What makes our proposal unique is that it's truly for Lake Elmo by Lake Elmo. Over and over again through community surveys and on social media, residents have said they do not want more housing in the old village core. They want more restaurants, more family oriented gathering spaces, and more parking downtown. Our plan answers those requests directly.

I think we're prepared to go ahead and move forward without that if we had to. But uh what I wanted to make clear in the response was there are options available and we would be happy to have those conversations with the city to figure out what might be available to utilize. And if the answer was no, um our financing, our investors and conversations with Julian, we're we're okay to proceed without that if we had to.

Yeah, we've in the discussions we've had with the various contractors we've talked to, it's about a six to eight month timeline once the purchase is finalized.

These cities like Lake Elmo represent places that have history with agricultural legacies, but also have a real downtown that represents a pretty rare uh a pretty rare um opportunity, which is to say a walkable town is really hard to to come by. And as we've discovered in our kind of, you know, really hitting the streets, getting to know the people here, this is a place that is really special and beloved to everyone in this community.

When we transition to a brew pub model, we actually give up our ability in the state of Minnesota to do distribution. So, we won't be selling on liquor store shelves. We won't be um selling kegs to restaurants and things like that. We would happily walk away from that business.

My concern there and coming from my perspective is that's at 38 to 40 that's already much higher than any of the other existing retail spaces in Lake Elmo. So if we're going to bring in an outside business and I don't know where you're at in lighting those up are they local businesses or are they more regional or national businesses that can afford that have that bigger deeper pocket to get started.

We really want to be able to capture and harness that charm of Lake Elmo and then people a place to enjoy and and celebrate with their friends and family. And we want it to be unlike any place else. One of the things that really makes Can Wonderland and St. called brewing so popular is that it can't be replicated. It's it's one of a kind because of the space, because of the buildings, because of the locations. And that's one of the things that we want to bring to Lake Elmo and with Old Village social as well.

So, we've we've dra dramatic dra uh drastically increased uh our revenue when we switch from that production model into that brew pub model and really making it more of a um a gathering space uh food beverage and beverages that that suit more than just a a beer lover's needs.

Well, uh, the good news is for all of my companies, we we do the, um, extraordinary, and so we have a full-time fabrication shop, a full I have eight people that are employed in my fabrication shop. And so anytime things need repair, fixing, uh that's their job. And then we've also learned in the last almost 10 years that um we have to build things uh really really durable because uh kids are hard on on on these things and and so are uh so are adults.

Every one of these applicants has something about involving the community. So in other words, you listened and I think the council and the EDA made it very clear and staff in in this process that we wanted applicants that are here not just to provide a service with customers and that's that's the lens I'm looking at it from like how is it helping the community and I have a bias. I am a resident with two kids and that's the lens I see it from.

I encourage whoever wins to consider some of the interesting, you know, concepts from the other proposals and think of ways that you can incorporate them. to Jeff's point, like we're happy with all these and and they they all could have a life in our community and I wish I could blend them all together and, you know, double the size of the space and we'd have a heck of a downtown.

I would also ask if you are not the one that eventually council goes with please come back with a similar proposal. We have many opport obviously there's only one fire station that's being sold off but please come back and continue your ideas for this community because that matters.