To order this evening, welcome to the uh Tuesday, May 19th, 2026 City Council meeting. Um members of the public may attend this City Council meeting in person or may watch or listen remotely by viewing the meeting on Channel 8, WCTV, and at the city's website at wayzata.org. Public comment during the public forum and or public hearing portions of the meeting may be provided in person at the meeting in advance or by logging into the Teams call and raising your hand during the public hearing. When your name is called in the meeting, you will be seen and heard in our council chambers and the cable channel. You'll be asked to unmute and turn your camera on and you'll begin your comment. All public comments should include your first name and the uh group or neighborhood that you represent. Uh next on our agenda is the Pledge of Allegiance. If I could ask everyone to stand if they are able and follow along. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you. Um the next item on the agenda is our roll call. Let the record reflect that we have two excused absences tonight. That would be Council Member Plekkady and Council Member Cook. And we'll have [clears throat] three uh here for this evening. >> [snorts] >> Earlier this evening, we held a workshop to discuss the following items. Uh we had our initial discussion of the 2027 budget priorities and process for the balance of the year. Uh that included uh a long-term staffing plan and report um for uh new hires or additional hires, discussion of short-term rental ordinance, and a discussion of our future agenda topics for workshops. Next item on the agenda is to approve the agenda. I would need to have a motion to approve the agenda as a as presented or does anyone want to make any changes? Uh I'll move to make uh to approve that agenda as outlined, Mayor. Okay, thank you. May I have a second? Second. Any further discussion? Hearing none, all those in favor say I. I. That motion passes 3 to 0. Next, we will move to our public forum. And as a reminder, those members of the public that are here tonight that are interested in speaking, please state your first name and the group you're representing. Limit your comments to 3 minutes. If the item that you would like to speak about is on the agenda, you can fill out a form and hand it to our staff. Um if you're watching via Teams, please send a note to staff via chat and let them know what agenda item you wish to speak about. Again, we require our camera to be turned on when we speak. Um we do have one item for our public forum agenda this evening, which is an update from our Commissioner Marge Beard from Three Rivers Park District. Welcome and thank you for being here. My pleasure. Thank you, Mayor, Council, and staff. It's my pleasure to be back back here to give you an update on Three Rivers. Uh so first, my name is Marge Beard and I represent um uh I serve on the Three Rivers Park Board and through that responsibility, I represent District 1. And District 1 includes uh most of Western Hennepin County and includes the residents of the city of Wayzata. That's what brings me here tonight. So at Three Rivers, our mission is to promote environmental stewardship through recreation and education in a natural resource-based system. And the key phrase in that is natural resources. So everything we do at Three Rivers is really nature-based. As an example, one of the things you will not see in a Three Rivers Park are ball fields. Ball fields tend to fall in the uh responsibility of cities or municipalities. So who is Three Rivers? So our park district was established in 1957 by an act of the state legislature. So we indeed are a standalone local unit of government. We are run by a board of seven commissioners. Five commissioners are elected. I serve in one of the elected roles, and we have two commissioners that are appointed from the Hennepin County Board. Our district includes suburban Hennepin County. So, it's just what it sounds like. It's Hennepin County with the exception of Minneapolis because Minneapolis has their own park board. So, we represent all of suburban Hennepin County. And you might say, "Well, Marge, you know, I've seen your signage down at Prior Lake. That's not Hennepin County." We indeed have a multi-decade relationship with Scott County, and we operate their parks on their behalf. We have 27 parks and park reserves, 27,000 acres of land, which translates to about 42 square miles. And we have 175 miles of regional trail. And regional trail is typically those trails that are found outside our parks. Some are inside, but most are outside. Uh right here in Wayzata, we have the Dakota Rail Trail is a great example. It's a uh 10-ft wide paved trail, and it has a yellow dashed line. So, if you see the yellow dashed line anywhere in Hennepin County, that typically would tell you that's a Three Rivers Trail, not a city trail. We have another over 380 miles of trails within our parks. And some of those trails may be paved. Many of them are dirt trails. Um some things that are uh cross-country ski trails in the winter are dirt trails in the summer. So, I like to put on my hiking boots. I like the dirt trails. And we have 16 million visits a year. And if you think about it, it's remarkable because it is more than twice our state's population right here in suburban Hennepin County. Here we go. So, back to natural resources. So, one of the things we really focus on is water quality, very important to the residents of Wayzata. We hire nearly 100 aquatic invasive species inspectors each year to inspect watercraft in and out of uh various lake points. We're We're second to the DNR in the number of resources we put toward that effort. Uh we have a lot of animals that we manage as well as I'll just point out in the slides here in the bottom right corner. Uh that is the prairie at Crow-Hassan Park Reserve. That might be a park you're not familiar with. It's in Rogers. It's one of our parks. It's one of our largest parks. And it's a restored prairie. And it's the largest restored prairie in the metro area. Some people think, "Well, I have to go all the way out west to a state park and maybe by Pipestone or something." And uh you can just drive right up to Rogers. See, now Rogers sounds a lot closer now that I compared it to Pipestone. But it's fantastic up there. So, something to just take a look at. But this is the year of the river. You may recall 2 years ago we had uh the year of bugs. And 2 years before that we had the year of birds. So, when we have a year of, we actually celebrate what This year we're celebrating the river, which means we have um various uh speakers and education events and we really focus on river and river knowledge and river health. And the reason we picked the rivers is because 2 2026 is the 100-year anniversary of a government study that counted the number of fish from Minneapolis to Red Wing. 100 years ago. Guess how many they found. I'll give you a hint. They found three. Yes, three fish. That is how polluted the Mississippi River was 100 years ago. If you think about it, it was industrialization, there was a lot of agriculture runoff. Things are a lot better now and uh really we're celebrating it. So, this is the year of the river. But let's face it, enough talk about natural resources. Why do people come to Three Rivers? Most people come through the front door cuz they want to do something