[0:08] [Music] [0:22] welcome everyone thank you for attending the henpen County Board commissioner candidate Forum I am Karine Shepard [0:29] president of the Bloomington League of Women Voters and I'm here this evening with Susan Rosenberg who is president of the Richfield League of Women Voters our [0:37] two leagues have work together to make this candidate Forum available to the voters in henan County District 5 the [0:44] League of Women Voters is a non-partisan political organization that never endorses any political party or [0:50] candidate our purpose in hosting the Forum is to provide you the public with [0:56] the opportunity to learn more about the candidate so that you can make an informed voting decision your vote is [1:02] your power and it will result in your voice being heard election day is Tuesday November 5th and early in-person [1:10] voting is available here at Bloomington Civic Plaza starting September 20th that's next Friday and early voting is [1:18] also in person available at Richfield city hall we hope that this forum as well as [1:23] the candidate videos which are posted on our website and that of the city and will be replayed on bloom inton TV will [1:31] provide you with the information that you need to assist you in making your voting decision tonight is our forum is [1:37] a good opportunity to evaluate our candidates and now I'll turn it over to Susan thank you Kine first of all I want [1:45] to thank you for the all coming tonight this is really an important step because [1:50] like Karine said we in the league believe that an informed and educator voter is a better voter so thank you for [1:57] coming and I want to thank the can I've got candidates but I'm going to say just thank you Debbie gotel candidate for the [2:05] time and effort that you have dedicated to running for office and for participating in this forum in these [2:11] days of political polarization we can be proud of our candidates for the efforts they make to run positive campaigns and [2:18] for demonstrating the civility in this forum that is becoming the office that is becoming of the office they seek and [2:25] what reflects the attitudes and demeanor of our community as a whole we ask that the members of the of the audience not [2:32] clap cheer or otherwise do anything that may disrupt The Forum or the recording [2:37] process thank you to the members of The League of Women Voters of Bloomington and of Richfield voter service committee [2:45] for planning this event to the city of Bloomington for use of these council chambers and to Bloomington TV for [2:52] recording and broadcasting this forum on Bloomington TV this forum will be posted [2:58] for viewing online on the League of Women Voters Bloomington website on the [3:03] city of Bloomington website and on YouTube this forum will be broadc multiple times on Bloomington TV and I [3:11] have a personal thank you I want to thank you say to Katherine housted she called me last spring and said what do [3:18] you think do you want to join us to uh to provide this uh forum and the League [3:25] of Women Voters of Richfield and I said sure let's do this and I I love [3:30] Partnerships I love getting to know people and I love to learn something so thank you Katherine for bringing this to [3:37] the city of Richfield uh League of Women Voters we really appreciate the efforts and the [3:43] opportunity so now I'm going to turn this over to Debbie mcneel who's our [3:48] Debbie is a member of the St Louis Park league and an experienced moderator she will now identify the rules of the Forum [3:55] and we'll introduce you to the candidate thank you thank you very much [4:00] presidents um good evening everyone uh I am Debbie mcneel um and I actually I'm a member of the League of Women Voters [4:07] Edina um but I have high regard for the leue of Women Voters St Louis Park and I'm the moderator for tonight's forum [4:14] and I've completed moderator training uh required by the state League uh before we get started let's all get out our [4:20] cell phones and put them on silent or turn them off um we ask that you do not [4:26] use personal devices to record this event because that could uh distract or obstruct other people's view please [4:33] remain quiet while uh the candidate is speaking so everyone can hear and hold your applause until the end of the Forum [4:39] so that um we'll have maximum time to respond to questions um the legue of [4:45] Women Voters Minnesota and local leagues conduct candidate forums to provide the public with an opportunity to hear [4:51] candidates discuss issues that are important to them the league is a nonpartisan organization that does not [4:58] support or or oppose any political party or candidate the views expressed in [5:04] every League Forum are those of the candidates and not those of the League of Women Voters League of Women Voters [5:11] Minnesota and local leagues post complete edit unedited recordings of forums and excerpts or edited Clips may [5:18] not be used for political purposes this forum is being video recorded in its [5:24] entirety and that recording is the sole property of the League of Women Voters [5:30] this evening you will hear from one of the two candidates for henpen County Commissioner District 5 discuss issues [5:37] that are important to the residents of the district both uh candidates for um [5:42] office were invited but unfortunately Jeffrey Beck is ill and unable to [5:47] participate tonight uh but both candidates confirmed by their signature [5:53] their commitment to abide by The Forum procedures and rules and copies of the Forum rules are posted in the Lobby [6:00] we're going to try and cover as many issues as we can in the time we have [6:05] which is just a little under one hour uh if your questions are not addressed tonight please feel free to contact the [6:13] candidates directly so here's the format for tonight's Forum um the candidate [6:19] will have two minutes for an opening statement and one minute for a closing argument closing uh statement and two [6:26] minutes to answer each question and League volunteers uh sitting in in the [6:33] front here Karen Jenkins and Karen din will time the candidate responses and [6:38] they will hold up signs that show when the candidate has 30 seconds left when [6:44] there is only 15 seconds left and when they must stop and so we ask that the [6:50] candidate respect the time limits and as moderator I'll ask all the questions and [6:55] legue of Women Voters Bloomington and Richfield will determine which questions will be asked and will attempt in good [7:02] faith to cover the topics of Interest indicated by the questions [7:07] submitted uh some questions were submitted by email prior to this evening and you may also submit questions during [7:13] this event by filling out a card that you were provided with um please write your question on the card and has hand [7:21] it to a volunteer who's collecting cards and those people who are collecting would you raise your hand so everyone [7:26] can see okay thank you very much um the question facilitators this [7:32] evening to my right are Morin Scalia of the Richfield league and Cynthia [7:37] Jorgenson of the Bloomington League all the questions that are submitted become the property of the League of Women [7:44] Voters no campaign materials or signs or brochures or cards or buttons or [7:50] clothing with candidate information is in is allowed in Bloomington Civic [7:56] Plaza I um ask the candidate to speak directly into the microphone