Good evening everyone and welcome.I will call this Bloomington City Council meeting to order. It is Monday,January 26, 2026. Thank you everybody for joining us here in the councilchambers. Thanks to everybody watching online. We will begin our meeting as wealways do. If you're able, please stand and remove any head covering and join mein the pledge of allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of theUnited States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nationunder God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> Once again, welcome and thank you forjoining us tonight. Top of the agenda tonight, council, isuh to approve the agenda. And we got a busy one again this evening. Uh, underintroductory items, we have a couple of items. Item 2.1, an introduction of newemployees. And item 2.2, we're going to hear the 2025 annual report and the 2026work plan for the Bloomington Human Rights Commission. Moving on to ourconsent business, item three, Council Member Robertson has consent thisevening, and we have 16 items on our consent agenda. Under item four,hearings, resolutions, and ordinances. We have three items. Uh first is apublic hearing uh for a resolution uh the host approval and issuance. It's bythe city of Hampton, Minnesota and its revenue note. And uh Lori EconomyScholer will explain that to us um in in more detail as we get to that. And item4.2, it's a resolution declaring intent to reimburse certain expenditures forthe utility system improvements from proceeds of bonds to be issued by thecity. And item four is uh 4.3 is a public hearing regarding the thirdalcohol license violation involving minors at Benihaha.Uh item five, organizational business. Uh we've got item 5.1 to order andauthorize to bid the Nine Mile Creek corridor renewal project and the NMCreek lower valley management plan renewal project. And then council, underitem five, I'd like to uh uh walk on a couple of items. I think you've all beeninformed of this. We've got a couple that we will be talking about. The firstwill be item 5.2. uh discussion on the local affordable housing aid and we'reuh we're hearing a proposal to use that for emergency rental assistance here inthe city of Bloomington. So that will be item 5.2 and item 5.3 uh is a resolutionto close the public meeting of the city council and go into close sessionbasically to uh to discuss uh some proposed litigation that the city may ormay not be part of. So that would be item 5.3. And we'll wrap up as we alwaysdo with our city council policy and issues update. Again, as I said, a busyevening for us this evening, council. Uh, any corrections or additions to theto the agenda? If not, I would move tonight's agenda as stated.>> Second >> motion and a second by council memberCarter to accept tonight's agenda as stated. No further council discussion onthis. All those in favor, please signify by saying I.>> I. >> Opposed. Motion carries. 70. And we havean agenda. And let's get into it. Item 2.1 is the introduction of newemployees. Uh, I think we've got a couple. And why don't we start with AmyCheney, our um our chief information officer, going to be doing anintroduction for us. >> Good evening.>> Good evening, Mayor Council. Tonight is my pleasure to introduce Carl S. Carljoined us as a GIS specialist in November of 2025.He assists with creating and maintaining spatial data, building web maps forstaff and residents, and supporting staff in their use of GIS software.In Carl's short time here, he has assisted with building a communityresource map that will connect residents to valuable services within the city,such as food and housing support. He has also built an custom tool for staff tofulfill data requests more efficiently. Prior to Carl joining us at the city, heworked uh for the Minnesota IT services providing GIS support to the Departmentof Health as a GIS developer. And prior to that, he interned at uh HenipinCounty for two years while attending graduate school at the University ofMinnesota. Carl also served six years in theMinnesota Army National Guard as a human resources sergeant and plays guitar in alocal cover band called Cactus Hat. Carl, would you like to say anything?>> Good evening, Carl. Welcome. >> Thank you. Um, pleasure to be here. Um,yeah, very excited about the work I've been getting involved in and veryexcited to, uh, yeah, continue, uh, contributing to the city.>> Well, we're very happy to have you here. Uh, happy to learn more about yourbackground. Sounds very interesting from, you know, National Guard to guitarand and it in between. So, that's perfect. So, absolutely. Welcome aboard.Thank you for being here with us tonight.>> Thank you. >> Thank you.and uh Anthony Deella, our recreation manager, has an introduction to make. Oops. Good evening, mayor and councilmembers. I have the privilege to introduce KT Bulver House to all of youthis evening. KT is our newest recreation supervisor in our parks andrecreation department. KT will oversee our recreational facility reservationsand also our youth athletic associations that we partner in with with our city.KT born in Bloomington, a current Bloomington resident, um received her MAand her MBA from Concordia University and she comes from the city or comes tothe city from Lifetime Fitness. We're just super excited to have KT'sleadership, her forward thinking, and all her other skills as part of the parkand recreation team. And I'll let her take the floor.>> Welcome, Katie. >> Thank you. Um, like I said, or like yousaid, my name is Katie Bover House. Um, I was born and raised in Bloomington. Ispent my childhood playing in NM Creek, going down the big slide at Moyer Parkand riding my bike up to Axeman's to see what was in the free bin. Uh most of mychildhood I watched my dad give back to our city for 24 years as a volunteerreserve and our reserve chief of police. Um I I adopted my feral cat frecklesfrom our Bloomington animal control. I volunteer within our city and the cityhas always provided me everything that I've needed from opportunities tosafety, connection and growth. and I'm honored to be a part of our park andwreck team as a recreational supervisor and continue contributing to thecommunity that has given me so much. Thanks.>> Well, that sounds great. Thank you. Thanks for being here this evening andthanks for thanks for sharing that with us. Very nice. Thank you.>> Uh so both KT and Carl, we I say this to all of our new employees. Uh in a lot ofways, you're the you're the face of the city of Bloomington. they people willlook at us and and you know look at this group but what who they really look atis the people that they work with and interact with on a daily basis and thatwould be the two of you uh in a variety of different ways and it's a bigchallenge but I have no doubt that you're up to it uh maintaining thatintegrity that uh excellent service and the great work of our Bloomington staff.So welcome aboard looking forward to seeing you interact with our communityand and doing great things. So welcome. Thank you.>> Thank you. Item 2.2 on our agenda council is the2025 annual report and the 2026 work plan for our Bloomington Human RightsCommission. Commission Chair Anita Smithson is here to present it for usthis evening. Good evening, chair and welcome.>> Thank you, Mayor and Council. Um, city manager, deputy city manager. Um, great.Right up on the screen. Um, I first want to take a moment just to thank you forhearing from the public at the session earlier and for the scheduled session onFebruary 2nd. Um, that is something that has been top of mind for the HumanRights Commission. We've been hearing about a lot. Um, so thank you for comingin with open hearts and open ears to hear our community members who caredeeply about each other. And this is my last time presenting our year-end reviewand our 2026 work plan. My um my time on the commission will end at the end ofFebruary. and it's been an honor to serve the community for six years. So,thank you. All right, so this is our work. Uh we'replanning our year in review and we're going to start off with ourcommissioners that we have had serving um this past year. Um Thomas Burns,Amomar El Mustafa, uh last year our youth commissioners have a kind of asplit term, so we there's four listed. Um only two serve at a time, but AlthiaForsner um left the commission in the summer. uh Noan Gansar, a commissionerwho is here with me today. Uh Heather Cammonson um my vice chair, GracieLebach was one of our youth commissioners who um was done at inAugust last year. Um Baron Lewis, commissioner, Amari Musenak, JuliaPerry, myself, and uh Commissioner Thornton who is here as well. Um, we'vealso been supported um by Eric Holt House, co-ed manager, and Kayla D'vorakFeld, the co-ed office support specialist, um, who've been amazing forus. And this upcoming year, we'll be we'll be with Amanda Krombi as aninterim basis, and Isella Mendoza, um, both from the equity and inclusion team,and we're really grateful for their support.So, our work plan, we were really intentional as years passed to make surethat we are in alignment with the city's strategic plan, Bloomington tomorrowtogether. Um, what we have appreciated so much about our work is ouropportunity to connect with community members and engage with them and hearfrom them. Um, so many of the things that we have done, people have sharedwith us that it's the first time that they've ever visited a a city councilmeeting when they come for a proclamation. um or that they don'tnecessarily see city government as something that's for people like them,which is silly because it's for all of us. Um so we really wanted to make surethat the work that we're doing is aligned with the work that you want todo. Um and making sure that building um Bloomington is a connected and welcomingcommunity for all. There we go. So, our year in review, um,it was really important to us that we had some events where we could engagewith the public and we could learn from and with each other. Um, we'reincredibly proud of some community members who came to us and reminded usof an event in the past, disab disability employment awareness month.Um, so I want to highlight this event that we had in October. We had 75attendees join us in person and online. Uh, community resource partners and wegot to hear a panel of speakers that were both experts in disabilityemployment but also disabled people who shared their experiences about greatemployers that made it possible for them to work fulfilling jobs. Um, saw themwhere they're at and valued the contributions that they provided. Ithink there's a lot of really wonderful lessons and Bloomington being a home toso many businesses. A wonderful opportunity for us to continue to growthat relationship that we have with business partners. Um share theresources that we have come from this meeting um to bring forward to sorry itskipped ahead but back on the last slide still. Um thank you. um the resourcesthat so many of our community partners have that are available to our businesscommunity here in Bloomington is something that we should absolutelycontinue to explore and communicate. And so as you're building thoserelationships with business partners um and small businesses in the communityand please leverage the knowledge that the Human Rights Commission has beenable to pull together to really make sure that Bloomington is a place whereall people of all abilities can find employment um and succeed.All right, now on to this one. And so we have seven proclamations last year thatwe presented to you all. Thank you so much for um hearing those and makingtime to hear community members stories. We had community provide input for everysingle one of those proclamations to make sure that they were reviewed on anannual basis and that community felt connected to the purpose that we weretrying to achieve with them. Again, so many people told us that this was thefirst time that they'd ever come to city council. that hearing each other'sstories and having an opportunity to share their story was incredibly powerand powerful for them and opened city government up to them. So, thank you forhearing that, taking the time. I know you often have busy agendas, so um weappreciate that you give us the opportunity to ensure that communitiesheard. Um,one of the things I want to share as a highlight that came out of um,especially the photo above from the A&HPI proclamation is that through thatum, the city of Bloomington has had an invitation to help plan the 50th uh,50th birthday or 50th anniversary celebration of the Japanese garden whichis coming in September 2026. So that was a relationship and a partnership that wejust have continued to develop with Normanddale Community College and theJapanese garden and these amazing um folks from the Normanddale CommunityCollege um student Asian club. So something to look forward to inSeptember. Um we've also been really intentionalwith engaging in the community and actually going out into the community.So we have tabled at farmers markets, other community events um includingJunth Pride and Learning Linkup. Um it's been a real pleasure to hear fromresidents to share the resources that we've been able to compile and umconnect with them. It's also really great to give the mayor uh cartoontemporary tattoos. So see that there. Thanks for being a good support for us.But again, just really any opportunity that we have had to connect withcommunity members to hear from them and to show them that city government is forall of us has been really valuable for all of us. We also facilitated the annual AlmarBanderude award. Um, this was recent so it's probably fresh in most people'sminds, but for those uh listening in and attending today, the Omar BanderootHuman Rights Award is presented by the human rights commission and the citycouncil to an individual or organization that has made a significant contributionto ensuring the rights of people in Bloomington. Omar Banderude was thefirst chairperson of our human rights commission which was founded in 1968. Sothis year we honored Unidos Minnesota and Normanddale Community Colleg'sequity and inclusion team. As we spoke in December when this happened, this uhaward presentation, those nominees really could not have been more timelyfor the moment that we're living in. Um deeply grateful that we had theopportunity to honor both of these organizations and I encourage the publicto visit the city's public YouTube page because there are great highlight videosabout these organizations where you can hear more about their work. So looking forward to 2026 again, we'rereally wanting to focus on making sure that Bloomington is building a connectedand welcoming community. And I know that you went through a large effort withpriority based budgeting this last year. I know that through that work there wassome decisions to restructure how some of the boards and commissions wereestablished here in the city and you moved the human rights commission fromthe community outreach engagement division to um the office of equityinclusion and workplace culture. Wanted to make sure I got the acronym correctbecause I know it's changed. Um I think that this is a really uh great strategicdecision you all made. um it will help us stay in tune with work that wasalready intersectional. And so I know that the incoming commission for 2026 umwhile I won't be here is really looking forward to that continued partnershipand maturation of the work that we're doing. So, we've got some annual initiativesthat we have always participated in um including the board and commissionsconnect which um you all reaffirmed with your recommendations in December um toinclude um you know more engagement that way um quarterly board and commissioncommunications as well as twice annual board and commission connect meetings.Those are really powerful for our members to feel engaged with othercommissions. So, um that is something that we will continue. The municipalequality index is um something that the human rights campaign does every singleyear and it has been growing. Um I'm really proud that Bloomington has gonefrom um I think a score, it's not on their website anymore, but I believe in2020 we had a score in the 50s um to indicate where this organizationbelieved that Bloomington stood as far as LGBTQ plus equality.We now have a score of 96, which is incredible. It shows you that the cityof Bloomington cares about LGBTQ plus residents and that it cares about theirLGBTQ plus employees. Um, so I just uh want to highlight that that's somethingthat we will continue to watch for on the commission, although at this pointit's it's there's not a lot of movement. Um, anything that the city might do toincrease our score um is going to be more on the employee side. Soconsidering domestic partnership benefits and then consider just reallydefining out the language of how you're providing services to the community. Umwe are happy to consult on that. That process often happens really quickly andthere's not always time. So thank you to the city staff that dedicates their umtime to making sure that Bloomington's submission is accurate for that. Umother items that we do annually again the Omar Banderude and proclamations.So, this upcoming year, we have um the list of proclamations on the screen thatwe intend to present to you um including uh Martin Luther King Jr. Day, whichyou've already heard, Black History Month, International Transgender Day ofVisibility, the Asian-American Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander HeritageMonth proclamation, Pride Month, International Day of Peace, uh there's atypo, I'm so sorry. Uh Hispanic Heritage Month, Native American Heritage Month,and International Human Rights Day. And again, these all have communityinput, community feedback, and we seek to get acceptters from the community aswell as from the internal business business resource groups here at thecity to help ensure that employees also feel heard and recognized through thiswork. Our other workg groupoup initiativesinclude understanding purpose. Um, part of this is just gaining knowledge. Wedon't know what we don't know, and we're all very curious and open-minded tolearn more from each other and from community members. So we will be seekseeking out regular education for commissioners as well as enhancing ouronboarding and commissioner experience. So um those are things that really helppeople feel like they are connected that they understand the mission um and theyalso understand what the role of of the human rights commission is. Um we'realso going to continue to connect and engage with the community. So continuingto build on what we've built this last year, maintaining and improving theresources for tableabling at events. Um, last year we had resources on periodpoverty, something that many people in our community experience, but nobodytalks about because it's fairly taboo. We were able to have wonderfulconversations and provide resources to community members. Um, that was valuableand important for people to feel seen. Um, we also have information on wherepeople can file discrimination complaints, where they can get resourcesum, if they have rental housing questions. Um, we don't always have theanswers, but