of two horses resolution number 2019- 55. It's an interim use permit that allows the applicant to have up to two horses. Um it has five conditions. One of which is that the applicant must comply with the city's farm animals code. Also must expand uh fence pasture to three acres. Uh the permit does require as a standard with IUPs that the pro that when the property is sold, the interim use permit will immediately expire or if there's non-compliance with the IUP conditions. The property owner also has 30 days to remove approved domestic farm animals upon expiration of the IUP. And that's fairly standard as well as upon expiration. there's a time period uh to essentially bring back into compliance after the expiration of the IUP. 30 days is fairly standard, but it can be shortened or extended depend depending upon the circumstances. Fifth condition is that the property may be inspected and evaluated annually by city staff and IUPs are customarily evaluated on an as needed basis. Some of them do require annual uh evaluations and inspections. And the sixth is all conditions unless otherwise specified must be met by February 28th of 2020. The second IUP has to do with permitting animal contractual services on the property. This is resolution number 2021-74. There are 12 conditions here. I want to underscore that these are interim use permits and as a result unlike conditional use permits they're personal. They do not run with the property. Five conditions with respect to the use as an animal contractual services uh site is that it is going to be non-commercial that the boarding of dogs is limited to 10 days at which time any dogs must be moved off site all municipal contracts entered into by the applicant must be filed with the city of East Bethl even though it's not stated That's a way to ensure that the use meets the interim use permit and also understand what are the contractual terms and obligations that the land owner must fulfill with respect to the use of the animal contractual services uh IUP. The third I strike that the fourth is that standard permit will immediately expire once the property is sold or if there's non-compliance. Again, number five, as is very standard with IUPs, is the right to inspect. This one actually goes even further, and that is it's not only the city's designated inspector, but all other personnel under the direction and control of the city. I think it important to note that the Anoka County uh sheriff's office is under contract with the city of East Bethl in order to undertake all the city's uh necessary and reasonable law enforcement and public safety activities and that that access must be allowed for inspection purposes upon 12 hours notice to ensure compliance with all applicable conditions. Number six is annual inspection by the Minnesota Board of Animal Health. Number seven, kennels for quarantined dogs must not exceed 15. Housing enclosures for the dogs must be located in enclosed facility. I think number seven is important when you take a look at also the limit with respect to the dogs. So that there's a time period of quarantine of dogs of 10 days and then there's a limit as far as the overall number seven of 15. Housing enclosures for the dogs must be located in an enclosed facility. All dogs must be confined to the premises. Accumulation of feces must be removed. And then it goes on as far as other particular keeping the premises in um good sanitary um and and sightly condition. Number 11, city council reserves the right to modify conditions of the IUP at any time where deemed appropriate. Actually, that's true under any IUP, but it's nice to have it expressly noted here under number 11 nonetheless for the animal contractual services IUP. Number two or strike that 12. Gratitude farms will be required to request an amendment to the IUP in cases where contractual service obligations exceed the parameters of IUP. Again, that kind of relates back to making sure that the city has on record all the municipal contracts and make sure that those meable contracts are within the limits of the IUP and provide that oversight as well. So, one of the things that jumped out at me when actually I received these uh two IUPs from the city administrator is actually the dates. The first IUP with respect to the two farms is 2019 and the second one is 2021. Now it is fairly common for IUPs not to be amended during a you know basically 16 or 14year time period but it is also very common through annual inspections and change circumstances and conditions and things you know change over time within the city or within the site or within the use and so forth for the IUPs also to to be amended to reflect those changes. Those changes can be either initiated by the property owner themselves because of those change circumstances or also fairly common by the city as they go through inspection processes and so forth and realize that conditions need to be changed uh tightened up and so forth. Therefore, the first thing that jumped out at me is going, this has been a long time period for these IUPs to essentially not have been changed just separate and apart from any circumstances that occurred within the last year or so. That being case, I also understand that essentially what has transpired with starting at the beginning of this year and so forth is one of the trigger points for this particular discussion. And the discussion for the city council is basically really to decide whether they're going