because [8:01] this is being recorded and that way everyone can hear you and please look at the audience when you answer not at me [8:07] and now let me finally introduce to you the candidate who is here tonight who is uh running for a four-year term as hban [8:14] County Commissioner this is Miss Debbie gatel thank you thank you very much [8:22] appreciate that um maybe the best thing would be if we start with your opening [8:27] statement for two minutes and then we'll proceed to questions absolutely so thank you very much thanks first of all I want [8:33] to start by thanking the League of Women Voters for years and years you have been doing this tirelessly it's never more [8:40] important than it is now hyperlocal newspapers are dying a lot of stuff is [8:46] going online some of it's just obliterated they're going out of business how do the residents get the [8:52] information of the local candidates that are running for office the ones that serve you that fix your roads that come [8:59] to your door when you need help it's very difficult I really think that the League of Women Voters is a Bastion of [9:06] wonderful information that still gives this back to the people with your with [9:12] your work here so thank you for doing that I just want to say that that really matters to us candidates at the local [9:18] level I'm hennipen County Commissioner Debbie gotel and I am up for reelection for another four-year term the District [9:25] of District 5 the area that it spans is rich field Bloomington a large part of [9:31] Eden Prairie mostly uh south of cross toown which is 62 and then a small piece [9:38] of three neighborhoods in Minneapolis now since they're redistricting so [9:44] hennipin County one of the biggest questions I get as says what do you do you know what does henen county commissioner do well we do a lot of the [9:50] same things that your city council and your mayor does but on top of that we're the safety net we are the safety net [9:57] when somebody can't pay their rent when they can't find food when there's a tragic and there's issues with mental [10:04] health those kinds of things that's who hennipen county is we have a hospital we have Public Safety we have the coroner's [10:11] office we have a a lot it's a huge organization we build roads just like your city does we do a lot of the same [10:19] things that happens but at a much broader scale throughout the entire [10:25] County one and a half million people and residents here so that's what the the county commissioner [10:31] does thank you very much for that opening um we thought um along the lines [10:37] of what you just said we thought we'd start by asking how the County board works can you tell us uh what areas [10:43] beyond what you've already said that they are responsible for well actually we hire the administrator and so there [10:49] are seven County board members uh depending on the city there's a certain amount of council members so the county [10:55] boards and different County boards have different numbers on them as well ours is seven there are seven districts [11:01] throughout that we are all elected bodies and we hire an administrator to run the day-to-day operations and [11:08] business for us and he reports directly then he or she reports directly to us as [11:13] the board we oversee a vast majority of that County budget that's 2.9 billion [11:20] coming up this next year we also set a levy limit for those kinds of things [11:25] that happen for the next year for your taxes so we set that we do assessing so [11:30] lots of times too when you're looking at what is the value of your house we do those kinds of things we have the county [11:36] sheriff we have the county attorney's office both those are the part of the public safety piece of things we appoint [11:42] to the Watershed districts we appoint to various committees we we have throughout [11:47] the year the libraries people love their libraries we have a library board I actually am honored to be able to say [11:53] that I serve on that we have a henpen history museum a lot of people don't know that I serve on the henpen history [11:59] Museum it's a fabulous fabulous we have a golf course believe it or not we actually have a golf course and we run a [12:05] golf course too at a very reasonable rate so people who want to learn how to play golf we give enormous amounts of [12:11] Grant dollars away for various things such as housing such as environmental grants environmental cleanup grants um [12:18] all public safety violence prevention throughout the entire County to try to [12:24] help cities um augment their own budgets to do the good work that they wanted do [12:30] so those are some of the other things the board does thank you so if you were writing a job description for [12:35] commissioner what would you say the skills would be that are required or best to have you know I talk to [12:41] candidates about this a lot because it takes a whole skill set to run a campaign and I see some of my fellow [12:48] people who have held office out here many times and the whole idea about that is that takes a whole skill set to do [12:55] that but then it takes a whole another skill set to govern things I think you need to be curious I think when you [13:00] first get to office you need to sit back and listen and not not not demand too many things I think you need to learn [13:07] but I think you need to be diving in for the facts and I think you need to never forget that you represent the people [13:15] you're elected by the people not any of your other County board members or [13:20] anyone else but you represent those people and the only way that you know what they need and what they desire is [13:26] to be out among them so you you need to go to their events you need to be seen [13:31] at farmers markets you need to go to the festivals you need to I door knock every season the reason I even when I'm not up [13:39] for election I do that because then I find out what's really going on with people at the doors you know you need to [13:44] be openminded about that I I anybody who calls and asks for a meeting gets a meeting with me if I can make any kind [13:50] of time at all in my day this is important those are the people the loud voices are not necessarily the voices of [13:57] all the people and so sometimes you have to go out and find those voices and so I'm regularly making a route to senior [14:04] highrises to go talk to them um rotary clubs Optimus clubs all these places out [14:11] in the community where I can get the voice and it comes back to me about what's really going on in the cities I [14:17] also meet regularly with city managers and City staff and council members because then they tell me what's going [14:23] on at their level and they let me know what's going on I also then meet with our Representatives [14:29] they let me know what they're thinking of legislation I can take that back to the cities and then I can be a louder [14:34] voice for all of us thank you so um you mentioned um um diving in for the facts [14:42] and that um leads to the next question which is how do you research things in [14:47] order to make a decision as a county commissioner sometimes I do my own research and I'm actually very fortunate [14:54] in the role that I have at the county that I'm in I have two staff members one of them sitting in the audience here [15:00] tonight thank you for being here Graham I ask them to do some of the policy work for me I also we have a National [15:07] Organization where I can also