recreation. We had a very successful winter season that we uh closed this year. We had natural snow, so we were indeed able to cross country ski out at Baker. We do manufacture snow at Highland Park Reserve in Bloomington and Elm Creek Park Reserve in Maple Grove. And two years ago, you may recall, we really had no natural snow. And if it wasn't for those locations that manufacture snow, really the high school kids would have had no place to actually do any of their races. And we all know we got to give those kids a place to go or maybe not so good things happen sometimes. Um but we're beginning summer season is in full swing. Golf courses are open, all the playgrounds are open. The watercraft rental like canoes, kayaks, things like that will start being available Memorial Day weekend for rent. The most exciting thing to happen to Three Rivers Parks in 20 years was the opening of Mississippi Gateway Regional Park. So Mississippi Gateway is in Brooklyn Park. You may have remembered that park used to be called Rapids Dam Regional Park. Um it's on the on the Mississippi River on in Brooklyn Park on the the Hennepin side. Well, don't you know, right across the the dam there's another county park called Rapids Dam Park in Anoka County. It's very confusing sometimes when people put that in their GPSs, so a name change was definitely in need. Just want to highlight a couple things. So we really redid the park, right? Mississippi Gateway was a very sleepy park. It wasn't even open all year long and it's in a large city right on the Mississippi. So it was quite an endeavor. The Gateway Center that you see there doubles as a visitor center as well as a nature center. So if you've been to some of our nature centers and we have turtles and fish and birds and things yep, we have that there as well. And off the back of the Gateway Center is a wonderful deck with some nice patio furniture with great views of the Mississippi. And on the bottom right, that's our treetop trail and that is a trail right off the Gateway Center. It's just what it sounds like. It's a trail that is elevated into the treetops. It goes out to a vista where park visitors are able to overlook wetlands. And I hear from the birders, they really love it because they're a lot closer to where the birds are and can really see that. In the top right, that's the mini Mississippi cuz the mighty Mississippi, as much as we're trying to get kids into the river to experience, you know, aquatic life and all that, it's it's too too rough for the the tiny tots. So right in front of the Gateway Center, we indeed have a water feature called the mini Mississippi and the the little tots just instantly knew what to do and adapted to it. It's been a great feature. Here locally, really the the Three Rivers asset to highlight is the Dakota Rail Trail. And a number of years ago, we were able to extend that through Wayzata. It was great with welcomed with great fanfare with band way and lots of lots of things that happened in Wayzata. We enjoy being partners with um uh Wayzata as well. Hang on. I just want to see. And then here's a picture of the trail as it actually comes through the heart of heart of downtown. One thing I just like to highlight is we do have in our plan to extend the Dakota Rail Trail. Eventually, it'll go from where the current one ends sort of by Cove in that area, it would extend to um Minnetonka City Hall. It's quite an an quite an endeavor to try and do that cuz there's no easy clear path and we will be kicking off the official I'll say definition or trying to figure out where that is. We've been working with staff and with Wayzata staff. Our staff came out earlier, I think like last week and tried to do a walk a walk along to try and find what would be good, but we're going to move forward on trying to figure that out. If it it easy, we would have figured it out already. So, there will be a challenge there. And I'm here to highlight at the end of the month Turtle Fest at French Regional Park. And you might wonder why turtles at French? Well, French Park is on Medicine Lake. It's the second largest lake in Hennepin County and it is the home of the uh soft-shell spiny turtle. And that that turtle, which is not actually pictured here, but that turtle uh comes out of Medicine Lake to the same spot every year on our beach. We know she's coming, so we uh get some snow fencing and kind of secure that area so that the turtles nest there. And if you come out, we'll have uh naturalists with binoculars and telescopes and you'll be able to see them. And if you've been to French um away from the lake, there's a a lagoon and there's always it's always a nice day and there's always a log and there's always a bunch of turtles just sunning themselves right there. So, it's a great day. There'll be food trucks. There'll be free um uh canoeing and like kayaking type tours where our staff will teach you what to do and like take you on a tour so you're not you're not on your own, but it's a great op- opportunity for families to embrace uh the lake. And moving forward, we enjoy working with Wayzata as well as the other cities that we work with in uh suburban Hennepin County. Always looking for future ways to partner. So, consider us a resource to be tapped at as you have questions on natural resources. And with that, I thank you very much for your attention. And yeah, thank you, Commissioner Beard. Are there any questions of our commissioner for Three Rivers by the council? No. So, thank you for being here tonight and thank you for all your service to the park district, to Plymouth City Council, and to Wayzata. So, Thank you very much. Appreciate it. Yeah. Okay, next on our agenda. Well, first do we have anyone on Teams that wanted to weigh in in public forum? Mr. Mayor, we do not. >> Okay. So, uh next item is uh new agenda items. Does anyone on council have any new agenda items that we'd like to discuss or bring up for the future. Hearing none, I'll move on to our consent agenda. Um on our consent agenda tonight is approval of City Council meetings of April 21st and workshop and regular minutes regular meeting minutes of May 5th, 2026. Approval of our check register, approval of municipal licenses, receipt of our police activity report, receipt of our building activity report, adoption of resolution 24-2026 accepting a donation from the Wayzata Fire Relief Association, uh adoption of resolution 26-2026 accepting a donation from the Sons of the American Revolution, adoption of resolution 25-2026 that um authorizes a TIF District 6 funds tra- transfer for elements of the Klapprich Park remodel, receipt of the 2026 first quarter financial report and approval of a special event permit for the Children of the American Revolution pancake breakfast, and lastly approval Oh, actually there's two more. Approval of the special event permit for the Wayzata Community Church rummage sale, and lastly approval of resolution 27-2026 declaring emergency equipment as surplus authorizing the sale of the same. Um so, I'm assuming that's the fire truck. Uh Mr. Mayor, that's actually the floating docks, our old floating docks which have been sitting out at the >> Thank you. So, um I would need a motion to approve the consent agenda or are there any items that need to be uh amended or are there questions on any of the items? I have a quick question. >> Sure. If I may, Mr. Mayor. Go ahead. Um uh