[music] Everybody got so quiet. Good eveningall. I will call this Bloomington City Council meeting to order. It is Monday,October 27th, 2025. Thank you for joining us here in the council chambersand joining us online. We will begin our meeting as we always do. If you areable, please stand, remove any head coverings, and join me in the pledge ofallegiance. >> I pledge allegiance to the flag of theUnited States of America >> and to the republic for which it stands,one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.>> [clears throat] >> Once again, thanks for joining ustonight. Council, welcome. Thanks for being here. We're at full strengthagain, up to seven once again. So glad to see everybody here.First order of business tonight is our agenda and uh we've got our agenda andI'm going to have one item that I'll talk about, a walk-on item that we'regoing to do is item 4.2. But uh first of all, under introductory items, we have ahandful of things. We've got item 2.1 which is an introduction of newemployees. Item 2.2 and 2.3 are proclamations. 2.2 is a proclamation forVeterans Day and 2.3 is for Native American Heritage Month. And then 2.4 wewill be celebrating some of our awards that our communications team hasreceived once again because of their outstanding work that they do. Ourconsent business contains 13 items and council member Dalisandro has consentthis evening. Item four once we get to item four are hearings, resolutions, andordinances. Item 4.1 is a uh public hearing regarding liquor licenses. Andthen uh what I would like to do, council, is add an agenda item, item4.2, that would be a resolution makingalterations to the approved budget and authorizing the use of funds fornutrition assistance and food shelves. And we'll talk more in depth as we getto that on item 4.2, but we have a resolution uh and uh Mr. Walker willlead us through all this and we'll uh you'll understand a bit better once weget to it. Item five, under organizational business, we have threeitems. We have uh an update on the Henipin County Nicolad Avenue streetreconstruction project. We have a review and item 5.2, a review of the AmericanBoulevard transit study. And item 5.3, we're going to continue our budgetdiscussions tonight. We're going to be talking about public safety and ourlegal department. We'll wrap up with the polic council policy and issue updateand adjourn. So, uh, I would like to, unless thereare additional changes or corrections or anything, I would like to move approvalof our agenda as stated, which includes adding that walk-on item, item 4.2.>> Second. >> Motion and a second by council memberLman to accept tonight's agenda as stated. No further council discussion onthis. All those in favor, please signify by saying I.>> Opposed? Motion carries 70. And we have an agenda. And first on that agenda isitem 2.1, the introduction of new employees. We have folks here, both uhnew employees from public health and from our finance department. Why don'twe start with public health if we could? There we are. >> Yep. If you're you're a new employee,you got to come up to [laughter] open my notes here. >> Good evening and welcome.>> Good evening. Yeah. Thank you, mayor. Thank you, council members. I have fournew staff to introduce to you today. I'm going to start with Ross McKenzie.[snorts] Ross is our community resilience publichealth specialist. His background includes a bachelor's degree in clinicaland applied health science from Drake University, a master of public healthand epidemiology with a minor in global public health from the University ofMinnesota Twin Cities, and the certified emergency managercertification through the International Association of Emergency Managers. Hehas experienced developing emergency operations plans, training staff inleading resilience programming that connects preparedness with climate,community, and public health goals. Ross is most excited about helping thecommunities of Bloomington, Edina, and Richfield withstand the unexpected waysthat al the unexpected in ways that also strengthen everyday health, resilience,and well-being. A fun fact about Ross, he is originally from Scotland andnaturalized to become a US citizen this year.>> Good evening, Ross. Welcome. [snorts][laughter] >> [clears throat]>> Next up is Britney Wyn. Britney Wyn holds a bachelor's degreefrom the College of St. Benedict and a master of public health and publichealth administration and policy from the University of Minnesota Twin Cities.She brings experience in advancing health uh equity initiatives, policydevelopment, and program evaluation across nonprofits and local government.At the city of Bloomington, Britney serves as a public health specialist,health and all policies, where she supports prevention and policy effortsthat promote equity and well-being across the community, focusing onsubstance use prevention and mental health. She's most excited aboutcollaborating with residents and partners to drive lasting positivechange. A fun fact about Britney is she recently picked up photography as a newhobby. >> Welcome, Britney.>> Welcome, Britney. So, were you two in the same class at in the the the publichealth? We barely missed each other. >> Oh, okay. [laughter] >> Next up is Dennis Vu. Dennis started inMay this year as our accountant in public health and oversees financialmanagement and the grant accounting process. Dennis holds a bachelor's inaccounting from Atabaska University in Canada and most recently worked atHamlin University in St. Paul overseeing the grants accounting and treasuryresponsibilities. Dennis brings over 15 years ofexperience in accounting and finance, having held various roles in theCanadian energy sector. Dennis is looking forward to learning the greatwork that public health does and the impacts it has on our populations. A funfact about Dennis is he has tried scuba diving, isn't a strong swimmer, but hasno regrets. [laughter] >> Welcome, Dennis.>> Thank you. >> And last up, Christine Lees. Christineis the population health program manager for public health. Miss Lee has over 20years of experience working in public health across Minnesota. She holds abachelor of nursing from the Catholic University of America in Washington DC,a master of public health and epidemiology from the University ofMinnesota, and is currently completing a PhD in environmental and occupationalhealth epidemiology at the University of Minnesota. Prior to this, she led thedisease prevention and control emergency preparedness and response andenvironmental health programs for Dakota County Public Health. Miss Le and herteam received several awards including a Humphrey Institute Government InnovationAward, Nature Model Practices Award, and the Dakota County Heroes Award in 2019and 2022. Miss Lee led the Dakota uh Dakota County CO 19 vaccinationoperation, which vaccinated over 70,000 people in 2021. She is most excitedabout bringing together the three population health teams to createsynergy and build strong connections internally and externally to help usachieve our mission of a healthier community for all. Fun fact, Ms. Le isthe great granddaughter of EMTT Culligan who invented and founded Culligan WaterIncorporated. >> Well, Christine, welcome to you as well.Uh, each of you individually have a fascinating background. I mean, the fourof you put together this would you could really fill up an evening talking toyou. So, um, thank you for being here and welcome to the city of Bloomington.Very happy to have you on board. Welcome.>> Thank you. [applause] >> Next up, we haveKi Carlson and the newest member of our finance team.>> Good evening, Mayor and Council. I'm happy to introduce our new smallbusiness procurement program coordinator, Evan Iikaboni.Evan joined our purchasing team and finance about two months ago onSeptember 8th. He comes to Bloomington from the Minnesota Department ofTransportation where he helped expand their equity through contracting programwhich supported small businesses and taking on smaller construction projectsas prime contractors through new contracting approaches and hands-onassistance. He also managed Mandot's internalcontrols program and internal IT policy. Evan lives in Minneapolis with his newhusband and their very loved golden retriever, Barney. In his free time, heenjoys long bike rides and trying to keep rabbits out of his garden with alittle help from Barney. >> Uh we're really excited to have Evan onboard and look forward to the experience and creativity he brings to helpingsmall businesses connect and succeed in working with the city of Bloomington.And Evan has some remarks for you as well.>> Welcome, Evan. Glad glad to to see you. We we met the other night at the uh thePort Authority meeting and I said, "Have we seen you but yet in front of thecouncil?" You said Monday night, so [laughter] perfect timing. So,>> I'm switching things up for all of you here. So, thank you so much. I'm soexcited to join the the city and uh look forward to supporting our small businesscommunity and providing goods and services to the city of Bloomington. Ummy work will include providing contracting support to our localbusiness community, setting up bench benchmarks for small business spend andproviding resources to my colleagues uh across the city. So I thank you so muchand I'm just so glad to be joining a wonderful team in the finance officehere. So thank you. >> We're very excited to have you. Thankyou. So, uh, Evan and and Dennis, Ross,Britney, and Christine, I I tell all of our new employees, in a lot of ways, youare the face of Bloomington. They, uh, people will tune in and see us sittingup here, but, you're the people who are going to interact with people on a, aconsistent basis out in the community. And, uh, that's what how they will judgehow the city of Bloomington treats them and and how they work with residents andand how well our organization functions. And so, it's a big responsibility. Uh,but I know you're all up to it and I look forward to seeing you out in thecommunity and doing great things for the residents of Bloomington. So, welcomeaboard. Glad to have you. [clears throat]>> Next up, I have a couple of proclamations. I'm going to head down tothe podium. We have two proclamations tonight. Uhthe first is for Veterans Day, which is November 11th, 2025.Uh I would like to call up I know Dwayne is here. We have we we always invitefolks up who we're going to present the uh present the proclamation to. AndDwayne is a veteran of the United States Air Force. Come on around here. He's aVietnam War veteran and he's very active in the Bloomington Remembers Veterans uhproject. And so very glad to have you here, sir. I'm going to read theproclamation then turn it over to you. It's proclamation for Veterans Day,November 11th, 2025. Whereas the courage, dedication, andsacrifice of those who served in our armed forces has safeguarded the freedomwe cherish. And whereas our veterans embodied resilience, leadership, andcommitment to the well-being of our nation and community. And whereas it isour shared duty to honor their service with gratitude, recognition, andsupport. And whereas the city of Bloomington expend extends specialthanks to the American Legion Post 550 for their steadfast support of ourveterans appreciation celebration and our veterans year round.Now therefore, I, Mayor Tim Busy, do hereby proclaim November 11th, 2025 asVeterans Day in the city of Bloomington. And to honor our veterans, the city willdisplay a veterans photo wall at Civic Plaza from October 21st through November6th. It's out there right now, which uh is also available online. A veteransappreciation reception will be held on Thursday, November 6th here at CivicPlaza, bringing our community together to celebrate and thank those who served.In addition, the P MIA flag will be flown at Civic Plaza and Public Worksfrom November 8th through November 15th in tribute to those who remainunaccounted for. I encourage all residents to join in remembering andthanking our veterans for their service and their sacrifice signed Mayor TimBusy dated this 27th day of October, 2025.Sir, thank you for your service. Thank you so very much. And I'm going to turnthe microphone over to you. Mr. Mayor, city council members, citystaff, and all guests and viewers. Thank you for this incredible honor. Iaccepted on behalf of the incredible veterans of Bloomington.I was raised on a farm near Austin, Minnesota. After graduating from AustinJunior College in 19 June 1967, I enlisted in the US Air Force. Thatsame year, I lost two friends in Vietnam.I chose the Air Force because it offered the best chance to pursue a businessrelated role while serving. I completed basic training at Blackland Air ForceBase in San Antonio, Texas, and was fortunate to be assigned to theaccounting and finance office at Lowry Air Force Base in Denver, Colorado.After a year and a half, I volunteered for worldwide assignment and receivedorders for the accounting and finance office in Plecu, Vietnam.During my time there, family and friends [clears throat] were a lifeline as theywere for all of us serving in such difficult conditions. For 13 months, welived under regular and frequent rocket attacks.I was then assigned to the accounting and finance center, [clears throat]excuse me, back in Denver. That's where I met Glenda.And just six days after completing my service in June 1971, we were married.My service gave me the foundation for a career in banking where I worked for 28years. In 1978, we moved to Bloomington andstill live in the same house we bought then. Our two children went throughKennedy, I'm sorry, Bloomington schools and both graduated from Kennedy HighSchool. Today, our daughter Kim and her family live in Minatrista. Our sonTravis has served in the Navy for 24 years and is is a captain and iscurrently director of public works at Joint Base Pearl Harbor in Hawaii, wherehe lives with his family. Some may remember that Travis was the speaker atlast year's Bloomington Veterans Appreciation Reception.As for me, I now serve as treasurer for the Bloomington Remembers Veterans andwe're working to build a Veterans Memorial, which we hope to dedicateVeterans Day next year. I am deeply proud of my four years of service andprofoundly grateful to my fellow veterans and the families who supportedthem. Thank you again for this amazing honor and I again thank you on behalf ofall Bloomington veterans. Thank you. [applause] [applause] You should bring the crew. [snorts] >> [cough and clears throat] >> I like the pictures of you, Dwayne.Those pictures we had up there. I don't know if you saw those or not. It's a>> a dashing young fly boy. Very nice. Well done.[applause] Yeah, >> the the colored one up there was when Iwas at the airport up here leaving for Vietnam.>> Wow. >> Oh,>> very cool. Thanks for being here tonight.>> Our second proclamation tonight is for Native American Heritage Month, November2025. Clarissa Cidle is with us who is with Bloomington Public Schools and theAmerican Indian Education Program. Thanks for joining us tonight.Proclamation for Native American Heritage Month, November 2025.Whereas during Native American Heritage Month, we celebrate the rich tapestry ofindigenous peoples and honor their vibrant and diverse cultures, which werecognize as inextricably woven into the history and present times of thiscountry. And whereas the indigenous people who have resided on this landprior to the arrival of European settlers experienced injusticesattempting to suppress and eradicate the knowledge, practice, and observances oftheir own culture and spiritual heritage. And whereas from timeimmemorial, Native Americans have a long and rich history and presence inBloomington, including Dakota, Ojiway, and Iowa. And we recognize the 11 tribalnations that call Minnesota home. And whereas indigenous people have andcontinue to make essential contributions to law and justice, arts, iron,environmental stewardship, government, and many other endeavors. And whereasthe Bloomington City Council resolves to support their legacy and preserve thissacred heritage for generations to come. And whereas the Bloomington City Councilincludes equity and inclusion as one of its strategic priorities and strives tomake continued and meaningful progress toward equity and inclusion for NativeAmericans. And whereas the Bloomington City Council recommits to supportingNative Americans and working side by side with their leaders to securestronger and safer communities. And whereas during the month of November, wecommemorate the rich and diverse culture of Native American people and recognizetheir continued contributions in strengthening the diversity of oursociety. Now, therefore, I, Mayor Tim Busy, do hereby proclaim November asNative American Heritage Month dated this 27th day of October, 2025.Clarissa, welcome. Thank you for being here with us this evening. I'm gonnaturn the microphone over to you. Um howakiappimakiapota. Hello my relatives. My name is ClarissaCidle. I'm Dakota. I'm from Shanchiappi. Um which translates to where they markthe trees red. You may know it as Lower Sue Indian Community located insouthwest southwestern Minnesota. It's one of the four um Dakota tribalcommunities. I'm one of the program specialists for the American IndianEducation Program for Bloomington public schools. Our department is dedicdedicated to supporting the success of our American Indian students in thedistrict by meeting their unique cultural and educational needs. We dothis by providing direct services to our American Indian students throughcultural group programming and academic support. With our cultural programming,we recognize Bloomington and its surrounding communities have significantconnections to Dakota people, past, present, and for future generations. Weemphasize this by providing place and land-based learning opportunities forour students and families to participate in with our uh local community members.Our American Indian Ed coordinator works with the district's curriculum andinstruction department to ensure that our Bloomington educators are educatedon Dakota and Ojiway communities in Minnesota Makoce through variouslearning um opportunities through placebased and land-basedum lastly over the past few years or so ourAmerican Indian ed program has partnered with Mark Jay and Eric from the city ofBloomington on events and programming on behalf of the American Indian edstudents and families. Pedameay, thank you for this proclamation. [applause] Item 2.4 on our agenda is ourpresentation about all those awards that our communications department won. Onceagain, Janine, welcome. >> Thank you. Good evening, Mayor Busy and councilmembers. I'm here to present a number of awards the city has received this yearfor communications and engagement. The city was honored with nine awards fromthe statewide organization, the Minnesota Association of GovernmentCommunicators or MAGC and two awards from the national organization, the CityCounty Communications and Marketing Association or 3CMA.These award competitions continue to be competitive with MAGC receiving 162award submissions from Minnesota jurisdictions and 3CMA receiving nearly1,170 submissions from cities and countiesacross the United States. It is an honor to receive these awards.Receiving a third place award in MAGC's contest in the category of interview,talk show, or news program. News programming was Discover Bloomington, amonthly video segment that highlights opportunities to discover the greatactivities, amenities, arts, and local businesses in Bloomington. In thespecial event category was Moving Bloomington Forward, the 2024 state ofthe city. MAG's second place silver awards went tothe corporate report to the community, the city's annual budget report, thebriefing, the city's monthly newsletter. Bloomington supports businesses, a videoseries that highlights a variety of businesses that add vibrancy to ourcommunity. And there was one more silver award, but more on that later. The first place Northern Lights Awardswent to embracing trends in social media, a strategy that we have in placefor more engaging posts. Bloomington Today, our weekly cable televisionYouTube program, and the Notable Neighbor video series, which showcasesthe many great people in our community doing remarkable things. For a sample ofthese award-winning communications, here is a highlight. Welcome to Bloomington Today. I'm EmilyTaplan. Thanks for joining us. First, we bring you the buzz for the week ofOctober 2nd through the 8th. I've always been interested in art. Thedecision to like officially call myself an artist has come in fits and spurts.I'm Jamie Schumacher Calakaram. I am an artist, author, and mom living inBloomington. [music] I've never had a boring life. I love costumes. You know,it's a big part of it. So my name is Reit Felt from the BL and I'm thefounder and director of the Continental Ble Company for 35 years.You just saw the notable neighbor video series in that last slide and I am happyto report that this series also received a third place award of excellence at thenational level. Judges said, "This series is extremely heartwarming andvery well produced. The interview setup is clean and very professionallook. Nicejob, judges said, and great concept that showcases a wide variety of communitymembers. Mayor Busy and council members, as youare aware, the three Bloomington Forward projects, community investment projectsare underway. The Bloomington Ice Garden will celebrate its grand opening in acouple of weeks. The community health and wellness center recently brokeground. And the project to improve and restore 9M Creek corridor is movingforward. I would like to present to you something special about the NineM Creekproject. It is well known how Nine Mile Creekcorridor is a muchloved natural amenity. And as in true in most communities, asplans for restoration began, Bloomington heard from its residents through variousengagements and surveys the importance of natural resources, trails, andconnections to green space. Some people had concerns about the project and staffwanted to address these concerns as well as inform, educate and engage the entirecommunity. We produced several videos among other communications to explainthe why behind the restoration efforts and also provided opportunities toinform and educate the community on the project and to build trust. We felt itwas important to include our stakeholders at the beginning stages ofproject's development. In addition to frequent communications,staff worked to listen and learned with honesty and authenticity. Engagementincluded one-on-one conversations, workshops for environmental advocates,cyclists, and people with accessibility needs, online engagement through theLet's Let's Talk Bloomington platform, public events, including a creek walkthat became a turning point in building mutual understanding. Here's a brieflook at one staff produced video that showed the engagement in process. >> Tonight is the 9mm Creek corridorcelebration event kicking off the start of [music] the project.