to take any actions with respect to the IUP or if they're going to take actions then actually the action today and the limitation for the council is to direct city staff to place it on the necessary agenda and go through the not the proper notice proceedings with respect to taking action on the IUP. So the decision today is not whether the UPA is going to remain in place or whether it's going to be amended or whether it's going to be revoked. That is not before the agenda and that is not within the power of this particular body today. The power within this body is to decide whether such action should occur and then go through the necessary steps. That's why this body is not going to be taking evidence or testimony or those things because that is through a public hearing process. That is where you put the holder of the IUP on notice that the council is looking at either amending or revoking putting that notice either before the planning commission and the body and this body can decide to send it to the planning commission or have it directly come before the city council uh for such action. So as I understand what has triggered this particular discussion is a series of events that started on January 26 of 2025 where the In Noa shower noa county sheriff's office responded to a call um in the city in the township of Lynwood and the township of Lynwood does have a contract with Tammy Gimple with respect to sh uh taking and sheltering animals. one of the municipal contracts that the applicant has or the holder of the IEP has such animals were brought to Miss Gimple and then in a followup the sheriff's department needed to undertake further investigations with respect to the care and condition of those animals to determine whether there had been abuse of those animals by the original property owner and at least as alleged by the inoc County Sheriff's Department. Despite despite repeated requests, they were denied entry in order to to undertake the inspection. As a result, according to the Noa County Sheriff's Department, they needed to get a search warrant in order to do so. as a result of a series of uh steps taken by Miss Gimple with respect to refusing entry onto the property, refusing to provide information upon request in a timely timely manner or provide all the information upon request. Eventually, the sheriff's department referred it for criminal prosecution. That criminal prosecution resulted in a summon complaint that was issued on or about March 12th of 2025. And that summons and complaint contains two counts. State of Minnesota versus Tammy Anne Gimple located at 22359 Batton Street Northeast East Bethl Minnesota 55011. The two counts are one charge theft take use transfer movable property without consent in violation Minnesota statutes section 609.52.2 to subdivision 1A. It's a gross misdemeanor. Date of the offense is January 29th of 2025 to February 10th of 2025. Count two, obstruction legal process, lawful execution, legal process in violation of Minnesota statute section 609.50, 50 subdivision 111 misdemeanor offense. Offense date also January 29 of 2025 to February 10, 2025. I want to make it very clear that right now under the as we well know under the United States Constitution as well as our state constitution, a person person is presumed innocent until found guilty. So these are just charges. These are just allegations and what I have summarized of course in a very summary of fashion is the basis for that. What is clear is that under the IUP with the city of East Bethl an inspection of her premises to ensure compliance with IUP is one of the conditions. What is also clear, at least as alleged by the Ena County Sheriff's Office, is that the NC County Sheriff's Office was prohibited by the holder of these two IUPs from undertaking inspection. At this point, the disposition of the criminal action so forth uh is still in process and so not sure exactly how it's going to occur. also want to make it very clear that I believe Miss Gample is here and this is not a criminal proceeding and this is not a proceeding whatsoever. This is discussion by the council as far as whether any steps, if any, are to occur, but that if there should be an opportunity permitted by the mayor for Miss Gimple to say anything that any statements she says can and may be used against her. Now, I don't have that obligation to provide her those fifth amendment rights, but I think it's very important nonetheless given the fact that there is these these criminal proceedings to make that very clear. Also make it very clear that when and if the city does undertake any type of civil actions and so forth. That's a different standard. The city has full rights to oversee its code and ensure compliance with IUP and can take any reasonable action amending it adding an additional conditions and if appropriate and found that there is basis for non-compliance to also revoke with that I certainly would be open to any questions but I think that I've teed it up at least as as quickly as I can for the council to engage in the discussion as to whether they're going to take no action or whether they're going to refer to staff for proceedings with respect to what actions would be appropriate based upon the facts in the record. Mayor um Mr. Look, do you got any further information on any violations? Uh Mr. Mayor and Council, again, um just want to reiterate this. This is a conversation that we're having this evening. I do not want to confuse