Item B on the agenda is approval of the agenda. I'll entertain a motion as unless somebody would like to move some things around. >> Move to approve the agenda as written. >> Second. >> We have a motion and a second for approval of the agenda. All those in favor, please signify by saying I. >> I. >> I. >> Agenda is approved. Um, item C is public comments and we do have somebody who would like to speak tonight. When you come to the podium, please address your your uh please say state your name and address for the record, please. And you'll have six minutes. >> Gee, thanks. >> Sure. >> My name is Wendy Griffin. I live at 2835 Lake Mo Avenue North. I'm president of the Lake Mo Lake Association. We were here a couple months ago to tell you that we had submitted um a grant into the 3M PFOS for the DNR uh for money. >> Well, they accepted our letter. >> Great. And so we're in the process of writing for that grant. And I'm here to ask the city if they would help us by supporting us with a letter of intent. And our intent in doing if we do get the money would be to do a full lake treatment for the lake to deal with Eurasian mil foil and curly pond weed. We had a meeting last night with Patrick from PLM, the gentleman that does our weed removal, and Meg Ratty from Bar Engineering. And we talked about some of the other invasives. We found out late last week or last week that Lake GMO now has zebra muscles in it, but you know, we're with keeping up with the dry lakes. And we talked about some of the other invasive species and found out that it's going to be a five-year plan out from now for zebra muscles, which me is working on with Valley Branch, bless their heart. And there's another invasive out there that can be dealt with through Washington Conservation District. So, I'm just here asking for a letter of intent with the city saying that you support us in our efforts. >> All right. >> And one other comment. Thank you very much for Saturday night. What a fun evening. I'm so glad there wasn't quite as many people there that I thought were going to be there that I would know because I've been here my entire life, but there were enough and I really do appreciate it. And I would sincerely hope that the city council would consider possibly maybe might bring back a street dance because that's something that we had when I was younger and growing up. It would be fun to have some kind of festival or something going on in Lake Elmo for the residents. I think there's enough people that live here now that might be interested in that. But you guys did a fabulous job. >> Thank you very much. >> Thank No, thank you. Oh, y'all have fun tonight. All right. Item D on our agenda is uh approval of the minutes. Everybody have a chance to review? Everybody good? If so, I'll uh I'll accept a motion for approval. >> Motion to approve the minutes from the 8:1425 city council workshop. >> Second. >> We have a motion and a second. All those in favor, please signify by saying I. >> I. I. >> Minutes are hereby approved. >> Tonight's consent agenda agenda consists of approved payments and dispersements. Adopt resolution for summary publication of ordinance related to trash haulers. Accept donations for centennial celebration. Approve position and job description for administrative assistant public works fire. Approve AT&T temporary cell tower lease extension. Approve 3M priority 2 trail grant submitt. Approve 2025 street and utility improvements pay request three. Approve Stillwater School District improvements pay request one. Approve Eert's edition security reduction. Approve Wildflower fourth edition security release. Royal Golf third edition security reduction. 2025 mill and overlay accept bids and award. Uh the 2025 street and utility improvements call for final assessment hearing. Number 14, call for final assessment hearing for Stillwater Area School District utility improvements. And that's it for our consent agenda. I'll entertain a motion on the consent agenda this evening. >> Motion to approve the consent as written. support. >> We have a motion and a second. All those in favor, please signify by saying I. >> I. >> Consent agenda is approved. >> Our regular agenda, the first item is accept feasibility report and order public hearing for 2026 street and utility improvements. Okay. Here we go. We're good. However, we're a couple slides in. Okay. There you go. >> Uh yes, mayor and council with you tonight uh before you tonight with an item to uh receive the feasibility reports and call a public improvement hearing for the 2026 street utility improvements. Uh tonight we're going to recap um a number of items, but uh I'd like to really take a moment to discuss the recommendations of the report and the costs associated with the project. So to refresh everybody, the uh project is in uh the Lake Elmo Heights and Eagle Creek Point Estates area of town um just off of uh Inwood Avenue there. Uh tonight's uh the the schedule is as as presented here. Uh tonight we're presenting the feasibility report um and calling for a hearing on the improvement. Um If council moves this forward, I'll be back before you in October to conduct that public improvement hearing and look for direction on moving forward the project. Okay, so what did we find out? Um, pretty good news actually. Um, the geotechnical investigation supports a um pavement reclaim existing roadways in the project area. This is very this is identical to many of the similar past projects including the 2025 project that we're uh finishing up right now. So we want to reconstruct the streets to more or less existing grade and width matching geometrics making minor adjustments as necessary necessary for drench improvements. Um