>> We have a lot of celebrate your story. How you use 9mm Creek, how you use thearea, how you use the parks, and a lot of the history of 9M Creek in general,history of the creek through the park area. We have some information on thenatural resources, some of the birds and mammals and different species that usethe creek and the wetland areas and then just more of a share with us what yourstory is with the area, how you've used the area, what you're excited about forthe project, what you might have concern about for the project, and just more ofa celebration of the area. >> We worked with our community outreachand engagement staff here to make this event exciting and welcoming. We've gota food truck here. We're giving away ice cream from our icicle tricycle and havegames for kids to play to. I think there was at least 200 people here tonight. Weare [music] very happy about how many people came out and took their time totalk with us. Hearing people talk about what's important here, how they use thepark today, all [music] helps inform our work.>> We came to learn more about what is being proposed. If you want to knowabout the history of the park, we uh use it frequently for quiet, peaceful walks,getting back to nature and solitude. Even though it's used by lots of people,it's a big place. There's room for lots of people.>> Want to kind of see what the plan is. um just voice my concern that they do thiswell and not damage too much of the natural wildlife that is [music] there.It's just like the perfect place to study nature with all the animals, thebirds, the plant life. I don't want it to be lost.>> What I love most about this park is it's a wild oasis right in the heart of thecity. You don't have to drive for it. You've got absolute beautiful terrain.You feel like you're someplace else. It's quiet and as an artist, youcouldn't ask for a better studio. >> Every time we go walking down there, itlets me be wild and free and I enjoy seeing all the animals down there. Itjust makes me feel really good inside. >> What I've been hearing, a lot of peopleare excited. They've been sharing stories of how many years they've beencoming to this park, [music] where they access the park from, how they use thepark, and just an overall excitement and value for the natural resources in thisarea and for this amenity that we have here in Bloomington.Public engagement evolved over time from cautious inquiry to activeparticipation. Residents who initially expressed concern about ecologicalimpacts became collaborators, focusing on stewardship activities like cleanupevents along the creek corridor. Feedback from the third round ofengagement this past year reflected broad community support and appreciationfor the city's thoughtful planning and transparency. Numerous resident commentsexpressed enthusiasm for the renewal and pride in Bloomington's natural spaces.The NineM Creek corridor renewal project demonstrates how transparentcommunications, active listening, and consistent outreach can alignenvironmental goals with community values. These efforts efforts arecommendable and a win for our community. And I'm also pleased to share with youthat these efforts were recognized with the first place national award forcommunity engagement in the resident participation category. And as I alludedto earlier, this also received a second place award from MAGC.Congratulations to teams in parks and recreation, public works, communicationsand and community outreach and engagement. and Mayor Busy and councilmembers. We share this award with the community and with the folks who turnedout to share their concerns about the project. They have been wonderfulcollaborators with whom we have a shared interest in caring for this communityand protecting its natural resources. And some of those members are with ushere tonight. And I'd like to introduce to you Chrisanne to say a few words. I talk this way or this way. You didn'ttalk right this way. Okay. I didn't know who I was talking to. Uh first uhcongratulations um on this welldeserved recognition. Uh you deserve this specialhonor. Uh I'm speaking to this uh group behind me. um alone for the volume ofletters and emails you received from community members uh former Bloomingtonresidents and visitors to NineM Creek as I'm sure you um were CCD on many ofthose. Um this was over the last two years. Um we can only imagine how manywere received in this time period. We understand that all of your jobs werechallenging during that time and we realized that Restore the Nine may havemade them a bit more difficult. Um, as a grassroots organization passionate aboutthis cause, we felt it was essential to vigorously engage community members. So,thank you for acknowledging our work and engaging with us in creative ways. Youfostered a positive resident government relationship that ultimately helpedbridge gaps and promote constructive dialogue. With this in mind, we arehappy again to celebrate this national award with the communication and parkand recreation departments. Thank you. [applause] Good evening. Renee Clark, deputydirector of parks. We're all stewards of this really important natural area ofthe city. Um, together and it's with much gratitude um to the communitymembers who gave so much of their time, their passion to work with us patientlyand collaboratively through this process. Um, it was a lot of extraeffort. I'm sure many of you have other jobs besides the full-time job and thestewardship that you're giving to this resource with us and we look forward toa partnership long term as we continue to care for this special place. So,thank you all. We want to have a photo with the group.So, can can we come up and we'll take a photo? We've got Ashley here to take aphoto. Mhm. Maybe shift a little more just down thisway so the monitor is not in our way. >> Yeah. Yeah. Shift down. Thank you. >> Okay.>> I know. We've got such a big That's a big crowd.>> Yeah. And nobody should be behind that monitor. So come on over or come to thisside. Yeah. >> Mayor Busy.>> Do you want to go up? Oh, good. We can see everybody. >> Perfect. Okay. Is everybody ready? Justin a little bit. Perfect. Yes. All right.Here we go. look great. Thank you so much.[applause] >> Well, good job everybody. Thank you toour communication staff. Thank you to our park and rec staff. Thank you to ourresidents who were so involved in this. Uh truly is a team sport and uh it'sgreat to get the recognition at the national level for the outstanding workthat is done. So thank you Janine. Well done. Thank you.>> Okay. Thank you. >> Next on our agenda council is ourconsent business. Council member Dellesandro has our consent agendatonight. Council member Delisandro. [snorts]>> Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Uh, I have not heard of any holds. I'll ask one moretime. It doesn't sound like we have anytonight. So, with that, I will move our consent business items 3.1 to 3.13.>> Second. >> Motion by council member Dallas, secondby council member Carter to accept tonight's consent agenda as stated. Anyfurther council discussion on this hearing? None. All those in favor,please signify by saying I. >> I.>> Opposed? Motion carries 70. Thank you, Council Member Dalisandro. We will moveon council to our hearings, resolutions, and ordinances. We have uh one publichearing this evening. This is item 4.1, uh public hearing regarding liquorlicenses. AndI'm looking for our city clerk or a deputy city clerk. Peter can Peter can do it. >> Oh, there she is. [laughter]Just in time. >> Sorry.>> All right. Good evening. >> Uh getting a little election work donein the meantime. Um, so tonight we're here to talk about a potential liquorlicense ordinance amendment. Do you have the PowerPoint? Okay, thanks.Um, so as you'll recall, we were here in July on the 28th at the study session umto talk about the increase that we're seeing in um alcohol compliance checkfailures. Um, one of the other things we talked about was late renewalapplications and payments. And that's we're going to talk about at a futurecouncil meeting. Um, but tonight, uh, we're talking about that councilexpressed interest in ordinance amendments that would require proof ofcompletion of an approved server training as a conditions of licenserenewal as well as suspensions for the second and third compliance checkfailures. It's not working for me. Okay. It's not it's not super important.I can just talk. Um and so for our proposed ordinance forservant training um what we had talked about was um asking that 90 or askingthat 100% of servers be um trained with within 90 days of um hire and that umthey would maintain that certification after that. What the city clerk's officewould do would provide the applicants with a tracking form um that would besubmitted with renewal packets and then the servers would complete that trainingwithin 90 days of hire. There we go.Um and then what we had talked about was uh proposed uh suspensions in additionto the fine that the businesses that fail the compliance checks receive. Um,and so the proposed ordinance would add a one-day suspension to the secondviolation and a five-day suspension to the third violation. Um, thesesuspensions would come before city council. So, should uh council choose to adoptthe proposed ordinance, uh, staff recommends these motions. Are there anyquestions? >> Council, any questions of Miss Hansenthis evening? >> Can we go back one, Mr. Mayor?>> Alandro. >> Yeah. Can we go back one just to makesure? Um it what was the was it five days was thehighest one? >> This one?>> Yeah. >> Five. Yeah. Five days for the third andthen after that the fourth would then be up to 30 days. And that would be atcouncil's discretion. >> Okay. Thanks.>> And to be clear, that's that's a number of offenses within five years.>> Within five years. Correct. >> And it's a rolling five years, I'massuming. Correct. >> Correct.>> Okay. Council member Mo.>> Thank you, Mayor. Um, and for the renewal applications, this would be forany type of renewal or like if they had a a suspension and then had a renew. Canyou just clarif clarify that for me? >> Yeah, thank you, Council Member M. Um,mayor and council. That would be for um all of our renewal applications. Wewould ask them to have the uh server training.So potentially then moving forward, anyone who came forward, regardless ofif they had issues or not, would have to provide that proof uh for anytime theyrenew. Okay. >> Yes. Correct. Thank you. >> And if you could remind us, please, MissHansen, we talked about this, I think, but the the renewal training is anonline course, correct? >> Yes, we're going to offer severaloptions for them. Um, most of them are offered by me places they already havememberships through. Um, and they're relatively common. Um, the state hasalso uh several approved courses. So, we're going to offer a wide variety forthem. Um, that will make it easier for easier for the service to get thetraining that they need. >> Very good. That that's what I wanted tohear. Good. Thank you, Council Member Lman.>> Thank you, Mayor. Uh I I did bring it up in the questions earlier, but I see uh Ithink it's page 178 or uh I don't know sure what yourslide number is there. Uh but you know, you kind of see the trends there, theseven-year trend. And uh I don't know, we're still trying to figure out whatthat date is when our public shaming uh ended. But, uh, you know, when you kindof look at that, you kind of go, I wonder if there was, uh, you know, sometruth to that that if you knew you were coming before us that, uh, you know,maybe that's the way we ought to be going. Certainly open to, you know, thisthis route of trying to go this route, but I don't know. [laughter]>> Thank you. And thanks for that question. They would be coming for before you thennow at the second violation as opposed to the fourth with this ordinanceamendment. So, we're moving the public shaming up then>> a little bit. >> Okay. Good. All right. That's good then.>> Council, if there's no further questions, I would like to open thepublic hearing here. Any other questions? Quickly.>> Let us open the public hearing if we could. Uh this is our public hearing onitem 4.1, the uh the liquor license uh ordinance changes. Uh for folks whowould be speaking, uh we have a fiveminute time limit, and you will havethe shot clock on the wall to to tell you how much time you have left in youruh statements. uh we don't limit time to be mean. We do it to make sure thateveryone has the same amount of time to speak. And what I would ask you to do ifuh if you are speaking, come forward. Make sure you state your name for therecord. And we have that. Uh if you ask any questions, we will answer them atthe end of the public hearing or at the end of the at the end of the publichearing rather than try and um uh answer the questions on the fly. So with all ofthat said, I will ask, is there anyone in the council chambers who wishes tospeak to item 4.1 this evening? Priyanka, do we have anyone on thephone? >> Mayor, we do not have anyone online.>> Last call for anybody in the chambers to speak on item 4.1 tonight.Council, no one coming forward, no one on the phone. I would look for a motionto close the public hearing on item 4.1. >> So moved.>> Motion by council member Mua, second by council member Dalisandro to close thepublic hearing on item 4.1. No further council discussion on this. So all thosein favor, please signify by saying I. >> I.>> Opposed? Motion carries 70. Council questions, comments, thoughts on this.Council member Lman obviously had the thought about uh the going back to theold way of bringing folks back in, but I I do like the fact that uh aftermultiple violations, perhaps it it would be a worthwhile thing. Uh any othercomments on this, council? >> Council member Mu.>> Thank you, Mayor. the the one piece that I'm still just a little nervous on isthat the the the 100% for everyone even if they haven't had any history orissues. Um and the the barrier that that puts in, right? Especially becauserestaurants are one of the highest turnover businesses and when I thinkabout our community and growing and the the different um people who are movinghere, restaurants tend to be one of the first businesses that pop up. I know myfamily ran a restaurant because that's what we knew how to do. Um and so that'sthe piece that I have uh hesitation and concern with is that everybody has to doit uh regardless of your history of compliance. Thank you. Thank you, council member.Council member Alesandro. >> Uh Mr. Mayor, if you would allow me,just a quick um kind of counterpoint to council member Mua's uh concept. I Iwill just say that um it's not expensive. I did it last year myselfwhen I was out of work. I was I went and got a bartender license and I passed thetest that you needed to test and it didn't take much time at all. Um, and itum, it really is reinforcing the point of of making sure that they're checkingIDs at every stage of the process, right? And and it um, I found itactually pretty informative as somebody who has been of drinking age for a longtime. I was surprised to think about the ways that you can get around thosethings and how important is. Um, so I, you know, while I understand exactlywhat you're saying, I I will just tell you from personal experience, it wasn'thard to do. Um, and I found it very informative even as somebody who you'dthink would know what they were doing after all these years. Um, and uh, andand so I would be an advocate I am an advocate for it because I think it justit it will help them in the long run avoid the issues associated with this.And more importantly than anything, this is a public safety issue, right? If wehave folks that are um drinking underage, uh you know, then getting intocars and other things like that, we cause problems that are a lot moreimpactful than you know, the 20 bucks it takes to take this license. So thatthat's just the way I think about that. Thanks.>> Thank you, Council Member. Council member Carter.>> Thank you, Mayor. Um I just have a quick question. So if somebody is um workingat a restaurant and then leaves the restaurant and starts at another one inBloomington, will their training transfer? So even if there is turnover,>> yes, >> it goes with them. Okay. Thank you forthat question. Um, yes. So, most of these provide like a certificate andit's good for X amount of years and so that it's not tied to the location. It'sjust tied to the person. Okay, got it. Thank you. Um, I will say I am insupport of these changes. I think um like council member Dlesandra said, thisis a public safety issue and um the the rate at which we are seeing increasedfailures and compliance checks is very concerning and um so I I think this isthe right step forward. Thank you. >> Anything in addition, council?If council member Nelson, >> did we have specific feedback fromowners of restaurants? Did Did we reach out to them?>> We did not reach out to the owners of the restaurants. Th this came more froma place of um the administrative burden that it is putting on our staff and ourpolice department and our legal department um and the public safetyconcerns over the dramatic increase in the failures. >> Thank you, council. If there's no further questionsor comments, uh I would look for action on item 4.1. Council member Carter.>> I'd move to approve [clears throat] an ordinance amending chapter 13 of thecity code related to alcohol alcoholic beverage control and fines forviolations of chapter 13 as set forth in appendix A.>> Motion by council member Carter, second by council member Dalisandro to adopt anordinance amending chapter 13 of the city code related to alcoholic beveragecontrol and fines for violations. Council member Nelson.>> Yeah, thank you, Mayor. Um, I'm going to vote against this for just one thing. Ithink if we have an ordinance that's going to impact a group of businesses, Ithink we should reach out to them. Um, and not having that input. I I think uhdoes [clears throat] them an injustice. I actually agree with all the stuff. I Idon't think it's ownorous. I don't think it's over the top. I I completely agreewith my colleague here that brought up that uh you know the change frombringing them in here is probably beneficial that on the second time thatthey do have to come before us. Um I think the other stuff is good. I don'tdisagree with the policy. I just if we're going to pass something thatimpacts businesses or residents or whoever it's going to impact, theyshould be involved in it. >> So thank you.>> Thank you, Council Member. Any other discussion on this? Councilmember Rivas, >> just one comment. Um, have they beenmade aware that there are possible changes coming to the ordinances?>> Uh, thank you for that question. They have just been made aware through ournormal process or of uh notifi notification that an ordinance is beingconsidered. >> So, not direct mail or anything likethat. But they have there have been some communication extended to to restaurantowners and liquor stores and and such. Right.>> Just if they're following if they are following council packets and andagendas, they would see it there. >> All right. Thank you, Council MemberCarter. >> Um I'm wondering um although therewasn't engagement on the front end, maybe there could be a more robust kindof roll out and communications planned with restaurant partners in Bloomington.I mean, I don't think I worked in the restaurant industry for a very long timeas well. There's all kinds of training and things that you have to do, right? Idon't think it's, you know, I I understand that these arechanges for the restaurant community, but um I'm assuming that staff willshare this is why we've done this. It we saw increasing rates of CL compliancecheck failures. Um so, the council I mean, I don't know. I guess to me itseems pretty common sense and straightforward, but [clears throat]maybe I mean I'm just wondering if your comfort level would increase if therewas a robust kind of outreach and communications plan and like sharingrationale. >> Is that a question>> to those who have concerns? >> Council member Nelson in response.