All right. Good morning. We will call the July 7th, 2026, Washington County Board of Commissioners meeting to order. Clerk, please take the roll. Commissioner Miron. Here. Commissioner Karwoski. Here. Commissioner Cox. Here. Commissioner Bigham. Here. Commissioner Clausen. Here. Roll call taken. All present. Please join us for the Pledge of Allegiance. 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. Before we get going on the meeting, I would like to take a moment to acknowledge with sadness the passing of Washington County employee Thomas Peterson. Thomas served in the Building Services division of Public Works, and last week his family shared information on the service and an obituary. Thomas was a valued member of our county team and a friend to many colleagues. Thomas' contributions to Washington County and the relationships he built with those around him will be remembered. On behalf of the county board, we extend our deepest condolences to Thomas' family, his loved ones, and his coworkers. Please join me now in a moment of silence in memory of Thomas Peterson. Thank you. We are now on to the comments from the public portion of our board meeting. I do not have any speaker cards up here at the dais. Is there anybody in the audience that would like to address the board? Seeing none, we will move on to approval of the agenda. Colleagues, is there a motion for approval of today's agenda? So moved. Moved by Commissioner Clausen. Is there a second? Second. Second by Commissioner Cox. Any discussion? Seeing none, all in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Opposed, say nay. Motion carries. Before we do the consent calendar, Administrator Corbid You have something to report about the consent calendar? Good morning, commissioners and Madam Chair. Yes, the personnel committee met this morning at 8:30. They reviewed items H and I that are on your consent calendar this morning. The personnel committee voted to recommend approval by the county board. Thank you, Administrator Corbid. Would any members like to take anything or talk about anything on the consent calendar? Seeing none, is there a motion? Madam Chair, I will move the consent calendar, all items as presented, A through M. Moved by Commissioner Miron. Second. Seconded by Commissioner Cox. Clerk will take the roll. Commissioner Miron? Aye. Commissioner Karwoski? Commissioner Cox? Aye. Commissioner Clausen? Aye. Commissioner Bigham? Aye. Consent calendar passes five zero. Thank you. The next item on the agenda is a public hearing regarding an application for a new off-sale intoxicating liquor license, and we have Christine Piskura from our Taxpayer Services division. She's our manager. Madam Chair, you do have a script at your desk to read. Oh, my bad. Sorry. I'll read it. Well, I already said the first one. The Property Records and Taxpayer Services Department received an application for a new off-sale liquor license from Senko Farms, doing business as Afton Apple Orchard, located in Denmark Township, Minnesota. Statutes chapter 340A.405 requires a public hearing to be held prior to action taken by the county board on an application for a license of this type. Madam Secretary, was the notice of the public hearing published, and do you have record of its publication? Yes, Madam Chair. Before we proceed, let me explain the format we will be following. These proceedings are being videoed, recorded, so that a verbatim record of what occurs today can be maintained. And each individual who wishes to make a presentation should come to the podium and identify themselves with their first and last name. Since everyone who wishes to speak will be given the opportunity to do so, we ask that none of the speakers be interrupted, except that board members are encouraged to ask questions during the presentation for clarification or additional information. If there's any documentary evidence that anyone wishes to consider, it should be given to the clerk so that it may be made part of the record. I ask that each presenter be as clear and brief as possible, and as always, the chair reserves the right to limit an individual's presentation. At the conclusion of today's presentation, and after receiving public testimony today, the public hearing will be closed, and the board members will discuss the matter. Are there any questions concerning the procedure we will follow? All right. Seeing none, we will now proceed with the presentation by Property Records and Taxpayer Services Department. Morning, Madam Chair and commissioners. As stated, my name is Christie Piskura, and I'm the Taxpayer Services division manager in the Property Records and Taxpayer Services Department. Thank you for your time today. I'm before you this morning to provide information relevant to the public hearing being held to consider an application for a new off-sale intoxicating liquor license. The agenda will include some background information and operational details relevant to the request and the business making the request, an overview of the licensing requirements for this type of license, where we currently are in the process, what happens after today, and of course, public comments and board discussion. Minnesota Statutes 340A.405 authorizes counties to issue off-sale intoxicating liquor licenses to businesses and townships within the county, and it establishes the requirements for licensing. Property Records and Taxpayer Services Department received an application for a new off-sale liquor license from Senko Farms, doing business as Afton Apple Orchard, located in Denmark Township. The business currently holds on-sale and Sunday sales licenses, with renewals for both approved by this board in May. These licenses authorize the sale of alcoholic beverages for consumption on site at the business. The requested off-sale license would allow the sale of packaged products for off-site consumption. In this case, the business intends to sell packaged hard cider primarily during their fall harvest season activities. Currently, the on-sale and Sunday sales activity occurs at a designated service area on the premises of the business. If approved, the off-sale activity would occur through the business's retail store, which is a separate location from the on-sale designated area. The intention, again, is to offer packaged hard cider for sale to be taken off the premises for consumption. The business is open to the public from mid-June through November, with the fall harvest season taking place from mid-August to November. They operate seven days a week, with hours from August through October, from 10:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m., and in November, 10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. There are several steps in the process of issuance for this type of license. They are an application and fee submitted to the county where the business is located, a town board resolution supporting issuance of the license, review and approval by the county sheriffs and county attorneys' offices, publication of a public hearing notice in the county's official newspaper providing information on the hearing, as well as ways for the public to provide comments ahead of the hearing, notification to cities within three miles of the business, conducting a public hearing, county board review and action, and review by the Minnesota Department of Public Safety, Alcohol and Gambling Enforcement Division, and approval by the Commissioner of Public Safety. To date, the following steps have been completed. As I said, we've received an application and fee from Senko Farms. Denmark Township adopted a resolution consenting to the issuance of the license on May 4th, 2026 We've received approval from the county sheriff's and county attorney's offices. The public hearing notice was published in the Country Messenger on June 10th and June 17th, and we received no public comments ahead of today's meeting. A notification was sent to the cities of Cottage Grove and Afton. We did not receive a response from either city. So, the remaining steps are the public hearing to be held today, county board consideration of the application, which we would like to set on the July 14th, 2026 agenda. And then following county board action, pending approval, submission of the application for state review and approval, and those are the final steps. So with that, I'm happy to stand for any questions and ask to move to public comments and board discussion. Thank you. Thank you. Is there anyone from the public who wishes to be heard? Okay. I will note that in advance of today's hearing, members of the public were provided with an opportunity to submit comments to the Property Records and Taxpayer Services Department. Comments that were received, if any, have been provided to the board members and made part of the record. Madam Secretary, do you have all the documentary evidence? Yes, Madam Chair. Okay. Now that we've heard from the interested parties and have received the documentary evidence to this point, I will ask for a motion to close the public hearing and open the matter for discussion and comments by the board members. I'll make a motion to close the public hearing. Second. Moved and seconded. Any discussion? Seeing none. All in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed, say nay. All right. The public hearing is now closed. Any comments from the board? Commissioner Clausen. Just one question, and I know I have had this conversation with the sheriff, but because this is in front of us today, I was just asking about the alcohol age verification testing and if that's still happening in the townships then around the area. Director. Excuse me, Madam Chair, Commissioner Clausen. I will have to get back to you with an answer on that. I'm not sure what that includes. The verification that the sheriff's office does looks at compliance with alcohol licenses, any convictions for criminal things relating to alcohol, but I will need to get an answer for you on that. Okay. Thank you. Any other questions? Madam Chair, the county sheriff is in the audience. I think he probably could address that now, that way we don't do it at a later date. Sheriff? Good morning, Madam Chair and commissioners. I'm Dan Starry, the county sheriff. And yes, we do the compliance checks for our cities that we contract with, as well as the townships. Thank you. Yes. Any further discussion? All right. Seeing none, oh, wait. Yeah. We move on because this will be on a later agenda. Because based on the discussion and comments of the county commissioners, I will request county staff to set consideration of the application for a new off-sale intoxicating liquor license for Sendik Farms back on the county board agenda for the board to consider approval. All right. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Next up is our county attorney's office, and we have a presentation on our law clerk program. And I'm going to let you introduce yourself because I do not want to mispronounce your name. Understand. Good morning, Madam Chair and commissioners. My name is Hannah Prokopowicz. I'm an assistant county attorney in the criminal division and the law clerk supervisor. Welcome. Thank you. I have the opportunity to talk to you about our law clerk program. I'm going to go over what the program is, who our law clerks are, the different types of law clerk, and really the impact that they have on our office and overall the community. So let's start with, what is a law clerk? A law clerk is essentially an intern that's in law school. Unlike a typical intern that you would see, law clerks have to go through some additional steps to become a law clerk. Specifically, they have to be eligible for student certification by the Minnesota Board of Law Examiners. In order to be certified, they have to be in good academic standing within their law school, and they have to complete two full-time semesters of law school, so they essentially have to finish their first year of law school. Once they're certified, they can do lawyering tasks under the supervision of a licensed attorney. Our law clerks here will work for pay or for credit or both, and some even just volunteer. We have two different types of law clerks in our office, our senior law clerks and our federal work-study law clerks. The main difference between them is how they're paid. Our federal work-study law clerks receive financial aid award through the law school, and their wages are either paid directly by the law school or the county is reimbursed by the law school. Their hours are capped by their award. Typically, our law clerks or work-study law clerks work anywhere from 10 to 20 hours a week. During the summer, I think average, they work about 16 hours a week right now. During the school year, it's closer to that 10 hours a week number. We currently have one, two, three, four work-study law clerks in our office. A number of them are here today watching. And our senior law clerks are different because they are considered county employees. These two positions were developed, I believe, about six years ago in recognition of the value that our law clerks add to our office. They are paid by the county. They receive county benefits. They are part-time employees who work about 20 hours a week, both during the school year and during the summer. They do have some additional leadership duties. They take on our more intensive projects. Most recently, they've trained in our new batch of law clerks that started in May of this year. Our current senior law clerks are Jack Straka and Connie Palumbo. We engage in various recruitment opportunities. Our most common one is to post on the law school's career platforms, typically at St. Thomas, Mitchell Hamline, and the University of Minnesota. We also have an ongoing informational post on the Minnesota County Attorneys website. But often we get word of mouth referrals. I think our last senior law clerk just called in randomly because he had heard good things about the office and wanted to work here. Former law clerks have