call and get some of that information from our National Organization we have a state [15:13] organization where I can get that same information the association of Minnesota counties and the National Association of [15:20] counties those are two great places but sometimes I'm looking for something even more Innovative and then we start [15:26] searching on our own for internet. we start looking at University websites and then we try to find some of the experts [15:33] who can come and talk to us and sometimes I go back to staff and I just say we don't have enough information to [15:38] make a good decision where can we get more information so we're better informed you know so that's that's where [15:45] you start that's where you go and you keep fight fighting till you can get enough to make a good decision sometimes [15:52] you don't have as much as you'd like and sometimes we still have to make a decision those are always the tough [15:57] times that's when it's nice to be able to go back to some of my colleagues at the city and say and to my cities I [16:03] serve and say what do you think about this what have you heard what do you know and that's very helpful to me to [16:09] get input from other folks so if a person has an issue or a [16:14] concern how would they uh bring that before the County Board well sometimes [16:19] they come to the open Forum we have an open Forum at the beginning of the committee meetings every month um um and [16:27] sometimes twice a month and so so I actually that's part of mine is the administration committees and so they [16:32] can bring it up and they can voice their concerns there however we don't respond to those concerns they can write and [16:38] they can call and they can meet with us and sometimes it comes through staff but other times they call me on the phone [16:44] and sometimes we go out and have coffee depends on what their comfort level is [16:49] not everybody feels comfortable coming up to a deis and talking and some some [16:55] people feel quite intimidated by coming into the Chambers and doing it that way [17:00] so I will meet them sometimes out in community rather than even doing that but I invite a lot of people up to have [17:07] coffee in my office the office that we work in is actually the people's office it's not my office it's our office so I [17:16] invite people up there anytime they're downtown even if I'm not in there my staff are there to come up and have [17:22] coffee with my staff in the office and see where where the county body is and where they work and we we'll take them [17:29] around on a small tour and everything if they'd like to many times two other groups want to know about one specific [17:34] thing or something they want to know how does the herk work you know what is it like you know in the forensics labs and [17:41] I go would you like a tour and I arrang those tours for small groups of folks who'd like to see that and it's and it's [17:48] a really enlightening so they get to see and know what their county is about and they get to find out and ask their own [17:54] questions there's so many things we do there that people don't know about so um [17:59] following up on that question If a person wanted to for instance get a tour of the herk or the forensics lab how [18:05] would they um arrange that would they email they can email or they can call [18:12] the office or lots of times too there's places online where you can actually do it too and then there's also classes [18:18] much like you have citizens acmy here in Bloomington and in Richfield Neen Prairie we have citizens acmy for [18:25] hennipin County so if you really want to know what the county does I would invite you to go sign up for those classes they [18:31] fill really fast I remember because before I became a county commissioner I got to go to one of those classes and [18:38] sit through it and I got to educate myself but also just to find the facilities like our one of our big [18:44] transportation and our dispatch is way out of Medina but it's a very cool place [18:49] to visit and they let you climb on the yellow equipment and everything they get they let you play with the stop lights [18:55] that they have out there but I mean you really see what they do and what they have to do to fix things and everything [19:02] and they usually have some of the workers there who are out on the roads to talk to you about this you could ask [19:07] your specific questions about how they fix potholes or how they res signal um [19:12] or Lanes when they're doing construction and things like that it's quite fascinating there's a lot to it you can ask them about a snow plow too you can [19:19] climb up in the snow plows they're huge they're huge pieces of equipment it's [19:24] amazing and it's a really good time and I would encourage people to do that and when they have their open houses and [19:29] they do ever so often if you get up on the website and sign up for their little newsletter piece of that take the kids [19:35] out there the kids love this stuff this is so good because we need workers in [19:40] our County and all of our government offices we need them at the city level the county and the state level and if [19:46] you expose them to it at this age this is a great place for them to get a great [19:51] education about you know what's the government doing for you thank you um what do you think the [19:59] most contentious issues are are that the henpen County Board is currently working on currently working on I think one of [20:06] the contentious issues is balancing the budget with the hospital right now that's probably our biggest issue right [20:13] now I think the second issue would be uh the Staffing at the in our in our [20:21] Sheriff's offices our County jail and our Juvenile Justice those are issues [20:26] that we we've suffered from the pandemic with and we're still dealing with so the [20:31] county hospital is a safety net hospital we have an awful lot of uncompensated care meaning they don't have insurance [20:37] and there's and there's growing need for people coming in our emergency room doors and that means there's more [20:44] dollars that we have to come up with the county actually is responsible for the uh uncompensated care the hospital is [20:50] not we are as the County Board we actually own all the infrastructure the county hospital is actually a subsidiary [20:57] of hennipen County so we have jurisdiction over it so people don't understand that relationship but because [21:04] we can't let that County Hospital fail there would be no place for people to go [21:09] and so we are level one trauma center and right now one percentage point of the increase in the tax levy is going to [21:16] the hospital to keep it afloat that's a big issue the other big issue is we're [21:22] seeing the jail population rise with violent felons and so we're concerned [21:28] about that just saw the piece go come by our desk where we're going to house some of those people down in Dakota County [21:34] because we're getting very full and we don't have enough staff we are trying to hire we're working on it same with our [21:40] Juvenile Justice we have these kids in trouble we tried to work with the legislature to get a regional facility [21:47] started that didn't get passed we're hopeful that the next session we can do this I'm really concerned we need to be [21:53] taking better care of our kids could you tell us um why why you're [21:58] running for hennipen County Commissioner well there's a lot of work that