[Music] I will call this meeting to order agenda so we will start and we are being recorded thank you Sissa so we'll start with you Sissa on um introductions Sissa fol Senior Management coordinator City attorney Darren Nelson Finance director Mike bunk city manager paty Foster Bolton W one Kimberly Wilburn uh at large Rebecca shakor too Brad woron mayor Deb calber at Large Mar Dam assist city manager res manager Public Work Julie wish community development director will Manchester Public Works director Scott Orbin police chief Kelly OD day Recreation director Kevin fox fire chief Kevin ringhofer citizen 2200 Indian Road West all right well thank you all and welcome it's um it's not a bitterly cold night but it's moving in that direction it's not too bad I didn't get outside too much today um so let's see we've got a pretty robust schedule tonight but some very um important substance substantive things to talk about um so I'll just turn it over to you Mike and we'll uh we'll take it from there all right thank you Brad good evening councel and and staff as the mayor already indicated robust agenda tonight so I want to make sure my comments are brief so we can get to a lot of the content at hand but but to Tee It Up just a couple things I think one if you look at tonight's agenda it really is framing up 2025 if that's me I'm sorry Amazon delivery at dev's house so really this is taking shape for 2025 I mean really in for staff too I I'd say this last month uh we looked to transition from One calendar year to the next and part of that transition from One calendar to the next is really doing these planning efforts so tonight it's it is a lot for your role Council when you look at our strategic plan I'll touch on that here in a few minutes then we'll look to frame up that the study session work plan again a big body of work for you the council we'll frame up also our legislative priorities and the importance around doing that we also have then our Council and staff appointments for next year and then we'll round out tonight with shared values so that I I really want to get in big night for you I say it it's a big night in the sense you're elected as as our elected leaders of the city you set the course you set the direction the tone the tenor uh for all of this body work and so as we transition to 2025 uh staff will look for your input uh it's going to be very valuable because it will be our guide from a staff perspective for what we do next year so with that being said uh the next agenda we go next slide I have just a few slides and we'll get to our team leads here in second just to back up and really put in perspective again when you think of the Strategic plan and its relevance and how important it is we have spent time in it we are ending again the chapter on your current strategic profile and really turning the page next year for what we're calling the 2025 through 2027 strategic plan it's a three-year document it's it's a living breathing document which means that we adjust it every year and so that adjustment comes by uh framing up the action steps for 202 25 that's what we'll go through here this evening and then we'll repeat that exercise for 26 and 27 and then in that kind of 26 time frame we'll start this all over again and just given how fast the world changes I remember doing strategic planning years ago and you'd frame it up for five or seven years and now strategic planning is more of a three-year look just because of how fast things evolve and so this is a three-year plan and tonight I again I think want to capture first the timeline I'm sorry kind of got ahead of myself I just want to stick back to the timeline just as a refresher on the volume of work that all of us have put into it going back to our Retreat that was can I Miranda because we have that TV on back there that would be helpful for me yeah thank you appreciate it um we had a retreat back in uh April that was the April 19th and 20th uh we spent a couple days really with the top two levels of the plan and I'll again I'll touch base on that here in a second and then for those subsequent months we had our team leads come back to you and talk about the the uh desired outcomes and we're changing the naming Convention of the second level of the plan we have our six strategic priorities that are listed there along with our what we call our team leads and our team leads have their own team and so it's just not for example Financial strength is not just Darren Nelson uh infrastructure and asset management is not just will Manchester and so I I I think we've seen this growth and evolution from a staff level even the last number of years because there was I think we wind the clock a few years ago there was less hands on it than there are today and I got a photo coming up that just really illustrates the depth of which this is hitting our organization so those subsequent study sessions dating from May to October we had our team leads come in we Revisited those desired outcomes those are so valuable that's that second level of the plan we have 18 desired outcomes and really what we're doing is whole lesson tonight about how we operationalize that as we say make this plan come to life and the plan comes to life by the work that's done by staff to really ensure that we as staff are meeting your goals and objectives as you've identified uh couple of things just to quickly mention on this slide October 31st and November 1st we had two days uh led by Sissa faul and I need to acknowledge her as well in all of this Sissa does a lot of heavy lifting with our staff uh ensuring that all these pieces come together Sissa really ensures that our dashboard is up to date the reports that you get are all up to date so again Sissa is very instrumental in the work that we do and Sissa helped coordinate on October 31st and November 1st it's noted up there's a staff Retreat not necessarily a retreat in the sense of you think of a retreat but it was a couple days where staff uh came together really collaboratively to work on what you're being presented here this evening kind of those next steps is again tonight is the uh action steps uh that we're presenting and then just want to touch on January 13th and 27th those are our next regular Council meetings the idea is to bring these action steps and the entire plan to you either on January 13th or the 27th for adoption uh I say one of those two dates in the event that tonight uh if we need to come back uh for for for more work or discussion we have the January 6th study session to do that or perhaps a January 13th meeting to do that but our goal is to get these to you in one of those first two meetings uh next year so here's that staff Retreat and I I show this to you because it I think it illustrates the depth and the involvement of our staff and again I credit to a lot of heads come together uh to in these couple days as it's more than just framing up action steps there is uh there's uh to make this successful there are it's all interde departmental much of it is inter interde departmental so many of the action steps you see tonight and in the packet you'll notice that there's owners of particular action steps the that's the staff employee that's in charge of that making sure that happens but there are also contributors and other departments and other divisions involved in those and so this type of exercise was uh a really good exercise in collaboration Reaching Across departments we're a large enough organization that sometimes even in our organization the left hand and right hand always don't know what's happening and so we in this exercise we break down um those proverbial um silos if you will again we're very we stretch across all departments all the time and it's part of who we are in our culture uh but again I think this this is an important exercise in getting um involvement from across the organization roughly what I think 60 50 to 60 employees were involved in what you see here tonight so why strategic planning I I know it's it's probably obvious to all of us of why we do it but I think it's also important to to point it out and just spend minute or two pointing out why we do strategic planning it first it establishes a Clear Vision for the future strategic planning articulates your vision for the city it serves as a guiding star True North is sometimes as we often say it for what we do here at the city it provides that purpose and Direction it aligns Resources with Community PRI priorities uh strategic planning ensures that our financial our human and operational resources are allocated are allocated uh directly to the community's needs and your goals and so what I mean by Financial human and operational resources when creating the plan and putting these words on paper is one exercise but then the work that I do with our staff is to ensure that we have the budget to support it we have the human capital and our staffing to support it and then also have the process and procedures in place to also effectively make this happen it also drives continuous improvements uh at the last or in that lower right hand side that Baldridge Excellence model I pointed that out to you here last week uh using the Baldridge Excellence model strategic planning um strategic planning enables the city to systematically assess our our performance and it identifies areas for Innovation and Improvement I know we're all interested in that efficiencies Innovations and areas for improvement so part of this is again promoting our um continuous continuous Improvement uh Mantra enhances decision-making so in clear strategic plan provides a framework for informed decision- making I know you utilize that we've changed our staff reports a couple years ago to reflect that so part of our decision making not only from a staff level and also I think for you as a council is we uh bring when we bring items forward we point out where an item on a particular agenda meets or perhaps does not meet some of our strategic objectives we also want to promote organizational Excellence I think for the mayor and for many of our council members we talk about Excellence here at the city and as such high performing organizations thrive on alignment and purpose strategic planning Fosters a shared commitment amongst our Council the city manager our staff to achieve measurable success uh we also want to strengthen accountability and transparency and with having strategic plans and strategic goals uh and we measure that if you look at our metrics uh we put into place performance measures that allow the council allows for our staff and myself to track progress our dashboards are essential the quot of the reports are essential for providing accountability to Residents and anyone that might be interested then last I would um or last two things uh it's about also encouraging collaboration by encourage by engaging with our staff uh we think back to our Retreat how that was engaging between Council and directors and myself it's a partnership in this planning process and for for all of us it builds trust or hope it builds trust in how we work together in alignment and shared ownership of our City's future Direction then last strategic planning reinforces leadership and unity that the planning process strengthens the council's collective leadership role and reinforces the city manager my responsibility to implement your vision and so part of that is that alignment that again talked about in the B Baldridge model so I think for all those reasons that's why we do this it's such a a key element in success of who we are as an organization So the plan and I'll quickly point out to you I this was in your packet uh but it's in front of you on give you a sense for this is the current strategic plan so get a good reference guide for you here this evening again the six strategic priorities are not changing that's what we call the top level of the plan uh as we go through it here this evening those definitions have changed but the wording is relatively intact I think we did make some tweaks to sustainability and natural environment and we'll we'll re we'll touch on that here in a little bit but mainly those six strategic priorities stay in place we then changed that vernacular from Key strategies that you see in this handout to desired outcomes we're our goal is to be more focused more specific in what our goals are for 2025 we have 18 desired outcomes uh in the current plan there's a few more than that so we we got to get more targeted regarding our desired outcomes and then tonight you're going to hear from our D our team leads action steps and there are 72 of those uh in this year's current plan 2024 action steps are over 90 uh two years ago there were over 90 action steps so again we're being more targeted more focused on on what we're doing in 2025 uh so again I pointed out that red line in there for for you the council your role and we see your role is creating vision and strategy that's those top two levels of the plan where we spent a lot of time these last six seven month excuse me six seven months and then again action steps being generated by staff to support you want to go next slide please I think this is my last slide and then we want to get into more of the the heart of the conversation you've heard me talk Council that departments have work plans and really what goes into those work plans and for for that transition for staff as I mentioned as we go into 2025 it's been busy us last month um as we look at trying to close out 2024 activity and we gear up for 2025 our directors uh we all work together internally work with me on creating those work plans in that Center Blue Circle you you'll notice two items there's action steps that we'll talk about tonight so when you think about our departments uh what goes into their work plans is really this the action steps that support the city strategic vision and then the other listed there is indicators and that's a word we use internally it's something that's embedded into our Merit pce system really when you think of indicators they're goals they're in essence that's what indicators are so for our directors they're creating work plans around again action steps and these indicators what goes into all that and I think this is worth pointing out there's a lot of uh puzzle pieces that come together uh for creating action steps in our indicators uh starting up on that top circle is Mayor and Council Direction so certainly you're influential in creating what our action steps look like through the Strategic plan we also never lose sight of a lot of other living and breathing documents those are our natural resources master plan our Trail Improvement plan Park Trail and open space plan or post plan for short our Capital Improvement plan economic Improvement plan our comprehensive plan police and fire master plan and then certainly our community survey plays a role in developing our our strategies and actions as well as minona matters and a lot of other informal surveying that we do so collectively all those documents that you see or have seen throughout the year or last couple years do play a role in the work and the body of work that are we do as staff for you on our residents behalf so that all setting the stage um I won't read through our mission vision and values you've seen those before so our mission and vision and and I say values or guiding principles all stay intact we can Circle back to those later if you want to discuss any of those those were again validated during the retreat so I don't want to spend too much time on those this evening unless you do and then with that I'd really like to welcome Darren Nelson who is our team lead with financial strength he'll go through the outcomes and the action steps so with that uh Council you hear from our 16 leads the next about hour or so all right go ahead thank you Mike uh good evening mayor and council members before you tonight is the first strategic priority the financial strength which we did tweak that definition a little bit from our previous strategic profile and really focusing on the financial piece of that so the definition that has a financially responsible organ organization that delivers results and so that's really shortened from where we had it before um we focused on some operational programming um before in the previous version so this is a little bit more focused and and right to the point on that end of it so looking at the I'm sorry go ahead I bumped you okay looking at 2024 highlights from our current uh strategic profile as Mike mentioned we had our um our stud our our Retreat to to develop our strategic profile for the upcoming three years um so it's a it's a big a big win and a big accomplishment uh moving forward to to put all this into place uh we successfully administered a number of Elections um within the city last year we had um a special election with henip and County Commissioners we had um we had a prime presidential primary in the spring and we had just the normal um other general election primaries in in general en elections later in September and November as well too so a busy year on the city clerk side on with election staff and such like that um oh I'm sorry I kicked off the wrong one the first one at the very top was actually the community facility study itself and so I I read that wrong um that was a study regards to the marsh and Wilson Center community center on on that end of it and such U we've been working on that study for a number of months and uh presented that to council last summer and are still we're working on trying to figure out a plan our next steps on on that from a financial perspective on that end of it the third bullet there is a strategic profile obviously on that end of it and then the last one is um moodies did reaffirm our AAA Bond rating um I believe it's in the spring they typically do that so um still maintaining that and that's the plan going forward so those are some of our highlights from 24 so looking at our first desired outcome 1.1 is to achieve a high level credit worthiness and so here our action steps are to maintain a Moody's fund balance rating a very strong and so Moody's has a number of different rating criteria that they use to to measure our financial strength and U the fund balance one is a is one that we have been measuring for a number last number of years and we will continue to measure that and so that measures our fund balance compared to our um annual revenues and gives it in puts it into a percentage and so wherever our percentage lies it uh gives that a grade by Moody and we want to maintain that very strong range on that end of it um the next one is to go back Sissa to maintain Moody's net direct rating of very strong um that's another rating there and so that measures our direct debt and that we have outstanding against our um uh against our total market value within the city so we maintain a strong very strong rating there as well too and then to maintain a fund balance within our um water sewer Utility Fund so that is the fund that we've been issuing the most debt out of on a consistent basis or a regular basis on that end of it and so we want to make sure we measure that or kind of monitor that uh making sure that we have enough cash to uh pay our current debt service amounts for the upcoming year pay six months of operations we've received um annual or monthly Revenue within the water and SE Utility Fund on that end of it so we don't necessarily need to have 12 months or more months of operating cash on hand to that but our our minimum balance a 6 months of operational cash and then we want to have um about 10% of our accumulated depreciation on hand as well too to help give us a sufficient um minimum cash balance in our Utility Fund and that's kind of a a benchmark that a lot of uh utilities and in Enterprise funds have used across from the city perspective on that end of it then our performance metrics there are our bond rating obviously we want to measure what our bond rating is and we hope to maintain that um AAA Bond rating so desired outcome 1. two is to improve alignment between service expenditures and identify priorities um so here we're going to look at um we're starting to look a little bit more at priority and program budgeting and so we talked about it at our Retreat is that we keep on adding programs and priorities across the city and we don't necessarily look and see we keep getting wider and not necessarily be able to lift up our programs and priorities and so we want to uh make sure we're staying focused and really the things that are driving our strategic profile and plan we're pretty those efforts and dollars into those into those areas and so um we are in the beginning process of looking into U this project there's a new um program and um priority based budgeting model that's um being worked with between icma gfoa and the national league of cities on that end of it and so um we're kind of starting to dip our toes into into that and understanding where that's at but we really like to um start to identify programs across the city and and projects and making sure that then we can prioritize them and make and see if we can redirect our resources to the the priority ones on that end of it um so we'll develop a a program and priority budget training plan for departments and then we'll try to begin a uh program identification later this year as well too so um and that is our performance metric is the um program identification and ranking eventually is to get there um I don't necessarily know that we'll get there all one year but this is a couple