referred new law clerks to our office because they've enjoyed their time so much. So I would say more often than not, we get a lot of word of mouth referrals. These are our current law clerks, all of them except for one. I believe Connie was out at a class that day. We have a couple of Washington County residents who are current law clerks. Jack grew up in Oakdale and now lives in Lake Elmo. Paige grew up in Forest Lake. So it's nice to have them back and working in our community. So what do law clerks do? Their primary task every day is to handle our jail calendar that occurs Monday through Friday, with a second calendar on Friday afternoons. Their job is to advocate for release conditions on behalf of the county attorney's office for defendants who are in custody, whether they're in custody for new crimes, on probation violations, or violating conditions of release previously. That takes up a good chunk of their time with preparation and the work that needs to be done after the calendar. However, when they're not doing the bail calendar, their time is filled by doing legal research and writing projects. They do various things all across the office for the juvenile division, the civil division, and the criminal division. To list a few things of what they do, they draft memoranda and probable cause statements. They research constitutional issues, look up legislative history. They listen to jail calls. They help with child protection appeals. They've researched licensing childcare requirements and fair market value of waste hauling services. Whatever attorneys need, they are there to help out. When they're not doing the bail calendar or researching and writing, they are observing court. They're observing meetings. They're observing the county board meeting. They're taking it in as much as they can. We also offer some off-site experience as well. We've done jail tours, prison tours. We've been to Stillwater and Oak Park Heights Department of Corrections. They also have done ride-alongs with our local law enforcement. The value that they add to our office is incredible. We're talking about just the time that they save attorneys in the office. That jail calendar is at 10:00 a.m. Monday through Friday, second one at 2:00 p.m. That's six hours right there a week, plus the one to two hours it can take to prep that calendar, and the additional time to update the file after the calendar. I'm still an attorney. I'm not great at math, but that is a lot of time that attorneys then can spend prepping their files, prepping for trial, meeting with victims and witnesses, and taking on the additional initiatives that our office does, like our motor vehicle theft grant that I think you heard about recently. Or even just going to a senior living facility and educating its residents on common financial scams we see. Without the law clerks' participation in our office, it would be difficult to find the time to do those really important things. Our law clerks are also the front-facing people of our office. They are in the office every single day. They're in the courtroom every single day. They've built relationships with jail staff, with the judges, with clerks, with Washington County Community Corrections, even our building services staff. They really represent us in a very positive way. We teach them a lot of practical experience, give them the opportunities to try the skills that they're learning in law school. But I think more importantly, we teach them the stuff that you can't really learn in law school, and often the more difficult lessons. Talking about using prosecutorial discretion and often having to weigh competing interests, what it looks like when public safety requires something different than what a victim of a crime may want. Those lessons are very difficult to learn, and that's our goal of this program is to start teaching them those things and hopefully inspire a career in public service. Many of our law clerks have gone on to take on full-time careers as prosecutors or in government work. I was recently on the phone with a professor of one of our law clerks doing a check-in meeting, and he was really surprised that this law clerk wanted to pursue a career in prosecution. I think prosecutors kind of have a reputation for not having the most lucrative careers. I think had this professor gone through the law clerk program in Washington County, he would've realized that it's lucrative in so many other ways, and it's incredibly rewarding opportunity. And I'm happy to report that many of our former law clerks, there's actually five in our office right now, have gone on to become prosecutors in the county attorney's office, including Mr. John Ristad, who will gladly show you his law clerk ID badge from, I think, the '90s. And with that, I will stand for any questions you have. Thank you. Thank you. Yeah, the '90s were great. I also like to highlight that Judge Freeman was a law clerk in Hennepin County when I was a paralegal in Hennepin County. So there's another person that has went on to do incredible things. And I understand that some of the law clerks are here in the audience. Yes. So, thank you for all you do and appreciate- Appreciate the value you bring. Any comments from the board? Commissioner Clausen then Commissioner Miran. Thank you so much for the presentation. Your last name, I was like, "It sounds so familiar," and I had to research. I'm like, "Oh, family of attorneys." So cool. Thank you. I can see the passion of public service is obviously a legacy that you guys hold true. And I have a friend of a friend that's a part of your family. So, I really enjoyed your presentation. I do think law clerks are extremely important and always support law clerks. We had them in the law firm that I worked at as a paralegal. I found them very important in crutch times in which I did not have time for a niche type of law that I couldn't research, and found that law clerks were very important to me. And so thank you so much for the presentation. Commissioner Miran. I just want to thank you for your leadership on this particular program, the leadership of our county attorney, Kevin Magnuson, in providing these kind of opportunities, and all of the staff within the county attorney's office in working with these people and helping them understand the values that we have here in Washington County and how that might transfer into their careers, and just really appreciate that opportunity that we're providing. And then as you described here, the significant benefits to the county as a whole because of the program at a very minimal cost to the county and the county attorney's office. So appreciate understanding the program a little more and what a great picture. I wish I would've seen Ristad in his youth as he was a law clerk. It must be a picture somewhere- ... that would've been nice to have seen. So... All right. Commissioner Karwoski. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you for the presentation. I agree with the comments, and that's worth mentioning again, is really the... It's really cost-effective. A lot of really good return on the investment. I really like the partnership because as you mentioned, so many good attorneys come out of this pool of law clerks. And I want to point out that the Supreme Court justices are almost always a law clerk exclusively. And it may be in Washington, DC serving for another chief justice on the Supreme Court, but I find that really interesting how they get groomed being a law clerk, and they serve as a judge at the highest office. So thank you. All right. Well, thank you very much and appreciate the presentation, too. Thank you. The next item we have two very significant public works projects, and starting us off this morning is Kevin Peterson, who is our county design engineer. Welcome. Madam Chair, commissioners, good morning. My name is Kevin Peterson, as noted. I serve as the county's design engineer, based out of the Public Works Department. I'm here on behalf of Public Works this morning to recommend board approval of a final design contract for the County Road 19A, 100th Street Realignment project in the city of Cottage Grove. You'll see an overview of my presentation today. We'll close with Public Works recommendation, and of course, have time for questions at the end. Washington County and the city of Cottage Grove began studying this alignment in 2019 under CIP project RB2685 with the goal of identifying a future southwest arterial corridor. Following study completion in 2020, the project team began preliminary design for this corridor, which identified a three-lane road section, an overpass over the CPKC Railroad, pedestrian accommodations, stormwater facilities, public utilities, and realignment and extensions of the existing roadway network to serve the new southwest arterial alignment and future development in the area. To date, Washington County and the city have successfully secured more than $23.2 million in state and federal grants for construction of this project through five different sources. $9.6 million was recently awarded via the state bonding bill. A $5 million Minnesota Highway Freight Program grant was secured. $1.6 million in federal congressionally directed funds have been awarded. Finally, federal grants have been secured in the form of $2.4 million in federal Surface Block Grant funds and $4.5 million in PROTECT funds. Each of these grants has unique requirements and several have deadlines in 2027. Advancing the final design today will allow the project team to meet these deadlines and utilize these grant funds. Public works issued a public request for proposals for final design services in May of 2026. One firm submitted a proposal in response to this request for proposals. SEH, the firm to submit that proposal, has significant project history and has added a sub-consulting engineering firm called TKDA to their team to lead the railroad coordination and stormwater design portions of this project. This team is among the most qualified in the state for a project of this complexity. A scope and fee of $2,280,159 was negotiated with this team. Both the hourly staff rates and scope of this work were reviewed in detail by public works and are consistent with similar projects and our experience. This contract includes the full range of technical work required to advance the project through design and into bidding, including project management, coordination, and permitting, railroad coordination with CPKC, utility coordination, including subsurface utility exploration, stormwater management and design, environmental documentation and permitting, traffic engineering, final roadway, bridge, and retaining wall design, cost estimating, specifications, and finally, construction and bidding support. This final design scope of work will occur through 2026 and into 2027. Right of way acquisition will also continue on the same timeline. This sets the project up for construction from 2027 through 2029, allowing the project team to meet federal authorization deadlines required to utilize the grant funds awarded for this project. Here you'll see a summary of the project expenses and capital improvement plan budget to date. Total consultant costs, including prior expenses and the proposed contracts total $3.35 million, with the contract recommendation this morning accounting for just under $2.3 million of that total. Revenues include wheelage tax, county transportation sales tax, city contributions, and the state and federal grants noted prior, leaving approximately $10.18 million available for construction and remaining project needs. You'll see $5 million of the $23.2 million in grants represented in the current project budget on this slide as well. Looking ahead to construction, the 2027 capital improvement plan will reflect a $26.1 million construction project, shown in green and blue on this slide. This will utilize the remaining budget funds shown on the prior slide and the $23.2 million in state and federal grant funds, and then be supplemented with both city and county local costs. The City of Cottage Grove is working to fund an extension of Point Douglas Road to be constructed in conjunction with the County Road 19A project, shown in dashed lines here on the slide. With that, Madam Chair, commissioners, on behalf of Public Works, I recommend board approval of contract number 18370 with Short Elliott Hendrickson Incorporated in the amount of $2,280,159 for final design engineering services for the County Road 19A and 100th Street Realignment Project. Thank you. I'll stand for any questions. Thank you. To get this before us, I will move to approve contract number 18370 with Short Elliott Hendrickson Incorporated in the amount of $2,280,159 to provide final design engineering services for the County Road 19A and 100th Street Realignment Project. Second. Moved and seconded. Thank you, Mr. Peterson, for all the work on this. There's a lot of moving parts. The railroad, obviously, is never an easy discussion and Short Elliott Hendrickson has significant experience as you mentioned in that. So I want to lift that up, and then I also just want to say that we still have one, I think one, larger one, outstanding request with the federal government, which is moving forward through the congressional-directed requests. And so obviously we're waiting on that too as well. Couple weeks ago, you, me, and Director Sandberg had a great meeting updating the city on this too. So, just excited about being able to get the congestion that is off of Jamaica in its overcapacity and move down to here in that ever-expanding industrial park, and I know there are businesses that are excited for this opportunity as well. So, would appreciate the board's support. Commissioner Miron. Just appreciate your leadership on this, representing your district very well. This is an important road project improvement as you described it, and happy to support the motion this morning. Thank you. And Commissioner Clausen. Great. Thank you. I'm going to be opposing this