I want to do at hennipen County I first ran for [22:05] hennipen County Commissioner because I I was seeing what was going on in the community I was mayor of city of [22:11] Richfield I saw some of veterans suffering I saw some of our elderly suffering and I saw parents with kids [22:17] who had mental health issues and things and we had no resources at the city level in the city of Richfield for those [22:23] kinds of things and I really wanted to help those people more and I was consistent stly calling Randy Johnson I [22:31] had he was a county commissioner at the time I have his cell phone number we had lots of dinners out Randy I need help [22:36] with this Randy I need you to do this Randy how can I get resources for this and I really realized that I could do [22:43] more for my community if I actually ran for the County Board and made sure that our communities were taken care of and [22:49] that they knew that they could call my office and somebody's going to pick up the phone it it's so heartwarming to get [22:56] some of the text messages and the letters and the emails back from a mom [23:02] who whose quadriplegic daughter they were trying to discharge from the hospital without the proper care to get [23:08] her off the ventilator and get her back where she wanted and she called us and through the weekend I was working on [23:14] this we got her to the correct Place she's off the ventilator she's back home [23:19] and she's doing great but they would have pushed her out to a care facility that we're not sure would have taken [23:25] good care and we're not sure if she would have made it very well so those are the kinds of things that I'm going to continue doing we have the Southwest [23:32] light rail that we need to finish we're still working on this hospital I'm determined to to write this ship for [23:38] that hospital I'm also determined to try to do better on the mental health for our kids and so we're working on that [23:44] too there's unfinished business I have I want to finish that thank you um this is a question on [23:53] the hennipen energy recovery center the henen energy recovery center is slated [23:58] to close because of air pollution complaints before closing would the board consider a scientific study that [24:06] would close herk that's the center for a reasonable time and test the air quality [24:12] before during an after closure and gather data from trash haulers to compare what is more environmentally [24:19] friendly landfills or the henpen energy recovery center well that's an interesting [24:24] premise and an interesting question to pose in that direction I think I will come up that it a different way though [24:32] one of the things that I'm working on and you asked about how do you get the facts and how do you research things where I've been researching the Danish [24:39] uh burners over there the recovery in energy they have zero emission energy [24:45] facilities over there that burn trash we are over there now one of our staff [24:51] members is over there looking into that particular technology right now how the [24:58] um the energy recovery works is we actually have two full burners so one [25:03] burner is always going well lots of times one is down and being repaired [25:08] what we could do is take one down and try this new technology and see if we could make it zero um emissions that [25:18] that's the issue that we that the community brought to us it wasn't the trucks hauling so much as it was because [25:23] the trucks would still haul the trucks would just have to haul it to a landfill if we closed they just be Hing in someplace else it doesn't stop the [25:30] pollution the pollution that they're talking about is coming through the stack although we are well below permit [25:36] it's it's still pollution there's still pollution coming out there but can we get it to zero I don't know I'm hopeful [25:44] I'm very hopeful if somebody else has already done it that technology exists I want to find out if I can put it into [25:50] this particular facility and if it'll work and I won't have that answer right away but we're looking into it right now [25:56] I don't have all the facts they just got back from and they're going to be talking to us soon and we're going to be [26:01] having a meeting of the partnership on waste and energy there are um three County Commissioners through three [26:07] different counties who sit together on that board and that's what we work on together Solutions like [26:13] that uh we have a question next on rank Choice voting uh it says to fill a vacancy on [26:20] the County Board this spring there was a primary and then a general election the [26:26] cost of these special elections could have been reduced with rank Choice voting according to the questioner do [26:32] you support a local option bill that would give the counties the ability to use rank Choice [26:39] voting I don't believe we had a primary for County board for hanpen county seats [26:45] I think other Counties have but not us I don't believe we had a [26:50] county there um just speaking from my own memory there was a primary in [26:56] district 6 in District Six okay yeah but I know I didn't have a primary so we don't always have primaries so sometimes [27:03] we do sometimes we don't um rank choice choice voting I know it's a it's a huge [27:08] controversial issue right now and coming back up in Bloomington right now you know it it's it's funny was you're on [27:13] the candidate side you like to know who your opponent is and you'd like it to be Whitted down to one but on the voter [27:20] side of it it's nice to have more than one choice so Yes actually I do support rank Choice voting um I think it should [27:27] be a choice for FKS I think it's probably better for the voters I think it takes some time getting used to for [27:33] voters and of course you're hearing from some that aren't necessarily happy with [27:38] it too because it's change I think change is always hard for folks but it might be a fair way to have a a voting [27:45] process thank you um we have a question on um mental health for youth which you [27:52] re alluded to a few minutes ago and here's the question young people in particular are Gra Ling with mental [27:59] health issues what do you believe are the best ways that the county can help them well I was hopeful one of the ways [28:06] is is to get more facilities and more folks working in that in the local area [28:12] a lot of times we end up shipping these kids pretty far away from their families that's not good for them when they have [28:18] huge crisis especially if they have violent actions along with them we don't have a lot of facilities that's why we [28:23] took an opportunity to the state legislature to have a regional fac facility with several of the other [28:29] counties that want to come together so that we could work this together we Al also asked for them to do lenser [28:35] different facilities that are licensed with youth have to be licensed separate if the kids have any violent tendencies [28:42] at all um we'd like them to be able to combine in some circumstances we think [28:47] it might be better for the Youth along with kids who have mental health just in general because we think that as young [28:55] as some of these kids are that they would be better off with other kids and so we're hopeful that we'll get [29:00] something on a regional basis together currently we do have mental health capabilities in our schools um sometimes [29:07] that has worked better than