we're glad to have those resources. We also want to make surethat the materials are more inclusive and that there's ways to reach moreresidents. So expanding the languages that we offer for our resources is apriority and um finding other ways that we canengage in the community. Not everybody wants to take home a paper, but ifthere's short videos or things that we can have on our website that that'shelpful. Um we will also continue to um have interactive and participparticipatory oper off offerings with the community just to continue to deepenthose connections. Additional items for our work groupsthis year is to foster inclusive community and cultural events. I amincredibly excited that we are host co-hosting an indigenous filmfestseries. um three dates, March 20th, June 26th, and November 14th, where we'll beseeing some documentaries, um PBS documentaries here at Civic Plaza andoffering opportunities for the community to get together, connect, and learnabout our indigenous neighbors. Our young commissioners uh are veryinterested in exploring a youth project. So, that's something that we'reencouraging them to embrace. Um it's been a great experience working withthem, and I'm excited to see what they come up with. We're also going tocontinue the disability employment awareness month educational event. Umthat was an incredible opportunity to engage with the business community andresidents and I think we can go even bigger and and really help get thoseresources into the community. And then the last for this is just to continue topartner with other community organizations and residents as momentsum come up that we are able to do that. As far as improving our outreach andcommunications, um we're going to continue to promote those proclamationsreally broadly, ensuring that they have broad community voices and input andfind other ways for the Human Rights Commission to get involved. So, ifthere's ever a community event that you think that we would be beneficial at oryou can even get some volunteer labor from us, please take us up on theopportunity. The commissioners love to engage with the community. And thenspecial opportunities could be an opportunity for policy development orencouragement of policy and considering the prospect of a themed year. So, moreto come on that. That is the end of my presentation. Um,I'm available for questions if you have them. Otherwise, I just want to thankyou for your time um and your attention and your support of the Human RightsCommission over the last six years. >> Thank you very much, Madam Chair. Thanksfor the information and the presentation and thank you for your service on the onthe commission and chair. We do appreciate it. Council questions,comments? Council member Dlesandro. >> Uh, thank you, Mr. Mayor. Uh, thanks forbeing here. uh commissioner um and yeah, appreciate your service on thecommission for the last six years. Um can you talk a little bit about what uhwith just um want to follow up on the kind of the realignment strategy intothe um into our um uh equity and inclusion and workplace cultureorganization. When you think about the benefits of that and you know is it astreamlining event? Is it a is it a resource uh you know sharingopportunity? like what where where are you looking as the next year goes by tosee that that would either accelerate the the the work of the human rightscommission or for that matter enable you guys to accelerate the work of the theoffice. How are you looking at that? I think they go hand inand and I'm Icertainly would welcome if Eric has anything to add but I think it reallyhelps um with efficiency truly because there's so many times that there wouldbe something that we had questions about or maybe needed input on and it wassomething that really did fall under the office of equity inclusion and belongingand so it will save staff time and staff resources having to sort of mediate andfind time in everyone's schedules to do that work. So, I think it will helpstreamline things. Um, I think it'll be more efficient, so hopefully save alittle bit of staff time. And I think that, you know, the benefit really isthat when you think about human rights work, it it's everything. But I thinkthere's there's something powerful about saying as a city that human rights workis equity work. It is inclusion work. So, I think it just fits better with thestrategies and um I'm grateful that you all made that decision. And I don'tknow, Eric, if there's anything else to add. Thank you very much, uh, mayor,council, councel, uh, Delisandro, uh, you did a great job of explaining that,and I think that's, uh, right on point, um, in the work that the equity,inclusion, and workplace culture team does. Um, that will always be incollaboration with communications and engagement. So, that remains strongthat, uh, collaboration, the communications, public participation,civic engagement, but it's certainly the case that the equity team has a lot ofstrength in their community relationships, their community building.That's a lot of the work that they do. So I think in the realm of alignment andefficiency and the talent and staff that exist in equity, it made a lot of sensefor the um human rights commission to to locate there. But of course to note thatthe collaboration will remain strong. So mostly just did what you had offered butadding that elaboration. Anything else council?Council member Lman, >> thank you for your service. I wondersince you've served for so many years if you have any words of advice to to ushere on council or those in the uh the public at all since you've served overso many years and so many interesting things have happened over that period oftime. >> That's a big question. Um I think juststay curious about each other. Um it's very difficult in community rightnow andum you all know that I'm very emotional. Um yeah, I I just think what I've takenaway from this time um is that we always have something new that we can learn.There's always something that we can unlearn in our brains about each other,about our community. There's always things that surprise me um in awonderful way and there's things that surprise me in a oh I need to thinkabout that differently kind of way. So just stay curious. Continue to encouragecommunity members to show up and be curious. Our government only works whenpeople show up even when it's uncomfortable. Um even when it's hard tobe held um you know to words that we that make us feel uncomfortable or sitin the discomfort. Um, so I just encourage you all to to continue tocultivate that kind of community because that is how we make democracy work. So, >> well, thank you, chair. Yeah, appreciateit. And thanks. I know we've got a couple of council or commission membershere. Thank you for your service and please pass our thanks on to the rest ofthe human rights commission and uh good luck. Looking forward to seeing yourwork through this year. >> Thank you. Thank you very much. Yep. We're going to move on to item three onour agenda. Council, this is our consent business. Council member Robertson hasthe consent agenda for the first time. >> Oh jeez.>> I believe council member Delisando. What?>> Yeah, I was waiting for her to ask >> Oh, I'm sorry. I I apologize. We do wewe actually need a motion to accept the uh the work plan. We forgot that.>> Oh, >> yep. We're going to need a uh a motionto approve the Human Rights Commission's 2026 work plan as presented.>> So moved. >> Second.>> Motion by Council Member Robertson, second by Council Member Dellesandro toaccept the Human Rights Commission's 2026 work plan. No further discussion onthis. All in favor, please signify by saying I.>> I. I. >> Opposed? Motion carries. 70. Now,finally, thank you very >> Okay. Thank you. Thanks legal staff, ourwonderful city attorney who probably said, "Hold on a second. You actuallyhave to approve this." Thank you. Thank you for your work. I appreciate it.>> Thanks much. And now we will move on to the consent business. And uh I believecouncil member Dallas, were you raising your hand because you had something tohold? Is >> council member Robertson doesn't knowthat I intend to hold 3.12. So that was what I brought up.>> Okay. Thank you, >> Council Member Robertson.>> Uh thank you, Mayor. Um yes, with the exception of um Council Member Dander,you said item 3.12. Yes. Uh so um with the exception of item3.12 um hearing no further questions. I don't believe there's any otherdiscussion or questions on any other items. Correct. Um all right then Iwould move um to approve items 3.2 uh through 3.16 >> uh in addition to item 3.1and anything else Melissa tells me I should do.>> So the motion is to uh accept the consent. The motion is to accept theconsent of business 3.1 through 32 11 and>> my apologies. Yep. >> And then 313 through 3 16.>> Thank you, mayor. >> Is that correct?>> That is correct. Yes. My apologies about that. So 3.1 through 3.11.I uh so move those. Uh we will hold item 3.12 and then move to approve items 3.13through 3.16. Correct. Motion by council member Robertson, second by councilmember Dalisandro to accept tonight's consent business as stated. No furthercouncil discussion on this. All those in favor, please signify by saying I.>> I. >> Opposed. Motion carries. 70. Item 3.12.Council member Dalisandro. >> Uh, thank you, Mr. Mayor. I I apologize.I I I feel like I pulled an audible here and I didn't mean to, but but as I was Iwas getting uh um as I was getting through this again, the the I feel likethe cost of Axon has gone up exponentially and I just wanted todouble check that I am correct on that. I feel like when we first passed thisbecause like I don't know four years ago or so I feel like there was a numberlike half a million a year and now it's 3 point something million a year and I'massuming there's more work maybe happening or not but I just wanted todouble check it if we are in the business of actually questioning ourexpenses like we say we are. I want to throw this one out there because itfeels like it's a lot more. It's totally probably valid and everything but Ididn't I didn't know anything about it so I thought I'd ask the question. Thankyou, council member. And uh just for everybody's uh understanding here, Exxonis the police camp, police body camp, just so everybody knows that. And that'suh we have seen those costs increase significantly. Uh Mr. Walker.>> Yeah, thank you, Mayor, Council Member Dalisandro. Appreciate the question. Uhthis actually crosses a couple city departments, so it's used by our policedepartment, but technology obviously managed by our information technologydepartment. So I'll ask um city staff if they would help opine on this item. Chief Hajes, good evening. Welcome.>> Good evening. Uh this is not an increase for Axon. This is um we had money setaside uh for a new records management system or to maintain our recordsmanagement system. The decision is made to go with Axon for our recordsmanagement system as opposed to the current central square that we have now.So even if we were going to stay with central square, this would be the dollaramount, but it's the amount that uh it has had set aside for this project. Allwe're doing is going to Axon to manage our records. So everything iscontiguous. >> Okay. That helps a ton. So So the thename is what caught my attention, but what you're saying is it's actually twodifferent services. We have the actual suppliers of the body cameras, but thenAxon has a data management function as well that you are also now going topartake in. >> Yep. Our records management system isthe system we use for police reports and everything else. So okay,>> it's a it just allows the system to be more contiguous together.And that's not an un I'm assuming that means that that that's about the pricewe were paying right now for records management police regardless.>> It might be a little cheaper than we were going to pay for the other.>> Even better then. >> Yeah. And then this one uh the amountthat's due on here we don't have to pay it for two years.>> Okay. Excellent. >> Right on. Uh and is that an annual feethen? Like is it it's 3 million over three years?>> Okay. Very good. >> Thank you.>> That's very helpful. That's all I needed. Appreciate the clarification andsorry that I >> Council We're not asking for any moremoney. No worries. No worries on that front.>> Not today. Council member Delisander, would you like to move? I know.>> Yeah, that that's totally fine then. Thank you. Uh, thank you for theclarification and thank you for the um I that's a question I could have thrownout earlier and I apologize. I didn't have the time to do that. Um, so I willmove to approve Axon Enterprise quote and statement of work for implementationof Axon's records and standards program governed by the master services andpurchasing agreement currently in place. >> Second. Motion by council memberDalisandro. Second by council member Carter to accept to accept item 3.12from tonight's consent business. No further council discussion on this. Allthose in favor, please signify by saying I.>> I opposed. Motion carries 70. Thank you. Council member Robertson. The first oneis always the hardest. Now you Now it's easy to do. Now it's easy to do. We'llmove on to item four, our hearings, resolutions, and ordinances. Uh ourfirst public hearing of the evening is item 4.1. This is a public hearingregarding a resolution to host approval and issuance by the city of Hampton,Minnesota, and its revenue note for Frasier Child and Family Service Centerproject to finance a project located in Bloomington. That's a lot of words, andI'm sure uh Lori Economy Scher, our CFO, is going to explain that to us. Goodevening, Miss Coner. >> Good evening, mayor and council. Um Ijust want to acknowledge Jim um Olsen is the CFO and executive vice presidentfrom Frasier. He's here in the audience should you have questions for them. Umso this particular uh public hearing is to give approval that the city ofHampton can issue the debt and spend those dollars in our city. So um underMinnesota law and federal tax rules, we as a city need to give approval thatanother city's bond proceed authorization can be spent in our city.Um this is not an obligation of the city. um you know nor um and the city'snot affected in our tax and authority and it will be solely paid from um therevenues that Frasier generates to pay their their debt seers back. So it's notan obligation. It's just they're getting proceeds and they're going to spend itin our city. >> Very good. Everyone understand aquestions of Miss Economy shoulder regarding this kind of a unique one butI think it's pretty straightforward. Hampton issuing the debt but it's goingto be spent here in the city of Bloomington. Correct.>> All right. All right, no questions for now, but uhdon't go far. Thank you. So, >> as I said, this is a public hearing andI will open the public hearing and I just want to make sure that everybodyunderstands our ground rules for uh public hearings. Uh if you want to speakon this, please come forward. Make sure you sign in and identify yourself as youstart to speak. We limit everybody to five minutes. And we have the shot clockon the wall to keep help you keep track of how long you have spoken. And when wereach five minutes, I will cut you off, not because I'm a mean guy, but becauseI want everybody to have the same amount of time to speak. And so uh that will bethe uh that will be the plan. And we also what we'll do if you have anyspecific questions, we'll collect questions and we will answer them at theend rather than trying to answer them on the fly. We'll have to answer them atthe end of the public hearing. With all of that said, is there anyone in theaudience who wishes to speak to item 4.1 this evening? I'll open this publichearing regarding uh a resolution to host approval and issuance by the cityof Hampton and its revenue note. Briana, do we have anyone on the phonewishing to speak? >> Mayor, we do not have anyone online.>> Last call for anybody here in the chambers.Council, no one on the phone. No one coming forward in the chambers. I wouldlook for a motion to close the public hearing on item 4.1.Motion by council member Dalisandro, second by council member Rivas to closethe public hearing on item 4.1. No further council discussion on this. Allthose in favor, please signify by saying I.>> I. >> Opposed? Motion carries 70. Closing thepublic hearing. Council thoughts on this. any concerns or additionalquestions you might have of Miss Economy Scholar. It's pretty straightforward. Ithink it makes a lot of sense and uh uh I my questions are about the FrasierChild and Family Center project and I'd like to learn more about that as we getcloser to the project, but uh that's not our topic right now. Uh Council MemberDelisandro, >> I just wanted to confirm, Mr. Mayor, ifI could, this is the this is the former um Slumberland building right at thecorner of 78th and Xerxes or is it on the north side? I can't remember which.>> Misher. Um, Council Member Lona, uh, Dando Alesandro. Um,Jim Olsen is shaking his head that Yes, it is at the location.>> Yeah. Okay. Thank you. Yeah. Great. Um, no, I'm I actually love the idea of thatgetting developed. So, thank you. Just >> absolutely.>> Council, if there's no other questions, I would look for uh action on item 4.1.Council member Aisles. >> Sure. I'll happily do that.I am moving to approve a resolution resolution giving host approval andconsent to the issuance by the city of Hampton, Minnesota of its revenue notefor the Frasier Child and Family Center project series 2026 to finance a projectlocated in the city of Bloomington. >> Second motion by council member Dallas,second by council member Nelson to accept item 4.1 as stated. No furthercouncil discussion on this. All those in favor, please signify by saying I.>> I opposed. Motion carries. 70. Up next is item 4.2. M economy shoulderis back again. This is again is a resolution. No public hearing on this,but it is a resolution declaring intent to reimburse certain expenditures forutility system improvements from proceeds of bonds to be issued by thecity. Miss Economy Scholer, >> Mayor and Council, consistent what we'vedone in the past, we have put all bond related issues type items in section 4.Um, again, this is just a resolution and this is um asking the council to approveup to a maximum of $33 million for the North Central Sanitary DiversionProject. Um, the reimbursement resolution comes now. We would ask thecouncil at um a future date to authorize those bonds and we're looking at afuture date of u May 18th as the date that we would um bring the the bids onthe sale to the council. So the authorization will come later, but um sothese ones here will be able under Minnesota statute and tax rules, we needto capture all the costs that are occurring now until we issue the bondsso that we may reimburse them with the bond proceeds.