two threee plan on that it but it would be the end goal in three years is that we can identify all the programs and priorities within the city and then be able to rank them and and prioritize them as we move forward into with our budget process and then um desired outcome 1.3 is to expand sources of revenue for Capital Improvement projects um we talked about this at The Retreat as well too that we've been um kind of just going status quo with our CIP funding a little bit we've been kind of cutting back on there to help us um kind of keep levies moderate on on that end of it with the implementation of kind of our Public Safety master plan and things like that so um here we want to engage with a consultant to perform an updated utility rate analysis we talked about that last week at the council meeting that with utility rates going forward in our public or our um Public Works infrastructure plan um that assessment coming forward we want to make sure that our rates are um in line with what we needed to be for future um infrastructure improvements and needs on that end of it um then we will submit the bonding request in 2025 for inclusion in the 2026 legislative session so we've done that now for the last couple Cycles um 2025 is the Summer where we input put in our request into the state to the the bonding request for 2026 legislative action um so we will do that again for this this coming summer and then the last one is to search and apply for entract Grants and other funding sources that align with the city's strategic plan and so I know Sissa um we showed that to council not too long ago as well too our bonding or our our grant tracking software that we have in place now then um really trying to enhance that um the organization of that and being able to tell that story of what we're applying for and make that a little bit more organized and and cohesive on that end of it and so we have a performance metric there we of looking to expand our non-levy revenues by $2 million per year um so put that as a Target so from the finance uh strength one I think that is all I have I think so I'll save you a few minutes that you can reallocate to others and I'll take any questions you have very good any questions for our finance director Mr Nelson Darren yeah thanks Brad and before we move on I I did have I did hand this out to you before and that too is just an easier way to look at what be the new kind of the new framework if you will so versus looking on your screen uh that you can look at the desired outcomes and the metrics and targets as we're going through this evening but it's in paper in front of you as well you need to reference it so with that Brad and Council will'll turn over to safe and healthy Community which is Scott bbom Chief good evening good to see you all and I have safe and healthy community and the Strategic priority is defined as create initi IES to enhance Community well-being and engage residents to build trust and prioritize programs education Hazard mitigation and emergency response as we look at some of our highlights for this year in 24 um we transitioned the social worker position to a city employee and um I you know I think it's um well well to point out that this wasn't something even on our radar last year while we wanted to look at our mental health response um I do appreciate the nimbleness of the of the council as we as this opportunity came up we we kind of jumped on it quickly and uh and we're moving forward um really enhancing that position as a city employee so I just want to let you know that we do appreciate that we don't always plan um so far out and we're able to Pivot pretty quickly uh CI training for all officers uh that is uh something that we've been focused on for a number of years and we did complete that this year so that's good news partnered with hennipen County and that is the joint Community Partners uh police partnership program for Community engagement you you met Olivia Washington um maybe a month ago she's still uh here which is good uh doing great work with uh our within our community uh we created the community engagement unit and a little uh background in our Public Safety master plan it was called out that when we we had one person dedicated in in that plan originally it asked for a second and what we did is we looked at that and said you know instead of having two dedicated uh uh staff to do that work let's uh create a team uh to do this work like peripheral outside their normal Duty so those two positions are no longer needed and so instead we're going to do that work with a unit of officers you know some may feel like some are interested in our faith group some are interested in the schools some work with our nonprofits so they kind of spread it out depending on what they're what they're passionate about so that's kind of how we how we operate that and then we really had good luck with grants this year uh anytime we look at an initiative we always will look for Grants to fund that you're not going to find a grant that that says hey we're going to pay you to go out and respond to police calls but we will um you know maybe give you a grant if you're looking for outside the box Grant initiatives like firearm storage that IC poet what that is is a Pathways program folks that already have a degree that want to maybe look at uh transitioning policing it abbreviates their schooling and then we employ them but the state pays for their schooling a DWI traffic safety officer we've had that now for a couple years safe road Zone that's our Highway 7 initiative and what's not included in here are a couple other big ones we have a dedicated uh auto theft detective we've gotten some equipment so I don't know the exact dollar amount but we've had six approved um well over half a million dollars in in uh in Grant opportunity and we have many more that are pending right now so we had a very successful uh 2024 as we move into our first desired outcome Implement Service delivery models outlined in the public safety master plan just as a reminder the public safety master plan is police and fire so these action items I'm going to um mention here are not just police there are some that are uh also included for fire and what we've done this will be our our second year of the master plan and and we we talk a lot about the people right the hiring so you you hear a lot about those um those requests but you don't always hear about the things that are in that public safety master plan that may not have a a a budget implication and like for example for police and that Public Safety master plan there were 59 findings and 49 action items and so what we've done is look looked at all those items that are called out and we kind of broke it down every year to say how much can we take on in 24 and 25 and 26 and Beyond and fire has has has similar numbers they have certain action items that may not be just people but they're things that we need to do to to f fulfill this this U what we call the public safety master plan so the first one is to identify and Implement new technologies that can be used to manage resources more efficiently to prevent detect and solve crimes second one is enhance operational efficiency of the Patrol Division by ensuring optimal resource allocation third one is evaluate the current structure and Staffing of the investigative division to ensure the team is well positioned to meet future demands next one's established a detailed project plan for the axon public safety system implementation involving multiple work groups across police divisions that Pro that that that um public safety system there's like four 14 or 15 deliverables and so you've got body cameras Inc car cameras you've got and so what we've done is we've created teams and Milestones so it's it's a big project and it's going to take a lot of coordination across all of our different you know divisions within the police department next one is complete the year 2 recommendation in the public safety master plan and hire nine career firefighters to staff a station on the north side of the city 24 hours a day and this will approve response times in the fire department's busiest area or District next one is utilizing career and paidon call Firefighters increase the minimum number of apparatus on duty to three which will increase capability of responding to overlapping calls next one's work with henpen County Sheriff Communications to implement closest unit dispatching this dispatch method ensures that the closest available unit is sent to a call and just what that does is it they use GPS and they just dispatch right right to the nearest car instead of just sting it out to uh to anybody to grab so it really speeds up the response time and the last one is to implement a new analytic software online to provide real-time tracking of call data and response metric and as we look at our performance metrics we're going to look at resp cont for fire and EMS um our Target is to meet service level objectives defined in the public safety master plan next metric is to look at our I mentioned investigative division um and you know I came forward with a request for an additional detective and that was really based on the increased workload per detective and so we're going to hopefully and I think there's a oh it is 10 good I thought I saw one 0 1% um is to reduce each detective's active case load by 10% we're not necessarily going to reduce our active case load by 10% because that we that it's more just across the the detectives reduce their individual case load still going to we still expect the same amount we just have more people working on on the cases and then the last one I mentioned that the project axon project we have Milestones embedded in there and just making sure we we we reach those it's about a 18mon process and so there's there's a lot lot of moving um targets there as we move into desired outcome 2.2 ensure Public Safety Readiness for the Opus Area Redevelopment and our action steps first one is collaborate with metrotransit police and other Public Safety Partners which would include Ido St Louis Park and Hopkins all who have light rail in their cities to continue coordinated response efforts in conjunction with the potent potential substate in Opus area next action items develop a comprehensive technology plan for the Opus area focusing on integrating Public Safety Systems and data sharing platforms but that is as we look for um city property where we're putting Trail systems and um other amenities is there any uh ability to put in you know maybe uh camera systems uh you know call alerts where if there's an emergency someone can hit a emergency button you see that at different locations so really just has having a comprehensive uh review of what's happening and so as they build out that area we can make sure we're ready to uh Implement something if if it if it works Implement a targeted strategy for the diverse and densely populated Opus area focusing on building strong relationships with community members and addressing their public safety concerns monitor development Opus area and track Public Safety calls for service uses data to proactively adjust Public Safety response and El ate resources based on emerging needs next one utilizing information from the fire station analysis identify opportunities for the development of a new Public Safety facility near the Opus area and last one is the Fire and Life Safety Division will seek opportunities to provide education to the diverse and growing residential population within the Opus area as we look at our our metrics uh one thing that uh um Olivia is going to work on with our community engagement events not only do we track it we do we do we do a fair amount of events is what is the what is the response survey look like are we are we reaching um you know certain populations are what kind of feedback are we getting um making sure that what we think we're doing is is worthwhile if not we make some adjustments and then call for service data is really that's creating a baseline as we grow in that area are we just to see what that looks like and so we can report back and and make some adjustments and the last one and I know there's a lot but this is police and fired we're pretty fairly large divisions so there we have a fair amount here so and bear with me um the last one is enhanced Public Safety mental health response we've been talking about that for for a number of years here so we look at our action steps to support that establish a system for securely tracking and managing Mental Health Data in compliance with HIPPA requirements and privacy regulations next one research and develop alternative mental health response models as you know we do an after care followup we're really trying to find a way to respond in real time 91 call comes in the appropriate resources get called um at that at that point and then enhanced existing officer Wellness systems for by implementing new programming focused on Mental Health Stress Management and family support but we're hearing um a lot in the in the in the policing and fire and First Responders it's not just the the first responder it's the family and the impact to them and how can we support them and lastly is to enhance the training of fire department personnel to better recognize and respond to mental health related calls and what we'll do with our performance metrics is mental health health call data it's really again just creating a baseline is what does our activity look like and so it gives us the uh so we can make some informed decisions and then a part of that is use of force related to mental health calls um what I have heard from my colleagues if those that have do that do an alternative response they do see a reduction in the use of force and I think I've mentioned this before use of force is simply an officer may put their hands on you we we track every every time they do that uh oftentimes people think use of force is going to require some sort of you know gun or taser it's it's not that it's as simply as me putting my hands on somebody so um we track that and obviously I'd like to see that go down if we're able to have a a co-responder model and I believe that is it for safe and healthy Community turn it back to you mayor well thank you Chief um Council any questions you'd like to ask the chief on this it's pretty important stuff very important stuff Paula yeah thank just really quick question when you say use of force can be putting your your hand on could that be like a helpful can too like you know people in crisis so is there a way to differentiate good good question so it's often um I'm going to direct you to go somewhere versus I'm just helping you it's you know I I need you to go with me and you refuse to go with me and I have a you know lawful request I then can go up and do what they call an escort and so if I give you you know you're still kind of unwillingly going but you're more I would say passive versus yeah so that's but as far as me just helping somebody like I can pick you up that's not it's really to redirect you from okay got it just want make sure good that's a good question okay great any other questions anyone Chief I had I had one um you know this um third Point here um right there um you know uh Wellness um officer of wellness and implementing programs and you know mental health Stress Management family support I mean you know the work that you got you all do is is challenging and stressful and and I've long H held a concern that you know are we doing enough and I know that you you've implemented a lot of programs check up from the neck up and doing things that I think we're kind of Leading Edge but um you know are we doing enough for our officers and if we were to do more what what types of things would you recommend that's a good I would I will I would say that um what we've done is is beyond what most do and it's not what I've Beyond you know we do the uh on duty Wellness they do the check up that's all fantastic we also have a pure support team and so right now I can go into an app and if I feel that that will need some attention I could do a recommendation and someone would just reach out and say hey we'll just checking in on you so we have and then we have our you know Samson our dog so we we have done a fair amount um we do debriefs that we had that horrific accident um a week or two and uh we do a debrief I think part of it is um there's also like I think we don't see the stigma if you need help people are more apt to ask for help and so we're breaking down those barriers but as far as what we've offered I I think we're we're in a really good place good well well that's good to hear but I mean I I know that anything I can do or we can do collectively to to support the mental health of our public safety personnel is of strong interest because I really I really do feel that we do it better than anybody in terms of how we how we manage Public Safety and uh you know but but there is stress in the your jobs and uh we want to acknowledge it and and provide any support and help that at least as far as I'm concerned that we can provide support you all need yeah and I think you we we and they know the support and supported is a big part of it I'll be honest with you if they're feel supported it makes them feel good and I I'm speaking for police I don't know if Kevin I mean I want to make sure fire is included in first respon they do a lot too I was speaking of so I don't know if there's certain but I think we work very closely with fire on our debriefing things like that we have a lot of overlap but very good well thank you I think the after care work that you do and the followup that you do with Crime Victims and things I mean it's all part of it I think closing that Loop is helpful to everybody both I think both for the victims but also for the officers to know what happened and and that we didn't just drop you know once it was over moved on so thank you anyone else Council otherwise that just was that's a lot so I just want to say just in general reading through you know there's so much in there even though we're we're down 18 action steps but uh you have a you have a heavy lift and uh so uh I just appreciate this that this particular section there it's kind of jam-packed and there's a lot going on so thank well and that Public Safety Master Plan gave us a road map for the next 5 to seven years years and I think that has helped immensely great yeah thank you Brad Council turn over to lesle yetka our natural resources manager for sustainability resilience and natural environment all right thank you mayor and Council um so if you recall there was some discussion about the title of this so it's did change slightly we included the name the word resilience um the uh goal here is to be a community community that values the natural environment sustainability and actions that lead to a more climate resilient community so really kind of getting the climate focus into this priority I think was a priority of the council so looking at some of the highlights from this past year with the current uh strategic plan um of course we adopted or you adopted the climate action and adaptation plan so that's an exciting step and if you recall that was on Earth day which is even more special um the city is participating in a pilot uh program it's the called the low salt design pilot um program through the N Creek Watershed District working with a consultant um just examining how the idea of low salt design or designing for winter maintenance and reduced salt use can be uh incorporated into the work that we do so that's exciting and it's new uh we're really one of the first in the nation to do this um we developed a wetland prioritization scheme um using JIS to assess and enhance Wetland buffers that are on city property so where Wetlands intersect with city land uh we made progress in enhancing and expanding the city's storm water infrastructure inventory assessment and maintenance program um which is part of our what what's required through our state storm water permit also known as this ms4 permit um and we're working with uh our engineering staff has been working with our GIS staff on that effort uh we hosted the third annual everything electric event um which was held at bridale mall so some of you perhaps attended that event so that was uh obviously an event to Showcase electric cars electric uh equipment and it was uh successful and a good way to help people kind of get into that enter into the electric uh world and then we also partnered with henen County uh and better Futures to allow for building material donations during our City Spring Community um drop off event at Public Works we host that every year um this was really focused on uh donating and repurposing building equipment so that was new for that type of event that we've hosted so those are some of the highlights so Switching gears to 2025 um again we have three desired outcomes the first is uh to be a more resilient community that both mitigates and adapts to Minnesota's changing climate so just a quick refresher mitigation is really focused on energy and greenhouse gas reduction and sort of reducing the uh the the basic climate warming uh gases in the atmosphere and adapting or adaptation is adapting to what we're already experiencing and what we can expect to experience in the future so we have three um action items uh the first is develop and education Outreach and incentive program based on the climate action and adaptation plan so this is really sort of operationalizing the adaptation plan or the climate