>> Um for me, no. I I think it should be done beforehand. I mean I think theyshould have been notified directly on this. I think that they should have beeninvolved in discussion because, you know, to be perfectly candid, maybe theyhave better ideas on how to do this. Again, I think I look at all of this, itlooks rational, it looks reasonable, it it makes sense to me. I'm not I'm notagainst what you're doing. I just I we should talk to those people that areimpacted by things before we do it. Before, not after. That's justwhere I'm at. So, Council Member Delandro,>> uh, uh, just as a comment, I'm going to support this because I actually disagreewith that sentiment. They, the people that are going to be most concernedabout this are people who are violating this right now. And frankly, I don'tcare what they think because they should be doing a better job and I don't needthem to come in here and tell me to soften like the penalties associatedwith them being non-compliant to something that's been on the booksforever. So, please just ID people and don't like give drinking to underagekids. That's what we're asking you to do. You probably should be doing thatall along. And nothing you're going to tell me tells me that I'm going to dosomething different if you continue to violate that. So, I you know, that'skind of where I sit in it. And so, if if if it I understand community engagement,I do. But these are penalties for non-compliance with a law that existscountrywide. And it doesn't feel like something they should have a say in whenwhat we're trying to do is explain to them that they need to follow the rules.And that's kind of why I I wouldn't I mean maybe we should notify them. Okay,sure. We put something in the paper. It's a public hearing and nobody cameforward to say they do or do not like it. Um, so I that's just where my head'sat. I I I understand the I understand the need, but I think we we have thecontinuum of of of conversation that we have, right, with community engagement.This just doesn't fall on that line to me at all.>> Council member Rivas, >> I will be content with sendinginformation to them before the the ordinance be becomes effective. Uh Ithink it we owe it to the community the business community community as a whole.Um we should in the future try to communicate it to them but at this pointuh we discussed this extensively before and I think it calls for this. However,we should communicate it to them that it is coming. I think it's our obligationto make sure that they do find out. I would be happy with that. I mean at thispoint I know what we discussed this extensively last time we spoke about it.So uh I would be happy if you take steps to make sure that they do know monthsbefore this becomes effective so that they are aware of it and perhaps thatwill be enough for them to fix their issues and and be compliant you knowcomply with the the requisitions right >> thank you council member>> thank you >> Mr. Walker.>> Uh, mayor, members of the council, if it would please the council as well. Rightnow, ordinance is uh going into effect 10 days after adoption by the council,you could always delay the effective date and staff could send out a mail asearly as tomorrow. Uh, pulling down the businesses who have liquor licenses umaking them aware of a to be determined date uh maybe 30 45 days into thefuture. U the ordinance changes and the effective date that's coming forward. >> That would work, I would think.>> So, council, I think we've we've had the opportunity. We've got a a motion and asecond on the table to adopt the ordinance amending chapter 13 of thecity code related to alcoholic beverage control and fines for violations. Blessyou. Of chapter 13 is set forth in appendix A.>> Council member Delisandro, >> do we need to, Mr. Mr. Mayor, do we needto make the amendment here then that says effective?>> I think that's more of a staff direction as opposed to amendment to it. What>> mayor, members, uh the last part of the ordinance has an effective date inthere. Um right now it's stated as upon publication, which is our typical, butyou all are um legally allowed to state a different date if you want to stateanother date. One note I will just make is that um the date that you state uh ifit's further into the future may not uh be able to be incorporated into the thenext round of compliance checks if it's too far out into the future. Umcompliance checks uh often happen this time of year. Uh so uh just something tonote with regard to timing, but if you wanted to um put an effective date of,you know, two 14 days or something like that and direct staff to mail noticeright away, they will. Um this will also go in the paper. Um we publishordinances after they're adopted. So >> thank you. Uh and thanks for bringingthat up. I I think council, if we would uh if we could say 14 days enforcement14 days after approval. uh and then direct staff to send outnotifications and information to affected businesses prior to the uh theapproval or prior prior to the implementation date 14 days afterapproval. >> Mayor, one more thing. The compliancechecks for 2025 have already been completed. So there would not affect the2025. >> Okay,>> I'm comfortable with that amendment to my motion.>> Thank you. >> So 14 days from tonight. Does everybodyunderstand we're talking here? All right,we've got a motion and a second on the table. All those in favor, pleasesignify by saying I. I >> I opposed.>> N. >> Motion carries. I'm thinking counting43. Is that correct? >> Four. I'm against I'm with no>> 52. I'm sorry. I 52 with uh Council Member Nelson and Council Member Mua.>> I voted no too. >> And that's why I said Yeah. Yeah.Yeah, >> it passed 43 with council membersNelson, Lman, and Mua voting no. >> Okay. Uh, Council Member Carter, I needa motion for summary publication, please.>> All right. I would move to adopt a resolution directing summary publicationof uh, ordinance amending chapter 13 of the city code related to alcoholicbeverage control and fines for violations of chapter 13 as set forth inappendix A. Do I have to add the amendment under this one, too?>> Yeah. Mayor, members, um, we'd be looking for, uh, an edit to that. We'llstate the specific date that it's effective in the text. You can direct usto do that. >> Okay. I direct you to do that.>> Very good. [laughter] >> Motion by council member Carter, secondby council member Dalisandro. For summary publication,>> no further council discussion on this. All those in favor, please signify bysaying I. I. Opposed. Motion carries 70. >> Thank you much. Next on our agenda, uh, council is theitem that we walked on at the start of the meeting with, uh, with our agendaadoption that we did. This is a resolution making alterations to theapproved budget and authorizing the use of funds for nutrition assistance andfood shelves. Uh, I pro, as promised, Mr. Walker is going to elucidate alittle bit more on this and fill us in. Mr. Walker.>> Thank you, mayor, members of the council. Um, just want to start off bysaying, um, I don't think any of us on staff want to make this a routinepractice, but what we're dealing with is certainly not in the realm of ofroutine. As you know, the federal government is in the midst of one of thelongest shutdowns in recent history. And while public attention has been focusedon Washington, we're starting to see real impact here locally in Bloomingtonand across Henipin County, especially when it comes to food access. Uh if theshutdown continues into November, um SNAP benefits will stop on November 1st.Uh as you may know, SNAP is administered by counties and losing those benefitswould um immediately affect many families who apply rely on that supportto put food on the table. Uh in Henipin County, about 110,000 residents receiveSNAP, which totals roughly $200 million annually. That includes 42,000 children,14,000 seniors, and 30,0007 37,000 people with disabilities locally.Uh that's about 5200 residents in Bloomington, 1,400 in Adina and 1,800 inRichfield, uh who are receiving SNAP assistance.when SNAP stops or if it stops I should say we expect increased pressure on WICas well uh which provides nutrition support for pregnant women infants andyoung children and in our tri city service area about 3,100 residents haveused WICK so far this year alone including 1,700 in Bloomington 660 inRichfield and 172 in Adina with WICK we're delivering about $25,000 in foodsupport every month or nearly $2 million annually to local grocery stores.So, if the shutdown continues uh to through November, WIC funding could runout putting families with infants, particularly those needing formula atserious risk. And we currently have 138 infants on formula uh over 50 who relyon specialized formula uh because of medical necessities.The good news, uh, if there is any to be had, is that our public health divisionis financially stable and can sustain WIC staffing, uh, in the near term, evenif federal funds were to be paused. Staff will continue serving clients,providing formula, and preparing for full program restoration once fundingresumes. So, the resolution before the council tonight authorizes targetedbudget adjustments so we can quickly direct funds to local food providers orpurchase infant formula if federal resources lapse. Uh the resolution uhwas reviewed by the city attorney as well as the finance department and itcomplies with both state law as well as our city charter. Uh if local funds areto be used, if that becomes necessary, reimbursement from the federalgovernment is possible if certain conditions are met. primarily thatfunding is later restored and we continue to follow WIC guidelines whichwe'll be diligent about. Public health is also preparing backup eligibility andverification processes ensuring that families are served without duplicationor gaps in coverage. Communication with affected families would happen throughthe Wick app. uh text messages and health care partners and outreach willbe done in coordination with Henipin County, the Minnesota Department ofHealth, and the office uh locally the office of racial equity, inclusion, andbelonging to reach immigrant and low-income families. So, if theresolution is passed tonight, mayor and members of the council, uh I wouldcontinue to provide this body with regular updates on fund usage andcommunity impact. I do want to compliment our city staff foridentifying an approach that balances fiscal discipline, sustainability, andequity while ensuring that during this period of federal uncertainty,Bloomington remains a community that takes care of its residents. And we'rehappy to stand for any questions. >> Thank you, Mr. Walker. Council questionson this. Council member Rivas. >> Um um I'm just wondering this will thisbe temporary or or or let me rephrase the question. Vietnam would these fundsbe only allocated in the event that the federal government doesn't open, right?But if it does open before November, they will be returned to the generalbudget. >> Um, mayor, members of the council,council member Rivos, you are right. Uh, I would describe this as contingencyplanning on the event of staff. What the council is being asked to considertonight is authorizing the use of these funds, but staff will treat this as ameasure of last resort. Uh first and foremost, we're going to hope thefederal government reopens. Uh you may have seen today the state authorized $4million uh towards this program. Certainly, we're competing withstatewide for those dollars, but we would obviously compete for those. Thismeasure tonight is then kind of the break glass in case of emergencyapproach. >> Thank you.Council member Lman and Council Member Delisandro. Council member Lman.>> Thank you, Mayor. Um uh thank you for uh putting this together so quickly. Um youknow, given we don't have a lot of time to to do this and so understanding that.Um so uh so from a long-term perspective um has staff thought about what thislooks like if we need to go further into sometime next year um with this and arewe um that's kind of my first question in terms of what does what does thislook like long term if we have to break the glass? What happens after that? Andthen I got another couple questions for you.>> Yeah, Mayor U council member Lman. Uh to your question, yes. Uh um I'm reallyproud to see that our finance, law, and health department have really shownstrong levels of cross departmental coordination in such a short period oftime on this. So uh finance team was able to do some financial forecastingand modeling. Um I would say intermediate term would this probablywould not carry us through a full calendar year but would carry us intonext fiscal year uh for some period of time. UmI don't think though that we can rely upon this as a sustainable measure youknow multi-year process. This is strong financial management that has allowedsome surplus funds to be available here towards the end of the fiscal year thatif we need to break that glass we would have it carrying into next year. But Iwould not recommend relying upon this as a multi-year financial strategy. More ofa one-time use of resources in an extraordinary circumstance. And uh onequestion I know that we'll get is uh you know given that we are kind of thefiscal agent for uh both Richfield in Edina and the fact that we are taking uhthese dollars out of our strategic fund. I know it's a kind of a placeholder.Could you just talk a little bit about that? Um, a little bit, you know, and Iknow we may not have all the details worked out, you know, because this iskind of a placeholder, but I just want to be really clear so that folksunderstand, you know, what that means uh in terms of our relationship with bothRichfield and uh any Dina when it comes to this particular because we're takingit out of our strategic priority funds. >> Yeah. Mayor, members of the council,Council Member Loman, if I could um utilize the expertise of staff, there'ssome nuances associated with these dollars that's very important to becauseof the tri count or the tri city services that we're providing. Um, perfect. >> Mayor, council members, thank you. I amactually Dr. Kelly is on the line, too. Um, I'm going to ask him to I'm stillnew here, too, so he has a little bit more of the nuance he can explain.[snorts] >> Dr. Kelly, good evening.>> Good evening, mayor, council members. Um, uh, as the city manager articulated,uh, we have been able to navigate this current year. Um and with support fromthe three cities, uh we're able to navigate the the wick side and theformula end. Um the putting resources towards our local food, uhestablishments and support for that would be more of the strategic directionfrom the council. Um and that would be supporting that work uh from thatBloomington angle, the the wick formula and managing ours. we would be managingit under our normal budget process with the contributions from the three cities. >> And then finally, if we could just uhtalk about uh direct assist assistance to what what is the what does the staffunderstand about that and can you talk a little bit about that? What does thatmean? How can we support and how can we help and assist folks? And I know youtalked about it in your opening up, so I just want to be really clear about whatwe can and can't do uh with this circumstance. So, yeah, Mayor, um,Council Member Loman, I'm going to ask Dr. Kelly again to to speak specificallyto that. But at a high level, um one thing I do want to make sure I artarticulate, as I said, tonight is about um authorizing the potential usage ofthese funds. If we do have to draw down upon them, what you'll see staff do isdevelop a formalized procurement process so we can figure out um the distributionof those funds in an equitable manner and um with partners that um can bedepended upon to help us do that. Um, but we're not at that place quite yet.But I'll ask Dr. Kelly to sort of speak to your point. Exactly. Council memberLman, >> Dr. Kelly,>> Mayor, Council Member Lman, uh, what we would be doing is is operating somethingwhat I I'm kind of equating to Wick Light. Uh, we would not be able toprovide the food support uh, that WIC normally provides with the the benefitsadded to individuals cards. our priority would be making sure the the babies inour community that are receiving uh support through the WIC program do nothave a lapse in formula. Um and so we would be prioritizing making sure thatformula is not disrupted uh to the the infants and the babies in our communitythat are being supported through the WIC program and our regular clinicappointments we'd be doing under WIC. We would be doing the additional counselingand nutrition support and lab work as normal with some additional support ofreferring uh individuals to different parties or partners in our communitythat have food resources uh to try and make sure that the the gap in the foodresource is mitigated as much as possible. But our focus is on formula. >> Uh council member then council memberCarter. Council member Disandro. >> Uh thank you, Mr. Mayor. Yes. I uh wantto say thank you to uh staff to uh for thinking through this and trying to beproactive about putting something in place that will guarantee um you knowsupport for these folks. It's really important. So, thank you for that. Um myquestion is uh what I want to be sure we're doing well. Um I don't have anyreason to believe we won't, but I want to put it on record. um is that we weneed to make sure that um if we're talking about granting, you know, justfunds to people to go get food support and things like that, uh I'm all for it,but I also want to make sure that the people who um are providing that foodsupport are vetted resources that we can count on. Uh so that we don't have asituation where, you know, I mean, we anytime you start to release blockgrants of funding, you can find opportunities for fraud. And I don'twant us to be caught up in a web of that like other places have had with thestate, you know, especially with CO funding and everything like that. So, wejust want to be really, you know, we know the people that we can trust andlet's make sure that we're counting on them to help us and that somebody out ofthe woodwork doesn't show up and we give money to them and then that we find outthat they're not legitimate or whatever. So, that would be the only comment Iwould make. I think it's just important to say that given the fact that we'vehad some situations in our state where that has not been the case. Um so umhopefully we can we have plenty of time between now and November 1st to sortthat list and get it right and their trusted partners we know we can counton. Thanks. >> Thank you, Council Member Council MemberCarter. >> Thank you, Mayor. Um so first I want tosay thank you to staff for putting this together so fast. Um um it's kind ofunbelievable to me that we're in this position. Um not kind of unbel it isunbelievable, but uh so thank you for for for doing this. Um, I will just addto council member Dlesandre's point. I mean, we I mean we have some amazingreliable partners in Bloomington. VEP, Loaves and Fishes. There's severalothers. Uh, so, um, I echo and I'm not concerned really because we have suchgreat partners. Um, so I wanted to ask about, uh, I understand needing toprioritize the resources that we have available. Um, and specifically what Iheard is we are um, prioritizing formula for those who need it. I am curiousabout um pregnant women um who are eligible for WIC and why they would notbe included because I that's also babies and I guess I'm just kind of curious howthat decision that those decisions were made.>> Sure. >> Dr. Kelly, do you want to take that? >> Sure. Uh Mr. Mayor, uh, Council MemberCarter, uh, we we kind of went down that road with looking at the availableresources we had and opportunities to, uh, we recognize that pregnantindividuals may have, uh, some additional challenges accessing somefood resources if WIC benefits are restricted,but there are opportunities with partners to try and mitigate that. andin conversations with partners, uh, access to formula is a a challenge formany of our our partners that provide food support. And so that felt like aspace where we could step in and manage the formula end and work with partnersto try and make sure that we uh help maintain or increase access toindividuals that are pregnant or or immediately postpartum.>> Okay. Um, [snorts] and then the state funding that is going to becomeavailable, does that have limitations as well or is that um are we going to beable to use those resources for kind of more traditional WIC support?>> Dr. Kelly or or Mr. Walker, who >> Dr. Kelly, I'll defer to you and yourexpertise here for councel. >> Hello, Mr. Mayor. Uh, council memberCarter. Uh we'll have to get back to you with specifics on on what the thegovernor's allocation process looks like. Uh I have not seen those yet.>> Okay. Thank you. I have lots of other questions, but I can ask them offline.Um I will say overall I am very supportive of this. Um I will also say,you know, just being on different community groups and including Facebook,as much as I hate Facebook, but um it's really heartwarming to see how ourcommunity is rallying. Um there's lots of people having lots of conversationsaround how they can support. Um so I'm again very happy that the city isfiguring out you know the best way we can leverage resources and maximizethose um to fill the gap during this time. Uh so I will be supporting and youknow I hope I hope that we don't have to use the resources. I hope that they canjust go back into the general fund. Um but we need to have an emergency fundduring this time to make sure that babies are not going out withoutformula. um who need it and um and that we can support our community partnerswho are also experiencing increasing demand and it's much harder to getresources. I work for a nonprofit. Um it's tough to get grants right nowbecause every all nonprofits are are feeling the squeeze and feeling thepinch and so um yeah, I'm I'm I'm going to be supporting.