this with code enforcement, notifications of code enforcement or the process that the city takes to enforce any sort of violations. In terms of code enforcement, these IUPs are essentially a contract where the um the city approves an interim use permit conditioned on whatever is written. Okay. So, what I want to do is just kind of go through uh these uh two. There's three of them, three IUPs in total. I'll I'll differentiate between those, but essentially there's the integrity of the of the city, which is at stake right now. We have multiple IUPs that are out there. Um when the city comes in into knowledge of the fact that an IUP applicant may um may be in violation, I think it's in incumbent upon the city to follow up on that. And that's precisely what we're doing here. and whether or not you want to take that to the next level um is uh is your decision. Um obviously there's a range there's a range of don't do it again to revocation. Um but just taking the first one here I think the the easiest one is well just by by the older resolution of 2019-55. It's a resolution granting an interim use permit for the keeping of two horses on the property located at 22359 Baton Street Northeast with the pin number there. Um I drove by that property. Uh I counted eight horses that I could see. Um, so there's um, and again our our code is kind of set up for acreage and pasture land and the amount of space that the city at one point deemed was necessary for raising of horses and um, and uh, and whatever the case is, the uh, the number was established at two. Uh, there is there are more than two on that property um, as of the date in which I took that picture. Uh the second uh resolution, resolution 2 20221-74 is a resolution granting an enemy use permit for the operation of an animal contractual service home occupation on property located at the same address 22359 Paton Street Northeast. And uh the attorney kind of went through the um the conditions set forth in that and I would like you to zero in on um four in particular. Uh the first is as was alluded to, the city's designated inspector and any other personnel under the direction and control of the city whom the inspector believes necessary must be allowed access for inspection purposes upon 12-hour notice to ensure compliance with all applicable conditions. The sheriff's office, as I understand, uh made uh it took him 3 days uh to request access to this property. Um, as I was told, the um, the condition of the animals need to be verified so that if prosecution was necessary for the individual in Lynwood, they would have their reports completed, etc., pictures taken, whatever was necessary to do that. And I, from what I understand, the the woman in in um, uh, Lynwood is uh, did I say East Beth? the woman in Lynwood uh is an elderly woman and they'll probably take some grace in that, but I think this is part of the uh process that's necessary to determine that the dogs can't be returned to her or whatever the disposition might be of that. Um so eventually it led to a warrant as was indicated. Um, from what I understand, the sheriff's department arrived on scene uh and uh the dogs were not there, which leads me to uh the um uh condition number nine, which was all dogs must be confined to the premises. Uh I believe the reason for this is because um Gratitude Farms goes through kennel inspection reports by the Minnesota Department of Health. Um this is one that was conducted on uh December 15, 2023. This is to ensure that the animals are are going to be properly cared for, have a proper uh uh area clean, etc. uh to take care of them. If the animals are removed and taken to other locations, those other locations are not licensed and there is no guarantee that uh that those other locations have what it takes to uh to raise to to keep these animals properly. Um and uh I think um you know whether it was the horses or whether it's this uh animal um contractual service home occupation, you know, if there was any sort of limitations that that the IUP holder felt uh pro prohibited her from doing her work as she needed to do. Um item 12 uh essentially says that she's required to request an amendment to an IUP. just can't have people uh in a I guess uh um uh decision of their own just go and start changing the conditions of the IUP and operating how they see fit. They need to come back in front of this body to say this is the reason why this doesn't work or this is the reason why I need to add more conditions or whatever the case is or alleviate conditions so that things can be done. Um, and uh, I would I would um, I would say at the very least under item 11, it says the the city council reserves the right to modify conditions of the IUP at any time where they deem appropriate. And I would suggest that there's probably some conditions that need to be modified if this IUP is not revoked in the future. So that uh, Mr. Mayor is is the information that I have on this. Um, and uh, again, if it's something that um, you know, I I believe that uh, 2021-74, while it relates to the court decision, I don't know that it's going to affect the the outcome of that court decision. I think they have what they need. Um, I don't think this discussion will have bearing on that. Uh but nevertheless, uh I think this discussion is necessary again to preserve the integrity of not only um the other IUPs that are out there and the and the individuals that are following their IEPs, but also um the