installation of B418 concrete curbon gutter. I didn't have that stated explicitly but I did want to bring that up. um posting of no parking per city policy. Uh in this case, it's it's just around those culde-sac bulbs of the neighborhood, a replacement of storm sewer as necessary. Um as well as grading out uh any any sort of ditches, clearing ends, making sure the systems work. The water the uh neighborhood is served by existing public water that was installed approximately 20 years ago. It's anticipated there's many many decades of life left in the system. Um and no improvements are proposed at this time in the water main system. Uh the streets or the project areas are outside the existing Musa boundary and there's no proposed extension of sanitary sewer into the neighborhood at this time. This is kind of just it's a little hard to see. Um just kind of a recap. I mean I'll draw attention to the orange dots. Those are storm sewer imp areas. Uh like I said, the water man exists and we're proposing curb throughout the entire neighborhood. These are larger lots um with significant frontage. Again, the parking restrictions we're just proposing to culdeac bulbs um per city policy the the width of the streets is adequate so that we don't need to restrict one side or at all. So, in our 2026 uh capital improvement plan budget, we have rock a little over 2.7 million estimated. The current project estimate all in is just under $2.4 million. of that we're estimating um $1,665,000 to be paid by the city and $727,000 to be assessed to benefiting properties. Um there's a kind of a breakdown below listed you can see um I want to draw attention to the lake I've got two Lake Emblem Heights uh neighborhoods indicated here and that was how it was written in the report. Uh the Well, while in the same plat they're not contiguous streets. So, we did separate out the Instale Avenue culde-sac with access off water boulevard. Um, that culde-sac, you'll you'll notice the assessments are are quite a bit less per unit and that's just a a matter of those lots actually being a little bit smaller and having a greater number of units on the culdeac. Otherwise, these these assessments are generally in line with what we've seen for recent past projects. There's a map to illustrate that. And like I just said, the the you can see the two culde-sacs um on the top of the page here. The uh Eagle Eagle Creek point is point of states culde-sac, which is actually old avenue, has four properties fronting it. There is a side uh driveway one property that's that's actually front stoer boulevard that was that one assessment that was half of the original half of the uh the folks that front the culde-sac the Lake Heights neighborhood the larger of of the areas act is accessed offwood Avenue by 26th and 27th avenues so tonight I'm asking council to consider Approving a resolution receiving the feasibility report and calling for a public hearing for the 2026 street and utility improvements. >> Questions for Mr. Stanley Pragnus. >> So it looks like on August 13th you had a neighborhood meeting. Can you explain how that meeting went if there was any feedback about that? >> Absolutely. Thank you for the question. It was actually uh the week after I think it was the 19th. We kind of lost a week there schedulewise, but it was fairly well attended. I'd say we had 35 to 40 folks show up and it was informational. We didn't talk about we didn't at that point we didn't have the feasibility report to a point where we were ready to share um preliminary assessments for instance which is >> And did you have people from each neighborhood attend as well? >> Yep. >> Cool. >> We did. Yep. >> So it was it was informational. was uh people were generally happy to hear that the streets are being done. Um there was some discussion about concrete curb and gutter and the benefit which which um I went through uh everything why it's proposed why it's a city standard and I I think most folks um accepted in the end that it is is the best strategy to go but um it was um it was I think it was generally appreciated the fact that we had the this this public meeting at that time to provide information in advance of the next public meeting we're having which is going to be between now and the improvement hearing. >> Got it. Okay. Thank you. >> Yeah. >> Her question with the financial side of it. So, and and maybe I just maybe this is how it works, but I see like at the bottom of um the 2026 street improvements document, it says that project proposed to be paid from a combination of special assessments, general funds, and issuance of bonds. A little higher up in the the document, it just says the remaining 70% after the 30% special assessment is going to be paid through the city general fund. and and maybe that's just how maybe there was a mistake there. I guess I was just wanted to clarify that. >> Yeah, I would I would uh I I'd review that with you. I there there could be some some miswording there. I apologize for that. Um but yeah, generally the and and I can if there are more specific questions about financing, I'm happy to step aside, let Director Hadler um hear you out, but >> generally the project come, you know, we we estimate it at 30% it's assessed. Yep. >> 70% we're just calling city cost here in this and and how that is distributed is through a combination of you know bonds or whatever other funds we have available. >> Okay. >> I would say >> and are I guess are we digging into the general funds for this project? We're not to that point. That's kind of the point of the funds that we're creating now is to be able to draw from the infrastructure fund for these types of projects in the future. >> Correct. If