project. In December, I voted against the CIP because I don't believe the process and project selection has been equitable or fully transparent. That is why I continue to advocate for the Citizen Advisory Board for the CIP. Thank you. Any other-- Commissioner Karwoski. No, I'm fully supportive of this. It's certainly a help to the region with jobs that will come. Big industrial park. Chair Bigham, thank you for your leadership. I know A lot of elected officials have been involved in this. It's amazing between the city, the county, the state, federal, all coming together to put a financial package. This is a great example where you need state and federal aid when you're doing a project that has such regional importance. I'm fully supportive. Thank you. Commissioner Cox? Thank you, Madam Chair. Mr. Peterson, thanks for the presentation. I think this is a project that I just appreciate because it's looking forward. The development maybe hasn't happened yet in this area, and so the city, the county, everyone involved gets to say, "Hey, this is what we need in this area to really make this what our city and our community needs." And so I appreciate the forward-thinking and not maybe just reacting to something here. So I'm happy to support this. Thank you. Seeing no further discussion, all in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Opposed, say nay. Nay. Motion carries four to one. Thank you, Mr. Peterson. The next one is, we have four items for Century North Reconstruction Project, and joining us today is Ms. Erin Blalock. Good morning, Madam Chair and commissioners. As mentioned, my name is Erin Blalock, and I'm an engineer too, serving as a project manager with Public Works. I'm here this morning to discuss the Century North Reconstruction Project. Let's dive in. Today, I will review the project location, the recommended project improvements, discuss the land acquisition needs, review the project schedule, provide a refresher on the contracted consultant services, and touch on the project financials, which will ultimately lead to my recommendation for board actions on behalf of Public Works. Public Works has identified this reconstruction project along the newly acquired portion of County Highway 27 in the capital improvement plan as RB2668. The project extents, as shown in green on the right, are from Interstate 694 to County Highway 12, which is Wildwood Road. Because this segment of Century Avenue is a border road between Washington and Ramsey County, the project is located in both Mahtomedi and White Bear Lake. The project improvements include pavement reconstruction, intersection improvements, including three traffic signal system replacements and two new roundabouts, new pedestrian and bike facilities, improved access to local transit stops, stormwater treatment, including new stormwater basins and replacement of existing dated storm sewer systems, as well as signing and striping replacement. These anticipated improvements are consistent with the Washington County Strategic Plan, specifically the goal to enhance and maintain investments in the built and natural environment to encourage growth, accessibility, and resilient communities, including the objective to maintain, develop, and expand multimodal transportation options to improve the ease of travel across the county, and the annual measurement of Pavement Condition Index, PCI. It is noted that Public Works applied for and were successful in seeking regional solicitation funding for these project improvements. That funding award totals $7 million. Regarding the land acquisition needs for the project, both Washington and Ramsey County are coordinating the acquisition of their own respective property needs for the project. Both county right of way teams have hired independent appraisers to inform property offers. The anticipated land acquisition cost on the Washington County side is approximately $1.8 million, which will be funded in accordance with the Washington County cost policy. Taking a quick look at the project schedule, the red pin identifies where we are today. We performed extensive community engagement during the preliminary design phase, which started in 2023. As of the beginning of this year, 2026, upon receiving municipal support from Mahtomedi and White Bear Lake, our project team has transitioned into the final design and property acquisition phase, with the ultimate goal of construction being a two-year construction season in 2028 and 2029. It is noted that since we were last in front of you with this project, the 2028 construction year has been pushed from the start of 2027, which was specifically requested by our city partners and recommended by our project team. The $7 million of regional solicitation funds mentioned previously will not be jeopardized by this shift of the anticipated construction year start. In June of 2025, the Washington County Public Works Department issued a request for proposals to provide the final design engineering services for this project identified in the capital improvement plan. Public Works received four proposals from qualified firms to perform design services for this reconstruction project. The proposal evaluation committee included representatives from both Ramsey and Washington Counties, who reviewed all proposals on a qualification-based selection with criteria including the quality of the proposal, understanding of the project's objectives, the proposer's work plan, project approach, and proposed project schedule Qualification and availability of the specified project team and similar project experience. Through this process, Public Works, in partnership with Ramsey County, selected Kimley-Horn as the final design consultant. The services included in Kimley-Horn's scope are project coordination, agency and public involvement, drainage analysis and design, ADA design, specific emphasis on construction staging and development of detour plans, completing permit applications, producing construction documents, and calculating estimated project costs. An initial contract amendment was executed for additional environmental documentation services, which resulted from federal environmental investigation requirements, and in accordance with the Washington County strategic plan's objective to develop and implement climate change strategies and policies to improve community resiliency and sustainability of natural resources. A second contract amendment is recommended for out-of-scope work resulting from progressing the municipally approved project improvements. It is noted that the rate for the services of the contracted professional design services staff will remain the same as the initial contract, but the total maximum amount of the contract is recommended to increase by $407,850. Regarding the project financials, the current project revenue budget is $2 million. If we total the already spent construction costs from the previous project phases, today's current board actions, and the anticipated property acquisition cost, our remaining project budget is approximately $1.5 million. Our project budget is approximately short $1.5 million, so Public Works is recommending a budget amendment to fund the second design contract amendment and the delta in the land acquisition costs using additional local contributions and turn-back fund balance. We would like to note that Ramsey County will be funding their portion of the design, including all contract amendments, which will be executed once the final construction costs are determined per Public Works' usual process. Cost share agreements with Ramsey County and all project cost participators will be brought to the board for consideration at a later date. With that, Public Works recommends four board actions for the Century North reconstruction project this morning. The first two are to approve budget amendments to make more funding available for the project budget via turn-back fund balance and local contributions. The third is to approve a second contract amendment to the final design contract with Kimley-Horn, and the fourth is to adopt a resolution to acquire the necessary right of way and associated easements for the project improvements. This concludes my prepared presentation, Madam Chair, and I will now stand for any questions. Thank you. Commissioner Karwoski. Thank you, Madam Chair. To get this before us, I'll make a motion for the first item, and the motion is to approve the budget amendment to increase the planning design budget using turn-back fund balance in the amount of $408,000. Second. Moved and seconded. Commissioner Karwoski. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Blalock, for the presentation. I know you worked on this project a long time. This is part of what we have those turn-back projects that are planned for many years. This falls into that case. So they're well-planned, and this has potential to finally happen. It is a shared project with Ramsey County. I do like the aspect that often the case along Century Avenue, or commonly known as 120, that Washington County takes the lead in the design and managing it. And Ramsey County's a great partner, but I really like when our department, our road public works takes the leadership. Just some highlights. This really does spur a lot of good redevelopment. We've worked closely with Mahtomedi around the 694 area on a redevelopment project that's being spurred by this kind of investment. It also keeps a trucking firm, not UPS, I forget, but in the area and growing, and it provides a lot of safety there for the trucking company. Century College, it provides not only for residents, it provides trails on both sides. It really lacks trails, so it's really a great upgrade for public safety. I know that one of the details that still needs some work would be the roundabout plan at County 12 and 120. There's just concerns about how to do that. That's going to be a major roundabout, a major intersection. And as mentioned by Ms. Blalock, it was delayed one year to accommodate Mahtomedi's schedule, and we still are getting the work done. I believe in '27, we can get a head start. So it's Not critical that we keep to '27 and we extend the project into '28. So overall, a lot of work. Got to thank our public work staff and our partners along the route, primarily Mahtomedi. I appreciate the support on this. Commissioner Miron. Yeah, thank you. I'm happy to support this. I know that this has consumed a lot of Commissioner Karwoski's time. You've attended significant meetings. I had a conversation with Mayor Brainerd in Mahtomedi. You mentioned about delaying it to accommodate their schedule a little more and that type of thing. Just so much appreciate your leadership on this project. I want to talk a little bit, because I think this project is very similar in many ways to what we just approved in our last item from a transparency and public engagement item. I just jotted down a few notes as Aaron was presenting, but this project was in our capital improvement plan. That requires a public hearing. But the budgeted funding for this obviously comes through a public hearing process with budgeting and that type of thing. Reference was made to our strategic plan, which has been a very public process, people involved in that. Our pavement condition index and the discussion about that. The funding requests that are made from other agencies and all of the public engagement involved in those funding requests. The work with the local governing agencies. We mentioned Mahtomedi. All of the discussion that's occurred at public meetings and presentations that have been done. The community engagement with respect to the needs of these corridors and the design that goes on. The public bidding process, which is a public process, and the public is invited to present there. All of the permit applications that we go through, those are all public processes. So these projects are vetted in a very public way and then, of course, our discussion today at a public meeting as well. And there are significant issues of public engagement that I'm not mentioning here today. But there is, on all of these projects, significant public engagement and transparency in the work that we're doing. Thank you. Commissioner Clausen. Thank you. I'm going to be opposing the Century Avenue North project in the amount of $1.8 million. In December, I voted against the CIP because I don't believe the process, planning, and project selection has been equitable or fully transparent. That is why I continue to advocate for a citizens' advisory board for the CIP. Thank you. Commissioner Cox. Thank you, Madam Chair. Ms. Blalock, thanks for the presentation. I just appreciate all the partnerships that have had to make this happen with the state, with Ramsey County. It's good to see this project started, and I'm happy to vote in support. Thank you, Ms. Blalock. I just also want to lift up Commissioner Karwoski's leadership in securing $7 million in the regional solicitation process, and that is really helpful in these projects, just like the last one. And I think to Commissioner Miron's point about transparency, every single project that we support or oppose go through the same process. And so I appreciate staff's work and the local stakeholders, too, who their staff takes time to coordinate with our staff and make sure that we have open houses and get public feedback. So thank you. Seeing no further discussion, all in favor of approving the budget amendment, say aye. Aye. Opposed, say nay. Nay. Motion carries four, one. Commissioner Karwoski. Thank you. Item two, I'll make a motion to approve the budget amendment to increase the local contribution and turnback funds in the total amount of $1,458,000. Second. Moved and seconded. Discussion? Seeing none, all in favor, say aye. Aye. Opposed, say nay. Nay. Motion carries four, one. Commissioner Karwoski. For item three, I'll make a motion to approve amendment number two to the contract number 17-654 with Kimley-Horn in the amount of $407,850 for final design services. Second. I'll give that one to Commissioner Cox. Discussion? Seeing none, all in favor, say aye. Aye. Opposed, say nay. Nay. Motion carries four, one. And then the final item, Commissioner Karwoski. Thank you, Madam Chair. Item four, the final item, I'll make a motion to adopt a resolution to acquire a right of way for construction of the project. Second. I helped you out there. Any discussion? Seeing none, clerk will take the roll. Commissioner Miron? Aye. Commissioner Karwoski? Aye. Commissioner Cox? Aye. Commissioner Clausen? Nay. Commissioner Bigham? Aye. Resolution passes four, one. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Bladelock. All right. Next up on the agenda is General Administration Administrator Corbid. Do you want to introduce the next item? Madam Chair and commissioners, Item A under General Administration will be presented by Stephanie Suter, Public Health Senior Program Manager. Awesome. Welcome, Ms. Suter. Good morning, Madam Chair and commissioners. Excuse me. My name is Stephanie Suter, a senior program manager in public health and environment. I'm here to provide a brief update on an item Commissioner Miron brought to the county board's attention at the June 23rd board meeting. For way of background, the Plumbing Board, which is within the Minnesota Department of Labor and Industry, proposed changes to the plumbing code this spring that would prohibit the use of stormwater as an alternative source of water for irrigation unless it was treated to drinking water standards. Other proposed code changes would make stormwater drainage piping, pumps, and distribution systems, like irrigation systems, of such practices subject to additional plumbing code restrictions. These proposed changes would be a major shift away from current practices. These types of projects are already regulated and overseen by state agencies like the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency, Department of Natural Resources, and Minnesota Department of Health. Water reuse projects are a tool for managing stormwater runoff from public projects. These projects assist entities like cities and counties, including Washington County, in meeting stormwater volume control requirements and can reduce groundwater pumping needs for irrigation. County staff from Public Health and Environment, Public Works, and Parks have all been made aware of this issue and its potential impacts and are monitoring the situation. Once these potential changes were discovered, a broad coalition of stakeholders has been forming in opposition. This includes Minnesota Watersheds, which is the statewide association for watershed districts, watershed districts themselves, the Minnesota Nursery and Landscape Association, other associations for large irrigators, like golf courses and ski resorts, Public Works and Parks Associations, League of Minnesota Cities, and many others. Commissioner Miron brought this issue on the potential rule changes to the county board on June 23rd as part of commissioner reports after they were discussed at a Clean Water Council meeting in June. That same day, on June 23rd, staff from our department, Adriana Hutchinson, attended a special plumbing board meeting to listen in and provide comments on the proposed changes. Our comments focused on a request to pause the changes and defer to existing state agencies, reiteration of the county's support for safe water reuse as stated in the county's groundwater plan, and that the county has successfully partnered with watershed districts and cities on several reuse projects in the past. There were approximately 30 public comments from various organizations, including many of our partners, local watershed districts, the City of Hugo, Lake Elmo, and the Clean Water Council. State agencies also provided comment. Due to those many public comments, the plumbing board voted to rescind prior authorization of Chapter 15, where these changes would take place, and they are reconvening an ad hoc rulemaking committee and will reopen a request for action, which is their process for receiving public comment on proposed rule changes. County staff will continue to monitor this issue and work with partner organizations to advocate for safe and feasible water reuse, which can provide benefits from both a water quality and quantity perspective. This group of stakeholders is convening again next week to discuss next steps and possible submissions for request for action as part of the process that the plumbing board follows. Our staff, along with Public Works, will continue to monitor these efforts and will coordinate with county administration if there are any actions requested from the county board in the future. Depending on where these rule changes go or don't go, there could be potential legislative discussion later this year or into next year. And that's it for my brief report. I'm happy to answer any questions. Thank you. Commissioner Miron. Yeah. Thank you. I just so much appreciate representation from Public Health and Environment, Public Works at that meeting. It was obviously during a county board meeting, and as policymakers, we weren't able to be there, but I appreciate the slowdown of the process here and the recognition to take broader public comment on this issue. As you pointed out, Stephanie, just a significant impact to both water quality and water quantity within Washington County. These changes in plumbing code are going to have a significant effect on both of those issues moving forward. And so I appreciate your continued watchful eye on this issue. I've got a lot of faith in the work that you do and your understanding of the policy that this board has created and taken on and the support for the local communities. This change in code just has such an impact on investments that our local communities have made in the way of water reuse. And then, as we look at from a Clean Water Council perspective, the amount of funding of the legacy funds over the years that have gone toward this, and then the potential impacts if this code were not to change from what it's being proposed. So just appreciate the update and the recognition of the importance of this issue by this board. Thank you. Commissioner Cox. Thank you, Madam Chair Thank you, Ms. Suter. I appreciate the quick response on this. We heard about it and your team just stepped into action. And I just really appreciate that. I also attended the Valley Branch Watershed District meeting that same week, and Administrator Hanson also shared an update on that project. And so that board of managers was very interested in how this was going to move forward, as water reuse is just something that I think Washington County and others within the state of Minnesota have really prided themselves on to preserve and protect our environment in different ways. So thank you again for your work, and I appreciate you staying on this. Yeah. Commissioner Clausen? Thank you. Thank you for sharing this information. It sounds like a significant issue, and a large effect and impact. And it also sounds complex. I ask that if administration wants to provide information, that a report be shared in the agenda. I also ask that administration from now on have a report in writing so that we all can understand what's going to be in front of us, and we can prepare for the agenda and that presentation. Thank you. Thank you. My question regarding this is, Met Council, are they at the table on this? Madam Chair, yes. Met Council did attend the same plumbing board meeting. I don't believe they provided public comment. I'm not positive on that. But Metropolitan Council and the other state agencies who are already involved in water reuse, the MPCA, the DNR, and the Minnesota Department of Health, all have been made aware of these same changes and are at the same table sharing information. Okay. Thank you. And then I just want to thank Commissioner Miron for bringing the attention to this and staff's quick action on it. I want to echo those comments because there's a few of those boards that are appointed. They have actually pretty broad authority. I think electricians are the other board that's coming to the top of my head besides plumbing code. So, I just appreciate the watchful eye on this and then just the broad stakeholder group that quickly came together on it, because I think you have strength in numbers, and clearly it worked. And appreciate the leadership on this from Washington County. Commissioner Miron. Well, it worked to the extent that they're looking at it more closely, but obviously there still likely will be a push from the plumbers union on this particular issue. I just wanted to respond to your question with respect to the Met Council because those state agencies, including the Met Council, are all part of the Clean Water Council. Yeah. And we did have Jen Cater, our administrator of the Clean Water Council, speak on this particular issue. But I do think, similar to Washington County, my position on the Clean Water Council is representing Metro Counties. Sure. So as a county now, we're weighing in on this, and I'm hoping that some of the other organizations that are part of the Clean Water Council also weigh in. Yeah. And I think that's where drawing attention to this issue is really important. Sounds good. Thank you, Ms. Suter. Thank you. Administrator Corbid, anything else? Madam Chair, the only thing else I have is just a short scheduling update. Next week, July 14th, we will have a fairly short board meeting. I expect that will be done prior to noon, probably quite a bit prior to noon. And then on July 21st, the board does not meet. That is the week that many of the commissioners will be out at the National Association of Counties conference. And then on July 28th, there's a workshop-only meeting. We have moved one of the budget workshop hearings of the Community Development Agency to that day to help manage our schedule for the following week, because on the August 4th meeting, we will start with an overview of the county's proposed recommended budget by Deputy Administrators Lucke and Wagenius. And so we've asked the CDA to present theirs on the 28th just to manage the workload a little bit. August meetings and the beginning of September meetings are all going to be fairly lengthy because the number of budget workshops that we will have as each of the departments presents their recommended budget to the county board at that time. So just a short update on scheduling. That's all I have to report. Thank you. Anything for Administrator Corrid? Okay. We will move on to commissioner reports. Commissioner Miron. Thank you, Madam Chair. Metropolitan Mosquito Control District executive committee meeting met. We're making recommendations to the full Mosquito Control Board on a records retention schedule that we reviewed, and our attorney for mosquito control had an opportunity to review along with staff. We also reviewed our project bid process. We've got a number of capital improvement projects that we're going through and had good discussion about our bidding process there. We also reviewed a study that we'd done internally on non-union compensation, and then also had some budget discussion that will be reported to the full commission. Partnership on Waste Energy met. Both you, Madam Chair, and I were in attendance at that. We did our budget review. We also reviewed our 2025 annual report, and then we had discussion on our legislative update and potential brainstorming for legislative issues coming up in 2026. I was able to attend, in Anoka County, a celebration ribbon-cutting ceremony for the improvements that were made by Walters company on their transfer station expansion there. Those upgrades are going to accommodate the work that we're doing within our food scrap pickup program. I know we've got a workshop coming up today on that particular issue. That program was rolled out into Northern Washington County here the 6th of July. And the AI technology and the improvements that Walters did at that transfer station are allowing us to expand that program. So, it was good to be there. It was also really refreshing to hear the comments from Anoka County about the leadership that Washington County and Ramsey County is providing in the way of waste management and environmental protection by our efforts on recycling and the work that we're doing. So, it was fun to be there. I had an opportunity to not only represent the Recycling and Energy Board at that meeting, but Washington County in providing some comments there. Attended just a meeting with some staff on a conservation easement request, and then this morning we had a personnel meeting. Those items were on the agenda today. That's all I have, Madam Chair. Thank you. Commissioner Cox. Thank you, Madam Chair. I was able to attend an Xcel Energy Allen S. King Plant update meeting, where there were some great presentations by some environmental groups actually. Planning Advisory Commission and Board of Adjustment and Appeals had a meeting. Then SCHSAC, sorry, I didn't write down what SCHSAC stands for. It's our public health group. I was able to attend that meeting with Director Brummel. And the Metro Caucus voted me onto the executive committee, so I will be serving on that committee till the end of the year. And then this morning's personnel committee. Thanks. Commissioner Karwoski. Thank you, Madam Chair. Since our last meeting was the 4th of July, relatively light schedule relative to formal meetings. But I did have several constituent meetings. Two of these were regarding water, and Stephanie Suter, who presented just a short while ago, really did a great job helping one of those constituents out with what was the county role in providing water, groundwater management plan, and our insight into the 3M settlement with PFAS, and that the cities provide water, and really provided some strong direction to this resident to work with the city on their knowledge about PFAS and their wells. Also, had a watershed meeting with a constituent who had concerns, and I'll be working with that watershed to address those concerns. Summerfest was last week. That's Oakdale Summerfest. So I spent a lot of time in the community with that celebration, and then had several staff meetings, and that's all I have to report. Thank you. Commissioner Clausen. Yeah, thank you. It was a really fun weekend. 