integrity of the authority the city has. So we'll stand for questions if you have any. I think at this time, council members, it's time discussions come up. You have pictures of the horses that you're talking about? I do on my phone. Yes. I can make those available at a public hearing if you'd like. Has has there been any uh letters sent out uh for notice of any violations on this property? Uh Mr. Mayor and uh Council Member Mundle, uh it is not required uh as a condition that we send letters out for violations. It's incumbent upon the applicant at that time and the person agreeing to the conditions that they follow the conditions. Um, I did send an email saying that we were going to have this discussion this evening as a courtesy to the uh to the owner of the IUP so that they could be present here and defend themselves or answer questions if you had questions. But it is not customary that we send out that's why I said in the beginning it's different than code violations. Code violations there's a specific process where you have to send believe it's three letters and follow the process through and uh before you can go to any sort of uh court proceeding. uh in this particular in you know instance you as the body get to decide if there are violations if they are legitimate and what the outcome should be of that. So what would be the next step? Do we have to make a motion to bring this up at a future meeting for a hearing or something like that? What's the next step? Mr. Mayor, council member Urkel. The next step would be if there's a consensus the council to bring it to could bring it to the May 28th meeting if you like. Council can prepare a a case for that. We can have a public hearing. Um photos can be provided at that time. Um and um you know there would be no motion no decisions here this evening in terms of formal motions but uh but a consensus we would would direct staff to do that. Well, I personally I think we should go to the public hearing. So, and hopefully maybe her court is done. I don't know. But I I would like to hear the whole Whoops. I would like to hear the whole um story, see the pictures, everything. So, and that's what a public hearing would do. Anybody else? Can we get copies of the Yep. We'll send those out. Sure. So, excuse me. Moving forward, uh, as Miss Erko would like is not to consent here or Sure. Okay. Okay. I believe we'll uh put this up for a public hearing at the next meeting. Then for for the record, uh all council members and the mayor uh nodded in the affirmative. Oh, yeah. Good point. Yeah. In the meantime, if you can provide us with the pictures and IEP and any other material that you have pertain to this and uh if you can find out an update on uh their current court proceedings, that'd be beneficial as well. Okay. Thank you, Mayor Council. what uh is customary is to provide essentially and assemble a packet of information and the documentation for the basis for the action that would be provided to the holder of the IUP so that individual knows at least uh record to date what it would be the evidence um for the the city to take action at the same time the city and its own valition as long as a reasonable basis can do anything it really wants with the IUP so the record would be available not only to the city council but to the holder of the IUP as well. And if there's any additional um documentation that other residents provide and so forth, that should be provided and then in a reasonable fashion would be forwarded on to the holder of the IUP as well. Okay. All right. With that closed, uh let's move on to item number two, fee schedule review. Um Mr. Mr. Mayor and council members, we um generally in January we deal with uh fee schedule uh changes that occur and um I know that some of you are probably familiar with those reviewing those um reviewing those changes and we we generally as far as fees are concerned we try to um try we we cannot charge more than it costs us. Generally we're not charging enough. Um and so uh we try and evaluate those fees on an on a annual basis certainly and wanted to just have a discussion here because we're in the process of kind of establishing the budget parameters right now and we want to get your feedback on what uh some of the some of the uh fees that are out there right now. particularly um we're looking at uh planning and zoning fees um variances, code enforcement fees in particular. Uh planning fees, I know we've we've had some phone calls recently here as it relates to some of Kendra's work. Um we we generally whether the attorney works on it or um Craig Yokam works on it, our engineer or now if Kendra works on it, it generates an expense to the city. And so uh these expenses, some of which can be absorbed uh and some uh some we bill back to the applicant. Um in terms of planning and zoning fees, I know that we charge an escrow escrow of um $300 for example. Um and uh and in some cases the cost for planning and zoning is coming in at $3,000. Okay. So we have a significant um you know uh cost above and beyond what we're charging uh for some of these applications. Um some cities uh have have an onstaff planner. We have an onstaff planner, but she's new uh newer and uh and certainly coming up to speed. Uh hence the reason why we have Kendra kind of acting as a backup right now. She is uh rolling into more of a um call me if you need me and I'll bill you on an hourly type of basis for that. Um, but as as Grace comes up to speed and