I may, uh, mayor, uh, that is correct. So, I would say the end, the final funding is still to be determined because we're sort of piecing together sort of the strategic plan and the levies and such. Um, so we'll have a little bit more information, but yes, the goal of those infrastructure levies is to fund these capital projects, which have largely been funded only through bonds for the for a number of years. >> And and that's helpful. I guess I as I was reading through that I just because I know we've kind of um used some of the general funds as we're looking at the budgets. I didn't know if maybe that was a strategy that was being implemented, but it doesn't sound like that was the intent. >> No. And I I would kind of go back to this like we've got a lot of work to do with our strategic planning. And so part of I mean certainly in my in my mind and part of the the strategic plan that I'm working on is is talking about moving some of the general fund over to the infrastructure fund to sort of jumpstart that. But but for this particular project um I again we'll look at it next year. In my mind it's more about like what are the new levies that we are we'll be implementing. So for right now it's tentatively at that 400,000 for next year plus those franchise fees that we'll be um receiving from the utility companies. And then um for whatever um projects are uh for other projects not this particular project there will be MSA dollars available as well. >> Okay. Thank you. Thanks for clarifying. >> You bet. Mayor. >> Yes. Council member Jerry. >> Yeah. This is another project. We have storm water utility improvements in here and we should be using our storm water utility fund to pay for those improvements. Um because that's why we have the fund. Uh we went through this project earlier this year where we had storm water improvement funds. We use bonds to pay for them and not going to the utility. So, I'm hoping that when we get to the end of the financing options for this that the storm water portions will come from the stormwater utility fund and not our infrastructure fund or our or bonds. That's something we can look at. Right now, we we're here for the uh accepting the physibility report, but yeah, duly noted for finance and public works streets to to look look at that. Anything else for Mr. Stanley. Okay. And I'll uh I'm open to uh a motion. Motion. I think I'm on the right one. Motion to approve resolution number 2025-059 receiving the feasibility report and calling hearing on improvement for the 2026 street utility improvements. >> Second. We have a motion in a second. Any discussion? Hearing none. I'll call the question. All those in favor, please signify by saying I. >> I. >> I. >> Motion passes. Man, is it just me or is it stuffy in here? >> That's really hot. >> Wow. >> All right. Number two is 2026 preliminary budget and levy brought forward from our workshop last week. Oh, Julie. I broke it. Nice. I had it open. >> It's I tried to escape out of Nate's and the whole thing just went black >> because we can't get it to appear in both places. >> I realized um >> that's not what it was actually the minutes of and I said that. >> It was the 92. >> Oh, but that's what the minutes were. Okay. >> Well, this is our third, I think maybe fourth discussion on the budget and levy for next year. So, it'll be a little bit uh abbreviated. So after um our discussions last last week, we um have landed on the current proposal. Uh so I'll just kind of review this quick. Our um uh for the general fund budget, we're looking at a total tax revenues of 6.3 million. Uh non- tax revenues of just over 2.2 million. For um expenses, uh we are looking at a total expense of 8.8 8 million which is about 11% increase over the prior year. Um some general uh some changes from 2025 that have added to that or sort of caused those increases are um added public works staff, the addition of three fire captains for half of the year next year. They'd be full year in 2027. And then we have a lot of projects on the books for next year. So we have a multi-year comprehensive planning process. We have some planning for the um sports comp future source sports complex and the 180 acres. We have the second year of our finance software implementation market wage analysis. Um we are still getting a handle on our city center expenses. So a lot of the maintenance and repairs. Um we have a team that that goes through all of those. And then 2026 is of course an election year. So, our um goal tonight is to adopt the proposed levy. Um the proposed levy, as you may know, may be decreased um at the at its final adoption. It may not be increased. So, we're setting the high bar for the levy. So, um part of the levy that we've discussed a lot are the capital levies. Um the numbers shown are the ones that we have landed on after that discussion last week. Um it's decreased from the initial proposal. So um we have these are all uh the capital levies are all uh new as of this year. We haven't done um a lot of the separate capital uh levying for capital needs in the past. So infrastructure reserve is specifically for um larger street uh reconstruction the reclamation as well. City Center CIP is just getting a jump on um those uh future uh repairs and replacement of this building. The park CIP we uh brought down to zero. Um we have the Balthar fund which is an interfund loan that is repaying the sewer fund and that's for the purchase of the 776 acres for that sports complex. Our vehicle and equipment levy covers all of our vehicles and equipment um in all general fund uh departments. Those are also funded by the utility funds. And then we have our street maintenance uh which is uh all of