4th of July and celebrating 250 years of being a country. The city of Woodbury had a really nice fireworks event. I know many of us experienced weather, which unfortunately some of us didn't see a lot of fireworks. But, I also was able to talk to constituents, and also my representatives in the community this last week. And I'm enjoying getting to know what the concerns really are currently in Woodbury as we continue to meet constituents. And so, traffic is still number one issue, and roads, as we know. And we have heard complaints on Bailey Road, Casa 18. And the condition of the crack seal that's in front of a $60 million math and science school, it looks like it is not up to the task of bringing on those additional students. I do not think that the condition of the pavement will be secure and safe. I do have concerns about it, and if anybody wants to visit, by all means, go and visit the road yourself and go look at it. For a $60 million road, the crack and seal it's just not gonna do it. That area sees hundreds of thousands of visitors every year, with East Ridge High School right there as well. So, I do believe we'll have ongoing issues with those roads, and that is one of the four roads that the county has in the city. We only have four in Woodbury. So, yeah. Thank you. So last week, or this week, I'm sorry, we had the African-American Family Preservation Act statewide group, and the department, DCYF, did announce that they won't be ready for statewide guidance. That's always fun. And we're going to just keep pushing on. So- Anywho about that. Yesterday there was a town hall with Attorney General Ellison and Senator Seeberger that was really a good turnout. Lot of consumer protection questions, which is in our lane. But he did receive questions about PFAS and the litigation and the status of that, and he did mention that he's going to have a specific town hall in Cottage Grove for that. And I appreciate Council Member Olson bringing that up. And the lawsuits regarding SNAP and a lot of the other federal funding that impacts counties was brought up as well. I had the NACO Public Safety Committee meeting where we went over resolutions for NACO annual conference in a couple of weeks. We had the AMC board of directors. We approved the fee per diem, membership fee, I guess, for counties at that meeting. And then we also had the June audit committee meeting, and then as we do every year, we will have that before the board sometime this summer. Then next is board correspondence, and we do not have any board correspondence. Prior to adjournment, I want to say that we have two workshops. We have a continuation of the mandates and core functions workshops. I believe this is the last one of them, and I just really want to give gratitude to staff for putting this together. This is extremely helpful discussing this, especially they're going to be on camera here about the budget and how over 80% of our budget is mandated spending. I just appreciate you guys going through that before we really dive into the budget here. Then the next item is an update on the recycling and energy food scrap pickup program, and it's going to be easier to just stay here in the board chamber. And so we will not break. We'll just continue on. I believe Ms. Garlitz is aware of that, who's here today on behalf of R&E. So, seeing no further items before the board, we are adjourned. There you go, Commissioner Cox. Do you want to start right away? We will take a minute, like five-minute, 10-minute, five-minute recess. All right. We will go ahead and get started with the 2026 Mandates and Core Functions Workshop, starting with administration and Deputy Administrator Jan Lucke. Thank you. Good morning, Madam Vice Chair and commissioners. I am pleased to kick off the Internal Services Mandates and Core Functions Workshop today. We are the closer to your series, and I will present the Office of Administration's mandates and core functions in my dual role as department director for the Office of Administration, and then others will follow in roughly alphabetical order by department. So that'll be Cat Piepho from Accounting and Finance, Jodi Brown from Human Resources, and Adam Larson from Information Technology. The internal services are predominantly supported by a levy, and the Office of Administration is no exception. On this slide, our other taxes includes transmission line tax revenue. It's a state-determined tax that benefits the county. We use a portion of that revenue to support operational costs in the Office of Administration. Intergovernmental revenue includes the grant from the Les Hard Sams Outdoor Heritage Council for our natural land restoration and the State of Minnesota Award for submitting performance indicators to the state Our other financing sources include supplemental requests that were approved last budget cycle using one-time funds, including the comp plan, comprehensive plan, the Climate Action Plan Analysis for the Land and Water Legacy program, and a new county video. Moving on to expenditures, most of our expenditures are in personnel services. The services and charges line item includes those consultant and contractor, the work that I mentioned on the previous slide, with the largest efforts being that natural lands restoration, the Climate Action Plan, and the comprehensive plan. Our mandated services is approximately 55% of our work in the Office of Administration, and core functions being the remaining 45% of our work. Our mandated services are broken down into organizational leadership, which includes staff time, AMC, MICA, and NACO memberships, and our legislative work. County board of commissioners and board meetings includes staff time to support commissioners, our civic clerk contracts, and communications and technology to support board meetings. Our budget development and financial management includes staff time to develop and administer the countywide budget, and our contract with OpenGov for our budget software. We have a few examples of discretionary spending within Office of Administration mandated services. Cutting back on organizational leadership would result in diminished leadership and administrative support for the county board and departments, as well as access to AMC, MICA, NACO, and the resources available through those memberships. Under budget development and financial management, the law does not require us to publish a budget book. However, without it, budget information would be less accessible to the public, and we would miss the opportunity for national recognition of our budget work. We're never shy of sharing that our Washington County budget book has received 27 consecutive awards from the Government Accounting and Finance Association. Finally, under board meetings, the law does not require us to record, broadcast county board meetings, offer closed captioning, media releases, or social media posts on board agendas. However, without this service, residents and businesses would have diminished access to county board discussion and decision-making. The Office of Administration's core functions are bucketed into six areas. I will talk a little more about these on the next slide. But as a reminder, as mentioned, our Land and Water Legacy program receives grant funding from the Lars Sams outdoor Heritage Fund, and we receive that small amount of funding, non-levy revenue, for our state performance indicators that you approved in June. So we have several examples of core functions with county discretionary spending. I'll walk you through each one. We are not required to have an internal auditor. However, without this function, there would be less real-time feedback to the organization, its employees, and the Audit Advisory Committee. Many of our planning efforts are also discretionary. We've highlighted a few on the screen. The Climate Action Plan, the signage study, continuity of operations planning, and strategic planning. And without the Land and Water Legacy program, Washington County park boundaries may not expand to reach the full public vision detailed in their parks master plans. It would also be more difficult to preserve natural lands that protect surface and groundwater and wildlife habitat. Many of our employee and public engagement activities are also considered discretionary. However, we find them critical to organizational development. Our employee engagement survey provides important employee feedback that we use for training, communication, and employee recognition needs. Our employee engagement events, such as those delivered by our employee resource groups, provide important opportunities to build connection and understanding. And our public engagement events provide critical outlets to disseminate information about programs and resources and gather feedback on county planning initiatives. The website redesign project includes many enhancements that are not required but will significantly improve user experience, including online transactions for residents to pay for services and products remotely, a chatbot that will provide real-time answers to visitor questions, and webcams that provide real-time information on construction projects. And finally, performance measurement is not mandated. However, eliminating our performance measurement activities would impede the use of data to enhance programs and services. With that, Madam Vice Chair, I am happy to stand for questions or pass the baton to Kat Piepho, Director of Accounting and Finance. Thank you for the presentation, Deputy Administrator Lucke. Any thoughts, comments? All right. Well done. Director Piepho, welcome to the podium. Thank you, Madam Vice Chair, and good morning, Madam Vice Chair and members of the board. I'm Kat Piepho, Accounting and Finance Director. I'm here to talk about mandates and core functions for accounting and finance, as well as debt services. All right. As you can see from this slide, both departments rely heavily on levied dollars. However, AFD does receive a little bit of non-levied revenues from rebates relating to our virtual credit card program, and we also charge a small fee for bookkeeping services to the public safety radio. And occasionally, we collect recoveries from our collections area. In 2025, we did use a little bit of fund balance from our debt service to maintain a stable debt levy level. So that's why it's a big number under the miscellaneous revenues in 2025. As far as expenditures, debt services makes up for more than 80% of total spending across both departments. The remaining portion covers AFD's operating needs, mainly personnel costs, along with services and charges such as audit fees, software licenses, training and development, and materials and supplies. When we look at our mandated services, it's important to note that even in areas where the county has some initial discretion, such as choosing whether to issue debt, the related requirements become mandatory once that decision is made. Beyond debt-related requirements, AFD's core functions, such as paying invoices, processing payroll, procuring contracts, investing county funds, and preparing financial reports, they're all mandated by either state and/or federal regulations. Meeting these mandates requires meaningful investment, including staff time, software licensing, and continuous training and development to maintain accuracy, compliance, and service reliability. These two departments really don't have core functions because every function within AFD is mandated, and there are mandates relating to debt once issued. When we look at discretionary spending within mandated programs, I've listed three key areas where the board could exercise meaningful choices. These decisions don't change the underlying mandates, but they do influence how effectively and sustainably the county is able to meet them. The first major area of discretionary spending relates to how we choose to finance long-term infrastructure. Historically, the county has issued about $30 million in bonds every four years to support capital projects that keep our facilities, technology, and equipment functioning at the level needed to deliver mandated services. While the decision to issue bonds is fully at the board's discretion, the underlying infrastructure required to meet service obligations is not optional. Bonding strategically allows us to spread the cost of long-lived assets over the taxpayers who will use them, helping preserve current resources and maintain stable operations. If the board chooses to authorize a smaller bonding amount, it may delay critical projects, which can result in aging facilities and/or outdated equipment, ultimately affecting the quality, safety, and efficiency of services provided to residents. A second area of discretion for the board involves how and when to invest in modern financial systems that support our mandated operations. As the county evaluates options for updating its financial system, the board will determine whether to move forward with new technology, select among solutions with varying capabilities and costs, or choose to maintain the current system for now. Modern financial systems are essential for compiling and managing financial data efficiently and accurately. Investing in updated tools strengthens internal controls, supports timely and informed decision-making, and ensures departments, leadership, and the public receive reliable financial information. A third area where the board could exercise discretion is in the level of financial transparency that the county chooses to provide beyond statutory requirements. While Minnesota law requires counties to prepare annual financial statements, the county is not obligated to produce an annual comprehensive financial