7:00 get this ship rolling. Uh first order of business pledge allegiance, please stand with me. >> 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. >> Welcome to the city council [clears throat] meeting here on May 5th. Thank you. Um First order of business is approval of the agenda. I'll entertain a motion as such. >> Motion to approve the agenda as written. >> Second. >> I have a motion and a second. All those in favor, please signify by saying aye. >> Aye. >> All right. We do have a presentation this evening on biofilm-mediated destruction of P Foss in groundwater research. >> Thank you, Mayor and council members. Um as you know, we've previously partnered with Bay West with their um research to destroy P Foss and so they are here tonight um with Freshwater to talk about their newest research that they're going to be conducting on destruction of P Foss. >> [clears throat] >> Thank you, Administrator Miller. Uh Mayor, council, thank you for the opportunity to come talk today. I'm Seth Thompson. I am with uh Freshwater. We're a small nonprofit headquartered in St. Paul that works across the state on Minnesota's water uh resources. And [clears throat] I'm going to talk a little bit today about a project we have funded by the LCCMR uh with Bay West and the University of Minnesota to uh try to find new ways to destroy PFAS in groundwater So, our project's titled uh biofilm mediated destruction of PFAS in groundwater. Uh really this is a a collaborative project. Um I'm Seth Thompson. I'm the project lead for Freshwater. I'm joined tonight by Keith and Jenna from Bay West uh who are on the technical lead side from uh Bay West. And then Dr. Carissa Santelli is the UVM uh lead on the project and she wasn't able to join us tonight. But, this work uh was funded by the state to really identify microbes that are capable of PFAS destruction and develop stable biofilms for field scale uh applications. The project was uh started in July and we're funded through June of 2028. Uh Freshwater's the prime recipient and Bay West and the University of Minnesota are or the technical leads as subcontracts on that award award. And it's a $1.3 million award over that 3-year performance period. So, really fundamentally uh this work is looking across a number of different sites to try and identify these native microbial communities that we can use to treat PFAS. Uh we're looking at landfill leachate, agricultural impacted groundwater, and hopefully uh partnering here to look at some impacted groundwater in Lake Elmo as well. So, first uh we're doing uh isolating microbes from the environment, trying to identify those that have potentially the metabolic capability to uh degrade or destroy PFAS, and then see if we can use those microbes to develop these stable biofilms that we can use for in-field testing. So, rather than having to run something through a treatment facility or something like this, we can actually do injections that will allow us to test the to treat the groundwater in the field. So, um right now we are still in the identify and isolate phase. So, we're doing a lot of lab work and we'll be transitioning to bench scale testing over the the coming months and are now in the in the process of really looking to try and identify at some of our field sites and start our field work in this upcoming um you know, late spring and summer period. >> [clears throat] >> And so, here's our final kind of legislative language uh appropriation language. Ultimately, the goal's to develop these biofilm treatment technology and demonstrate field scale removal of PFAS from contaminated groundwater. And really the partnership [clears throat] opportunities we're hoping to partner with Lake Elmo to collect samples from various field sites uh so, we can do some metagenomic work to really try and understand the um the metabolic uh capability of the microbes in doing this kind of treatment process as well as collecting basic kind of water chemistry >> [clears throat] >> uh information as well. So, as we move forward, I think there would also be a lot of opportunities, should it be relevant, to consider uh kind of field scale testing opportunities. And those would likely be um at least about a year maybe a year and a half off from now. And I think with that, I'd happy to answer any questions that folks have for me or my technical help as well. >> Um at at the beginning is any of this coordinated with the U of M at all? >> Yep, the U of M is a project partner on this. That's happening through uh Dr. Kersten Telly's lab. Uh and she's really leading the the microbial biological component of the work, particularly around kind of the metagenomics and and culture based activity. >> So, you used that word. >> Yeah. >> What does it mean? >> Metagenomics? >> Yeah. >> Yeah, so the idea behind metagenomics is when we can go out into the field and collect samples that allows us to look at all of the genes from the microbial community, all the genetic information that's out there. And what that can allow us to do is get a sense of what are the different types of capabilities from like a metabolic pathway, [clears throat] what kind of food sources might the microbes be really good at eating, what are the energy pathways that are out there. And we can assemble all those into kind of like a genetic fingerprint of the environment, of the whole microbial community. >> Got you. With the work that will be occurring out so you got to collect water from different places, will all then the work itself be done offsite at the U or in certain laboratories will any physical space be needed closer to the sampling? >> Yeah, great question. So, for this first phase it would it would simply be collecting the the water sources and then yeah, those would be taken back to the lab near the process at the university or through partners at Baywest in their facility. So, no no additional physical facilities would be needed at this point. >> Got you. Thank you. Well, well we're really uh obviously as a city we're kind of hit hard with this so we appreciate anything that is being done to try and and fight it. So, thank you for [clears throat] your presentation. >> You bet. Thanks. >> Right. So, we do have item D which is public comments and inquiries. Um when I read your name, please come to the podium. State your name, your address for the record, please. Uh you do have 6 minutes. If somebody has already said what you're going to say or the same thing you're going to say, it's okay to indicate that somebody said that and you you want to uh you want to ditto that comment. Uh >> [clears throat] >> Yeah, if you came a little later, I did say if you wanted to speak, there's sign-up forms in the back. You can hand those to uh this side over here and they'll work their way up to me. >> [snorts] >> Uh first one is uh Colleen Swedberg. >> Good evening, uh Mayor and Council. Uh for those who don't remember me from the last couple years, and for the record, my name is Colleen Swedberg. I live at 6165 Upper 44th Street North in Oakdale, Minnesota. So, don't hold that against me. I'm here for my annual plug for the Landscape Revival event held in Lake Elmo at Rockpoint Church, uh 5825 Kelvin Avenue. It's June 6th. It's a Saturday from 9:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. The previous 2 years, we've had tremendous turnout, over 1,200 people. So, we're looking for the third year to be the same way. What we have is we sell native plants. I have growers from all over Minnesota and Wisconsin, uh and then we have exhibitors that are inside the church that help explain how to do water conservation, how to plant a rain garden, or how to plant a butterfly garden. It's very uh informative, so you can learn a lot of valuable information from this event. Plus, we have a food truck. You know, what can go wrong when you have a food truck and it's fantastic Mexican food truck. He's been with me ever since we've been doing this all over for over 15 years. So, anyway, I dropped off the postcards on back on the table there. I don't think you can see it. They look like this. They're on that that table and a few of you guys have it up front. So, I would really appreciate it if you could come out and then help support us. Lake Elmo has been fantastic on supporting this event and so we do appreciate it. So, thank you. That's all. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. >> [clears throat] >> Thank you. Um Ann Bucek. >> No, my name is Ann Bu- My goodness. Um my name is Ann Bucek. I live at 2301 Legion Avenue in Lake Elmo, Minnesota. I am here to because I would like to urge the Lake Elmo City Council to deny resolution 2026-029, which deals with short-term rentals in the city. I feel this ordinance will not be beneficial to our city's residents. This is the second time this ordinance has been brought before the city. It was denied the first time and it should be denied again this time. Many of these housing units are owned by corporations who are not residents of our city and do not share the same concerns homeowners have regarding their neighborhood. A constant stream of strangers in and out of neighboring >> [clears throat] >> properties makes it difficult to maintain a safe environment for our children and families. Good I just think yeah. Uh good reasons have been given for denying a license and you'll see those in your ordinance. Uh such as breach of the peace, a menace to the health, safety, and welfare residents or the public, or disturbance of the peace, comfort, and safety of the residents of the public. Uh [clears throat] specifically, an increase in noise, excessive trash, parking congestion, or {quote} {unquote} a party house atmosphere should be cause for alarm. However, who is to police this activity? The ordinance states that the manager of the property may live up to 60 mi away. That's probably more than 1 hour. And will they come to settle any disputes [clears throat] that arise? Uh is the city asking the surrounding neighbors to become the police and call the sheriff when trouble arises? One planning commissioner member stated that there was {quote} {unquote} value in this tool for homeowners that are looking to generate income. However, I ask whose expense will this income benefit? Doesn't the individual who has purchased a home in our city have the right to a compatible neighborhood and a quiet evening? Are we to more concerned about our own citizens or the tourist who's going to be gone tomorrow? I encourage the city and unfortunately the planning commission did not see the ordinance from West Lakeland Township. They had no idea of this ordinance when they were discussing it. I would recommend that you and our city look to our neighbor, West Lakeland Townships. They have a short-term rental ordinance, 4.3.3. It was enacted in 2019. Their short-term rental ordinance is designed to limit disruption within the neighborhoods while preserving the township's quiet, rural, residential character. The ordinance prohibits renting or leasing any dwelling unit for a period of 180 days or less with a maximum of two rentals per rolling year. Their ordinance aims to maintain a sense of community and neighborhood with the township. I would encourage our city to consider this ordinance or ones of other cities who are concerned about the citizens' welfare. There are many reasons. I've only listed a few why resolution number 2020 6-029 should be denied, and I urge the city to vote no on this. You may want this planning commission to further this um to further study this subject. >> Thank you. >> Don Penns. >> [clears throat] >> Yeah, my name is Don Penns, and uh first I'd like to comment about your uh PA system. >> Your address >> If somebody really cared about listening to this place, and to to what's being said, you can only hear about maybe a quarter. >> Mis- Mr. Penns, could you state your address, please? >> What? >> Could you state your address for the record, please? >> Uh 8309 38th Street North. And uh Lake Como, of course. >> Thank you. >> I'm not impressed with the cuz I have this is the first time I've ever ever here and then you know, I just can't uh understand what's being said. Uh I'm and I just uh was informed by somebody that came around the neighborhood about rentals. You know, for a homes and uh you know, it could have been just uh um neighbors coming around and uh >> [clears throat] >> uh what do you say? Gossip. But you don't know, you know, for sure because I haven't seen anything put out by the council, anybody about this. And then they're just going to have a vote today. She calls up the mayor and then she says, "Oh yeah, we're going to have a vote tonight." Well, what are they supposed to inform you? I don't know for sure, but it seems like they should. Anyway, thank you. >> Thank you, Mr. Pence. Uh Geraldine Breheim? >> [clears throat] >> Geraldine Breheim, 8415 38th Street, Lake Elmo. And I wanted to bring to your attention our 38th and Dale and 39th Street are residential homes for many years for same residents. We do not want temporary people living in our homes and coming and going, changing people and we don't know where they are coming from. We have many children in that area and that would be endangering them in some ways. We have seen that happen in many areas. And also we have such well-established families. We don't want to have any temporary people moving in and out of our areas to disrupt this. I've been there 67 years with no problems and do not intend to have problems in the future. So, I vote strictly no to having temporary people moving in and out of Lake Elmo in our area. Thank you. >> Thank you, Ms. Brehm. Pete Kastler. >> [clears throat] >> Good evening and thank you, Council. My name is Peter Kastler. I live at 91 30 55th Street North. You may recognize me from the Park Commission, but here tonight to talk about short-term rentals. Uh our family lives on our old family farm. It's been in our family since 1869. Uh sixth generation. My kids will be the sixth generation. Um It's the old Klietz property. Klietz Park is on some of the old farmland. Uh so, we have 40 acres still and there's two houses on that 40 acres. It's pretty common. Uh maybe not pretty common, but not unheard of to have a family build the the next generation build a house on the farm property. So, my great great grandparents built the farm house and then my grandparents built the farm in 1962 which we call the new house. Um but we will currently live in the in the uh on the property. We use the second house as a rental. Right now we run short-term rentals out of that property using the bed and breakfast permit that Lake Elmo has. We were told by staff at interim that that was going to be okay to do. Uh and I just wanted to share that doing this for a couple years we have across the board had quiet uh respectful guests, a large percentage of whom come to visit family members in Lake Elmo. Uh they come for family reunions, they come for weddings, they sometimes come for funerals. Uh we don't have problems with parties or noise. Uh Lake Elmo is not a got a got a big bar strip with a lot of parties going on, I'm sure you know. Um and even [clears throat] if we did we're we're present on the property making sure that the rules are followed and that we have people that are there that are respectful. We don't generate more trash, it generates less trash than a long-term rental and I I know that is a fact for my property anyway. Uh it generates less traffic as a long-term rental. Generates probably about the same amount of noise. It's kids whether they're long-term rental or playing in the yard, they make some noise. Um this has helped our family pay the bills. You might not uh be surprised that farming on 40 acres does not pay the bills. So it helps pay property taxes, it helps get things done. It's also helped our property from becoming uh more developed houses, which I know are are neighbors appreciate. I think a lot of Lake Elmo residents appreciate. Uh we've heard the issue of whether a commercial activity should be occurring in residential areas. I don't think that's an issue, we already do. We have daycares that are allowed. We have bed breakfasts that are allowed. We have uh in some residential areas group housing could be allowed. Um and long-term rental is certainly allowed. So, I don't find that really an issue. The issue as to whether corporate ownership or absentee landlords or investment firms might come in, that could be an issue potentially. I don't find it a huge issue, but I hear it a lot as as a potential issue. I think there is a way