and more confident in the work she's doing, I think that'll start to um, you know, start to uh, fall off. The some cities charge for even if they have uh, on staff planner, they charge for the planning costs. So, for example, you come in and you want to reszone your property. Um, you know, nobody's forcing you to resone that property. You want to reszone it. there's a there's a cost to the city for doing that. And so the decision that you folks get to make then is is it the responsibility of the entire city to absorb this cost of a reszone or does it fall upon the person who wants the reszone and uh and do you want to capture some of those those fees? That's that's one of the questions um that we have. Uh variances are another situation. You want to put in a a second driveway or um you want to build a a larger than than code allows for uh secondary structure of some sort. No one's necessarily holding a gun to your head to to build that driveway to do that. But there is a cost associated in making sure that everything's reviewed and everything is comes out properly so that when it's recorded it's it's going to be a night it's going to be a legal document that'll withstand a you know a process of sale or going through uh uh um any sort of record search or anything like that. Um so that's kind of the question that's here before you today. We have a couple other fees. I know um I know Carrie has brought up um one of these fees where it takes two I forget the exact situation but it takes two publishings uh with the county at 30 $40 $50 whatever it is a time we only charge for one you know it's those type of things where um where do we re do we want to re-evaluate this do we want to capture the cost as opposed to spread spreading it out amongst the entire population of East Bethl. Just want to get your feedback on that. I've t I've taken a few of these phone calls about people who uh pay a fee and then get a bill that's two and three times as much. I think it boils down to a communication process or lack of not not you know informing someone that this extra work might take some time and some resources from the city. I think the other thing it involves is that when you have someone who's in a position and this is what their job is and you know and in some people's mind even mine in the beginning I'm thinking this is what they're supposed to be doing here at the city. If someone comes in and asks that question, this is what their wages are for. Um, could you explain a little bit why that's not exactly what's happening? Why the extra cost is actually there? Uh, Mr. Mayor, uh, Council Member Miller, uh, first of all, let me touch on the first issue. Yes, it was a, um, failure to communicate in the very beginning. We have since um changed a form to say that this is the escrow, this is the application fee, and there will probably be other fees associated with this. Um I've even asked um Grace to kind of ballpark. We just had a variance come through and that cost that person X amount. And that could be similar to your case in terms of the the amount of work that's required. Some variances fly through, others required a significant amount of of uh of work from staff. Um to touch on the second issue, uh there are certain staff functions that um for example, my work here at the city gets absorbed by everybody. Um there are other uh things where um you know you apply for a fire permit or something like that, you pay a fee on that. There are fees associated with some of the work that um that staff does. It's not out of the or it's in other words, other cities charge these fees. Some do, some don't. Uh and that's the question. That's the question as to um if if it doesn't cost very much to apply for an for a variance, you might have a lot more applications for variances. And then if you have so many variances and so many applications, pretty soon you're short staffed to the extent that you need to add another full-time employee to handle these continual requests that are coming through. So it has somewhat of a you know your ripple effects in a pond in terms of to the applicant it's just a you know it's fill out this paperwork the process involved behind the scenes of trying to make sure that that comes before the planning comes you know you pay your planning commission members you you advertise uh appropriately for it you have to um you have to then uh register it with a county cost associated with that if legal's involved if there's if they're ve various different things. It it can be, you know, cheap to what you're seeing some of those expenses that are out there like the Blanco project uh that's coming through has a has had a significant amount of back and forth. Um so the question then is is it incumbent upon the applicant to pay that or does the city get the pleasure of absorbing it? So can I ask a question? Can could it be itemized so that my thinking is every fee is a tax from the government. It's a tax and I am anti- probably the most anti-ax person up here. But that being said, I if we could make it just for instance, whoever is doing development, they because their stuff is huge, but what's on private properties. Now, I reszoning, I wouldn't mind having a reasoning, letting those people, resident or developer, whoever, um, pay whatever that cost comes up. But for it being on somebody's personal property, if they want to build a pole barn or a a barn barin barninium, I can't it's not coming out right. But uh