report, or what we call the ACFR, and it's not obligated to produce the popular annual financial report, PAFR. But preparing these more detailed reports is a discretionary choice, but one that offers significant value. Both the ACFR and PAFR enhance transparency for residents and stakeholders by presenting clear, accessible, and comprehensive information about the county's financial position. In addition, credit rating agencies view these reports favorably, as they reflect strong financial management practices, which can positively influence borrowing costs. With that, Madam Vice Chair, I will stand for questions. Otherwise, I'll hand the baton off to Jodi Brown, HR. Thank you, Director Piepho. Commissioner Bigham will start us off. Thank you, Madam Vice Chair, and thank you, Director Piepho. Probably one of the most important things we can do is shine light on our financial transactions, our budgets, and let people know the processes that we have. And I am a proponent of updating your software. I've never made that a secret, and I think that that can only benefit our residents and benefit your staff. And- I don't know if you say this enough, but when we have such high standards and recognition for 39, well, soon to be 39 years, sorry, I think that was a surprise, of having the triple crown of financial reporting, that saves our taxpayers money. Correct. Because we have a AAA bond rating in both bonding houses, and so all of that saves money, and a key component of that is the transparency and the processes that we've set up. And I'm going to say it again that since you've joined the team, too, there's been, I think, a very thorough review of those processes and everything that you do and have been updated and modernized and just appreciate that efficiency because I think it just goes to show that in the long term, it gives us credibility within the public, within those bonding rating houses and agencies. And also we lead. And that's an example that is worth holding up. So thank you to you and your team. Thank you, Commissioner. All right. I think I'll wrap this up. I just have one comment, which is thank you for explaining debt service a little bit more. It's a big number when we look at the overall budget, and I just appreciate you walking us through why we do it. The facilities that are required for us to do the mandated services, I think, was just a really nice way of wrapping up why we invest in our facilities and why we take on the debt services in such a responsible way. So I just appreciate that extra piece that you shared there today. Thank you. Thank you. Yeah. All right. Ms. Jodi Brown from HR will take over next. All right. Good morning. I'll go through the human resources elements of our Mandates and Core Functions Workshop series. This slide is a summary of the HR department revenues. You will notice that 98.1% of revenue in the HR department comes from the levy. Moving on to the department expenditures. Most of the department expenditures are in personnel costs. Human resources is the smallest department in the county with 19 employees, and represents less than 1% of the county-wide total for expenditures. This also shows that 100% of the expenditures are also in mandated services. You will perhaps notice in this slide that the mandated services does not match the total department expenditures. A large portion of this difference represents costs associated with post-employment benefits, which includes retiree health insurance provided to employees hired before 2001, as well as the county's contributions to health savings accounts with employees that have high-deductible health plans. Also included are costs related to COBRA administration and broker consultant fees. These costs are also not reflected in the HR department operational budget. Moving on to mandated services. Services provided by human resources are either mandated by federal or state law, or through labor contracts of which the county board has authorized. Public sector unionized organizations must comply with a broad range of federal and state employment laws, including Fair Labor Standards Act, which establishes minimum wage, overtime, and record-keeping. Family and Medical Leave Act, which provides job-protected leave for qualifying family and medical reasons. Anti-discrimination laws such as Title VII of Civil Rights, Americans with Disabilities Act, Age Discrimination in Employment Act, and the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination. Additional requirements include workplace safety obligations under OSHA, employment verification, equal pay protections, rights for employees serving in the military, and then finally, public employers in Minnesota must also comply with several state-specific requirements, such as Public Labor Relations Act governing collective bargaining, Minnesota Human Rights Act, Minnesota OSHA, paid leave, earned sick and safe leave, wage theft prevention, Minnesota data practices, and state laws providing veterans preference and various other paid and unpaid leave entitlements. These federal and state mandates shape nearly all core HR functions and obligations within public organizations, and each of the line items show that the cost related to administering each employment-related function of which HR is responsible. And then again, the costliest mandated service in HR is overseeing employee benefits, which include retiree health insurance, health savings accounts, costs related to COBRA administration, and broker consultant fees. Because nearly all HR work is mandated by law, we do not have separate core functions in the traditional sense. Our responsibilities are integrated and driven primarily by the statutory contractual requirements. Looking at any sort of county discretionary spending opportunities would potentially include learning and organizational development. The potential service impact to not offering some or all of these programs or functions would be possible reduction in employee efficiency, effectiveness, engagement, and potentially an increase in employee turnover. For wellness program, service impact would potentially include the same things, efficiency, effectiveness, engagement, increased employee turnover, and then the additional element of potential increased health insurance premium costs. And then another function example would maybe be the recruitment marketing, with a service impact could possibly include increase in time to hire, impacting department efficiency and effectiveness, possibly decline in both total applicants and the number of highly qualified applicants. And with that, I'd be happy to try to answer any questions for the board. Thank you, Ms. Brown, for your presentation today. It looks like everyone is happy with what they've heard. I also just want to share a thank you to your department, and I hope that I get this correct. I know I'll be corrected if I'm not, but your team, small but mighty team, navigated the union negotiations for all 10, 12 unions that we have here at the county this year for three years. And so I just want to also just share a quick thank you, since you're standing here today for that. Thank you so much for that. All right. Next on board is Adam Larson from the IT department. Thank you. Fantastic. Last but definitely not least, because none of the other presentations would have happened so nicely on the technology in here if it weren't for Director Larson. That does sound like a core function, so. Good morning, Madam Vice Chair and Commissioners. I'm Adam Larson. I'm the IT director here at the county. I'm here to present the mandates and core functions for the IT department. So without further ado, this slide here shows that IT is almost completely funded by levy. The $9,800 that you see as non-levy is from some fees that we charge Bayport Library for support and some reimbursements from Met Council for GIS datasets. Let's see. This slide here shows that department expenditures went from 9.6 million to 9.8 million, or a 2.2% increase. Like my counterparts, the bulk of our expenditures are related to personnel services at about 85%. Security is the only directly mandated service that we're required to perform. This includes things such as identity and access management, intrusion detection, security training and awareness, and the overall security of our applications, data, and network resources. Core functions is where the bulk of our work is, and it should be noted that our core functions are in place so that the rest of the county can do their mandates and core functions. Included in the core functions is IT administration, infrastructure, support services, collaborations and data, and IT projects and solutions. These line up with the individual divisions within IT. So, as an example, there's no mandate for us to have a network infrastructure, but services such as communications, accepting credit cards, connectivity to state and federal services are pretty hard to do without a reliable network. Let's see here. We did do some brainstorming on where there's some discretionary spending within our mandates and core functions. There really isn't any discretionary spending that we could cut or look to cut in our security function. Doing so would increase risk for cyberattack or data breaches. And... Oh, wow. We'll skip that. One area we were looking to save money at in our core functions is extending the lifespans of our equipment, our servers, and our laptops. Unfortunately, this has been forced upon us with the shortages, so we are struggling to buy equipment. And then we're not actually seeing savings because the cost of the equipment has gone up so much. As an example, a standard laptop in 2025 cost us about $1,300. Our current price for the exact same laptop is $2,467. So it's $1,100 more per system in a year, and they're going up about every three months. So another area we identified where we could reduce some discretionary spending is by reducing our on-call and off-hour support. Decreased hours would reduce the need for overtime and staff working weekends and holidays and evenings, but it would also require other staff to have to wait for the next business day for a lot of their issues to be resolved, and even their passwords to be reset. So that's the summary of our mandates and core functions. I can stand for any questions, or I can bring Adam or Jodi back up to answer any questions as well. Thank you, Director Larson. Commissioner Bigham will start us off. Thank you. Thank you, Director Larson. This is another example of how prevention saves us money, and a cyberattack or ransomware attack would cost us a lot of money if we weren't up to date on our software that prevents all of that. And I think that it is expensive, and there's reasons for that, but I believe that making sure we have the appropriate and secure technology for our residents to be able to do transactions, for example, with our staff here is very important. I've said this before that you can go to any retailer and buy whatever you want, but you only have one place to pay your taxes and different things like that, that there's an expectation of being secure. So, just appreciate that and wanted to lift that up, that prevention saves saves us money. Commissioner Miron, then Commissioner Clausen. Yeah, and to that point that Commissioner Bingham's making, this board has made a concerted effort to really invest in IT in recent years. It's been a significant increase and an important part of our annual budget. But I think it really has been prudent for us to do the work that we're doing. And the only suggestion I would make is that we spend a little less time doing these trainings things. Commissioner Clausen. Yeah, I actually agree with that. I've gotten many training requests, which I already did them, so I don't understand why I have to do them again. So I support IT, but I think it's really important that as commissioners, we ask questions. And so my question is, do we issue laptops to every new employee? No. I would say laptops and desktops are issued based on need. So depending on the role of the person, they would or would not receive a computer. Some of them share computers, things like front desks. I don't believe we issue laptops to lifeguards and that as well. Do we have an amount or a percentage that we know laptops are required for the position? And do we have, therefore, a plan in place in the next four years knowing what positions do need laptops? I do think that some positions can likely have an iPad with the amount of AI changes. I do think that's an opportunity. So I was just wondering, do you have that information, and are you using that to forecast? Well, Commissioner Clausen, so yes, we do have all the information. So we do have an accurate inventory of what we have out there. We do defer a lot to the department to decide what their staff need and what tools they should be using, and it's also based on the software and applications that they have to connect to. One thing I will say is that COVID changed a lot of the inventory. So a lot of people had to go home, and who could traditionally use a desktop or a less expensive computer was moved to a laptop. So as those are starting to age out, we'll be re-looking at all of that. Thank you. Commissioner Larson, just before Commissioner Karwoski steps in, we also have a, I'm not going to remember the exact name of the technology plan, but we have an IT essentially capital improvement type plan like the public works has, but for IT. Is that correct? Yes. The county technology plan. Thank you. Well, that was simple. Yeah. Commissioner Karwoski. Thank you, Madam Vice Chair. Director Larson, good presentation. Want to thank the other three previous directors on the presentations for these core functions. What I noticed on yours that struck me as really the only department where nothing was a mandate. Would it be ridiculous for us to assume this almost, I think we invest about 10 million a year, just short, in technology to operate the county and the computer systems and