to address that. Capping it at 20 permits is what I heard would be the way to address that. I don't think that addresses it all. It wouldn't keep an investment firm from buying up, however likely this might be, but buying up several to 20 license permits. That's not going to address that. I think the way to address that would be to require that the permit holders be Lake Elmo residents, homesteaded resident residents, permanent residents. They may have a property that's not at their residence, but they are there. They're going to be much more likely to be engaged [clears throat] in the community, taking care of the property. They're going to be nearby. As we just heard, management companies aren't necessarily going to be nearby, and they're really not going to be involved in the property as much. It's just not that's they as a management company, that's not the way that's going to work. We could still cap it at 20. In fact, you could require that maybe only permit holder could only have one or two two houses. Uh as a as a way to do that. So, just in in some I do hope that you would allow residents to use their property in a manner that's reasonable. I think this is reasonable as long as it's not generating a nuisance. That's required of all property owners across the board in Lake Elmo. There's ordinances on the book for that. I would also hope that you would send this back to staff to require that it be for Lake Elmo residents, homesteaders, or permanent residents, and I think that would address some of the concerns and make this even better ordinance than it is. Thank you. I appreciate it. >> Thank you, Peter. >> [clears throat] >> Stephanie Checkley. >> [clears throat] >> Good evening, Mayor, council members, members of the community. My name is Stephanie Checkley. I live at 8382 Hidden Bay Trail in Lake Elmo. And um I'm a Lake Elmo resident. I'm a realtor uh with Keller Williams. And tonight I'm just standing before you as a um very proud Lake Elmo resident. I respectfully urge the council to focus on regulation rather than prohibition when it comes to short-term rentals. An outright ban might sound like a simple solution to some, but in practice it punishes responsible homeowners while doing little to address uh actual concerns being raised. Issues like noise, parking, and nuisance behavior are already enforceable under existing ordinances. A ban does not eliminate bad behavior. It just uh removes any accountability and pushes activity underground where there's no licensing, no oversight, and no opportunity for revenue for the city. Um the better path is a thoughtful licensing framework. Cities across Minnesota, including Stillwater, Duluth, and Minneapolis have implemented very successful uh programs and uh short-term rental regulations that protect neighborhoods while also generating meaningful tax revenue. And I believe that Lake Elmo can do the same. A strong licensing system could include annual permits, safety inspections, occupancy limits, uh local comment contact requirements, insurance requirements, and strict penalties, including license revocation for properties that violate those standards. If the concern is investor saturation, the city could also implement density caps or as previously mentioned uh owner occupancy requirements. I also want to offer a perspective from the front lines of the Lake Elmo housing market. I'm an active listing agent with multiple current listings in Lake Elmo, including two current lake home listings currently, and I can honestly say I have never in my entire career listing homes in Lake Elmo, had a buyer express interest in purchasing a Lake Elmo home to operate it as a short-term rental investment. The numbers simply do not support it. The average home price in Lake Elmo is now well over $700,000, while occupancy rates for short-term rentals in this area are estimated to be under 40% annual occupancy rate. Financially, that is not an attractive investment model. The reality is that most people purchasing homes in Lake Elmo want to do so to have a home for their family to live in, to raise children here, and become part of this community, not commercial investors trying to turn our neighborhoods into hotels. And this is not about choosing between neighborhood character and property rights. We can protect them both. My own family relies on short-term rentals when relatives visit because Lake Elmo simply does not have an existing hotel infrastructure. My husband and I also hope to responsibly potentially rent our home in the future while traveling for mission work. Many homeowners value that kind of flexibility. I'm just asking for a fair framework, one that holds hosts accountable, protects neighbors, respects homeowners, and creates a new revenue source for our city. Lake Elmo has always been a thoughtful and forward-looking community, and I hope we choose regulation over prohibition and create a policy that reflects balance, accountability, and common sense. Thank you for your time and service. >> Thank you, Ms. Checkley. Susan Dunn. >> Good evening. Susan Dunn, 11018 Upper 33rd Street North. I guess a procedure had has changed. I thought public inquiry was just for certain things and if something was on the agenda, you were to discuss it at that point in time. But nevertheless, I do want to bring up the thing about the short-term rentals. I believe it needs to go back to to have some extra information looked at it and maybe some other things that have been brought before us today to thinking about, especially the things in like West Lakeland Township, which is closer to us. Um I looked at the obviously what the proposed ordinance and one thing that really struck out to me was the majority of people who are making the decisions live in HOAs and they have the opportunity to opt out of all this. So, this is not citywide. It it would just be as it stands now on specific areas of the city that do not have HOAs. We do have bed and breakfast. I think that they've uh they've been really run well and people been very responsible in that. No issues with that. But I do have a concern as the ordinance that it's written now has has some areas that that need looked at further. It's not really appropriate for our city. Um property rights, people talked about that. And um if you're in an HOA, like I said, you can opt out. You don't have to have somebody be beneath you. But public safety is a problem. Um Cape Fear is for real. People are fearful of the revolving door type of individuals that are coming in. They may be just fine, otherwise it could be a problem. So, please vote no on this one when it comes up before you tonight and send it back for further evaluation or denial. Thank you. I I'm not a realtor. >> Thank you, Susie. Brooke Dwyer. >> [clears throat] >> Hello, I'm Brooke Dwyer. Longtime resident of 4870 Jerome Avenue North is my primary residence. 9233 Jane Road North is our secondary property. We We have a cabin that we literally can walk to. We spent 20 years getting to know the lady that owned it and she allowed us to purchase it. So, our long-term plans are to just use it as our cabin. We've been fixing it up, keeping it exactly the same as it is. The lot is relatively restricted. The big thing I'm looking at is with this ordinance, it's taking away people's rights. And so, I want to be cognizant of that for the residents like myself [clears throat] that maybe someday would like to do something with that property. It would be nice to have that option. I think the the council and the planning commission can work towards eliminating or restricting, you know, outside people to do it. But for somebody like me who literally looks out my south side window and can see the property and who has 20 different sensors and cameras in the property, I would know if I was to rent it out everything that's going on in that property. So, I would if I was to do that in the future, which I'm not going to, you know, there are technologies and stuff that would allow us to do that. As for the quiet enjoyment of the Lake Elmo area, I don't know if anybody's been around the lakes, but the fireworks have already started. They go on almost constantly. I have a dog that is absolutely freaked out about it and I've got two neighbors that have PTSD and they they really get upset about the fireworks and that is already started. [clears throat] The kids on the lakes with the surf boats and the other ski boats that are blaring their stereos all afternoon on weekends and all during afternoons. If you know, peaceful enjoyment of the area is important, we should be looking at those things, too, because people at a dock, you know, hanging around partying is one thing, but there's a lot of noise that's going on that is becoming elevated. When I was working at my cabin on Sunday, I could barely hear myself think from one of the boats that was out there full volume, you know, so anyway, just think about it from a standpoint of allowing residents that live in the city to do what they can with their property, but restrict outside commercial organizations. And I think that's pretty should be pretty reasonable to be able to do. Thank you. Have a great day. >> Thank you, Mr. Dorr. I think that concludes our uh that concludes our our speakers for this this evening. Um Yeah, we got the Just make sure I'm got everybody covered. Did have somebody that sent something in uh Todd Williams uh also basically indicating that he is not in favor of short-term rentals. All right. Um Next on the agenda, we have approval of minutes from [clears throat] uh April 14th and April 21st. Those were provided in our packet. If uh if there's nothing to change in those, I'll entertain a motion to approve. >> So moved. >> Support. >> All those in favor of approving the minutes from 4:14 and 4:21 of this year, please indicate by saying I. >> I. >> And it's already here by approved. On the consent agenda this evening, we have approved payments and disbursements, denied [snorts] stormwater appeal for 4180 Irvin Circle North, approved stormwater appeal for 11243 30th Street North, denied stormwater appeal for 11018 Upper 33rd Street North, accept donation of the fire department from Knoll Raleigh, approve plans and specifications and order advertisement for bids for the Elmo's Pup Park parking lot improvements. And that's what we have in our consent agenda. I'll entertain a motion for approval of the consent agenda as presented. >> Motion to approve the consent agenda as written. >> Support. >> Okay. >> We have some discussion on that, Mayor. >> Sure. >> I would like to remove items two, three, and four, the stormwater permits. >> Two, three, and four. >> We can take them all up as one. That My concern is the same for all of them. >> Okay. Any objection to the amendment to the removal of two, three, and four? >> [clears throat] >> Don't matter. >> You objecting? >> Well, that's fine. We're going to remove it. All those in favor of the consent agenda with items one, five, and six, please indicate by saying I. >> I. >> All right, 1, 5, and 6 are approved. Moving into the regular agenda, we have Polco contract for community engagement subscription. >> Thank you, Mayor and Council. Um as you all hear later on in the agenda, we will be um talking about hiring a consultant to continue our discussions about that 76 acre in a future park. As part of that discussion, we've talked about um someday conducting a statistically sound survey for our community. Um and so we are not quite ready to do that survey yet, but tonight um we are talking about about it because staff did research our um two top community survey providers that are pretty familiar in the area Polco and Morris Leatherman. And we did some analysis on their services and um Polco offers an additional um product, which allows for use of a community engagement tool. And the reason we're talking about tonight is because staff is eager to use this tool um for our community engagement that is coming up for 180 acres. And so we thought it was appropriate um to bring in Alec Vice here, who can just describe about the national community survey, and then we can answer any questions about that survey as well as the community engagement portion of um Polco, which is called uh engage the engage platform. And then um we're hoping that um council takes a look at it, and then we would like um council to authorize us to move forward and start using the um Polco platform as well. So, can turn over to Alec and he can um go over the national community survey. >> Thanks, Nicole. Uh Mayor, Council, staff, appreciate you having me this evening. Uh do want to mention at the outset I'm having a little bit of trouble uh like the audio is just breaking up a little bit. So, if I do ask you to repeat a question, um that is why. So, apologies ahead of time for that. But, I'll go ahead and share my screen and get started here. Hopefully you can see my screen, but if not, um just want to provide a little bit of background about uh Polco. Um so, like I mentioned, my name is Alec Weiss. I'm the Director of Account Management at Polco. Uh I also work with a lot of communities around the Minneapolis-Saint Paul area and across uh really the Midwest, but a little bit of background about Polco. So, we are the nation's largest provider of community surveys coast to coast from Palo Alto, California to Annapolis, uh a lot of counties in between. Also, uh partners with ICMA and NLC uh as well, but you are especially good company uh in the Minneapolis-Saint Paul area, really across Minnesota. So, just wanted to highlight a couple of the communities that use the National Community Survey and Polco as their community survey provider. And really what that allows you to do is a couple things. So, uh when you're administering a community survey, uh we'll dive into methodology a little bit, but you can actually compare your results. Probably the most important comparison is being able to compare against yourself. So, over time you can establish benchmarks and then compare how you're improving, what areas are decreasing, that sort of thing. Uh you'll also have access to national benchmarks. And so, that's 500 communities across the country that I mentioned previously that Polco works with to administer community surveys. So, you can benchmark to see what's going on nationally, and then you can also benchmark against these communities and then many more uh that are in your area also administering the NCS. You're not just constrained to geography, though. So, if you'd like to see your results compared against a smaller subset of communities, call it like 5 to 30 like communities amongst each of these demographic characteristics. So, could be region, could be um population growth, median household income, uh any of these. And so, we can compare uh again, kind of a more similar snapshot of communities to your own uh to compare your data against as well. The reason I put this on here, we offer more certainly than engagement and then benchmark surveys. Wanted to highlight some of the other things that we do, but really uh that the dynamic I want to point out is the fact that most of the time you'll have like an engagement platform, which is a separate entity from a community survey uh provider from your scientifically valid community survey. In this case, we allow you to actually combine both of them. And so, by administering the National Community Survey, you can actually build an online followership or resident panel in all the communities that I mentioned previously. They build that over time. So, what it allows you to do is not have to audience chase. And so, just with a click of a button, you'll be able to retain those. And then any additional survey, poll, live event work that you want to do, um focus groups, that sort of thing, you can click a button, it'll send that poll or that survey to them directly. And so, it creates this thought flywheel effect where the more polls and surveys you do, uh rather than having to audience chase, you can kind of build that over time. I'll show you a couple of examples of what that looks like uh on the live platform here at the end. But just want to flag that dynamic in case uh it seems a little bit odd to be talking about engagement and scientifically valid surveying at the same time. Okay. So, looking at use case, the most common use case most of the communities I mentioned, the way that we'll use this is sort of as like a a guidepost within either a comprehensive plan or a strategic planning process. And so that looks like in year one or year zero, you administer something