All right, good evening everyone. I'm Charlie Miner, mayor of Lawn Lake. Uh, appreciate you joining us tonight. It's a beautiful night outside. I think it's 72 degrees and sunny. I understand there's a basketball game starting here in a few minutes, so hopefully we can keep most of your attention uh for the foreseeable future. So, this is the fire services joint open forum co-hosted by the cities of Lawn Lake and the cities of Orno. Uh we'd like to thank Train Lutheran Church for hosting us for this event this evening. Also, this event is being filmed by the Lake Minnitanka Communications Commission. So, we'd like to thank their staff for filming this tonight. It will be available on YouTube on the LMCC channel in the near future. So, this is the Lawn Lake has had three different forums like this in the in recent years um at at Calvin uh Presbyterian Church and um we're very excited tonight to be actually co-hosting this event as I mentioned with the city of Orno. Um we've it's taken a while to get here for Lawn Lake and we very much appreciate sitting at the same table with our with our Orno colleagues here this evening. like to start off by just identifying some of my fellow alumni council members that are present tonight as well as some of our staff. Council member John Dybec here to my left, council member uh Dear Kowali is here. Council member Mike Feldman and council member Todd Newcomer are all present. Also, our city administrator Scott Wesky is here and our Lone Lake Fire Chief is here as well as uh several members of the Lone Lake Fire Department and I believe the Orno Fire Department as well. So, we mo most appreciate the firefighters being in the room this this evening. Thank you for coming and thank you for your service. And also, we have some representatives from other cities here tonight as well. Um, from Madina, we have council member Dino Deloreier here. And for Minnetonka Beach, we have Mayor Joe Pagano and Council Member Jennifer Halverson. So, thank you for joining us as well. All right, with that, I'll turn it over to Mayor Tunai. All right. Thank you, Charlie. Um, I'd like to introduce a few of my fellow council members as well. Uh, including to my right, Steve Persian. Uh, Steve has been a wonderful um, uh, member, new member of our council, uh, and has been involved in the fire negotiating team. Um, having been a firefighter and a volunteer fire chief, his insights and, um, and knowledge have been uh, have been really valuable in this process. We also have two other council members here. I think just two. Um, Alisa Benson and Jacqueline Ricks, please uh identify yourselves. And is Claire Barrett here? I don't believe I I've seen her, but um anyway, and our administrator, Adam Edwards, is here as well along with several other of our staff. So, um, welcome everybody. Um, as uh as Charlie mentioned, the um we we do have to apologize that we uh we we ended up um scheduling this on a night when the Timberwolves are playing a playoff game. But uh if if anybody else out there is as big a fan as I am, you'll know that they always start slow. So, we're just saving you from a hope from maybe another slow start. But, uh hopefully it's a win tonight. Um, I also want to acknowledge uh that this has been a difficult and emotional um issue for our community and uh we're not here tonight to rehash what we've gone through over the last three or four years. We are here to talk about the future. And so uh in your comments and your questions, hopefully you're you're geared toward the future and not toward relitigating the past because uh we'd really like to put that behind us and heal as a community. So hopefully you'll help us do that. Um I would however be remiss if I didn't recognize the uh our firefighters uh many of whom are here tonight as Mayor Miner pointed out. Um they did not ask to be in the middle of a political battle and uh but yet they performed their jobs well. They kept our community safe and for that I think uh they deserve a nice round of applause. Thank you very much. Um, as as I've talked to members of our community, including firefighters, um, it was clear to me that no one was advocating having two separate fire departments. It's in everyone's best interest to have a uh, a single department that delivers top-notch public safety. And I I hope you will hear tonight um our plan. Well, we will be um explaining our plans tonight uh for how we do that, how we get back to one fire department serving our community and delivering top-notch public safety. So, with that, I would turn it back over to Charlie to um to go through our our presentation. All right. Thank you, Bob. So what what what where where are we at today? What are the current challenges facing fire service in our communities? Um for starters, um we are in a contract. So just a little quick history lesson is that cities of Long Lake, Orno, and Madina are in a a joint contract for fire services that dates back to uh to 2002. And that contract is ending at the end of the year. So it's been a been a long run. It's been a, you know, worked fairly well the last uh 20 plus years, but it's coming to an end. So, we need to plan for the future. We need to figure out uh what's going to occur once the contract ends here. So, that's been step one. We've spent a lot of time, the four of us have gotten