Hello everyone and welcome to the council update. I am Phil Jentz, your communications manager and this month we're here with council member Justin Olsen. Justin, welcome. Well, thank you very much for having me this month. It's a big month. We got a lot going on so it's exciting to be here. Yeah. April is National Volunteer Appreciation Month and there is a lot that we certainly could talk about regarding Cottage Grove's incredible residents. So Justin, uh given that it's National Volunteer Month, how do volunteers contribute to our community here in Cottage Grove? Oh my gosh, what a great question. Thank you, Phil. You'll notice I'm here today in my Cottage Grove Lion shirt. That's true. Uh that is one of the many volunteer organizations that we have here in the city of Cottage Grove who contribute to the vitality of our community. I have to say Cottage Grove really does have an incredible spirit of volunteerism and that's something I'm so proud of. And the thing that always sticks with me about our volunteerism is when we have those people who are contributing regularly to the health and vitality of our community, our community benefits by such a huge degree. Give you a couple examples of that. Whenever you go to city hall where you work every day and you walk in, there are beautiful gardens as you walk into uh city hall and in the public safety department. Those gardens are maintained by volunteers. That's right. Yes. and and they wouldn't be there but for the volunteers. So really the volunteers in the city of Cottage Grove make this uh an incredible place to live, to work, to play and they contribute in ways that are sort of quiet and hidden in many cases uh but very important. That is me some very good points and you and you just kind of ended with like quiet and hidden which to me you know screams boards and commissions right everyone always knows that's correct about the various boards and commissions that we have uh here at the city of Katro so let's talk about that sure what kind of work do residents do on our various boards and commissions yeah you know that's such a good question because I think many of our residents um don't quite understand that we do have volunteer citizen advisory boards records that actually influence policy decisions by the city council uh regularly, including our historic preservation commission, including our planning commission, including our parks and recreation commission, and many others who take on the very difficult task of sort of being that first look at what is coming down the pipeline. Is it a new park? Is it a uh new development of um housing or commercial development? All of those go through those volunteer commissions very quietly, but they do a lot of very challenging work when it comes to a assessing, okay, what is it that I'm looking at? And b trying to then help shape is what I'm looking at what we really want as a community or should we be advising the city council that we want some changes to that. They work really closely with staff and then when it comes to the council table, it's been vetted. So by that time as a city council, we've had the opportunity to review something that's already been reviewed. The questions have already been asked and really we're just the fine-tuning element, right? That's that's such a good point. Uh and and and that work is very important. And we we'd certainly be remiss to not mention uh the volunteer of the year uh and the volunteer group of the year. uh you know we recently had a banquet to to honor Mark Wiggins and Beyond the Yellow Ribbon as recipients of those awards and so what can you tell me about those awards and the winners? One of the things we try to do each year in the city of Cottage Grove uh we try to recognize them during volunteer month with a volunteer banquet and we've done that annually in the city of Cottage Grove for as long as I can remember and we bring them down to River Oaks. We put on a nice meal, there's a gift, uh, and then, as you mentioned, we will name a volunteer of the year based on nominations that we solicit throughout the February, March time frame. And then a volunteer group of the year. Uh, Mark Wiggins has been instrumental in serving as um, clergy basically to our public safety team as part of the East Metro uh, Chaplain's Association. and so you know serve as counsel to public safety personnel particularly when they go through a challenging situation and that's kind of every day. So these people are on call at all times and you know they're there to to to talk to listen and to really help people work through some of the emotions and the challenges that they deal with as part of our public safety team and not just here in Cottage Grove but throughout the East Metro. So we we are very grateful for their contributions to do that. And with respect to Beyond the Yellow Ribbon, Cottage Grove has been what's called a beyond the yellow ribbon city for over 10 years now. What Beyond the Yellow Ribbon does is they work with the Minnesota National Guard to help support veterans and militaries uh military families rather. Clearly there's no shortage of opportunities for people to get involved if they choose to. some of the things we've mentioned today, boards and commissions. Oh my goodness. Beyond the yellow ribbon, all sorts of different ways, even just helping out around the neighborhood, you know, picking up garbage for instance. So, if somebody wanted to get involved and volunteer in Cottage Grove, right, where do they start? Where do they where do they jump in? Thank you for asking. I I have a sort of a pat uh saying that I have used many times because people will often ask whether we're at Strawberry Fest or doing some other event, hey, how can I get involved? And the the real answer is this. Um, don't be afraid to get involved. Everybody can do something. It doesn't have to be grandiose. It doesn't have to take a ton of time or a ton of effort. You could read books at the library to children on a Sunday morning or a Saturday morning. We also have opportunities, as I mentioned earlier, with our various boards and commissions if you'd like to be part of that. Many people volunteer through their places of worship through their church. And then of course we have our various nonprofits whether that's the youth service bureau, the Cottage Grove Lions Club, Beyond the Yellow Ribbon Network. Um all of those opportunities exist. And if you really are interested and you're thinking to yourself, gosh, which way should I turn? Call me. I'll happily put you in touch with the right person. Mayor Bailey is also a great resource, as are any of your other council members. We work with those volunteer groups all the time and we are so pleased that we have that opportunity. So, if you want to get involved, trust me, there's no shortage of uh places where you could spend some time helping out. Right. That's that's really great. Council member Olsen, uh we'll let you get back to your day. It's all the time we've got, but I do want to thank you again for coming in and for sharing a lot of really great information about, you know, how people can get involved in the community, which is very important uh that folks that folks step up and volunteer. My pleasure. Thank you. Uh, well, that's it for this month's council update. If you'd like to learn more about the city, please visit our website or find us on social media. We would love to hear from you.