>> Council member Rivas, >> I just want to piggy back on councilmember um Adelaand's comments. Absolutely. We should bet everybody outthere before we grant any grants. Thank you,>> Council Member Nelson. >> Yeah, thank you, Mayor. Um, first I justwant to disclose because this does talk about grants to uh food-basedorganizations within the community. Um, Council Member Carter mentioned one ofVEP. Um, and so people should know that I am on the board of VEP. Um, and I wantpeople to be aware of that. I was actually at a meeting with them uh thatstarted at 5:00 tonight and and came from there. Um and it's a toughsituation. Uh they did make some budget adjustments. I recused myself from thatvote uh in order to avoid any um actual or appearance of a conflict of interest.This what we're talking about tonight does not specifically allocate any moneyto VEP. So I will uh provide comments on that. But if if we were to do that, Iwould have the same propriety towards the city of Bloomington. I I don't wantthat um appearance of a conflict there. But I support what they do. We all knowthey're a great organization. Um but they're they're hurting. I to be honest.I mean, it's not just the SNAP. It's it's the fact that uh the food that theyget has been uh the uh federal funding for it has been cut by over 50%. Um Iwould like to thank one of our great Bloomington companies, Thermal King.They did 2500 uh food packs which are emergency food assistance for people. UhVEP is looking at they're expecting at least a 25% rise in needs starting uhwhen this SNAP thing goes into effect where people can't use SNAP benefits togo buy food. They still need food from somewhere. They're hurting. So toanybody out there that can help, to any of our corporations in the communitythat can help, they need the help. And not just them, like every foodorganization within the region needs it. I just happen to be on that board oneand have that information. Um there's other ways that we might be able to helpin terms of distribution. They're concerned that they don't have thecapacity with that increase that they can do it. So they're looking forsources and places that they can have those food packs um and things likethat. I I believe that um Nativity of Mary is one, Darl Farooq is another,that they're looking at expanding those opportunities to get that food out thereuh for people, but this is it's not a good situation for the most in need inour community. And I I think it would be um absolutely tragic to not support thisand I would support this and if necessary more. We I mean we talkedabout priority based budgeting. if this isn't a priority, what is, you know,seriously. So, um, again, we're not allocating direct aid to VEP in this[clears throat] motion. So, I I will be participating in this, but um, if if wedid, I would, uh, step step aside in that conversation. But, uh, it it isabsolutely potentially urgent. Or maybe they'll get their act together and[snorts] not shut end the shutdown. You know, that could happen, too. So, um,anyways, I appreciate all the comments of of my colleagues and the support forthis. Uh, we got to support babies. We got to support the mothers. We got tosupport those of low income that need help. And, you know, these are a lot oftimes people that are working. And one of the other interesting side effectsthat they're looking at is a lot of these people may actually be people thatare working for the government that have to still go to work but not get paid.>> [snorts] >> So, air traffic controllers, TSA, thingsof that nature where they're required to work but not get paid. So, anyways, thatthat's all the comments I have. I I think I think we're there. I think itlooks like everyone supports this and and to the point of the fraud, I thinkabsolutely. Let's look at our established organizationsum in that process. Uh and going forward, we don't need to come up withnew stuff here. There's people that know how to do this.>> Yes, exactly. Council member Carter. Um >> I was just going to offer to make themotion. I I will would appreciate you making the motion.>> Okay. >> Please.>> Um before I do, I will say um to council member Nelson's point about if there'smore that's needed that we should have that conversation. So if we are hearingfrom clients, pregnant women, women with babies that they are not able to get thefood resources that they need through our partners and others that like weshould hear about that. We should know about that so we can have thoseconversations. Um, so I would move a resolution making alterations to theapproved budget and authorizing use of funds for nutrition assistance and foodshelves. >> Second.>> Motion by council member Carter, second by council member Mua. Moving theresolution making alterations to the approved budget and authorizing use offunds for nutrition assistance and food shelves.Any further council discussion on this hearing? Council member>> No, sorry. Go ahead. Sorry. >> Hearing no. No uh council discussion onthis. All those in favor, please signify by saying I.>> Opposed. Motion carries. 70. Uh, I want to echo thanks to our public health, ourour legal team, our administration, uh, for pulling this together. I know it wasvery quickly done and but it it does look thorough and it looks uh, wellvetted and I appreciate that and appreciate this is um, I I mentionedearlier it's a team sport and this is another example of this. This is takingcare of people who absolutely need it uh, at the worst of times. So, thank youfor your work on that. Greatly appreciated.>> Thank you, >> council. We're going to move on to itemfive, our organizational business. No action required on any of these.These are uh information and feedback. And item 5.1is an update on the Henipin County Nicollet Avenue Street ReconstructionProject. Mr. Simons is here to lead us off andwe're going to learn a lot about this. Good evening. Welcome.>> All right. Good evening, Mayor and Council. I'm here just to give a quickintroduction. Um, we have Emily Goodell with Henipin County, a project managerfor this Nichollet Avenue street reconstruction project here with ustonight, as well as Nikki Ferington from SE, the consultant team. City staff'sbeen working closely with this team on this project. It's a Henipin County ledproject, but Emily has a presentation for you here tonight. So, I will turn itover to Emily to give you guys some information on the project.>> Good evening, Miss Goodell. Thank you.>> All right. As Bob mentioned, my name is Emily Goodell. I'm an engineer withHenipin County and the project manager on the Nicola Avenue reconstructionproject in Bloomington. Um today we'll be giving you an updateon the project in general. Uh I'll also give a summary of the public engagementthat's taken place so far. Um, I'll be sharing the safety enhancements andpresenting the multimodal um, alternatives that we looked at for thisproject and finally touch on project funding and next steps for thisreconstruction project. First, a little bit of background. Thisproject extends from East Old Shakape Road by Kennedy High School up toAmerican Boulevard. So, this is about a 2.3 mile long reconstruction project.Um, and as you can see in this slide here, this is the existing uhconfiguration on the roadway, which includes a center left turn lane, uh,two travel lanes, one in each direction, on street bike lanes, and sidewalksimmediately adjacent to the roadway. Couple items to note here. Uh there'sabout twothirds of the corridor has a 66 foot rideway width making it a fairlyconstrained section of roadway to be able to fit um all of the enhancementsthat we're discussing in. Um also want to note that the daily traffic valesup to 10,200 vehicles per day. Just wanting to drive home the fact that thisis a important corridor in the Henipin County and city of Bloomingtontransportation network. So, we kicked off this project a littleover a year ago in July of 2024. Since then, we've been meeting monthly withour project partners, including the city of Bloomington, Metro Transit, and ourdesign consulting team. We've hosted three phases of public engagement, whichI'll give more background on in the next few slides. And then looking ahead,we're looking at uh final design beginning in 2026 in preparation forconstruction in 2027. Ourfirst phase of public engagement took place in March of this year. And in thisphase, we took the project overview, timeline, and goals out to the public toget input on and understand what their priorities on the corridor are. So, wepresented the current corridor conditions as well as some as sometraffic analysis. And then we also asked for feedback on what's working on NicolaAvenue and what's maybe not working for us to start the project on. We hosted anin-person openhouse. We also had an online survey and three pop-up eventsthroughout the community. And some of the um feedback we received from theseevents included um a call for safer crossings near Kennedy High School andat busy intersections. There were concerns about speeding near AmericanBoulevard and old Shakapi Road. Um we also heard support for improved bike andpedestrian um connections to key destinations and finally a call foraccessible sidewalks for all on this corridor.We took that into our second phase of public engagement which took place thissummer. Um at this point we shared a toolbox of potential improvements withthe public. This included uh multimmodal alternatives as well as intersectiontreatments. And again, we included another openhouse online survey and fourpop-up events with the community. We also did a business owner uh outreachwith a virtual office hours with the county um for any business owners whoare interested in learning more about the project.Through this round of engagement, we uh heard more support for providing off-streetet bike facilities, support for adding green space in the boulevards. Umalso, we did hear some people supporting reconstructing Nicola Avenue as is inthe current typical section. And the one of the biggest concerns that we werehearing from residents was about losing yard space and uh parking in theirdriveways due to right-of-way acquisition.So with that, we took that into our final round of public engagement in thepreliminary design um segment of the project. We just wrapped this up thismonth. Um and in this phase, we shared um some options that we removed fromconsideration on the project, which include on straight bike lanes androundabouts. We also shared uh two corridoralternatives for the multimodal component of the project. The firstbeing a shared use path on one side of the road with sidewalk on the other sideof the road and the other being one-way bikeway pairs with sidewalks on bothsides of the roads. Similar to other um rounds of engagement, we had an openhouse online survey and several community pop-up events. And we also metwith uh Kennedy High School with their administrative staff and facility staffto understand um how they're using Nicola Avenue outside of Kennedy HighSchool. So overall what we heard from uhcommunity members on this is that there is support for a shared use path on oneside of the road with um the sidewalk on the other side of the road. And I'llalso note that um from property owners who are directly on Nicollet Avenue,there was a strong preference for the option that included the um shared usepath on one side of the road. um as far as what we heard from residents makingtheir decision between the two options was that um the property impacts and thecosts of the project were most important to them. Uh we also heard concernsregarding potential speed differentials between cyclists and ebikes with ashared use path given that um people will be walking and using that at lowerspeeds um with others going at higher speeds. Finally, we had a few uhmiscellaneous comments about clarifying maintenance responsibilities. Um somelighting comments and support for additional tree plantings in theboulevards. Uh also want to share some of our interintersection treatments that we've been working through as a team. So as Imentioned before, roundabouts were dismissed from consideration on thisproject. So we are proposing traffic signals at each of the existingsignalized intersections with the exception of 84th Street. Through ourtraffic analysis, we found that 84th Street was not warranted for a signal.So we are um recommending uh stop control on the side streets there um dueto that not meeting the the traffic warrants to retain a signal.I'll also add on this graphic, you'll be able to see a handful of pedestrianmedian refuges throughout the corridor. Uh this is a place that will allow forsome traffic calming with a raised median in the middle of the road andalso allow pedestrians to cross the road in two stages rather than having to umlook both ways and and cross all lanes of traffic.Um, we also are including removal of some free right slip lanes that are onthis roadway, including at 95th Street, 90th, and 86th Street. The purpose ofthis is to get cars to slow down at the intersection and not be able to takethat right turn quite so fast. Um, still be able to have their right turn, butum, it'll just be a little bit slower to help with the, um, pedestrian safetyaspect of the project. Um, 83rd Street, we're showing a closed median. I'lltouch on that a little bit more in a future slide. And then also want to notethat we are showing uh transit stops on this graphic and it looks probably alittle different than what you're used to right now. We're working with MetroTransit and they are looking at consolidating stops on this roadway. Sooverall, we're generally trying to pair our uh intersection treatments wherethere are transit stops for Route 18 planned. All right. And then we take we took allof the technical analysis that the team's been working on over the lastyear and the public feedback from the several rounds of engagement and have umas a project team um our uh let's say um suggesting the shared use path on oneside to carry forward with as the preferred alternative. Um so you can seeit kind of in a typical section view here. This includes a three-lane sectionthat there is today, but it takes the bike lanes off the road and reallocatesthat space to allow for some boulevard space and also a shared use path with asidewalk. Uh, a couple notes on this alternative. Uh, this does require lesspermanent property acquisition than other alternatives that we looked at onthis project. It also allows for a little bit more space for boulevards andtrees just because there's a little bit less pavement some than some of theother options and it is a lower construction cost than the other optionsthat we looked into. So with that, there's three keylocations that I wanted to point out as part of this project. The first being upat the north end of the project near American Boulevard. Currently, there aretwo through lanes going southbound um from American Boulevard here. Um butthey're very short and terminate the second one terminates right after theintersection. We heard from a lot of residents that there were complaints ofspeeding and unsafe merges in this area. So, we're proposing extending thatsecond through lane as far as we can um basically to about the McDonald'sentrance up there um to allow for travelers to have more time to make asmart decision in terms of um merging or deciding what lane they need to be in. And as I mentioned before, uh I want totake a look at 83rd Street here. So 83rd Street is a currently an offsetintersection. Um we are proposing putting in a median through thisintersection which would um change existing access today from a full accessto a right in right out on this side street. The reason that we're looking atthis is that because these are offsetting intersections. If twotravelers are turning left from opposite directions, that movement would overlap,which presents a safety risk for um that consideration. And the trade-off therethen is the the right in right out. And then the last location I wanted topoint out with this presentation is near Kennedy High School by Old Shakape Road.Um so currently there are two lanes of travel in both directions on thisroadway in this section. Uh we are proposing narrowing that down to onelane of travel in each direction and adding um introducing turn lanes tohandle the added capacity um and and needs for the school at school drop offand at any events that are needed. Um and as part of the considerations forum deciding on a preferred alternative, we did do a preliminary cost estimate.Um, we're still early on in the project, so this is certainly concept level, butthe preliminary costs are coming in at about $26.4 million for this entireproject. Um, we are um anticipating cost participation from the city ofBloomington to follow our cost participation policy that Henipin Countyhas. Um, and and with that, generally, we're looking at about a 25% cost shareon this project from the city. And finally, looking ahead to some nextsteps. As I mentioned before, we're looking at beginning final design at thebeginning of 2026 with rideofway acquisition starting shortly afterthroughout the duration of 2026. We are um planning to come back to council witha cooperative agreement at our 60% design milestone, which will likely bein the middle of next year. Um and then, as mentioned before, construction wouldstart in 2027. um if according to plan, if everythinggoes according to plan. Um and then I also included the uhproject website link in here if there's any more information that you'd like tosee. We've been posting along the duration of the project. Um but Iincluded my contact information if you have any questions. But with that, ifyou have anything for me now, I'm I'm happy to answer.>> Well, thank you for the update and uh thanks for the work that has obviouslygone into this. the you could see the progression through the three communityengagement uh opportunities and I and I do like the outcome. I especially likeseparating the sidewalks from the traffic with with the boulevard andtrees in there are great. Anything anything is better than the lastpictures that you just showed where the sidewalks literally bumping up againstthe uh the the through traffic in the street. So I I do appreciate that and Ithink uh it looks like a strong design. So thank you for that. Councilquestions. Council member Mua and then council member Carter. Then councilmember Dallasandro, council member Mua. >> All right, mayor. Thank you so much.Thank you for being here, Emily. Um, this is really relevant for me because Ijust drove on Nicollet right before council going up to Culver for a schoolfundraiser and I saw literally everything you just said talked about.Um, I'm particularly interested in the 83rd Street setup because as I was goingout there, a bus moved to the middle lane, turn it on, and there's anothercar coming to turn left going south. And so, um, that I think that's a a a goodcall for safety, especially around transit and students. Um, and then alsoAmerican Nickeola. I'm particularly interested in the in-n-out with thatholiday >> as I got to that intersection. It wasjam-packed, multiple cars lined up to get out of the holiday. Um, and it justwas a chaotic event environment to get out of there. So, I'm interested to seeif you're going to do anything with the in and out of that holiday access tothat gas station just to make it a little more safe.>> Um, and then two more things. Fire station one is right there as well. Iknow fire station one is due to get updated in the next few years here. Justwant to make sure we're going to be collaborating on that. That we're notgoing to put this new road in and then we got to put the new station in thenrip things up to redo it all again. Um, so any coordination and collaboration onthat would be uh really appreciated. And then my last thing is just timing forschool, >> right? It's already a busy intersection,kids driving every which way. Um, want to make sure that we're timing this tomake sure that that section at least is going to support school and when kidsare back in the fall and as they're leaving in in the spring. So, thank youmember Carter. [snorts] >> Uh, thank you. The I I think this isawesome. I appreciate all the commun community engagement that was done. Ihave heard frequently when I've been out door knockocking um being in an atlargeseat, you know, I door knockock all across the city and I have heard frompeople on the east side like why don't we have like beautiful roads likeNormandale on the west side and I feel like this is moving us in that directionum with the trees and the boulevards and then having the multimotal pathways. Ithink it's just um definitely a huge step in the right direction. I'm excitedto see this happen. Um I did have a quick question. Um can you just tell mea little bit more about conversations that have happened um related to the 494project and then this happening at the same time? Um we have concern I think Ican say we but uh we've had a lot of increased traffic on the city roads inBloomington because of the 494 project and so I guess I just have concernsabout the overlapping timing and how that will impact um people's ability toget around in Bloomington. So, if you could just speak to that and whatconversations have been had, that'd be helpful.>> Sure. Yeah. Mayor, council member, uh, thanks for the question. We are workingwith members of the 494 project um, in coordination with our project. So, the494 bridge replacement over Nicola or at Nicola Avenue is scheduled forconstruction um, coming up in 2026 and we are looking at constructing thisproject starting in 2027. So we do anticipate that the work being donedirectly on Nicola Avenue with the 494 project would be complete by the timethe construction for the Nicola Avenue reconstruction project starts. Um and inaddition say we are planning on tying in our project in line with what isproposed at 494 to avoid overlapping work between the projects.