to know each other very well the last three or four months meeting on a regular basis trying to figure that out. So, tonight we we we believe we sort of have that piece figured out. Now, we want to talk about what's going to happen in 2026 and beyond. Item two there, equipment costs are rising. An existing capital plan is underfunded. So the cost of fire trucks and fire vehicles, for example, has gone up immensely in I would say the last 5 years since since co. It's not unusual for a fire engine to cost over a million dollars now. If you want a ladder truck is, you know, $2 million or more. Um crazy amounts of money. Both fire departments, both cities have what what are essentially, you know, large Ford pickup trucks on order that are rescue vehicles that are anywhere from $250,000 to $400,000 just fully equipped. So, so incredible amounts of money uh need to be spent and are being spent on on fire vehicles really, you know, across the nation, not just here. And the the capital plan for that for those purchases has been un unfunded uh through the current contract. As as Mayor Tunim said, we're not going to go back and rehash past history here, but there there's some things that led to that and now we have to kind of build up that capital uh going forward. That relates to number three, their capital equipment is aging and needs needs replacement. Um both cities have been purchasing vehicles on our own for the last couple of years. And in some cases, we've ordered the exact same thing. you know, it's we've pretty much, you know, one fire department's copied the other fire department on the order spec uh and gone and ordered the same thing. And that doesn't that doesn't make any sense in most cases. There's some duplication going on. So, we're trying to we've been working together to address that. Uh but at the same time, we need we need to uh fund our capital uh funds better. Um this isn't we're not necessarily going to save save uh money long term with this. I think we'll get in that a little bit more, but um all of our cities should be spending more money on fire service. We've been talking about that as Long Lake for the last many years and I know has as well. So, it's not a uh public safety is really to me is uh the most important thing that you know our local governments provide for our residents and we need to be sure we do that as cities. So, that's been a challenge. Number four, there are smaller departments challenged to meet increasing regulations. you know, being uh firefighting 40, 50 years ago was a lot different than today. You know, there's u fire uh uh any firefighter will tell you that cancer rates are high among firefighters. Um very important to keep our firefighters safe. There's fire stations in our in our area here that are not really built uh to today's standards. uh you're not supposed to have turnout gear lockers in the same bay that you park the trucks and things like that because you're worrying about exhaust and and uh there's more more regulations on the horizon. OSHA at the federal level is proposing many many changes to uh fire regulations that that impact uh local fire departments and those could be immensely expens expensive down the road. So all of these reasons and then I guess one more is that maybe we didn't put up here is just the staffing challenges. Uh is maybe a new number five there is that you know back in the old days maybe when you turned 18 you know your dad grabbed your you load up the pickup truck and said you we're going down to the fire station and signed you up. You're going to be a firefighter now. And uh you know it's kind of a a duty that was uh a duty that you had to serve that way in communities and those folks um folks are not showing up to be firefighters as as as as much as they used to. Thankfully we have many members of our community that are willing to do that but it's a challenge whether it's police officers, firefighters. U not that many people are stepping forward to do that anymore. So having redundant fire departments is not is not a good idea from that perspective alone. So that's why all this really points to consolidation and not isolation and why we're we're coming together now to address that issue for the long term. Okay. So um what I'm going to talk a little bit about are some of the steps that we've taken u the interim arrangement so to speak. Most of you are frankly aware of some of those steps up to including signing the first amendment. The reality is the politicians have come to an agreement and gotten out of the way of the fire firefighters and the department's ability to work together. And frankly, I wish it would have been quicker, but I'm learning that things take a little more time. Um, the departments are training and responding to incidents together, sharing equipment and facilities. Also in the spirit of working together, the councils are committed to settling the outstanding litigation between the cities before signing the joint powers agreement. Simply put, we are better together and these initial steps demonstrate increased cooperation between the cities and firefighters and should act as the basis for long-term collaboration and partnership. So go ahead and click. So, where are we headed with our joint powers agreement? Our plan is consolidation. It's to take the best of each