plan uh and to engage residents and businesses in how they can help reduce greenhouse gas emissions um throughout the community um I just like to point out uh we the new sustainability coordinator uh actually started late last week her name is Ally Sutherland so I'm sure you'll hear more from her um so she'll be involved in quite a few of these action steps as well the SEC second action step is to perform two to three targeted Outreach events related to our resilient minat tanka program so if you recall this is a program in our Natural Resources Division that we Implement and it really is intended to encourage residents to take some kind of action on private property or on their own property whether it be uh residents or HOAs um so we provide education we provide training we provide uh site consultations with landscape designers and then we have some an incentive program reduced native plant uh reduced cost native plants uh a Buckthorn pickup if you recall we started that too so the idea is just to encourage uh residents to take some action on private property U the third action item is planning and implementing a campaign on flood reduction as part of the uh a new study that's coming up called the holiday Wing Rose drainage study so this is a drainage study looking at flood and potential flood impacts and reducing flood impacts but part of that project um we would like to engage residents and helping them understand what they can do on their own property to mitigate future flood uh conditions and so that is part of a CIP project uh so that will be happening this year as well so in terms of the performance metrics we have three performance metrics so really it's one performance electric per action step if you can kind of connect the dots the first is a CommunityWide greenhouse gas emissions and so the target is to reduce emissions by 20% per person um based on a 2018 Baseline and that would be by 2028 the second performance metric is reducing uh our number is the metric is the number of residential landscape practices installed so this is installing a rain Garden removing Turf planting a a pollinator Garden uh or a wetland buffer as part of our resilient motanka program and our Target is to add add 100 additional participants that have taken some kind of action on their property by 2028 and the third uh metric is the number of property owners educated about mitigating flood risk and the target is reaching an additional 200 property owners and educating them about flood risk reduction practices on their own proper property and that again is by 2028 so the second desired outcome is focusing on the natural environment so this is uh uh protecting and managing and protecting managing and enhancing the natural environment so we have two metrics here I'm sorry two action items one is initiating 10 new Acres of habitat restoration on city property um if you recall when we adopted the natural resources master plan included in that was really kind of a schedule for uh prioritizing parks and then prioritizing Restoration in those Parks um we have a new CIP page that allocates funding just for this uh effort and so what we are doing is we're working uh methodically through our Parks based on our prioritization scheme and initiating really sort of intensive restoration um in those in those parks and so we already have some restoration happening but these are really intensive Restorations think of the col of Nature Preserve there's some recent Restoration in patory park that's happened that's about five acres of Oak Oak Woodland restoration so this is really focused on adding 10 new Acres next year um the second action item is selling an additional 200 trees at our tree and shrub sale uh annually uh actually that's in 2025 and then actually annually um through the next years and so we uh currently sell approximately 800 plus trees so we're adding and we want to add an additional 200 on top of that uh we have two performance metrics again we have one is acreage of restored habitat and so the target is 500 Acres of restoration following our natural resources master plan guidance by 2028 and that's 500 Acres total um that includes what's currently uh been being restored or maintained even what we've been doing for the past couple decades uh it also includes that additional 10 acres that's why there's that doesn't seem to match up but the 500 is the total the 10 is the additional on top of what we currently have just for next year and then the number of trees planted our Target is 3,000 trees um planted in the community so that's in private property or public property we do some tree planting ourselves by 2028 and so these are trees that are planted primarily through our that we're selling through our tree sale um and what we're also planting in our own property um this does not include trees that are getting mitigated when there's you know development activities and mitigation required as part of that development or that building so this is separate from that effort and the third desired desired outcome is focused on CommunityWide adoption of sustainability and conservation best practices so we have four action items here um the first is planning and hosting an education event focused on promoting both battery operated and plug-in hybrid vehicles so again this is about encouraging the adoption of um electric vehicles to help reduce greenhouse gas emissions the second is promoting energy audits for multi household residential units um we have a pretty robust program focused on single family residential so this is sort of taking that to the next step and looking at multif Family residential uh units the third is planning and hosting an event to educate residents about solar installations um so for instance rooftop solar and promoting available resources for properties in the community so I think that's pretty self-explanatory and then the fourth is promoting the city's water efficiency grant program to incentivize both indoor and outdoor water conservation so so we've we have an incentive program um we've had one for a couple of years we'll be continuing that effort to make sure we can support the adoption of efficient uh you know shower heads and Faucets in the house and that irrigation heads and irrigation systems are running as efficiently as possible so we have four performance metrics under this the first is the number of electric vehicles registered in manona so our Target is 1250 additional registered vehicles uh in 2025 um our the second one is number of Home energy Audits and that's 500 home energy audits completed now this is by 2028 so this is over the ne the three-year period uh the third is number of on on-site solar installations and and on-site again that means on your property you know on your rooftop um and that is 100 on-site solar inst installations Again by 2028 so a three-year window and then the gallons of per capit water use and the target is to maintain that water use at 75 gallons per person per uh per person per per day yeah 75 gallons per person per day which is the Met council's Target for Community which we already reached so we want to make sure that we maintain that and I think that is actually it so I'm happy to answer any questions great thank you Leslie uh Council questions Deb so you thank you for this thank you for for all of it um so are you just getting back to the acreage of restoration so you're saying basically we're sort of in the ballpark of five like maintaining restoration at about 500 and we're adding 10 so so we're actually right now we have about a 450 acres of active restoration happening okay so the idea is that we would add an additional our goal is 50 over the next 3 years so to get to 500 so 10 this year it's not going to be the same number every year if you look at the CIP we identify certain parks that we want to work on and some we can do are smaller Parks so we can't do as much some are larger so we can do more but that number we I expect will fluctuate but yes the 500 is the current which is about 450 plus what we add over the next three years and then I just one other question and that is so um we have action items for like water conservation and um uh other kinds of you know energy conservation and you you were talking about sort of educational uh programming for our residents and one of the things that I talked to Mike about um this morning is you know I really applaud the goal for uh increasing the number of trees that we sell but also you know we wouldn't have to sell so many trees if we didn't lose so many to begin with and so I just was wondering if at some point maybe this isn't the year because we're trying to stay more focused but I'm not sure people understand the value of trees sort of as in these sustainability efforts so reducing Urban heat islands and Energy Efficiency if they're shading your house you know in hot weather absorbing Surplus water like if you have a nice uh Cottonwood and a water logged area uh reduces crime increases property values and you know sort of all that the kinds of things that trees can do um and of course creating habitat as part of like some of our you know native species stuff and so it's just something that I've been thinking a lot about and you know I think this is it's a lot and I don't want to add to your workload but it's just something that I think about because replacing trees some people get rid of trees because they find them annoying but I think sometimes if they understood the purpose of certain species like cottonwoods they'd be less annoying so um they're such an important species here so anyway just just wondering if there are any plans to do any of that CU I know we've had some great videos on you know pollinators and all kinds of stuff that was on um Facebook and stuff that were just so great so I was just wondering if you could talk about that sure so one thing about our resilient manataka program which is sort of our overarching resilient Landscaping uh Focus program um we do talk about you know rain Gardens and managing water on the property for pollinators we do include trees in that so obviously there's removing Buckthorn but there's seeding and planting and then and maintaining and enhancing that canopy cover where appropriate especially in the urban heat island areas so that's already built into our our resilient manataka program and then our our forestry staff and our forestry forestry programming you know as part of the tree Cale we do provide education on the benefits of the trees that we're selling um to make sure people are matching up what their looking for and what you know what the benefits are that they're looking for and what they actually need on their property we can certainly in increase and enhance the education component of that as well and that would help Reach people um we we also do look at topics to include in the mitano memo every April we do an insert you're probably familiar with um we can certainly look at uh you know the the really showcasing the benefits of trees and the urban canopy also one thing you haven't seen yet before you is the uh something we're working on is the community Forest management plan and so that is actually a document it's right now we're just working on a draft form but that really does showcase the benefits of trees and a will come out of that is not only enhancing our forestry programs but how we can better communicate with the public about the benefits of trees so you'll be seeing that coming up in the spring of 2025 as well thank you Leslie other questions council member Foster Bol or yeah um back to the resilient motanka you know and educating residents about um rain Gardens and stuff like that I wonder if um because one of the things in my experience is that my husband has this rain Garden in our front yard and people stopped by and unite the night people were so interested and wanted it so bad but they get so overwhelmed and they think you know and so they're they they want to be educated but it's like that stops there for them and I wonder if we can do some kind of like just like a group for just the residents or something so that they can sign up and talk to each other about their Gardens and help each other out and like I know my husband like gives neighbors plants and stuff and how if they were connected to each other it might not feel so over overwhelming because I think um I think it's a super cool idea and all this other the stuff my husband's retired he has all this time like a mentorship program exactly exactly and I know he would be like more than willing to spread his information like and I I think other people that have rain Gardens would would do the same kind spreading the gospel of rain Gardens it's kind of like our sustainable Awards program I mean that's the whole point of doing the sustainability Awards we don't ask them specifically this is an interesting idea to be a resource to people but the point is your neighbor is talking to the other neighbors about what they're doing and explaining their project so that is the point of that okay we we also have we actually have a a green Corps member this year and that's a a a person who's coming from a program through the Minnesota po control agency actually her work plan includes developing a uh residential uh rain Garden Workshop to actually intended to help people who have a rain Garden understand how they work how they're supposed to be maintained and we could easily include networking and making sure people are connecting with each other and then they can help support each other so I think that's a great idea we have something that's actually going to happen the spring so we can incorporate that it too thanks so building building on that um in addition or maybe this green Corp member or this new sustainability coordinator um in addition to that um building on that would be to have like a Garden Club like a sustainable not just for rain Gardens for sustainable Gardens is and um I don't know whether this would be a community organization or somehow partnering with um the city might might be that way to incorporate P's idea um with this and it Jes with something that actually thought I thinking about as well as if we could eventually have a sustainable garden tour I can hear that very well can't hear Too Well Paula oh shoot you just have to speak up the microphone doesn't yeah it doesn't amplify us anyway yeah just uh amplifying your your idea with the idea of a sustainable garden club and or a garden tour that's a good idea on to that it reminded me of a conversation I had uh with the resident about um individuals like like py said that have their own rain Gardens or have but have the expertise that would actually be willing to donate labor to help someone put in a rain Garden um so just sort of building on that you know part of that network but actually will you know I'll I'll come to your house and help you dig and and pl you know that kind of thing so yeah great I do yes something else um on a different uh topic uh talking about I know that the some of the action items and metrics were solar Gardens um and a lot of our city because of our wonderful tree canopy isn't isn't suitable for solar and solar suitable in my own home she still we can't hear you down here that sorry oh sorry um just the solar issue instead of having or in addition to having that as a performance metric or an action item um as much as it pains me um the easiest thing that people can do is to sign up for um Excel connect uh right now and and if we can be um educating people about that as a first step as kind of a phone call step um that you know could be helpful especially for people who you know the community solar garden is just a lot of work to try to figure out at this point um until we have more resources maybe that can help people with that and make sure they're not getting into a bad situation there um and then if they can't do on-site solar and the other thing um that you know residential geothermal is starting to be a good thing and so um you know looking at what we provide in terms of information and incentives I'm assuming that part of the education is going to be trying to hook people up with incentives I know surrounding cities um do provide have been providing using arpa money to use to provide incentives um and you know that's not something that we have done as much but and we maybe can't do in the next few years but what we can do is maybe connect people more because it's blindingly difficult to figure out what all the incentive rebate program programs are and maybe that's something that a new sustainability coordinator can do to really help residents um just one thing on the sustainability commission work plan that is proposed for next year you'll see that on January 13th um they have talked about education about geothermal but also about um water pumps and um making sure yeah heat pump and understanding the technology and how it works um so that is on their work plan already not the incentive part that's a whole another discussion with budget but um but the education is definitely on their work plan so yeah and I understand the budget might not be there but connecting with state and federal of course which is super confusing right now to try to navigate for individuals and maybe that's something help so the the grant the grant support and uh you know seeking ways yeah helping people get what they could have coming if they implemented different programs yeah that is on their mind great very good I have a very quick thing which is I'm I'm a little apprehensive to see Ally a new person that did not have a part of this programming her name you know showing up so many places so I hope she's up for it but I I do think we need to be sensitive to that I mean you throw somebody into a situation and you know I I think we as the council and and staff you know need to give this person Grace while they get their feet under under them the nice thing about Ally is she's had great experience she's spent four years doing exactly the same work for another city so think you'll be happy um that she is hitting the ground running and it's not a lot of catch-up work uh for her which is great thank you all right Mike I'll turn it back to you thank you um Leslie very nice report appreciate it than you yeah thank you Brian Council maybe two quick things excuse me before we excuse me turned over to Julie and that is U tonight again we looking for your feedback so I think at least on this last one I'll connect with Leslie and maybe we'll look to um enhance perhaps an action step based on what you're discussing here at the end that will come back to you for final adoption so when we bring this whole plan to you to to approve we're taking notes and and certainly it looks like we'll perhaps maybe add an action step in there again that's the purpose of tonight and then just also want to just quickly touch on what Julie mentioned that is in your first meeting in January uh Julie mentioned that the sustainability work plan is coming forward other work plans are coming forward so on January 13th you'll we're actually going to have the chairs from our different boards and commissions come to the council meeting and present their work plans and so sustainability will be there uh we'll have uh recck will be wreck will have a a brief uh update on their activity in 2025 edac edac so different boards and commissions are going to come and you'll hear the the various work plans and the the body of work that the boards and commissions that work on your behalf are doing as well next year so we have some influence and some understanding of what they're doing as well good and I and I had one followup question for Leslie before we jump into Julie I apologize but um you know we obviously are paying a lot of attention to the trees that we have that we're gaining and that we're losing do we have a pretty I mean given the fact that we have all this Emerald lhb stuff going on we've got a lot of dead trees in our community do we do we keep track of our kind of overall tree count plus minus you know I'm my assumption is we're going to plant a lot of trees um and get and both um through the tree sale and activity of the city and also Replacements and developments of things but my my guess is that we're going to be down trees because because of emerald ashb and so um you just as a comment anything that we can do to um to encourage more tree planting and I think that's what you're doing but then the question I had was so we're going to increase our tree sale by 200 so um and do we sell out um every time we have a tree sale and two um I assume that if we don't sell out of every species or every type of tree that those trees do get planted somewhere in the city on Public public land by our public work staff and things like that but I just want to double check that um we do usually mostly sell out every Everything sometimes we may have one species that just isn't not popular popular and and we don't sell out um what we and then some some of them don't get picked up so some people do choose to not actually um actually come and pick up their tree right for a variety of reasons we'll take their money that's but yes everything that's left over does get planted on on City Parkland or uh City open space public property yes thank you um if I could just say uh quickly the community Forest management plan that we're working on um we do do statistical sampling of Co canopy cover and we have overtime and I won't get into the details but basically it shows we've been holding steady on our canopy now it doesn't necessarily take