it's National Public Works Week next week. Um and I want to just give a little background on National Public Works Week. So um it recognizes the professionals who focus on infrastructure facilities and services that are that are of vital importance to sustainable and resilient communities and to the public health, high quality of life and well-being in our Wiperlake community.

White Bear Lake City Council hereby designates the week of May 17th through the 23rd, 2026 as Public Works Week in White Bear Lake and urges citizens to join representatives of the American Public Works Association and government agencies in activities, events, and ceremonies designed to pay tribute to our public works professionals, engineers, managers, and employees, and to recognize the substantial contributions they make to protecting our health, safety, and advancing the quality of life for all.

the main scope of work there is replacing the signal and with that we have various ADA improvements along with the closure of access to the intersection of Buren Street. Uh the rest of the work down at 694 is a little more complex and I'll kind of run through that, but we're replacing all the mainline pavement of 61, reconstructing the ramps, and also adding a second left turn lane for northbound trunk highway 61 to westbound 694.

It's actually faster to travel from Second Street up to Fourth Street, wait at the light, take a left, come back all the way to City Hall than it takes to sit in the lane, the turn lane on Second, which does not have a flashing yellow.

the response that we've historically received is that either the technology doesn't allow us to adjust and so we can't change traffic stacking up on lake waiting to make a left-hand turn can't adjust etc etc. um now that that's adjustable. Awesome. Thank you. But um that 61 is still a state highway. So you guys are the ones that we have to y cajul uh entreat request. Just wanted you to hear directly. That's an issue in our community is those turn signs.

we have issued an unmodified or a clean opinion on your financial statement. So, that's the opinion you're looking for when you have a financial statement audit performed.

So, what you're not spending in your kind of just general operations type stuff, you're spending more in your debt service expenditures to support different projects throughout the city and improvements that are going on in the city. So, but even with this and with the the debt, you still currently are at a lower tax rate um than your peers.

Is are my are my assumption or my conclusions reasonable? Are all correct? Yep.

our mechanics are, you know, jack of all trades. They can do or diagnose most anything. Um but there are specialties you know with you know within the uh fleet. Um uh you know the average squad cars, the trucks, things like that are you know pretty you know standard.

I've shown council before a picture of a pallet full of boxes and in those boxes an entire pallet worth of equipment that goes into one police squad car. And it took it was over 20 hours...to build that squad out.

our public works staff actually prefer the electric over the um the gas. So as as we have the opportunity to replace those um they actually prefer them. They're quieter. They're um they're ready to go... So, as we have the opportunity to replace a lot of that small equipment with uh the uh rechargeable battery uh style, we uh our staff prefers it.

The purpose of the MS4 general permit is to reduce the amount of pollutants entering state waters from the MS4. So examples of storm water pollutants are listed here. So that includes litter, sediment, phosphorus that's generated from fertilizers, leaves, and grass clippings, chloride from winter salt application, bacteria, and hazardous waste such as oil, gas, and antifreeze.

Good news is two of the lakes that we used to have waste load allocations assigned for are now delisted which means they meet the water quality standards for nutrients. So that's a huge deal and it's because of all these projects over the years that the city and the wershed districts have installed.

the bigger industry is looking at different things of that is, you know, nonchlorides or things. Uh, we actually use treated salt. So, we use a um kind of a non-pollutant treatment on it to help make it stick better to the roadway. It works to a lower temperature. You have to put less down.

the request before you is uh the first reading of an on proposed ordinance. Um the applicant in this case is Founders Cigar Company. Um the text amendment that's uh before you tonight for the first reading would add two conditional uses to the MXD or mixeduse downtown zone. Those uses are uh listed as tobacco product shop and premium cigar lounge.

both planning commission and staff had re have recommended denial of this request.