department, including the firefighters, leadership, equipment, and operations, and bring it forward in a planned manner to our communities through the creation of a new fire department. Excuse me. It also includes developing a model that's flexible, sustainable, and allows for growth. It will be a model that delivers a wide variety of important fire services and has an organizational structure that aims to deliver exceptional services to our communities. Looking at other similar communities, this will include full-time, part-time, and paid on call firefighters. All that said, I can summarize these couple slides and ask you remember two things. And I have two requests. First, I'm thrilled that we've taken the first step to restore our relationship and I'm excited to take the next step with our neighboring cities. My request, please positively join us along that journey. Second, and more importantly, remember that our firefighters are our greatest value. My request, please always give them the respect and gratitude they deserve. as they serve our community. Now, I'll turn it over to Bob to talk uh to talk take talk about some key elements of our future department. Thanks, Steve. Um so, um just a couple things I want to mention here. Um as mentioned earlier, joint powers agreement, uh we are working on that. Um it is a document that will uh be between the member cities Long Lake Orno hopefully Madina um to formalize our cooperation on this important uh important issue. It outlines level of service to be provided uh to ensure that uh the new department meets all of the um expectations of our community for the quality of service as well as government guidelines including OSHA standards that are that are going up uh along with state and local ordinances and of course best practices that we observe from other other departments. Uh this will be governed by an it will be an independent uh fire department that's governed by a board that's um that's going to be named by um uh by the member cities. Uh and one of our one of the elements of that that we've negotiated is as long as Oro is paying over 50% of the cost of the department or will get no less than 50% representation on the board. Um, I I've been a business lawyer for over 37 years and I've consistently counseledled my clients to avoid having evenumbered boards. Uh, and here we're talking about an even numbered board to avoid deadlocks obviously. U, but I and I like that here because it's going to encourage us to cooperate and get together um make decisions that are in everyone's best interest. And so um uh the size and the constitution of the board will depend on which member cities are are involved. If it's just Long Lake and Orno, it's probably a four-person board with two members from Orno, two from Long Lake. If Madina chooses to stay with uh say as a member, uh it would be probably a sixperson board. Three from Moro, two from Long Lake, one from Madina. All of that has yet to be decided. But uh but the point is it will be a board that will have operating authority over staffing, budgeting, equipment, service levels, you name it. They will be in in charge. They will have the authority here. Um and so uh that's that's how this how this uh new fire department will be governed. Uh the fourth point here which I think cannot be underestimated is we're going to select a new name uh for the department. It's not going to be the Long Lake Fire Department. It's not going to be the Orno Fire Department. It's not going to be the Long Lake Orno department or, you know, it is going to be a new name and it's going to represent a broader community that we uh that we are serving here and um uh and it will also be welcoming to other communities that want to join us. So, I think that's really really an important step to be taking here. Um, so we move on to uh the implementation plan. Like I said, we're drafting the uh joint powers agreement. Uh, our goal is to have that approved by July 1. We believe we can do that. We had a um uh for those of you that saw what we what we passed with respect to the amendment, we had a term sheet attached to that that had the terms of that joint powers agreement uh that have largely been hammered out. So we think uh we that that goal is perfectly attainable. It will fit into our budgeting cycles and uh and that's what we are striving for is a July one uh signing date. We're also oops skipped one ahead but uh we're we're also defining the department structure standards and equipment needs that that work has already begun. Uh we've not yet selected a board obviously we're that that would come a little bit later. Uh but once that board is named uh they will start developing budgets um capital operational plans including department leadership uh and all of which would lead us to hopefully being fully operational by January 1, 2026. So it's a relatively compressed time frame, but we believe we can do it during during that time frame. And uh um it's uh ba based on our experience in negotiating uh I have full confidence that we will get to that point uh so that we're ready to go by January 1, which coincides obviously with the with the um uh end of the current contract. So with that, I will turn it back over to Charlie to talk about governance and accountability. All right. Thank you, Bob. Um so, uh Bob covered