into account the full extent of EAB which we're not going to see yet for probably another year or two um but we have been holding stud in our canopy so that's that's good news that's encouraging thank you all right pardon my sidetracking us yeah thank you Brad Council I'll turn it over to Julie wishnack for livable and well planned development thank you and the Acoustics are always bad in this room so if I'm not if I'm not speaking loud enough just let me know um my area is obviously balancing CommunityWide interests and respecting menot tono's unique features while continuing community reinvestment and so some of the um highlights that I had I always tell you how many inspections we're doing 16,000 inspections happened over the last year I actually just pulled this today Darren I'll be really excited 365 million in construction um as of today we still have some time to permit yet so maybe it'll get a little bit higher that's a really strong number compared to last year we were hitting about 200,000 um so really good uh investment into the community um also we inspected 602 facilities that's not counting way Zetta for health code compliance on the housing front we had about 1,500 units that were added over the last couple years and 235 of them were affordable and we had some 40% units so that was progress and trying to shake up the Ami a little bit uh which I know you're very familiar with uh progress was also made on the owner occupied housing and I would say in two ways besides um homes Within Reach we always are adding homes every year to that uh bucket but also on the habitat project and then with the Amman uh that you just approved uh at your last meeting and then also the implementation of the rental registry there right now I just pulled the numbers today 354 uh properties are um registered and that represents about 6,000 units 6,300 units in terms of Outreach um we've had a lot of different kinds of meetings this year you know think about the Hill Crest site think about Kia think about Marsh run um we often this year and you can tell that in the construction numbers we're having to communicate construction information to Residents so we're talking to people about what's happening on site maybe they're pile driving today maybe they're routes have changed for trucks or something has happened so that's been a lot of the work in the last year we've also had a really good success a lot of us Mike um myself uh various staff members depending on the day Kelly was even at our business Council last uh last time at the wetta Chamber of Commerce so different kinds of people were reaching on those meetings and then also we've been having apartment meetings and so that can be um are there some calls for service that need to be addressed with the property manager how is the environment for the residents what's happening um we do pretty regular meetings with lots of Staff members and uh property managers so we have really good success there and then don't even think about the ordinance work so I just mentioned a few things that uh Community Development has been working on but there's lots of others on the list so we won't go through that you don't want to relive that I do want to talk a little bit um sustainability kind of overlaps into Community Development so it's kind of hard to like what's in this bucket and what's in that bucket but you already heard about the climate plan um you know what I I think is really H happening with the sustainability commission is they have really good Cadence of meetings they usually meet for two hours in the meetings they're in the months they're not meeting um they're going to an event they're tabling at an event they're being ambassadors to the community um and they're going on tours um they're seeing things they're being educated themselves so then they can be Educators for the community the Cadence of that I think is something um we're really proud of in this last year um and they really have established themselves as Ambassador if you talk to any of them they'll give you um a talk about you name it they they can usually tell you what's going on with electric vehicles or whatever so that's been fun um also if you didn't know um our core members our green Corp members finished the research on plastic bag research they actually talked to 103 multifam um Property Owners to discuss energy efficiency they also um worked on nonprofits with a company named interchange I think it yeah interchange which does nonprofit evaluation to help them save money so I think a lot of these programs don't always hit a nonprofit or the funding doesn't hit a nonprofit so there's been a lot of Outreach with that um provider to help them think about the same kinds of things you would do with businesses or with households um the Ros swap was really exciting and then of course the award program and in planning of course we're starting that good old zoning rewrite so uh go to the next slide please so on the outcomes that we have on 4.1 it's really to talk about the increasing affordable housing in the city and I have to look at this sheet because I can't read that uh 4.1 is exploring additional funding either internally or externally for programs and organizations that address uh affordable rental and Home Ownership opportunities that's a pretty wide range of um opportunities but that's something we continue to work on um our last project had I think three sources of funding so um we're we're continually doing that but um to stay AB breast of that does take a lot of time and a lot of energy on our staff's part 4.1.2 is researching and evaluating new approaches to affordable rental and Home Ownership options including um doing the zoning ordinance update to see what that can do for housing the next one is to complete the Roland Road affordable home ownership project which is something you approv but it hasn't been implement we got to close on it we've got to get the permit issued you know there's a lot of leg work to still happen the metrics on this is really targeting uh the 100 unit increase in all types of affordable units I think we talked about that specific verbage at our last time that we looked at this at or below 80% median income uh and that would be 25 to 27 so that's a 3year time frame the next one is 4.2 which is enhancing Vitality across the business sector and this is specific to the large corporate um corporations I think there was some discussion is that the right Focus I think during your retreat we did decide that that large corporate presence and the investment of those corporations can really tip the scales if you will if somebody vacates um minat tanka and that employment and tax taxable property value goes with it so the things we're working on in this area are supporting businesses uh the needs of businesses that is and identifying new initiatives the second one is identifying key contacts at large corporations to establish relationships and how we can support those businesses I think it's always kind of misunderstood we know various people at corporations and it just depends on what we're working on and how we get to meet these people but there's not a direct connection um you really have to cultivate that relationship so that's something we would work on then when the business survey comes back we'll evaluate what the outcomes are there and create any new implementation that's required and then connect and engage with culturally diverse businesses to provide resources and Partnerships the metrics on this one is have this one was hard to figure out no net loss in the number of businesses as measured by the registered business count at the secretary of state so that was our easiest most objective way to get at how how's the business environment in our city are businesses closing or open so they have to be a valid um organization on that um on the secretary Secretary of State website and the target for that is 5% net new businesses between that threeyear period then the next uh performance metric would be number of large corporate businesses zero loss of large corporate businesses in the region we did had talk about why that region is important because we're part of um fiscal disparities and all of that uh and we're a contributor to that so the regional aspect of large business is important to point out and then all also um the estimated market value increase um we actually I thought we changed this but I thought we're going to change it to just an increase in um 0.5 billion not an estimated market value but it was um construction value so let me make that correction right now um sorry about that we talked about it is it right on there it say there construction says increase construction no it's Market value that's the wrong terminology we have to use the word construction value we talked about that with our staffing and and it's probably just a more accurate and nonsubjective way to look at it so we're going to use the word construction value and then 4.3 is to con are you ready on there you go uh continue to support the Opus area's trans uh transformational area vital and connected part of the city of minetonka um you'll see Opus in a lot of the slides but this particular area talks about um the city's placemaking goals ensuring the current and plan improvements makes makes the uh placemaking goals that we've established quite a while ago the second action step is to begin the design of public space and broaden multimodal connectivity to other areas through public engagement and as outlined by our state bonding agreement so that money that we have has to be used in certain ways so kind of recognize in that in the AC action step and then finally the public Outreach developing a strategy to keep property owners and residents engage in planning and development and this is again for Opus we don't really have metrics other than a number of opportunities for public engagements and number of participant in those engagement activities that mayor I'll turn it back to you thank you um questions for Julie or her anyone I have one yeah py so you know um when you're talking to you know in terms of like the rental registry and you're talking to the management uh and seeing how the things are going I wonder if if like some of the residents would ever be included because I think sometimes the like the management doesn't say like if the we do that too yep so they're included okay it depends on the it depends on the building and how open they are to that um we do make ourselves available um anytime um residents might say hey we're having a problem with this or that we'll go out and have a group meeting with folks to visit about whatever their concerns are um I can think of a specific example a Dominion the senior uh they wanted to know about Light Rail and how that was going to impact their building and you know some of the kind of construction that they've been experiencing since they moved there so there was a lot of interest in having a meeting there was probably 40 50 people there yeah so we do that but but we try to do that in a targeted way who whoever's having some challenges or we're hearing from more than a couple of people that's when we provide that Outreach okay and they they reach out to you it it depends if we're seeing emails if seeing Communications too many maybe there's some complaints um depends on what it is yeah thanks other questions Deb thanks Brad um so at the at the top of page one um the wording uh it is about respecting natural features and I first of all I want to say how much I fully appreciate the mental gymnastics I remember we we talked about this in particular uh and you know we're we were trying to get away from any kind of misconception about um the goal here sort of keeping us you know racially homogeneous orh and that it really had to do with natural preservation of sort of natural features sort of the natural character of our neighborhood or you know housing type in the neighborhood you know blending well and all of that kind of thing so that things didn't you know weren't jarring and sort of out of character for the neighborhood um and um so the the the I just want to say that I fully appreciate the the difficulty here and I also really have heard very clearly um some of the angst around the tension between our community value of preserving trees and potential impediments to um development and just sort of you know that is kind of a a point of friction and I do feel like the it's it's just the way it hits me so it's not it's not a critique um it's just the way it affects me it feels a little bit like we're retreating from the intent of the action step in from the last iteration of the Strategic plan and so one of the things that I'm thinking about is is is if it's worth it this year to have one of the outcomes be exploring the impact of the existing tree ordinance um to help us when we as part of a study session on the tree ordinance I I I don't know which is comes first the chicken or the egg but I just feel like you know it's clearly very important to me personally but I think we all have really struggled we don't want to be seen as anti development but we also want to try to preserve mature tree canopy and and natural features like steep slopes or you know whatever but but if maybe I don't know how you feel about it I'm just wondering what your feedback might be on having maybe one of the outcomes being exploring the impact of the existing tree ordinance on development or something along those you want to know what I think you want to know it no I mean like literally exploring it as Council yeah so I mean because I think I we've heard we've heard that developers feel that there was a big article in the Star Tribune this weekend not and what was so interesting is that a resident wrote To Me encouraging us to implement the financial penalty that they thought that that and I was like well that you know they're suing the city of udina so but I just think you know it's a it's getting to be an increasing point of friction because we are fully developed and I think that there have been some some proposals that were close like really interesting even the one on Plymouth Road or the the the um condos on 101 that I that uh that uh Lake West was was proposing really intriguing really close and and so just I just think it's we need to explore it at a deeper level so that we can support sensible development and somehow still reach our goal and do more than just you know respect our unique natural features you know I don't think it says natural but maybe un features of of whatever and that's what I saying like there's housing types and there's all kinds of yeah okay you know I have two thoughts one um yeah I have maybe leftover hangover from doing it the last time or the time before that but I you know maybe that's you're alone in my brain however um I think there's two ways to handle that one is to try to understand that during your zoning review because you're going to spend 18 months looking at your zoning code and that's where the tree ordinance sit so I would say or I would submit to you that is an opportunity you already have and you have space and time to talk about not just tree preservation but any environmental ordinances that you might have strong feelings about second thing I would say and as lese was talking tonight development is not our main source of friction on the tree canopy problem um as you what was a stat that you shared that one time 2% of our tree removal issues actually come from development I mean we had done some stats um and I can't remember the number of that but anyway it's just not as impactful as people Perce perceive it's perception and people are like oh that development caused that to happen so I think when you're talking about overall trying to balance CommunityWide interests is that the is that the cause of effect well that's part of why I'm bringing I mean seriously that's why I'm bringing it up specifically and I mean we had already you know it was on our list to talk about later in the meeting about tree ordinance and so I was just trying to think of a sensible you know yeah I think doing it during your zonning ordinance would help not purse it out out as a separate I think that's a good idea hot potato maybe is the best way I'm trying to describe this I guess that was the comment I was going to make later was that you know that seems to have a home in the zoning and I would I would my intention is personally to push to put the tree ordinance conversation there and not have a separate study session on it so but that's also a study session conversation but you know I want to cover it now we got anyway and then Paul you had something yeah comment and then um I look forward to having some of that factual that data I think that will help us a lot in in terms of the zoning discussion as we consider how we want to approach that going forward so looking forward to that um I had a couple of questions from Julie's presentation if you can just go ahead um did you say so 200 million in development in 202 three 23 and 365 right yeah it used to be I mean it was in the 360s for last couple of years uh last year was a down year oh okay and then the plastic bag research I'm sorry I'm not familiar that that happened with the green Corp member that's oh we'll be seeing no um that was presented to the sustainability commission the sustainability commission read the report I I'll send you the report and they're going to be doing doing whatever they're going to do y exactly okay and then um one uh question slash comment about um affordable or or as I learned to call it in Tampa attainable oh attainable yes um which I thought was a a interesting uh phraseology of it so and I know during our strategic Retreat that we talked about focusing on 80% and Below Ami um since then since April and since I've come on on uh Council and and even before during the campaign um last year I heard a lot about kind of that um 81% maybe to 120% Ami and you know kind of the young professionals and young families and as much as we you know certainly we absolutely want to continue to emphasize and I just wonder if staff has any Vision or sense or probably maybe even bandwidth which may be the problem to look at you know that 81 to say 120 I know we have some of it through the the loan um program the pathways and things like that um is that the primary way that we're going to look at at doing that going forward or well are we maybe thinking is that something Council might consider um in the future I just would say historically you have been more concerned at the lower level Amis as as a council that always you've always kind of talked about 80% and Below um I think the other thing is it matches a lot of funding sources right so that's probably why we put that in the um in the Target but um yeah you're right some of our loan programs go higher than that so I'm open to whatever you guys want to put in that as a Target I don't have strong feelings about it it's just 80% is more where the funding is at so that's why we put that okay just curious that something I'm hearing about is you know kind of like I said those young families who's combined household income might put them above 80% but still a lot of nanka homes are Out Of Reach agreed y so just wondering just bringing it up I'm not sure that there's an action step that can be involved right now I'll noodle on it well let me think too if there's a way to uh amend that Target my and I'll talk and see if there's yeah something and then I will maybe to uh we'll talk about how to address the zoning thing I'll make sure we do that try to maybe put another line in there about just the zoning work maybe I'm thinking good yeah thank you Jo I just add if I could Brad and Council that again tonight is I mean this is a good conversation this is that this is what you're supposed to be doing as council is asking us questions and we're going to be again I think tweaking a few things as noted I think to to Deb's point about the tree ordinance again it's I'm going staff is going to turn to you and look for your direction and so it could be handled a couple different ways uh certainly tree ordinance type discussion can be embedded in the Strategic plan uh it's also been suggested that another place that could land is with the zoning rewrite and then another place it could land is at a study session so we're going to be talking about that coming up so it's really st's going to be looking for your direction Council really where do you want to see this surface and what's the best approach to have that conversation and when right I shouldn't have said what I thought sorry Mike what said I shouldn't have said what I thought I'm sorry because it it is open I mean it's whatever you want to do right and so I probably played my cards too much no I think having the options of where it would you know kind of logically fit is really helpful so really appreciated that okay and I mean and there are a lot of reasons that that that particular issue comes up because we've had some really contentious meetings and it it's going to take us a while to get through the the code and um the the intent of like the Woodland preservation area um ordinance uh was completely perverted by a particular developer and um you know it can definitely be dealt with you know when we talk in the code but it's it's it's it's a particularly you know some things just need to be sort of refreshed and rewarded and some things just need to be reworked which is a heavier lift and that's that's why I mean I wasn't the only person that talked about getting the