>> Okay. Thank you. That's really helpful. Um, and then my last thing I'll say, andI've plugged this recently, um, when you design the shared use path,>> as much as possible, um, when we have the driveways that the path goes over tojust clearly indicate that it is a multimodal path, um, you know, somethingthat I've seen recently is like in St. Louis Park where they have the brightgreen striping. So, it's very obvious to cars that there it's a bike path aswell. And we don't have that in Bloomington, um, to my knowledge.mentioned. I would love to see us start to have things like that. So, I wouldjust plug that for this project. >> Thank you,>> Council Member Delisandro. >> Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Um um nicedovetail from Council Member Carter's point. Um I'm I'm confused, I guess,about Well, I can't envision what that shared use path looks like when it getsto intersections. And the concern that I have, although I understand everybody'sdesire to have that in terms of, you know, I love the fact that it's lesscost. I love the fact that it's less, you know, right of way um you know, umconcerns for residents on the the the on the avenue. Um but and and I love thetrees. I always love the trees, but now it's harder to see when you have bikeson that path. And if somebody's going to turn right onto something or turn leftand they can't see because the boulevard trees are in between their line of sightand the shared use path, how does that work? And so, not that you need toanswer that for me today, but but I I would like us to make sure that we'renot solving one problem and creating a massive other problem, which is, youknow, people who are walking or biking on those shared use paths are now harderto see because of where we've put it. Um, because that would that would kindof dis it just would defeat the purpose of the point, right? give them all moreaccess to bike and and and you know pedestrian transportation and then putthem in danger. Like it doesn't make sense to me. So I can't see that>> in the in the descriptions. So I'd like as we get through design for us to bepaying attention to that and if it means to council member Carter's point we're alot more clear about where these crossings are happening um includinglighting and including the opportunity for right of way at certain points etc.you know, I don't know. Um, I don't think I've seen it in the Twin Cities.Maybe we have it somewhere, but you know, there are there are places, well,I guess downtown we do places where bikes have a an opportunity to go and,you know, then cars have an opportunity to go and they're very distinctive andthey're very different times and everything else. And it's just otherthings like that that we might want to make sure that we're including in thisif we're going to dedicate it that way. Um, the other thing I think I would sayfor council just in general is that and it just because somebody said somethingabout it is um, we should as a council make sure that we're being clear aboutlike if an electric bike is on a bike path, it can't go above a certain numberof miles per hour versus if it's on the road, then it's got a different par setof parameters, right? Because those things are different and we should careabout that a lot. Um, I wouldn't I mean, my motorcycle goes a different speedthan my bicycle for a reason. Um, and you know, we're crossing a lot ofboundaries there and making it harder for people to understand when they'renot expecting something to go 15 miles an hour on a sidewalk. So, justsomething for our note as we think about this. Thanks.>> Thank you, council member. Actually, I think we we dipped our toe into theebike conversation last time, so we did. Council member Reos,>> I happen to drive. Thanks for being here this evening. Um, I happen to drive alot in that area. That's my district. Um, and I see a problem not only onNicolet but on Portland as well. Uh, where we reduce from two lanes oftraffic on each side to one and the center. On numerous occasions quiteoften people pass me because I drive at the speed limit. People pass me on thecertain line center lane speeding like crazy. I I wish B uh BPD would be thereat that point, but usually it's you know they're they happen to go by a couple ofminutes after or so, but um I seen the pictures of uh American Boulevard wherethe four lanes and all the trees around it. That would be more adequate andthat's what I would dream of. Not only there, but Portland Avenue, uh Lindell.I know it's probably out of a question because of uh the funds. Umum the if we add more trees, it's beautiful, but the lighting doesn't workas well. Um you know, on uh council member de Alexandra's point, umto me, um I lean on that four lanes traffic, two on each side. Um you know,we we lost that. um the bicycle traffic uh that I see personally in that area isnot it I don't think it calls at this moment to have dedicated bike lanes tobe honest with you. Um I I bike occasionally. I'm getting old so I don'tdo it as often as I used to. Um, so you know, to me is the emphasis on bicyclesall the time when we don't really see the the community utilizing bikes totransport themselves to work or or whatever the case may be. What I see isa lot of children underage cruising on bikes at all at all times. So I I justquestion the emphasis on having bicycle lanes uh when the reality is that uh ifyou at any time go and stand there all day for eight hours.Uh you're going to see maybe a couple of bicycles throughout the day and thetraffic gets a little out of hand because now everybody's going onto onelane. Another another street that is very dangerous is 92nd and Nicollet. Uhthere's an apartment building in there and when you're trying to turn left into92nd uh to go towards uh Lindell, a lot ofpeople are trying to get into that apartment building and when they comethey come at 35 miles an hour or faster and they jump into the center lane toturn left into that apartment building. some people that are already trying tomerge into that lane, the turning lane, >> find themselves in a situation thatcould be, you know, major accident, I guess, ifboth of them are going at 35. Um, so I think we're just dropping the ball andnot paying attention to a lot of the details. uh uh you had to drive thatarea constantly to see and have a better evaluationuh to design the streets in there. And Nicola, whether there's construction on494 or not, it's busy. >> It's always been and so is Portland.And it isn't fun when somebody flies by on your left. Um and it happens a lot,not just to me. I guess if a lot of the people that drive there will come overhere and have their their um uh voice heard uh they will have the same uhthoughts that I have. Um so you know to me it is worth it. It looks beautiful onthe pictures as uh uh council member Carter mentioned. I want to see the eastside looking as nice as the west side but I want it to make sense. and and tome everything that we're always pushing the bicycles maybe on the west side yousee a lot more and I I witness that as well sometimes I get off 494 and come onthe streets because I don't want to drive through the mess in there right umand I see that over there this a lot more people biking but here you don'tsee that it's just I think the bike lanes are totally unnecessary on theeast side um but that's just my opinion um youknow um I I live on that side I drive all the time and I have had the theopportunity to do that a lot all day now because I haven't been working since Ihad surgery earlier this year. Um, and I don't think we need bike lanes on thaton that side of city at least for now. So, you know, I would like to see adifferent design. U some of it makes sense having the bicycles run on thesidewalks in California. That's how it goes. bicycles go on the sidewalks andall the cycles had the little ramp to go on and off. It makes perfect sense. Idon't remember ever back there seeing a lot of bicycle and pedestrian accidents.You know, you learn to communicate when you're behind them. Uh but that's that'sjust my my two cents to it. You know, the project seems looks great on thepicture. I mean, I would love to see that, but at the same time, bicyclelanes, it's you know, I don't think we need him in there, at least for now.Thank you, mayor. And >> thank you. And and it's a good thingthat the design eliminates bicycle lanes. It takes it to an off streetbicycle uh facility that uh so that to yourpoint, council member, that's uh will eliminate bike lanes on the street. Sothe design will make sense. Council, any additional questions here? Thank you very much. And uh now the thethe timeline will will you be back with us again before it all starts I'massuming? >> Yes. Uh we will plan to come back umlater next year probably mid year with a cooperative agreement as design hasprogressed further. >> Thank you very much. Thanks for beinghere tonight. >> Thank you. >> Council we'll move on to item 5.2. AndI'm going to take note that it is now 8:17 and we still have I think fourpresentations. We've got uh the American Boulevard transit study and then I thinkthree different presentations within our budget discussions. I'd ask that we uhmaybe tighten up our comments and focus a little bit and make sure that we'renot here too late. I don't want to rush our budget discussion. Uh and I want tomake sure that everybody has an opportunity, but I also don't want to behere till 11:00 tonight. So, uh we will move on to item 5.2, our review of theAmerican Boulevard Transit Study. I see Kirk Roberts and you must be Miss Hallfrom SRF. >> I am indeed. Thank you. Very good.Welcome. >> Can we put the presentation inpresentation mode? Thank you. Good evening, mayor and council members.Thank you for having us tonight to talk to you about the American Boulevardtransit study. Um Kirk and I will present together. I'll go first, though. So, we were last in front of you inDecember of last year. So, I'll do a little refresh on why uh the city didthe American Boulevard transit study. And it was really prompted uh by sort ofa vision of what this corridor could be. Knowing that 494 is under constructionand is changing and is going to have more capacity to carry cars was kind ofan open question about does American Boulevard still need to act as areliever to the freeway or can it be a different type of street for thecommunity. So there were three components to this study. Uh one was toconsider the opportunity for bus rapid transit or BRT on American. Um, anotherwas to identify community priorities that would help us set a vision for whatthe street could look like. And the third part was about real estateredevelopment along American Boulevard, land use change to help facilitate thekind of redevelopment that the city might want to see along an importantcorridor like this. So just to refresh on what where westudied uh we covered all of American between the Normandale Lake District andthe South Loop District also of course including the Pan-American District. Sothree major target areas for development in the city all connected by AmericanBoulevard. Uh we did a real focus during the study between France Avenue and 24thAvenue. Um, I wanted to recognize also the existing transitway service thatcrosses American and uh in a short segment on the Dline uh runs onAmerican. So, you know, there's an Orange Line uh station at Knox andAmerican in that Pan-American district. Uh there are Dline stations at Nicolletand Chicago avenues on American itself. And then there are blue line stations,several in the south loop. And then blue line, Dline, and red line all of courseterminate at the Mall of America along with several other local routes.In addition to the transitways on America or crossing on and on AmericanBoulevard, there's also uh local service, bus service that runs all daylong, every 30 minutes on American Boulevard. And this was an increase inservice that Metrotransit made this summer. Previously, the route 542 ranjust during peak periods. Um, and now and it ran hourly and now it runs everyhalf hour all day long. Uh, earlier this year as well, SouthwestTransit started running another local route on American Boulevard, the route686, and that route runs hourly on American. So altogether combinedMetroransit and Southwest Transit are running three trips each hour onAmerican Boulevard. This is what uh transit ridership lookslike in the city of Bloomington. That bright orange or yellow dot is over theMall of America Transit Center. That is by far where the most boardings happenon buses and trains. And then those other purple areas all are transit waystations whether orange line dine um or blue line. When it comes to American Boulevarditself, um I'm sure many of you are very familiar with the condition of thiscorridor. It's quite wide. It's usually three lanes um in each direction. Manyof the busiest intersections have two left turn lanes. They also have uh sliplanes for right turns. And so at many of the crossings at the major intersectionsuh a pedestrian has to cross nine lanes of traffic to get from one side of thestreet to the other. So it's a long crossing. I might also mention at this point toothat the sidewalks are right behind the curb. So there's no, you know, boulevardor buffer at all between the street and the sidewalk.So just to summarize all the reasons for this study, uh the 494 prompt of courseum and then also some development occurring along American Boulevard andsome changes and a and a desire to see uh and realize higher density uses alongAmerican um to in recognition of the transit investment that's been happeningalong the corridor and then a recognition of an opportunity to changethe character and so city saw an opportunity to consider the future ofAmerican Boulevard. Uh to start the study, we did a round of publicengagement in January and some brave souls came out to visit us at an openhouse. Uh we also got out on the route 542 a couple of times. We had a surveyand we asked folks on the bus uh to respond to our survey. We alsopublicized the survey via Let's Talk Bloomington and had a really niceresponse. Uh some of the themes that we heard were that people would reallyapprec appreciate dedicated space for transit, cyclists, and people walking.People really valued improved safety um and um improved and new public space,including greenery. People value American Boulevard because it providesaccess to lots of places, which of course you all know living here. um andthat people get there a variety of different tr uh ways, walking, biking,riding transit, and of course driving. So, after we um heard from the public,we got into studying some routes, potential routes for bus rapid transit.We studied four different routes. Um they all terminate at the Mall ofAmerica. And then from there, alternative one follows American andFrance Avenue to Centennial Lakes. Alternative two follows American andFrance up to Southdale Mall. Alternative three extends on American and then 84thover to Normanddale Lake District. And then alternative 4 is kind of unique andit is an extension of the current route 4 which is a local bus route that startsin northeast Minneapolis comes through downtown south Minneapolis and Richfieldand then today it ends roughly at Knox and or Penn and Americanand what we're proposing here is extension of that route along AmericanBoulevard to the Mall of America and conversion of that route to BRT. So,it'd be a big long route for BRT. So, what did we learn about these BRTroutes? Um, the route to Southdale and the route to Northeast Minneapolis viadowntown were the ones that performed best in our evaluation. We looked at alot of different factors. Um, but ones that emerged, of course, were connectingthe most important destinations. Um, and this incorporated uh some of thedestinations we heard from from in our survey about which were most important.Southdale, the Southdale route did that well. The um I'll just call italternative four, the route for extens for extension did that even better. Bothroutes uh served Bloomington transit Bloomington residents likely to usetransit. And what do we mean by that? Um one of the things we looked at early inthis study was demographics across the city. In transit studies, we always lookfor zero car households as indicators of folks who are more likely to usetransit. We also look for low-income households also as indicators of folkswho are more likely to use transit. I don't think it's surprising to any ofyou there are more of those households east of 35W. And so we felt it was veryimportant for the BRT service to all at least make it to past 35W in particular.Um so both um of these BRT options do that. They also both connect to theregional transit system in several locations both to local bus as well asthose transit ways I pointed out earlier. And then the last one, um,building on a local route with established ridership. This is, ofcourse, a nod to that route 4, which has good all day service today and hasstrong all day ridership today as well. And we thought it made logical sense toconnect it to one of our biggest regional destinations at the mall alongwith all the the other connections available there. So, why invest in transit? We felt itwas important to kind of go back to this bigger theme here for just a moment andcome back to some of the values of the city of Bloomington as a safe, fair, andaffordable Bloomington. Transit is an important component of that. Um, transitalso enables a range of housing choices and options and growth and addition ofof residences without major changes to established neighborhoods. Soredevelopment along a commercial corridor like American Boulevard to adddensity without having to change the character of I think what are veryvalued single family and and lower density neighborhoods in the city. Umfocusing transit investment on a given given corridor also can help withguiding land use and development um in that corridor. And of course, um, I'veheard many times the valued partnership between Metrotransit and the city ofBloomington and a desire to continue that, as well as with MVTA and SouthwestTransit, too, of course. So, I'm going to move on now to thesecond component of the study, um, the land use evaluation. And this was reallyimportant. Why did we look at land use in this American Boulevard transitstudy? um land use and transit are just inexraably linked, right? The thewrership um uh on transit is really tied to what how many people can live andwork nearby and and what kinds of uses are are nearby that enable people toeasily reach transit. Um land use is also within the city's control. So,while transit is a regional decision, land use and and changing developmentpatterns are under the city's purview. Uh we early on in the study, we heard acomment from a planning commissioner about American Boulevard asBloomington's front porch. Um and this this comment really resonated with theteam as we were working through the study and thinking about well, if thisis the front porch, what are the land uses? What is what is the look and feelof this corridor if it's the front porch? Um and then finally, thecomprehensive plan process is coming up um in 2026. And so this study was seenas kind of a preparation for the comp plan.We looked at existing zoning and future land use, looking really for mismatches.Where does the future land use indicate that that certain things could be built,but current zoning would not allow those? We looked at a land value tostructure value. So that's looking at if there's a building built on a piece ofland and the building is not worth as much as the land, that indicates usuallythat the site could be ripe for redevelopment and something new to comealong. Um, and so in turn, we use that process to identify those priorityparcels for redevelopment. Um, and then we put all of those together on acomposite map. And I'll show that here briefly. Um, the areas outlined in blueare those potential redevelopment priority areas. you'll see they'realmost all filled in with red and red were the the parcels that where thestructure value was essentially the lowest and sometimes it's becausethere's nothing built on that land or there's maybe a parking lot today. Um solots and lots of these opportunity sites along American here.So, some of the recommendations coming out of this study, uh, there there arecurrent zoning regulations in your in your guide today that supporttransitoriented development or a higher density uh, development, but wesuggested two new designations that are a little more specific, a higherintensity to that is closest to American Boulevard or closest to your transitcorridors, allowing for the highest density uses along those. and thencorridor oriented development that kind of steps down the density as you getfurther off the corridor. This map shows uh that highintensity toapplied to all of those uh redevelopment sites. So you can see lots of pinkopportunity on this map here. I'll keep things moving. So, the otherthings that our land use uh part of the study touches on are things that aren'texactly about what each parcel what each land use is, but all about how does thatparcel get redeveloped? What does it look like? Things to guide that. Thingslike parking for both cars and bicycles. Um built form guidelines that dictatewhat buildings look like, not just what use they are. um uh guidelines about ifa large block site redevelops, how do you make sure there's internalcirculation on a site so it doesn't just feel impenetrable? Um and then of coursethe the densities and uses. Um public art does also get a mention as well. Sothis will um translate into the comprehensive plan. Um and the theplanning team at the city is is incorporating this into their nextsteps. Now, um Emily just showed one like thisfor Lindale, but this one is quite different. This one's for American. Umbut these illustrations really are worth a thousand words. So, I'm going back alittle bit to what we heard in public engagement. You'll see some of thefeatures that we heard about showing up in this diagram. And one of them, ofcourse, was greenery, shade, more kind of nicer public spaces. Um