>> Council, any questions on this one? Again, pretty straightforward.As I said, this is not a public hearing for this one. This is just approval of aresolution. So if there are no questions orcomments, concerns, I would look for action on item 4.2. Council member Lman, I'll move to adopt a resolutiondeclaring the official intent of the city of Bloomington to reimburse certainexpenditures for utility system improvements from the proceeds of bondsto be issued by the city. Second>> motion by council member Lman, second by council member Nelson to adopt theresolution declaring the official intent of the city of Bloomington to reimbursecertain expenditures for utility system improvements from the proceeds of bondsto be issued by the city. No further council discussion on this. All those infavor, please signify by saying I. >> I opposed. Motion carries 70. Thank youvery much. We will move on to item 4.3 on ouragenda. Uh this is a public hearing as well. This is regarding a third alcohollicense violation involving minors at Benihaha. UhI know this is a a special kind of setup for us. Uh Miss Manders, I'm going toask you to remind the council and me uh exactly what we're doing here and andour different role that we're taking on as a council at this time.>> Sure. Uh thank you mayor members. Um as you probably remember, the council canact in quasi legislative role and a quasi judicial role. And in tonight'sparticular public hearing, the council will be asked to act in a quasi judicialrole. Um, so it will be more like a court hearing. Um, there will be timegiven to both sides. And there are specific requirements in the processrelated to how you're going to vote and those sorts of things. Um tonight, uhPeter Zuniga, our deputy city attorney, will be marching us through that, notmarching, will be leading us through that process and um we'll indicate whenwe need to take certain actions and I will be uh watching that as well. And umI'll pause for any questions, >> questions on what we're undertaking heretonight. Council >> Council Member Delandro,>> I just had one question that maybe it isn't. Um we we had had a conversationum as a council about um about the um the requirements around um the uh theneed for training for individuals that are that that are are serving beveragesand things of that nature. Do you remember that conversation? Did we getthat any I didn't see it in this particular packet around any of theparticular requirements as we pass judgment and everything like that. Ididn't see it in there. So, I wondered where we were in that process. Dad, wehad not passed it yet or we had not incorporated it yet.>> Uh, I I don't >> Am I the only one that's rememberingthis? >> No, I I do remember that conversation.Um, but I I don't know given given this unique kind of setup we're in right now.I think what we have to do is go through this process, then maybe bring that upin the uh um council policy and issue update, you know, answering thatquestion or talking more about how we want to move forward with that. I mean,I think if we can get a nod here, I don't think we've implemented that inany >> We don't have anything in right now. I Ididn't see it in the the options that we were going to consider. So, it isn'timplemented yet. Okay. Very good. Thank you. That's all my questions.>> All right. Council member Lman. >> Mayor, I did send a question ahead tothe city manager. I'm not sure if this is a a time to talk about that or if weshould wait till the presentation is over and then ask it. I'm not sure.Maybe you'll answer it in the in the in the procedure.>> Why don't we see if the presentation question?>> Mayor, council member Lman specifically. uh council for Benihana uh BloomingtonCorporation is here and is prepared to answer your question specificallycouncil member Lman. Uh just real quickly to address council memberDelesandro's question. Uh this was going to be covered in some of my housekeepingitems that I was going to make. Um if you remember back in October the councildid amend the city code uh one related to server training. Um so that is in ourcode. Um you will hear from council from from Benihana Bloomington Corporation.uh they have seen that they've taken that seriously and he will present thatinformation to you. Um you also amended the violations for involving minors forthe first and second violation. I will note that we are here for a publichearing for the third violation. You left that provision untouched and so wewere we're still operating under those existing rules. >> Thank you. Everybody kind of on a levelplaying field here now? Very good. Mr. Mr. Zuniga, please.>> Thank you, mayor, members of the council. Uh we are here for a publichearing for the uh suspension and issuance of a fine related to a thirdalcohol violation involving uh the Bloomington or Benihana BloomingtonCorporation uh for a third violation occurring within the past 5 years. The Benihana Bloomington Corporation,which is located at 358 South Avenue, Bloomington, Minnesota, 55425,which is located at the Mall of America, holds a city of Bloomington intoxicatingon sale and Sunday on sale liquor license. Uh, a little bit further in mypresentation, you will find that uh, who the license holder is important. Uh, itis not Benihana. It is Benihana Bloomington Corporation. They are thelicense holder. Under both state law and Bloomingtoncity code, it is unlawful to provide, sell, furnish an alcoholic beverage to aminor. And so that's why we are here. Uh, a alcohol license uh is creates aproperty interest. So, anytime the city wants to suspend or revoke that license,the license holder is entitled to due process under our code, they areentitled to at least 8 days notice of a public hearing. On December 16th of2025, I provided that notice via written letter sent via certified mail to theBenihana Bloomington Corporation. Um, that is one way that we ensure that weare providing due process for the license holder. Uh as I indicatedearlier, council for Bloomington or Benihana Bloomington Corporation is heretoday. After I speak, uh the license holderwill be provided an opportunity to address the council as well. So annually our police departmentconducts uh annual compliance checks where a detective goes out with anunderage operative and they conduct compliance checks where the underageoperative will enter the establishment, order an alcoholic beverage.the transaction is witnessed by a Bloomington detective. And if theestablishment fails the compliance check, the detective quickly identifiesthemselves and informs the employee that they have violated uh state law, cityordinance, and failed the annual compliance check.For our purposes, um the license holder received their first violation onSeptember 12th, 2023. They failed the annual compliance check.As part of that process, we submitted a written letter to thelicense holder informing them of the license violation and then alsoinforming them of their right to request an administrative hearing before thefine is instituted. On February 23rd, 2024,uh the license holder admitted to the violation, they paid the civil penalty,and then they waved their administrative hearing. And so in your packet, uh, youwill see that as what we've labeled as exhibit B. Again, in August6 of 2024, the Bloomington Police Departmentconducted their annual compliance check. And again, the license holder failedthat compliance check. On October 29th, 2024,the license holder admitted to that violation. They paid the civil penaltyand then they have waved administrative hearing. Uh I will also note um bothexhibit B and C. If you look at the signatures of those documents, they arelisted as the Benihana Bloomington Corporation.With respect to exhibit C, council for the license holder who is present todaysigned that that stipulation and signed that waiver of the administrativehearing. And so the reason why we are here todayis because for the third time within the past 5 years on August 11th, 2025, thelicense holder again failed that compliance check.A Bloomington police detective and an underage operative entered the licensepremises and ordered an alcoholic beverage. The employee looked asked forthe identification and looked at it. Um it's also important to note that theunderage operatives are instructed that anytime they are asked about their age,they are not to lie about their age. If they're asked for identification, theyprovide their actual driver's license which shows that they are underage. thathappened in this case. Uh that is represented for you in your packet withthe Bloomington police to report that documents how the underage operativewent in, ordered a corona, was provided it. And in this particular instance, theemployee did ask for the identification, uh looked at it, but calculated thedates wrong and yet still provided the alcoholic beverage to the minors. So the penalties um I mentioned earlieryou looked at the penalties in October. However, you did not change a specificpenalty related to a third violation. Here the penalty says that the citycouncil shall impose the fine as set forth in appendix A and in this case itis $2,000 and a 5day suspension.Uh there's no discretion in that penalty. Uh that is the penalty that isset uh in city code. When we're talking about a multi-day suspension, thesuspension shall run consecutively uh beginning, you know, as the coderequires at 12:01 a.m. on the first day uh and ending at midnight on the lastday of the suspension. Now, as I mentioned, um, council for thelicense holder is present. Um, and so earlier today, you were emailed anupdated resolution as well as information that the the council for thelicense holder intends to present to you. Uh, we have had a nationwide outageon the peak software and so we were unable to add this to the agenda packet.Um, but I want to bring up one more exhibitthat's not in the packet and that unfortunately we couldn't add to it. Um,so I'm going to ask Grant to put the overhead on. So I think for this document, I printedthis up today from the Minnesota Department of Public Safety and theiralcohol and gambling enforcement division. If you notice here, thelicense holder is the Benihana Bloomington Corporation.The license was issued uh first in 2014 and it was recently renewed uh in 2025and expires on June 30th of 2026. In addition,when the license holder submitted their application for renewal,uh I want to note that they did submit it as the Benihana BloomingtonCorporation. This was the cover letter that theysubmitted. You will see here from their licenseapplication renewal that they did submit it as Benihana Bloomington Corporation. And then the final page of theirapplication is a date that it was submitted and renewed which is May 20May 7th of 2025. And so at all times the license holderhas been the Benihana Bloomington Corporation. Uh it's my understandingthat council for the license holder intends to to uh submit documents to youthat indicates that there's been a change of corporate officers. Um but Iwill submit that the license holder as submitted by their license applicationrenewals as maintained with the department of public safety has alwaysbeen the Benihana Bloomington Corporation.And so if we can we get the present there you go.So, if we look at city code, the city council shall impose a $2,000penalty and a five-day suspension uh for the if there are three incidencesby the same license holder at the same license premises.So, with that, I will give an opportunity to the license holder tospeak. Um, council member Palomi, you look like you're about to ask aquestion. Um, as part of the process, we would allow the license holder to speak.Uh, if the council has questions for either me or the license holder, uh, wewill reserve time for the council to ask questions and then reserve time for thecouncil to have discussion as well. >> Thank you for that clarification. So,council member Lman just got jot it down and hold on to hold on to your question.>> I would invite council up for the the license holder. Good evening andwelcome. if you could identify yourself and yep, the the microphone should getyou. >> Good evening everybody, honorablemembers of the council. Uh my name is Alex Tbolski. I'm general counsel of theOne Group. We own and operate several different restaurant brands uh includingBenihana, STK, Kona Grill, and Raw Sushi. I really appreciate uh the timeuh that you're giving us today. Um I had I have a presentation for you guys thatI wanted to walk through. Um Peter kind of cut to the chase. Uh what I wanted totalk to you about was the concept of license holder and I wanted to talk toyou about um the retraining uh that we've done uh and the policies thatwe've implemented um to hope you to in hopes that you guys can appreciate thatwe take this very seriously. Um because this is very serious and our toppriority is the health and safety of our uh employees and our guests. And in thisinstance, uh, that commitment was violated. Um, sosection 13.41 focuses on license holder. Um, I think that's really importantbecause, uh, in May on May 1st, 2024, the one group acquired uh, Benihana. Uh,it was a very large transaction and in our view, uh, this changed the thelicense holder. Um there was an upper tier change in the equity ownership andeffectively management for the entire organization changed the decision makerschanged. Uh and that was also reflected in the officer update that we did uhwith the city and the state. Uh we updated the officers um on the liquorlicense. I don't have the records for 2023 and2024, but when this incident happened in August of last year,uh we descended upon the uh the venue and we did retraining on August 15th,2025. Um I brought here today sign-in sheets that show uh all the employeesthat signed in for that retraining. It's a responsible alcohol service trainingthat uh has been developed uh by our training teamand all the employees that uh were currently employed at that venue didhave a retraining who serve alcohol. And I also have a policy change uhdocument that we distributed to all of our employees on August 28th, 2025. Um,and that policy change is that all staff is required to check IDs for any guestwho orders or shares an alcoholic beverage. Uh, so it's no longeruh how old do you look? Um, but it is uh we asked for the ID for any guest. Inthis instance, in August of 2025, that wasn't the issue. It was a calculationissue. Um, and what we also uh what we also did for our employees on September29th, 2025, we also put together um information sheets on how to check IDs,how to calculate dates. Um, this was if if you would just lay it on the um onthe deis where the piece of paper is right in front of you. Move that and putyour paper on top of the the logo there and it will be on the overhead camera.How about that? There it is. >> So, this is the first page and then seeif I can go. >> I'll give you a moment to review that ifyou'd like. I can also show you the uh the policy change document. This is the press release that we issuedto the world. um was also included in an 8K SEC filing um that explained the uhthe acquisition uh by the one group of Benihana. These are what the uh responsiblealcohol service training signin sheets look like. Andwe did it again every other month in August. I mean in October.There were fewer employer employees in October. In addition, on October 23rd, 2025,uh we uh communicated a policy and an enforcement policy uh to our employeesexplaining that uh failing to check a guest ID before serving alcohol wouldresult in a final written warning and any subsequent failure to check IDswould result in a termination. Um, I will confirm to you that in 2023,uh, the offending employee was terminated. In 2024, the offendingemployee was terminated. At that time, uh, the GM was, I believe, MichaelJohnson. And, uh, in August of 2025, although Michael Johnson, the generalmanager, did not serve, uh, the, uh, the Corona. Um, it was a, it was a server.Uh, not only was that server terminated, but so was the general manager. this again uh another retraining inDecember and because of the high volume in December and Januarywe did another training in January of this year and we will continue to doretrainings every other month indefinitely.Uh so I I show you all of this because I want you to really appreciate that wetake this very seriously. Uh we have four restaurants in the state ofMinnesota. Uh three Benihana and one Kona Grill. Um we employ hundreds ofcitizens of the state of Minnesota. Uh with the Benihana brand alone, we employover 6,000 employees nationwide. And across all brands for the company, weemploy over 9,000 employees nationwide. And we have approximatelyund and alittle over 160 venues uh globally. This is a an extremely rare occurrence. Umit's unfortunate I have to meet uh the members of the city council ofBloomington under these circumstances. I wish it could be something differentlike do you know providing tanyaki food to the uh anniversary of the Japanesegarden. Um but you know unfortunately I am here. Um but the CEO has sent mebecause we take this very seriously. Um, and I'd like to open the floor to anyquestions that any of the council members may have for me. >> Questions? I I want to ask uh Mr.Zunigar, we we're through this with your questions now. We can do that. Okay.Very good. Council member Nelson and Council Member Disandro. Council memberNelson and Council Member uh Lman as well. Council member Nelson.>> Thank you, Mayor. Um, apologize for my lack of formality. It's Alex, right?Yes. Um, are you asking for a deviation fromour guidelines? I I appreciate that you brought forth information that showsthat you're taking this seriously. That's good. Are you asking for adeviation because of that? >> So, I think that I find myself in adifficult position here. Um, and probably the city council does, too. Um,I did have a meeting, you know, with Peter uh earlier today and I went overuh the concept of license holder. Um, because I think it's important to tofocus on this. Um, I looked at the legislative intent and I couldn't findanything that has to do with license holder. There's no definition of licenseholder in the code. In my view, the in our view, the licenseholder changed when there was an equity uh ownership change at the highestlevel. And uh although Benihana Bloomington Corpwas issued the liquor license, Benny Benihana Blooming uh Bloomington Corphas a parent and that has a parent and that has a parent. And ultimately, ifyou go all the way down the chain, there was a top tier change in ownershipstructure which changed the the management. And so what I'm asking citycouncil to do is to not count the 2023 violation against the one group which isthe ultimate parent company. We're a publicly traded company on the NASDAQand our stock ticker is STKS. And so if the city council were to adopt myunderstanding of the license holder under these circumstances, then we couldmove away from a five-day suspension and focus on a one-day suspension instead.And that's what I'm asking the city council to do here today. >> So yeah. Yeah. So, one group purchased Benihanaumbrella organization. Benihana owned multiple places including the Benihana>> Bloomington Corp. >> Bloomington Corp.>> Yep. >> Okay. Um,and so your contention is that because there was a change in ownership but umand license holder. And so my question is when that purchase was made,what was purchased? Was the corporation purchasedor were assets purchased? Was an a was it an asset purchase agreement where youdidn't take on the liabilities or did you actually purchase the corporation?