others sometimes it's really hard to keep some of those mental healthcare workers there we also have cope which is a response [29:15] team 247 through hennipen County so if there is something going on kids or [29:20] adults we can respond to that the other program we have is the embedded social worker now they can deal with youth or [29:26] adults and then embedded social worker knows out in your community who has mental health issues they know a lot [29:33] about them they know their doctors and other things so they're a resource however they're not 247 cope is 247 but [29:42] it they do have a 2-hour response time but this is a full um licensed um [29:48] psychiatrist who comes out in the middle of the night to help you with a crisis in your family um I don't know anybody [29:55] else who has that kind of response for this where we're looking really hard and I know that the fire department are also [30:01] looking to have some embedded social workers for that very reason for those kinds of things so thank [30:07] you this question is about uh speed limits on County Roads who decides and [30:14] how are speed limits determined for County Roads well we're having that debate ourselves because a lot of folks [30:20] have come to us and asked us to bring these County Road speed limits down and we're doing a we're do we're in the same [30:27] program as our cities are and our state uh we're trying to Rise To Zero [30:34] fatalities and speed is one of the issues that we're talking about now I think it's fabulous that Richfield and [30:40] Bloomington have lowered their speed limits I have brought this to our Public [30:46] Works director I have had conversations about that and the state has had had [30:51] itself decided to come into our conversations and so we are now working with the state to try to talk to them [30:59] about what our limits can be to lower speed limits now if it's near a school or other things like this we have [31:05] jurisdiction over lowering that but the state is telling us that we can't just necessarily lower our speed limits [31:12] because we're reliever roads for state roads so there in lies the problem that [31:18] we're having in some of those conversations but we're not giving up yet because we're going to go back to this because saving lives making sure [31:27] that people people on bikes pedestrians and this General car accidents you know [31:33] are much less fatal than they are to make it safer for people crossing roads and stuff like this I live off of 66 [31:40] Street and most of you here live close enough to know how that is from 35W to Penn Avenue it's a Raceway um and it's [31:48] really sad because there's a park across that street and it's very difficult I can tell you personally it's very [31:54] difficult to get across to walk the dog there and it's not safe and how do we bring safety speed is a piece of it I'm [32:02] for allowing the counties to lower the speed limits with and work with the [32:07] cities on how to do that thank you this question is about uh [32:13] the Metropolitan Council how do you perceive the relationship between the County Board and the Metropolitan [32:21] Council well that depends and it depends on who you're [32:26] dealing with if you're dealing with the housing folks or if you're doing with the environmental folks or if you're [32:32] dealing with the transportation folks because they're all very different and they're very siloed or if you're dealing [32:37] with the board itself the Metropolitan Council folks so I sit on the technical [32:43] Advisory Board and that's the called the tab there's along with city and county [32:49] and communities we have hundreds of millions of dollars that come through [32:54] there every year of federal and state and granted dollars for your [33:01] transportation your roads your Bridges and other infrastructure bike trails those kinds of things that come through [33:08] there I would say that's very well-run I would say it's exceptionally well-run now on the housing side as a mayor I [33:15] would say that I was extremely frustrated with some of the requirements that we were supposed to have for zoning [33:23] um residential areas into very high density when they were fully built up [33:28] and also some of the ideas of where we could put and get density in where we couldn't we had to schedule that in it [33:35] was because we were told we had to do it but we had no land that was developable [33:41] so it it was very frustrating for cities and that was one of the issues that I [33:47] had they also gutted the fair housing act out of their housing plan and when [33:52] they did that they were sued and the federal housing and Fair Act came back in and said you will write this program [33:59] back and you will put it back in there to make sure that there is uh furthering fair housing and so I did bring that up [34:06] because I sat on their housing task force and that was very disappointing that they I didn't feel listened to at [34:12] that time I think there's a there's a lot of those people have since moved on and I think it's a different met council [34:19] at this time this is about um commissioner pay what are your thoughts about hban County [34:26] Commissioner pay well let's talk about the elephant in the room everybody thought we were getting a 60% increase we did not and [34:34] people thought we count we passed that through the County Board we did not we passed it out a committee and the reason [34:39] I voted for it and several of us other did is because we knew it would be negotiated down but people don't know [34:44] that they only they only see the political football they only see the sensationalism and there oh it's this [34:50] High we're going to give ourselves the county boards giv themselves a big raise no we gave ourselves a 5% raise um our [34:57] salaries have been flat for 15 years and they haven't been raised uh hardly at [35:03] all in that period of time and it's because it's such a political Quagmire to try to give ourselves a raise I [35:08] really wonder whether we should be doing that the the state legislature doesn't do it anymore they have a third-party review and I've asked whether we could [35:15] be looking at a statute change for that as well because I don't think we should be making our own pay raises I think we [35:20] should be looking at a market value and and like other government entities do and find out and pay a market value for [35:27] folks and not put it in the political football so you have to have a lot of Courage because you have to do it an election [35:33] year so there's always going to be somebody up I'm one of those who's up I am up for re-election so I had to vote [35:39] for my own pay raise right and so that's how that goes I'm not sure it's a very [35:45] fair just or equalizing way to do things um I worry about that system too because [35:51] it's also down at the lower levels at school boards and counties uh not just counties so it's also at the council and [35:58] when you look out west in our communities out west they can't get people to run for those seats because [36:05] they can't raise the salaries because nobody has the political will to want to have to fight the ugliness in the [36:11] newspaper when it comes up right nobody thinks anybody should have a raise when you're a government official it it's a [36:18] sad State of Affairs and we can't get people to run for really good government places we need [36:24] them thank you um this is a question about uh people who are homeless or [36:29] unhoused