and and yousee those the trees in the boulevards in the medians. For that reason uh we hearduh a lot of excitement for better spaces and designated spaces for people walkingand biking. So you see sidewalks on both sides of the street of course and thenalso those sidewalks are separated from the bicycle facility which is alsoseparated from the road. So you see that two-way bikeway um and that is intendedto be very separate from from the people walking. So you see there's a thatbuffer that twoft buffer in between. Um one feature of this of this concept isthat it's 94t wide which means that it fits in the footprint of AmericanBoulevard today. Wouldn't require new rightway in any of the spots. In somespots, American is much wider than this. In some spots, it's right around 94feet. Um, and that helped make it a more cost-effective option in addition to itsability to just move a lot of people through this space because it allows forbikes to move, because it allows for pedestrians to move, because it allowsthe buses to move freely, and it has room for cars. The people, not thevehicle throughput, but the people throughput is much higher on a streetlike this. um which you can imagine as it densifies is more becomes more andmore important. Um the reason this has the title preferred concept for testingis that we wanted to make sure it was understood that we did not do a trafficanalysis as part of the study. So, this is a a vision and a and a communicatedconcept that reflects the community priorities, but it hasn't been tested umin a traffic model to see what it would look like. Um, I will say though, um, byby way of of uh sort of understanding is that that that street does have asimilar um annual average daily traffic to Lindell Avenue in Minneapolis, whichjust did go last year, I believe, to one travel lane in each direction. Um,that's not the whole story, of course, right? There's there's a lot more um tolearn about how a street functions and Kirk will get into that a little bitmore. But um it is not unheard of to carry that volume of traffic with justone travel lane in each direction. Um so so to wrap up here with next steps,there's really three major next steps. one is that you know this study um didits own examination of of the potential for BRT on the corridor but Metroransitis of course the regional decision maker for BRT so they are working through uh astudy right now to identify the next generation of bus rapid transitcorridors the the there'll be the JK and Linesum and Kirk will talk a little more about that uh and so the city will stayin touch with Metroransit as the outcome of that study is known and next stepsare put forward there. Um and then the city will um begin programming yourcapital improvement program timing it in conjunction with BRT investment um toreconstruct the city the street in a way that makes sense for the transitinvestment. And then finally, the much nearer-term action of updating thecomprehensive plan and preparing for higher intensity development along thecorridor. And with that, I'll turn it to Kirk. >> Thank you, Mr. Roberts. Good evening,>> Mr. Mayor, council members. Um, in terms of an implementation, so Adele touchedon the three major areas of the study. The first is transit, obviously. Um shementioned the the work that's going on in Metro Transit right now to figure outthe next generation or the next um arterial BRT lines that will roll out.We expect to hear back the results of that um midpoint next year. So we'llknow for example if that route 4, the extension of Route 4 turns into a BRTline and if we should start planning around to extend that out to the Mall ofAmerica or if something else needs to be done. Um and that will sort of queue offwhat we do there. Um, and we'll develop American Boulevard alternatives once weknow some direction there. We'll also work in the meantime though tocoordinate with potential partner agencies. Adina has an interest intransit service over in their city and so can we talk to them and see ifthere's some win-win that they'd support there. So that's the next step ontransit land use as mentioned. It's a pretty easy one. We are going into thecomprehensive plan update. These recommendations once adopted by councilwill make their way into that process. That work will wrap up in around the endof 2028 all said and done. Infrastructure is the last one and I'mgoing to touch on this one a little bit. As you all know, 494 is underconstruction. It's going to be under construction for a very long time. Um,as the construction moves to the eastern sides of the city, that will wrap uparound 2030. There will be big dancing all over the city at the end of 2030.Um, we should plan some parties. the the um why this matters isthere's there's high traffic all over the the northern side of the city. Youhave all heard about that directly from residents. Um and American Boulevard isis is the focal point of that additional traffic. And so right now um we can't wecan't do a lot with that. The state's doing some construction on AmericanBoulevard itself as part of the 494 projects. And so it's just going to sitthere. But the the reason I mentioned this when you're thinking about thatinfrastructure, the only really controversial part of this study was thecross-section that we looked at earlier. Um, people look at this, they look atthe volume of traffic that's on the roadway now with construction, the highvolumes that have been there in the past, and they they wonder what we'rethinking when we talk about taking lanes out or reserving lanes for transit. Andthat's a that's a really rational reaction. um uh that's respected. And sothe the thing I want to emphasize is we didn't make this a preferred adoptedcross-section. You shall implement this no matter what. But it's a cross-sectionto be studied. The reason is this cross-sectionrepresents the values of the community. This represents what we heard peoplewant changed about that corridor. They want a corridor that works for everyone,not just vehicles. They want the vehicles to get through to serve thebusinesses that have invested in our community, but they also want space fortransit. They just want it to be a nicer place. They want amenities for walking,for biking as well. That's what this represents. So, when we go to theseprojects in the future, this is where we start those conversations. This is thecross-section we start to study. We might we might not be able to implementthis. There are some sections of the the corridor where we could probablyimplement this today. There are some sections of the corridor where we'reonly going to be able to get some components of this and we might not onlyget down to one lane. We might have to have multiple lanes especially acrossthe intersection. But this is this reflects the values of the community andit's where we start. Um so the one thing I didn't want to have to do now is asthose projects come online, traffic's going to start to moderate on American.It'll actually decrease as density occurs in the future. We could see someincreases there. trying to project that, trying to predict that um is reallydifficult and so having long debates about how many lanes should we buildright now, uh it's just not a useful um way to spend time. So this is a this iswhere we'll start for the future. Um that's where we'll go. So in terms of study adoption, the majorwork is wrapping up. We're writing the report now and that'll be posted to theLet's Talk Bloomington page soon. We are going back to the planning commission onNovember 6th. The planning commission in the city of Bloomington is an advisoryboard on transportation issues to the council. We'll be seeking arecommendation of adoption um from the planning commission recommending thecouncil adopt the study. That will happen as part of a public hearing onNovember 6th. We'll be back to the council on December 8th looking foradoption. We have two ways to do that. Um we can just add that to the consentcalendar. That's going to be my recommendation. The study has not beenthat contentious or controversial. Most of the comments we've gotten are fairlysupportive. Um, we could also have this as a public hearing. Again, I'mrecommending we just add this to the consent calendar and council adopts it.Hearing no protests from you tonight. That's the way that we'll proceed. Stand for questions.>> Well, thank you. Thanks for uh the information. UmI I will say so the the preferred concept for testing that you mentionedif you take out the the boulevard with trees in the middle it looks very muchlike University Avenue from univers from 35W all the way over to Hiron and youtalk about uh and it's brand new this year just opened and Kirk you talk aboutyou know it's too early to talk about these things and looking for evaluationI think that's going to be a good proof of concept in terms of certainly a muchdenser area there but in terms of the uh single lanes of traffic in certainareas, uh the dedicated bus lanes, the separated bicycle lanes, uh separatedfrom the from traffic, physically separated. It it'll be good to see howit works. It'll be good to see how it all operates in a much more congestedarea. And it'll be good to see how it practically works. I'm thinking inparticular with snow removal and and how well it stands up uh based on what it'sgoing to look like and how it's going to operate. So, it's good we're not makingthe decision on exactly how it looks right now because we've got a few yearsto at least look at some other options and or other examples and see how theyperform before we decide whether or not we want to head down that road as well. Council member Dellesandro,>> I have a very quick question, Mr. Mayor. Um, so I know, uh, Mr. Roberts, you'rerecommending that we put it on consent, but I'm still I'm not quite 100% sure Iunderstand what what it is going to be that is on the agenda. So, what exactlyis contained within the report that we would such that we could make a decisionto say, "Yeah, sure. Put it on consent." >> Um, Mr. Mayor, Council MemberDellesandro, the report sure this is on the report. We've just given you a briefhighlight of the outcomes of the report, the study itself. We'll be asking you asas part of the the adoption process to adopt the report formally and then itbecomes we can act on that report. So for instance, we can um start to advancethat towards the adoption in the comprehensive plan or inclusion in thecomprehensive plan, we could start to do things with that study. That's whatwe're asking for when we ask for adoption.>> Okay. Uh I appreciate that. I I I'm not sure where other folks on the councilare. It seems like the only question that has been posed to us in terms of apoint of view is whether or not we would put it on consent versus a publichearing. Um I I don't know what the right answer is on that. I feel kind ofsort of like getting planning commission's input on that might makesome sense before we know. Um but adopting the the studyum is one thing. It's another thing to say, yeah, go ahead and start to takeaction in comprehensive plan and everything like that as a result of thestudy. So, I'm not 100% sure I know exactly what what what the results ofour adoption decision would be. So, I might lean towards having a conversationabout it versus putting it just on consent if if that's an answer we needto give tonight. I don't know how the people feel about it. So, thanks.>> Other thoughts, council, council member Lman,>> I'll be brief. I got a email today about the about the lane stuff. So, I'll I'lljoin uh my fellow council member with that. I'd rather see it come back as aconversation. >> Others back to the bring it back onrather than on consent. May have another conversation after we hear from theplanning commission. I think that makes sense. Right. All right. Any otherquestions or comments regarding the presentation?All right. Very good. Well, thanks much for being with us tonight and thanks forthe information. Item 5.3 on our agenda, council, is our2026 budget discussion uh continuation. This focusing on public safety and legalcouncil, I am going to uh looking at the clock on the wall, I'm going to uh makea motion that we extend our uh deadline to no later than 9:45 tonight. Give thisuh discussion item plenty of time. We don't have to go to 9:45, but then we wealso don't have to rush to get this done. So, I will move that we extend ourdeadline to uh adjourn no later than 9:45 this evening.>> Second. >> Motion and a second to extend the deaduh adjournment deadline to no later than 9:45. No further council discussion onthis. All those in favor, please signify by saying I. I.>> Opposed? >> Motion carries 70.Miss Carlson, welcome back. Good evening. Hello, Mayor and Council. Thankyou for that extension. And um police, fire, and legal budgets will bepresented tonight. But before uh fire chief El Seal comes up here, I justwanted to take this opportunity to just highlight the rest of the budgetsessions that will be at council, which will be every council meeting from nowtill the end of the year, but just talk a bit about at each one. So, um, Monday,November 24th, there's going to be a budget presentation, but there will alsobe an opportunity for public comment that evening. And then on December 8th,that will be the truth and taxation public hearing. So, obviously alsoopportunity for public comment. And then on December 15th, that will be a studysession to discuss for the council to to discuss the final 2026 tax levy budget.And then on December 22nd will be the date that the council will do the finalapproval. So just wanted to highlight that and then I will turn it over to thefire chief. >> Thank you for the update.>> Chief Seal, good evening. Welcome. >> Good evening.[snorts] >> All right.So, quick overview of uh the fire department's budget where it's umquickly overview structure and staffing, the budget request, priority basedbudgeting analysis, budget highlights, emerging topics, and then time fordiscussion and questions. Our structure here is is like many fire departments,we've really got two areas, fire code enforcement and fire prevention as wellas operations. Um and under fire code and enforcement,we got fire prevention and fire investigations. in under operations. Wehave um our firefighters split up into three shifts staffing the the the uhstations that we can staff. We got training and we have EMS as as functionsunder operations. Then we have administration as well um that thattakes care of a lot of records management and um administrativefunctions at the department level. The biggest change in our budget fromthis year to next year is in salary and benefits and that's because we have 18firefighters coming off safer grant coming onto our reg uh regular funding.So um the priority based budgeting analysisum several recommendations that were made are aligned with initiativesalready in place. staffing and cost allocation data need further refinementand that's based upon some assumptions that the AI program made that aren'tquite um accurate for us. Uh comparison entities differ in sizing capabilitiesum and that also limited direct comparability with with withBloomington. Um I can dive deeper on any of these if you need me to.recommendations appear multiple times which um to me overstated the projectprojected impacts that were that were uh being predicted and the report relies onbroad industry examples that don't really reflect both our financial andour organizational environment. So those are some of the things that we got outof that. However, going forward we did find some opportunities for alignment umand shared services and re regional collaboration. Uh we currently partnerregionally for equipment and training. Um and u expanding shared services foradministrative or maintenance functions um have some inherent limitations in it.um both with how they were suggesting that um it be carried out but also umgaining that kind of cooperation with multiple departments around us would beuh multi-year multi- council multi- difficulty um endeavor. So strategicresource allocation and efficiency um our administration our administrativeoffices are pretty lean and they're really structured to meet ourdepartment's mission right now. really don't have much opportunity for forreallocation there. My administrative staff is 2.5.Um and they take care of all of our records management which we're going todo a little over 11,000 calls for service this year. So, um those 2.5people as well as running payroll for our part-time and there's a lot of lotthey do. There's not much room for them to get put anywhere else. Uh we partneracross city departments and and I I'd like to highlight a lot of this becauseI think we've got excellent working relationship with our city departmentsum but with police both emergency response and emergency management publicworks emergency response and emergency management um as well as um theyactively seek uh input from us on street projects and and uh um um streetimprovements. Um so we maintain um access for public safety park and wreckwe partner with them with proactive wildland fuels management um where we douh uh live burns for prior restoration um every year um it emergency respondand emergency management obviously um like most places there's not much um youcan accomplish in today's world without IT support communications publicinformation and public notification and then legal finance finance, HR,community development, all of those departments uh we work very closely withwith and and um while this uh city is a conglomerate um all of the the lines ofbusiness have to work very closely together to make things work. So umrevenue generation opportunities for revenue generation. Well we have as youwell are aware um leveraged some um grant opportunities in the last fewyears um to the point of millions of dollars um each year. um those revenueopportunities are select though, right? I mean they're not something that we candepend on every year which um we have uh provenum but we've even even though we've done very well at it um there are someopportunities we leverage um um um revenue from the Minnesota Board of FireTraining Education is one of them which provides reimbursement to the departmentevery year for firefighter training and we um leverage that um and get in mostcases two allocations. They um give every department a letter that says thisis your allocation for this year and and that's around 2930 29,000 to $30,000.And um we submit all of our costs for training. And if not all the departmentsum collect their allocations for the year, they do a second round umallocation. And this year that second round allocation was um over $100,000.So, we track all of our costs. We submit all our costs where we can, and we umget revenue where we can. And then our fire prevention and and inspectionsrevenue that's built into our our our current system as you as you well know.So, cost savings or operational efficiencies. Um several of thesuggestions were about firefighter health and wellness. We have some um umdistinct health and wellness programs with our firefighters. We give them allannual medical physicals, annual mental health checks. We have a peer supportteam within the department. Uh we have a therapy dog. Um we have access tocritical incident stress management teams. And we also have access tominfire which is a statewide program that provides resources for firefightersboth for um cancer or significant or serious uh serious diseases and as wellas mental health. uh performance metrics. I just wanted totalk us about some operational highlights here. Pre-model change. So,I'm talking about uh 2021. Um we had about 4,700 calls for servicethat year. And you guys remember this discussion. We've had it before. I had1333 um truck runs that were rolled short.That's with one or two people and and filled. The rolls were 586.Uh so those are um in 2021 which you'll also remember was um um a nasty littlebug was running around giving us problems in society as well. So um postmodel change and I want to point out we're still in progress on that. We'restill changing our model. Um current calls for service um we're over 9,000calls right now. When I put the slide together we're at 8929. We're about9,500 right now. Still predicting around 11,600 for the year. Um, and we onlyhave 68 roll shorts. And that's usually because, uh, one or more of ourfirefighters are accompanying an ambulance to the hospital. Um, so wedrop an engine down to two for a short period of time. Um, and we've got nofailed to rolls so far. So, we've improved, our metrics have improvedgreatly. Um, and as part of those response metrics, [snorts]um, we're down to 9 minutes and 15 seconds for our 90% number, um, for timeof call to a a unit with at least three people, um, showing up. Um, in 2021, wewere at 11 minutes and 30 seconds for that. So, we've dropped several minutesoff of that. That will continue to improve as we increase our staffing andare able to to uh staff regularly station six and staff station two, whichis uh primary one of our primary goals. Right now, we're staffing four enginesall of the time, five engines some of the time, and that sixth engine is notbeing staffed. Our goal is to staff six six engines at six stations with fourpersonnel um 247. Um we also instituted a paramedicprogram um and our advanced intervention by uh our crews so far and that number Igot an updated number on that today and we're over a thousand advancedinterventions on EMS calls since the first of the year. Um, we also supportour ALS transport system by providing medics um to ride along and providethose uh help provide advanced interventions. And then we've got SWATmedics that support our police um our police counterparts as well.First safer grant ends obviously I spoke about this already next year but itsaved the city $6.2 million over the three year three-ear life of the grant.It's been critical in allow us allowing us to jumpst start staffing to provideservice to the community. Second safer grant still active till 2028 and they'llsave the city an additional $6.9 million over the three-year life of the grant.And our our American rescue dollars uh have been expended and our threebattalion chiefs are also coming onto our regular our regulartax levy. There we go. Call volume continues. These are emerging topics foryou. Call volume continues to increase. I expect that um number to go up,especially if they continue to do things to Medicare, Medicaid um that they'replanning to do next year. Um and as we continue to see an erosion of support umservices to many um um portions of our community, uh people are going to waitlonger to call for help because they either don't have access to insurance orthey're worried worried about um maybe their citizenship status beingquestioned. Um so they're going to wait longer. they're going to become moreseriously ill and they are going to also um then become more of a burden on ourhospitals and our system as that stands. I'll also point to our our uh our agingpopulation and the Medicare Medicaid issues that are going to come up andthat's going to same same cycle there. They're going to wait longer to call forhelp. They're going to become more seriously ill and they're going to be uhbecome more of a burden on the system. The other thing I'd like to talk aboutis the built environment. Um it's becoming increasingly challenging. Notin a bad way. That's part of becoming a more dense and populated city. Uh butthat does increase our calls for service. More people, more calls forservice. Um our structures are changing and how the city is composed. Umcontents continue to increase in heat release potential and spread of fireprogression. That's because everything just about everything nowadays is madeout of plastic. um the density and access um requiremore staff to meet that challenge and um technology continues to bring additionalchallenges, right? Um as they come up with these new um electric vehicles umthey have not shied away from parking them in underground garages with multimultiple stories of of residential or hotels above them. So, um, fire codestypically lag behind technological changes and this is no no different. Um,[snorts] so adequate staffing, four-person crews in six stations isreally important to us and important to the city long term. Um, there's a coupleother topics quickly to talk about, and that's the the paid leave and parentalleave programs that are happening as we grant more people time off to adequatelystaff. We need more people to fill those positions. and wellness and mentalhealth. Physical and mental health are significant impacts in the fire service.Um, cancer currently is a number one one cause of duty- related deaths. Heartdisease is a close second, but PTSD and suicide rates are rapidly rising and andthreaten to overtake those two unless we can try to disrupt that progression. Um,however, we have implemented programs to try to address those risks. talk fast.