then I say no, absolutely not. It is the city. Their taxes are paying this whole city anyways. So that's that's where I I stand. I think that developers and um some bigger projects like resoning uh but I would like to see it itemized and you know where the council can say yes yes yes no no no you know that kind of thing. Mr. Mayor and council members it's always itemized. Um you may not see it as itemized but everything is broken out in terms of what um what category it's going to be build as for from an accounting standpoint. I meant the fees. The fees itemized. Yep. All the fees are itemized. So that if the city is paying for it, what budget is that coming out of? You know, is it coming out of the legal fund? Is it coming out of, you know, um wherever I mean there's there's a myriad of different accounts that we have to track these things. Um so that can certainly be provided. Uh there and and this is precisely the discussion. It's like in this situation, uh, it's fine if you're, but perhaps in a barnaminium situation, you want 20 foot walls, which aren't standard, and it's going to require going through this extensive process. Um, whereas if you're told upfront, "Yeah, we can work you through this process. That's not a problem. It's going to cost you potentially $3,000 to do that." Then the customer can make a decision. you know, do they really need the 20 foot walls or do they think it's a simple process to get done? Um, I agree with what Suzanne saying. Our residents for their own personal property like a $300 charge to do it is fine, but if it's just normal things, you know what I mean? Versus developers and stuff like that where there's a lot more entailed with it, different story. We can't be raising prices on our residents. I feel the same way. It's like we're already paying staff. Our taxes are covering that. Staff is paid to do that job. So, we shouldn't be charging over and above. That's how I look at it. Different story when we got businesses or developers or some huge projects. That's what I got. Well, I I think it's important that our residents know exactly what they're paying for, period. Um, if we charge $300 to put a pole bar on to overlook the, you know, the the plans for a pole barn on a private residence, how does it get up to 1,200? I mean, they they've got to know exactly what they're paying for. And correct me if I'm wrong, are we starting to build back developers now? We didn't do that in the past, did we? Yeah. So, we started doing that. So, that that's going to help. Well, there but I mean we shouldn't have to do that with with the residents though. That's that's I agree with Jim on that one, you know. Yeah. There are there are two types of um developers. There's the shall we say a professional developer like Capstone which is aware of all the costs associated. They don't have an issue with it. And then there's the private developer that got into, you know, development of some land that they own, but they really don't know, you know, how to develop this and and they don't prepare things. I mean, the the additional work required by the city is essentially doing the work that they would have to do, uh, but they're not providing it because they don't know how to do that. Um or you have uh a situation where somebody wants to put in a pole barn. Um you know they they get plans drawn up. It's too close to the property line or it's over a septic system or it's over a bunch bunch of areas which a lot of that can be caught in plan review certainly. Now that's what your application fee is going to pay for is a plan review and and that sort of thing. These are additional the additional charges um that come up. They come up. We see them more often than not. But as long as long as they're aware of it, you know, I'm okay with something like that. I'm not okay with blindly charging people or sending them a bill that wait a minute, I gave you this amount of money and now it's doubled or triple that. I mean, that that's that's not okay. Hey, if we can fix that, that that's a big hurdle. You know, that's a big step in the right direction, you know, that communication process. But, uh, we're not in a we're not in a situation of giving money away either. I mean, it's our job to make sure that that dollar here is spent right to the bottom line. So, we're not going over or under. We want to be as precise as possible. Are we that far off on some of these fees? Because I I've I've heard before that some cities charge a lot for a polebard for example. I mean in the thousands right off the you know bat. I think Ramsey's one of them. They charge a lot of money for that and we charge a quarter compared to what they do. Right. You know u Mr. Mayor and council members, I I think I think with kind of the turnover in that department, we've had now the opportunity to look at these things a little closer and what was always kind of done in the past um hasn't really kept hasn't really been increased over time. Number one, uh but number two, when you start looking at the actual costs of it and what you're charging, you start scratching your head wondering why are we charging this because it's not even close to the cost, you know? Um, and that's why I think it should precipitate a discussion um, as to how do we handle that? It's a, you know, it's a serious liability to the city um, that we can continue doing it the way we've always done it or we can revisit it and try and determine what's more equitable uh, for