the major street maintenance such as mill and overlays and chip seals. So a total of 1.78 million. Our total levy uh currently proposed is 11,497,785 an increase of just over 1.4 million which is a 14% over uh increase over 2025. Um the prop our uh estimated local tax rate would be 29.57 which is a change of 2.73 percentage points. Our median value home uh increased just slightly this year. So we can see that the increased tax rate would have an impact of about $179 which is less than $15 per month. on that median value home. Here's our tax rates relative to all other Washington County cities. So, we're very much on the low side of those. And then this is in comparison to the cities in Washington County that are most similar to us in population. So, we are ninth out of 10. And there's our proposed the recommendation for the motion and I'm happy to answer any questions. >> Any questions for director? >> Um yeah, thanks for the presentation and thanks for answering my questions. Um I I know you sent me the some of the CIP scenarios and with some of the questions I had as far as um how it would impact the debt projections if we did change some of the numbers with the um the the how much we're funding each year with it. And you sent some numbers and I guess I think it would be helpful to maybe talk through those. Um, the one you just sent me, it looks like, I'm understanding it correct, that if we decrease that infrastructure reserve fund amount 200,000 less than what we are planning this year, is that what I'm seeing in the one that you sent? >> Yep. That was the proposal that you had asked me to. And I don't I'm the only one looking at this right now, but if we had 200,000 less that in 2038, our debt projection would be at about 23 million versus as proposed, I think it'd be our debt projection would be at 20 million in 2038. Am I seeing that right? >> That sounds right. Now, and I would just remind you that we talked about that this is just these are just modeling at this point and like this is this this discussion is going to change quite a bit as we go through that strategic planning process. >> And and thank you for for doing this. you know, like what? Well, I guess yeah, I'll wait for discussion, but I just want to make sure I was seeing that right that that is it would be bring it down to $23 million of debt versus 20 million if we drop from $400,000 in that infrastructure reserve to 200,000 and then work our way up. >> Correct. I would just also point out that the debt is just one of a number of factors that we should be looking at. Correct. So the um total balance of that infrastructure fund over time is going to be really important >> for the long-term sustainability of our infrastructure and the city and finances. >> Thank you. >> Any other questions at this time? >> Okay, I'll entertain a motion. Motion to approve resolution 2025-060 approving 2026 proposed general budget general fund budget 2026 proposed property tax levy and setting the public hearing date for the 2026 budget and property tax levy for Tuesday December 26 December 16th reading is hard 2025 at 7 p.m. There a second. >> Second. >> We have a motion and a second. Discussion. >> Okay. >> Okay. Council member JSON. >> I think that the presentation um has been good and we talked a little bit about comparison of tax rates with 10 cities closest in population and with all the cities in Washington County. However, if you look at other data and you look at the amount of property taxes paid by a median valued home in those same communities, meaning half the houses pay more property taxes, half the houses pay less property taxes. For the 10 um most comparable population, our property tax on our median valued home is the is higher than six of those and lower than three. So, we're much more to the high end than we are in the tax rate. And part of it is because we very we have very high values in Lake Elmo. If you go to all of the cities in Washington County, um you you'll find that 19 cities of the 27 have a lower property tax on a median home than Lake Elmo and five had a higher tax. So, we're on the high end of property tax, actual property taxes paid by median valued homes in the county, even though our tax rate is on the low end because of our high values. And so, as you look at increasing the levy by 14, 11, whatever percent, keep in mind that from the taxpayers's point of view, we are a fairly high tax city. >> Thank you. >> Anyone else? Council member her >> I guess I'll I'll just kind of reiterate then I you know my feeling is with looking at those projections again my goal with this has been I understand that the taxes do need to go up. I understand that we need to be able to support the spending and the growth of the city. I think if we can approach it in a in a slower approach versus um and again I know like you said it's not ripping off the band-aid even I know you feel that way but I think this projection again I know it's a projection it's not perfect but neither is the other one then right so but if that's the data that is presented in front of us and I can see that in 12 to 13 years we would improve from being at $60 million of debt lower that down to $23 million of debt versus to $20 million of debt. I think that that shows that that slower approach could work just fine. And so this is where I still do feel strongly about if we can look at those funds decreasing how much we're putting into those funds. Again, for if anyone's watching it, we've had a lot of discussions about as far as the general fund. I don't think that there's a lot of things that can change there. if we want the tax rates to stay lower, if we want to think about how we're spending this, I