Director Kelly, maybe this one would be for you, but regarding um letter G, I'm I didn't see much detail about the bench itself, and I'm wondering if this complies with our naming and dedication policy for the Panoway. I might turn that over to Aurora. It's actually a donation that was originally requested in early 2025 under manager Dahl. Um I believe it's a stone bench. I don't know if our memorial benches that we originally had a program for were part of our naming and dedication. Um yeah, Councilmember McDonald, that's a good question. Uh the honest answer is I don't know how different this bench looks compared to um benches that are part of the donations that the conservancy is raising money for. Um I mean I know there are differences. I mean this says Sons of the American Revolution on it. Obviously that that is different than what we would see from anything that the conservancy helped fundraise for. Um I'd have to relook at our naming and dedication policy I guess to pull that up. I could do that maybe now, but I I don't have an answer right off the I just I you know I I'm I'm love the spirit of it and it's quite a thing to celebrate, but I just was a little taken aback by um the logo and that didn't feel like it was had the spirit of that naming and dedication guideline. So I just felt if we required of one should we require it for everyone? That's a great question, Councilmember McDonald. I'm going to look it up. Yeah, I do know that our naming and dedication policy applies citywide, but the guidance on the physical construct of the uh the the asset that's being presented is probably not guided by that. So but I I bet actually logo might not meet that requirement for the citywide. Cuz I think that is something we amended and discouraged as part of what we did not want to see. It felt very logo-focused as opposed to celebratory and >> recall that. Yep. Yeah, Mayor, I think there's actually a section of that policy that has to do specifically with things on Penn Ave. Mhm. Is that right? And there's certain design standards associated with that. >> And then there's policies that affect citywide. >> Correct. Yep. Correct. Yep. So, I can't find that right at this moment. So, I guess what I would recommend the council consider is tabling action on this item tonight. Um so, staff can make sure that those components are in alignment with that policy. That's what I would recommend since it's before you tonight. Would you be comfortable just directing staff to make sure it adheres to it and if it doesn't, then bring it back? So, we don't have to table it or would you prefer to see it tabled and brought back for full discussion again? And I'm open to either. I I just want to respect your request. If it If it got If it does adhere to the guidelines, then I think that's fine. It just >> doesn't, then bring >> it doesn't, I think we should have a a bigger conversation. I've looked at the We've looked at those guidelines. >> We don't want to We don't want to add uh an exemption to something we just changed. Yeah. And Mayor and Councilmember, I would point out that the resolution just accepts it. It doesn't bind the city to install it in any particular place or uh we still have to abide by that policy. So, I think it is okay to accept. I think the record will reflect that it's accepted subject to that policy. I would hate for them to order something and then say, "No, we can't put this out." Right? So, that would Okay. All right. Appreciate it. >> clear enough that we'll accept it, but you need to do that extra level of due diligence to make sure it meets all the policy uh changes that we recently made and if it doesn't, then work with them to bring it up to up to what are our policy guides. Okay, good. Any other questions or did that address yours? Okay, so then I would need um a motion to approve the consent agenda with with the record reflecting the guidance that we just talked about for this item of the the bench. So, I would accept a motion for to approve the consent agenda now. Uh Mr. Mayor, I'd make that motion uh subject to your to your comments. Okay, may I have a second. Second. Any further discussion? Hearing none, all in favor say I. I. Motion passes. Um next we have public hearing. I don't believe there's any items for the public hearing this evening. Then we'll move on to new business and first on our new business agenda is consider acceptance of the city's 2025 audited financial reports and we'll have Mr. Lawer here. Uh welcome, sir. Good evening, Mr. Mayor, members of council. Thank you for uh making time for me on your agenda this evening. Um what I would like to do is just briefly kind of cover three things with you tonight. Um first of all, I'd like to kind of go through the audit process. Uh what our responsibility is with regard to the financial statements that you just received in your packets this evening. Uh secondly, I will go through the opinions and the report letters that we issued as a result of our audit and finally, I'll just spend a little bit of time going through some of the high-level financial results for the year under audit, which was of course uh 2025. Um so, the first thing I will do is talk about what our our role is as auditor. All of the information, the data, the disclosures, the footnotes that you got in your financial statements um all comes from city management uh and of course with the assistance of your contracted uh financial accounting assistant. Um we come into our audit, provide an opinion as to whether that fairly presents the city's financial position and results for the year under audit. Uh as part of that process because your audit is under government accounting standards, we're required to review and give a report letter on your internal control and compliance over financial reporting. And finally, because you are uh a Minnesota local government unit, you're subject to an audit of your compliance with Minnesota laws and regulations. There's a audit guide that the state auditor puts out for various local government units. We audit to that and issue a separate report on that on your compliance with that. Uh as far as the results of the audit, it was a very clean audit again this year. Once again, we were able to give the city an unmodified opinion on their basic financial statements. In addition, as far as your compliance with financial reporting requirements, we had nothing to report. The only thing we do remind you of is because of the the size of your office staff, you have a relatively small number of employees. There are some areas where segregation of duties is could be a little better than it is. It just essentially means you're placing more trust in less people than a bigger organization might have to. Uh also from a Minnesota legal compliance, I'm happy to report that there were no findings again for 2025 for the city. So there's not not a lot controversial there, but I'll just stop before I move on to some of the financial information and ask if there are questions on anything I just covered. Questions at this time? No? Okay. Then I'll just briefly go through some of the financial information for the 2025 fiscal year. Uh the city maintains two types of funds, governmental funds and enterprise funds. Um this shows a change in fund balances of your governmental funds kind of broken down in two different ways. The first is by the various components of