some of these bullets already. Um, but just a few highlights is we talked about the the uh the board being appointed by partner cities. Um, you know, Minnitanka Beach is is maybe we accidentally overlooked them, but they're obviously a partner in us now and we we we hope that they'll continue to be a partner as well. Um, as and we're it's kind of a build let's build it and they will come kind of a philosophy that we've been having and we we're hoping that what we're doing here is is unique. We'll talk about some some things uh in a few slides that are maybe different than how some other uh cities and uh jurisdictions operate their fire service and we're hoping that this is a model that's very attractive to other communities that are around us outside of our current the current current four partner cities um service and service levels will be clearly clearly established. So you know we've there's lots of services provided by fire departments and firefighters. Um, back in the old days, you know, fire departments were there to put out fires, you know, that was about it. And, uh, other other duties, you know, medical duties were handed elsewhere and by paramedics and and that type of thing. And they didn't do inspections. And just the world of firefighting has changed, as you might imagine over time. So, they they they're called on a lot now. you know, a lot of the I think 70 70% or so of the calls that firefighters go to are medical calls, including things like list lift assists as um as our population ages. And so, you know, we'll be determining the board will be determining what are those services provided by the fire department. Some fire departments are looking more and more at at uh EMS and paramedic services. You know, there's a big kind of a debate about this going on down south in the in the, you know, excelsier fire district area about it's it takes a long time for an ambulance to come out from HCMC, sometimes from downtown Minneapolis. They they may start up their own uh paramedic service at some point and that that could be something to look at here too. Just just and um and not saying that that's going to happen, but just a concept of establishing those services. What services do we want as a community, you know, and how do we go about providing those services? That'll be a key aspect of this leadership accountable to the board. Uh Bob mentioned that, you know, so the fire chief will be accountable to the board. The fire chief will not report to the to the uh city of Orno will not report to the city of Lone Lake. It'll report to this board which is made up of representatives from both cities. Bob already covered the board representation kind of aspect um of of the situation and and and how it'll start and that could evolve over time if more partner cities join those uh kind of numbers could be adjusted. Uh as we look at to the south you know as Lawn Lake we've we've we've admired the Excelsier Fire District for many many years. Um they have a you know 25-year-old roughly fire district now that's made up of five cities. Each city has, you know, one representative on the board, one city council member on the board. I'm told that that works well. Uh something to look at there. But u the point is is there are successful models around us and there's there's more in the works. Um M the cities of Mound, Dor, St. Bonafacious, Minitrista, Spring Park, they're having very active discussions as well about creating a fire district amongst their four cities. Right now there's the St. Pontifacious and there's the Mound Fire Department. There's talk about merging those two together to have a larger uh fire department and that's um that it's great to see that occurring because there's strength in numbers and that's kind of what we're getting at tonight. A couple years ago, the Lorettto and Hamill Fire Departments merged to create the West Suburban Fire District. That's currently a private uh a private organization. Uh we'll see what happens in the future with that. they serve several cities, but it's it's it's again it's happening all around us and we want to be able to keep up with with the times as they evolve. And then lastly, their transparent performance review process and mutual aid participation. So that's just, you know, ensuring again that we're providing quality services that are that our staff are are providing quality services and by having more uh oversight from a larger group of cities, we hope that's that will uh aid with that. and the mutual aid participation. You know, no no fire department around here, even your, you know, your Minnotonkas and your Plymouth can can do it alone. You firefighters will tell you they they get paged all the time to go assist their brothers and sisters in in other local fire departments. So, it'll be important for our our new department here to have great partnerships as our surrounding cities. And uh we want to help them and we want them to come help us as well when we're in a time when our firefighters are in a time of need. Okay, next would be so whenever there's uh two cities or more that share a fire department for services, you have to have a way to share the cost. And um so you you would have a formula that would be a function of u maybe just property values in some cases um a combination of property value and call volume