think that's where we need to look. Um, and I think this shows that that is an option. Right? If this would have been presented, it would have showed that our debt continues to go up. Um, or maybe our debt drops by drops down to 50 million after 13 years. Maybe that's not feasible. But again with what I'm looking at now like that looks like we're getting to a very good position from a debt perspective. >> But that that's only one that's only one point. If you look down is there if the I don't remember how many pages I sent you but >> well okay so I guess so what other perspectives then should we be looking at >> the fund balance and the infrastructure fund is going to be really important. So the >> so why don't we present that can we get can we get the information on that then? That's what I've been looking for. And I guess my concern is through these discussions is I feel like there's I feel like maybe I'm concerned. I I was I was told that we're as a city that we potentially would have to work towards 50 to 60% tax rates. That's very concerning to me. And if that's what I'm being told, then I I want to make sure that this is something that we're we're looking at and that we understand why we have to get there. If that truly is the case, we need the information. And again, I a lot of this idea of starting the funds stemmed from the the objective of lowering the debt to put us in a better financial position. And so like when I look at it, if there's other factors that we should be considering, like I'm open to hear that, but that's the data that I've been looking for of that comparison. We had scenario one. Thank you for putting together a second scenario to show that delta of what happens if we change it. If there's other factors, then you know I'm open to hearing that and understanding that, but I haven't been shown that information yet. >> I believe that was in the CIP scenarios that I presented at the meeting last week. The two scenarios as well as the one that I just emailed you shows the fund balance over time. Yep. >> Based on that infrastructure levy. >> So, okay. And that's again it's just one of one of >> of the other data points. >> Um many of the other data points that we will be able to look at. Again, we're gonna we're going to touch on all this on that. And this is kind of this importance of the strategic planning because the city definitely needs a a strategic financial plan moving forward that we can all kind of come together and and decide. >> So just to make sure I'm understanding, is it the infrastructure fund balance >> correct >> page that you're looking at? So in scenario two 12 million scenario three 8.5 million. So again I I don't know what that does what does that mean? Does that mean if we say do what my recommendation was instead of spending 2 million per year on roads or four million per year that we have projected over the next 10 years what if we decrease that to three million again. Can we make these ends meet? I think it's it's it's going to have to come from both ends. I don't want I understand that we do have to increase the revenues and with all these scenarios, it's doing that, but it also shows if we think we can approach it in a slower way, yes, we're also going to probably have to curb some spending as well. So, I that's just I I feel pretty strongly about I think we need to approach this slower. Um, unless I can really be shown why only having 8.5 million in that infrastructure fund balance 13 years from now versus 12 million. Unless I can be shown why that is going to put this city in danger. I I don't know why we can't do the slower approach. >> These are all going to be fabulous discussions when we get further along in the strategic plan discussion. >> So, when when will that be? Uh we're working on a timeline. I'm probably am hoping to have sort of a touch point um with the council later this year. I'm having to kind of build these models from scratch and um lay out the discussions and stuff. And you will recall we're in the middle of a uh software uh transition as well. So that's my goal. >> Be able to talk about it before December 16th. >> Not to answer all of the questions that council member Hearn has. I can give you like we've we've done some really rough um had some really rough discussions um like during the CIP I had mentioned um what our fund balance is relative to our depreciation. Um we are working on this discussion with engineering about like how do we get a better feel because depreciation doesn't necessarily represent what we have in today's dollars. It's what was given to us at the time of that those streets were built. And so to get a really a a better understanding of where we need to go, we kind of need a better idea of where we're at. And that's part of that process. So, >> okay. >> Again, it's sort of, you know, we can sort of I can get us headed in the right direction, but some of these questions really need a lot more information before I can give good answers. >> All right. Council member Holtz. Well, and again, this is to set the hearing date and to propose an amount that we can reduce at that time. With that said, I appreciate number one that staff is putting it together, that you are answering questions, and I also appreciate that council is taking the time to discuss in-depth questions beforehand. I see many institutions and boards where that doesn't happen, and it turns into mass chaos at these meetings. So, thank you for doing that. Um my my two cents would be on the premise of the rate of essentially savings. No matter what you have to pay the piper and whether you start the savings at a faster rate now and then there's a smaller hit down the road for for