>> So this was an actual purchase of the stock in the corporation. So it was anequity. >> So the corporation still exists. So, thecorporation still exists. It was not an asset purchase. The corporation stillexists. And what I have here, which is what was submitted to the city,I'm sorry I didn't present this earlier. It could have been a little bit morehelpful. Um, so I'm trying to streamline this here. This shows the previouscorporate structure chart. This was included in our application for anofficer update. Um it shows that the top tier Safflower Holdings LLC was changed to TOG Kaizen AcquisitionLLC. So essentially that is the entity that acquired the stock in the in in theultimate parent company. >> Yeah.>> Council member Delisandro. >> Hi, nice to meet you. I'm going to callyou Alex. You can call me Lona. That's fine. Um uh appreciate the informality.Um so to make sure that I understand the timeline, this is helpful here. Um onecorp was in charge of this location as of what date?>> So the one group um >> one group, sorry.>> Yeah. No, that's okay. Uh the one group uh closed the acquisition on May 1st,2024. >> Okay. Okay.>> And on May 1st, 2024, effectively the one group took possession ofBenihana and all of its subsidiaries. >> Okay. So, so um my question would bewhat did did you attempt to um did you do a review of the licensesthat you have for all your liquor establishments? And did you determinethat you you did or did not need to change the ownership here in the city ofBloomington in order I mean what what I'm trying to get at is what was yourthought process that allowed you to either ignore or choose not to if youmeant to actively change the ownership structure on the on the documentationthat we have if it was important to you that that get done.>> Yeah. I mean I I I think it's not necessary. I don't think the coderequires uh the uh uh the the license the the the entity that the license isissued to to change. Um I don't think that's required by the code. Um and weworked with licensing authorities and council to ensure that all of all of thelicensing authorities nationwide were notified of the top tier change inownership and that's what we did and we followed the application process toupdate the officers accordingly. Um, and it's it's kind of like a routine it's aroutine thing that happens in an acquisition. Uh, and to my knowledge, wedidn't we didn't miss anything. Uh, it's something that it's something that we uhwe did in conjunction with the licensing authorities.>> The re uh you did with the what kind of evidence do we have that you came to thecity of Bloomington and updated that somehow?So, one thing I didn't share here was the application process was theapplication that we submitted and actually Peter shared it as well. This is the cover page. This is I believe for the state. This is for the city of Bloomington. This is an officer update explainingthat the one group is adding officers. This is for Tyler Ly. This is Christy Hing, an employee of theone group. So, this is an official application thatwas submitted with the city of Bloomington. Um,updating the list of officers who essentially are responsible uh on theliquor license as employees of the one group. And so, and this is this is verytypical when you do an acquisition, you change the you update the officers umyou know with the licensing authorities. What you do is you identify uh uh uhofficers that are officers of the parent uh because ultimately these are thedecision makers uh that uh oversee all licenses uh for for the company. And andat the time that you did that, was there any conversation with the city abouteither changing the license holder as you define it um as it's defined here asBenihana Bloomington or the license number itself, the actual literallicense number itself? Did that change as a result of that? You're basicallysubmitting the officer information. So, what I would contend is that when therewas an acquisition, the license holder changed. I understand that the city ofBloomington issued a license to a specific entity and the name of thatentity didn't change, but the equity, the management, the control, that allchanged. And so without a formal definition of the license holder in thecode, without legislative intent to help everyone here understand what thelicense holder truly means, I'm asking the city council to breathe meaning intoit and reflect the fact that management did change and the acts of the priormanagement perhaps maybe in this instance should not be held against thenew management. That's what I'm asking. >> Understood. Thanks,>> Council Member Lman. My question is for our attorney. So then um my my question is um so if uhI thank my colleagues for asking the other question I had. So but but this ismy question for you. Uh if we have a new company that acquires a uh you knowacquires the license by which uh that service is being done there. Let's say,you know, you have a let's say you have a certain company, we'll call it Kcompany, and they're serving liquor there. A new company comes in andpurchases that uh that business and acquires that license. What happens withall of the previous uh um let's say um uh uh violations uh in that particularcase? Mayor, Council Member Lman, in thatparticular circumstance, if a new company came in and purchased the newcompany, the new company would have to apply for their own liquor license. Um,so that when or there would be a transfer of ownership or trans ormanagement agreement transferring the responsibilitiesuh for the license to the new owner. Um, I just want to mention a couple ofthings that since we're informal here, Alex said. Um he he said it right there.The corporation didn't go away. Um Benihana Bloomington Corporation stillexists. Um it was a purchase of shares. Um and so the city takes a position thatif it's simply replacing officers of of the corporation that's responsible forthe for the management adherence to the license requirements, every licenseholder would simply switch uh officers of the company to avoid that liability.Um you know what what Alex showed you uh the city has a two-part application. Uhhe only showed you part two of the application right here. If you look atpart one of the application, it clearly lists Benihana Bloomington Corporationas the license holder. But what application two does is simply replacesthe responsible individuals with new individuals. So the license holder isstill the same. Uh it has existed since 2014 and they submitted this renewal aslate as as 2025. >> If I could just ask one other one oneother just two more questions. So when it says non-transferability,if if uh you had started a new company, I guess that's what I'm trying tounderstand. So it sounds like to me what the the applicant is arguing arguing isthat they started a new company, but you know, if it's going to be transferred,it would have to have a new license, right? I mean, that's what I'm trying tounderstand from a from a legal and what we've done in the past in thesecircumstances with other companies because I've seen that happen beforewhere the ownership has changed and they come in and they reapply for the exactsame license. So, just help me understand how we've done that in thepast as council. >> Mayor, Council Member Lman, you'reexactly right. When a new company comes in, they are required to get a newlicense. What typically will happen is there will be a management agreemententered into the old existing license holder and the new company for thatexisting license holder to manage the alcohol service and operation until thatnew company has an opportunity to apply for its own license and receive it.>> Would the the uh offenses that that occurred under that old license carrythrough to the new new company? >> Mayor Council Lman, no that would not.>> Okay. So, in this case, this is not what we have though. We don't have a new newcompany. We have the same company which I've seen before. I just want to makesure I understand this. What we've done in the past when there's been a changeof the directors uh and the leadership in that organization that's still underthe same company. What we've done in the past is we've said no, you have theexact same license and those violations that have occurred in the past carrythrough even though it's a new ownership. Right. Mayor, council memberLM. And I think that's exactly what happened here is that those uh corporateofficers were simply replaced. Council member Rivas,>> microphone, please. M. Council member, >> my questions are a lot quicker andsimpler than those. Um, just two. Uh, when did the violation occur and whendid you first apply or try to make an intention to remedy the issue?Yes. Are you talking about the 2025 incident?>> Uh, in general, it's the same license, so the whole thing covers I, you know,I'm I'm not familiar with the legality of everything, but I've been in thebusiness very similar to that. And whenever there's an acquisition and thename changes at the top, the what trickles down is that nothing is goingto change and that goes with the entire staff that works for that particularentity. So in that case, Mike, that's why I'm asking you when did theviolation occur and when did you first make a move to kind of rectify theissue? You know, as it's been stated already byour attorney and some of our fellow uh council members,if you have made a move to change things before and try to get a new license,that could have remedied the issue. Although most companies try not to dothat because otherwise they have a waiting period to after they apply forthe license for especially for a liquor license. So in order to avoid thatnobody changes the license numbers. So by doing so you are as assuming all thatresponsibility that already exists whether it's negative or positive.So, you know, I I would have suggested to you that as council member Nelsonasked you that if you were trying to get a variance on the issue would have beena lot easier for you because what you have made clear to us is that yourcompany is still in violation of the the guidelines of you know selling liquor tominers. Uh, you know, anywhere you put it is still it's the company'sresponsibility because you never change name. Benny Hannah continued to be thesame name. The license continued to be the same license. That never changed.Um I can you know say that you know management dropped the ball by nottraining people the way that they're supposed to. I you know recently I'vebeen working through uh healthc care and we get trained every two months onliquor selling and and we don't serve alcohol on under normal circumstances.So, you know, I'm I I would, you know, like council member Nelson suggested, itwould have been different if you come asking for something totally differentthan what you're asking for right now. At least in my point of view. That's allI got. Thank you. >> Well, if I may.>> Sure. >> Um, I think it's really important toacknowledge a few things as I respond to what you said. This isn't just anofficer update. That's not what this is. And this is not going to create an abusefor fraud where you can just update the officers and then wipe the slate clean.That's actually not what I'm asking here.The one group acquired Benihana and paid $365 million to actually acquire all thesubsidiaries of Benihana and that transaction closed May 1st, 2024.The entire executive team from the prior management structure was gone. So theyno longer the ones who had the 2023 violation they no longer had controlover the license and they effectively were not the license holder anymore. Iunderstand there's a lency and the license E is Benny Hana Bloomington Corpbut in my view the license the license holder goes a bit deeper and you have togo to the ultimate parent and you have to go to who effectively manages andcontrols the the the license. And when you think about that, well, you you onlycan really come to the conclusion that it's the ultimate parent company, whichin this case would be the one group. And so in 2023, the reason why I can'tanswer what was done in 2023 is because we weren't the license holder.So I I actually can't I wasn't I wasn't here, neither was any anybody a part ofthe one group here in 2023. So I wouldn't be able to tell you what wasdone in 2023 because we weren't the license holder. But then in 2024there was an incident and that to us came across as a fluke. We have a robusttraining department across all brands and we do effectively manage responsiblealcohol service training. In that instance that did happen. I oversee alllegal activities for the company and this is this doesn't happen to usbecause we have such a robust training program. So the fact that this didhappen here should have been a red flag and we probably should have changed thepolicy then. We didn't change the policy in 2024. But in 2025 we realized thismight not have been a fluke and it was the same general manager who oversawthat restaurant. We separated employment and we did change policy and instead ofjust relying upon onboarding training, we have decided to do retraining ofresponsible alcohol service every other month, which is what we're doing, whichis the signing sheets that I that I showed to you. And in addition, wechanged the policy. So now it's not just looking at how old you may be. And ifyou look over 35 or you look over 40, we check your ID. No matter what, in everyinstances, we check your ID if you're ordering liquor. And if you fail to dothat, that is a final written warning. And if you fail to do that again, you'reterminated. And in addition, we distributed uh uh those thosecommunications about the policy changes in August and September of this pastyear. And we continue to do the retrainings and it's scheduled for uhthe retraining is scheduled for March because we did one in January and we didone in December of last year and again we're doing it in March and every othermonth so on and so forth. So I I hope that answers your question because itreally cuts to the core of who the license holder is. On the sheet thatPeter showed you, you see the lency as Benihana Bloomington Corp. But thelicense holder in my view and without any legislative intent in the code andwithout a definition of license holder in the code, we are left to interpretwhat that word means. And today I'm asking the council to interpret that tomean who actually manages and controls this license and who should beaccountable uh for the for these actions. And in 2023, the one group wasnot responsible for the license. We could not control what was going on in2023 because we weren't the we weren't the holder of the license.So that's what I would submit. >> Uh one more question, Council MemberRio, and then Council Member Robertson. >> I just have a quick follow up on it. UmI I do realize that you guys acquire a company and I've been part of anacquisition before you know and as junior management you made the decisionto keep those managers as managers not the top executives but the junior middlemanagement and all of them remain in place. Therefore you make the decisionto take accountability for whatever decisions these managers make.Right? Um I mean I'm not talking about 20 23 right but 24 25 it is totally yourresponsibility 23 uh you acquired a companyMay 24th say May 1st 24 right >> yeah the the transaction>> when actually happened the first incident when did it happen in 23>> in 23 >> yeah when what month did it happen>> I believe it was September Peter >> September so the negotiations werealready happening all this time right I the new executives could have negotiatedall those liabilities as part of it. You know, you're responsible for whateverhappened before. We're going to pay this some sum of money for the company andyou know, work out all those details between the attorneys. I mean, like Isaid, I don't have a complete understanding of what happens there.I've been involved in several of those acquisitions from bigger companies intosmaller and you know you of course everybody feels the ramifications of it>> but I mean when you buy something like that you are acquiring everything thatcomes with it if you didn't work the details as an attorney before you makethe decision to pay for the company you are taking all responsibility for thatat least that's my understanding right that's all I got mayor thank you>> thank you council member council member Robertson Thank you, mayor. Uh, Mr. Tabolski.>> Alex, please. >> Alex. Perfect. Call me Danielle.Wonderful. Um, so I just have a question. Um, you talked about thelegislative intent of the term license holder, right? And that we're currentlylacking a definition. And so you're asking us to breathe life into thatterm. I just want to be clear that your ask that we breathe life into is thatlicense holder would be defined as the parent pump. I And I truly am not tryingto be obtuse or anything like that. I just want to make sure I'm really clearon on what we would what definition we would be breathing life into. Right.>> Yeah. I think Yeah. >> to No. And totally please I never stoptalking. Jump in anytime. Totally fine. Please go ahead.>> I I think that I'm asking you to look at the bonafide owner of the license. Andthe bonafide owner is the owner who actually owns the shares of the companyand who owns and controls the day-to-day decisions of the company. And thatholder of the license changed May 1st, 2024 when the one group acquiredBenihana and all of its subsidiaries and the entire management team who wasmaking decisions for that entity that Benihana Bloomington Corp. theyeffectively went away and and you know what I can add to that is the the CEOwas terminated the first day on May 2nd. Okay. Okay. And then so our our CEO forthe one group is the CEO of the one group. Uh and so uh the chief financialofficer of the one group ranks higher than the chief financialofficer of the subsidiary Benihana. And ultimately the the the who manages andcontrols that license that changed but they but but it's not just that theofficers changed. It's that the top tier equity ownership change. It's thebonafide owner and controller of that license, which is that's the that'sreally the the concept that I'm asking the city council to breathe into who thelicense holder is. Now, what that would mean if the city council were to adoptmy definition of this is if there was an acquisition. And and it's interestingbecause it's very important. You know, I think council member Lman brought thisup and Peter addressed it, which is if this was just a pureu uh ownership uh change at the lowestlevel, at the lowest level from Benihana Bloomington Corp. to uh PepperjackBloomington Corp. Okay. Pepperjack Bloomington Corp. would apply for a newlicense. Okay. And that new license would have a new license number and thatnew license and new license number would not have the history of the priorlicense. That that much is true. But if if the city council in the city ofBloomington gives effect to that, then why wouldn't it give effect to an a atransfer of equity at the highest level when essentially it's kind of the samething? But we just didn't have to apply because it's a top tier change. And youknow, I I can appreciate uh Council Member Delisandro's viewpoint on thiswhere I think that you would have liked us to apply for a new license perhaps,maybe, or maybe you thought it was required. What I will say is it's notrequired under these circumstances because it's it's it's a it's a top it'swhat we call a top tier ownership change. Um it's at the highest level.that sheet that I sent you, seven layers of uh of different entities, uh oneowning the next, one wholly owning the next, but ultimately at the end of thatchain is an ultimate parent company, and that's the one group. Andmaybe they make things easier for, you know, bigger companies when they'redoing bigger transactions like this. I mean, you know, we're talking about 90restaurants that transferred to uh an entity and it would have been much morecomplicated for um you know, a company of our size to do transfers of eachindividual entity and apply for new licenses. And so jurisdictions allow forthis to happen. And so all I'm asking is that you you let us have a clean slatewhen we actually became the license holder.Um that that's that's essentially what I'masking. >> All right. If there are no morequestions, maybe we get to one more question.