uh the question says uh people who are unhoused is a growing problem in [36:34] henan County what do you propose that the board do to help alleviate this [36:40] situation well we're doing a lot and there's good news and there's bad news on that so the we were really working [36:49] hard through the pandemic because there was a lot of people we were concerned with were going to be evicted and so we [36:54] gave them attorneys we have attorneys that still meet people at eviction court and 80% of the time we keep them out of [37:02] eviction and we work a deal with their landlord and sometimes we pay their back rent and sometimes we don't get them we [37:09] get them out of the eviction but we have to find them other housing and we do that we have a social worker there too [37:15] and so that's some of it but what the good news is is we kept seeing a skyrocketing eviction rate now we've [37:21] seen it level off it hasn't tipped down but it's leveled off that's a really [37:26] good sign for us one of the other good signs is those who live in Bloomington know that there was a homeless shelter here in October that [37:33] will be closed because we don't need that large of a facility anymore because we're housing families faster than [37:40] they're coming in finally we're getting ahead of that families are finding us we're being able to get up the curve and [37:46] put them into homes before they're homeless we could get to more of them I hope we can we're running out of [37:52] emergency assistant aids for that like cap HC and some of the other organizations we're going to try to tap [37:58] into some State funds to try to keep that get going in the direction it is but when you see a homeless person and [38:04] we see them out on the corners we we drive through all these different places we see them and they're holding the [38:10] signs and everything up I can tell you that that person has been touched probably four times that day if not more [38:15] they've been offered food they've been offered water they've been touched by either hennipen County worker or [38:21] somebody from your city they've been offered shelter more than one time to do that and what happens is we turn [38:28] down they're just not ready to come in we've offered them Addiction Services [38:33] they turn us down they're not there yet we never stop asking we know them by [38:39] name we we help them out on a regular basis and we won't stop doing [38:46] that this is um another question about housing but in this case about affordable housing what are um your best [38:54] ideas for affordable housing for working families and how would the County Board fit into that um situation well I'm [39:01] excited to hear about um the work that's going on um with what the candidates are [39:08] discussing at the at the presidential level affordable housing is a huge crisis and they've noted it finally [39:14] thank you thank you thank you so did our legislature they gave us money they gave [39:19] us a quarter of a penny of a cent tax but you think that's not a whole lot it is that's $12 million this year $30 [39:26] million next year we already put 147 million into housing and housing [39:31] supports and we put in about 40 extra million on that through the pandemic so over aund what close to 1990 uh million [39:39] dollars into housing and housing support systems what we're going to do with that extra money right now is help the [39:46] naturally curing affordable housing with all their pent up need we're going to help landlords who carried carried [39:53] unpaid rent if they can prove that they have it we're going to try to make them wholesome so they'll stay with their [39:58] affordable housing we're also going to increase our emergency assistance we're seeing a huge increase in calls for the [40:06] emergency assistance to pay rent and mortgages so we will be working on that [40:12] in the future to give more dollars for that so that we can stabilize now next year when the dollars go up and we'll [40:18] we'll we'll kind of reassess and see where we're at and then we'll decide [40:24] whether we can look at other other kinds of uh dollars to go otherwise but we are [40:29] first money in for a lot of affordable housing that's being built people don't realize that we actually invest in those [40:34] kinds of things and housing supports services for some of those people who have those special needs who have people [40:40] who need caregivers on a regular basis we bring those kinds of services to folks right [40:46] now we have uh two related questions on um hennipen County Medical Center or [40:51] henpen Healthcare as it that was called um and so I'll tell you both of them at [40:56] once um one of them is about governance what is your position on hanpen County Medical Center's governance structure [41:04] should the board County Commissioners take back the governance or leave it with henpen healthc care the second one [41:11] is um what is your position on the henpen County Medical Center's funding issues since the Twins stadium tax was [41:19] not diverted to HCMC according to the questioner I'm going to or I'm going to [41:25] ask I'm going to answer the second one first because I already told you we are 1% of the levy increase is going to save [41:34] our our hospital we had to do that so 5.5% Levy is the maximum Levy we can [41:41] have right now so if we didn't have the hospital issue it would have been 4 and a half% but we have the hospital and [41:48] it's vital we have to have that hospital for our community and so that's how [41:53] we're solving for it right now we are going to go back after that ballpark tax we are already in conversations with [42:01] representatives and they're listening and they're very interested in looking to see if we can do that there's a lot [42:06] of old infrastructure that we could make more efficiencies and that hospital if we had the ability to be able to take [42:14] down some of those old buildings and build them the new Clinic is phenomenal with everything that we have but so many [42:20] of those old buildings are extremely inefficient and some of them are are kind of disastrous you should go for a [42:26] tour for some of those some of them you go up and down I don't know how people find their ways around these things up [42:31] and down places too because they're not even at the same levels when they connect to go there and they're having [42:36] to bring people on gurns through places where public people are which isn't isn't that that's not dignity so we need [42:43] to be we need to raise a couple of those buildings we need to make a new surgical unit a whole lot of things need to [42:49] happen over there at the county hospital on the board issue the board no we we [42:55] did not ever bring up people brought up the idea to us um that was employees who brought up the idea of dissolving the [43:01] board no we did not the board is working because we found the issues that they were having through the current [43:07] governance we are looking at the board structure however about who sits on the board and so we're going to we have had [43:14] already discussions about whether there should be more input from the employees on that board and who else should sit on [43:22] that board and should there be other Commissioners on that board and so that's currently under discussion right [43:27] now but along with the hospital and the hospital board thank you this is a question about [43:34] hazardous waste uh what steps would you support to further reduce