like a a custom community survey or the national community survey, establish a benchmark, um see where you're at from the sentiment side of things. I imagine there's a lot of data points you're looking at in-house to ascertain what needs improvement. Um you have a lot of good ideas, I'm sure. And then really what we're bringing to the table is does that actually match the perception of what the community thinks? So public safety is fantastic. [clears throat] Does the community agree with that? Uh and then is it a perception issue or is it something that uh really does need fixing? And then from there, budget allocation. We also do some uh budget engagement. I'm going to skip that for now. Uh this can also just be replaced for like that additional polling surveying that we talked about earlier. So if there's projects in between the larger survey project uh they want to put out to the community, great way to do that. And then measure progress. So if it's a four-year planning process, maybe in year two, re-evaluate re-administer the survey and then allocate budget accordingly. So looking at the national community survey itself, uh it's measuring the 10 facets of livability. These are stock questions. In addition to the stock questions, you can add your own custom questions. So things that are more specific to Lake Elmo. We can add up to anywhere from half a page up to a full page and a half of custom questions. The instrument itself does benchmark questions, that's five and a half pages. And so uh you're looking at quite a bit of information, again measuring the 10 facets of livability. You'll be assigned a project manager from start to finish. We'll go over timeline, but throughout this entire process from sampling to coming up with those custom questions we mentioned, they'll work with you. They're trained survey scientists, so uh they can help you come up with questions that are scientifically valid, not leading, and then also you're able to get the most information possible uh out of your out of your survey. Oh, and I guess one other point on this. If there's questions you actually don't you don't really care about the information, you can strike questions. So, if you see a section or a couple questions on this you're like, I don't necessarily know if that'll be useful for us. Uh please do let us know. It's your survey and then we can shrink that. I'll cover this quickly in terms of timeline. So, uh this is pretty conservative but grouping 1 through 7 really, that's what I mentioned. So, you'll be assigned a project manager, come up with custom questions, we'll administer a sampling plan, too. So, what that usually looks like is 3,000 households will be randomly selected in Lake Elmo. So, we'll take all zip codes that encompass Lake Elmo and then we'll take your GIS shape file, imprint that on the community, and then you can also come up with sub geographic areas, too. So, east side of town versus west side of town, and you can have breakdowns of that data that way. That's all going to be this weeks 1 through 7. Again, probably the most intensive but you'll have a project manager for that. And then 7 through 13, that's data collection. That's open to the community. There is an optional open participation survey the last 2 weeks after the community. So, that's anyone who wasn't selected for uh the random sample, they'll have the ability to take that. During this 6 weeks, there's going to be two points of outreach. Every household that's selected, they're going to receive a postcard invitation uh saying who in the house should be taking the survey. It's going to have a QR code, a unique URL, and then a week later it'll be followed by a full mail survey packet. So, folks who prefer to send that back in, um there's going to be postage paid return, so no additional cost there to them. And again, that'll be for all 3,000 households that take it. Usually what we see is about a split of 50/50. So, 50% of folks will take it online, 50% will take it uh via paper. And then by the time we wrap things up, we'll have a report in your hands, maybe three to five weeks after uh that wraps. This is what I what I was mentioning earlier just in terms of the shapefile. We're looking at Papillion, Nebraska here. Very uniquely shaped community. So, we can certainly adjust any shapefile that we need and we'll develop a sampling plan with you. And then I also just wanted to highlight what it would look like for the mailing materials. We can also do translations as well. And so if you'd like to translate it into Spanish or any other language, we can accommodate that certainly. And it's going to look like it's coming from you all from the community. It's not going to look like it's coming from Polco. There won't be any Polco branding associated with it. And then in addition to that, we'll equip you with resources for frequently asked questions and the best ways to advertise the survey as well. >> [clears throat and cough] >> And then diving into results, I'm actually going to show right after this as long as no one wants me to pause here. I'll show you what our results look like. But really just wanted to highlight two things here. One, what the trendlines look like over time. And then you'll have access to this is the national benchmarks and then the custom benchmarks that I mentioned. That's that five to 30 even more similar communities that will exist here, too. And then the other thing is this quality and importance gap analysis. So, the NCS doesn't just measure quality. We also really want to measure importance. So, if something comes back as being perceived as lower quality, it's also important to keep in mind if the community necessarily care about that and to what level. And so being able to map that out is certainly helpful. And then in addition to this, you'll get breakdowns. So, east side of town versus west side of town, how for all these questions, how satisfied are they with you know, police services, trust in government, that sort of thing. And then it's housing tenure, age, any other demographic information that you'd like. Obviously, it's anonymized, but you will have access to just the overall data. I'll pause here, I guess. Any questions at this point that you think would be helpful to to recap? >> Any questions? >> Yeah, I have one question for Alec here. Um so, when you're s- This tool is great, but it only come it it's only good useful if people are using it. So, what is the average like percentage of engagement for something like this? Like, if you send it out to a city of 10,000, let's use round numbers, how many folks are actually filling out this survey? >> So, the national average for the random sample is 12%. I will say your So, Minnesota usually crushes that. Uh I was looking at some other communities that are closer. Uh it's usually closer to like 15 to 20 or even above. So, that would be like Oakdale, Woodbury. Um I'm trying to think who else was very close. But, you all almost always beat the 12% um return. The 12% is average. So, I would anticipate higher, but I hesitate to say exactly how much. >> Okay. Thanks, Alec. >> And then really anything you can do to pre-notify the community, that certainly helps to to bump up the information so people know it's legit, it's coming, and it's very important. We're using this to make decisions for the community. >> And would you say that this tool is more useful for our residents or is it more useful for our staff to look at the data? >> I think for for the staff, really to be able to see one, are our hunches correct? Look at like [clears throat] a statistically valid subset of the community, what are they saying? Sometimes it backs everything up, and there there are no surprises. Sometimes there are surprises, but it can help back up those resource allocation decisions of Okay, is the community actually feeling what the hard data says? So, being able to put both of those things together can be really helpful context. Cuz sometimes it's just gap of a gap in information or um yeah, how the community is feeling. >> Sure. Okay, thank you. >> And then real quick, I will show just what this looks like. So, on the Polco platform, you'll have access to this. In this case, we're looking at Needham, Massachusetts. It's a uh Boston suburb. And so, what they've done is every other year, they do the National Community Survey. And so, they've done it one other iteration before this, I guess. But, they jumped up to 417 subscribers in '22. I guess a little higher, 500. And then again. And then once again. So, they're at roughly 1,200. Um I think they're maybe 25,000. Uh don't quote me on that. And so, in terms of returns, what this could look like is using the Engage platform, they also put out these like smaller surveys. So, in this case, like uh a mural project. Little bit of information. Uh I imagine the community is doing something similar, just on a different platform at this time. But, uh okay, so where's the mural going to be? Here's the location. Here's the finalists. And then vote. [snorts] So, it can be something lighthearted. It can be something uh maybe more contentious. I don't know if like backyard chickens or turning tennis courts into pickleball courts is reached your community, but you know, those can be contentious historically. Um that sort of thing. So, totally up to you. Customizable. You'll also have access to a customer success manager uh who can guide you throughout the process. But, what I wanted to show is how many responses. Yeah, so for some of these, 2,700 responses, 700 responses. And so, being able to build that panel is a a huge difference maker in terms of being able to garner responses for those follow-on surveys. >> Quick question for cuz you've mentioned being able to compare things over time. Are you are you seeing a lot of instances where cities are using maybe the same five or 10 core questions on a four-year basis or a six-year basis so they can start to create those trends? >> Yeah, great question. Yeah, so for the custom questions, I think what we most often see is communities will have one or two topics that they measure over time. And so they're just seeing what's going on. Maybe they have an idea of a project they want to build consensus for or something like that. And then everything else is top level. So maybe it's a four, five, six extra questions of what's going on this year that we want feedback on, that we want scientifically valid feedback on. And so you can sprinkle those both of those in while also maintaining benchmarks across everything else that kind of provides this wider snapshot of the community. >> And last question, we own the data, correct? >> So Polco would own the data, but we don't restrict your access to it. And so should after the survey you say we want the hard data, give us a copy of our report, we want to part ways as friends, we're happy to provide that for you. The reason we own it is just for the ability to benchmark so that we're not using your data against your will to benchmark, but we won't restrict your access to it. >> Got you. And there's nothing stored behind the scenes to reveal um um PID personal identifying >> No personal identifying information will be stored. We don't have access to it. So even the hard data that we share with you, they just they won't be anything to share. >> Got you. Thank you. >> And Nicole, that concludes my main overview. Happy to cover what's included in the contract if you think that'll be helpful, otherwise I can skip. >> I I think that might be helpful. Yeah. Yeah, if you don't [snorts] mind covering a little bit of what's included in the contract just in in relation to some of this that's been presented. The additional I know it of it's in the in the packet, but >> Yeah, happy to cover it. We're a little bit uh unconventional, I guess, in terms of how we we build this in. So, really our goal with the agreement, the term of the agreement, is to match however often you're planning on administering the survey. The most common that we see is every other year, so 24 months, 36 months. I think that's totally reasonable, especially as the first community survey. You can add additional community surveys um at roughly the same cost, but then we'll build in access to the Engage platform at no additional cost. So, if you were to come to us and say, "We want to do the survey every 2 years." same price. 4 years, same price. Uh and then with that, you're going to get access to again, like I mentioned, the Engage platform for this term. This also includes one administration of the National Community Survey. We're including a full page of custom questions, a remote presentation of results. So, your project manager, they'll come and deliver uh report results. We'll meet with you all ahead of time to see, you know, uh anything in particular we want to cover, um that sort of thing. And then, custom benchmarks. That again was that smaller cohort we we talked about. And then, I really wanted to include that at no additional cost since I think it's especially interesting given your location and the Twin Cities. And then, final thing. This again would be the the total cost for the 3 years, so not per year, but 24,000 total in 3 years. >> [clears throat] >> And in that that 36 months, that's you feel like that's a pretty uh good spacing of time for a growing city? >> Yeah, I think it depends uh mainly on preference. I think 30 or 24 months is the most common that we see, followed by maybe yearly, and then 36 months. But, there's a lot of communities that do um all of them. So, it just depends on what your planning process looks like, uh and then how often you'd be using the results. So, some communities that they do it yearly, it can be a lot to administer. Um so, Just up to you. >> Okay. And then >> [clears throat] >> anyone else have a I do have a question kind of moving back here a step. Um we we've done surveys in the past. We've had issues with the statistically significant aspect of it and that's always been a sticky point and uh kind of a frustration if we'd get the data and then um >> [clears throat] >> at times people would want to use the data and then and forget about that it wasn't statistically significant and other times they would they would reverse their opinion on that kind of depending on whatever was was being discussed. How how does this survey become statistically significant? Are there certain benchmarks, a certain number of citizens, residents that we need to complete this for it to become statistically significant? If you could just speak to a little bit from that standpoint cuz I I want to make sure if we were doing this that we're sitting on really solid ground. There's no question that when this data is presented, when we're making decision on that as policy makers, that we're confident in this data. >> Yeah, love that question. Um let me I don't know if it's handy, but so a couple things I would mention. One is it's really the methods that make it statistically significant. And so, it's the random sample that we're doing. It's no leading questions, um how we design the instrument, and then it's the re-weighting that we're doing. And so, that's really what makes it uh valid. What brings down the margin of error, which is maybe um more interesting or more um important, is how many responses that we get. And so, one thing we can do is if we would like to send out more surveys. So, the base sample is 3,000 households. If we want to bump that up to, you know, 4,000, uh then that can surely drive down the margin of error and so that band of decision making, that's going to be a little bit slimmer. So, if you're looking at a 5% margin of error, if you get a score of 80% could be 85, could be 75, uh somewhere in there we can feel confident that that's where the true the truth lies. And so being able to dial that in a little bit further, that can be helpful maybe if we're looking at like 3% either way. And [clears throat] so getting more responses to help with that. >> Okay. >> But I think the margin of error is probably the best way to >> And so we always have that margin of error. We'll always have that margin of error that we can use as okay, yes, yeah, I we're showing 80%, you know, we can statistically say within 5% one way or the other, you know, that this number is accurate and then make decisions based off of that. And the idea would be is if the more residents that participate in this, the the smaller that margin gets, the more concise and accurate that data is and the more certain we are with it. >> That's right. And we will publish