the automation that provide great service to our- Mm ... residents and security. I think what we spend here at the county seems to be similar to my 39 years in the private sector of computer technology, so you can do leading-edge service. So I found it interesting that it wasn't mandated by the government, but there's really no option to not make these investments in computer technology. So I like the answers you provided. I agree with the comments made by the other commissioners. I do think, though, in summary, because we won't have any more department presentations on these core functions, that it really provides us, one, great transparency to the residents, citizens watching, that there's nothing being hidden here. We'll be looking at... And this is a great lead-in to our budget review that starts up shortly. I know staff's been working on it for the last several months. And great lead-in to giving us insight for those more detailed budget reviews. So thank you. Thank you, Director Larson. You got a comment from all five of us. Nice work. Thank you. Thanks for everything. And then Administrator Corbid, and then hopefully we can maybe do some wrap-up comments just like Commissioner Karwoski did for all of the workshops. Madam Vice Chair, also on your desk today, we provided a one-page document. You'll notice that in the presentations, we have provided a number that gives you the percent of the expenditures by department for each of these areas. What we didn't include in the presentations was the percent of the total levy. So we've included both those items side by side. It gives you another kind of a way to look at how some departments are more levy-dependent than others, and those that have greater resources coming from outside or non-levy sources. So, for example, the sheriff's office at 12% of the total county budget, but it makes up 23.2% of the county levy. Conversely, the public health department at 7.5% of the county budget, and only 2% of the county levy. So it gives you some idea about how those resources are allocated throughout the organization differently And they don't always coincide. The higher budget, the more levy they're using. So just another way to think about the impact of the levy and mandated services throughout the organization. Thank you for providing that document. I know I was trying to add up the lines from the yellow on all the presentations, and I wasn't getting to 100, so I appreciate that. Commissioner Clausen. Yes. I have a follow-up to Kevin Corbid. You had stated that the public safety budget, is that reflective of the capital projects as well? So you had said that the budget was just in that one fund, but I don't believe that that's the case. I think that they also have money in the capital projects fund for 8.1 million. Madam Chair and Commissioner Clausen, the item that's listed on the bottom row as sheriff's office, that is mostly just its operating cost. There might be a small amount of capital in there as far as fleet or other items that'd be listed in that operating budget. But they also would have costs under both the capital repair fund, the capital projects fund, and the debt service item if we have a building project that relates to them. So yes, there'd be other public safety costs in multiple lines. Thank you for the clarification. All right. Would any of the commissioners like to share any comments about all of the presentations that we've had? Any wrap-up? Looks like Commissioner Bigham, please. Yeah. Thank you. I just, again, want to extend my gratitude for the work and the effort and the time that has gone into looking through these core and mandated services. I just think it's obviously, again, I'll say it, over 80% of our budget, so it's a lot of what we're going to be focused on in how we maintain the service and be mindful of the impact on the levy. And so I think one thing that might be helpful as we go through the process is if there is an adjustment to some of the core programs, that that maybe be highlighted for that change specifically, related to how that also may impact services. If it is recommended by administration that maybe we have the information as to what that impact may have on our residents. Any other thoughts? Commissioner Karwoski kind of got us started a little early. I appreciate that. I'll also just share my thanks to all of the county directors and then administrative staff. I see Cy and Trung here in the audience as well. None of this work would happen without those two, who are very kind and humble sitting there. Just thank you for everyone for being a part of this. I think the transparency that this shows is just a great lead-in to the budget. I like the thought of if during the budget presentations there are changes that have been made to the core functions, to maybe highlight those so that the board can see that a little bit more clearly. And we look forward to starting those presentations in August, I believe. I'm getting a nod. Yes. All right. Thank you, everyone. We will transition now to our next workshop. Pardon me while I wake my iPad back up. It looks like we are going to be talking about the Recycling and Energy Food Scraps Pickup Program, an update there. And I believe we have Ms. Garlitz, I sure hope I'm saying that correctly, to present. Welcome. Good morning, Madam Vice Chair, Madam Chair, and commissioners. My name is Annalee Garlitz. You had it right on. And I am with Ramsey/Washington Recycling and Energy, and I am the food scraps pickup program supervisor there. Here today to talk about the Food Scraps Pickup Program. We have some exciting announcements that have happened this week. But to start out, in case you haven't heard about it, the Food Scraps Pickup Program is a voluntary program for residents to participate in and is a way for residents of all household types to recycle food scraps from home. And this program is a coordinated effort between Ramsey/Washington Recycling and Energy, Washington County, and Ramsey County to help achieve, as one measure of a way of meeting the state goal of 75% recycling. And also the seven-county metro area communities have a state requirement of offering curbside compost to their residents by 2030. So this is how the two counties have joined together to meet that goal. Commissioner Miron mentioned that he was at a ribbon cutting last week for the Walters Transfer Station, and it is because of that ribbon cutting and the addition of the new sortation capabilities that we were able to roll out the program to all of Washington County now. Just yesterday, we were able to roll it out to 78,000 more households, which brings Washington County to 100% ability for residents to participate And so we've tried to make it as easy as possible for residents to participate. There's postcards are going out, they dropped in the mail yesterday to all residents in the new areas, and that alerts them to the fact that they can participate. I know county has been sending out a variety of things on social media. There's been newsletters. Commissioners should be receiving an update, commissioners in the new area will be receiving an update with some sample newsletter text today about the launch. And so what residents can do, there's two ways residents can sign up in the event you get questions from residents. They can go online, or they can call our customer service line. If they go online, our website is translated into five different languages. If they call our customer service line to order bags, we have translations available 24/7 at that line as well. So residents can order up to two free supplies of bags. Each supply contains 60 bags in it. So if you order 120, that's about two bags a week to put your food scraps in. Residents collect their food scraps, put it in their trash container. They tie it off, they put it in their trash container, and after that, the waste haulers haul it to the facilities that have sortation capacity. So right now, that is in Newport at R&E and up in Blaine where the Walters transfer station is. And I should note that if residents would like to order an additional beyond the two free supplies, they can purchase those for cost. And so this is just a map that shows happily that it is available in all of Washington County. And in addition to this rollout in Washington County, we also did launch to a bunch more communities in Ramsey County, so that was also exciting. And you'll see the gray area on the map. That is awaiting the completion of another transfer station, and so that will be the Waste Management transfer station, and they are in the process of building. I happened to go there and see it in the works. It is happening. And so we hope to be fully rolled out across the two counties by the end of 2027, so mid to end of 2027, which will be really exciting. And I should note that you see all the green areas on the map. Staff, I want to give a big kudos to Hannah Keller from Washington County. She has been working very closely with all of the communities and will continue to do so. She worked with them leading up to all the launches and to get everybody ready to make sure that the city recycling coordinators had everything they needed. We have a variety of materials prepared for them, for social media, for newsletters, any trial kits that they might need for residents. So she's been working very closely with them across the two counties and along with R&E. We've been doing events, presentations. We've set up display stands. We've been tabling at businesses across the two counties. There's just been a lot of work and a lot of outreach, and I know that Jamie Giesen from Washington County will be up next to share a little bit more about what's been happening in Washington County. Going forward, we will continue to work with the recycling coordinators. We're running marketing. There's a variety of things happening. And if any commissioners, I want to give a pitch for this, if any commissioners would like trial kits, brochures, or a yard sign to display in your yard that you're participating in the program, I hope everybody has signed up. I'll work with Hannah to get you those materials. And with that, I can stand for questions or happily turn it over to Ms. Giesen. Thank you, Ms. Garlets, for the presentation. Commissioner Clausen. Yeah. Thank you so much for coming here and presenting to us today. Can you remind me again on the St. Paul and Roseville, it's Eureka Recycling? Is it the complication with the contract, or what is exactly the reason why they're not on board yet? So Madam Vice Chair, Commissioner, it's not that they're not on board, it's that the Waste Man-- So we have a contract with Walters. Ramsey Washington Recycling and Energy has a contract with Walters and with Waste Management, and it's a matter of them building the actual facility that contains the tip floor and the robotics that will sort things out. So Walters, in the case of Washington County, happily, was completed first and Ramsey County's main transfer station, that Waste Management one, will be completed next. So that's the only, it's just the construction is what's happening. And so we're going to continue to roll out in phases. And so the first batch, once the Waste Management facility is updated or is completed, will be Roseville, Lauderdale, and Falcon Heights. Wow. And then to give them a chance, we've been rolling out in phases the whole time. And it's worked really nicely to be able to provide those communities the support, the attention, the outreach that they've needed to get started up in the program. So we'll do those three communities first, then it'll be St. Paul, and we'll need to give them ... a while to get going, to get started. We'll be rolling out by their wards. Okay. It'll be available for everybody, but we'll be sending postcards out in batches. And then you'll see very tiny gray spots on there where we share borders with Spring Lake Park and Saint Anthony Village. And so Spring Lake Park is part of Anoka, and then we have a shared border with Saint Anthony Village with Hennepin. And so they'll go after the Saint Paul launch, so we can work out any finer details as we go across a divided city. Do you have any updates on the percentage of participations today? Madam Vice Chair, Commissioner, I knew you would ask that question. I knew somebody would ask that question. Thank you. Yes. We are currently at 13% participation across the board. Great. Awesome. Which is really great. We're continuing to grow participation every week, every month. It's wonderful to see those numbers go up. And we're trying a variety of different tactics, a variety of different things. We're working with Biz Recycling, we're working with multi-units. We have technical support to work with multi-units at R&E, and we just received a grant from the Pollution Control Agency where we can purchase up to 15,000 bins with the grant money for residents in multi-units. And I know Washington County also is supplying residents with bins, but this will hopefully stretch everybody's bins a little bit farther, and we'll really be able to get them in the hands of residents in those multi-units. We, in my district, have several new senior buildings that are almost up to construction. Is that then something then staff goes, "Okay, so we have a large multifamily. We're going to go there and we're going to give the 1,500 recycling bins," and then I would hope the pickup program trial kit? Or maybe I should ask staff, Washington County, since you're Ramsey County, I guess. But is that something that our staff would do then? Madam Vice Chair and Commissioner, I wear the hat of both counties. Oh, okay. Yeah. So, what we do is we do indeed work. We go out, we contact the management company, and it's done through Biz Recycling. Okay. And so Biz Recycling will go out, and there's a variety of other services that we also offer multi-units to help increase recycling in those buildings and recycling visibility. And so there's a variety of grants that we have. And so we would do that outreach, let