the projections that we cannot have for certainty what the exact cost will be in the year 2039. we cannot it's it's going to be projections or you do the approach of some neighboring communities where you don't and then as we've seen there is a substantial one-time hit and I I don't want to see that for residents down the road. I don't and and and the phrase is not correct about pulling off the band-aid at this point. It's we are trying to wrap a wound and trying to determine how much wrapping is needed on that wound because these discussions didn't happen years ago. And it's it's not the fault of any specific individuals or any staff like we just didn't have these conversations. We didn't have the institutional abilities. We didn't have enough staff on hand. The questions weren't being asked. I am glad we are having these discussions now so we can start to determine how much. I would prefer to do it in this way now to try to not have a substantial jump five years or 10 years or 15 years from now where all of a sudden you need to go out for a bond for 15 million bucks on a because you are that large of a shortfall. And I mean when it comes to stats, yes, council member Joyce, you are entirely correct. Our median is higher than the median of other households. That's entirely correct. I could also look at, say, as an example, a house in Stillwater where their value is 533 and they're paying almost twice as much to their city than we are. that the medians are one thing, but if comparables because of the rate itself, you pay more for the same house in another city. West Lakeland, you pay less except for the recent bond. So, it it comes down to to me, are are we in that happy middle middle place? I think we are. Does anyone like taxes? No. Do our constituents want services? Yes. So, that's I mean, that's where I stand. I don't again we're going to have this discussion further in December 16th and honestly we want public feedback as well the good the bad all the above um that would be what my two cents the um if if if my dad's watching I'm just going to apologize now because he really hates property taxes. He's just >> right dad. >> Yeah, he's he's got he's got that. So, um I I appreciate the idea of extending it uh extending the um you know the decreasing the amount in the savings account and extending that debt out there. I think that some of the things that we've done in recent history like I think the bond for this building was something in the $14 million range. even though we knew it was coming up, it really wasn't accounted for in any sort of savings, if you will, it was just paid for via bond, right? So, we're paying for that this building just like you would a house over the course of however many years. And I guess I've seen too many of my friends and my cohorts colleagues in other cities that have run into issues where the I'm just coming at it from an infrastructure standpoint. That's that's what I know. That's that's what I think about. And if we look at the amount of infrastructure that we have, I I think that cliff can get higher if it's not taken care of appropriately at the time it you know the right fix at the or the the right road with the right fix at the right time, right? And so I I believe in all those things and I I think this and I'm maybe I'm being a little conservative, but I'd rather have that in the bank than saying, "Oh, we tried to stretch it out. Now we now we can't do that, so we had to add some more bonding to take care of that down the road." Or we're continually adding infrastructure to our city with every development that comes in. And at the current rate, the residential housing in this city is is primarily what what we need to keep the operations running. And I think I've said this from when I first ran for mayor five years ago was what we really need is a stronger commercial base, a a different tax base to help balance out some of those operational costs within the city. And I think we're getting some businesses. So even the picture that we look at now given future development if there's commercial and business it can change so that strategic I mean a lot of this speculation right so and I would rather speculate on the conservative side and hope that things turn better rather than thinking things will be great with housing and building and all that and then not have it happen. So, that's that's where I'm at right now. So, um I would like to talk more about these scenarios, uh and some of the questions I think are are good. Um questions that I didn't have that enlighten me to, you know, a different way of looking at things. So, um as far as the resolution we have on hand, I plan on supporting that. member, >> one little thought. So I just want to I do want to clarify that I don't think again looking at these projections that I necessarily would say that that still isn't conservative with with what we are doing or if it was less again I mean if you look at the the debt projections the debt projections are going down to 23 million from 60 from 55 million the infrastructure fund balance would go up to eight and a half million versus at the current amount shown up to 11 million. So if we do get in that situation, we've improved our debt load enough where if we do have to bond, we're not getting back to where we were today. We're still in a good financial position, right? We still have a good rating. So it's not that. And again, you know, so I'd even be cautious of saying we're, you know, we're trying to to wrap the wound because again, I think we're in a in a good financial position, but if we don't make this change, we're going to get in trouble. And so I just I I don't see it as being um aggressive and