our methods too for how we administer the survey. And so we're accredited through the American Association of Public Opinion Research, that's like Pew, Gallup. >> Um >> So we we do >> [clears throat] >> publish all of how we administer the survey. So if you're interested in that, feel free to check it out. We're quite proud of that. But you're exactly right. So it's really just driving down that margin of error is probably the most important in getting that true snapshot of a community. So if we have a band of like we won't do this to you, but if we had a band of like 10%, then it's becomes like okay, well 20 points is quite a bit versus the more narrow we can make it the better decisions you all can make. >> Okay. Sorry if I continue on this line. >> Sure, go ahead. >> So and then again kind of again with the previous surveys that we've done, um I'll kind of tie these two together. Another issue we had was one non-Lake Elmo residents participating in it. Uh and the second one is we would often see I'm just for lack of better word I'm going to call it like a special interest group, right? Like a an organization or a certain neighborhood or a certain um community within the the city that's very passionate about a very specific thing. And so they will, you know, reach to their uh their organization, uh send out an email blast, and all of the sudden, you know, there's 100 responses. Now, I'm not saying that that necessarily is inaccurate, right? It's getting people involved by by doing that, and people on the opposite side of the decision could do the same. I guess just to from your perspective from operating these, do you see that as an issue? And if so, how does Polco go about addressing and kind of ensuring that, you know, one, they are Lake Camel residents, and two, I I I I I guess I'm not really sure how to ask it, but how do you handle where you get these special interest groups that will push out a mass message, get a large group of people to participate, you know, likely in a skewed way? >> Yep. Yeah, so for the national community survey, I will say ballot stuffing historically hasn't been a huge issue. I think part of that is length, just because it takes, you know, 10 15 minutes to fill it out. And so, in order to go through and fill out all the information several times is quite burdensome. Uh certainly, but there are some measures in place um sort of from the outset. One is going to be IP address. We'll track IP addresses, so if there's multiple responses from the same household, we'll know that. It'll accept the response, but we'll know that. We'll be able to see that, see what's going on. For the random sample, um if it's a concern, oh, and if there's also it's more than 95% similar, we'll also flag that. Um and then finally, for like the mail paper survey, it is printed in a unique way, so you won't really be able to uh copy that necessarily in the booklet fashion. However, uh we have seen it done in the past. There's still been some instances since I've worked at Polco where that's come up. Uh if it's of interest, we can actually add a PIN so that would just uniquely identify it as this survey has been taken, it's off the table. And so, uh you can only take it once then. So, there wouldn't be any more than 3,000 responses even possible. So, because of 3,000 codes. So, those only can be used once. >> As in like a unique PIN on each flyer that goes out. >> That's right. >> I get a certain PIN, Nick gets a different one. >> Yep. And then one thing I would mention that with that as I know there's some concerns at times is we're not sampling individuals, we're only sampling households. So, when we purchase our list to send it out, we're not sending it to John Doe, we're sending it to you know, 6342 Stonebridge or something. >> Ooh, so we got some disagreements among >> Who's going to fill it out? >> How is my wife going to tell me what to fill out? Okay. >> Yeah, so if not to dive into the weeds, but we will use the birthday method. So, member of the household over 18 that had the most recent birthday, we would ask them to fill out the survey depending who the winner is there. And then if the other member of the household would like to or other of the household would like to fill out the survey, that's where that open participation is valuable. They can then have their voice heard through that. >> Would the Would the IP be able to limit the surveys to only being from Lake Elmo residents if we didn't go with the PIN um method that you were talking about with the IP? I I I don't know how that works. If the IP address would be able to limit to where only Lake Elmo residents after the initial 300 or 3,000 are are gone or sent out and it's open to anybody to submit. >> Yeah, it's a good question. I actually don't know the answer to that. I could get back to you on the feasibility of that, but I'm not sure off the top of my head. >> And maybe just a better I mean, have you seen this in other communities where they struggle with this? Residents who use services in a neighboring community you know, want to see them add a splash pad, but hey, I don't have to pay for it all with my taxes. You know, I'm going to try to get my survey in. >> Yeah, yeah, especially with the pin. No, I think maybe we've had and I've worked with Polco for like 5 years. Um, so that's a couple thousand surveys. I think it's come up twice that I've seen it um, where we have had to, okay, clearly there is some valid stuff going on here to your point. Um, let's then revisit this and then redo it. Uh, so it it is pretty uncommon especially [clears throat] with the sampling. So, if you you see something online that's that's strange, certainly we can take a look, but uh, it is yeah, pretty uncommon. >> Okay, thank you. >> Any further questions for Alec? If not, thank you very much for your presentation. I'll entertain a motion. >> Question for staff. How do we have if there's a proposal if there's a recommendation, how do we have this budgeted? Cuz some of it is for a park's usage and some of it is general city. >> Yeah, we have it in our budget for 2026 under contract services. So, we did budget 30,000 for this. >> And none of it's from the parks fund at this time? >> No. >> All right. Thank you. Motion to approve the received quote and scope of service from Polco. >> Second. >> We have a motion by Councilmember uh, Holtz, second by Councilmember uh, Pregnus. Uh, discussion. Councilmember Holtz. >> It's a good discussion. I appreciate the questions Councilmember Hearn especially. That's uh, that has come up those questions. So, I appreciate you got those out. Um, I guess for context cuz I know some I can see looks on a couple of people's faces. Why why are we doing this survey? For context with the discussion of as Administrator Miller mentioned earlier, we purchased 76 acres of land uh on the south side of Sand Fish Lake Park with a specific intention of seeing if we can do if there's community interest and engagement and a desire to put a sports complex there. And the reason for it is we did a parks master plan update year and a half ago now? Yeah. Year and a half ago. It hadn't been updated in almost two decades. And we found that we not only are short on ball fields of all types, but between football, soccer, baseball, and softball, we're short by over 10 fields and likely more. And that was 2 years ago. And so we're only getting short as time goes on. And we're hearing it from our families, we're hearing it from our youth, we're hearing it from sports organizations that serve Lake Oswego. So that that our intention here was to try to say, "Look, what is possible?" So part of this with this survey is to try to determine does the community not only support this, but what do they support? And so that's going to be kind of that's why I I like this because we can customize questions and start to see, "Well, what are the things that would seem like a good fit there? What are the things that are just dumb? No, not that." And then maybe what are the things maybe, you know, maybe needs to be uh a bit more analysis on certain things. So I I support this. I prefer data and I really prefer good data. And I I think it is a valuable tool and I'm very intrigued especially over time for maybe longitudinal analysis of some of those core questions. Um but I think that's another conversation for another time. To me, the the most important thing here is the statistically significant data for the sports complex. >> Anyone else? Councilor Jagitsch. >> Yeah, I I agree with what's been said. When we did the original survey in the parks piece it wasn't done you know, statistically significant. So, we didn't have a lot of confidence in what it said and our conversation at that time was this is a very big endeavor we're going to look to take on it has a long-term impact to the city. We're taking 76 acres can make into a park everyone can celebrate and use and we want to do it right. And so as we go through our community engagement process the final piece or one of the pieces is this survey to determine what does a broad community want and we want to be highly confident that we're getting information we can bank on cuz we're going to go back to you and say if you support this we need a way to finance it as well. And so we have to do it right the first time or we'll be in a lot of trouble. >> [clears throat] >> Here again? >> Yeah, obviously. Yeah, I'm just going to add it you know my questions on that line of kind of the statistical significance and and how that's all interpreted just goes back to again you know, when we've done this before that's been a frustration. I've always actually really appreciate the data even you know, maybe even if it wasn't perhaps statistically significant even if maybe there was some of that you know, pushing by kind of again special interest groups. I I think that still is meaningful. I think that kind of goes to what you were talking about the quality versus importance. If there's a ton of people that are really passionate about it it's more of an important issue um and vice versa. So, I from what I'm seeing but I do really like it is specifically that quality versus importance gap. I think if we do move forward with this I think as a council that is something that we very much have to focus on not just on the raw number but on that quality versus importance gap. Again, I remember from our parks survey this came up frequently where there'd be a recommendation that said hey you know, your your you have four less basketball courts than the national average. But then it comes back to well, what's the importance of that? Is there Is there any request for basketball courts? Have we had anyone come out and ask for that? It just is an example, right? And so, I think that's where that's really important um for us as a council to remember. Um and then you mentioned as well early on that this can most importantly be used to compare against yourself and the standards you set versus necessarily just against other cities. Again, I think that is the council is really important for us to remember that we're not trying to use this to say, "Hey, we want to be necessarily like another city, but we know the direction that we want to go." And this can help us make sure we're moving in that direction and make sure that the residents are are in favor of that as well. So, I I I do like those two aspects. And again, I think that's just more me saying, "Hey, as a council, I hope that we really take those two things into consideration as we move forward with this data." >> All right. With that, I'll call the question. All those in favor motion approve receive quote and scope services from Polco, please signify by saying I. >> I. >> Opposed, same sign. Hearing none, motion is approved. >> Thank you. >> Thank you, everyone. I look forward to working together. >> Thank you. >> Next item of business is zoning text amendment, short-term [snorts] rentals. Uh Community Development Director Mr. Stolpa. >> And then Jason just real quick here. Uh before this item begins, I I'm going to recuse myself from the discussion and the vote on this. My family owns a a home in Lake Elmo that we rent. I disclosed this to the attorney several months ago. Uh based on that disclosure, I was advised that I recuse myself to avoid any potential conflict of interest in this discussion. Um I'll step away from the the dais at this time. >> Thank you. >> Good [clears throat] evening. Give you a quick overview of uh short-term rentals and how we've got here. Um initially we identified that we uh we have a bed and breakfast license, so we identified that perhaps some people were not owner occupying the property that had the bed and breakfast license, so we introduced it as a zoning text amendment to housekeeping. It went to the planning commission, and the planning commission decided to not uh recommend it for approval, and then we brought it back um for further research. We brought it back on November 12th, 2025 for a workshop with the council, and then the planning commission December 8th of 2025 for their feedback also. So currently the city does not allow short-term rentals in any zoning district. Uh the city does permit bed and breakfast in most residential mixed-use districts, provided it meets the minimum standards. The main one is that it's owner-occupied. It's a single-family home. The number of lodging rooms do not exceed five. Um possible if it with a conditional use, and there's additional parking requirements and insurance. >> [clears throat and cough] >> So the issue before the council is being asked to make a decision on the proposed text amendments. Little bit of background. We discussed this with Washington County's Department of Health and Environment. Uh they license lodging facilities, including they would, you know, they license short-term rentals in other cities. Uh we talked to the sheriff's department also just to talk through nuisance complaints. Uh we all looked at a couple cities. Um Stillwater, Maplewood, and Cottage Grove have short-term rental licensing. We also later looked at others that do not have it, and I'll go through those in a second. But for the license, Washington County's uh license, they currently like I said lot uh license short-term rentals. The staff performs an inspection every 2 years and every year if the property has a pool. So, they're really interested in pools, wells, and septic. That's that's the main thing that they're looking for. Violation enforcement, they work with the property owner to get the property into compliance with county requirements. They do not enforce local ordinances. We asked if we could combine this with the county's process early on and just have a county permit essentially and it wasn't going to work for how this the need of the city. So, we'll talk more about nuisance complaints and and the county sheriff working through those in terms of if this was if this were to be approved revocation of licenses. So, that's important. So, Stillwater, we [clears throat] looked at Stillwater. The new licenses are approved by the city council on a consent agenda. All renewals are approved by staff. It requires a local property manager and they're capped at 50 outside of downtown. I believe there's one available on their website. So, they're at 49. And inspections happen every 3 years by the building department. That's similar to what we're proposing. They're the one city that looks into the R1 R3 occupancy and that's something that we discussed early on in the workshop. When we were talking to Stillwater, they believe they may be the only city that actually does that and we weren't able to find any other city that would require an R1 occupancy for a single-family home. For their enforcement, it's three strikes you're out. It's a revocation of the license. The staff estimates they get about four complaints a year and they've never had to revoke a license. Maplewood does not distinguish between long-term and short-term rentals. New licenses are approved by the staff. They do not limit um through zoning or limiting bedrooms. The inspections are every year every 3 years depending on the need. Basically, if they've had issues at the at the property. Uh utilizes administrative citations to enforce the code. That's something that we do not do on anything here in the city, administrative citations. And they estimate they have three complaints in the four years. Cottage Grove does not distinguish between long-term and short-term rentals, either. New and renewal licenses approved by city council on the consent