fund balance that your your fund equity is reported in. The bottom half there then shows how that changed by major fund. At the end of the 2025 fiscal year, you had about 12.4 million dollars in total fund balances in the funds shown there. That includes your general fund, special revenue fund, debt service funds and your capital projects funds. That was a decrease of about 2 million from the year before. You had about 14 and a half million at the end of the previous fiscal year. As you can see on the top there, most of that decrease came in the assigned fund balance category. Down below, mainly of that was capital outlay that you did with funds that the city had on hand. So, you did some fairly significant projects. Your Clapperton Park project being the biggest and also some fairly large equipment purchases this year and some street improvements. That's basically where you spent down resources that the city had accumulated in previous years for those capital purposes. And then your unassigned fund balances, which mainly relates to your general fund, that was about 4.9 million dollars at the end of the year and that went up by about 270,000. Drilling down then within those governmental funds, your general fund is the primary operating fund of the city. This shows a five-year history of your total fund balance in the general fund. At the end of 2025, you had about 5.2 million dollars in total fund balances. You adopted a balanced budget and you added up about $279,000 to the good compared to that budget. Um, you actually had positive variances in both revenues being over budget, expenditures being under budget, and I'll dig into that a little bit further as we go along here. Um, but those positive variances allowed you to transfer out about $677,000 more than you had projected in your budget to fund future capital needs of the city. Um, you have a policy to maintain a minimum unassigned fund balance in the general fund equal to or greater than 40% of your next year's budgeted expenditures and transfers out. The city has been well in compliance with that the last 3 years. Your fund balance at the end of 2025 was almost 50% of your 2026 adopted budgeted expenditures and transfers out. Um, one thing I'll just point out there, you see the shift between 2022 and 2023 in the elements of your fund balance. Um, that assigned fund balance was or I'm sorry, not spendable fund balance was much larger back in 2021 and 2022 because of a loan to your downtown tip district that you had originally made from the general fund. Um, in 2023 you moved that loan to your water and sewer enterprise funds and out of the general fund, so it didn't impact your total fund balance, just the category it's being reported in there. As I mentioned, uh, your general fund revenues came in about $478,000, roughly 5 and 1/2% over budget. In total revenues were about $9.3 million. Uh, the biggest reason for this variance, frankly, was conservative budgeting. Um, your um, areas where you had the biggest variances your licenses and permits, charges for services mainly related to development, uh we're about $265,000 over budget. Um it was building permits, plan check fees, things like that. Um your intergovernmental revenues were about $137,000 higher than budget. Um here again, some of your police and fire aids were a little higher than budget. Um you had about $50,000 in grants that you applied for and received during the year that obviously weren't contemplated in the budget you passed in the prior year. Uh and then your other revenues as shown here were about $117,000 over budget, and the biggest part of that variance was your investment income being about 82,000 uh higher than you had projected. Your general fund expenditures also had a positive variance in that they were about uh $439,000 less than budget, roughly 5% under budget for the year. Uh total expenditures were about $8.6 million for 2025. That variance was spread through uh just about all the categories you see there. The biggest part of it was in public safety. Uh your police costs were about $413,000 under budget, mainly due to unfilled positions. So, your salaries were uh almost $480,000 over budget in the police area. The other type of fund that the city maintains is your enterprise funds. Your governmental funds are mainly financed with your property tax levy. Your enterprise funds are mainly financed through user fees or sales. You have seven different enterprises that the city maintains. Four of them are kind of your traditional utilities, water, sewer, storm water, solid waste. You also have um three more little more unusual funds. You've got a uh motor vehicle DMV fund. Uh you've got your bar and grill and liquor store on off sale. Uh and then your marina fund that you opened about 3 years ago. Um, as you can see from the table then, this shows your change in net position. Uh, both in terms of the various components of net position and by fund. You had about $21 million in total net position in all of these funds at the end of the year. Uh, the bulk of that, about 74% of it, uh, roughly $15 and 1/2 million was your investment in capital assets. And that's mainly related to those utility funds, obviously water, sewer infrastructure, things of that nature. Um, and that's where you see the biggest change. Um, your total net position went up by about $1.1 million uh, from the year before. Most of that was in the year investment in capital assets. Um, you did have positive changes in all of the funds uh, for 2025. Some of the biggest areas uh, were in your sewer fund, um, your marina fund, and your storm water. Uh, the marina fund, you had a dredging project in 2024, so your costs were down quite a bit this year. Uh, 2025, I guess my this year, your last year. Um, and you did uh, transfer about $661,000 then out of these funds. Uh, about 348,000 of that went to support your general fund operations, and about $313,000 went for capital purposes. The one uh, enterprise fund I'll drill down on just a bit here is your liquor fund. Uh, as I mentioned, you do have both on and off sale operations. Your total gross sales uh, for the combined bar and grill and liquor store was about $6.9 million for 2025. That was down a bit from the year before, about $213,000. Uh, the bar and grill was fairly stable. That went down by about $64,000, little over 1 and 1/2 percent. Uh, your liquor store went down by about $150,000. Uh, decrease of about 4 and 1/2 percent on gross sales. Um, you did have uh, operating income then of about $266,000. Um, non-operating income including interest and a few other things of about $67,000. You transferred $220,000 out of this fund to support the general fund at the end of the year uh, with an increase of about $113,000 in net position. Then the last table I will go over with you is actually kind of a snapshot of the very first presentation in your overall financial statement document. This is called the government-wide statement of net position. This takes all of the fund information that we just talked about, converts your governmental funds to a full accrual basis, which the business type or your enterprise funds, that's already on an accrual basis. Uh, but for the governmental activities, you don't report uh, within your fund financial statements long-term capital assets, depreciation, bonds payable, um, long-term employee benefits payable within the funds. So, this