them know about all of the resources that are available to them, and then that includes recycling totes, that will include the food scraps bin that they can use, and it'll also come with two sample bags and information about how to sign up. Oh, great. Awesome. Thank you. Appreciate the updates. Yeah. Commissioner Miron and then Commissioner Karwoski. Thank you, Madam Vice Chair. That participation rate may seem low, but we are meeting what our expectations were when we rolled out this program, and I think in every community, right, AnnaLee? Madam Vice Chair and Commissioner, we are a little bit lower in the second and third-year participation. We blew the first-year expectation numbers out of the water. Initially, it was projected that we'd meet 10% participation increases, very neat and tidily every year. And so by the end of the fourth year, the goal was initially to achieve 40% participation. And so that's our goal. We had our first launch in our first phase of communities, October of 2023. So we would like to see more, but I think that as we've been rolling the program out, we've really been learning a lot about messaging, what entices different people to participate. We hit that 10% mark within the first three months of rolling out, and I'm expecting to see that happen again, if not quicker than three months. So that'll be a fun thing to learn with this most recent launch to see how quickly we can get to 10%. But I think our next step is not only to get people to sign up, but to make sure that we're keeping people engaged and then trying to figure out how we reactivate people who may have signed up and may not have ordered bags again for 15 months. So we have different plans in place for the reactivation, the retention, and the recruitment for the program. And I think it's worthwhile mentioning or reminding people that about 20% of our municipal solid waste is food waste. And so as we look at meeting our statutory goals of recycling, this really is going to be important in helping us meet that statutory requirement. So I'm excited about it. And then if we go back to your slide four, I think. Yep, you had it there. Right there. I think that item number four is going to be changed at some point in time, or maybe we should have a footnote on that slide that, AnnaLee, maybe you can remind us our schedule, where the food scraps will move from being composted to creating renewable natural gas. And we have a A contract with a private company. We broke ground this past spring on an anaerobic digester that we've received significant funding for. But it's going to provide an opportunity to use those food scraps for a higher use in the way of renewable natural gas. And our participation rates are going to be really, really critical when we reach that point because we have signed contracts to provide a certain amount of food scraps to keep that anaerobic digester functioning and working. And so AnnLee, could you just remind us when that is scheduled to come on board? Madam Vice Chair, Commissioner, it is scheduled, we're looking at 2028 for that. Like you said, it's currently under construction, and so we're looking for that to be up and running in '28. And as part of that, we are obligated to send 30,000 tons of food scraps to that facility from households. There's other tonnages that we need to send from other sources. There'll be organic rich material. We're also working to source and find other areas to get those food scraps to send to that facility. And so, we're trying to get as much as we can obligated to send to that facility. 30,000 tons doesn't have to arrive day one. It'll be phased in over time. Yep. And then just to remind people, these food scrap bags are compostable. A lot of effort was put into the testing and the creation of those bags. And then the neat thing about this program is on item three there, where you just put them in your trash. That's being picked up right now, so there's no need to send another truck around on another route to pick these up. It's put in the existing trash. The bags are designed to hold up in that process. When they're being picked up, they'll sustain whatever effort goes into picking them up, and then they'll sustain the dump off, whether it goes directly to a transfer station or to our plant. And then obviously they get moved to the location where they're being composted or eventually developed into renewable natural gas. So the bags are durable but compostable and certainly service well and hopefully, in this case, eliminate a lot of trucks on the road to do separate pickups and that type of thing. The program was really very well planned out. And just excited to see how the northern part of the county reacts to the opportunity here. Commissioner Karwoski. Thank you, Madam Vice Chair. A good presentation. Thanks for coming in. I think next, Washington County will present a little bit of insight for just Washington County. I have a few questions, comments, though, that I think are generic to the whole project. First, I want to thank Commissioner Miron, Commissioner Bigham, for serving on the Recycling Energy Board. A lot of difficult, challenging, a lot of decisions made, a lot of big investments, a lot of time by you two, and we've got Commissioner Cox as the alternate. Thank you three. Thanks for being at so many events because I think as commissioners, we like to get out in our community events, and it's surprising how many you make it to. So I think that's part of it, too, to keep getting out to events. The 100% for Washington County, as the map showed, that's impressive. So hopefully, more community members, when they get together socially, I think this type of topic comes up. So the more people that are now accessing the program, I think will help, too, with achieving something greater than 13 as we try to go towards hopefully 100% at some point. That's what we've got. Everybody's got a recycling bin, pretty much every neighbor that I can recall. I think, getting back to the bags, for our family, and as Commissioner Clasen pointed out, I think she mentioned some senior homes. I really think, and relatively new was where you went to a small kind of a daily bag, right? Or have you had those longer time than I know of? But I think that's the key to many households to be able to not, what do you do with the bag? Weekly, the trash comes, but I think if you have this small daily bag, I think that's, in my mind, a key to getting more participation. Any comments? Madam Vice Chair, Commissioner. We actually have two bag sizes. One is a six gallon and the other is a 13 gallon. At this point, we don't have a daily bag. Perhaps you're thinking of the drop-off sites at the county- Maybe that was it ... place? I had got some. I assumed they were on the household delivery But I got a smaller bag many months back. The program provides the six-gallon. We recommend that for a smaller household. However, that is the most popular bag that people are ordering, just because it fits nicely in an approximately three-gallon size container. The 13-gallon fits nicely in a 13-gallon size container. And again, the county is offering those containers for free for residents. So they have those available at the environment centers. The bag supply that we offer is you can get up to 120 bags, because the bags do have a more significant cost than some of the thinner daily bags that you get. We do recommend people, two bags a week is adequate for most households. Yeah. And then if people want more, they can purchase more. Well, anyhow, I'm just being critical of ourself. We're having a hard time changing our habits to what do we do with this bag for several days. A lot of good techniques. Leave it in the garage, put it in your freezer. Great techniques. I'm just admitting I haven't quite got there on a regular user. I do think, though, with smaller families and seniors and such, that if it's cost effective, if there's a way to have almost a daily bag, if it doesn't add to the landfill, because the bag is biodegradable, that's something to consider. That's my own bias in the thing. Thank you. Commissioner Bigham. I'll help you out, Anna Lee. That's not economically feasible to do that, Commissioner Karwoski. I just want to thank you and your team. The excitement that you and your team have for this program is palpable, and it starts at every community event that you all are at. Whether it's the Newport Boo Yah or Pioneer Day, Heritage Days, Strawberry Fest, it seems like every large or small event, you're there. And so I just want to thank everybody for that. And I'm really happy to hear, and I know we talked about this a couple of months ago, about the re-engagement, because I do think that's an important aspect to keep those numbers up and to, in a bifurcated way, go ahead and get the new residents that are coming into the county, and then also maintaining and checking in on the current users. So, I just wanted to say thank you for that and for being here today. Thank you, Ms. Garreitz, for your portion of the presentation. We'll bring up Ms. Giesen now for her one slide she's been so patiently waiting to present. I'll keep it real brief. Anna Lee covered some great information. But good morning. I'm Jamie Giesen. I'm a program supervisor with the Department of Public Health and Environment. We mentioned Hannah Keller, who's in the audience. She's on my team, so I have the great pleasure of helping her to promote this program throughout Washington County. So here today just to highlight a couple of the things that Hannah has done in preparation for this particular rollout. So this is just highlighting sort of the promotion in the north, not the continued work and effort that she does with the existing communities. But taking it back a little bit, just wanted to refresh. You may recall in March of 2025, we did a board workshop on the solid waste plan implementation and how there's some things the counties do and some things that R&E does, and then there's some programs that have collaborative implementation. And this is probably the biggest example, the food scraps pickup program, of that collaborative implementation. And so in these situations, the county role is to really kind of amplify the message in ways that are innovative and really target community-specific needs or amplify them in areas that we have existing partnerships or relationships. And so Anna Lee mentioned that R&E sort of leads the multi-unit because they've got the Biz Recycling program. And so then we lead things like coordination with municipal partners since we already have that relationship through our municipal recycling grants. Hannah is plugged in at R&E through Anna Lee's team. So she's there representing Washington County, bringing our priorities and our perspective to the table. So kudos to Hannah for all this great work and the involvement in the program. And again, I'll quickly just go through some highlights. So coordination with municipal partners to share the rollout. So we worked with the recycling coordinators to make sure that they could share it up with leadership. We provided information on the digital and the print resources so that they could include it in their municipalities. We have confirmation that many of them are going to be tabling with this material at their events this summer. So it's nice to have them kind of sharing that message on our behalf as well. We've got trial kit display stands in many of the city halls. We also have them in our North Environmental Center and our Forest Lake Service Center. We did an information session at the Headwater Library. Sort of any of those internal channels that we can pursue, Hannah's been doing a great job of doing that. Updating our signage and resources at the North Environmental Center to reflect eligibility. So that looks like the signs at the drop-off, so people who are participating in drop-off can see that, hey, there's another way that I can participate in recycling my food scraps. As well as sharing things like now that you can pick up the bins that Anna Lee was mentioning at the North Environmental Center, or you can pick up a yard sign at the North Environmental Center. So just making it clear that now both environmental centers act as a hub for resources for this program. As well as additional communication projects. So we've got the upcoming quarter three Staying In Touch will have an article on food scraps pickup as well as an advertisement in our environmental update portion. We're updating bright signs, so throughout the county, you can see some advertisement on the food scraps pickup program as well as promoting on social media as an example here on the slide, promoting some of the resources we offer as well as the program at large. Externally, we also have some communication. So we're working, just a couple examples, we promoted in the Stillwater School District community ed calendar, or excuse me, community ed booklet, now that all of the entire district is eligible. We're working with schools to do community or school assemblies to promote in sort of a fun, interactive way with students. And so we'll target schools in the north this fall when school starts back up. And then tabling's been mentioned, or events, but we've got over 50 events planned that county staff will be at this summer. So that is all I have. Thank you, Ms. Giesen. Yes. Any questions? I'll ask one. So you can pick up those thinner, smaller bags where you drop off at a bin your compost. Those are not pullable from our trash cans at home with the magic arm at the R&E Center, correct? Correct. Those are for the drop-off only. Okay. Got it. Got it. All right. You just gave a suggestion for the future, and I was in product development, so I know the cost return. That's fair. Yes. I had a hunch that that would be a lot of picking by those robots. It'd probably wear their arms out. Anyhow. Well, thank you, Ms. Giesen. Thank you, Ms. Annalee, for your presentation today. We are wrapped for the day, and we'll be back here 9:00 next Tuesday. Thank you.