agenda. They have a property manager. The inspections are every 2 years. Uh they estimate they have one complaint every couple years. Uh they've never had to write a compliance letter except for unlicensed properties. So, one of the slides added here tonight from from the planning commission is just a little bit about Lake Elmo and where we're at currently. So, currently, according to the Met Council 2024, we had 5,410 households in Lake Elmo. Uh we do not allow short-term rentals. There are multiple listings on Airbnb. Currently, we respond to complaints through our code enforcement department. So, anything that comes in, we respond to complaints. That's our approach. That's pretty common approach for cities. Since I've been here for 2 years, we haven't received a complaint. There are seven active B&B licenses. So, these are properties in Lake Elmo with the bed and breakfast license. We have identified that four should be STR licenses. On Airbnb, there are 11 listings. It appears that approximately seven should be STRs. It's not uncommon for a bed and breakfast to list on Airbnb that's licensed correctly. I've also seen Woodbury has a long-term stay motel that lists on Airbnb. That would be a different license. That wouldn't be an STR. So, this question was asked at the planning commission meeting, but if this were to be adopted, our approach would be to work with those four bed and breakfast license holders to become short-term rental license holders. >> Can you clarify on that for four should be short-term rents to completely interrupt? Sorry. Um why should those four be short-term rentals? Are they not owner-occupied? >> That's correct. >> And then as I know we have it in the definitions, Airbnb Airbnb bed and breakfast are to be owner-occupied. But we don't define what that means. How have we been applying that concept? >> They need to occupy the property when the guests are there. >> So at the time of guest, it's not this it's not necessarily it is a homestead. >> Right. >> It's not that it is a primary residence. It's not that they are on site 183 days out of the year. >> That's correct. It's pretty common in other cities to have bed and breakfast have higher standards. So typically that person is there. Sometimes they're required to cook breakfast. >> Right. So you know. >> Would we would we know that the person there is not the owner but is the owner's child? >> So the ones that we've identified, I don't believe have homestead exemptions and they don't appear to be even homesteaded. So meeting the 183-day rule. >> Got you. Thank you. >> Yeah. So but to answer your question, if if a homeowner was there, a family member, that would be fine. So Woodbury this was brought up too about Hugo and Woodbury since they're adjacent to us, they do not allow short-term rentals and um we know that there are multiple listings in Woodbury on Airbnb and I um spoke to both of them and they respond to complaints. So that's their approach and um they receive about a complaint every other year. They don't really get complaints. Specifically about Woodbury, there was one problem property that caused um them to look at rewriting the ordinance. They ended up prohibiting short-term rentals, but it was based on one property. Woodbury, I when I talked to them they didn't have a long history, but there are multiple operating that are just operating without licenses. So, this is the proposed language. The proposed language is a short-term rental means the use of a dwelling unit or any portion thereof rented for at least one night and less than 30 consecutive days. Each short-term rental is limited to a total of five guest rooms and 10 guests. Hotels, motels, bed and breakfast, and other land use explicitly defined and regulated separately are not considered to be short-term rentals. So, we use the the five-bedroom limit, 10 guests to align with state fire code. And then the license standard we're looking at um that licenses are required for short-term rentals. The applicant must provide 24-hour contact information for the owner and at least one manager, uh who must be local. The local is the 60-mi. So, some say have to be in a certain county. We know some people may reside in Wisconsin, so we just made it um 60-mi. The license term is 3 years, and a rental property must be inspected by the building department. So, essentially you would receive your license the first year it'd be inspected by the building department. Um and then we would go out every 3 years for the inspection. The number of licenses approved in the city shall be capped at 20. This just came from feedback from residents about the fear that an outside entity would buy multiple properties, and then we'd have, you know, hundreds of short-term rentals. Homeowners associations too must opt in prior to the city approving a license in that neighborhood. Most homeowners associations, if they are founded recently, would most likely not allow this sort of activity short-term rental in their neighborhood. Uh we were asked how many homeowners associations there are. There are 41 in our file that we have. Um so that's what we're looking at in terms of the homeowners associations. A short-term rental shall be permitted in all residential zoning districts. This was asked, should we limit them to certain districts? So um basically if it's a residential district or mixed-use commercial where the residential's allowed and they have residential building types, whether it's you know, single-family homes or apartments, it's allowed. Uh the short-term rental must provide at least one parking space per bedroom, but are not required to provide more than four parking spaces. So essentially if you have the five-bedroom house, you have four parking spaces. If it's an apartment with one bedroom, you would have the the one parking space. The rooms shall not exceed five. The license must ensure that the property is maintained in compliance with all city ordinances uh >> [snorts] >> and state and federal laws. We're just basically when we go out to inspect, make sure there aren't issues with the property and that they're meeting city code. So one of the things that we could do if we issue them a license, we can revoke the license. So if we have three substantiated relevant complaints or violations within a 12-month period, that the property doesn't comply with health, building, maintenance, or other provisions of the city code, failure to pay fees, fraudulent statements information, breach of peace upon recommendation of the sheriff, actions unauthorized or beyond the scope of the license granted. Those are like the party house, for example. So a reason to deny or suspend would be um another license is revoked in Lake Elmo or another jurisdiction. This came up in the last meeting with the Planning Commission. So basically you have someone that's been kicked out of the other cities and we're made aware of it, we can deny their permit, so they would not have a license to begin with. Um failure to schedule or allow inspections, failure failure to comply with all conditions of the license, delinquent taxes, failure to pursue the removal of guests who have violated city code, failure to cooperate with the city in identifying individual individuals with a right to occupy the property, other good causes as determined by the city council. Just want to bring up a lot of these standards are adopted by the local cities that have the ordinance. So, we had public comment at the planning commission. And we had um six comments that you've received. Four were um against and two in favor. Planning commission, this came up too that um believe really quick, the vote though was a four three for approval. One of the things that was discussed was the licensing fee. So, the idea here is to have a one-time well, once every three years, a $1,500 fee. So, that's basically $500 a year. And we think that's reasonable. It was brought up that Stillwater's fees are lower. Stillwater charges a $600 fee on the three-year term, but they have a 3% lodging tax. So, Lake Elmo doesn't have a lodging tax. So, that's something that could be considered in the future for Lake Elmo, but we believe that if you have a successful short-term rental, you'll end up paying more in fees with a $600. Basically, Stillwater would receive more fees per unit. And then we have um motions here, recommended motions. So, stand for any questions. >> Yeah, Jason, uh back a couple slides here, you had 41 HOAs. Do you have any idea of how many single-family homes that comprises of with those 41 HOAs? >> I don't have the number, no. >> Okay. Yeah, not a problem. It just It just came to me. I was just curious. >> And you're talking about the the cities that ban them, uh was there any discussion on the enforcement of those bans? I mean, you indicated that there were houses listed there within those cities? Can you speak to that at all? >> So, Woodbury is silent on the issue, like we are currently. And they only respond to complaints, like noise complaints. So, they are not actively looking through listings, they are not actively looking to you know, stop stop the activity. So. Hugo, I believe I saw one on Airbnb, and they had one problem property that was operating that I believe is no longer operating. They also respond to complaints, so they aren't actively trying to remove that one listing. >> From an enforcement standpoint, what was some of the feedback that the sheriff's department provided when nuisance complaints do arise? Cuz I know that they do from time to time, whether it's um certain items that are left in lawns at certain and at various within our zones or with noise ordinances. How do they follow up and what's that process? >> Mhm. Basically, uh an officer would go out and file the complaint if there's a noise complaint, complete a record of that, and then send it to us. We've asked for that to be shared. We basically want to verify that the complaints are valid. I mean, we wouldn't want someone calling a complaint in and it's not there, so we have to work with them to figure out if this was a valid complaint. >> And you had said earlier like in your last 2 years, we don't have any complaints from the rentals that do exist. >> No. >> But, we do have complaints from, I presume, from non-rentals, right? Cuz we do get a couple every once in a while that come in. >> So, for the activity of a short-term rental or >> No, just in the city. I mean, we do get complaints. >> All the time. We do. I mean, we probably get like It's not that bad, really. It's like >> Good. Good. >> three or four a week, maybe, of various things, yeah. >> Any other questions? >> Oh, yeah. >> Okay. >> Um And this is kind of a curiosity. I was thinking about this. So, cuz I mean, I work in this field, too, of enforcement and carrying out consequences. And everything's about what you know and what you can prove. Right now, we have I mean, we have apartments. Can a per- if a person was sub leasing, would we be any the wiser and would we know? >> If someone was sub leasing their apartment? >> And they were making money. They were using their their location for monetary gain. >> Yeah, that I I guess I could answer that a couple ways. Usually, whoever's renting the property usually doesn't allow that. So, if they do sub lease, they sometimes could sub lease to a long-term or short-term short-term. So, it just depends. So, we would not know if someone had a rental property and then was listing it as a short-term rental. >> Cuz we're we're silent on that in our ordinances. And again, it'd be regulated by the the owner of the property. >> Right. So, if this is adopted, then we have to have the owner approve this license, and they have to have a property manager if they're not the property manager. >> Um do do do With HOAs, cuz I I a resident asked me that this question. Is the lake the Tri-Lakes Association considered an HOA for these purposes? Cuz they're an association. They exist. They are a legal entity. Are they considered an HOA for this purpose? >> about this in the office internally. We were saying that they are not cuz they're not technically a homeowners association. Uh it's a different type of association. But we can get back to you on that if we can verify. >> Got you. And And it was mentioned tonight, and I know we received emails from from those who don't support this, but some who did support it have asked, "Can it be limited to Lake Elmo residents?" I know legal has provided feedback on that. Can you ex- expand on that? >> Yeah, definitely. There's a case out of New Orleans where they attempted to do that to prevent corporations from buying short-term rentals cuz they have hundreds of short-term rentals there, maybe thousands. So, um it went to court and basically the the appeals court, federal appeals court located in New Orleans, said that that was not constitutional under the commerce clause, that you could not restrict a corporation or someone outside of the city from having a license. And I know legal could provide a little bit more information on that. >> I guess to expand on that, so the federal in the fifth stated it would be unconstitutional. And I guess that that's where the the 60-mile came came from. Do you feel that that would be legally um sustained if ever someone were to question it? >> Uh Mr. Mayor and members of the council, um based on the federal appeals court decision, I would not recommend that the city adopt a short-term rental regulation that would require it [snorts] to be owner-occupied. Um it it's basically you know, saying that it's discriminatory against um out-of-state you know, owners. And and that's violating the commerce clause of the Constitution. So, I would not recommend that. I mean, it is it's a fifth circuit decision, which is we're in the eighth circuit. So, I guess the eighth circuit could decide differently, but they have not and usually they do look to other courts when they make their decisions. They'd probably look at this similar case if they were to receive this. >> I have my opinions on the fifth, but yeah, we are in the eighth. So, with a staff, with this recommendation of 60 miles, do you feel pretty confident that that is legally and constitutionally uh valid if it were questioned? >> Uh Mr. Mayor, members of the council, I think it is valid because you're just saying that they have to have somebody that's reachable within the 60-mile zone. You're not saying that I mean you you could have an out-of-state owner, but as long as they have a property manager or somebody here that's within that zone, they they can have a license. So, you can hire that out if you need to. >> And I believe the fifth said that, too. The idea of a property manager is different than an owner. >> Yeah. >> Got you. >> So, to just piggyback on that, uh Council member Holtz, is so, it wouldn't have to be 60-miles radius, it could be less than. >> Correct. >> Okay. >> Within. >> What in that I don't like depending upon the fifth for things for but let's go with this. If there is another regulation that the owner in totality can only have five short-term rentals overall. Cuz that was that was another suggestion I think someone mentioned it tonight, too, but um cuz then it's not distinguishing based upon the type of owner, whether it's an LLC, a sole prop, an individual. Um is that something that staff has discussed and vetted? I cuz it's not in the proposal, so I assume there's a possibly reason why. >> Well, it's come up recently. So, this has come up after the planning commission um limited to maybe one. And we believe that that's possible. Um the issue with that is that when you look at one person, uh the way it's interpreted is that a business entity is a person, so you could in theory open different business entities um to kind of get around that, but that's basically been our conversation. Like yes, it could it could be limited, I believe, to one per person or business entity. >> Now, this question might have been answered already, but I have a question about So, if there's a property manager, would they have to live within or be within a certain radius of the property, or would that not be constitutional either or discriminatory? >> So, they would have to be within the way it's written, 60 miles of the property, and we believe that that would be constitutional. >> Okay. Question on the um Was there a discussion about having Is there Is there a benefit to the city to have a lodging tax versus a higher uh license fee? >> So, the higher license fee would bring in more revenue if it wasn't like wasn't being rented often. So, the