presentation takes that information and adds in all those long-term factors to give you kind of a longer-term idea of where uh, your net position is for those governmental activities mainly. So, at the uh, end of 2025, you had about 61 million in net position in your governmental activities. Uh, the 21 million in the business type activities relates dollar for dollar back to the enterprise funds we just talked about. And then, um, one thing that isn't included within the city numbers, but it is in your financial statements. Your HRA, because of the way it's legally structured, is considered a discreetly presented component unit. So, there are fund statements in here for it, but it's reported separately from the city. Your HRA had a total net position of about $2.4 million at the end of the year. That was an increase of about 129,000. And that's mainly your tax increment districts. Right now, you have kind of two major ones, your downtown and your Bay Center, I think are the the right names. Um So, the only thing I guess I'd point out once again on the top third there, looking at the governmental activities, you see most of the increase there once again was in that net net investment in capital assets. Your unrestricted net position went down by about 1.7 million. And when we talked about the funds, we talked about that capital spending that you did. That's where you're seeing the capital or the um resources that you'd accumulated that were used for projects, equipment purchases. They're kind of changing which category that's getting reported in. So, that's typically what I cover from a number standpoint. I don't know if there are a lot of things at you there. If there are questions on anything that I covered? Questions? Please to lower. I just have one. I think you covered it, but um in our licensing operations, it showed, you know, net change negative negative. Um can you go back and maybe just comment on that um net position? >> Yes. Um so, your licensing fund at the end of the year, you still have a small deficit in your net position there of about $169,000. That did improve by about 54,000 from last year, but you'd accumulated a deficit. And I think this goes kind of back to COVID era, where that fund went negative and you've been kind of digging out of that for a few years. I believe this also has to do with some of the audit entries related to some of our OPEB liabilities as well because on an operational standpoint, our license center is profitable. >> That's what I thought. That's why I asked. That's why So there like in the net position, there's some other liabilities that are towards the licensing operation. I'd have to I actually looked this up during last year's audit to talk about it. And I didn't do that before this one. I should have. >> But but I do want to differentiate. This is net position. This is not on an operating basis. Yep. >> Okay. Thank you. Any other questions of Mr. Lauer? Clean audit except financial controls, which has been there for decades. Correct. Okay. Well, thank you for your work and anything you'd like to add, city manager? The only other thing I'd like to add is thank you to Bill Lauer and his staff for working with our staff, but really this is a month-long incredibly intensive exercise in going through our financials. And so I really just want to recognize our finance manager, Pete Zimmerman, and our accountant, Aaron Sentser, for really leading the effort behind all of this work. Thank you, Mr. Zimmerman and his team. Okay, with that, I need a motion to accept the city's 2025 audited financial report. So move, Mr. Mayor. May I have a second? Second. All in favor, say I. I. That passes 3 to 0. Next on our agenda is consideration of a special event permit for the Hi-Fi and the Lake concerts at Makanda restaurant, 294 Grove Lane. And I believe we'll have a staff presentation, and I think the upkin is also here tonight, and so we'll give them a chance to address us as well. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I'll turn it over to Public Works Director and City Engineer Mike Kelly. Thank you, city manager. Good to see you, council and mayor. It's been a been a while since I've been here. But, uh, tonight before you we have, uh, uh, application for a special event permit, the High Fi on the Lake. Uh, the applicant is Makanda. I don't know why it's running by itself. Um, wanted to start out with just the purpose of our, uh, special event ordinance. We encourage special events, obviously. We want, uh, events that contribute to the character, vitality, health, and welfare of the community. But, we also have an ordinance that lays out some of the rules of how we're going to evaluate those applications. And the council even went to, uh, further extent by creating a matrix of how many events we felt were acceptable, uh, throughout the year. That being said, uh, Makanda has presented an application for concerts, uh, to be held on July 17th and 18th, Friday and Saturday. Uh, they're proposing 6:00 p.m. to 10:30 p.m. Uh, approximately 1,000 attendees each night. I apologize that this has a mind of its own and is going to probably forward again. Um, as they did last year, uh, they plan to present some sort of electronic music. I know that, uh, the applicant will talk a little bit about, if you let him up there, about EDM and the music that they'll be presenting. Uh, they'll be presenting their concerts, uh, from the Boatworks boat launch, which is private property, as well as the Depot parking lot, which is public property. Uh, they're proposing to meet the same conditions that were placed on the event last year. I've listed those here, including noise mitigation, an emergency plan, traffic control plan, additional public safety personnel, as well as notify notifying the adjacent properties. Here's a layout of the event showing the main event and stage located on the boatworks ramp, boat launch, directly adjacent to the restaurant. I'm sorry for that. Uh as well as some additional uh bar area and standing room uh in the depot parking lot. A reminder of our special event requirements. These larger events, anything more than 500 participants, requires city council approval. Uh because this is a concert event, ticketed event, uh we also have a stipulation that there's a ticket fee that the applicant would be required to pay uh within 2 weeks of the event. Uh it's the fee was established as the greater of a dollar or 1% per ticket. Uh as I mentioned before, the council approved a special event matrix which lays out the number of events that were acceptable to uh the council for each month. This application happened to be the third of three applications for July and our special event matrix uh limits the number of level three events to two in July. There's a note on the bottom. Our special event matrix and resolution also mentions that special events outside of these parameters may be approved by the council upon showing that the event meets all the criteria outlined in the um ordinance, as well as not having a negative uh impact on other previously approved events. And with that, staff's recommendation, really based on our city code and the limitation of two events in July and two previously approved events in July, we're recommending denial of this approval this particular special event. Uh and I would stand for any questions you might have. Questions of staff