those ordinances on a study session for that reason but I totally respect why people are trying to um streamline the discussion well and I and I think some of our conversations on some of these things we've have some experience we we know what the consequences and the unintended consequences of some of the things that we've done are so I think there may be more you know tweaks and additions that tackle those issues rather than you know it's not like we have a blank sheet of paper and we have no tree ordinance we have one but we know that there are probably areas that can be improved and so how you know what's the most efficient way to do that based on the experience we've had would be kind of my take so we can talk about that some more anything else on this section otherwise Mike I'll turn it back to you and we'll move on mayor in Council you're good thanks I been quickly checking on time so it's 8:06 we have two more to get through okay on our first agenda item so we'll we'll we'll do our best to keep things moving on a staff level let keep it moving so will Manchester I'm reaching around the pool to see him over there hi Will over there will will has infrastructure and asset management all right thanks M um we kept it simple you know reliable high quality infrastructure so it's kind of says speaks for itself um I'll kind of go through the highlights so we completed the Hopkins Crossroad Trail project from Cedar Lake which all of you are familiar with uh we did receive a large sum for Grant non City funds which was really helpful in that project as well to complete it um the second one we maintain our city infrastructure we started our water met replacement uh we've got about 7 to 800 in this year we do stop for the winter just because of complications with water shuts off shut offs in the freezing temperatures and so we wait till this spring the start back up um we that a Boulevard improvements we completed those and then our city Crews actually paved 24 Lane miles which is a lot for our crews to do on their own um and then Citywide infrastructure assessment that Mr Nelson mentioned before I'm working on that just kind of looking at our core services and how we move forward on funding and um everything related to that um you've seen this one before we did get approved for the Department of Commerce solar on public buildings and so you'll see that again here shortly um that would be Central fire station one and then a ground array at well number three off of Lake Street extension and then the last one uh we administered around 400 RightWay permits um I know all of you have gotten calls and so one of the things we've looked at to this year is our planning efforts and how administer those going forward and just keep tabs on them even better um the they've doubled so in the last 10 years we've seen pretty much double in the amount of permits that are coming through um our first one desired outcome improve reliable and efficiency of utilities and Facilities so continuing the first one to look at our utility replacement program needs not only for uh piping but our water you know our lift stations our water towers our wells everything related to that the second just kind of looking at our asset management for our city infrastructure um sustainability and then also for things in the RightWay that I just mentioned as well just how we track them and keep track of them as they come in and then finally our GIS I'm looking at our future goals and then utilizing GIS technology so not only in public works but Citywide we also help a number of other departments on our JS efforts uh our performance metrics uh we target 1% utility system improvements so um that's part of our asset management study we do want to look at that and how we fund things because right now that would be a hundred year cycle on things and so we want to make sure that we're looking into the future as we prepare for those things and then our GIS uh just looking at new uses for GIS technology our second outcome uh safe quality and well-maintained roadway system so with the light rail wrapping up um a lot of the construction efforts in Opus we're finally getting to our pieces of it we've kind of put some of those streets off and so we're not getting in and doing work and then it was getting disrupted so we'll look at that this year to make sure we can get that done um Jeremy from engineering he tracks all of our annual pavement plan updates and so we make sure we look at our 80% index just to keep our streets in good shape um Community Development meeting with met transit to discuss quarterly route updates and then increase connectivity in the city and then finally collaborate with our regional state and state agencies such as mot anip County Three Rivers anyone that we work with around the city I'm looking at our pavement condition index to maintain 80 and above just to keep our roads in good shape and then uh 10 miles of Street systems and improvements every year and so essentially we can touch every street within 20 years is kind of our goal right now um our last one enhanced safety walkability and connectivity of our trail system uh so partnering with PD just looking at our traffic as well as looking at educational efforts for ebike and state regulations to get out to folks uh coordinating our Capital Improvement Trails our next big trail project would be manaton Boulevard in 2026 it would take utility burial in 2025 and so that we need to start later this year or excuse me as the year clicks over and then finally looking at our Opus Trail lighting another one we've kind of waited on just to make sure that some of that work is done down there I'm looking at some of the metrics on that uh we look at how it connects the quarter mile household connections so in the next 3 years about 4.2 miles and then 800 new households connected as the trails are f with that I'll turn it back to the mayor thanks will um questions Council anyone we like Trails me too s sounds good anything counil well we're going to let you off the hook pretty easily um we had talked last um thank you br um we had talked last or brought up the option about possibly doing an escrow for fiber optic works is that something that's potentially or has that been determined to yeah we we talk to our City attorney it's something we'll bring back when we come back next to either the pond yeah we're looking at it right now okay great and then um one other followup is you know the the cost of trails are so expensive we've seen that exploding in recent years and um is there any potential to you know research lower cost like Alternatives like striping like you know or clearing brush from you know similar I think I had a resident who y yeah things like that is there any option for that I mean I just know that that might be something we have to look at cutting back on in future years given the expense but yeah good question I mean we we've been looking that over the years so if we do an overlay we have looked at shrinking the lanes to add some but they end up being on road so we'll continue to look at them uh the expense comes when it's off-road and a lot of the segments we're building right now is everything that we didn't build before because it was difficult and so that's why they're so expensive you know right now running into retaining walls and wetlands and everything everybody pretty much stopped before they got to but yeah we'll continue to look at anything possible all right thank you thank you anything else back to you Mike all right thank you uh mayor councel uh last one is community inclusiveness uh jcece Alexander is our team lead in replace of Jace this evening as Miranda D our assistant city manager uh so jce is out for a little bit of time so Miranda is stepping in yes I'm pinch hitting for Jas so please be kind I will do my best to fill in for him but he's so good at this work and what he does every day that I uh I know I can't totally fill in for him but I will try my best um and cissa can definitely help to she's been involved heavily with Jay and his work so between the two of us we're going to try and get this done for him so Community inclusiveness um Jace is the team lead um and the definition is to create a community that is engaged tolerant and compassionate about everyone Embrace and respect diversity and create a community that uses different perspectives and experiences to build an inclusive and equital City for all so I know that definition was worked on quite heavily in the U conversation here so that was the final language so some 2024 highlights this is just a snapshot of all the work J has done and led but launched the Dei commission they're in a really good place or just voted on their work plan last month that'll come to council here in January and they're really getting focused and really have some good things on their um Horizon um reviewed hiring language um with HR implemented sensory space at multiple City events and held inaugural black history Hispanic Latino Latin and pride months Community celebrations those were all new to vaka so um desired alcome 6.1 is that all people feel welcome and engaged so four action steps there organize cultural festivals that celebrate diverse Heritage through food music and performances showcasing the unique contributions of various communities so that's un happening continue to happen um next year facilitate engaging workshops and panel discussions featuring speakers and experts on Dei fostering a culture of continuous learning and Community Education using uh surveys and Community feedback to assess the effectiveness of inclusiveness initiatives and identifying areas of improvement I think with that one that jcece was thinking at events people come visit him may be surveying them on the spot even just through conversation questions not necessarily always formal ways and then train more staff to facilitate sensory rooms for City events I do know some of our Dei Commissioners have been training the sensor room and are helping Jace as well with that um so some performance metrics to help that is a number of opportunities and spacing so uh the target for that one is provide an increase in Opportunities and spaces other through events or so forth um the next one is community survey community members at a minimum of two events each year again trying to avoid all of us serving everybody all the time but trying to get some feedback as well for the sensory friendly options at events offering sensory friendly options at a minimum of three events each year and then uh American Sign Language at events we do not have a target for that because it's something we're just going to start doing and trying to do and see how that works out so desired outcome 6.2 enhance Community representation through ART and imagery um the first one is conduct an audit to determine which art is currently being showcased trying to get that Baseline of what we currently have the next one is to develop and partner with community art programs that engage local residents to participate in creating temporary or permanent art installations and the last one is build and maintain a database of diverse artists that help draw from um the performance metric so increase Community representation across public art cultural events commission artists and social media and then there are no other targets for the next two beautiful desert outcome 6.3 is create and expand equital opportunities for assessing programs services and Facilities so lots of action steps on this one the first one is creating a database to understand the composition of the City's population focusing on RI ethnicity income gender age disability language proficiency really taking the census and expand it off of the Census Data um collecting data on who is assessing City programs and services broken Domine demographics the next one is determining best practice on how to survey community members to better understand any barriers to participation in programs and services um the next one involves police develop a youth programming initiative targeting diverse communities and fostering POS positive relationship with police and fire called Safety on that one um the next one's with Sarah Westy and Recreation purchase and implement the web track app and offer additional userfriendly online features the next one is provide new class offerings in each Area Youth teen adult and Senior and then we have promote program services and events at the marsh provide low and no cost special events that build community and then provide scholarships and financial assistant programs that one's in Recreation as well so some targets for those are down to the Ace Program participants um so we have the city of mka demographics we have social demographics identify underrepresented groups participating in programming and services and then the Ace Program so the Ace Program is those um individuals barriers we partner with Hopkins on that one so fully staff the Ace Program each year you're gearing up right now to launch that recruitment campaign and then for recreation program participants and member numbers improve programming numbers and Marsh memberships by 5% by 2028 is a Target on that one so happy to answer any questions you may have or trying to answer thank you Miranda question questions for Miranda anyone Kimberly um yeah so two question for different parts of this so um I'm on the places committee um and as you so we're task the henan county green line extension uh public art around the the stations that are going in um so it seems like that would tie in well with what the the uh the Arts goal um so I'm wondering is that going to be a is is are we going to tie that together I know Al Alicia and um K Kirsten yes have been have been coming to some of the places meetings I believe they're both contributors on that action step yeah okay so they're both we noticed that when we did the meeting yeah so they're both contributing so I'm assuming that'll all come together with those too okay in the room cool um and then the other thing which like maybe we don't have to decide to or just I know that NLC um has some programs like through the real Council where cities can go and like sort of find their their their history and like put together a a city timeline and that those sort so I'm it seems like something that might be worth pursuing is in reaching some of these goals long thank you other Deb thanks so this is a lot and it's know it's a lot and it's all it's all great and the thing about this is like with so many of these kind of issue areas you could just go on forever there's always more to do but um one of the things and this is not for this year the you know it's just something that that rattles around my brain I I I bring it up from time to time about sports that appeal to particular sectors of our community so I think about Badminton cricket and I know that we you know we approved um a cup for a like a Cricut facility here that I actually was invited to come to their like one year anniversary thing but you know and I'm I'm a musician so I was super I'm just into the art so super excited about the whole art and representation thing which I think can also be you know in future years because I think we have enough to do um right now but just thinking about arts in general so you know World music offerings um and and also you know sports that appeal to you know that aren't just like football and baseball and sort of you know the the the sort of typical American Sports but that we do definitely have a certain critical mass of people in minaka that enjoy those Sports and um somehow I don't know maybe spotlighting it somehow someday so I don't know if that's something that we can do sometime but it's just there you could go on forever and I I it's not at all a critique cuz this is a a lot and I just I just think it's all great pass it on other questions um Paul yeah thanks and totally agree with Dad this is um just a lot and uh my my one comment I guess would be it's a lot to do multiple festivals and um and I think and for me it's it's about lifting up like the very many cultures that we have represented in our city including some of our traditional ones um so in a sense I would love to see consideration of a festival that included you know some of the ones that we've done this past year um you know we have you know Indian cultures we have West Indian or east Indian we have I'm a minority I'm a Dane you know I'm Danish my parents used to say we're oppressed to minorities in Minnesota um you know so having something where we value all of our cultures and think we can all come together um like like Eden Prairie has the people fast yes exactly something where we're trying to build Bridges and that would bring a lot of people out at one time to see all of those different um cultures represented and I think that would um help represent the tapestry that um we are and show that we care about you know all all cultures and uh here and and help build Bridges between them including Danish culture including even the poor prees yeah anything else anyone else just a quick comment on that too I mean I I think jaay is doing a great job and I really appreciate the way he has highlighted different cultures at City Hall and you know it's um when you're part of a small relatively underrepresented group to all of a sudden see your group identified um my wife is Danish too I'm Dutch we don't do a lot of Dutch things here that's more in Michigan you know but um but you know it's um yeah I mean when that when there's that recognition I mean that brings people out and they feel connected and and I agree that maybe we don't have you know for some of these relatively small underrepresented groups in our in our community by doing something where we we have you know everyone shows up and and you know has different representations of the many different cultures we have I think could be could be fun and positive and I know Jace is very creative and he's done a great job and I think yeah if we have ideas we should share them with them because I think I think this is an important area and opportunity to build community and to the extent that we can do that will will all benefit so my quick comment anything else otherwise turn it back to you Mike all right thank you thank you Miranda Council maybe so Miranda again we're all taking notes here you can see that was at the staff LEL say just a couple quick things maybe Kelly will day I'm going to put you on the spot Kelly you're also behind the pole over there somewhere hi uh you with your like DB your comment on like a youth program or youth badminton or whatever the sport may be I think that's somewhat covered in I just had it sorry had my finger on it oh action step 634 the Native American lacrosse where it's developing youth programming um to Target diverse communities and I Kelly I know if you can speak a little bit about how you analyze programming and and really the intent behind that action step as well yeah definitely and I think we do analyze programming you know seasonally here and Debbie made a great pointment about bedman we actually have one of the largest bed mitt programs around and we've got a lot of people coming so I think it it makes sense to look at those nontrad sports but we do evaluate our programs we send out program surveys uh try to do our best to figure out what people are looking for in the community and address those needs yeah thank you Kelly the other thing just with with your comment too Paul on our that's somewhat capturing that action set 622 which is developing and partnering with community art programs I know it's really kind of art programs I think that's the whole intent um is to really explore how do we how do we lift that up even further and so there's there's a lot more kind of the word you use a lot meat on that bone so I think there's a lot more coming on that aspect and I think these comments are very helpful we'll pass those along to jaay in that yeah thanks so much for the art I really appreciate it seeing what we've done this year yeah yeah well just I mean the art the art room and then but but I I love the art in the hallway um here that celebrates the different looks of people in minaka I mean I just Ian I when the when the artist was putting that up I mean I stopped and talked to her and it was just it just gave me kind just a warm positive feeling um you know about our community and and you know you know just our the diversity of our community and the diversity of the work that people do in things I mean I think I think that's just a great representation and I it does give you a very positive feeling about our community as you as you look at that and see that thank you Brad for those comments and then the last slide I have and then I think we'll be done with this is again just kind of putting a bow on this entire conversation if you look at the left hand side of that we started with Mission Vision Values this last April and that transcended into our study sessions these last six or so months really building those desired outcomes and so uh your team leads that you've seen here tonight have been in front of you in those study sessions so kind of honing in and filtering the the best uh language and best Direction uh for you Council that you're setting for us and then as I noted what staff has done here recently has has gotten together in our teams and and really pulled together performance measurement metrics and those action items so R is really kind of pulling it all together what then happens once we get once it's approved or adopted in