lodging tax would bring in more if it was successful and it was running at a higher occupancy rate. The other positive for the lodging tax is it would apply also to um any hotel, motel that exists in Lake Oswego. So, it's possible the city could generate more revenue through the short-term rentals if they're successful. It's possible, but also we could generate revenue from hotels and motels. >> And my understanding is that the lodging tax can only be used for uh certain purposes of uh attracting visitors and the like for businesses and and whatnot. My question is as cities do are there opportunities for the city to uh For example, I think the lodging tax in Stillwater goes for uh Discover Stillwater. In other words, has there been any di- Uh probably not cuz I I just thought of it, but if if there was an opportunity potentially work with Discover Stillwater to use that dollars to support um some advertisement for the businesses that operate in Lake Elmo, whether it's um the Holiday Inn Express, Party Barn, Lake Elmo Inn, Marmalade, Lakewood Tavern, things of those natures that that would give them an opportunity to maybe broaden their reach for people that are visiting the valley overall. >> We haven't discussed it in much detail. We have mentioned briefly just about, you know, if you had a special event that drives tourism, could you hire somebody potentially >> Okay. >> for a portion. So, that's something we'd have to look into and have another workshop to >> Right. >> bring that up. >> Clarifying question cuz this was a question that came up as well, but I think by email, uh to extend off the the revenue question, it would it be a valid assumption that the revenue being raised is not to add overall to our budget, it's to help pay for the cost of licensing. >> That's correct. I mean, it would max at um 10,000, I believe, a year. >> We're not somehow being able to pay for a new ball field because we're allowing hypothetically, allowing short-term rentals. >> Yeah, that's correct. We would not be able to pay for a ball field. >> Do other cities um that have short-term rentals, are they also doing the year or uh an inspection every 3 years or do they do it yearly? What what made us or settle on what made you guys think three years would be best? >> So the staff capacity for one and the idea that we go out we're looking to make sure that it's available to be available to be occupied. It's in good condition and we think that three years is a good enough time frame to where we can check and it should be still in good condition. >> Okay. Going back to the county cuz you said they they have their own process. Are they aware of some of the short-term rentals that exist in the city? >> They are they're aware. Yes. >> Have they inspected them? >> I don't believe so. I think they'll inspect them if they have swimming pools. They're that's the main thing. They want to make sure people are not operating um a short-term [snorts] rental with a swimming pool. There's a different standard there at the state level. They have um so they basically push that into a a special category of pool. It's not considered just a simple residential pool. >> So is there their source of knowing based upon cities that indicate we have licensed these entities, please now go review for your county level regs? >> That's something we could do is we will share data. So if this is adopted and we have licenses, we can share that with the county. >> But otherwise, like in the case of pools, they don't go and inspect Joe Schmo who has a pool. It's if it's a short-term rental or long-term rental. >> That's correct. That's my understanding. >> All right. Thank you. >> So we could have annual inspections required and we could contract those out cuz we do have adopt we have adopted the international property maintenance code in our city code and that would be the basis of an annual inspection to ensure that the properties are you know maintaining those standards. >> We we could. We I think one a year we would charge them um I believe there's a $75 inspection fee. Um if it's 20, I think we we can handle the 20, you know. >> Yeah. Also, we could contract with inspection firm, too. >> We could, but >> Is the quantity in the ordinance itself, or is that in an internal policy? >> I'm sorry. >> For the qua- the 20 >> The every 3 years versus yearly, is that in the ordinance, or is that would that be an internal policy decision? >> the ordinance. >> Okay. My apologies for not remembering that. >> Any further questions? >> Yeah, one more question. Um just curious why 60 miles, not why not 30 miles, something a little bit more than local for folks that are concerned about property managers being over an hour away? >> We were looking at a different code that was basically an hour. So, instead of having an hour time frame, cuz it's difficult, we put the distance, so if someone can get here in an hour, seemed reasonable. Um >> Okay. >> Yeah. I mean, I don't think there's I mean, if you wanted to be closer, you could. >> And then my last question is again, these are all just number-based questions, but was there a reason for 20? >> So, 20 equals basically one per 1,000 when the city's built out. >> Got it. Okay. >> projection. We just tried to land on a number. Also, it allows growth in the short-term rentals, so it is approved, it's not like eight for nine, 11, whatever number we have. >> Sure. >> You know, half the licenses are are no longer >> Hypothetically, if it then doesn't pass, what happens with the Airbnbs that you believe should be a short-term rental? >> So, if they're bad records that should be a short-term rental, that's something we would need That's something we would need direction from the council in terms of the approach. So, what would end up happening there is we would just uh we would either revoke the license or not renew the license. >> All right. Thank you. >> I I may have missed it, but I didn't see it. Is there a requirement in the policy that in with regards to proof of proper insurance for >> That is not in the ordinance, no. >> Okay. Along those lines, what are your thoughts on that? Is that something that from a staffing level would be applicable for a license review? Are there certain types of insurances, whether it's the total amount or certain type? >> Yeah, I think we could look at it. Um the bed and breakfast Miranda has license uh requirements, I believe. Is that correct? >> Yes. >> So, I think we could mirror the bed and breakfast insurance requirements. >> Any fur- anything further? If not, I'll entertain a motion. >> Motion to adopt ordinance 2026-06 approving the proposed text amendments and fee schedule updates for short-term rentals as presented by staff. >> Is there a second? >> Second. >> Any discussion? >> I would like to um I was going to offer an amendment. >> Okay. Councilmember Drazic. >> I think allowing them to be everywhere in the city is is is not the best decision in this council's opinion. I would support a more of a compromise. I wouldn't allow short-term rentals in residential districts or the village districts. The other districts this would be okay. I say that because in the two districts I want to exclude, the houses are closer together and the opportunity for disruption of the all the things people talked about being in a residential neighborhood. You buy a house in a residential neighborhood to have residential you you know culture. And putting rental units in in the middle of that breaks that culture up. In the other districts um where they are like in the rural districts they're on five-acre lots. It's not the same type of residential neighborhood as you have in a you know, residential district where the houses aren't 40-ft lots or 50-ft lots. Um the other thing I would I would like to see is that the manager or owner must be any within a 20-mi radius of the property. If you have a problem, there's a party at night and things are going on, having someone an hour away is too far in my opinion. You know, and I think that we should also um add on the that they have annual inspections, comply with the code, and we have to add insurance requirement in there to protect the um people who would be using the short-term rentals and not find us in a situation where we didn't require it and someone gets hurt or injured or there's a fire that happens and it burns the house next door if we don't limit it to other districts, we'd be dragged into some litigation we don't need to be in. >> Do you have a specific amendment you want to offer? >> Well, we we have to go back to the different sections of the you know, of the ordinance and make changes. >> Yep, cuz it's three separate ones, so which one do you want to start with? >> Well, I would start with we look at the um the districts that are permitted. I make a motion that we you know, that that the permitted conditional and interim use uh would only be in rural residential RTA RR RE MUC and MUBP. Would be they would be permitted and not permitted in any other district. >> So, just for clarity, it's RTA RR RS RE and then the mixed-use commercial mixed-use business park. >> Yes. >> Okay. >> I'd like to comment on that. Um >> I'll second. We got to get a second. >> Yeah. >> Sorry. >> And then there's a section of um >> Well, hang on. >> Oh. >> We're still >> But it's But it's separate amendments. Three separate? >> Yeah. >> Yeah, I think that'd be >> All right, that's the way to address it. >> Okay, so that would be my motion. >> I'll second it. >> So, discussion? >> Yeah, I mean, I personally I don't agree with that. I I have a I live in the old village. Um we have a we have an Airbnb two doors down from us. It's I have family, a wife, 1-year-old daughter. I've never felt unsafe there. Honestly, probably one of the quietest houses on the block. Um it's always well-kept. I don't think limiting short-term rentals to certain areas is fair in my opinion. So, I would not be in favor of that. I I think it should be not limited to certain areas. I think the old village is just fine. I I've not had any issues with the one Airbnb that's across the street from me. I guess um from my standpoint, I don't know that um Lemy and his is probably necessary for only going to have 20 in the whole city. From my standpoint. >> Hello. >> No, we don't take any we don't take any comments from the >> Okay. >> from the uh in the chambers. Thank you. >> And I also I I think there are worthwhile amendments to help uh align various things. I don't think this is one of them for me. >> All ma'am, I'm sorry. While council's in discussion, there's no comments from from the gallery. Thank you. Um >> I vote. >> So, we'll take a vote on the amendment for limiting uh short-term rentals to certain areas. All's in favor say I. >> I. >> All's not approving say nay. Nay. Nay. Amendment doesn't pass. Your next one. >> Well, given that one didn't pass, I'll let someone else make the others. >> I Oh. I'd like to make an amendment to enforce uh uh uh policy that the manager or ownership needs to be within 30 miles of the property uh that's going to be licensed. >> Second. >> Any discussion? >> I think 30's too far, personally. That's just my personal opinion. >> Okay. >> I think that is a good compromise. I don't want to get hung up on on the difference between 20 and 30 miles. I think that 60 was way too far. Um so, I think 30 is better. Again, I don't want to get hung up on 30 and 20, but I think that's a a fair compromise. >> I and I appreciate that the initial thing was miles versus time. >> Mhm. >> I think it's logical to use miles and 60 I think it based upon some of the feedback we've had and I think we're all in agreement is is not the path and I would support 30. >> All right. I'll call the question. All those in favor of having 30 miles as opposed to 60 miles in the policy please signify by saying I. >> I. >> Those opposed same sign. >> Nay. >> Thank you. >> I would like to pass this >> Three to Three to one. >> I would like to propose an amendment to add in the >> It would likely be for standards for licensing, probably under performance standards. So, 2C and probably fifth one uh the required similar to the to our bed and breakfast the insurance requirements that are the correct types that are applicable for this type of usage. Uh similar to the question that the the mayor was asking. >> I'll second that. >> Discussion? >> I Again, we already do it for bed and breakfast. We know it's required for other usages of residential properties where there's a a additional revenue such as daycares. There's specific insurances they have to use. So, I think it would this is very >> I think it's typically an additional rider on their insurance for the house insurance. So, I think it's fairly easy to get and should be required by the property owner. >> All those in favor >> They're going to do what they're going to do. >> All those in All those in favor of adding in performance standards for C the requirement to have appropriate insurance for short-term rental. Please, if you're in favor of that, please signify by saying I. >> I. >> Suppose same sign. Hearing none, that should be added to the policy. [snorts] >> I would propose an amendment um under section D, maintenance standards, uh paragraph two, that would require annual maintenance inspections or annual inspections for conformance to our city codes and the international property maintenance code. >> I second that. >> Question on that, Council member Dragicevich, does it indicate who has to do the inspections or do we need to add that maybe >> their respective representatives. >> Okay. All right. >> Those would be made by the city, the inspections, yeah. >> Yeah. >> Okay. >> And the only thing that's changing is the frequency, not not any of the language. Okay. >> All right. I'm cool with that. All those in favor of the amendment to frequency of inspections, please signify by saying I. >> I. >> All right. Discussion. >> Can I have a quick just clarification? >> You do. >> So, is it that the license term would be >> [snorts] >> a year? >> No, the inspection would be a year. >> Okay, so it's a still three-year license inspection. >> Still three-year license. Council member Holtz. >> I mean the great thing in all of this is residents have participated and provided feedback um for it, against it, and also I received feedback that was um that ebbed and flowed. And there are days up here when we don't get anyone to attend. And it's sad because it, you know, some of the things we do are kind of boring and dry, but you know, we're trying to represent how the city is operated, what things that affect the lives of residents and our businesses. Um we're all residents here. Like we're we're trying to do the same thing that all of us in the room are are trying to raise our families and create a a city that we want to be proud of. And it was interesting. We received a great deal of feedback, especially by email. Received phone calls and texts, too. Um I tried to I did not respond to everyone. My apologies for the couple of people I didn't get to today. Um but one of the things I asked uh for many people was you know, thank you for this. Can I ask a clarifying question? The Planning Commission recommended this with several restrictions. What are your thoughts on those restrictions? And they were the things that we discussed tonight. The a max of 20, that there is a that nuisance ordinances and violations can lead to a license revocation. Uh the distance requirement for a a property manager. And the reason I was asking that was because I believe conversations matter. Um sometimes when we see something posted online or statement or we just hear something, it's valid and it's correct, but it might not provide the full context. And I say that because many, many people have upon hearing the additional context said, "You know what? That is reasonable." A couple said, "No, I still don't support it." But what I have found is that it actually in the totality, we had a diverse set of views and people who didn't, people who did support it and then people who, you know what, I maybe yes, maybe no, maybe can add a couple more restrictions. And and I've said this before, but disagreements are okay. Disagreements are good. I don't want to live in a place where we agree on everything. To me that that means something is wrong. And I I appreciate that um through those disagreements you can create amendments. So, those amendments we have tonight are because of the feedback that has come in from people who didn't support it whatsoever, but we're trying to find a solution uh that takes into account feedback from people that also do support it. I firmly believe in property rights in being able to use a property when it does not affect others. We have nuisance rules, we have noise ordinances, we have an amazing staff with Washington County Sheriff's Department, we have fantastic staff in our planning department. Um again, I think it's a very important data point that none of these rental properties that do exist have had a single uh complaint come in for those things. And if they do, I fully expect due process to occur and that that investigations happen just as I would with any other property. Um I I don't believe that a max of 20 households out 5,400 has any statistical impact on housing prices. 