at this time. Council member Sorenson. Yeah, so um So, Mr. K, the recommendation of denial is that you just said it, I think, but is it solely based on the fact that it exceeds the two two per July requirement? Yes. We've We've also, as I mentioned in my memo, we've received noise complaints over not only uh the Makanda event, but our Wam Fest that also presented EDM music um just with adjacent neighbors. And in this particular event, it's a little bit different from the Wam event in that the stage is oriented towards downtown rather than away from our downtown. Um so, based on some of the negative impacts that we've seen complaints about, uh as well as the city code provision restricting the number of large events to two, which we've already received two applications and approved two applications earlier this evening. Um that's the recommendation. Again, I wanted to throw the note on the bottom of this particular slide. That doesn't say that you can't approve it. It says you may approve it uh if you feel that it does meet the kind of the intention of our ordinance. Following the rules of our meeting each other requirements, paying their fee, providing insurance, any conditions you may put on a permit, all of those. So, you may consider it, but just based on the letter of our law, I have recommended denial. So, this may be a bit of an unfair question, but um if it weren't for the restriction of the three events in July, what would staff's recommendation have been? I think we would have recommended that the application would have met the standards of application procedures. I think we still would have referenced the noise complaints that we've had in the past and probably recommended approval. Okay, thank you. And the sole criteria for a ventus number of estimated persons at the event. There's no other marking character just to go with them with that estimate would be. Really has to do with overall size and impact to public property. Okay. Other questions of staff? Anything else you'd like to add? No, but as you referenced the applicant is here if you have any questions. >> Yeah, no, we'll definitely invite them up to offer their perspective. Um >> [clears throat] >> Okay, so I guess I would invite Mr. Switz to the podium if you would like to present to us your perspective on this event. You're welcome. Thank you. Um so kind of you know, we applied for this we obviously got notified that you know, this kind of going to be a problem with the over the two. So in thinking more about it and this we've gotten a lot of kids obviously hitting me in the last couple months. To be frank after I heard the September 25th City Council meeting I wasn't really planning on doing this again. It just didn't sound like it was something that you guys were very excited about. Um the amount of people that have hit us in the last two or three months when your tickets going on sale and I've been just hitting back saying, "Hey, I don't feel great about it. I I don't know." But then I pivoted to "All right, I'll just do my best and I'll come ask you guys." Um you know, Mike Kelly brought up do I do a one-day deal versus doing two days. You know, at first I was negative on that cuz there's a lot of cost and set up stuff to do that for one day and everything kind of sits there um for the whole weekend and getting one day out of it is it it seemed not exactly the right path, but I guess you know, my take I just want to bring a couple things up I guess just to kind of highlight and I'm not like you really angling hard to get this. I mean I'm just um I'll throw out a couple different options. I'm I'm kind of here because I think you know, there's a lot of kids I the zip code 92% of the kids that went to that were a 55331 55391. So, I think I've heard a lot of stuff like there's almost no one going from Minneapolis to this event. Um the EDM thing I I don't know how best to let me I come in here and start playing some songs where I like Rufus Du Sol they're playing at Shakopee this year. That's the that it's indie dance music, okay? That's considered electronic dance music. I think there's a huge difference in that and I think that I don't like getting put in that box that we're you know, coming in playing Diplo or you know, something else, right? So, I I think the other thing I want to highlight is there is the Palm Tree Festival. Um that is that started in West Palm Beach. Now it's in Montecito, the Hamptons and Aspen. So, I I really in my heart think this is kind of cool for the city. This kind I mean we are we brought in people from Sweden. We have a guy in from France. I mean like we're I think it's something cool for the city. I think there's a lot of kids. I mean there's probably about 482 YZ high school kids that feel pretty strongly about this. Um and obviously the Edina and the Blake's the Breck's the Minnetonka cuz obviously my my kids are 19 21. So, there's 18 to 24 of a bunch of kids and I'm kind of here for them. Do they get one night? They get 6 hours to come out and have fun. And even though maybe everybody in this room doesn't think it's the I heard all right country I I I I I don't know what to say about it. This is what the kids are listening to. I think it's actually kind of ahead of its time and it will be what they're listening to. And I think it's you know, I know the kids have gone to Carver you know, County Fair. They love to come and see their friends. They like to hang out. I think we owe it to them to have a 6 hours on one night. So, I'm going to propose August 1st, Saturday, a one night. That gets past the July uh confliction. And so, I'd ask the council to to think about that if that's something that they they would uh um possibly think about. So, that's really all I have. I just have a couple clarify questions I just want to draw out is like what what were the hours that you were hoping to have the event um for for actual music? I think to make it really easy, 2:00 to 10:00. Just stay in the statute. I don't even need the 10:30. I mean Okay. I think I'd just go a little longer and start earlier and make it more of like a block party kind of thing. Because if we're going to end at 10:00 and we're going to charge the price to make the money back to cover the cost, I think that's the you know, we we need a little bit of an opening time for some local people then to lead into the people that are coming in from around the world. Okay. And would you be open to one night any other time of the year? Um meaning maybe July? I don't know if there's support for that or not, but Yeah, and the last weekend in July would be fine. I mean, this year is I mean again, these get tough. They're getting harder and harder because of these, you know, obviously now at Shakopee. Um there's a little risk obviously to like outdoor events, I think, a little bit obviously from that standpoint. And for us, like I guess the other ask would be, you know, what's the appropriate amount of time to ask you guys in advance so this could get done, you know, not haphazardly and really this puts a lot of pressure to even like take the risk to do it. I don't even I'm not even talking to anybody like I was last time when I came in. I just honest didn't feel great about it and I didn't really want to fight for it, but I felt like that's not the right thing to do with the put on the Instagram and say I didn't even try, right? Um So, I wanted to at least