>> Okay. I I think we can get to comments. So, thank you both very much. Uh I thinkuh I will need a we're going to need a roll call vote to close the hearing. Uhso, do I need a motion to close the hearing?>> Need a motion to close the hearing. So, >> moved.>> Second. >> Motion by council member Dallas, secondby council member Lman to close the hearing. And we will take a roll callvote now to close the hearing. >> Dalisandro,uh, yes. >> Reebas,>> yes. >> Nelson,>> hi. >> Lman,>> hi. >> Robertson,>> yes. >> Carter,>> hi. >> Mayor Bassie,>> I passes 70. Closing the uh the hearing.Very good. Thank you for that. Uh, discussion. Council member uh councilmember Nelson and then council member Dallasro. Um, I I just want to say I'm Ifirst of all, I appreciate the the responsible alcohol service trainingthat you folks just obviously jumped right into when you saw this was anissue. Uh, and in answer to your question, Council Member Disleandro, uh,we did pass mandatory server training as a requirement for liquor licenserenewals. uh businesses are required to provide documents showing 100% ofservers have taken the approved training in order to renew license as of uh orrenew their license on 7126. So January July 1st of this year we won't receivedocumentation of any training until the time of renewal. But I think we canagree that um the steps that these folks took admirable and and well done to totry and avoid things in the uh in the the future. Uh our question now is youknow the we're looking for the basis of the facts here and I think in theinterpretation that we've been asked to um from from my standpoint and the wayI'm looking at this um the license holder is the name on the license in mymind and the name on the license that we have seen for all these years is theBenihana Bloomington Corporation. It's the same name on the license and thesame name on for that matter on the uh the violation forms that we've seen thathave been mailed out. And it's not a new new license as we've been talking aboutit. It is indeed a renewal of a license. And I think to uh to try and to splithairs on the notion of the license holder license e the differences I Ithink in my mind this is um pretty obvious where we should go and thisnotion I I appreciate that um it's Mr. Sabowski considered this a rareoccurrence. Uh three years in a row is not a rare occurrence. I think it's arare occurrence to have three vi three years in a row violations with our ourBloomington businesses. And that is the rare part of this. Um, that's where I'mcoming from. That's where I'm standing. Council member Nelson, I saw your handup earlier as well. And then Council Member Delisandro.Thank you, Mayor. Um, I'll just be very quick. Uh, a business is uh separatefrom the individuals that owner own it. It can be transferred and all that. Thebusiness is a separate entity. It stands. If you bought it, you bought itwith all the assets, all the liabilities, everything that comes withthat. Um that's why a lot of times when people buy businesses they don't buy theliabilities they just buy the assets they buy the physical things the namethe goodwill that type of stuff and it's a totally separate transaction but ifyou bought the actual shares of the company the company is a separate entityit comes with all the baggage that it comes with I mean that is I mean youknow that's just fundamental to to our system and you know I went on thesecretary of state's website the business has been renewed in 23, 24, 25.It's the same business. I the business is responsible for its operationsregardless of who owns it. I mean, I I own a business. I could have a heartattack tonight and it would transfer to whoever it transfers to. I forget, butum or maybe don't want to say publicly. Um, and you know, all of the stuff likeall of my clients would still expect me to fulfill all of my contracts.Everything that we said we would do would still be fulfilled. Um, I mean, Iappreciate the argument. I and I really, as the mayor said, really appreciateyour stepped up efforts on this and and so I look forward to next year you nothaving this problem. But for right now, the problem exists. It's the problem ofthe corporation and if that's just I think that'sfundamental basic laws with regards to business. So,>> council member, council member Delisandro.>> Uh, thank you, Mr. Mayor. Yeah, three things. So, yes, thank you definitelyfor updating your policies. I think it makes the city safer and I think thatthat's wonderful and thank you for being proactive about that. I I my biggestthing is that um there when the license was available for change of ownership ofthe stakeholders um the option was there to change the name and I'm notsuggesting you needed to even change the name but that it could have been the onegroup doing business as Benihana Bloomington and then we would knowbetter that there's a new license holder there. Um and that happens all the time.I mean, we get probably what 30 to 50 license renewals every six months comingthrough here and we so much so that we update them and put them on consentbecause we didn't want to look at them all the time. Um, so we get enough ofthem that we we we see what they look like and and these changes of ownershiphappen all the time. And so I'm I I think I think to me anyway, this is thisis a the fact that that the company is saying that um it wasn't required is onething. The fact that it wasn't known is the part that bothers me. That that whatI'm hearing us I'm hearing is two sides of the same argument. The one argumentsays we're so big. We were seven floors up and didn't even know what the littlepitily guys at the single entity were knowing, which is why I'm confused aboutwhy we're worried about $2,000 fine. Okay. So, I'll put that in perspective.And then on the other side, what we're hearing is we here at the city ofBloomington should have known by the names that you changed on the forms onthe second part of the form that you had a change of ownership. And I don'tunderstand that because I wouldn't have known that those two people becoming newentities uh new people involved from Korea would have would have I mean Idon't think a clerk in any city would have known oh that means ownershipchange like it just means that you change the responsible parties on thesame c on the same company in my view. So I don't disagree that ownership maybel like ownership should get defined in our code. Okay, sure, we could take thaton. But I don't, in my opinion right now, it feels like it's a lot to ask usto to look at this as not a consecutive three years in a row violation at thesame location with the same license number when something happened sevenfloors up and two doors over to a company out of country that wouldn'thave in a million years I would have made the the ability, you know, a clerkin Bloomington would have been able to connect the dots and go, "Oh, we shouldprobably proactively ask about whether or not that's a change or not. Like itfeels uncomfortable to me. So, um that's where I stand. Thanks.>> Thank you, Council Member. >> Council member Lman. Uh>> oh, I I think we're moving toward action. I think Council MemberRobertson, you have anything to add? >> Oh, uh yes.>> Thank you, Mayor. Um just uh to thank um everyone who's here tonight. I reallyappreciate what you're saying. Um, and Alex, um, I certainly do appreciate youasking us to really take a look at that and say, "Hey, there's no definition, solet's do that right now." Um, I'll be real honest with you. I would behesitant to breathe life into a definition that even possibly could makeit easier for someone to just change every year, every two years, right, andand get away with the violation. I also want to be uh really clear and to echowhat Council Member Nelson is saying. Um, and that I really, as a Bloomingtonresident and someone who frequents the mall, um, I really, really appreciateyou guys changing that policy, right? It makes all of us safer. Um, so thank youfor that. I love the remedy that happened immediately. Um, but I will behonest, I'm I would be hesitant to to want us to define it this way. I thinkto council member Dlesandro's point, um, it sounds like we do need to to defineit, right? Um, as of right now, the definition I want to breathe lifeinto is, uh, different than yours. Um, and so that would be my position. Ithink it's I would say that that the license holder was the same for allthree violations. So looking for action and I'm looking tocouncil member Lman. >> Well, Mayor, thank you. I think it's allbeen uh stated since this is a quasi quasi judicial uh process. I kind ofhear where I think we're headed. So, I'll move a resolution uh of a findingof fact in conclusion of law in a decision of the city council of the cityof Bloomington regarding the third alcoholic beverage license violation atthe Binha located at 358 South Avenue, Bloomington, Minnesota 55425.>> Mayor, >> Miss Mandershide,>> uh just to be clear, I the motion that's proposed on the screen says BenyahBloomington Corporation. >> I was going to I was going to say thesame thing. So, thank you for catching that. So, the motion does include thewords Benihana and Bloomington Corporation.We have a motion. Do we have a second? >> Second by council member Dalisandro. Isthere any additional conversation on this? We're going to go to a roll callvote one more time. >> Briian, please.>> Dlesandro. >> Hi,>> Rivas. >> Hi,>> Nelson. >> Hi.>> Lman, >> I>> Robertson, >> hi.>> Carter, I may >> I. Motion carries 70. Once again, thankyou for the the updates you made to your policies and please share that and um welook forward to to continued success and uh continued hopefully not seeing youagain. So very much. Thank you. >> That concludes uh that concludes ourhearings, resolutions, and ordinances for the evening. We will move on to ourorganizational business now. And item 5.1 under organizational business is toorder and authorize to bid the NM Creek corridor renewal project and the NMCreek Lower Valley Management Plan Renewal Project. Andwe've got the the cast of thousands today. Um Renee Clark is going to kickus off. Thank you very much. Welcome.>> Thank you, council. I will get started as the presentation comes up here. Umnatural resources has been a top priority for council and the community.um which is why council asked staff to develop a proposed project to beconsidered for local option sales tax and that's what we're here to presenttonight. In 2022, um, park staff convened with engineering staff andstaff from the NM Creek Wershed District, as well as their administratorto align our plans, our CIPs, um, for investments and our prioritiesaround trails, um, infrastructure and facility needs and restorationpriorities. And that's how the proposed project um, was developed.This is a significant natural resource investment that provides uminfrastructure improvements, resilience to protect and improve access that'scherished by our community and beyond. This graphic you've seen um many timesnow. It came out of our park system master plan is our promise to thecommunity on how we will work together to develop um design um of projects likethese. We started back in 2024 um and culminated with a concept plan about ayear ago um that determined bike trails would not be included in this projectand we spent 2025 developing the technical details of this project umbringing us to tonight. You heard from us at the end ofDecember. Um underway is a bid for tree removal to uh facilitate constructionand um getting ready to bid um the plans for the Harrison Park um VeteransMemorial and the trail head improvements um from Harrison Park. Tonight we'rehere to present the specific components of the 9mm Creek Corridor renewalproject. Future projects will include wayfinding as well as natural resourceum and cultural resources educational opportunities.Starting here with the Moyer Park project. The concept for Moyer Park isputting a park in a prairie. Um tying the park um restoration here to theoverall um restoration efforts of this corridor. It includes a new picnicshelter, consolidated parking, a trail loop, which is important to um thecommunity, and um a redo of the disc golf for safety. And this is the secondof two um ADA accessible routes to the creek.The playground here serves toddlers, teen to teens, accessible rubbersurface, inclusive and accessible equipment that will be a unique to thepark system. Design was developed with community input and with user groups. The shelter, which we've seen um herebefore, includes um accessible restrooms and an open air shelter that willreplace the existing building and open air shelter. I'll turn it over to um my team members,which I didn't introduce at the beginning, Derek um from Bob Simons, ourassistant director of engineering. >> Right. Thanks, Renee. I appreciate theopportunity to speak to you again. We've we've talked a couple of times here.Each time we come forward, we have more information and more details to sharewith you. So, I'm happy to present some of the aspects of it. As Rene hasmentioned, the the um components here around the parks, there are othercomponents within the park system that we're also talking about um specificallyaround our infrastructure with uh repaving the 8-foot trail between Moyerand 106th Street. So, that's the northern portion of the park m uhmaintaining paved trails in that area. Um the trails south of there towards theriver will also remain but they'll be aggregate. So we have a pave system andan aggregate system uh to try to uh balance that a little bit with ourusers. Um within the the project overall we do want to replace two bridges. Oneof those has unfortunately already washed out um is being replaced andanother one uh we're replacing it to make it uh longer and taller so that itbetter accommodates the creek and protect that from having the same fate.Uh other sixes are bridges are being redecked uh so that they're going to berevitalized. We're removing one and and trying to work with all thatinfrastructure. Uh there are some stairs that we also have in place. Uh thestairs north of Morgan Circle will be removed. Uh we have a a switchback areacoming in for new infrastructure to replace access to the northern portionof the trail. And then those of you that are uh familiar with uh 106 streetparking lot, replacing the stairs that go uh from that parking lot down to thecreek. Of course, the bypass on 106 to the other side and down will remain, butuh that kind of dangerous staircase that's in there will be replaced with anew one. So dual access at the center point of the park. Um this was somethingthat came up midway through the the project, but under 106 Street there's aretaining wall that are under there. There's one concrete one that's by thechannel and then there's some other ones ups slope that are I think timber pileon there and there's some stability issues with those. So it sounds reallyglamorous that we're going to do a soil pinning but it's a geotechnical processof stabilizing uh the retaining walls that are already in place so that theystay where they're supposed to uh stabilize those and then make sure thatwe don't have any interference with the other portions of the project. uh it'snot as glamorous because it's not a necess necessarily natural resourcecomponent of the project, but very critical that all of our infrastructureuh remains stable and and works in place.So, one of the things I want to talk about is specifically around the creekand the natural resources. Uh 9M Creek is a gem uh particularly in this lowerreach, but it is an urban stream. There is some instability associated with uhthe amount of storm water. uh previous efforts to have uh stabilized portionsof it have been successful in some instances. They certainly delayedthings. Um some of them need refreshing. So we have a number of areas along thecreek. These are all taken there where we have storm water inputs. We haveerosion that's encroaching on our trails. We've got some uh repairs thathave been done that just need to be spruced up a little bit and try to workthrough all of that. Uh so we've focused specifically on theerosional features within the corridor as we think that's a a primary area withthat being the central resource to the park system. Uh you can see here in thisphoto with the uh the cones on it or the barrels uh that is bridge 8. The onethat we're being replaced because that event that erosion you see thereeventually uh undercut that south abutment and and had to be removed forsafety reasons. Uh some of these other photos in here along the channel wherewe've got embankment erosion. Uh some of these are along the valley wall wherethat's starting to erode away. It works up the valley wall. Uh it's important aswe look at this to try to determine the best solution. And we have kind of asliding scale on that from trying to use vegetation and natural material up tohaving to use rock and other uh hard material to try to protect it. uh thephoto on the top with that tree leaning over, it's kind of hard to see in thephoto, but there's uh town houses and apartment buildings up above that slope.So, that would be an area where as that slope continues to erode, uh eventuallythat will become an issue for that infrastructure to lose that space. So,that would be an area where we would come in and armor that to hold that inplace. The one in the middle would be an area that there's nothing like thatabove. So we would try a softer solution uh to hold that in place because if thatultimately is not successful, there's not the same risk that we have in otherlocations. So we really tried to be thoughtful inour approach. We wanted to show some examples of whatsome of the actual work will look like. So these are not from nonmal creek yet.These are from other representations of what we're proposing to do. One of themore common things we're doing is the root wads and live stakes. And if youlook at the the photo on the top left, uh you see there's some root wadssticking out of the side. Those are actually long sections of trunk with theintact root wad that embedded in the creek embankment. The interface of thatchannel is