20 out of 5,400 is a rounding error. Um it it I I've we had There was a very good piece of feedback that came in from a person who's lived in Spain who provided citations and evidence from a place that he had directly lived with first-hand experience to show where it had an effect where literally the entire market was owned and uh people were taken advantage of. This isn't This is not what If we had set it at 200, yes, I think we could have a reasonable conversation. 20, I don't believe is going to have an effect. I fully agree with the concern, but 20 out of 5,400 to me does not rise to that level. Um above and beyond that, again, I do I think this is a a something needs to happen in terms of having an answer, and I think this is a reasonable and pragmatic and moderated solution. >> Councilmember Dragisich. >> I think um you know, the information that calls, text message, discussion with people, um the emails were that I received were against this ordinance 10 to 1. The other thing I think we're missing here is by allowing it everywhere, those people who live in homeowners associations are shielded from this. And there's a large number of them in this city. And the people who don't live in homeowners associations will not be shielded from this. So, it's not an all, you know, it's not equitable across all of our districts in the city. Um and I happen to live in a homeowners district. You can't have short-term rentals cuz they're not allowed in our declaration. So, I'm fortunate, but I feel for people who bought a home in a residential neighborhood to be a resident residential neighborhood environment and culture, and now would have a a um a short-term rental next door that they really don't want. Um I guess this is probably going to pass, um but the opposition that I saw from this was overwhelming compared to the support. And the fact that we have large number of HOAs who won't be subject to short-term rentals creates an unfair and un- unequal position for those who aren't in an HOA and will be subject to it. >> Can I ask a clarifying question on that? Cuz I I guess how you see that process playing out? So, a person sends in a permit application. And you see that there is an HOA in that neighborhood. What happens next? >> a letter from the HOA before we accept the application. >> What if the HOA only Most HOAs, to my knowledge, only meet once a year because there's a cost. They have to pay for a lawyer to attend and sometimes a property manager. So, they they only meet once a year. So, how does that then play out? >> Well, it could play out that they consider this and figure out if they want to opt in or not. Something to address. Um If they're not meeting, then it would they would not have the option to receive a short-term rental cuz we would need a a letter from them to move forward. >> Cuz in that case, a person who's applying who meets every single standard, if that HOA isn't meeting for another 10 months, they're kind of between a rock and a hard place. >> Well, actually they're not. Because each way has a Every each way has a board of directors. >> They meet monthly. >> And they have a declaration and bylaws that guide what's allowed and what's not allowed in the HOA. And so, the board of directors would reply to the inquiry. >> When it is a declaration that's already in there. I'm speaking of HOAs that then that don't have it. Mine doesn't. They would need to affirmatively say, "We choose to allow this." >> That's correct. >> You don't you don't have How can you be an HOA without a declaration and rules? >> About this topic. We We permit >> on it. >> Yeah. That we have We allow people to use their property in certain ways. >> Mr. Mayor, members of the council, I would like to point out that HOAs have a declaration and that is like basically all the rules about what you can and cannot use your property for and those are recorded with the county. So, worst case scenario, we could always look up their HOA declaration and make a determination for ourselves if it's allowed or not. >> What if it's not clear, like if it doesn't state that this is allowed, then they would have to opt in. >> to provide a letter. Okay. >> Yeah, I mean, I just I Councilman Holtz and Councilmember Dragicevich said everything extremely well. Um me personally, I feel that our residents should have the freedom to do with their property as they see fit. However, that doesn't go without regulations and licenses, so I think we I believe we found a good framework that allows people to feel safe in their community, but also doesn't take away rights of ownership of property, either. Um so with that, I I'm going to be for this. I think the amendments passed were great, and I really appreciate everybody coming out and all the emails that came out about this, because this is the most community engagement I've seen in the 2 years that I've been on council, so I just appreciate the community on this one. >> Thank you. Yes, I'll I'll speak to this, and and one point that Councilmember Holtz brought up was that it did receive emails when asked the question if they knew the parameters that were set in the policy, by and large, those people had not looked at the policy and did not know that there were regulations were on them, you know, kind of thought that that it was a free-for-all, and I I believe there are some some some curb, you know, some barriers on this to kind of keep it between the lines. Um the fact that we haven't had any complaints on on operating short-term rentals to this this point leads me to believe that you know, that the the fear of them is greater than the reality of them. Um I've used them. Uh typically people are I like to assume that people and 95% of people are good and respect the the the the property that they're renting. Uh certainly there are those that that don't and to the point that neighbors policing neighbors, that's how things happen in society today. When people see something happening in their neighborhood that isn't correct, they either take it upon themselves to address it or call the authorities to address it. It's really no different in this case in my mind. Um I do look at this also as a property rights perspective. I don't feel like there should be over-regulation on people and what they do with their property. Uh a ban to me feels like government overreach. Um I don't think that it impacts affordable housing in the city of Lake Elmo. Um It it it doesn't seem like that that's an appropriate argument against it. Um as always, we have to you know, as a city and and government should look at and balance individual rights with the collective well-being and and I do think that we have put some the staff has put together along with comments from the planning commission and people in here tonight uh on this policy to to to try and balance that as best possible. Um So, that's with with those amendments that were in there, I'm I'm going to be in favor of this and uh certainly um I don't I I have a problem with an ban in the sense that the cities that I looked up that have bans, whether it's Woodbury, Hugo, Apple Valley, Eagan, Shakopee, Edina, you can find a VRBO or an Airbnb in each one of those communities. If you have an ordinance and you're not going to enforce it, then what are good or any of the other ordinances as you have in your city? To me, they're not worth the paper they're written on. So, this will be something that we need to pay attention to, and I believe that we can do that with 20 uh short-term rentals within the the city of Lake Elmo. Council member Jagodzinski. >> Ted, we had some discussion about people should have the right to do what they want their property. We have all kinds of regulations that limit what they can and can't do on their property. You can't open up a business on your property. It's my property. Like, if I can't have a Airbnb or short-term rental, that's a business. Can I open up a butcher shop? We We have regulations, all kinds of restrictions of people can and can't do on their property. The fact that it's your property doesn't give you the right to do anything you want with it. And so, that argument just falls short. We have a city code that's 500 pages that tells you what you can and can't do on your property. So, to say, "It's there It's It's my property. I should be able to have short-term rentals if I choose." If we're going to take that position, then let people do whatever they want on their property. I'll pile junk cars in my front yard. It doesn't bother anybody. You know, it doesn't cause any harm to anybody. It's my property. Why can't I do it? Why can't I open up a business and sell pizzas out of my property? It's my property. >> I think you you know that that argument doesn't stand true, and and that if you're causing harm to your neighbors, in case this policy does address that. As far as loading junk cars on your your yard, uh whether you live in an HOA or not, that's not possible. And I I live in an HOA. There are things that I'd like to do on my property that I'm not allowed to because of the bylaws in in my uh in my in my So, but I but I chose to live in that community, right? >> My only point is being the argument that's it's your property, so you can do what you want with it is hollow because we have all kinds of regulations that prevents you from doing things you might want to do. >> And those those have been in place or in place in counties and cities and states. And it's not saying that you there there there there's guidelines, right? And this this has guidelines on it. So, I'm going to respectfully disagree with your sentiment on that. >> Well, and and the way I I the way I phrased it myself was I firmly believe in >> to ask you to be quiet while council is discussing. Thank you. >> And the way I I phrase it personally cuz I agree with property rights with a reasonableness that does not harm others. So, as an example, we have multiple businesses in my neighborhood. There's multiple daycares. There's multiple people who run their they are insurance agents. Their home office is in their property. It does not harm others. A butcher shop, we're going to have discussion about traffic counts and possible pollution from runoff from blood and whatever. We don't allow certain things in the code, but we do allow certain things when it it a when you can make a reasonable argument that it does not harm others. I and I think that actually we're going to People are going to disagree. What is a reasonable use of a property that doesn't harm others? And to me that's always going to be the gray, right? I I think daycare is such an easy one. We we all know daycares exist in residential neighborhoods, but they are inspected and regulated heavily because the safety of kids matters. But again, I have a business in the home across the street from me. It's an insurance agent. So, I That's that. >> All right. I'll call the question. Motion to adopt ordinance 2026-06 approving proposed text amendments and fee schedule updates for short-term rentals as presented by staff with adjusted amendments. Uh all those in favor, please signify by saying I. >> I. >> I. Those opposed, same sign. >> Nay. >> Thank you. Uh motion passes 3-1. Motion to adopt uh make a motion to adopt resolution 2026-029 summary of publication of ordinance 2026-06. As this is uh resolution that calls for it just to be published, I'll call the question. All those in favor, >> Uh Mr. Mayor, >> Yes. >> you need a motion. And we will need >> a second to make >> Second. >> Motion and second, and then um just so everybody knows, we do need four votes in favor of this, or we're going to be publishing the whole thing. >> Right. Motion to adopt resolution 2026-029 summary of publication ordinance 2026-06 with a motion by myself, a second by Councilmember Holt. All those in favor, please signify by saying I. >> I. >> I. Uh opposed, same sign. So, you you want us to print the whole thing. >> So, everybody knows exactly what it is. >> All right. >> No questions. >> Got it. So, we'll be printing out the whole thing. >> [snorts] >> Next item of business, if somebody could let Mr. Hearn know that that item is complete. We'll take a short uh >> Just yours. >> What do we call it? Point point of preference, 5-minute recess. >> I'll try and keep this presentation relatively brief for you since you know a lot of the facts of this property. Um but just to jump right in, we are looking at a preliminary plat, a rezone request, and variance requests for the High Point Crossing development. So, uh the location of this project is shown on the screen. This is a property that's just over 78 acres. Um formerly, the city did review and approve an OP PUD development on this property in 2024, which had uh 65 residential units on an open space development. Uh since that time, uh the developer identified issues with the community septic system that led them to reevaluate the development proposal for this property, uh and now is proposing a 20-unit or sorry, um an 18-unit development with individual treatment um on these home sites for septic. So, uh the developer just as a refresher is Rachel Development. Um property uh is currently zoned rural residential. The proposal is to rezone this property as residential estate. That is to uh that is a zoning district in the rural districts or rural areas of the city uh that will allow for this form of development. Um it is consistent though with the 2040 comprehensive plan's guidance for this property, which is rural single family. Um you're looking at that 18-unit single family development being at a gross density of just about uh 0.23 units per acre. And uh just as uh as we discuss this site just as a refresher, the development to the north is called Lake Emma Heights. The development to the south is called Tory Pines. This project is between uh those two developments uh and is bordered by Oakdale on the west and the park reserve on east. So, here is the development plan that was initially submitted to the city. Uh this has 17 new rural lots uh with the existing farmstead site being that 18th lot. There is a still a road connection provided through through this development connecting Inwood with Imperial to the north. That was a required kind of roadway connection for this development in addition to city water main running along that road alignment serving these lots. There are a couple of different storm water ponds and infiltration basins that are located on this site. It's a little bit challenging I would say to topographically so those storm water ponds are located accordingly. I have just switched the slide and it's kind of hard to tell but there is a a plan that is a little different on this slide. I'm just noting that the developer has resubmitted project plans in response to comment memos that were received and from city staff and so just acknowledging the fact that the city is currently reviewing a revised plan set that's addressing or seeking to address a lot of those city comments. So that review is currently underway and I'll be presenting what what staff's review has been of the prior plan. There aren't many differences but there are a few if there are questions. So I just from the land use point of view you can see on the screen the zoning map on the left. So the zoning would change from rural residential to residential estate. Residential estate is consistent with those zoning the zoning for the developments that are both north and south of this proposed project and you can see the future land use map that is not proposed to change. There are three variance requests that are included with this preliminary plat. The first one is a variance to the front yard setbacks for these single family lots. In in particular on the 17 that are new lots they are proposed with a 50-ft standard front yard setback. And that existing farmstead is