be able to say I came in, I tried, they denied it, they passed it. Here's the deal. We can I'm willing to edit it. I think the 10:30 was, you know, again, I understand the neighbors. I you know, I wish that a couple hours could go by where they could allow that to happen and not be so frustrated with it. But I I don't you know, I get it. Um any other questions of the applicant from from council just so we get it all out there. Ms. McDonald. Yeah, um Mr. Swartz, you mentioned that you watched the council meeting with Mr. Born on the lake >> Last year, yeah, not this year. Oh, not this year. >> No, no. Well, I I I don't recall that specific feedback from 2025, but I would assume it's pretty similar to the feedback that he was given this year. And being a thoughtful person, you you would think you would have um taken some of that feedback to heart and applied it to your own event, which I was disappointed to see that that wasn't done. Um mainly the length of the time um of the of the shows and the start time. And also the orientation of the stage. Right. Some of those things I think could have been um a little bit more thoughtful, if especially if you've been kind of paying attention to what feedback we get. Um having that stage point directly at the neighbors up the hill at the neighbors that were where I live, so I know how loud it actually is. Um for asking for 4 and 1/2 hours times two on a summer weekend, that just didn't seem like I mean, my my first instinct was oh, he didn't catch any of the feedback we gave. >> No, I I I get it. No, I did. I just The orientation of this is more for the backdrop. Right. Literally all of it, honestly, right? Like that's the thing. And then it goes on the lake, which is then that's a problem for people, too, but yeah. >> Yeah, so um as as this is presented, I I'm having a hard time supporting that without any of those um considerations made to the to the residents. Sorry. Okay. Any other questions of the applicant? Okay, hearing none, I I will bring it back to the council for discussion. Um Uh I guess, you know, we already have some one point of view, right? Which thank you for that, council member McDonald. Um I I'm hard-pressed, given the new information that was presented, to um outright deny this. I think there is some flexibility here that was expressed by the applicant that um it there's deserves full consideration by a future council. Um I eat the change of the date, you know, um moving it to one um night. And I think I would feel more comfortable having the full council weigh in and if, you know, the see where where that where that lands. Um so, I I would be supportive of an adaptation to this proposal. Um and I'll leave it at that. Okay. So, Mr. Mayor, you're your suggestion is that maybe we table this. I think so, because um there's new information that was presented um around a flexibility of a date um that wouldn't trip the the rule. And and since we approved two other events on consent, I just feel out of fairness to to the applicant and that that we give it full consideration with the new information. Yeah, I I was looking forward to this discussion I because actually I I came here uncertain as to how I might come down on this issue. So, the conversation has been helpful both with staff and um with it and with the uh applicant. It's been interesting to me that staff's recommendation would have been different if it weren't for the three in one month issue. And the other two that are conflicting but they aren't probably typical to what we might think would cause an issue to have three in one month. I mean the the rummage sale at the church and uh the pancake breakfast on on on 4th of July. Um I also thought, well, what's going on this summer and how much disruption is it to our downtown community? And we have well, we have the art festival in June. Correct. Uh we have the 4th of July. There's a lot happening on on the 4th. Um you're suggesting July, but maybe there's flexibility to move that a bit. And then we've got GG Hill Days in September. So, it kind of fit in a rhythm a bit to me where it wasn't really close to um something else. Um so I guess I I would I would give it consideration also. I mean, I think it's I think you're being very frank and open to us about how you're viewing this, and I And I would appreciate that, too, to have what are the hard knows. I I listened to the calls. I I I I get it there's certain I don't want to be disrespectful. That's not what it is. It's you know, the whole backdrop of the lake is the is what makes it special. Facing it up by the railroad tracks and having kids have their backs to the water, I think that's like security I I just that that was my take on it. It doesn't mean it's right, but it felt like that's the whole point is to have the beautiful backdrop of the water. I get it. So, that that was just so you know. And then the hours all right, you know, if it's three or if it's too many hours if that's what I guess I was thinking during the day, it's not such a big problem, but I I don't know. So, I guess I don't know all the ins and outs of every single detail, but yeah, that's how I was coming at it. Just >> I do appreciate your willingness to consider one night, cuz I think that that's an important issue. If we could could have narrowed down a date and the time frame we're talking about with one night, it would be I think more more favorable. And the other thing I'd maybe ask staff to think about more is, you know, from what we learned last year, what are the restrictions might we want to put on this to deal with some of the issues. So, I'm I'm supportive of tabling this bear. Um and I think we're talking about all the right things to maybe um get to something that that makes sense, but uh I think tabling would make a lot of sense. Um the the other comment I would make that I think is compelling part of your argument and I and I know it there's a counter argument to this is uh I did attend uh this last event and I others did as well, but it it did strike me how many local kids were were there and their parents. And that's [clears throat] a reflection of, you know, a stakeholder group that we don't always pay attention to here and um >> [clears throat] >> if if not given a a safe way to participate in their own community, then then they find other places to go and I don't personally, only speaking for myself, um want to give an opportunity for youth events even if it upsets other stakeholders from time to time. It's a fine line of how many and how frequent and how often and that's for us to find that balance, but I I um I I think of like, you know, if history was written like music trends change and the EDM 5 10 years from now could be like, "Well, what do you mean? That was once once controversial? I mean, you know, and so I I I have some empathy for those kids and finding a safe place to have a an event and and actually I was surprised how many of their parents actually went along with them. That did surprise me. Yeah, we had a lot that were watching their kids from the you know, that very area and you know, like I said, the the reason for the timing too is like, you know, June the weather's really iffy. Uh a lot of graduation parties. Um the Breakaway Festival now came exactly on and I and again, I I actually don't like having the streets closed down for the like that doesn't do do any favors as a business