January the right hand side of that then is kind of that rolled up reporting so it started with Council high level we bring that down to our staff to fill in action steps and then when it comes back to you it's it's bottom up in terms of reporting so we have a lot of folks you saw in the slides tonight that are involved uh when it comes to those quarterly updates they provide those updates uh those roll up to our department heads and our team leads and and roll up to you into those quarterly report so it's it's really a pretty robust process I appreciate all your time this year hopefully you feel there's a lot of value in it as I teed up this conversation really sets into motion um our our our body of work I can't than our staff and our councel enough for the teamwork as we've built this together uh it is a team effort and really appreciate being part of that conversation so with that Council we're done with this the uh I guess we'll package this together as I mentioned bring it to you in January we'll we'll come forward with some tweaks we'll point out those uh tweaks uh so you know what those look like and then we'll look for you to approve this and then really the discussion question that remains is do you support this and are there other things that we should be considering well I'm going to take that as a yes or no question um because we've had plenty of discussion so consent comments All Good with this yes yes I'm seeing see all yeses okay we'll move on so okay um I've got I've got 8:30 so we've been at this for 2 hours now um let's take a let's take a a five minute break and then and then when you come back let's talk we've got quite a bit of stuff yet let's talk about how long we're going to spend on it you know I'd like to think we could do the balance of this after we come back in an hour that's what I'd like to think we can do so I'm going to challenge everyone on that but um um if someone thinks differently when we come back say that otherwise we're going to we're going to Target getting it through through it in an hour need to get that summary yeah I gotta get that too I all right um well we're going to continue with the agenda but but Karine reminded me that I had committed to um rep reporting on our um performance evaluation with Mike and so we don't forget or have it at the very end and just rush through things I'm going to read this statement um regarding what we as a council did so during the regular council meeting on December 2 the city council went into a closed session to conduct its city manager performance evaluation pursuant to Minnesota statute 13.05 subdivision 3 3A by state law a summary must be given at the next public meeting which is tonight that follows the closed session and it must include the conclusions reached by the council city manager Mike Funk was raided by the council and the eight directors in 13 key areas and additional questions for comment during the during the close session members of the city council reviewed the ratings provided feedback and conducted goal setting with Mike Funk and I am pleased to announce on behalf of the city council he received a satisfactory performance evaluation so that's the necessary statement thank you Mike for your good efforts on our behalf over the last year and uh I think that covers my legal responsibilities on that topic for tonight all right thank you thank thank you Mike thank you mayor thank you councel that was my cue to move forward as I that's your CU Tove forward so we'll move on and and so a process check here so it's 20 to it's 20 to9 so I want to thank that we can get be done it 20 to 10 that's the goal all right well thank you Brad thank you Council appreciate it next agenda item is the study session work plan and as I teed up even this this evening at 6:30 I was mentioning what was I thought exciting for me and from my position is this is an opportunity for you as a council this is your kind of a really big night for the council in that that as policy makers you you're you have such a strong thumb print on our strategic plan and shaping 2025 the other thing you you have a strong thumb print on is your own work plan so this is an opportunity for almost for me to pee this up and and I'm going to sit back a little bit because this is your study sessions this is your time as a council these are uh study sessions dedicated for discussing matters of public policy uh meeting obviously in study sessions with staff and so again looking for your feedback and I think in talking with the mayor today facilitating a conversation with you on honing in on what it is that is important for you as a council to discuss in 2025 uh in the staff report and I think this is Illustrated on the next slide thank you Sissa really in the staff report tried to break down study session topics into three different categories uh the first one is what we're calling I don't know if this the right wording or not but it's the annual procedural item so there are items that are already kind of spoken for in some way in the study session uh work planning uh largely those around um the budget items legislative priorities this December stuff right we kind of fill up December study sessions already uh every year so you have in essence 11 study sessions to do a body of work um so I'll I'll point out to those in the draft that was in your packet so we have uh annual items that get plugged in the second item or second category of items is items that staff would recommend to you to consider for next year's study session and then the third item which is in that right hand column is more policy matters for that you've brought up to me this is conversations that I've had either one-on-one when we've met uh notes that I've taken during St previous study sessions this past year or comments that have been made in Council meetings so hopefully I've captured all this correctly um in the staff report I didn't write any narrative around this I assume this is an opportunity for each of you to talk about items that might be important to you and then we'll go through an exercise if it's okay with you like we did last year and that's using mentimeter uh so have your phones this is the time it's you get to use your phones and like in the classroom play with your phones during the meeting so we'll do that here this evening so we'll te that up here shortly uh what I do want to point out just a couple things before we turn it I turn back over to Brad and to you to discuss is I really want to just highlight those the items in the middle items recommended by staff and so these are some items uh we as staff are recommending again to you for your consideration to plug in next year the first one is fire station analysis and that goes back to the public safety master plan uh Chief Fox is here and can talk to the work that's being done right now at some point we think in early 2025 uh staff we need to bring forward the results of that fire station study because that's going to put into motion uh discussions regarding our long-term financial management plan and the timing and scope of and and what do future improvements look like to our fire stations along that same vein with Chief Fox is the service level objectives that also was a recommendation out of the public safety master plan um Chief Fox and will be looking to come forward with what we mean by service level objectives if I were to simplify that it's a lot to do with response times and so how what is the city council's uh goals regarding service level objectives around response times uh what those what does that look like and then ultimately that leads into a conversation about how do we then fund and provide the right resources for achieving those service level objectives uh next one is a housing update we usually call it uh Julie wishnack July all things housing I say all things housing in July we've done that's kind of been a staple the last number of years is is really getting into a lot of housing conversation in July so a housing update uh will Manchester earlier this evening during the action steps talked about the infrastructure rate study analysis so we are start we're doing that work and we believe next year at some point in the study session we need to bring the results of that to you for more conversation uh Julie's already touched on the zoning code rewrite and actually Susan Thomas mentioned that at last Monday's council meeting and the timeline the next 18 months around the zoning code rewrite and there's some touch points in that so bringing some touch Point conversation back to the Council next year in study sessions uh Community facilities uh at some point Mr D over there at some point we do need and we as staff believe we need to talk about long-term discussions about our facilities that circles back to the facility study that was done this last year questions again remain about the marsh and so what are we going to do with the marsh longterm with improvements what about the community center what about Willison what about Glenn Lake so there's more conversation needed on that front uh came up here I think a week ago and that is refining the city manager performance review process so that will be at some point in an agenda item uh next year and then Opus and that got brought up to tonight in terms of a more conversation needed with Opus we're going to be attacking bonding bill again this year and and we're going to be starting that work kka will be starting that work condition all the dog work he's doing with patory Park looking at Opus development and and starting that process as well so that's quickly the rundown on what staff is recommending uh mayor and Council will I'll let you we'll come back to your column I should call it your column for lack of a better word your column uh on the right hand side if you want go to the next slide you want to pull up so in your packet again I was trying to be very sensitive to not just plugging this in for you and saying you you got you don't have time or space Council and so what I try to do a little bit is to plug in the items that were on the leftand side of that uh that page we just looked at and that is some of the annual uh annual things that we do so what I've plugged into to this point is in February we usually have the community survey results come back in March is when we start with the director budget presentations in April fire station analysis in service level objectiv so somewhat kind of plugging that in in May is that our budget kickoff looks like we have Community survey results listed twice don't we so um Fe February is when we discuss the oh febru I'm sorry February is when we discuss the questions and then uh thank you Sissa March or excuse me may is when we bring back the results uh lightly again these are all penylan Community facilities perhaps in May in June we do our CIP EIP July housing I think I teed up a question at in the staff report is in the past we've cancelled July stud or we haven't had a July study session so you see July study session up there with a question mark but that's when we normally do housing August is budget really kind of budget and infrastructure teed up September zoning rewrite update in there October city manager review process November budget again and then December m hearing what we're doing here tonight kind of gearing up for then 2026 so that gives you kind of a rough idea of just plugging in a few things but again there's a lot of space in there to do more discussion and Brad and councel I turn this back to you to call us around your time this is your your study sessions your time and at for staff we'll be looking for your direction on what you want to discuss and we have mentom meter so Brad uh so we want to go back Sissa to the previous I think to slide thank you so then on the right hand column here these public matters recommended by Council so these are items again I've noted how they ended up on this list I sent an email out recently and I was really want to make sure I was capturing everything hopefully I haven't missed something if I did my apologies it would have been okay if you missed some but that's okay remind me again conference oh yes conf yes so I did miss something so thank you Kimberly conference so conferences so attending conferences if we want do like a conference debrief U we'll need to add to the list and I see and Mike and I talked about this earlier we've sort of touched on it but we never really I don't know addressed it so we many of us are on committees as say Liaisons and sometimes I you know like I'm on the the Southwest Suburban cable commission and I'm really a liaison so you know we've already discussed you know how do we how do we transmit information or ideas from conferences without sort of overloading Mike and staff but um more more importantly like we're actually liasing and like I I was asked to sort of help the city coales around uh signing a letter on one of the Committees that I'm on Mike dutifully signed the letter but we but we didn't you know the rest of us did I saw it but but you know how how do you know one of the questions I'm wondering is can should we be discussing how to make our liaising efficient and like truly effective in terms of transmitting the information both even when I think about like edac you know if staff has ideas for me to take to you know what our priorities would be for the improving Services delivery committee or something I should make sure to impart to the edac when I'm at that meeting um or or the minona family collaborative so I I've just been thinking about how can we make that more useful I think we all serve a great purpose and also how can we make sure that we're representing the city as a whole and not just our personal I think that's I think that's an important question but but I'd recommend that we write a summary and send it to Mike and ask him to share it with the entire councel and I think that's legal if it goes through the city manager and we all get the same information is it not green uh yes just Distributing information right yeah and and and soliciting and maybe soliciting an action by by the council do you support this yes or no or something like that I think that's efficient be done pardon me well well but we're looking for direction we're looking for a direction on something do we do we want to sign a letter soliciting action from the council has to be done at public meeting I mean if you're asking the entire Council what do you think about this and the council going to respond that has to occur at a public meeting how about do you want this letter to be submitted uh um I mean there is a commissioner's opinion that found that it was an open meeting violation for the it was a drug task force I forget the name of which one but that specifically is what happened they were circulating a letter saying should we send the letter they did it by email it was determined to be a violation of the open meeting law so all right so so but here's here's the point we're not I'm not going to distribute it to um to the council I'm going to submit it to the to the to Mike and he is going to send it to all the council members and make it part of the public record as far as as far as that goes but it's um I mean we we need to get information well maybe I misunderstood what I thought you were asking was whether the letter was being distributed with questions to the council member should this letter be sent that cannot be done if the letter is being sent by a separate body a different commission or whatever and that can be communicated this letter has been sent and that's information but I'm I'm being asked to sign on to this letter by this organization yeah I think she's saying you can't do could we I I guess it would depend on timing but could it be something where you send a summary it's it's shared with the council and then that goes on the uh consent agenda don't ask me ask labor things yeah that's a topic that's been suggested as an item discussion yeah so so let's yeah we do want to move through this so first of all items recommended by staff is there anything somebody wants off that list I'm not seeing anything either so we've we've decided that's that's all good so now now now we are on the right hand side of the list we can't do all of that and we will not do all of that so we have to decide tonight what how to how to P um pair that list down probably by about half 75% 75 because there's always additions so Mike or sarissa if you want to talk about the mentimeter um maybe set some standards and we can all vote and although it's not a binding vote I know um but we can State our opinions share them with one another publicly and and hone this list down for our our plan next I have a suggestion could we do the mometer first and see what bubbles up and then if there are things somebody really wants to make a pitch for that didn't Bubble Up they can give it a go can can I ask just one question about because I'm not sure what the dishwasher inspections SL building code is well well and maybe maybe I mean I think there have been things that we were asked about um I think another council member is asked about that I was asked about that I don't think it's I don't think it's appropriate for a study study session I would be willing to take that one off that's not a study session topic and maybe we say maybe we go down and say there's some things here that just aren't study session topics and take those off to simplify things but I would I would be happy to take the dishwater inspect dishwasher inspections building code off the list I and I have have another question which has to do with what what might be in the zoning what on that list like would um would drive-throughs be something that would sort of fall under the zoning you know if we're g to try to fold everything into that should we I have something that might help um I was just wondering as I was looking at this list today it was like oh my God you know there's so much stuff what really helped me um kind of think about it was dividing into um categories streets and Transit and having all of the items that were related to that Housing and Development business and then basically admin and categorizing each of those things help me to prioritize and then decide what because I I went ahead and without the vener started rating what I what I was interested in doing and that um kind of helped me to grouping them by category was was helpful to me and so something that's development you know zoning related well I think we can all identify with things on this list okay so I'm gonna I'm gonna pose the question um we should um which of these items do you think should be considered in study sessions in the upcoming coming year and um if we each you know we're going to pair the list by 2/3 75% so we're going to uh end up with a finite number so the the how many are on this list now I didn't is like 20 let's say it's 20 so if we want to get it down to five or six items let's agree on a number and let's vote and then then see what we have left and then then we can then we can ascertain and we might want to we might want to say like public art well what about public art do I like public art yes I do um um what about public art should we spend 10 million on public art each year okay that's a I mean we need to bring some questions and some specificity but let's narrow the list first and then ask a question so we can we can develop a work plan does that make sense and I'm open to other suggestions I forgot one more thing that um didn't make the list that I know we talked about which was traffic caling which was what traffic caling so sorry to add one more that's all right that's all right it it can be paired just like any other one I'm going to read the number out loud cuz it's kind of hard to read 3313 0494 what do we do go to Chrome Google y so um can you just do the code oh I still have to add the missing ones we still have before you do that conso Sissa is gonna add in two items one is traffic calming and the other one is as Dr Wilburn mentioned conference conference debriefing conference debriefing potential what dep then that could be part of it yeah so I would suggest uh mayor and Council if you want to we could try this first to see if that gets us gets you and not us you closer to where you want to be what um so there's whatever 20 I didn't count them 20 or so up there I Brad what you're thinking maybe pick five if all of you pick five yep we each pick five pick five pick five yeah so Sissa on here it says pick five but it only lets me pick one there you go are we doing it yet she's just adjusting it so I went to M meter and I not letting me do anything but uh I think she has to save it here we go hold on one sec it should work now okay should be updated and you can see you'll be able to see them better on your phone all right is everyone in y okay in you do you want to remove the QR code is that possible oh is that what we have to do okay the QR code or there's a code that you can type in up there QR code or type it in okay up to five QR code is in an odd place isn't it and wage theft wage left I think is supposed to be was left just just saying no problem if it would have been much there would have been far more changes had I typed it so we just get to pick five five is it okay can we see the results on our phones because I can't read it I think it there is a button that says see results view results oh yeah there it is thank you I think now you could take the QR code down cuz it's block Jesus got it got it wait yeah that's not better you can make it bigger this is not