that root wad then. So instead of using rock and othermaterial, that serves to protect it from the erosional forces of the flow. Andthen we like to couple that with other things such as that log vein and boulderhook where as much as we try to protect the embankments there oftentimes inchannel improvements can achieve the same thing. So deflect that flow awayfrom the outside of that bend into the center of the channel will reduce theerosion on that outside bend and actually scour in the channel andprovide some habitat in there. Um so we we put structures in place and some ofthese are already in place. We're proposing to add more in strategiclocations. Uh the fabric encapsulated lifts are away to build the embankment without using as much rock. Um again, you'reencouraging vegetation to establish in there. Uh same as the vegetated ripwrap. If you uh armor a section and then come back over with soil or compost andseed that, you can often times get vegetation to grow. You can also putlive stakes where you're taking cutings from shrubs that are living shrubs thathave been trimmed and get them established as well. Uh you get the sameprotection, but it softens the look a little bit. It's not quite as harsh asjust having a lot of rock embankments everywhere on the channel. So, we'velooked at each of the areas, prioritized them, received a lot of feedback fromcity staff, from residents, and have come up with what we believe is the bestsolution for each of the reaches. Now, one of the things that I think isgoing to be one of the most exciting parts of this project is this proposedremander. So, we have a section in the creek currently downstream of HarrisonPark that in the mega storm of 1987, the existing meandering channel cut a newchannel that went straight from A to B and it's been that way ever since. Uh,this is an area of the creek that is a little wider. It's naturally meandered.This is an opportunity to remove that straight section and introduce more of anatural geometry of the channel and let the channel do what it wants to do, butgive it a safe place to do it away from infrastructure. Try to avoid any of thattype of interaction and just restore some of those ecological functions andnot try to manage every reach of this stream.In doing so, we have an existing bridge that currently crosses that straightsection that will be removed and in its place, we're proposing to put in aboardwalk. So, that boardwalk will be an elevated feature. It'll be wood.There'll be a bridge section to cover where the channel is relocated. Butwe'll allow all of that area in there when it floods to come out of the bank,disperse, slow down, store that flow, and safely pass because the entire areabelow that boardwalk is capacity to for that channel to pass rather than onebridge that is either going to overflow over the trail or have otherconsequences. So when we put everything together on this and then we want to addan overlook and some educational material so folks that are coming acrosshere can see what we've done. Uh this is pretty significant. We're doubling theamount of channel in this reach. We're going to do instream habitat improvementso we've got the right conditions there for that to be stable. Uh encourage fishand macro invertebrates. Um get all of our things in place so that we've got areally healthy system. And then in conjunction with this, we're going toexcavate around those bends so that we're providing flood plane storage.We're restoring wetland in those areas and really trying to have this as alarge chunk that we're trying to get as many components in as we can. And thisis an area that's been very active historically. So, it's not unusual inthis location. Um, and we've talked a lot about impacts from some of theserepairs. Are we removing trees? are we having any sort of destruction with it?And I include this photo because I think it's an interesting conversation of whatBloomington has looked like in the past. So the black and white photo on here isfrom 1937. Uh the colored one is from uh 2024, I believe. U and you can seethere's a big difference in what this corridor looks like. Certainly from thedensity of trees, you can see where the channel is. Uh the re meander in thatblack and white photo is kind of in the center near the top where there's a bigopen space and the reason that big open space is there is there used to be a damon the channel and that was part of the mill pond. So that was inundated. Um inhere it's now wet meadow in this photo instead of water. But what that means isthat a lot of the vegetation in there is younger. It's more pioneer species. It'snot the same composition as a lot of the other areas. And it's also built up somesediment when that was a mill pond. So the soils in there are also a littledifferent than what we'd expect. So it's an ideal place as you can see in thisphoto uh where the channel was. Now we've got photos from different yearsthat in that reach that channel goes all over the place. It's not doesn't stay inone place and channels don't do that. That's a natural function. Um but I wantto point this out because when we talk about natural resources, the channel isa component of it. But I look at this and I see how light the tree cover was.Now, our plan is to go and restore the health of a lot of the wooded areas outhere. Uh that does include some tree removal. What I like about this is inthat photo, most of those isolated trees are buro and you can go out there todayand find those same trees. And those trees in that photo, most of those areover 100 years old already. So, a lot of what we're planning to do here isactually liberate some of those species that have been here a very long time.They're being encroached by younger species. They're being crowded out.They're being stressed by the lack of disturbance that actually kind of keepsthat burrow savannah healthy. And we can't go back and just let everythinghappen uncontrolled, but we can uh essentially simulate that with verycareful engineering and control. Um so part of our plan when we put allthis together is to generate a a request for proposals. Uh we have 235 acres inhere that we are including within the natural resource component of the plan.We have deliberately parsed this out into different components. So one of ourbig focuses is on invasive species. We have a lot of buckthornne. We have a lotof garlic mustard. There's dozens of other species in there as well, butthose are the main two we want to focus on. And that's pretty universal.We do need to remove some trees just because it's too dense. We don't havelight penetration to the ground. We have a lot of bare soil. It's not going intoremoving trees because we don't like them in the absence of naturally havingsome thinning. It is starting to impact the system. So, we will be selectivelyremoving some density of trees and being deliberate about that from 10 to 30%depending on the area. The Buro Savannah restoration is in those areas where it'snaturally thin. That will be more aggressive tree thinning because it'sleaving the oak and some sentinel species that are significant, but reallyopening those areas up. We also have opportunity for prairie restoration.There's an area of uh remnant prairie that's out there that it's in thosephotos and it's been there for a long long time. That's just this small oneand a halfacre sliver that's that's holding on but it's being encroached bytrees around it. So our plan is to liberate that area, remove the treesthat are encroaching on it, double that size and reintroduce what that footprintused to be. So part of that is preservation and part of it is expandingthat area. Couple that with buro savannah on either side and we have acommon unit that has similar management techniques that I'll touch on shortly.Uh our remander area does have wet meadow and flood plane uh habitatrestoration associated with that. Uh, and we are going to remove some ashtrees that are down more on the southern side. Uh, not all of them, but whereit's near trails and could be a safety issue. While we're in here withequipment, let's remove those, too. We'll certainly have some dead ash thatremain, but we'll remove some that maybe are a safety issue and just let mothernature kind of regenerate uh those. And because people love this park, sometimespeople love things maybe a little too much. There are some trails that areused pretty frequently that go up and down the hill and there's some erosionon there. We've got some natural gully formation. Part of our natural resourceplan is to repair those too. And our thought is while we have aggregatetrails of specific design and we've got our asphalt trails of specific design,we want to apply more of a wilderness technique on the the earth and trails.So rather than telling a contractor exactly how to do it, they can useexisting materials and build steps and uh an alignment that works better andthat'll keep that character for folks using those earth and trails on the hillslopes that it's not a created feature. It still is natural, but we will stopthat erosion that's uh degrading and exacerbating.And the intent of this is to start very aggressive. uh these differentcomponents of it will take place over the first couple of years in apreparatory way that'll be turned over to ongoing management and maintenance ofthose activities to continue that for a 5-year period. So initial work plus fourand then the plan is to have a long-term management plan in place that will beprescriptive towards some of the activities to anticipate work forward onmaking sure that this effort that's being done is really an investment. Thisisn't a one-time thing. This is a longtime thing, but the more effortthat's done up front with careful planning and we like to use adaptivemanagement that we will adjust to the conditions present and select the bestway to proceed. Um, we'll ensure that this is not a one-year project or afive-year project that this is a generational project and keep the healthof this corridor up. Um, one of the things I want to talk about in regard tothat is our Buro Savannah restoration. I think this is going to be a keycomponent. Uh the photo on the top that's got a lot of trees in there isphoto of existing conditions. You can see there's a lot of understory. It'svery thick, a lot of younger species. Uh the photo that's on the top that's alittle more sparse is existing buro oak that has had some cleanout underneath,but we have a lot of buckthornne seedlings coming in in that area. So ourapproach to buro specifically is to remove a lot of those trees, liberatethe oaks, manage the understory that's buckthornne, and then we actually plantit with a a grass mix so that we can compete with that buckthornne that's inthere, give it some competition, and what happens is that grass over a one ortwo-year period will build up and that grass then becomes fuel. So in thiscase, we would run a controlled burn through those areas, including theprairie areas. And the photo on the bottom right with the trail and bench isone of our lone oaks that's out there currently that's in the area near theprairie that's had a burn around it. That would be what we would expect tosee. But over uh let's see, our bur oak area. Just to make sure I get it right.Um, oh, I don't think I jotted that onedown, but we've got a very large area of the site. Uh, as you can see in thefigure there, the areas in that kind of yellowish coloring are where we'reproposing uh Buro Savannah. Um, similar activities for the different things, butI highlighted this one specifically because this is a good indicator of howit's not a we're going to go in and restore Burough Savannah. It's not threeor four years years in before we burn because we need all that prep work toget it ready. But that burn will be what really stimulates that back to more of anatural community and then we continue from there. So I'm highlighting this asan example for one of the activities and I believe Bob is going to talk moreabout um budget and timing. >> All right. Well, I get the fun stuff.No, he got the fun stuff. I got the budget and funding. But um I'm going totalk a little bit about our contracts and then uh the funding and our nextsteps. Uh Renee alluded to some of this in when in her part portion of thepresentation. We had two projects that were authorized to bid at the lastmeeting in December at council. First of which being the winter tree removal andwe did actually open bids for that project last Wednesday. Received fourgood competitive bids and we'll be coming back on through consent on nextthe next meeting next Monday to award a contract for that so we can get started.And that's the tree removal specific to the infrastructure improvements um forthe larger 9mm Creek corridor project that we need to complete prior to April15th um due to environmental regulations for the long-eared bat. And then theVeterans Memorial and Harrison Park trail head improvements. We're lookingto start advertising that project here later this week with a bid opening Ithink is February 20th and then we'll be coming to award that contract early inMarch. So to get that rolling so that we can have that done by Veterans Day so wecan open up the the Veterans Memorial. Now the projects that we have upcomingare the projects that we've been discussing here tonight that we'reasking for authorization to bid. The main one being the Nine M not the mainone but the big one being the Nile Creek corridor renewal project. That's all thecorridor creek and Moyer Park improvements that were just reviewed.Um, we're looking to obviously here tonight to order the project authorizedto bid, but then hoping by the March, April time frame, we're moving intoadvertising and bid opening with a contract award here by May. Um, startingthe spring with construction, but then it'll continue through the the fall of2027. Now, what Dererick was just describing with that lower valleymanagement plan, more going out as a request for proposals um for a five-yearcontract with a with a contractor. Um, we're looking to hope to follow asimilar timeline in getting out for bid and awarding contracts so we can getthat one started as well. And that's more specific to the invasive speciesmanagement natural resource restoration component. And then for the f a futureproject which will be coming out with probably here in 2026 is wayfinding. Weheard a lot from the public and staff onformational signage improvements.We'll be coming out with another project for that.Um, and the projects that we're bringing tonight, the the Nine Mile Creekcorridor renewal and the the Lower Valley Management Plan renewal. You cansee the cost estimates here for both of those. That's construction and alldesign and admin costs. And I'll get into the different funding sources forthose here. When it comes to project budget and funding, right now with allthose projects, the two that we ordered at the end of uh um December and theseother three projects as well, including wayfinding, we're at about 25.6 6million for a total overall construction cost. That includes all costs um when itcomes to um engineering admin and construction. Through the entireprocess, we've been including these three buckets just to show kind of wherethe natural res water resources dollars are, the Moer Park dollars, and then therest of the infrastructure work. So, you can see that there. We still we have afew funding sources that'll be in play here. We have the local option salestax, which is the big funding source that we have. And then also fortunatelywith this project we've we've had in our CIP for for well you're our CIP's alwaysincluded park trail improvements. Moyer and Central Park are on the list for thepark trail improvements as part of our CIP covered through our park pavementmanagement program park trails funding. We use that funding for park trailimprovements. We have rightaway trail improvements and overlay improvementsthrough our franchise fees. We have a large portion of money for PMP parktrails funds that we can allocate towards the Moyer and Central Park trailimprovements with this project which aligns well with our CIP. Nine milecreek wershed district is going to be contributing a million dollars to theproject about a year ago through their wershed management plan. They approved amillion dollars to be specifically for this project the Nimal Creek corridorcreek improvements. So, we'll be continuing to work with them as we haveover the past year on a term sheet and agreement, cooperative agreement forthat those dollars. Um, and then we have our stormwater utility uh fund thatwe'll be utilizing as well as for veterans memorial specifically. We havea deed grant, Bloomington remembers veterans funds and city funds that havebeen allocated the whole way along. We'll still also be looking into thepossibility of grants. We have funding to cover all of the work, but it neverhurts to have an additional grant if we can to supplement the dollars.So for next steps, uh we went to park commission a couple of weeks ago to givethem an update. We'll be giving sustainability commission an update bymemo here in the near future. We were at the Nmile Creek wershed district lastWednesday to give them an update and continue our work on the permittingprocess and the cooperative agreement process. We're here tonight um to orderthese two larger projects. And then we're going to continue working on thatNimmile Creek wershed district permitting and cooperative agreementprocess in the February and March time frame. Um, we've been closely alignedwith our regulatory group the whole way along. And then, as I mentioned, we'rehoping to be opening bids this spring and start construction by May to get itunderway and then complete by the fall of 27.And with that, that was a lot, but we have the two um requested actions fortonight and we have we're all here to answer questions that you might have.>> Well, thank you. Yes, that was a lot, but it was it was good stuff and andexciting to see this project continue to move forward and develop and flesh out.It's very exciting to see and very um encouraging. Uh council, I'll ask ifthere's any questions. I do want to point out we're at the bottom of thehour right now. We still have a couple more items. So, let's keep our questionsuh to the point and tight. Council member Carter.>> Uh thank you, Mayor. I'll be very fast. Uh this was a fantastic presentation andI just agree it's super exciting to see things start to actually flush out, justbecome more real. Um, the only thing that I would add, and I think youmentioned this last time, we had um when we approved the tree, the winter treeremoval, is to just have a I would hope that staff would have a plan forcommunity engagement and education for the next five years since there will bea lot of changes happening and just so residents understand it um and knowwhat's happening. So, >> yeah. Thank you,>> Council Member Delisandro, and then Council Member Lman.