the residents. as you know, um there's always uh you know, we levy x amount of dollars and there's always more things to do than the dollars available. And so if dollars are going to being sucked up in a certain area as opposed to um you know being used on things that need to be used on, uh then you're faced with a difficult decision of raising taxes at some point. No good deed goes unpunished. So before we contracted with land form, did we have these costs that uh I think the last five or six people have complained about because uh in my time on council and working with the city, I've never had heard of those costs being issued. So are these costs just being developed because of contracting with landform? Yeah, be Mr. Mayor and council members. Before contracting with Landform, we build out contractual services that whe again whether it's engineering or illegal or whatever the case is. That was the the way the city did it. You know, we if there was a contractual service that something required, they were responsible for that cost. Uh if it exceeded the escrow, the city ate it. Okay. Um I would say in the majority we did not bill for uh Aeron's time at that point. Um and if we had a planner on staff we wouldn't have build for that either. Um but because we went to a we're required to go to a contractual at that point do we bill for contractual? This is contractual now. Uh, and I think that's where it kind of got sideways is is uh finance always build for contractual. And so these these bills went out and I think there was two or three complainers justifiably that came in and said um uh wait what's going on here type of thing. So you know one of them I know you guys one or two I know you you said no city said he's going to absorb that. Um but then that that got us to the point of again drafting the the paperwork to say additional language on there so that you know buyer beware so to speak you know that there are costs associated in doing this. Um that was not council direction necessarily. Uh that's why we're bringing it through here to try and get that council direction. We can certainly strike that from the form uh or we can follow through on it. I I think having it on the form is okay. Uh just for better communication with the client, but uh in the same respect, uh I don't think that uh a resident should have to pay extra for something that happened as a as a result internally at city hall. So we uh lost our our director in that department. That was unfortunate. The residents should not have to bear the additional cost of of that. That's something that uh falls on the shoulders of the city that so those additional costs I don't believe they should incur them. Mr. Mr. Mayor and Council, we have a unique situation in that we've hired now a planner. Mhm. And we still have the contractual costs. Um so again it's um yeah I I don't believe that cont those contractual costs should fall on the residents as long as we're pursuing a the planner which we now have and another director so that when we can get a director hired that we will no longer have those contractual costs. I know all the calls I've gotten came after we kind of backtracked on the uh grazing land escrow deal. There was a couple of them come in right away and wanted theirs back. And uh I think like Tim and everybody else has said here that uh we got to be upfront with our schedule. It's got to be there in plain black and white, you know, so people are aware the consequences how it's going to go about and then they can question it. Why is this and that? And then we have to deal with them. But I think that it's got to be in black and white right away so they know what they're getting into. So let me let me clarify. Council member Mundo, you said it shouldn't fall on the residents personal res. You're talking the applicant. The applicant applicant. So, is that different than the mayor's position? I don't believe so. I don't think so. I I think we're all in one way or another in agreement up here that those additional costs that a a resident application should not garner those additional costs that having to go because we went with a contractual land form that those residents that are applying should not bear those extra unexpected costs. Now that we have updated our forms that you say buyer beware, um those should cover the additional cost though, those forms. Well, if it's any really unusual cost, maybe. But I I think we all are in agreement that it should go back to how it was before we start contracting with landform. Is there any disagreement with that? No. When it comes to the residents personal, there shouldn't be an extra fee over that. Correct. Businesses, different story developers, big even splitting lots and stuff like that. If there's a major like say that that one we just did with three lots, that's a different story because there's a lot more into that. Correct. Personal residence shouldn't be penalized in my opinion for any of that. Correct. That's how I feel. Okay. any developer, small, medium, large, they they can pay additional fees, whatever build per cost, per line item, but residents, $300, that's it. That's enough. They pay property taxes. Most of these developers don't. Yeah, I know. It's I've got another person calling me too right now who wants to do a simple lot split. What did you say? wants to do a simple lot split, but they butt up to state county land and a suspana forest, which instead of just a simple lot split, it