either. Um, so, you know, I didn't I came back to the chamber and was like, "Well, why don't you do it on a different day?" And I was like, "Oh, I didn't even know I could." Right? So, that's what made me kind of pivot to think a little bit differently about it. And then I kind of opened it up. And the reason why I don't want to go really far into August is most of the people go back to college and aren't there. And I don't know if I can sell enough tickets. That makes sense. So, that just to understand the timing on this is really around These are Minnetonka, Wayzata, Orono. These are all the kids around the lake. And they're either graduates, just graduated, or they're in school now and have heard about it from their brothers and sisters. So, you know, like I said, I'm looking for one day out of the whole year. If it's 6 hours, 5 hours, 7 hours, you guys guide me on what you think's appropriate. It's not going to matter that much at this point. That's just what my ask was. And I didn't ask for the 10:30 cuz I know that I was being respectful that when it gets above 10, that's the time that people get a little bit more critical. Okay. Council member Awe. Uh, just a clarifying question for you mayors, staff, or maybe even the applicant. So, if we table this tonight, um, is this going to look differently? Cuz I it gets a little tricky when you're studying something considering the neighbor, you know, the the community feedback, how it's going to affect businesses, how it's going to affect downtown. And then up here on the dais, it's it just changes. So, um, I find that really difficult to, um, give it a proper consideration as someone who, you know, we're elected to represent. It's not about me or my taste in music, but, um, so, when this comes back to us in 2 weeks, are we tabling this item? Or are we spitballing from the dais trying to figure out like what's going to be the ask? Well, to be fair, I mean, when we went through the evaluation of the fall James J. Hill Days, we gave that applicant a similar consideration, right? Their their application didn't have every detail in it and we gave them uh a chance to adjust their um presentation that would make it acceptable and that ended up in a 5-0 support. And I I I respect where you're coming from. And so I guess to to identify where I think your concern is, I would want this proposal as tabled to reflect the changes that were presented tonight so that we have a full picture of what the options were. So that as we look at it again, it's like, "Okay, there's a flexibility on the date. There's flexibility on the number of days." Um so that we could make an informed decision, you know, at that time. >> Well, I just could I make a request that those changes are in front of us uh beforehand and so we're all clear on what it is, you know, because as I read this, I thought this applicant isn't taking into consideration of the feedback we've received from these events for 3-plus years now. And so I just would like it to be a bit more clear. You know, if it's one day, are we going to move the stage? Are you going to point in a different direction? Um it just feels like there's a lot of unknowns. Understood. I think that's a fair request. I mean, you what you're asking for is just more specifics to what was reflected in the record tonight. And yeah, and prior meetings. Yeah. Okay. Is that clear to staff and to the applicant? So we'll reconsider this 2 weeks from now, right? In a tabled fashion. Um I don't know if we'll what conclusion we'll reach, but at least I want to give you fair due process as we did the other applicant um for the fall one and I I'm motivated by the flexibility that was presented here tonight that gives us options for consideration. So with that, I would accept a motion to table tonight's uh uh agenda item. I Who would like to make that motion? I'll make that motion for you, Mr. Mayor. >> May I have a second? Second. All in favor, say I. I. So, that tables. Um thank you for being here. >> One quick question. So, what should I prepare? So, should I send you guys like a I would work with Mike Yeah. And do you guys have a preference on July or August? I guess that's everything I mean, what is something So, I don't want to propose I I'm flexible on the last week of July, but I don't want to in in heat on that ordinance that is like legally, you know, there that I know you're not asking for a rule, but >> what I would recommend you do is just as you did tonight. Um so, the options for the dates are X and Y or X, Y, and Z. Um the options are one day or two day. These are the options that I would accept on uh timing. And that's exactly what the applicant did for um Wham. And I think that's what got us I don't know what it's called. That's not called Wham anymore. I apologize. It's called the the concert for James J. Hill Days. We afforded some flexibility in in that applicant. Um from the dais. So. I want to be consistent with it. And if it if it if it if it doesn't pass, it doesn't pass. Okay. Thank you very much. All right. Thank you for that. Um next is uh city manager's report. Uh thank you, Mayor and Council. Uh for my update this week, I really just want to recognize and thank staff and community for coming out to a number of community events we had really within the last week. Um so, Thursday last week, there was kind of a Klapprich Park celebration launch with um Wayzata Community Ed. It did get rained out at >> to say, until the rain came. at the end. Um but, there was a lot of um great community and families who came out to celebrate and enjoy the park. Um and then also this weekend was um Dig It Day. And so, I want to thank all the volunteers who participated in that, as well as our first I think the first ever historical trolley event. So I want to recognize the Heritage Preservation Board for planning that and to the Wayzata Historical Society for their participation in making that event a success. That's all I have for you. Any questions of the city manager? Um I just have one that I just wanted to log publicly. So obviously the 394 project is or Highway 12 project is extremely disruptive. Um I just promised that some of these residents that I would enter it into the public record that there's been some clear cutting of a number of trees um along the fronted road um particularly impacting the Hollybrook neighborhoods. Along Hollybrook there's several condo complexes and I know staff is making a request of the DOT and there's no promises, but uh I promised these individuals that I'd bring it up at the council meeting so everyone knew of their concerns and that staff was making request, but so far we've had a the DOT didn't plan for any replacements and they they likely not going to change that position, but we're not going to let go of asking for it. Is that a fair representation? Yep, absolutely. That's fair. >> know what I'm talking about like along Yeah, so I don't know if you've heard from some of those folks as well. You probably have, but I haven't heard, but Yeah, so anyway, I just wanted to note for the record cuz I promised I would bring it up. So with that um any other questions of city manager? Hearing none, I would accept a motion to adjourn tonight's meeting. So moved. May I have a second? Second. Any further conversation or discussion? Hearing none, all in favor say I. I. I. And we will conclude or end our meeting. Thank you.