>> Uh, thank you, Mr. Mayor. Uh, I'll add to my comments. I'm super excited aboutthis. Thank you very much for all your efforts on it. I know um it's a bigproject and there's a lot of really cool things that go go on with it. Um justlike any of the other projects, I have been notable notable in my commentsabout making sure that we don't have um things missed. Meaning that you knoweven tonight we had yet more big kind of like stuff that came back that was likean extra 5,000 here, an extra 9,000 there, an extra 30,000 there, whatever.And it's not going over budget. I get that. But if we can do a better job ofmaking sure we know the numbers when we bring the numbers to council, that wouldbe good because we're I that just seems to be a habit. And I think, you know, gofast and get it wrong a little is okay, right? I don't I'm not I'm I'm not superriskaverse in that regard. Um that's why we have contingency, but we don't haveto spend all of the contingency just because it's there, right? And I want usto see a balance on that. So, I'll just make the same comment I make at thebeginning of every project, which is please try to use your fiduciaryresponsibilities there wisely and try to get those costs understood up front sowe don't have those backs back and forth and and everything on the other side ofit. Thanks, >> Council Member Lman. And then CouncilMember Rivos. Council member Lman. >> Well, Mayor, I can wait. I want to movethis thing along here. My comments are brief.>> Oh, no. Please, you can go ahead. >> Okay. Well, really all I wanted to saywas uh you know, just thanks for answering my questions that you hadearlier. Uh, you know, I appreciate the conversation you had about long-term uhsustainability with this whole project. Continue that. I appreciate that. So,really don't need anything else about that. That's it. When we come around,I'd love to move this along so we can pass the motion.>> Council member Revis for a change your microphone, please.>> For a change, I have something very positive to say. I'm I'm looking solooking forward to this project. Uh, it's it's uh it's what it's going to bethe best. Uh, I don't care about the other buildings. I do, but I mean, thisis super exciting and I can't wait to see it all finished. Uh, thank you somuch for the effort. I didn't have much to do with it, but it's nice and I cansee people representing the Nine Mile Creek here that it's it'll be great tosee this. Thank you so much for the effort.>> Member Nelson. >> Yeah, I'll be quick. Mayor, um, how muchof this is being funded by lost? Can you remind me?Uh, mayor, council member Nelson, $20 million is being fun funded by the localoption sales tax. >> Okay. So then there's a additional fivemillion that's being funded outside of that. And and so um with regards to thePMP park and trails, if we use it for this park and trail project, that meansit's not available for other places. Um it were and the reason I asked that ismy understanding was the original project budget was based on replacing umsignificantly more bridges uh pavingthe entire corridor and yet we're still using PMP park andtrail funds and we're still five minute million dollars over the lost amount.And so can you help me reconcile that? I I believe in this project. It's tocouncil member Rivas's point, one of my favorite, but I I'm very concerned aboutthis budget that's being presented. >> Mayor, Council Member Nelson, I'll startand ask um Bob to help fill in the programming of the park trail CMP funds.Um we started out by saying when this project was selected, we convened totalk about aligning our priorities in engineering with park trail and parktrail improvements. this was the next project on their list. We looked at umpriorities in parks for um facilities replacement and at our natural resourcesprioritization plan um to help choose this site and this project. We startedwith knowing um the watershed district would be um a contributor um withoutexactly knowing how much. Um we started with the the loss $20 million. Westarted with the PMP trails funding at hand, not knowing what the scope of allof this would look like in 2024 when we hit go. Um, as we worked out moredetailed design, we refined the scope, we refined and understood costs and thenaligned funding accordingly. So, we um we did start with the known $20 million,but with really um just the high level scope of natural resource restorationmeans something. Um repaving the trails down there, doing some kind of bridgework that we didn't know exactly what would entail. Um and then consideringthe new facilities in Moyer Park. So as design developed, we aligned thosepriorities with our funding sources along with the addition of the umHarrison Park and Veterans Memorial um for funding efficiencies of that projectum and those funding sources along with this.>> Okay. And then my final question in terms of the bid package that's goingout, can you give me more details on the building? Uh one of the concerns thatI've raised frequently is the cost of some of these buildings. Um, and if Irecall correctly from a previous uh thing, there was maybe we were there wasonly one company that was going to do it. Is is that building designed in sucha way that we'll get multiple quotes on it or is it just the one company thatbuilt the garage and built a different um facility for us? Um, I I just want tounderstand what we're actually bidding out there. Mayor, Council Member Nelson,we're bid build bidding out the that shelter. It's not necessarily a buildingum with Romtech company who is on the state contract um where those prices umare on a competitive purchasing um contract and um not required to bid. Butum >> that because of the cooperativepurchasing contract, we are um assured that they are a competitive price andthe I think there's some efficiencies there of not having to do um a lot ofdetailed design work because that's all part of the building package in thiscase. >> Yeah, I can understand that. I I'll behonest, I'm very apprehensive about that part of it. Um, uh, you know, I theywere the company that did the the garage over by Highland. Um, in Canada,currently just finishing up a project for a sixcar garage with lifts and allsorts of stuff for 300,000. And we spent five, six years ago, over a million forthat garage. It makes no sense to me. They're they're pricing, what we'redesigning, what we've done there. Um, and so I, you know, that part gives me,especially when it's one company and we're just taking it and they'reprobably giving us very fair price for what they do. I think the question weneed to ask more often is what we're doing necessary. Like is it is there away to meet the needs with a lower scope of work? Um, is is what I think we needto do. And and I appreciate you guys giving me a tour of the building over atBryant Park. And I understand the costs and what went into that. I'd stillquestion even that building and if we needed the level of finishes and thingslike that that are in that building. Um or if we can do something that iscandidly more modest and yet still meets the needs, especially for a shelter. Youknow, it doesn't in my mind need to be that fancy. So, that that's the areathat I'm concerned about. Do we have an opportunity to change any of that as wego forward? >> Mayor, Council Member Nelson, um thecontract is not signed. There is an opportunity to change. UmDerek, do you have any input on the impact of bidding and schedule? I thinkum if you you're asking us to evaluate other opportunities and bring those backto you, that could be done. If you're asking yet, is there an opportunity tochange? Has a contract been signed? No, a contract hasn't been signed.>> Let me ask this. >> Can we sit down offline, talk aboutthat, and and see what options there may be? And if it makes sense and and parkand wreck and senior staff and others are are in favor of it, then bring itback. if if I'm crazy and or you explain it to me in a way that makes sense, umthen we'll go that way. So, can we do that? Just we'll schedule a time and itit sounds like there's an opportunity before we sign a contract if it to makea change if we if it makes sense. Thank you.>> Other questions, council, council member Lman,>> we ready to move this or what? >> I think we have exhausted questions andcomments. So, Council Member Lman. >> All right, Mayor, I'm going to ahead andmove uh to order and authorize to bid the 9mm Creek corridor renewal projectand 9M Creek Lower Valley Management Plan renewal project.>> Motion by Council Member Lman, second by Council Member Nelson to order andauthorize to bid the NM Creek Corridor Project Renewal Project and NM CreekLower Valley Management Plan Renewal Project. Any further council discussionon this hearing? None. All those in favor, please signify by saying I.>> I. >> Opposed. Motion carries. 70.>> Thank you much. >> Thank you.>> Next step. Looking forward to hearing from you again. Thanks, >> Council. I'm just going to jump in here.Uh, it's now quarter to 9 here and I think I'm going to look for a motion orI'm going to make a motion that we extend our deadline to go no later than9:30 because I think we've got a couple of decent sized items here yet and Iwant to make sure we give ourselves enough time. So, I will move that wesuspend rules and and uh adjourn this meeting.>> Pardon? >> Excuse me. Not to suspend the rules tosimply uh change our adjournment time to 9:30.>> Second. >> Motion in a second to extend ouradjournment time to 9:30. All in favor, please signify by saying I.>> I. >> Opposed? Motion carries 70. Thank youmuch for that. We're going to go to uh the two items that were walked on thisevening. And apologies again. I I know that our our ourmanagement system our our agenda management system is down apparentlynationwide is what I understand which is not a good thing and so we don't havecomplete documentation I think for folks to see online or to deal with but we dohave the the paper copies and we will get these posted just as soon aspossible and the first one is item 5.2 two, which is uh a local affordablehousing aid or our LAAHA funds proposed for emergency rental assistance. SarahAbe is here from our HA to lead us through this and describe this to us.Good evening. Welcome, >> Mayor. Might I just jump in quick? I'mgoing to recuse myself on this issue because there's discussion about fundingpotential for VEP and um as I think all my colleagues know and and hopefully thepublic mostly knows, I'm on the board of VEP as well. So, I'm going to recusemyself. I'm going to >> I'll be back.>> Okay. Don't >> Don't leave on me. Okay, great.>> Yes. Good evening, mayor and council members. Uh, my name is Sarah, Hadministrator, housing and redevelopment authority administrator. All right. So,um, I just have a couple of quick slides, uh, a few pretty broad overviewof the item before you tonight. So, just quick reminder, um the local affordablehousing aid dollars, the city council voted, um earlier this year to delegatedelegate the HA the authority to administer these dollars and split itinto two major um housing program areas. This is state funding that is uhdesignated to cities and is restricted for uh housing uses. So the two majorprogram areas are affordable home ownership programs and then affordablehousing trust fund activities which is u multif family housing essentiallydevelopment and redevelopment projects and in those two major program areas uhrental assistance does not fall into either one. So the discussion tonight isto consider a one-time allocation of up to $350,000 of LAA dollars for emergencyrental assistance. The reason for this and the reason for the walk-on item isbecause we've seen a much uh increased need for uh emergency rental assistancein the past month and a half uh especially in the last few weeks. And soum this uh funding source is available and this use is clearly spelled out as afunding use for these dollars. Uh and then the recommendation heretonight, so the the goal is to have at least some portion of these fundsavailable to distribute into the community as quickly as possible due tothe increased need that we're seeing. Um, so this includes the recommendationfor the council to allocate the one-time designation of 350,000 for this use, butalso included in that motion is um to issue $50,000 to VEP um immediately tohave funds available very quickly to start responding to the need. Uh VEP isa well-known distributor of rental assistance in the region. They currentlyare running a rental assistance program with LAAHA dollars for both Edina andRichfield. So um they have a program that is already up and running. They areavailable to start taking calls for Bloomington residents. Uh currentlytheir rental assistance program is open and available and it is servingRichfield and Edid Edida residents but they are turning away Bloomingtonapplicants. So they have a lot of experience with different uh fundingsources, public funding sources and um a clear a well-established system in placefor using and reporting on these dollars. Um and then for the remainderof the funds, the HA would as the administer of the of these dollars umwould be looking to design a plan or or to um assign a a program or a process toget the rest of the funding out into the community. And that is it. I just had the twoslides for you tonight. Um, so the motion is to approve an allocation of upto 350,000 in Aloha dollars for emergency rental assistance and uh itdoes include again that $50,000 immediately to VEP. So happy to answerany questions. >> Thank you very much. Uh and just to beclear, these local affordable housing aid dollars from the state, this is oneof the designated purposes for those LAA dollars. Is that correct?>> Yes, mayor, council members, that is correct. And um do we know of othercommunities who are looking at this as using their LAA dollars in this way?>> I know that Richfield and Adina are currently using the some of thesedollars in this way. I'm not sure if other communities might be exploring ituh currently, but I'm I'm sure that those two are>> okay. Council member Lman, you know, um uh andthis is not a public hearing, so we don't have to worry about that part. SoI Hey, I um I understand the need that's out there totally uh for doing this. So,I'm not want just be careful as I say this, but I would really like to find away to be clever. Um, not this year, but to to find a way to kind of do what wedo uh and and have a res revolving uh loans or something that brings thismoney back into the community uh so that we can kind of keep reusing this uh yearafter year. I don't know how you do that now with this uh but I just I reallywould like to see us, you know, try to figure out a way because I I don't thinkthis need goes away. You know, I just when you look at the economic uhindicators that we've got going forward and so I'd hate to kind of start a aproject or a process or program like this and then know that in future yearsthat we may not have that ability to be able to provide, but I think we've gotto do it now. Um but uh I want us, you know, you know, I kind of look over atmy colleagues here and I don't know if there's a way to revolve it. you know,when you have a when you have a a home loan piece, you're getting that moneyback and they've got something coming out of there. I don't know how you makethat work with, but but I I wonder if there's a way for us to be clever uh andfind a way to bring some dollars in or maybe we could leverage something off ofsomething else that we're doing uh to bring those dollars and use thosedollars so we have a permanent fund kind of moving forward for these people. Itdoesn't go away after this year ends. So, uh I will definitely be supportingthis, but uh with that one caveat, I'd like to see this more sustainable movingforward. Thank you. And and I would agree,council member, uh to to look for ways that we could stretch these dollars andmake them last as long as possible and to be creative with them. I think thetrouble is since we've got these LAA dollars, I think we've had about threeemergencies that have come up where we've had to put these to to prettysignificant use pretty quickly and so really haven't had the opportunity tokind of sit and think creatively about how to extend them as far as possible.But I agree with your sentiment completely. So others, Council MemberRivas Everybody's suspecting something verynegative. I love that. Um, you know, I I I I mean, it's impossible to say that Idon't support this. Okay, I can tell you that from deep inside myself. However, II would just not only like to see what council member Lman suggested, but also,you know, it appears to me it appears to me. Okay,it's it's just my personal opinion that we rush to do this and yes there is aneed I guess um you know I have been able to speak to a lot of people outthere you know I don't really want to make a big deal out of it um I'm youknow I'm trying to be um to look at things from a differentperspective but I want to see tangible evidence thatpeople are requesting see assistance Okay. Um, as far as I know, it's notthere. All right. I I I'm not denying in any way by stating that that the needexists, but I would like to see that people arerequesting the assistance before we commit the the the funds to that. Youknow, and again, I'm going to reiterate this that in no way whatsoever I'm evenimplying that the need exists doesn't exist. I am just merely asking fortangible information that can be available to us as a consult to say,"Hey, you know, by all means, again, I I am not against assisting people thathave the need to do it." Uh but I can tell you with certainty that I havespoken to a lot of the people out there at least in my district andI offer help and assistance with different things that come up you knowand not that I know with certainty that they exist but they have come up in inemails from from other residents and you know uh most of the people have deniedthat they the assistance or any help that that I have personally offered. togive. Okay. And that's where my umI wouldn't say resistance, my my my u uh idea of not resisting the idea ofhelping people out, but being a little more okay, I want to get a uh palpableproof that people are requesting these these funds and then, you know, by allmeans, I'll be behind it for it. But I I don't see any of that. I mean, a lot ofthe times we just uh don't make the decision. We bring it up here to counciland we vote on it, but I don't think enough information is provided to us toat least in my opinion to make a decision with enoughinformation to to be wise enough to to spend the funds on that. Um I mean umthere's there's a need. Yes, I I won't deny that. But as far as I'm concerned,um, you know, are we going to be helping people from outside the city? I mean,you mentioned that Edina and Richfield are denying funds to Bloomingtonresidents. And I have learned from what I read thatwe provide assistance to people that don't reside in the city of Bloomingtonas well. So, you know, all of these things kind of uh boggle my mind. I Iwant to understand why we do these things and how we do them. And I wouldlike to see, you know, again, tangible information that makes it clear to methat there is a need out there that people are actually requesting, comingto Bloomington and saying, "Hey, we need assistance to pay our rent.">> And I'll be more than happy to be behind 100% behind this.