hazardous [43:39] waste in henan County oh I love this this is a great questions first of all thank you whoever decided to ask that [43:45] question first of all I said on the partnership in waste and energy that's Ramsey and Washington counties along [43:51] with hennipen um and we rotate the chair on that particular thing we bring all kinds of [43:57] legislative ideas to the legislature one of them was the producer responsibility [44:03] act that just passed and that's about reducing all the packaging waste but [44:08] there's a lot to be done on the Hazardous with pasas and all those kinds of things we have brought in bans on [44:14] those kinds of things um we have there are a lot of legislative pieces that we [44:19] will bring and it correctly and should justifiably change the way we do [44:24] businesses and look at the hazards that we have have in our industry in in our community and give them incentives but [44:32] also provide us provide them with a Runway to get out of those kinds of things that pollute our atmosphere and [44:39] we can do this we can do this together we need to put a lot more dollars into that and the state has to be the one to [44:46] mandate that so that we can implement it we do the inspections for hazardous [44:51] waste but we can't mandate that something is is going to be banned or [44:57] it's got a Runway and it no longer can be produced that's at the state level but are we working with them are we [45:02] talking to them about it absolutely we're doing that and we want those same things that a lot of us want we want a [45:09] cleaner environment and we don't want contamination in our food and our water and our [45:14] air this is a sort of a related question on recycling um how can the Board of [45:21] Commissioners develop more resident business especially restaurant and multihousing Recycling and [45:29] composting well one thing we could do is we could sure make it a heck of a lot easier the biggest scam is the Plastics [45:35] industry know the triangle that's not a recycling triangle that's a triangle [45:41] that they co-opted and they put their little number in there and you can barely read [45:46] it and people don't know you can't recycle black plastic but it's got that little bang on oh isn't it recyclable no [45:53] if it's got food waste on it at least in this County can you recycle it no but people don't know this people [46:01] don't know that ones twos and some fives well which fives I don't even know which fives and I'm an environmental engineer [46:07] I can't tell by looking at that plastic to tell you which five except that if it's a color I won't recycle it you know [46:13] so you don't know and so we think that there should be transparency that there [46:18] should be a whole new system how to certify Plastics and then people would know how to recycle things once and for [46:25] all and so if they knew that then things you know how much time they spend in those facilities knocking out all the [46:32] stuff that can't be recycled it's hours and hours and huge machinery and millions of dollars to get the little [46:38] bit of plastic that we do have that's recycled that's a travesty and it's the Plastics industry that needs to step up [46:45] to the plate and do something very different here's the question about [46:52] climate change uh what action item would you [46:57] propose to help mitigate the effects of climate change and if you have more than one that would be great [47:04] also we're working on that in a big way I have to tell you that when I came to [47:09] the county we didn't have a climate change plan we didn't really have an environmental plan we were doing nice [47:16] things internally we were trying to save energy and stuff like this but we had nothing I brought that to the board I [47:22] was the one who did that I was astounded that we didn't have anything like that we didn't have sustainability any kind [47:27] of thing it was all LED internally and it was all driven by money not necessarily what was best for everybody [47:33] so we decided the first thing we were going to do is a zero waste initiative which is incredible to figure out and [47:41] how we could we educate the general public about how you can cut down on waste what you can do and of course the [47:47] Organics um recycling is also a big piece of that that was mandated down from the state a lot of people have [47:53] complained because they don't like the idea that they have to put the Organics in another bin or they don't want to [47:58] participate and they don't want to pay for it and I'm going well then you should talk to your state legislature [48:03] we're the ones who have to implement it we're for it but you know they're the ones who wrote the law to do this so [48:10] we're we're supporting we're working in partnership with us and we're taking times out in community one of the things [48:15] that I love is that we're out at the community in the farmers markets and every year we give away so many rain [48:21] barrels and then we also have them for purchase at a much lower um cost for folks too they go in hot casys we [48:28] they're up online and they're all bought before we ever get to the farmers market these are the kinds of things that we're [48:34] doing at the local level so people can do that we also have um mitigating [48:39] issues where we have cooling centers for folks they can call they can get a free ride to a cooling center we have call [48:45] checks where we can call on elderly to see if they're okay in emergency situations such as snowstorms and things [48:52] of that so we are doing a lot on the mitigation but we're also doing a lot of implementation on how do we make our [48:59] environment better this is a question about libraries how do you see the role of the [49:06] henpen county libraries in the future well I love our libraries and I'm so glad I always ask to stay on the [49:12] libraries and I also have melso which is the district huge district and they're the ones who get the dollars for all the [49:19] uh electronic books and the electronic systems and everything and Implement that into your uh County Libraries so I [49:26] sit on both both those boards um and I see that this is one of the last bastions of true true public free space [49:35] for people to use and what's so astounded is people say oh well library is going to disappear because of because [49:41] of ebooks and everything's going electronic no they haven't all the programming that goes on your library is [49:46] so fascinating if you're ever bored especially through the winter you should go to your library and see all the great programs that's going on and the [49:53] Southdale Library here that's going to change things we're going to have the um Edina Arts Center along with Richfield [50:00] will be in there from time to time the art center there from Richfield to help out to do those things we have lending [50:07] libraries we have toy libraries you we have tool libraries we have story times [50:12] for kids we're going to have an outdoor space in the Southdale Library where [50:17] we're planting a prairie so we can have classes on how you can bring the Prairie [50:23] back and what um Native plantings are going to be like there these are the things that people are going to learn at [50:30] their Library we have authors come in and talk on a regular basis so there's [50:35] so much activity going on for your children or for yourself we have bookmobiles that go around not just to [50:42] our kids but to our seniors