in other cases. And then uh also in some cases it might have a third element to include population and the percentages of those might vary. Uh there's no set rule on how that should uh be done. Uh on the current contract um that we have from 2002. Uh the formula was based on 70% property value and 30% call volume. Um there was even though the League of as I said there's no set rule in the League of Minnesota Cities or or elsewhere but in the League of Minnesota Cities website there is an example that they use where they do a 1/3 uh between property value call volume and population and and we thought that was fair um to to uh to apply that for the new JPA. Um it would be a little bit of a benefit to Orno because uh it would bring their percentage of the cost down, but you know with the population uh of their city being um four times long legs, it it's it's not going to make a a big difference. But but we felt that it was more fair and Charlie and I actually um were, you know, bringing this up with the previous administration that we'd be willing to do this. So um we think that this is fair and and I and I think Orno agrees. Um so that's what we're planning to do and then next slide. So as you heard um capital equipment has been a challenge. I think it's a challenge for any uh small volunteer fire department uh because of the rising costs uh and because you know we we were previously underfunded. Um and the way the fund was was the funding was done wasn't the best. uh going forward there's actually going to be a fund that all the cities will put annually money into so that there there's going to be that fund that will exist rather than you know being well you owe this much from you know the last three years and you owe this much it having an actual fund is is is going to be a better way to go but um in as as also as mentioned in the last couple of years or has bought some equipment long lake has bought some equipment on their own and and so now we're going to bring all that together. We're going to see what's redundant, what's the best of of the equipment that is going to be kept. And the administrators from both cities are are going through this exercise as well as as our leadership in the fire department. And um and then that the what what we don't need will sell. And uh and the money from those sales, from those proceeds will go into the capital budget to sort of be a seed uh some seed funding um prior to us then uh establishing a contri annual contribution to to that fund. Um and and that annual contribution will be based on what the capital plan calls for. We'll look at a 10-year plan or or whatever however many years would make sense. And then we can say well okay we need to have all the cities put in their percentage based on the formula again that I that I shared on the last slide um so that we would put that annually into that uh to that fund so that we'd be we'd be um properly funded going forward. I think uh starting out we'd actually have some pretty new newer equipment actually coming in uh to this uh uh new department from the shared um you know equipment that's been recently purchased. but but also to have a plan and and have that well funded. That's that's what we're going to do. Great. Thanks. Thanks, John. Um oops, I went too far. Uh where do we want to go? Future goals. Uh this is kind of the fun part. Um imagining and envisioning uh where the future of our of our emergency services might go. And really this is an exercise in emulating what's what's been done well elsewhere, anticipating what the future of um of emergency services is going to be. And um you know there's many factors that are driving consolidation around the country. Um I think Mayor Miner went through a number of those in an earlier slide. um the cost of equipment, the the redundancy of having every every department buy the same equipment uh when that equipment can be shared and really the dwindling number of people that are willing to serve as uh volunteer firefighters. So, we really want this JPA to be the first step in in um envisioning what what can be for not just our our community but a broader community of maybe some of our neighboring uh neighboring towns. Uh so, we want this to be expandable. We want it to be welcoming to neighboring communities and departments. We want it to be forwardinking. And uh you know, we've talked a bit about this, but we're not quite ready to go as far as to form an actual fire district with taxing authority, but that's on the table to for future discussion. Uh particularly if neighboring communities are interested in doing that. And what that would mean is, you know, instead of getting a property tax bill that's that shows how much you're paying your city out of which uh the fire budget would be paid, it would be a separate line that would say here's what we're paying for fire services to our district. And then the uh you know, that number would presumably be lessened from the amount that you get charged from your city. So, um, uh, again, we're not quite there, but I think we can see that that is a direction that a lot of, uh, fire services is going. Uh, the state legislature has made it, uh, easier to do that through legislation that was passed a couple of years ago. So, um, that is on the table. It's not what we're envisioning for January 1, but