>> Thank you, Chief. I appreciate it. Council questions. Council memberDellesandro. >> Thanks, Mr. Mayor. Um, I was curious aspart of I didn't see in the priority based budgeting discussion um or anysynergies discussion, an opportunity to look at outsourcing our fire inspectionsservice. Has that ever been analyzed? And if so, why would we not con do that?Um, currently there aren't um that many private entities that will do that. Andum the uh the the most pressing point for me is that our fireinspectors are also members of our fire department. And while strictinterpretations of the code um are not always um do not always brightly um youknow black or white, it is really about um building buildings and enforcingcodes in the city that protect life safety as well as give firefighters anoption or give firefighters the best options for providing protection inthose buildings. So there are code amendments in process right now to buildfour, five, and sixtory apartment buildings with one stairwell to accessall the floors. Fire service is dead set against us, but we've got quite a a a agroup of of people that think this is a really good idea. Um, and so I feel thatour fire inspectors and our fire prevention uh division is reallyimportant to keep as an integral part of our department because they are um animportant part for our operations folks to provide good service.>> Council member Mua. >> Hey, Mayor. Um, Chief, no questions, butI just want to make a comment. >> Sure. Um, I've been an ardent supporterof our fire department, continue to be because I see the need. And last year Isaid, I want to see it move faster. I'm going to say the same thing again thisyear. I want to see our fire department get up to staff. Literally three weeksago at a kids sporting event. There was a medical incident. Thank goodness wehave ambulances staffed at station two and they were able to get to Westwoodand be there within a couple minutes. But then I was like, you know what? I'mon counsel. I should pay attention to this stuff. And I was on my watchwaiting to see when our firefighters show up and it's that time 9:30 justlike you said. So our EMTs were able to get there within a couple minutesbecause they were staffed at station 2, but they were we were pulling from theother side of the city and it took us 9 minutes and 30 seconds to get a fulltruck to Westwood. And so, uh, we have the the space, the ability, and I wantto continue to move fast on this, invest in our fire department because we knowthe need that you've showed us, and I continue to see it every day. So, untilwe're there, we're fully staffed, ready to go. I'm going to continue to supportyou and make sure that our fire department can do the job that the cityneeds us to do. >> Thank you,Council Member Revis. >> Chief, [clears throat] I finally see youworking, not working out, right? >> [laughter]>> I just have a quick question. Um, since 2021, the uh EMS calls had almost doubleor more than double um due to the aging community and accessto medical services, right? Um so have you thought of u aligning with the uhhealth um department to help with the cost and you know or you take the burdenin your department alone all the time. >> UhI think the health care system is burdened to its breaking point rightnow. Um there are not um to my knowledge theyare not um pots of gold or pools of money around of anybody either offeringum that help or um being able to provide that kind of assistance. Um thedepartments that um provide ALS transport service whichwe do not. We provide ALS um engine service but not ALS transport service donot recuperate all the um all the money they spend on that service. Um they'reprobably close to 70 cents on the dollar or 80 cents on the dollar maybe thatthey recuperate which is going to change when they make changes to MedicareMedicaid reimbursements. Um, so I see more of this burden cominglocally, not less. And I see our current hospital and health care system becomingmore and more fragile because of the burden that's being put on it. So Idon't see an out anywhere right now um in any other partnerships.>> Thank you. >> Hate to be gloom and doom, but I I>> I mean, you you do have my support. I mean, it's I just I was curious.>> Yep. Thank you. others.Council member Lman, >> briefly, um I was amazed at the 2.5 uhfolks for administrative uh support that seems difficult to sustain over the longterm given the the changes of the uh the department.>> Um they are they they work hard. There's no room for them to do anything else.>> All right. Well, thank you uh for for that uh I mean that that's just anexample of how we really utilize our our resources. Um I noted one last time uhwe got together, but uh but again, just thank you for your uh your service and Idon't need to repeat what Council Member Mua said, but I think you know mysupport's been there. >> Thank you. >> There's nothing else, Council. >> All right,>> I'll yield to Florida. >> Thank you, Chief Seal. to the guy with agun. >> I don't know who keeps setting this upfor me to go after Julie. [laughter] Uh, mayor, city council, again, thanksfor having us here today. Um, how do I do this?That's not mine. I could just ablive it if this doesn'twork for people. Um, all right.Uh, before I get started, I'd like to thank uh, uh, Ki Carlson for all thework that she's helped with our budget piece. Um, she works some magic overhere and uh, Deputy Chief Bitney for all the work that um, he's done on thebudget also. All right. So overview here. Um I won't bore you with this. Youall can read. So I'm just going to go into this, get right into it. Um this isour organizational structure here. And just for purposes of educating our newcity manager here, uh the city of Bloomington, we are authorized for 129cops. Um Minnesota has one of the lowest per capita police ratios in the country.So, the city that you came from is authorized for 230 and you only gotabout 22 or 23,000 more people. Um, this is my fourth budget presentation and Ididn't put the slide in here, but I'll say it again. Uh, Duth, which is anotherregional department, has 157 cops. Rochester has 160 cops. We have 129police officers authorized here at the Bloomington Police Department. Uh butthrough your grace uh we've been able to overstaff. So currently we have 138police officers on board but we got about these were to hire people foranticipated retirements and those retirements are starting now. So veryshortly we will be even steen with staffing uh as people start to retirehere. Um, and also I'll just say this. Uh, thanks to the citizens of the cityof Bloomington, our our crime rate is currently uh down 12% from last year,which will make this last year was a record low crime year. And if thiscontinues to hold, uh, we haven't seen crime rates like this in decades in thecity of Bloomington. So, that's something that we should all be proudof. Here's our budget. Uh our main increasehere is going to be staffing, but the biggest increases are going to come frommaterials and supplies. Uh law enforcement equipment is not gettingcheaper. Uh we don't even have uh these radios on here yet, which people don'trealize are very old. They've outlived their life expectancy. And a lot ofthese radios come from the 911 uh time when Homeland Security was given grantsfor these radios. So this is not a only a police issue. It's going to be a fireissue. Um, and these are going to be very expensive to replace at some point.Um, we're going to have to do it, but we'll try to work through it. But if yousee here in our budget, uh, the two biggest percentage increases that wehave are for equipment and supplies. A lot of that's due to inflation and againour internal service charges. Now, this is from uh, priority basedbudgeting. Um the vast majority of these things that they gave us we've alreadydoing. Uh we support the adaptation of new technologies to improve efficienciesand I'm going to get into that in a second. And uh the report just like firesaid to I think uh the people who did this had a hard time kind ofunderstanding how Bloomington works and operates when it comes to finances forpublic safety. So we did find some opportunities for alignment uh ongoinginvestment with innovative technologies aimed at improving efficiency andstreamlining operations and delivering better services to the community. Uh howare we doing this? We recently got a program called force matrix. One of thethings in law enforcement that's for uh been in Achilles Hill for decades ishaving a program that could combine your databases. So if I have to deal withsomeone going to five six different databases can be very cumbersome. Uhthis new program force matrix basically takes all of our databases and makes itGoogle. So now we're just starting to roll that out to our police officerswhich is going to save a whole bunch of time in our dispatch center and for ourofficers on the street. Uh benchmark analytics which is our program where wetrack all our uh training and employee misconduct if we have those types ofallegations. And uh it's also our employee reward program. Lexapole whichis electronic version of our policy manual which really helps inefficiencies in the phone tree that we implemented for our front counter uhwhich allowed us and I this will be the next section we had uh the previouslypolice department ran two lobbies one upstairs one downstairs we implemented aphone tree we able to close the lobby on the second floor and reallocate thatbody uh to our community service unit to help answers phones for our socialworkers and therapists as oosed opposed to having to ask for another position.Technology allowed us to move that body without having to come to you and askfor another body. Another thing is uh Axon translate uh these body cameras nowuh that we got uh translate in different languages. So now if someone speaksSpanish, Mong or Arabic, I turn this body camera on. Uh the body cameralistens to it, translate it to English for me, and then I speak and thentranslate it back out into their language for them. So this also saves ustime from not having to call the language line and whatnot. Umso that's really technology has really uh helped us do a lot what we do here.Uh continuing funding raising uh funding opportunities. Uh on average, we haveabout $2.3 million in grants and donations. Uh we just got another$25,000 grant that we'll be or a donation that we'll be bringing forthnext week for our brain health program, but this amounts to about 6% of our uhannual operating budget we're able to get from grants and uh donations, whichis a lot of money. Um partnering with other law enforcement agencies for uhlegislative initiatives. The one that I want to just take get in your radar hereas we move forward to the next session is our bomb squad. Bloomington has oneof only four bomb squads in the state. And um we currently have the largest umthe biggest terrorist target uh threat uh platform is within our cityof Bloomington. And obviously having a bomb squad set up for that is somethingthat we need to do. The state has not funded the bomb squads adequately. Soall four bomb squads are going to the state to ask for adequate funding forthis. Uh obviously because we don't have umequipment the our vehicles are getting old. So some opportunities foroperational efficiencies. Uh we're working with public health and our brainhealth unit. Uh city engineering for our speed sign and data collection. Uh we'repartnering with IT for GIS and Henipin County for embedded social worker. Forthe citizens out there who don't know, Henipin County still partners with us ona social worker and we pay 60%, they pay the other 40% of that and also our JCPprogram and we're going to continue to look for ways to utilize technology. Uhthe city of Miami recently has a uh driverless car that goes out andresponds to like burglaries. So as opposed to sending a police officer,they actually send an electronic vehicle that goes out and deals with people. Sowe're going to continue to look at technologies um as we move forward hereto improve our efficiencies. Uh budget highlights. Uh we are largely justasking to maintain our current staffing and current service levels. Uh and alsothe public safety aid that was given a few sessions ago is uh we're going torun out of that sooner or later. So, we'll be here again with our hands out[laughter] for that. Hopefully, uh, some of thesegrants pan through. But, uh, emerging topics, and this is what I'm going tospend a little bit of time on here, and for the public,pay parental leave. We got 91 of our employees that are currently ofchildbearing age. Uh since the council implemented this policy, uh we've uhcalculated that this uh benefit that I wish was around when I had kids, um iscosting us about two and a half to three FTEEs. And that's without the state'sprogram that's set to take place here on uh January 1. Uh a lot of people in myposition are afraid or a little worried about the state's position that's goingto start January 1 because it expands the amount of uh things that people cantake off for. In addition, there's an attitude from people that becausethey're actually paying for the state's program that it's a benefit that they'repaying for, so why not use it? Um if that happens, and I know the fire chiefuh said the same thing, um we're going to have some staffing issues to dealwith. um not just here in Bloomington but statewide uh the growing demand forbrain health and wellness services both internally and externally. So you knowmental health's been a significant thing since we've had our therapists thatprogram has really taken off and people have really uh found use for it. Uh ourinternal wellness programs are going great. Um and patrol sergeant patrolsergeant staffing is something that we're going to continue to work with uhthe city manager and the deputy city managers on because um in our patrolsergeant ranks right now um there's no relief factor at all. So if a sergeanttakes off gets hurt, we're paying overtime and that overtime that we'repaying is a little bit more than having uh anothersergeant working in that position. So we'll we'll we'll have thosediscussions. Uh raising volume of data requests and this is going to be theonly political type shot I take during this presentation with data requests. Uhas we know the legislature is not subject to data requests. So the lawcontinues to not go changed. If you look here, um, the amount of data requeststhat we're having to deal with here, and just to give you an example, the city ofBloomington as a whole right now, absent of police department is only got like500 some data requests and we're at like 3600.This is a extreme amount of staff time to deal with these data requests. Um, soyeah, and then uh using AI u the news media kind of misreported that we'vealready deployed draft one. we haven't, which is the program where our officerswould use AI to write reports. We're actually testing that. It has not beenfully implemented throughout the police department. Um, so if it turns out theresomething we can use, uh, we will, but we're going to continue to usetechnology. All right, I'm done. [laughter]Any questions? >> Council questions. Council member Revis. You mentioned the 91 employees ofpotentially having kids, right? Uh and and you also you are already planning ontalking to the city manager and deputy city managers, but how many FTE if youthink you would need to fulfill your needs in case of a sergeant or patrolsergeant is out and including all these people that might have babies at thesame time. So the data that we have right now since the council implementedthe policy is u between two and a half and three additional bodiesand that's just in the police department. I don't know what the restof the cities >> Oh that's very doable. You can have itnice. [laughter] >> Thank you.>> Council member Mullet. >> Thank you mayor. Um I'll make a commenton the uh the paid parental leave as well. Um the paid parental leave in theprivate sector has been around for a long time. Uh in fact this year on myteam my job I had three people out >> uh which increased load for the rest ofmy team probably 25 to 30% for everybody else. And so um I'd encourage the cityas a whole to reach out to contacts connects we have in the private sectorto talk through what are the processes what are the strategies to use to coverthat because you're right if you would have had it when you were having kidshow incredible that would be for your relationship with your children. thatdoesn't mean it's impossible for us to cover those or find strategies to umsupport those people and continue to deliver the service that we have here inBloomington. U because the private sector has been doing it for much longerthan everyone else. Um so continue to to work on that, find our connections tohelp our staff uh go get through this transition as we make that transitionstarting Jan 1. So, and I just want to be clear, councilmember, for us it's not our civilian staff, it's our sworn staff because theyhave to work 24 hours, seven days a week. And when our civilian staff takethe like if I was to take off, you know, they can replace me, but our patrolofficers, they're not able to do that with >> council member Dallas.>> Um, thanks, Mr. Mayor. Uh, thanks, Chief. Um so when we talk about um thepartnerships with like public health and everything on some of the mental healthwork that you're doing um you know uh council member Rivas and I were kind oftalking before the meeting about you know what is the what is the what is thereason for example that we have um a wellness director in the BPD budgetversus having that same person in the public health budget supporting the BPD?like what is the what is the logic behind why some things are funded out ofBPD dollars versus they're published funded out of public health dollars.>> So that's a great question. Um and what we found is when these things are notfunded from within the police department, police officers don'tutilize them. So, if you go back to looking at the city's formal EAP programand these other benefits that have been available to city employees for years, Iknow the city of Bloomington has been really good at providing those benefits,they don't use them. So, once we brought these into the police department, we'restarting to see our staff utilize them. And we're also partneringwith the city on a few initiatives. Also, it it's one of those things wherethe city staff majority don't have a problem utilizing something if it comesout of the police department like a gym. Whereas a police department on the otherhand, if it's not somebody that's they get to see every day and know they'renot going to utilize the services. >> Uh, okay. That makes some sense to me.So then I guess the open question that you don't have an answer for today isthat does that mean that there's opportunities for the the city toum not fund to the police department or you know the things that they're notwilling to use. So, for example, if an EAP program is available to allemployees, but you know, 138 people aren't taking advantage of it, does doesthat does the number like do we just not offer that EAP program to the policedepartment anymore because they have this program instead or something tothat effect? Again, I don't know if that's doable cost savings for that or>> I'll say this, uh, you the city could do that. Uh, but a PTSD claim is costing us$500 600,000 dollars and we haven't had any of thesesince we've started to implement them within the police department.