>> Uh, chair and commissioners, if I could um so I do have some data on this. Um,so, uh, I reached out to VEP to ask for the volume of their calls and theyreported receiving 243 calls this month for financial assistance. Of those, 66,uh, named Bloomington as their place of residence. They anticipate the number ishigher because, just quick point of clarification, VEP is distributing moneyfor the cities of Edina and Richfield. Edina and Richfield are not uh makingdecisions about funds or denying requests for Bloomington. Um but becausebecause VEP has not had dollars available for Bloomington, they haven'tbeen tracking it clearly. So they anticipate that the the numbers areactually higher. Um also just today actually NPR um released an article thatnamed um cited a couple of increased need stats as well. So calls to 211,which is Minneapolis, um the calls requesting rent assistance more thantripled in mid January compared to the weekly average in the previous quarter.um Homeline reported um in the period from December until now a 72% increasein the request for financial aid. And then um I looked back at Henipin Countydata as well and they have their uh rent help program which is available forresidents of Henipin County and in 2024 they approved one almost 2,000applications for rental assistance. So there are uh documented needs uh forthese for emergency rental assistance dollars coming from various differentorganizations. >> So if that information is available, howcome we don't get it ourselves? >> It well this item was a walk-on item. Sobut I believe it is in the uh the packet that there's a documented need for thesesources. >> Did you guys get it in your bucket? I>> you you it was on your it was in your uh in front of you this evening.Uh, council member, what what I would recommend and I think I've recommendedit to you before uh take the trip over to VEP someday. I know they would behappy to sit down and talk with you and they show you their operation. Uh, talkabout the work that they do and they they do both not only uh food and rentalassistance. Uh, they they do they do a lot of good work throughout the>> I'm aware of that when I you know I guess everybody misses the the the pointthat I'm trying to make, right? I I I mean I I read all your information. youknow, I look at all your agendas whenever they come public and stuff andthe the my point is that it's great work. Yes, I understand that. Uh the thethe but I want to see t like I said tangible information that people arerequesting it. I don't want to see names. I understand that there is aprivacy that you know we don't want to know who the assistance is going to butI I want to see tangible numbers. You know I that's what I want>> and that's what I was suggesting. Council member VEP can provide tangiblenumbers to you. >> So, how come we can't get it herethough? This is where we are. This is where we're making the decisions. Why doI have to take that treat when it can be offered right here in public foreverybody to know? That's my point. I want the residents to when they'relistening to this meetings to get the information themselves right there,right here where we discuss it, where we make the decisions to vote yes or no onthe things that are important to the residents. That's my point. I I'm nothere to argue about myself or to represent myself. I couldn't care lessfor any of the staff on my own, but I am here to represent the people thatelected me. And that's why I ask the questions that I ask. I just want thepublic to listen to this information and to be informed on the decisions that wemake. That's my point. And you know, and no disrespect to you whatsoever. Please.And and forgive me if I carry myself in a way that offends you, okay? That's notmy intention in any way. I I you know, this is how I talk. I guess like atotal, you know, I don't want to use any language that is not adequate to be usedin public, but I I I apologize for that. It's is, you know, even my family hastold me that when I talk, I talk in a way that, you know, makes people feeluncomfortable. I don't mean to do that to you. Okay? I I'm just curious to knowthis and I want the public to understand that also every little detail that goesinto the decisions that we make. That's my point. And again, you know, I'm I'm Ican't say no to this. Of course, if people have the need to for assistance,let's give it to them if we have it, right? But and I also agree with CouncilMember Lman that we need to find a way to make it permanent. There's alwaysgoing to be people that have the need. There's no doubt of that in my mind. ButI just want to see more information. I want to see the information being madepublic to this residents right here in this meeting. Why do they have to go digit out? You know, I can go dig it out. I have the time to do that, but everybodyout there, I don't think they do. They want to hear it right here when we makethe decisions. That's all I got. Thank you. And please forgive me if I if Imake you feel uncomfortable in any way whatsoever. It's not my intention.>> Council member Carter and then Council Member Delisandro. Council memberCarter. >> Uh, thank you, Mayor. Um, so just onepoint of clarification. So, I also saw the NPR article today and I was going tocite some of the need that you did. Um, but 211 is statewide. I think you saidMinneapolis, but two 211 serves statewide. Um, and one of the also theother pieces of data that I thought was like it was crazy. I said many of thecalls that went through the 211 Spanish language line, they saw a 1,646%spike in calls. I mean that's I mean that's that'sthat's huge, right? So um now I will say I also I I did have um a similarquestion around just what we're hearing from VEP in terms of demand and so Iappreciate you sharing that um that information. Um I'm wondering what thedecision making for the full $350,000. What will be the decision- making there?So I'm totally comfortable with the 50 thou 50,000 immediately to VEP. Um backin 2018 19 like I was on the VE board and that's when they started to do kindof more housing work because even at that time people who were coming to thefood shelf said it was the cost of housing that was driving food insecurityin their families. And so um and I and during the pandemic we did emergencyfunding for VEP for emergency rent assistance and they did a great jobspending that money wisely and reporting back to us on the impact of thosedollars and so um VEP is a very well-known very trusted organization inour community. Um so I believe that the need is there. I agree that it would begood to have those numbers um when we make those decisions. Um, and then Iwould be curious to know moving forward for the full 350,000,will we will this be in front of us again orwhat kind like what kind of reporting will be done back to the council? Um,just so that we can share with the community um both this information andthe information related to food insecurity, right? That we the dollarsthat we pass. People want to know what we're doing to support our communityduring this hard time. And it not just to defend what we're doing we're doingbut to be proud to say that we're supporting our community. And I thinkyou know this earlier today we had um I don't even know how many people at thelistening session because they're so how many 60 over 60 people there um becausethey want to know how the city is supporting our community during thistime and this is one of the things that we can do and we've been doing thingsand so we need to be able to talk about them and talk about the impact that wecan have in Bloomington. So, um, so yeah, I guess that's what I have to say.Thank you. >> Yes. Uh, mayor and council members, uh,the decision-making. So, because it is a larger dollar amount and there are anumber of different entities that provide rent emergency rental assistancein the area, we would likely want to issue some sort of public um call forproposals or letters of intent or some sort of public response to be able toevaluate um the uh um qualifications of an organization and their ability todeploy deploy funds in the area. We selected VEP for the immediate needbecause as you said, they have a a very wellestablished program. Um in terms ofbringing back to the council um the HA would approve the decision-making aroundallocating as the administrator of these funds um and the um reporting mechanismum we've been starting to put this is new we just started spending LA dollarsthis year but in our all things housing report this year for the previous yearwe're um including the reports on LAAHA spending so that's the mechanism for thereporting back to the city council >> I do think just during this time. Youknow, if VEP says, "Hey, we spent that $50,000 in 30 days," I think that wouldbe good for like that would just be a good data point for us to know um tobetter understand what the need is in our community.>> Uh and mayor and council, I might just note this was um also in the packet asan attachment um but there is this is a spending update of where we are in theLA dollars. So, we do anticipate including some reporting in the allthings housing report and this is a quick summary of where we are. Um theheights was a special allocation that funding has been spent and then thereare some upcoming programming. You know these these dollars are designated forhousing projects and housing projects are slowmoving creatures. So we have anumber of planned uses um for these but this is currently where we are. We alsohave a couple of projects that are um in very early stages that we expect to berequesting some of these funds. >> Thank you. Council member Dellesandro.>> Uh thanks M. Mayor. Yeah, I I think um uh I think if uh if we uh so huge huabsolutely happy to support it. I mean statistics are very clear. Um it uh isuh the timing is hard right because by the time youmost people will because we don't have a eviction moratorum yet um most peoplecan get thrown out of their homes before renting dollars ever come to them to getaid. Right. And then now we have an unhoused population problem as opposedto a housing problem. And I definitely want us to be it is way cheaper for thestate and the community as a whole to keep somebody in their house as opposedto having them become unhoused and then try to fix it, right? Um so I'm all forthat. I am. Um, I actually think it would be great if the VEP folks couldcome and do a presentation to us about their H rental assistance programbecause I think if if if council member Rivas is actually hearing from peoplethat they don't understand why VEP, why this program, whatever, then maybe it'san opportunity for us to give them a forum to explain the value of theirprogram. uh so that we can educate not just ourselves but also the largercommunity about what they do and why they do it and how they vet the peoplethat are asking for assistance because that's another thing I think people outthere probably just think that we just hand out checks at VEP you know orwhatever and that's not true right there's a vetting process and I'm surethere's income level requirements and all kinds of other things that make thisa good program but we don't know about those things and so getting thateducation I think would be very helpful not just for us as council membersmembers, but also for the public as a whole. How do those project pro programsrun? How do they work? I happen to know a lot about rental assistance programsonly because my church does one and so like I I've been involved in it, right?But we're not talking about at the tune of $350,000 over there. We're talkingabout $11,000 type situation, right? So, I'm still in the dark a little bit aboutwhat maybe a program of this volume and that kind of thing might might be mightdo and what the vetting process is there. So, um I'm all for for us gettingthe education up here if we can. Uh thanks.>> Thank you. And and couldn't agree more. And actually, uh Mr. Walker and I justtalked. We're we'll have this on a a council uh study session in the verynear future. We'll get that get that set up so we can educate everyone. Otherquestions, comments, council hearing. None. Council. Uh, I would lookfor a motion to approve resolution uh resolution for an allocation of up to$350,000 in local affordable housing aid for emergency rental assistance.>> So moved. Second. >> Motion by Council Member Carter, secondby Council Member Robertson to um approve that resolution allocating up to$350,000 in LA funds for emergency rental assistance. Any furtherdiscussion on this? Hearing none. All those in favor, please signify by sayingI. >> I. opposed.Motion carries 6. Thank you very much for that and uh umextend our thanks to to our friends at VEP for the work that they're doingbecause it's it's breaking fast around here, I think. So, thank you.>> Uh what I think I'd like to do very quickly, council, uh we're we're goingto go to item 5.3, our close session, but what I think I'd like to do is do avery quick council policy and issues update. So that way when we come backinto open session, we can simply uh we can talk about what we did and we canadjourn. Uh but I I think I can do that. I'm going to use mayor uh priorprerogative and do that. Our council and policy council policy and issue update.Uh I'll just recap our listening session very quickly. We had as was stated Ithink we had we had more than 60 people in the listening session. Thanks to allof them who were there. uh the vast majority were expressing concerns aboutuh the work of federal ICE agents and uh the need for the city to respond andcity services and so on. So we heard from uh Jamie Wagner, Michelle Abbott,Cody Wright, Douglas Moody, Constance Reichi all spoke uh along those linesand I appreciate the the the points they brought up and frankly the passion andobvious emotion that they brought to it as well and I think everybody in theroom felt it. Uh we also heard from Pam Palmer uh talking about revisiting ourcommercial vehicles and enforcement issues uh for parking on city streetsand in in driveways. So that's a very quick recap of our listening session. UmI don't have anything else. Mr. Walker, do you have anything?>> Uh Mr. Mayor, just to build off of your um recap of the listening session, Iwould echo for the council, but also primarily for our community members.Next Monday evening, February the 2nd, we are going to have an extendedlistening session. So, typically those are 5:45. Uh this will begin at 5:00p.m. Uh last till 6:15 p.m., so an hour and 15 minutes. uh primarily uh givingthe community the opportunity to continue to visit about um the ongoingimmigration uh enforcement uh in the state of Minnesota and particularly itsimpact here in Bloomington. Um we want to give the community ample time tocontinue to dialogue about this as we mentioned 60 people out tonight when wemaybe have six on a normal night. That's going to be held here in the councilchambers. Uh so again more comfortable uh arrangement uh and give people thatchance to speak because we do want to hear from as many people as possible. Weare um going to ask to limit this remarks to three minutes not because wedon't want to hear from folks but we want as many people to have theopportunity to speak as well. So we'll promote this across our social mediachannels uh starting tomorrow uh to get the word out.>> Thank you for that. Thanks for that update and the reminder to everyone. Souh next Monday night hope to see as many people here as possible. Uh any othervery quickly, council member, we got to get into close.>> Yeah, as I mentioned to you earlier, Mr. Mayor, the other thing I wanted to justkind of put in front of council, um there's a cascading effect associatedwith this that is impacting our small business community as well. So, ifpeople can't open their restaurants or people can't deliver their food or otherthings like that, they're being impacted as well. I I'm curious if the councilhas an interest in us looking at ways that we might be able to support thatcommunity. I you know, we obviously have the emergency rental assistance andthat's great. That helps residents. um people who are not going to work, butthe people who run businesses who have people who are not going to work arealso being impacted and I think it's important for us to think about that.So, wanted to throw that out there and see if we could get some direction tostaff to take a look at what options might be available.>> I I think that would be another good topic for an upcoming study session. Uhcouncil, if we can get at least a couple nodding heads here, I think that that'dbe a worthwhile conversation to have. Council member, thank you for bringingthat forward. Anything else, council?Very good. Then we're going to double back to item 5.3, which again was awalk-on item. Uh we are going to go to a close session of the city council. Thecity council has uh a limited number of reasons why we can go into closesession. One of those is to discuss potential litigation, and that's whatwe'll be doing tonight. So I would look for a motion to adopt the resolutiondirecting the closure of a public meeting of the city council, which is uhwhat you have in front of you. >> So moved.>> Second. Motion uh by council member Lman, second by council member Robertsonto adopt the resolution directing the closure of a public meeting of the citycouncil. No further council discussion on this. All those in favor, pleasesignify by saying I. I. >> Opposed. Motion carried. We're going tohead into close session and we will come back out uh to close the meetingofficially and formally. So we are now in close session. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. N. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Hey, heat. Hey, heat.Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat up here. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Hey, heat. Hey, heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. N. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat up here. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Hey. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. N. Heat up Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. N. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Hey. Hey. Hey. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat.Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. N. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Hey, heat. Hey, heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Okay. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. All right, we are back. All right, we areback in open session here at Bloomington City Council. It's now 10:29and uh council, I would look for and entertain a motion to approve the topicthat we discussed in close session >> to take action>> to take to take action consistent with the discussion in close session. >> So moved.>> Second. Motion by council member Robertson, second by council memberCarter to take actions consistent with the discussions in the closed session.All those in favor, please signify by saying I.>> I opposed. >> Motion carries 61 with council memberRivas voting in opposition. With that, that ends our evening discussion and ourmeeting tonight gang. I would look for a motion to uh adjurnn.>> So moved. >> Motion and a second to adjurnn. All infavor? >> I.>> Motion carries. Thank you all for the conversation tonight. Thanks.