it is on the table for future consideration. So, um, we'd love some some feedback about that as we move forward. Uh, and I guess I will turn it back over to Charlie for our final slide. Thank you. Grab this one. All right. So, yeah, we kind of um went through those slides a little half hour or so. We didn't want to overwhelm you with slides or anything. There's a lot lot of moving pieces here, but we'd love to get your feedback. If there's anyone wants to give uh feedback on, you know, we uh most of our city councils are here tonight. We're going to be making these decisions in the coming months and and years, it'd be great to get any feedback you have on that. Um we're we're going to uh time them. Time your comments. Just ask not uh we're not going to make a big deal about it, but just try to keep your comments three minutes or or less for those of you that want to step forward. And appreciate you stating your name and what city you're from. if you step forward. And it's always hardest to get the first person to do that. If if uh anybody wants to do it now, it sounds Oh, thank you. Okay. And yeah, I'm sorry. If you'd step up to the mic, I failed to mention there's a microphone back there. Yes. Thank you. Approach that. Hello. Uh I'm Liz Levang. I was a former uh resident. I lived there for 35 years. I was also on the city council. My question uh is a historical one is about the Chvy Chase area. We know that in uh 2016 that area came back to Orno uh the Long Lake Orno Fire Department, but it was uh prior to that since about 1965 Weisetta was responsible for providing fire service. I'd like to know what you're thinking about that today. And part of the reason is that uh Long Lake takes longer to get to that area. And um I would like to see you return to Weisetta so that those people in that area of the city get faster service. is we all know it takes seconds a person's life and we don't and I don't appreciate the fact that it takes over eight minutes at least that was the record uh to get there from Long Lake where it would take about six minutes from Weisetta. So I'd like your comments about that. Thank you. So So I'll address that. Um we had a work session a few weeks back and one of the comments that was discussed was some of the changes in fire coverage over the years um up to including taking areas um in taking areas away from Maple Plane, moving them into Long Lake, taking areas away from Weisetta, moving them into Long Lake. And um part of that discussion was to ask staff to start to take some start to have some conversations with these neighboring cities about um reooking at whether or not we're set up the best possible way. Um part of what because I you know I believe that speed is critical and I think it's very important to making sure that we provide the right level of service to the areas within Orno. And so what I um where I think we're headed with that is to continue to have that conversation with the city of Wisetta. That being said, I haven't gotten an update um in recent weeks about that, but I will certainly take a look into that and see what we can do. Um something else to add to that is as the fire department is set up, the new fire department is set up and the structure of that new department is established, part of making sure that we provide the best service um goes along with the operational model that you have. And so in the event that you have a duty crew that is at the department, it needs to be taken into account um for how you provide service to to the entire city of Orno and ensuring that um if it's moved to Weisetta and this operating model is stood up, are we still providing the best service to the folks on Chevy Chase for example or in fact is the duty crew model um changed that ability to serve that area? So, we're going to use some of that data, but I agree with you that um time is of the essence and it's going to be important. So, I there will be a follow-up to that um with the city administrator. Yep. Other questions or comments? Go. Got one first here. Uh Dave Pearson uh 2160 Weber Hills Road. Uh mine is not is more of a request and not a view. It's the request is at the citizens of Long Lake and Orno. I got involved in in this fire pro process, you know, not knowing anything about it like most of us. And um I I you know it was very few of us that were really involved in the beginning and we had gone to the city of Orno and asked for a forum much like this with no response. That started to get people wondering what the heck was going on. And uh over time uh time being the election, it was obvious that a lot of us had come together uh upfront or in in the back in uh in back well what am I trying to say was just in the background. That's a good word. Um and and and obviously we saw what happened. My request is and and I've been on the the the Long Lake Council. I was head of their planning commission and I now live in Ornal. My request is to the people of Long Lake and Ornal. We asked for transparency. We asked for um for town hall meetings which Long Lake provided. But the best way for these things to continue is you got to show up. I mean, we have a nice crowd here tonight, but in all honesty, this meeting should should this church should be full in my opinion. um you know there orno is a big area and uh in Minnetonka and and