risky. It's just maybe a little less conservative, >> right? And I agree. I think one things one thing that we don't have is comparisons. Sometimes you look at the uh how do I make an analogy here on u expenses of maintenance, right? I mean that's kind of what we're talking about. Let's say we're taking care of our car. Um oil changes and and tire rotations and brakes. Those all cost one thing, but when the computer chip goes out, all a sudden it's a $5,000 deal, right? Um, and maybe you compare those as versus a a car that's worth $20,000 and a car that you buy brand new and it's $50,000. I I truly think if if we had the Gazsby 34 information on the investment that the city has in its infrastructure and a projected cost of that infrastructure into the future that would show a different picture than what you're thinking because we don't have that. How much does a city have? I mean, we're we're we're talking about numbers that we don't have a comparison to as to the the value that we're trying to take care of. Would you agree? >> I don't know if I agree on that. I I'm cuz to the car. >> So, hold on. I asked you if you have a number that you know that the city system is valued at. >> No. >> Okay. >> No. >> But without that, then a number is just a number. It's not it's not attributed to anything of a value. It just it's just a number. >> Maybe to the car example because I agree, right? We want to be doing maintenance on our car, right? That you you budget for maintenance. >> Now, in an ideal financial situation for an individual who's making enough money, Yeah. probably putting enough money away so you can just completely pay for a new car when that car is ready for replacement would be fantastic. But that's not what 99% of people do, right? They do their maintenance and then they know that they're going to have to take a loan when it comes time to purchase that new car. Now, they're able to push that loan off to 12 years, 13 years, 14 years versus seven if they don't do any maintenance. So that's where that share or the savings comes in. And and so I guess and this was a question I asked as well about like the depreciation. I mean if we're we're trying to fund 100% of the depreciation, which I realize when we're doing this that that's in today's dollars. It's going to be different down the road, but we're not trying to fund 100% of these projects in the future. So trying to fund 100% of depreciation just doesn't it doesn't quite make sense to me. Right? We we know we're going to have a special assessment for it. We know that there's we're planning to have some bonding for it and we >> we're not saying we're going to pay for it 100% cash, >> right? >> So I do I mean I'm glad I'm glad that we're having this conversation. I'm glad that we're doing the financial planning because I think maybe for me more than anything. It's just I don't have the data to show me otherwise that we can't approach this slower. And if we do approach it slower, you know, I don't have the data to show me that we're going to be in a catastrophic situation. I I shouldn't even say that to I don't have anything shown us that we're not going to be in a still a much better situation if we increase at a slower rate. >> And conversely, I would say that we don't I don't have the information that says we are being overly conservative or we're not going to be a situation. I mean, we're sitting in the same spot on a different side of the boat. So, Council Member Jesus, >> I think, you know, there's there's a logical balance of setting enough money aside to keep our debt manageable, which we've talked a lot about, and you know, um, issuing debt to finance some portion of those improvements. It's matching benefactors and payers. So, if we tax everybody today to build a new street that's going to last 50 years, people that paid for it, you know, won't be the ones who benefit from it entirely. The new people that move in will benefit from it. So there's this balance between a reasonable amount of debt and a reasonable amount of cash to be paid. I think you know finding that balance along with a balance of keeping our property taxes more affordable or affordable is a tightroppe we have to try and walk in some way that makes sense. Um you know as I said we have we we have fairly high tax on our on our system right now in the city our taxpayers. And so I think we have to be cognizant of that and try and find a reasonable balance. Okay. Going to call the question. Motion approve resolution 2025- what is it? 060. >> Correct. >> Sorry. >> Yes. >> Yes. >> Yes. approving 2026 proposed general fund budget, 2026 proposed property tax levy, and setting public hearing date for 2026 budget, and 2026 property tax levy for Tuesday, December 16th, 2025 at 7 p.m. All those in favor, please signify by saying I >> I. Those opposed, same sign. >> I >> All right. Motion passes 32. Thank you. Council report. Council member Jackson. >> Nothing to report. >> Council member Holtz. I anticipate the mayor will probably do this as well and others, but it's not only thank you for Saturday. Um it was a great time. M you know, we had members of council setting up food trucks, members of councils getting the bouncy house. Uh the mayor and myself were out setting stuff up uh the morning of and I council mere tried to get uh the air force to come in. Didn't work, but you know, we all took steps to do it and thank you all for doing that. But also, thank you staff for showing up. You guys came, you brought your families, either yourself, your kids, a spouse. um you guys came and showed up and that also I think shows a value that you're invested in the city as well. So, thank you for that. Um it is appreciated. Thank