looking good we have three things oh it's so sad connection there's so many with just one traic tra yeah yes yeah you see the consensus yeah I mean I get like some of them there's a bunch of things that I think could fall under zoning yeah me and we'll we'll also as staff as we work through this exercise if there's ways it can re surface in other places like whether it's through the zoning code boards and commissions boards and commissions that we could P that we can pass them with especially in January you'll have as I noted boards and commissions are going to come forward and do a high level oh high level uh presentation sorry this side the room is being quiet high level presentation on commission work plans and so you'll understand their body of work more comprehensively so if there's something on this list that might fit into what they're doing drive-throughs is a probably an example I think that's come up with the council before like addressing drive-throughs that could be you could pass that on um to perhaps a Planning Commission to study or sustainability sustainability or both I think we're still waiting on one person are we waiting for a submit you have to hit a submit sorry is there do we know who it is not punch punch oh I I had I had I had a feeling it was but I wasn't sure not not not to point not to isolate you or [Laughter] anything all right three four five six so I mean we have we have four things that um right then that you know that have two that have multiple and then and then we have then we have some that have two so I would say how is this for a suggestion and please opt in you know I think there are some of these things here that clearly can be covered in other ways rather than specific topics you know we can we can blend them in um you know but um so if we have if we have these four which are ebikes mm um Landscaping requirements for develop no that's uh ebike um group home clustering youth program no um trail trail enhancements and um conference debrief debrief okay so those are those are four good things and and I think there's other things in some of these that can be so they can be built out so that's pretty good plan going forward then then we've got four that got two votes and so then you know maybe the people who care about those can share with staff their thoughts on what they're thinking there and um and staff can say okay well we could these could be combined or these could be handled in this way and and and perhaps um that we can uh we can revisit that in our first um in our first study session and say okay do we have any other topics that we want to add does that make sense Mike from a process perspective yeah it does thank you Brad for for mentioning that and I would offer as I'm going through that list conference debrief and Council liaison seems like they could go together y yes definitely we can put those together uh why don't this is helpful and what what staff can do for January 6 is your next study session so right now there's nothing scheduled for January 6th that is your next regular meet not regular meting your next meeting is a study session so right now nothing is scheduled is there any direction you want to provide to staff tonight for January 6 like picking a staff member who now has to do a study session report over the holidays oh let me pick when when you mention Rebecca turn that way and let them know who it is I think I think that was I would say that Rebecca had had a fairly astute observation in that comment but you know I think I mean let's let's say for for that study session we we all we think about ways that these can be kind let's communicate with Mike and and let we can have a short staff report on on summarizing these and maybe adding one or two items for the for the year and and we've got it because stuff always comes up um Kimberly oh well that's what I was going to say like we could just decide on those four and get those on the um Y and then have the half hour sessions yes where you can bring up whatever and that sounds good those those things can come up during those times yeah the you know these are not being per per we prioritized we didn't permanently ex exercise them from the from the list and then the other question I'd like to ask is um the um the having that July um study session um do people have an opinion on that I certainly have one well I think Mike asked us a question though about what are we going to talk about in January right other than this is that an issue yeah well I well I don't think think you Rebecca I'm gonna I'll answer my own question this way and that is I think we've you've got a pretty good list here if you look at the threes and twos up there there's one two three four five like six of them like three we've got ebikes group home Clos group home I there's about six of them up there that have two or three votes and so what I think what I'll propose is staff can come to the January 6 study session with this more framed up for the rest of the year I think between myself and our staff we can make some recommendations for those other ones where they could be woven in in other places and then for January 6th to not fill up the whole time uh but to bring this forward and then we'll look at this list to see what could what we we we can find something we'll find something for January 6 that we'll sounds we're not worried and if it's too short if it's too short things happen yeah yeah I mean if we get done in 45 minutes you know what a shame just case we have dinner and go home yeah okay all right so we're gonna we're going to call this a wrap oh yeah the July study session um you mentioned possibly housing but I think we can do without that and combine that we can combine that I don't I don't think we need that study session in July do we think that we can do housing and Zoning in the same meeting to zoning has to be only one only only just there's so many housing topics that we cover at that meeting that I I don't think we could do that and okay we'll schedule but you don't want my yeah my my personal feeling on this even though I usually am remoting in for the July study session is like we have so much that we want to get to that taking away a study session I'm not necessarily a fan of that I would prefer that we keep it fair enough if we can remote in like now I think the I think the rules might be changing or at least there is lobbying for some rules well they haven't changed I I've remoted in for the many of us can do that if we or is the other op as long as it's noticed you can a clustered so we don't have the July that we have an additional one in another mon I'm neutral on it I don't really care I think maybe changing the date well I'm not hearing a strong consensus for for cancelling it um if if we find out that we're not going to have a quorum will will cross that bridge we come to it how many people can be remote too right so there you have to have at least one person present in the regular meeting room anybody who is participating remotely needs to P participate from a location that is open to the public we have to advertise it to you know notify everybody it's preferable that there be a quorum in the room um which would mean then three no more than I mean that's just preferable to have a quorum present I'll be here all right I I think I think that's that's fine let's let's let's go with that then we're not going to cancel a July 21st meeting and we'll we'll we'll we'll check with everyone um in June and we'll know what we're going to have well be mindful of trying to keep it as light as possible y yeah that's that's why we like mindful I didn't make that's why that's why five minutes let's go that's why we selected housing as a topic right we couldn't we couldn't you know you could have put ebikes on July and uh we'll look at moving some things around all right so U now we've got 30 minutes left um quick I'm Sorry Brad just go ahead uh the other question I have up here is does the council want to build in quarterly 30 minute open time so you started doing that this last year I think that's good idea I think it's I think it's worked well yes okay and maybe we talk about how we can keep it to 30 minutes and make it efficient Y is that a timer maybe you know yeah yeah and and maybe maybe it's that um council members who want to add topics um um submit them to Mike beforehand so we can have an orchestrated 30 minute um time I mean and I'm not saying we do that I'm saying you know let's let's think about how to make that 30 time 30 minutes of time as effective as possible think about what you want to say before and so we can do that okay but I think we want it any other comments I think it was nice to have yeah yes okay that builds in nimbleness I think that's what you're trying to do is be nimble as things come up I think I've got pretty I think I've got good direction um so I'll we massage this in a way and bring this back to you for January 6 hopefully with a nicely filled out GE that sounds good all right thank you for your feedback on that okay leg just lated a breakfast all right yes the legislative breakfast another topic we should probably could use the menty meter for that too but uh I won't recommend that so um so the legislative breakfasts um we've got another um significant list and um you know I think we need to we need to hone that down um if we look at the our our priority list from last year and we have that part as part of our packet way to pull that up S from the packet perhaps and I know I have it here it's just that it's like everything else when it comes paper so what we uh while you're doing that Council U what was included in the packet is was the 2024 legislative priorities so this is what was presented this past January perhaps you going to make that a starting location that's a again I want to that's your conversation Brad and Council um the other thing that we added as staff in the in the report was mlc legislative priorities so um Brad nice uh sit on the mlc board and so that's legislative priorities that was developed at mlc some of you were included in the league legislative uh priority process and so the league priorities were included in your packet and Metro cities as well so I think at some point all of I think most of you uh have some role in those different uh committees uh that are being served so those are attached and really this is thank you s this is the again 2024 I'll just quickly go through this and I'll turn it back over to you Brad if that's okay on the left hand side of this is bonding as you know bonding Bill wasn't passed this last year I think staff would recommend Opus and the marsh stay as a as an issue for taxes we do have our tax increment financing legislation so special Tiff legislation uh Julie and our lobbyist and Darren all part of that Tiff legislation that didn't happen last year so we need to be back at it again next year uh so we would recommend that stay in place local option sales tax I know we have an ion uh we've heard from the tax chairs and I think for some of us in the staff in the room and for some of you Council you've heard I think in different presentations that is issues coming back to the legislature um housing the flexibility in Tiff is something again we would advocate for I think staff would recommend we want to keep as a priority local control adult use Canabis probably can come off the list EMS is still very important to the city would recommend EMS staying in that Kevin Fox is over there within with a big yes up and up yes and then Family new support where we had this last year is Juvenile Justice resources Family Support resources again that would be I think the staff would defer to you on on that and then we had that category I don't want to call it a catchall but kind of a catchall where we call it awareness topics where we just wanted to put that on the legislator's radar screens it's something that we're thinking about and that was XL Energy and the solar Gardens as we know that legislation was not favorable to the city unlikely to be reversed but certainly something we could keep uh SRO I think that list could probably come off or that can come off the list opioids big big issue big issue not as I mean for in terms of City manat I think I you talk with both our Chiefs um a lot happening at the county and state level not as certainly a big issue but not as minaka specific perhaps not as big uh and then data practices I know I think this came up in conversation with a couple of you about data practices so with that very quickly just kind of running through that Brad turn it back over to you for all right the list that's generated what to do with it yeah and and that's the thing so I I think that as Mike identified there are some topics here that can come off U because I think this list shouldn't be bigger we should say okay which ones can we take off then what ones are we not you know if we're going to if we're going to add something we have to we have to replace something so um and then I would say on the local option sales tax I I know staff is very very interested in pursuing that but I don't think council's ever had taken a position on it and I'm not you know when I talk about legislative priorities having something on there that we have taken no position on is seems a little out of place to me so that's my opinion I'm not saying I don't know if other people agree um you know the the state stuck its nose in that quite a bit they ultimately ultimately have some Authority but I we we don't have a position so why would it be one of our priorities well I would we didn't have the opportunity to take a position because because they exactly well I think you know yeah I would push back on that I think what we said at that study session we talked about sales taxes like well why should we even take a position it's not an option so we're in a little bit of a catch 22 on that I mean I would certainly I'm not taking a position on it except that be to have all the options on the table when we look at some of these things and have it be in a well here let me make a suggestion then take it off taxes and put under local control or because it's really a local control issue right um it's not we have we don't have a position as a tax issue but do we want to have the authority to decide that locally rather than at the state level I would say that is that's a meaning of meaningful consideration move it into the adult use cannabis slot right Y and if you want to move Emergency Medical Services up and move that down that would be fine too however but so if we want to add let you know we've got some places where we can add because we've taken some things off yeah I have a question so the flexibility in Tiff is that like extending so I know like uh the city of minona has no it's different okay the second one is about using choling any kind of what we got special legislation for which we're try toote okay that is was I you said our special oh I get it I'm sorry I was thinking of the special legislation we need for the other two that's different no no I think that I think that stays there I mean I think that's a powerful affordable housing tool that we are I mean what we're really trying to do is avoid I mean I I'll say what I'm trying to do when I talk to legislators I'm trying to say don't preempt us look at the things we're doing let's let's focus on positive things that have been shown to work for housing and get them implemented in more places in the state and you can use minona as an example but don't preempt our authority to be a local right my I guess my question is that I didn't finish asking it so the Tiff increment financing extension that's the the specific to Thea specific whereas the flexibility would be a a state encourage that encourage that legislation yeah which I do support both of them but they are like yeah they're similar but different yeah we could be clear on the page yeah we'll come up some better clear language on the the Tiff Tiff piece of it I'd like to see ebikes on like the awareness topics I think that's a good idea and I think Mike when I talked to Mike about it today he said that the league is taking some positions on it but I think I think it's a big deal for our community and I think we should I think we could put a boost on that one um any differences of opinion but okay Deb go ahead um you know in terms of local control you know there's I think the uh the housing and uh you know like missing middle style bills are coming back again and I think again that that is a local control issue that I think is going to be very important this year so I I'm kind of hot to trot for that and that's not on the local control and I don't know that it you know that we can figure out what else to take off um I'm well s are off and XL and solar Gardens are off I'm sensitive to the fact that last year as a council we didn't really coales around that issue right I agree with that and I don't want to be in a position where we're giving mixed messages to our legislators when we're here as a council that would be my concern I mean I agree with you Deb but I I but as a council we supported we did support the League's position which was very clear un being opposed to zoning preemption of cities did we yeah we did we did I mean we we we we we said we support the league and Metro City's positions that was part of our conversation that was very clear to me no maybe it's because I like them I think it's I mean I I I'll just say I think it's to I think we're I think our positions as individual council members are too nuanced to bring it to the legislative breakfast I mean I don't again I don't disagree with you mayor but I don't want to I mean I don't want to create well we take votes as a council I mean you know I think you know I mean if if four of us think it should be she should be there it should be there five of us think it it should be there seven of us think it should be there but but you know we take positions based on votes now we're not going to vote tonight but if we think it should be there it should be there if it shouldn't be there there or if we say it's going to be there and then and then four people come and say I oppose that well then then we change our position can we we have one more study session a big wide open one on the sixth right that we can janary six yes wanted to revisit this and take a vote on whether we we don't vote we don't vote here we don't vote we indicate our preferences indicate preference okay sorry that so I don't know do it now but but I think the I mean I know that we supported the league position last year and I know that was contrary to some individual council members perspective but we did specifically support the league position which the league was clear on its position on zoning PR zoning preemption at the state level I'm confident to that um in terms of I don't know again this is sort of gets back to my my questions about being a good liaison but um I'm the one that brought up the blood processing centers I just feel like that's an awareness topic that's not something that we're taking a position on here but it's something I don't know how well aware people are of it I don't know if we want to bring it up or if maybe I should just you know use my personal relationships with people there to raise awareness so um but it's something that I feel is like a a national security or a regional security issue and so I I'm the one that added that which one the blood processing centers yeah I have no objection to that being under awareness topics I don't think it would take and and what's what's the issue yeah what's the issue I donate blood blood at the red the Red Cross right and so the St in St Paul there's a blood processing center that is literally the regional blood processing center for the Midwest it's it that's where it's processed and so there have been issues for instance with getting blood product from the place of origin where it was collected to that blood processing center and processed in time for it not to expire we lose a lot of blood product because the blood processing centers are just so limited and um and that's one of the reasons we have a blood shortage is that a state I mean is that I don't I'm I'm not pushing back I'm ignorant on it is it a state run facility or how it well I mean it's that's a Red Cross but it I mean I think I think this the state has you know if there's if there's a Regional emergency or an emergency here we're using blood from that processing center right so I think the whole idea is we need to build awareness around that issue of it of just the limitation and what if something happens to it yeah but I would say you know I mean I'm I'm trying to be definitional here I I I think that's an issue but but it's just like the thing on opioids too I mean you we just had an opioid Summit that that we put together with other cities but this I mean is this is this in the Wheelhouse of cities I I I think we care about it but to to care about it and say we got to build awareness of something that just is without it's an issue but it's not within the Wheelhouse of cities of what we normally normally do I I kind of struggle with I mean I trust me I I donate blood every chance I get and I think it's really important and I think building awareness of it's a it's a public health and a public health safety thing but no to me no different than opioids I mean there's only you know yeah who just took opioids off so but it's a public health issue you're correct it's a public health issue but but to Mike's Point not necessarily spef specific minaka