you know you shouldn't just get involved like you in the beginning that I did just cuz now I'm I was mad and didn't know what was going on now that we have the transparency that we have hopefully people aren't going to get mad they're going to have ideas but you got to be here you got to play in the game if we want the community to go the direction that I think these two councils uh are headed. So, please when they call when they call for a uh town hall, it's not just not something to say, well, I I'll read about it in paper or I'll go to the website or whatever. Be here because that's how we stay the community that we're really headed for right now. Thank you. Thank you. Believe Mr. Bash. Hi, I'm Mike Bash. I live in Long Lake. Question for you. Great work. Thank you very much for both cities and councils for doing this. You talked about how the joint powers board would work and its recommendations and being responsible for all that kind of stuff. However, you as city council members are elected to tax people and you have the authority to tax people, not this board. How do you see it happening when the board says we want X amount of money in good faith, right ideas, all that kind of stuff, and you and your role as city council members are then balancing that against police and roads and all this other stuff. And you think it's too much. Again, not not not a bad thing, just a just a different perspective that you have as elected officials. How are you going to balance what this board has that you've said run the place with your responsibility uh to tax people? That's a great question. I'll I'll take a swing at it and I'll I'll let my colleagues up here uh correct me if I if I say something wrong here. But uh the way this is set up, we will still retain authority to approve or disapprove the budget that's being presented to us every year. uh we we put a lot of we will put a lot of faith in the um in the um the the persons that we select to represent us on the board. Uh but ultimately we have decision-making power over the budgets. And if the budgets are too high, don't fit in with the rest of our priorities, we'll go back to them and say, "I'm sorry, we we can't approve this budget. Try again." Um I'm hoping that never is the case, but it might be. And uh ultimately until we go to a fire district uh we will have the authority to uh to say yes or no to those budgets. Not individual pieces of the budget but the overall budget number. I think in the past there's been some issues with approving specific pieces of equipment. We're not going to do that. We're going to do an annual budget. We'll approve it or disapprove it. and ultimately we'll approve a budget. Earlier um Charlie mentioned the Excelsure Fire District. That's not a district. It's a JPA among five cities as Charlie said. And so they have a five person board. This would not be unlike that. They have to bring their budget to each of those five cities for approval. And so I think it's just working together between the cities and the board to just to you know make sure that that there's communication there and uh and I I don't know that there's you know maybe there was maybe there's been some issue in approving the budgets. I haven't heard that uh in the Excelshare example but um but I think that for public safety you know you do not want to sacrifice on on the financials. So, as long as you know your board is doing a good job of budgeting, um I I would think that that all the cities would approve that. But communication um between the cities and the board is is is important. I guess you guys getting all the old elected official, real old. Um, it's really refreshing to see the commitment my fellow elected officials, I mean, Jim White, Mike Bash, Lily McMillan, and you already met our council woman. Um, could you just identify yourself, Mr. Jabor, please? Oh, absolutely. I'm Gabriel Jabor, troublemaker extraordinaire, special classification. Um, I just We worked too hard to get here. We really did. And you guys know it better than anybody. And I'm here to show my gratitude and respect for all of you for doing that. Let's just start with doing that. um you kind of snatch victories from the jaws of defeat you know at 11th hour but at the same time the mission is about to start and the long wrong it's a long road down the path I could tell you from my personal experience 75 years of it so far that nothing good happened without having partners. Partners in life, partners in social environment and ONO was phenomenally beneficial from partners and some of our elite residents made us who we are, not our elected official, the donation, the brand name that we had. And I seriously urge you not to delegate as we do in work. Most of us are CEOs and we delegate except some of us worked our tail off. The relationship between us and other cities around Steve I mean I have utmost respect for you regardless of the way I come across. I don't think staff should be handling it. Staff are my observation have moved from innovative to clerical. They just like a switchboard operator. You call and they route you to the service provider. We need to rebuild those relationship. We need to take the animous out of our partners and neighbors eyes and we need to have them wish us the best and be there for us. So, and that's not going to happen by