>> Yeah. >> So, if you take it out if you take itout of the police department, I'm telling you, people aren't going to useit and it's a lot more expensive to have people going out umon these programs than it is to have it within the police department.>> Yeah, I I I feel you and I I completely understand where you're coming from. Imy question was more about whether or not we we are getting savings in outsideof the police department by not necessarily providing those services topolice anymore because they have their own. That was my question and that's nota question you have the answer to. It's just an open question for the for thecity staff. Yeah. you know, do do does the EAP program become more more, youknow, um is it is it are we offering a are we are we paying for a benefit thata whole group of people aren't using is my question because they have their ownnow. >> Yeah.>> And if we are, can we stop doing that and save some of that money was my openquestion. More to everybody else, to you.>> Yeah. Thank you. >> Fair enough. Thank you,>> Council Member Lman. >> Thank you, Mayor. Uh I want to thank youat the at the outset of talking and comparing uh our police department withother uh police department uh how many u uh seats that they have uh there. Um interms of you know how we ought to be looking at that and also it representsour our investment that we've had um you know we look back five years ago we'veyou know we've kind of increased our our public service budget about 5%. And uhyou know I think that there's still more work to be done there where we cancontinue to invest and but we've already done a great job of investing u uh inthe city of Bloomington and want to be there as I always have been to supportyou in terms of those increases as we look to move forward.>> Thank you. >> So just two quick questions on the datarequest. >> Umfirst of all, how do they break down in terms of I I've got to imagine themajority of them now are are camera related. They're they're video relatedor are they still emails or how does it break down?>> It's [laughter] it's everything. So we have a very gooddashboard on so that takes care of some of the let me see traffic data X rightbut when it comes to I want to get this report I want to see emails I want tosee videos that's the stuff that really bogs us down.>> So and that that that leads to my next question. Of course all these datarequests are important. They're all legitimate. They're all very importantto somebody, but how many are really important and how many are legitimateand how many are frivolous that we end up having to do because either somebodyhas a a bone to pick or somebody is um looking to throw sand in the gears. Imean, however they're doing it. >> Yeah. Some of some of that takes placeoff. [laughter] >> You got to know.>> Well, it it's the video is the difficult part, too. I mean, it's I mean, like Isaid, everything we do is on video now, right? and we just can't hand over videoto people without it getting redacted. Um, you know, so if a cop goes on a callfor an hour and we got five police officers there and someone has to redactand you know, it's like if I'm the subject of the data and then everybodyelse in that video has to get redacted out,>> that's going to take a lot of time to do.>> Yeah, understood. Council, any additional questions?[sighs] >> All right, Chief. Thanks much. And our final budget discussion of theevening is with our legal staff, Miss Mandershide.>> All right. Good evening. >> I'm Melissa Mandershide, city attorney.I've never actually stood here with this. Do I? [laughter] >> All right, here we go. I did it. Um, so,uh, I'm joined tonight by our two deputy city attorneys. um uh Peter Zuniga andJennifer Cross uh the civil and criminal team respectively and I will also extendour thank you to the uh finance team especially uh Ki and others uh wecouldn't do we couldn't do this we couldn't do uh every day without them sothank you to them our process is going to follow uh our presentation is goingto follow the same process that that the others have done so I'll just getstarted in the interest of time we have a horizontal ORC chart um on purpose umbecause our work just cannot be done on and without the assistance of oursupport staff. We build on each other's work. Um without the case being opened100% accurately, the um the attorneys couldn't do their work. Uh and so webuild on each other. So I have it this way on purpose. Um you'll also see thefour divisions that we have as I mentioned uh criminal and civil. Uh wealso have a risk and litigation manager that we share with the financedepartment with a 6040 split. And then we have the CL compliance manager uhposition. Here is our budget. Uh it ispredominantly personnel costs and um technology. Um both of which areincreasing in cost in part due to some of the topics we'll talk about a littlebit later. So we too participated in the prioritybased budgeting and had some very similar experiences. Um the therecommendations largely fell into three categories. uh things that we werealready doing and could potentially do more of. Uh things that we have alreadytried and decided we wanted to continue doing or stopped doing for good reason.Um or things that have limited applicability to to the city and to thelegal department that we have here. Um some examples here with regard to thoseobservations, we have um we've brought this to you uma couple times in the past, restorative court. Uh there was recommendationsrelated to that. We're already doing that. Um that is a collaborativeapproach that we that we've undertaken uh specialized for the disposition ofcases that we have in the city of Bloomington and it is a collaborationwith Henipin County and the judicial branch. Similar to what the chief justmentioned, it's a cost cost sharing um for the social workers that staff thatposition. They are technically Henipin County employees uh and then we assistin a cost sharing um of their personnel costs. That's incredibly successful.We've already doubled uh since it was created a couple of years ago. Um youheard the uh county commissioner make reference to it when she was herepresenting. Uh we'd really like to see it countywide um well beyond the um thepresentation tonight, but it's very successful program. Uh the next categoryuh is the use of technology. We continue to leverage technology solutions toincrease our efficiency. One example is our um legal document management system.Um another one is um a litigation software system that is new that is muchmore user friendly. You've probably seen some emails. Um and our criminaldivision is doing a lot of work with bodywn cameras. Um the data that thechief talked about, all those officers that show up um in their camera footage,all of our prosecutors have to watch that. So, as their footage hasincreased, so has the workload of our prosecutors reviewing all that footageto prepare for court and processing the discovery requestsfor that footage as well. Uh, and then similarly with the, um, certifiedpayroll tracking software, uh, which is called LDR or excuse me, uh, LCPtracker. Um, all right. The final part is some of the, uh, recommendations thatdidn't really make sense for our legal department in the city. There was someuh suggestions that we provide public uh training and then also that we providetraining um for the wider organization um of lawyers and then charge them tocome here. Um we don't do that per se. Um we do host the city attorneyconference um every year in the city of Bloomington. So we're doing our partwith that in that regard at [snorts] a Bloomington hotel.Um so all of the presentations that you've heard um over these past fewweeks, the legal department has supported many of those efforts and uhclearly the easiest example of how we are aligned in our work uh as a as aninternal city department. Um I could go on and on um but you know we draftthousand thousand plus contracts. Um, you've seen the docu signs, you've heardabout the cases that we prosecute, the workers compensation, uh, and theadministrative conferences. We we'll talk about that a little bit. Here'ssome examples. Uh, specifically, uh, when somebody is cited, um, they havethe opportunity to work through that process and sometimes they appeal it allthe way up through our administrative conference um, staff people in the legaldepartment. they work out um the situation to the best um of the avail ofof the available options. Uh and then what we do is we track what we're seeingand we then have taken those suggestions to the various departments where thosecomplaints are arising from most frequently and you'll see some codeamendments coming later this year to address some of them as well as nextyear. Uh similarly with regard to the uh efforts related to the animal shelter,we have some animal related ordinances that we would really like to moveforward. However, we need some updates to the shelter to coincide with those uhrevisions. So looking to tag team um that alignment opportunity for thefuture. And then with regard to domestic violence is another example. We have aninternal uh coordination working group um at the city of Bloomington. and itincludes legal as well as police, public health, a lot of other parts of thecity. Uh and we coordinate those efforts and we always are looking to enhancethem with for example officer training uh and other sorts of engagements uhincluding um a training that we have later this week called in Her Shoes.With regard to some opportunities for revenue generation, um they're listedhere. We several of them were suggested by the PBB and also a couple by staff.We have not started doing internal chargebacks. Um you know it wassuggested that we charge um individual departments for our work. Um we don't dothat in our current system but certainly something that was suggested. Anotherthing that we've looked at a little bit over the years is could we performprosecution services for other jurisdictions that are also appearing indowntown where we are. it wouldn't be cost-effective for us to do it for otherjurisdictions that are in far away courts, but potentially in downtown. Um,we've had conversations before. They haven't moved forward, but that would beanother possible opportunity. We wouldn't necessarily have enough staffto do that um with our current arrangement, but um certainly somethingthat you, you know, we could look at if that was of interest. Finally, Imentioned technology and and and in the interest of time, I won't get into that. All right. So, as I mentioned, we areconstantly integrating with existing databases so that we can minimize theamount of data entry and and hightouch tasks that can be otherwise performed bytechnology integrations with our internal and our external partners. Um,that often works great until the database changes and we then have toreintegrate with something else. But for the most part, that's a greatopportunity to have some efficiencies. Another thing that was suggested by thePBB uh uh opportunity um was that we create a prioritization system for ourtasks. Uh and this is an intriguing idea. Uh we haven't worked out all thespecifics of it, but something that we could potentially tackle in 2026. Andthen the other thing that we're very excited about, well, I'm very excitedabout it. Uh I think the folks behind me are as well, is the additional use oflaw clerks. uh we are really limited on space and as you know we we were able todo some remodeling and so now we have the capacity to take on um more lawclerks and so we're looking forward to that possibility in 2026. With regard to our budget highlights umwe funded uh the collaboration with the county on the social workers with publicsafety aid as well as a staff person that will be ending. So that's resultedin an increase in our personnel costs. The other thing is that we did ananalysis of a citywide software that we use for prevailing wage and we're goingto be shifting that to um the IT department. Again, as I mentioned,technology costs are a huge part of our budget. So you'll see that here. One ofthe other things is the Axon bodywn camera software. We did a city-widecontract and as a result of that um we got bundled into a larger package thatis for the city and we saw pretty s a very significant increase in our chargeson that. With regard to emerging topics, we arelooking always for additional diversionary options for certain typesof cases. Um that takes a lot of time and effort to set up and do a good job,but we continue to look for those opportunities. AIIt's great and it's a challenge. Um we are um noticing in our workplace um somany generations in the workplace but also very very different levels ofexperience in working in the government. I I regularly say that we giveinformation at sort of two levels now 101 and PhD. And so we need to do moretime um in training and that will result in us lowering our legal risks. Anotherthing which is sort of ripped out of the headlines is the cyber attack coverageand preparedness. We have coverage um and we have tocontinue to be on guard about that. Um essentially if a contract is um goingbehind our firewall, they have to have cyber coverage in a nutshell. Um anotherripped out of the headlines is the um compliance and auditing. You all madereference to that earlier tonight. It's definitely on our radar and we are umworking to stay on top of that. Paid leave. Um we have also experienced thatone of the unique elements with regard to legal is that we have a lot ofsalaried employees and so what happens is we just all work more. Uh so whenwe've had a staff person out now we all just sort of pick up the the work. I ppicked up a part of it, Peter picked up some of it. Some of our other attorneyspicked up other parts of it. So everyone just works more. That's a different kindof challenge. And then ERPOS's. Um I have all kinds of data on that. On theinterest of time, um I'll just say we were the first to file and we're doing awhole lot of them. Peter's got another one tomorrow morning. And um I'm happyto talk about that some more if you have questions. These take um firearms out ofdangerous situations and um prevent um future potential firearm situations.All right, any questions? That was very fast because>> that was very fast. Appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you. Council questions. [clears throat]>> All right. >> Sorry, one quick question.>> You don't You don't have to counsel. You won't feel bad.>> Well, I I feel like I do, or else you'll get the question in December either way.Um just um I I wonder so there's this weird there's this weird dichotomy in myown brain about the presentation that you gave and the increase in the the theexpectations that we have and and of of the work that you're doing especially asit relates to either you know civil or or criminal work and what's happeningwhat we hear what I hear in the public about um about what are not enforcing asit relates to our civil code. So, for example, there's a lot of discussion inmy neighborhoods about people who are getting away with for years not beingcompliant with things like operating a commercial business out of theirresidence or, you know, having a property that is basically an completeeyesore that neighbors have to deal with on the regular, etc. And I know that'senvironmental health, but it does eventually become a civil matter. And sothe question I have is are we reconciling like where's the where's thethe the where where is that in is thatincreasing your your burden and if so where are we seeing that in this budgetdiscussion? >> Um mayor and members I put up a slidehere which has a graph um the far um the the the chart with only blue columnsthose are administrative conferences. Those are the ones that appeal up to usand you can see the numbers. I mean, they're like tripled. Um, they're havingmultiple a week and they do sort of have a seasonalfluctuation to them because a lot of them, frankly, are paint and you're notpainting during certain times of the year. So, there's a seasonalfluctuation, but they're averaging anywhere from one to three a week>> and that's with the staff on the civil side. Correct.>> Uh, well, it's a part of the compliance division, but yes,>> the compliance division. Okay. Um, so I'm just I think it's something to puton our radar because because while you're having all of those hearings, Ihave a feeling that there are a lot going unheardsimply because whether Environmental Health is not bringing them to you,they're not being escalated to that situation for whatever reason andthere's no judgment there or because because we're not in we're not enforcingit or we're not checking in on it. I don't know what the answer is there, butit feels like a disconnect to me. Um, and I I'm worried that we're notaccommodating what we want to see happen, which is compliance somewhere inthis budget. And so I just open that up to maybe some analysis before it comesback for final >> in the event that what you think you'regoing to see in 2026 isn't accurate based on what environmental health mightbe actually managing. Mhm. Well, mayor members, I will say that we veryintentionally have changed our legal delivery model with regard to uh the ehtype of violations. We did an analysis of where were the most high the highestimpact interactions with legal and we stepped out of the ones where they wererepeaters. Um we have a fair number of households that just repeat theviolation year after year after year. They just pay the fine. So, um, where wehave those instances, we have stepped out of our legal review of them becauselike there's not very much legal value to that. But what I hear you saying isthat there are these repeaters and maybe we need some new solutions.>> Thank you. >> Nothing else, council. Thank you much.>> All right. Uh just very quickly, who who do we havenext or are we we're done or it's a >> so next up will be November 17th. Itwill be the um utility rates public hearing.>> Good. So that's >> in the public comment opportunity.>> Yes. >> Correct. Thank you. Thank you much.>> Next on our agenda, council, uh the council policy and issue update. And Iwill start us off just a quick recap of our listening session. We had onespeaker tonight, Karen Lungquist, spoke on a couple of different issues. Uh shespoke about the desire or possibly the need for the anti-reflective treatmenton city glass on windows to prevent bird strikes on the glass and both in new andexisting buildings. And she also talked about the door the dog leash ordinance,how some people just kind of flout it and don't have their dogs on a leashwhen they're out for a walk and wanted to uh express her concern about that andsee if there was more that the council could do to make sure that that'stightened up and brought up to her that the all of our animal ordinance I thinkis under review on the 2026 work plan with our legal team. So hopefully wewill see that. Okay. And uh Karen was our only speaker tonight. Once again, aunique speaker for our our listening session.Any comments, questions on that, council? >> Are we a uh um do we kill the dogs atthe pond after a certain period of time >> or or the the shelter?>> We have a dog shelter. No, we do not euthanize there.>> Okay. I just I have a call from a resident that said that he was going topick up a dog that he liked and they told him that he had been utized and I Iwasn't sure, but I said that we don't >> I I know I know we don't do it at ourfacility here. >> He claimed that an employee told himthat. So, I'm going to go dig deeper into that, but>> Okay. >> Yeah. Just curious.>> That's all I have tonight. Mr. Walker, do you have anything? Uh our goal is tohave the community running because they're tired of hearing about this, butwe're going to overadvertise um public comment period on November 24th for thebudget truth and taxation hearing on December 8th for the council's benefit.We'd like you to also know that we intend to advertise that in the Novemberand December briefings, uh the November 5th and 19th buzz on Bloomington today,as well as posts on Facebook and Next Door, and information on the city'swebsite. And we'd certainly welcome the council's assistance in socializing itin any channels you have. Want to overcommunicate those opportunities tothe public. >> Very good. Any questions on thatcouncil? >> Council, is there anything you'd alllike to bring forward? Council member Lman,>> I had something else, but not enough time. Just don't forget to vote.>> That's right. Anything else? Council, we've reachedthe end of our agenda. Just in time. I would entertain a motionto adjurnn. >> So moved.>> Motion by council member Dalisandro, second by council member Lman to adjurnntonight. No council discussion on this. All those in favor, please signify bysaying I. I. >> Opposed. Motion carries. 70. We areadjourned. Thanks for the discussion tonight council. Thank you staff foryour input and uh thanks to our many folks who showed up tonight and werepart of this from the community. It was a good meeting. Thank you all. Have agood rest of your week. >> [music]