specific as like an overriding issue it's a it's an important issue and there are people in minaka that are are affected by it but like I say we don't I mean I I brought it I said I brought it up I don't know if it's appropriate I will just I will just talk to my legislators on my own no I'll tell you what do this it didn't it didn't make it didn't make the list um in the vote not the vote the mtim meter excuse me Karine I'm using the incorrect terminal why why don't you share some information about your concern with Mike that can be that can be shared with the council so we can have an intelligence discussion about it and then I mean I mean the other the other thing is I talked to Mike about just bringing it up on improving Services delivery committee because that is you know that's adjacent to emergency services so um you know I'll talk to Anin about it and see what she thinks that one off in our last 10 minutes is there anything else anybody wants to add to our list have we prioritized are we missing anything um uh We've deleted some things we' added one or two is there anything missing or I'd love plastic bags to be on there but I I'm sure I'm swimming Upstream on that one i' have it more in the context of um man waste products and having them to have to deal with that but the plastic bags will be included but again it's more of a regional state so um one of the things that I I'm fine I mean I'm neutral on plastic BS I I see the benefit of it I see what Paul said I've got I've got a quick proposal on the housing and maybe this can Bridge the conversation on that housing issue is to highlight more or so what um the financing challenges that we're having with affordable housing and maybe it's an opportunity to talk about our our um Rolland road project and what you know the cost of developing new affordable housing and highlighting that that requires um a huge amount of diverse funding and um you know even when the land is free and I think that is something that we certainly could all agree on and we have some really City specific data on that's a great idea well you know but one of the things we were now kind of expanding one of the things I I mean the cost of housing production is ridiculous and the idea of new construction affordable housing is really foolish so maybe we could say that we want to talk to our legislators about changing the focus on affordable housing to to renov of Noah and that let's let's let people with a lot of money buy new homes and uh let's renovate existing homes because it' be a much cheaper source of affordable housing and there's an ample Supply out there if we if we're if we have intentional if we're intentional about it now that really that's a broad discussion that we don't have time for tonight but but but I think I think the cost of new construction housing makes makes it inappropriate for an affordable housing and I think I think we really want to solve affordable we want to make more housing available and if we care about that we care about the cost of production and the cost of production we don't control it's through the roof so is there a better path to generate more affordable housing and ownership affordable housing because I think that can really make a difference in people's lives so but that's a broader topic we're already working on a different handout I was wondering maybe that could probably get at what Rebecca is saying it's the same kind of theory but for a different audience um we're working on what the city is doing well and how productive we've been in our housing efforts and what maybe just as a showcase for other people and that's kind of what you were saying and then the challenges of course with different types of uh construction yeah so maybe we're doing I can't remember who we're doing that for for ML mlc mlc Brad I could Brad yeah so any can I ask a question about the election law one and where it came from because if it came from staff or I don't know if it came well I raised it I I I raised it with Steve Simon Okay uh you know how do we how do we make voter access don't reduce voter access but reduce the burden of early voting on cities and you know how do you how do you re rethink election law I'm not sure well and that's got to be done legislatively but I'm not sure it makes my short list okay I just want to make sure I wasn't brushing over something that was super important well it's important that that's a Genesis of it but it's there's there's a conundrum there and I think I'd look to the Secretary of State to come up with some ideas that that then could be brought to the legislature I think that's a better way to do it because cities are burdened with having to provide all that early voting and all those election judges and pay all those election judges and uh and you have three people a day for 40 42 days and then you've got a lot of people for three days um Kimberly yes so just to throw one more thing in there um the developer vetting I know uh Mike and I have had several conversations about like the the fact that the city is um what's the word limited on like what say the thing you you and I had this conversation even limited jurisdiction or authority over ability to vet developers in a way like for example if you don't like a developer you can't say well we don't want to work with you we we'd have limited legal ability well I mean even if so what I what I learned is that if if if a developer actually violated something but they they paid the penalty or they you know made whatever restitution the law required it's basically considered a clean slate they met their legal obligation and just and if they are repeat offender we we don't have the authority the legal right to deny them based on that behavior but I there's some other there was some other mechanism that we learned about in one of our meeting packets about I don't know their ethics or I can't even remember but but we don't we really we don't have any we don't have any authority to deny right so like I think like if the city is seeking um uh contractors for a service there's something in there where what's the wording of of a good responsible contractor law respon yeah like the city can say can say okay you're you're not responsible we're not going to work with you but we can't do the same with developers um so and I know it's complicated but it it might be if not a priority at least in Awareness topic yeah I mean I think that's that's an interesting thought do we feel that data practi is is simply an awareness topic or should it rise to the level of something higher what do we what do we want what about data practices do we have a position that we well the F there are punitive very expensive data practices requests that really you know bogging cities down and costing a lot of money and staff time um and just sort of entangle Staff in these very you know onerous processes so um you know just trying to either help cities recoup the cost of the actual staff time involved not just the cost of like running uh copies off or whatever um and also just making sure that there's some mechanism to prevent these sort of um Superfluous but punitive um data practices requests that some people engage in because they're simply not happy with a decision that is city is made yeah no I I get that and that all those but yeah but I think but it's a money it's yeah let's I mean let's let's state that as a problem that has a you know so that we could recommend a solution because I think you're right I mean you know the thing before the dog thing where they you know wanted all this work done before we had our study session and we're demanding about it and it took a lot of Staff time and we weren't going to make the deadline and had no impact but it cost a lot of time and money at the staff level I get that I think that's a legislative priority either for um Metro cities or LMC well they have a committee at LMC just for that so with uh we got 7 Minutes may I suggest this um mayor and councel that sausage making right we're doing some sausage making here I think this is in pretty good shape it's in pretty good shape I I hear so thank you I I'm taking a lot of notes why don't I plan if you're okay bring this to January 6 perhaps this a nice January 6 conversation to bring this back we are meeting with our legislators on January 10th and so it'll be quick we'll have it pretty frame we we'll frame up a new version of the legislative priorities based on comments made here this evening you'll have another chance to look at it in January and we need to move things some things around rest strengthen some things if I didn't cap if we didn't capture this as we heard tonight we'll want to get that feedback from you and I would just add that it's this is not easy and I I say that in you know Brad and I have gone to these mlc meetings for months and it's taken that group of 18 cities meetings and meetings and meetings and conversations to hone in priorties and still not there so I think this is is part of it we're we're living in a different political time um where some of these issues are harder perhaps than than years pass and it's but I do think it's my opinion it's important for you to come come together in legislative priorities also for staff's benefit because there are times where once you adopt this what your legislative priorities are it's helpful for me and staff and I think for our staff members that get a little more intimately involved in the legislative process and you I think of Julie and even like with our chief Fox with EMS issues because we go to the legislature and we get asked we're seen as minaka is seen as leaders and often times I get asked what's Mina's position and what is Mina's priorities and it's it's going to be helpful for me and our staff to really say this is it and so I think there some time in January that January study session to just go through this a little bit more um it's getting later and come with some fresh Minds on January 6 to really kind of hone in on it I think I think that's good Mike and then if I could ask rather than wait for the staff report if you could kind of take your notes summarize them and share them with us before then then we could maybe noodle this you know over the holidays and come back and so we could be we can have a good focused discussion on the things we like or don't like and you know I mean the staff report coming out on Thursday is fine but if we had a couple weeks to think about it and cogitate on it we'll we'll do a better job sounds good any other additions Council hearing that's okay as a path forward I I think I I think that's good so the next item is we have these Council representations is that is that the next list correct um the next thing U mayor and council is the 2025 Council and staff appointments uh thank you Sissa for pulling that up uh very quickly on the right hand column is the staff participants and so staff has gone through these assignments we've we of Staff have updated this and we bring this forward tonight for your turn uh to take a look then on the left hand side for your councel and other Representatives so that even though it's titled 2025 staff is 25 filled in and what we'll need from you mayor and councel is and where where you where you want to be in these um committees and assignments and what we would do is once you have the conversation tonight uh you can decide you get to have that conversation amongst yourselves we will update this and bring it for Council approval in January because those appointments will be important for next I want to say the the advantage that we have this year that we didn't have last year is we have no new council members this year and I think anybody who wants to stay with what we've got or what they what they're doing they're welcome to do that I think I think that's um appropriate if there's if but if anybody wants to do something different or if um if you if we want to swap out something I mean if there are some changes that you'd like I think PE people can identif ify that tonight and then there's one question that Mike and I talked about and this I don't want to be targeted in this but I want to be I want to be reasonable is that we've got a couple of places where we've got a member and um an alternate and um and I've kind of picked up from anecdotal comments that boy minaka is really well represented on a couple of these where we we had KY Kimberly and Mike I mean we're we're kind of over over represented so the the thought that I have and want to share anybody's opinion is that okay well we can have alternates that's great but we shouldn't tag team and we shouldn't all be at the same meeting you know if it's if if we're if we're going if the member's going to be there the alternate doesn't need to be there in vice versa other because I think I mean to have Inka have three Representatives basically on some of these committees when most cities only have one is kind of bad Optics so I just throw that out I don't I'm not going to say more about that I'm not I don't but I I just think that we kind of should work through that at some point because I think the Optics are not great for the City so I'll leave that but any comments any changes well I see this partners for Healthy Kids is open y I'll take that excellent I like mine and I but I'm willing to entertain any um swaps except for the I94 Corridor Commission because I did prom to continue to be the chair for at least one more year because we're in a little bit of a transition okay time um I'd like to um I I think it's great and I I want to defer or respect um you know seniority and people who are already there um but you know those of us who are are new um neither paty or I are represented on right now LMC Metro cities or NLC although I did apply for a a committee there so I just was wondering how if if there's a protocol for how that would happen if not this year in the future because if we're not going to have alternates there how do we get that experience of being on a committee that's that's a good question so go ahead well I'm just going to like from the the Committees where KY and I are both it it's yeah um it's been my experience like we're not the only city with more than one representative and we only get one vote okay so I don't I don't think it's a problem having more than one person there and I think it's beneficial to to be present and actually hear what's discussed um but that's okay and that's that's good I mean we're not we're not saying we're not kicking anybody off I'm just kind of raising some issues right but that's fair I think and and I appreciate you're defending that perspective that that's good so I guess I don't really care about people being snarky like it's present company you know accept it of course is there something PA that you're interested in um well certainly I mean housing um that's a popular one it is popular cuz I left that one last year to give these folks a chance to give me local economies um you know anything I mean I just I I deliberately sat last year um to get exper you know to kind of get my sea legs on the council well I'll tell you what then um I will drop off of the Metro City's Municipal revenues committee if if you are interested in filling that spot because I'm already on the League's um fiscal Futures committee although we have Darren there too but but you you're welcome to have that I and I'm now on the league I'm now on the Metro City's board so I get plenty of exposure to Metro City so I can drop off that and you can you can take that if you're interested or if you prefer I I want to be on one committee but I would be willing if you prefer HR and data practices which it was very interesting this year I could move to the fiscal as a lawyer you have a I don't think it matters really so you pick your preference and I can I'm happy to do the municipal revenues thanks it's a good committee Y and the good news is we we' got all of our work done in two meetings just so you know okay now I throw that out maybe other people no interest in that you sure you don't want it okay there's that all right so so Paula will replace me and and Rebecca will stay where she is looks like any other changes and and paty is is joining the and ky's not here to speak for herself either right isn't she on well does she lead on what's local economies and transportation yeah she's on that and she is the member she's a voting member on both of those no not on both on one oh I'm sorry let screw up so please Kimberly is voting member on One and and KY is voting member on K's on one all by herself okay you're right I'm I'm looking at the LMC one too okay all right yeah so I think we have I mean I think all of our council members who are interested have the opportunity to be the voting member right on each of these various committees and I guess Mike could you check with KY and make sure she wants to stay on those committees and then like let us know if she doesn't I'm hearing Paula has some interest in the transportation particularly yeah yes and if Paula hops for whatever reason hops on Transportation I'm willing to stay on on the on the um Municipal revenues committee if it it doesn't need a body all right anything else is there anything else um our vision or whatever we call it principles yeah and I have that here so yes our governing governing principles and we we uh we pulled those together last year and I think they're important um but um any thoughts or comments that people want to share no I don't care any so um I mean shared values of minona city council civil I mean I'm just going to read that I'm going to read the the um the Bold type Civ Civility and respect open-mindedness and curiosity preparedness data and fact driven respectful disagreement teamwork and effective communication Forward Thinking commitment to Excellence Community Focus diversity and inclusion imagination and boldness joy in the journey and non-political and nonpartisan are there any is there anything that anyone wants to add or change or everybody feeling pretty good about that I'm fine I'm fine sorry um I was talking to Mike about this today because I know some people um were uncomfortable with talking about nonpolitical nonpartisan at one of our last meetings so um I just proposed some wording that um got good reception it said instead and it's really hard to you know say we're totally free from our ideological or political bias but what we can commit to doing is making decisions that are focused um solely on what is best for our community as a whole and is based on the City Mission values and priorities and so I just um if anybody is still uncomfortable with um you know saying nonpolitical or non um I think somehow getting to that fact and and might be the more Salient um issue but I do think that partisanship is really I'm I really feel strongly about this I feel like partisanship it has infiltrated the Council of over the time that I've been on it and um you know especially at campaign time and I think hanging on to the what I consider an essential nonpartisan um character of the of of our seats is getting increasingly difficult so um yeah I mean I will I was one of the people that raised the I think I was the person that raised the concern about the the nonpartisan and nonpolitical wording um it didn't seem like maybe there was a consensus around that so I mean I do appreciate the wording you came up with um and I would be I would be fine with that but I don't so I'm not going to here all night no no so we're not going to stay here all night so that's you don't have to worry about that um so Paul I'll tell you what um that's offer no no I and I appreciate your offer so what I would recommend is this share that with Mike and let's also have that come back to us on and and we can decide if we like it because I mean I think the nonpar being nonpartisan is a commitment that we make that doesn't mean we are nonpartisan that that doesn't mean we're not partisan people right it means that we check our partisanship and our party membership at the door it has no place in the council chambers in my view and not everybody agrees with me because um you know I've I've talked to I've talked to other elected officials I have a friend who's a mayor and I and he said well you know there's no D or no R by my name on the ballot and I tell him or her I don't want to I don't want to tip it off too much you are a very partisan person who holds a nonpartisan role other people are nonpartisan people who nonpartisan roles and there who hold nonpartisan roles there is a difference and we all have we all exercise our partisanship in different ways none of us has no view is on party but let's leave we are focused on the city the B the business of the city and we check our partisanship at the door and if we don't we should so I think your statement is good let's let's put it and let's think about it along with the notes from this meeting and then when we come together we'll make a decision on whether we want to change that wording if that works for everybody just to be clear this will come back on January 6 y okay y just the last one I I think we're in agreement on 1 through 12 and we may tweak number 13 okay thanks for the clarity right y all right I are we done can we go home thank you all this is this was a heavy lift tonight and I want to thank staff thank you for being here thank for thanks for putting up with us um Council good job tonight a lot of stuff Mike well everyone everyone did a great job um go home and go to bed thank you counc appreciate it Happy Happy Holidays happy holidays everybody be before the new year