staff. Dick Flint and uh I don't know if you remember Dick Flint and the formal council when I quit that had a secession plan how we going to keep the momentum our city bought I mean we bought railroads we bought islands I see I'm sure shooting and we had somebody from MIT come and tell us how we're going to do it and we had this little pocket said the mayors go have a plan the council, they came back saying staff city manager and he said no, a prince want to talk to a prince. A king wants to talk to a king. We can't have this. It doesn't work too good. So I learned that from them and we could rebuild it. So I really very concerned about the ability and the commitment. the commitment because obviously so far I found a lot and I still feel it a lot of contamination living in our not only our community in our city hall. Now I would like to ask question about the leadership. Are we sending mixed messages or are we going to be very defined and very straightforward? Who's in charge? how many chiefs we're going to have and where we're going because I heard that from a couple other fire departments down the street. Matter of fact, even when I went to pick up something in Sam Bonnie, I heard about it. Thank you for giving me more time than I deserve. Brian Miller, 295 Lake View Avenue in Long Lake. Uh, I want to elaborate on what Dave Pearson had to say. Um, back in 2022, it was just me at the Orno meetings and, uh, Gabriel Jabbor and uh, Barbara Jay and Brad of course and stuff. and uh began to see the demise of the fire department and I started reaching out to people. Uh Dave Pearson was one of them and uh I guess my point is from there everybody took off. Abby started showing up um Kim Carwell and Nancy and Kelly and it uh really took off. And the point is to have a democracy, everybody has to participate. And that's what happened here. And I'm so glad that people like Jackie, Alyssa, Alisa, Oh my god, I screwed that up. Oh my god. Steve Persian, Bob Tunheim, all stepped up and won in a landslide. And I think what you guys have come up with is perfect. Well, okay, not perfect, but I totally trust that you guys will guide us on the right path. And my signs always used to say not elected to do whatever you want. But in this case, I trust you guys. Go ahead, do whatever you want. Thank you, Brian. anybody else. Hi, Kelly Grady. I live in Long Lake. Um, most if any if you know me, um, you know I've said everything that needs could have been said. Um, but I haven't said thank you. So, I appreciate very much this forum. I appreciate very much the two cities coming together and I am really grateful for um a bright future for public safety, for our firefighters and just thank you all for working so hard. [Applause] Thank you guys. Anyone else? All right. Well, and yeah, just to you know, we saw a lot of people come up and and um you know, we we need to thank the community as well. Like that's what got us to where we are today. Um this, you know, 10 people on the city council and our staff can't can't do all this. So, it took the community to come together to make this tonight, this night possible. We're all up here trying to figure this out and plan out a course for the future. So, you know, we'd like to thank all of you who are in this room and watching at home who played a role in that. And you should pay attention to what's going on in your communities, whether it's fire, whether it's, you know, taxes, whether it's uh uh, you know, roads. I got talked to a resident today about, you know, the road improvement in front of her house. And you know, there's all sorts of things you need to pay attention to what's going on in your own backyard here so that you can um help, you know, keep us sort of on task for what we're supposed to be doing in serving when it comes to serving all of you. Next slide. Maybe then we'll yell. Okay. Well, there's isn't there one about feedback maybe or not? Okay. Okay. We had this because I went past. All right. We have this terrific slide about uh feedback. And for those of you that are not here today and want to provide us feedback or maybe you are here today and you want to provide us feedback, there's a uh page on the city of Orno website that is dedicated for that. Um I'm sure you can find it by going to the Orno website and I saw a tab on the left side. I think fire forum feedback or something like that. fill it out and and that'll be forwarded to both city councils so we can take your thoughts into consideration as we move forward here. So, please do that. And any last thoughts from else? I just want to thank everybody for coming. Um it's uh it is an important issue and it's more than anything it's important to come together as a community and uh realize we have shared goals and uh we're not a community that ends at our borders. Um it it uh it's broader than that and it's it's not just Orno Long Lake, it's Minnitanka Beach, it's Madina, it's Mound, it's Wisetta, it's Maple Plane. We are one big community and um and the sooner we start acting like that, the better off we'll be as we all have the shared interest, I think, in uh in in living in a good community. So really is wonderful to see all of you here. And as a brief public service announcement, it is 23-7. Wolves are ahead uh with 2 minutes left in the first quarter. Thank you all. [Applause]