you to residents who came out, the many volunteers who helped with it. The band was fantastic. Uh food trucks that I did try were were great. There were leftovers from my wife and kids, so it wasn't choice food that I picked, but food I got was good. So, thank you for all those who attended. All right, I have a couple things. Um, did receive a letter from the League of Minnesota Cities that the senator who represents our district uh at the state legislature um has been selected as a League of Minnesota's legislator of distinction for 2025. Uh she rep represents uh the city, this area's interest overall in a in a very good manner. um she's accessible for questions and comments. I know at least myself and I'm sure if other council members reach out to her, she is the same. So, just a a little recognition to our uh Senator Seabburgger here. Um I had a blast on Saturday. You know, I said a lot of thanks. Not a lot of people heard me say those when I was in front of the stage there, but um thank you to everybody for their part and getting the fireworks guys set up for the public works guys getting the stuff out in the street beforehand. Um close off a uh Washington County Sheriff's being available and having the the camera on hand. Um uh administrator Miller to be able to take care of some of the the bands requests and needs that they had at the time. and that's appreciated. Uh all the other council members for for helping set up and different members. I'd like to recognize earlier in the um consent agenda, the bounty houses were donated by Krueger Tree Farm and Lake EML Bank. So a big thanks to them. I I went over to say hi to council member Hearn and he was in mass chaos of kids bouncing around all over. He he he did look like he was having fun. And um uh special thanks to uh the band Tight Fit. They were they were very easy to work with and a joy to to talk to. And I thought a lot of people we had u kids from the ages of five maybe younger up to people I don't know how old you know 80 whatever uh uh dancing for the band. And I I really we had um former mayors uh Susie Dunn who was mayor in 1988 Dave Morgan from 1984 and Dean Johnson who was in the early 2000s uh come and attend. So that was nice to see them and I got to talk to a lot of people that uh well we just had the presenter here today that said she's lived her entire life in Lake Elmo. uh friend's parents have been Lake Elmo residents for 58 years and they really enjoyed it. So the fireworks were phenomenal. Um there's some pictures out on the website that we had. We had a photographer taking pictures and so please uh scan through those and uh maybe you're in one or two, I don't know. So um yeah, really enjoyed it. There's a lot of things to go around and uh thought thought it was a great event. Council member Heer. >> Yeah, I the only thing I would add to that is just I uh Council Member Draguchich for even having the vision I think to kind of bring this up in the first place. I you know I will be honest I was a little concerned when we were a month out talking about this. Um but that was really good vision and leadership to to think of that and so I do appreciate it and you know obviously we have to have the vision but then it was implemented and I know staff and council did a lot. So good job everyone on on doing that. Yeah, I mean a second to all the thank yous for the staff and everybody who helped out. Um, and then also thank you to Marty for hearing my concern about the wasps nest at the pickle ball courts at Lions Park. Made a few residents very happy. So, appreciate that. Thank you. >> Staff reports. >> Well, I just will echo what everyone said. Um, without the staff, we wouldn't have been able to pull it off. So, um, department heads as well as, you know, please pass on your, you know, our thanks to all the staff members that were there because council's vision and then you made it happen. You all had parts, too, at the bomb house, but it was great. Thank you, >> Julie. >> No report. Thank you. >> No report. >> No report. >> Chief, >> our uh annual fire department open house next Monday, the 22nd, 4 to 7, here at the fire station. We'll have plenty of things to keep people busy. >> Bouncy house >> and no bouncy houses. And then uh >> are the uh is the senior center doing their their what? They do donut sherbet last year. >> Fields are doing whip and mini donuts again for us. >> Nice. >> Y come by and get a snack. >> All right, Director Powers. >> The old water tower disappeared in six hours today. So if anybody got to see that, um it's amazing what that company can come in and do. I've seen him work before. very professional, kind um we took a lot of pictures, some videos, so Kathy, you'll probably be putting that together and we'll share that information at some point. So, >> fantastic. Mr. Stanley, >> uh just said 10th Street North is open again down by Oakland Junior High. It's been closed for the utility work down there. So, >> is Hudson Boulevard currently closed by Inwood? Hudson Boulevard is currently closed for the lift station for >> work. What's the expectation on that? >> Under promise overd deliver. >> We're talking five to six weeks originally, so probably five weeks out. Yeah, >> five weeks out. >> Okay. Thank you, >> Sarah. >> Uh, no report. >> All right, great. Uh, I think the only notable thing I really have on the future agenda that's not probably um we're gonna so tomorrow night the EDA's or the committee for the fire hall is getting together to talk about the proposal we're sent in and so then the agenda on the 7th uh we will have the fire station RFP at the council meeting and with that uh we will adjourn the meeting for the evening. Thank you.