to connect them with their libraries too and in your library you can check out an iPad [50:50] you can check out a computer you um all kinds of things are available there [50:55] movies that stream music that streams for free people don't realize how much [51:01] you can get out of your libraries for free movies don't pay for movies go get them at the [51:09] library so if a person would like to um follow more closely the work of the [51:15] County Board um I assume they would look online to discover when the Committees [51:22] and the board as a whole would meet is that is that information readily available online it absolutely is and [51:27] all of it's archived too for many many years back so sometimes when I want to go look at something way back I have my [51:34] my office staff go start looking at some of the old videos and some of the agendas to try to find some of the [51:39] information that we're looking to find out dates when certain things that happened or spans of times but [51:44] everything is recorded it's all um broadcast and in fact we're trying to go live on YouTube with closed caption [51:51] right now one of the things that the disability Community brought to my attention is that our Clos caption is [51:57] really difficult for them because they have to know how to maneuver within their own Electronics to turn it on or [52:03] off and some of them don't have the capabilities of doing that where the Minneapolis is already closed captioned [52:10] we are moving in that direction so that we will be even more accessible to all [52:15] people so that they can do it so you can look at that stuff on YouTube if you want to too or you can go up on the Hing [52:21] and just Google board materials or or board meetings and you'll you'll get right to some of this sites and you can [52:27] start put pushing the buttons and seeing those things um our County Board briefings are not necessarily televised [52:34] but they are all recorded so you can actually get the recordings for those too and those are going to happen the [52:39] briefings are going to speed up pretty quick because we're going into budget time I run the budget and so all those [52:44] will be recorded and and lots of times too you can just come live and watch them if you're downtown people don't [52:50] realize that you can come downtown and just sit into the County Board and watch them so are all the meetings and [52:56] committee meetings uh held downtown yes in the hanban County Government Center they are okay thank you so um we are [53:03] almost out of time but um we'd like to give you a chance to address any topic [53:09] you would like for two minutes either that you have touched on or something perhaps that uh hasn't been discussed [53:16] well just let me tell you about what's going on in hanpen County right now about some of the beliefs and thoughts [53:21] that I have you know I talked about why I wanted to run and that I want to help people where is safety net [53:28] unfortunately there are some holes in our safety net our call percentage for SNAP which is a food assistance is up [53:35] 300% we have hired 25 more individuals to respond to that and we are not [53:41] getting ahead so some things where I talked about the evictions are getting better we're housing more people in some [53:48] ways not everything is perfect here and so we are giving more money to our food [53:53] banks so that we can hopefully they can go there so when when they can't get through the lines right away and get [53:58] through their certification we'll help walk them through the process but we're putting money at the food bank so that they can get food also the same thing [54:05] for some of the assistance for some of the emergency for housing and for Medical Aid but I urge them to call our [54:11] office because we can handw walk things through the system sometimes and sometimes there is an error in in uh [54:18] needing specific information and we can help them gather that those safety nets matter not everybody came out of this [54:25] pandemic doing fabulous our kids are still struggling with mental health that was brought up [54:30] tonight there are people who still don't have enough food on the table and that's a really sad place to be there are still [54:36] people who grieving over the last lost loved ones from the pandemic people lost a major parts of their family some of [54:43] them they're not they're not coming out of this hole and so we need to be there for them that's why we want to have the [54:49] mental health Regional facility for our kids that's why we want more mental health um available to all of them in [54:55] their schools and that's why we need to get more people um and more help from [55:01] the state to address the hunger in our communities so if you can volunteer to [55:08] um get make meals for people to do something at your local food shelf ours as VP I encourage you to do that we're [55:16] trying to stop that whole safety net piece we're trying to sew it up thank you so that's all the time we have now [55:23] for questions and so now um Debbie gel we invite you to make any closing [55:29] remarks you'd like to for one minute I just want to say how honored I am to be [55:34] serving in henpen County you know I never knew how much this job would mean to me until I got here I never knew how [55:42] much it would bring to my own soul seeing helping other people to save their souls you know when they're down [55:49] and out some of these people I see you right along in an EMT you see them on their worst day those are the people we [55:56] see coming through our community the homeless people go down and talk to some of those people in encampment I have [56:02] have them come into your office and talk to you it's an honor to serve these people and put their lives together [56:09] there was a man through the pandemic who was six years homeless who was he had a murder conviction I talked to him every [56:16] week for over a year and a half we housed that man those stories matter to [56:23] me the residents of the community I serve you matter to me and if you need [56:28] help please call the office I'll be there thank you very much for uh [56:36] participating in this forum today and for your willingness to participate in the Democratic process by running for [56:42] public office thank you very much to the city of Bloomington for their technical expertise and for the use of the city [56:49] council chambers thank you to the League of Women Voters Bloomington and the League of Women Voters Richfield for [56:55] sponsoring this forum and a thank you for all the volunteers tonight [57:00] appreciate your help very much this forum has been video recorded in its entirety and it can be viewed unedited [57:07] on YouTube and there will be links on the city of Bloomington website and on [57:13] the lwv Bloomington and Richfield websites and it will be rebroadcast on [57:18] Bloomington cable TV until election day welcome and thank you to Future [57:24] online and cable TV audiences I uh remind everyone to [57:30] remember to vote on or before Tuesday November 5th for information about voter [57:37] registration voting early and voting in person please visit the Minnesota [57:42] Secretary of State's website which is MN votes.gov [57:47] um and um if the candidate can stay afterwards the audience is invited to [57:53] visit informally following the Forum this cludes tonight's Forum let's give [57:58] the candidate a round of [58:06] applause thank you everyone and good evening [Music]