pushed our code pushes it into a PUD where they got to do a planned unit development and it's going to cost them lots more money. I mean, you know, Mr. Mr. Mayor and Council, in a situation like that, it's probably going to cost the city a lot more money. Yeah. So, and that's precisely the discussion, right? I mean, do we do we pass that cost on or it's development or do we absorb it? It's going to cost us in the long run eventually anyway because we're going to have to update some of these codes because they're ancient. I think one of the hang-ups that uh the people that I've talked to so far has been, well, if they're not working on this up there, what are they working on? Aren't they paid to work on this during their hours that they're here? You know, it we're making it kind of seem like this is all after hours stuff that we're billing out when we actually are paying someone to be here and do this job. Yeah. So, if I can just kind of explain it again, there's an application fee. The application fee will cover um kind of the planer review or cover inspection to go out and and inspect the property, that sort of thing. That's what plan uh the the application field cover. Escrow is an amount that is paid that gets reimbursed if not used. Okay? Um escrow can be used for all of these things we're talking about here. The problem is the escrow is $300. And um if we have um the attorney fee in there, I I forget what your fee is, but that might give us two hours of work. That's more than 300. I was going to say I'm thrown the attorney under the bus. Not one just because he's present. Yeah. Less than an hour. Less than an hour. There we go. Um, so let's say it's a highly involved topic that needs I mean needs to be heavily researched. Boom. You're up to 1,200 bucks pretty easy. Sheep grazing. That got pretty expensive. Yeah. So, um, you know, you look at everyone's time in terms of coming before planning, coming before council, uh, notice noticing in the newspaper, you know, everything goes with it and 300 goes away. Then the applicant comes in angry because they thought they'd get their escrow back. So, this is the challenge that we're dealing with, but we can um we can try and draft something up here kind of based on the conversation here. Bring it back and we can So, what you're talking about now though, Matt, is like a developer situation, aren't you? Where there's more involved. It's not just a resident that wants to build a pole building or something like that, right? We don't need an attorney to get involved with something like that. I mean, what would a pole building, you know what I mean? Something trying to think of it, a situation where an attorney might be needed on that. Certainly, there's engineering that's required, you know, you know, if they're putting in a drain field or what what's a, you know, review of the the drain field, suitable soils, etc., etc. All of that $300 is gone in a just a whisper done. I understand that. Um, you ain't putting a drain field in in a pole building, though. I don't know. I'm I'm just I'm coming up with hypothetical do on a swamp. I'm coming up with hypotheticals. But um I'm just talking common sense easy for the residents. You know what I mean? I know if there's a different situation completely. I understand. You know, a lot of times say nine out of 10 there probably ain't the problem is is that the applicant comes in, they pay their fees, they start their process, etc., etc. pretty soon it grows into something large, right? That's where the cost is associated after the fact. Before it grows into something large, they should be made aware of that, right? Just because we should know enough to be just to start the process, but then if they come up with something different, it's like, well, I just got to let you know we got to get into this. That's why we're we're trying to we're trying this thisformational um portion of it by saying, "By the way, just so you're aware, this lot split or whatever the hypothetical is um has cost up to $3,000 or whatever the amount is, you know, just be aware of that and you can be responsible for that, right? because of that thought too with escrow money. I mean that's you're talking a bigger event versus a resident getting a permit for a whole building. I I'll give you for example um we had the uh gentleman that was building his house there kind of across the wet land. They had they had kind of encroached on wetland. We had to inform them you can't encroach on wetland. Um and uh and uh the attorneys got involved. I mean that was a massive undertaking. What what was the reason for that? Well, you had kind of a homeowner that was, you know, weekend warrior, however you want to say it, trying to save money. I get it. Everyone wants to uh try and do it themselves. The problem is some of these things are so complex that the reason why you pay a lot of money to developers is because there's a lot of time involved. And if the if the the individual doesn't know how to process that and and get the necessary ducks in a row, kind of falls on the city then because we can't approve or unnecessary delay it without trying to get those ducks in a row and that's where the cost is associated. No, I understand. So anyways, well I don't believe we're going to get into topic three. No, we can bring that to the next one. Mr. Mayor, so I'll entertain an adjournment of the motion journ. Second. A motion second. All those in favor? I meeting's closed.