proposed to have a 20-ft front yard setback. And primarily that's because with the dedication required for right-of-way along that inward corridor, that's really restricting that front lot lines moving further to the west. So, the single-family homes with the 50-ft uh front yard setback request, um that setback request has uh come from the developer because they, you know, in in evaluating the development, [snorts] are seeking to primarily enlarge the rear yard areas of these lots in addition to working around on a few of the lots uh some either wetland areas or slope areas to create a larger rear yard uh where those are present. Uh for the landscaping variance that's requested, uh the developer is looking to uh have a uh flexibility from essentially uh five trees per disturbed acre to about three trees per disturbed acre. Uh we'll talk about that a little bit more. And then there is a sidewalk requirement that the city uh discussed as part of that road section conversation. The The request is simply to not need a sidewalk. So, with the preliminary plats, we review against a number of standards. Those are shown on the screen here. I'll move right into the zoning review for uh what I will call bulk standards. That's the things like lot area, setbacks, etc. Um this is fairly straightforward uh for from that standpoint. Um the lots are all generally meeting all of those zoning standards. Uh again, there is that front yard setback uh reduction request. Um there is one unique standard in the residential estate district, and there's basically you have to be able to fit a 250-ft in diameter circle within the lots. All of these lots do comply with that standard. So, just uh just a note for you on that. If there are questions, we can come back to that slide. Um on the screen now is the landscaping or actually the tree removal plan that was submitted with this project. Um the kind of the summary here is that most of the trees on this property can be preserved through this development. There are definitely a few trees that will be removed as a result of the project. Uh and here's that landscaping plan. So, the landscaping plan shows uh the required um street trees that you can see in the They're actually in the front yards along the new proposed rural street. Um but the developer is also proposing to have the additional three trees within each lot planted by the builder. So, um there is definitely landscaping coming into these lots. Uh the planning commission, you know, we'll get to their recommendation in a in a few slides here, but essentially the planning commission um discussed that they were comfortable with the flexibility. One of their findings was that um this is a rural development. The disturbed trees requirement disturbed acre tree requirement has primarily been applied to more um urban sewer developments. And so, that was one of their uh findings. Another finding was just that they expect that the future property owners will be planting more trees uh where they desire. So, uh the landscaping in summary is uh currently short as proposed, but there is a variance request for that flexibility. Some other review considerations here. Uh there are six wetlands on this property. Of those, five will be preserved through this development. Uh there is a de minimus or a small wetland being removed as that that individual wetland six is roughly less than 800 sq ft uh in size and so uh there will be wetland buffers or um that are preserved within these private lots. So, there'll be easements over those those areas for preservation and signage requirements around the buffer. Uh as far as traffic and access and parking, all of the lots uh are expected to be able to meet parking standards. Um the road design is something that the council's discussed previously and um we've arrived at um a road design that engineering has uh reviewed. Uh there is a sidewalk proposed to not have to be constructed here and in this case, uh the proposal or the the variance is a subdivision variance based on the fact that um Imperial also does not have any sidewalks. And so, this development uh would be kind of continuing continuing that connection to the Inwood corridor without a sidewalk. From a stormwater standpoint, I did note those uh storm ponds and basins uh provided on the site and the developer, I know, has received the Valley Branch Watershed permit now. Uh they have that permit in hand. Parkland dedication, uh cash in lieu of uh Parkland dedication is preferred and recommended. Uh as far as review comments, uh there are memos provided as an attachment to the staff report. We've got comments from the fire team, Valley Branch Watershed District permits been received, uh landscape architect and city engineering teams have all provided um comment memos that are reviewing the plans that were initially submitted. Um now, with those resubmitted plans, they're currently under review and would receive revised memos after a decision is made. Uh findings that the city will have to make, uh first one on the rezoning, uh simply uh put, the rezoning has to be consistent with the comp plan. It would be in this case. Uh front yard setbacks, so uh these findings are um just kind of reviewing the discussion of the planning commission. Uh these findings are made in support of approval of a front yard setback variance. Again, that would be from 100 to 50 ft. Uh here are findings that would support the total landscaping uh per disturbed acre. And then findings actually for a subdivision variance, which are different uh different type of findings to support that variance. And lastly, uh findings to support the preliminary plat approval are uh these findings were all provided in the staff report and are in the resolutions and ordinance. So, uh should the City Council decide to approve the project and the requests for variances and rezone, uh staff are recommending 14 conditions for approval. These conditions are mostly standard conditions that you have with most uh subdivision approvals. Um So, I would just note that. Um public hearing. So, the the Planning Commission reviewed this project uh at its last meeting on April 13th and um ended up holding that public hearing um and they did hear from two members of the public that were uh both supportive of the project. Um So, the Planning Commission ended up unanimously uh recommending approval of all of the requests made by the developer with conditions and findings recommended by staff. So, uh that brings me to the recommendation. Uh should the City Council decide to approve the project, we do have some example motions for you on the screen here. We have an ordinance for the rezone, a resolution for the preliminary plat, and then individual resolutions for those variances followed by a summary public and publication uh resolution. So, uh that's what staff has formally prepared. The developer is here this evening should you have any questions for for Paul as well. >> Questions? >> Any council? >> None. >> Okay. I'll entertain a motion then if there are no questions. >> Move to adopt ordinance 2026-07 approving the rezoning requested by Rachel Development on the subject property based on the findings of fact therein. >> Support. >> Any discussion? Being none, I'll call the question. All those in favor of adopting ordinance 2026 -07, please signify by saying I. >> I. >> Ordinance is adopted. >> [clears throat] >> Move to adopt resolution 2026-030 approving the preliminary plat for High Point Crossing requested by Rachel Development on the subject property based on the findings of facts and conditions therein. >> Second. >> Any discussion? >> I'll just maybe quick on this one and the next one. I just want to go back to I think some of the work that we've did we've done on the OPUD in making this work, you know, in the end for these things to happen the the economics of it have to work out and I think we've seen that some of the changes that we've made in that OPUD has helped us move in the direction where these these can work which I personally I'm really excited to see cuz I think this does fit really well with the area even relative to some of the earlier proposals. So I'm I'm just very excited to see that financially that this can make sense and I hope that this can be used in other areas as well I hope that this can kind of be a a guide post to show that other developers that this can be a financially feasible path to development in Lake Alamo. >> Councilmember Holt? >> This has been a a long conversation. Um I've aged during this conversation for like last three or four years, but the between staff, professionals outside the city, and with feedback from the council, I feel that this feel that this solution not only provides a a type of housing that has been lacking for new ones in our city. It's a type of housing that will go very quick. Um we're talking acre acreage of four, five, six acres per lot. Those are in demand. They don't come up often. It fits with the neighborhood. It's Some of the parcels will be larger than um its neighboring ones. It'll be a very gorgeous place. It'll also be a very um high-value neighborhood, and um I I I fully support it. Some I'll be a very good asset for for the city, for residents, and the market will definitely support this. >> [clears throat] >> All right. There's nothing else. I'll call the question on the resolution 2026-030. All those in favor, please signify by saying aye. >> Aye. >> [clears throat] >> And uh resolution 2026-030 is adopted. >> Move to adopt resolution 2026-031 approving the front yard setback variance, resolution 2026-032 approving the landscaping variance, and resolution 2026-033 approving the sidewalk Excuse me. Say that twice. Resolution 2026-033 approving the sidewalk variance for High Point Crossing as requested by Rachel Development on the subject property based on the findings of fact and conditions therein. >> Second. >> Any discussion? >> I just again real quick on this. I think we've spent years providing variances to developers for them to be able to have higher capacity, develop at higher rates. I'm more than happy to make these variances work for situation where we've been able to bring the population density numbers down with this. So, I think they're all very reasonable. Like we've mentioned, this has been a process. So, and and it's been great working with this developer throughout that whole process and very open to our feedback. Very open to the neighboring feedback. I just I think that this is a very reasonable compromise that the city can make with the developer in the situation. >> I will say that the uh the staking was out on this property and and as far as the uh setback variance, I went to look from edge of roadway off center line along with Council Member Dragicevich on this this piece and we looked at the 100 ft versus 50 ft and to be honest it it didn't seem like 50 ft was really out of line. So, um just doing a little homework on it and appreciate the opportunity to take a look at that. If there's nothing further, I'll call the question. Uh all those in favor of adopting resolution 2026 -031 and resolution 2026-032 and resolution 2026-033, please please signify by saying I. >> I. >> All three resolutions pass. >> Move to adopt resolution 2026 2026-034 approving the summary publication of ordinance 2026-07. >> Second. >> All motion and a second. All >> call the question. All those in favor adopting resolution 2026-034 proving the summary publication of ordinance 2026-07, please signify by saying I. >> I. >> I. >> Uh ordinance passes. Or that the resolution passes. Thank you. Next on the agenda is approved cooperative cost share agreements with Washington County for the Trunk Highway 36 and CSAH 17 Lake Elmo Avenue interchange and South Frontage Road improvements. Mr. Griffith. >> Thank you, Mayor and members of the council. Um coming back before you to hear today on the Trunk Highway 36 and Lake Elmo Avenue interchange project. I have I have one presentation. It really addresses the next three agenda statements. So, we have three agenda statements here before you to to handle separate agreements with separate resolutions, but they're all they're all related. So, um we'll take them one at a time on the agenda, but only one presentation. So, um So, a little bit we'll have I'll I'll give you a quick background of where we're at with the project now and why we're before you um and and then address four different agreements. So, there's going to be a cooperative cost share agreement with Washington County. It's a standard agreement you've seen on many projects we've done with the county in the past, as well as a cooperative maintenance agreement. Uh and then because it's a state highway, we have a MnDOT cooperative construction agreement. And then uh change of roadway jurisdiction that will address the uh handing over the South Frontage Road to the city at the end of the project. So, Washington County is the lead agency that's that's um implementing this project even though it is involved with a trunk highway, a county roadway, and building a south frontage road that'll be the city's. But, the county's taking the lead on the project. They've developed the plans. Um the the project does include the construction of the south frontage road from Keats Avenue to 0.4 mi east of um of Lake Elmo Avenue. That will become the city's. Um this the the layout was approved by the council by resolution of support in December of 2025. Um recent updates then is the county received contractor bids on April 14th. They have Ames Construction as the apparent low bidder. Um the county intends to award that construction contract the May 19th uh board meeting and ready to kick uh kick the construction off on as early as June 1st. Um in order to do that, these four agreements that are before you need to be signed or approved and executed and and in the county's hands for that May 19th meeting. So, um that's why we're here tonight. Um so, I I've covered the four different agreements that are that are before you that we're looking at. So, the cooperative cost share agreement is the big one that's really covers what Lake Elmo's cost participation's going to be um on the project. Um it gives it it lays out the total estimated project cost. Now, this is after they've received bids. Um we're looking at just under $43 million. Um of that uh based on the county cost participation policy, uh just under 11 million is been assigned to city share costs. Um but there's also uh many grants uh involved in this project and there's about just about $8 million applied to the city share, which gives the city a net cost of about $2.4 million. Um as you may recall all through the planning process going back multiple years, we've kind of have that $5 million figure in our CIP all along that we were um preparing to to submit on the project. So, we're coming in at just about half that amount. Uh it's important to note that these are all estimated costs. The way the cooperative costs agreement is is designed, it's following the policy, it's what costs get assigned to you. So, if there's an increase in quantities or a decrease in quantities, it the the actual costs are going to be what's actually paid to the contractor at the end of the at the end of the day. So, it's all formula-based, and these formulas, as the actual project transpires, will get invoices and be paying actual quantities. So, everything in that table in the agreement is estimated. Um the county does have in their standard agreement, uh as the person running the project, the ability to us to do change orders as they see beneficial to the project or needed by the project. Um and if those costs impact city costs, they're allowed to assign those costs. Uh we have negotiated in past agreements and got it in this agreement as well, uh at least some kind of cost containment where um they at least have to come back to the city administrator and get concurrence if if those if our costs look like they're going to go over 10% of what of of our budgeted amount. The cooperative maintenance agreement then addresses, after the project's done, what um what the city's responsible for, what the county's responsible for, and what the state is responsible for. And I didn't attach all the exhibits cuz there's many of them, um but they are in your packet. Um this this does do a good job of laying out uh what the city will own and maintain. Uh the easiest part is under that first bullet, the city's going to own and maintain the south frontage road. So, everything there's going to be a right-of-way dedication assigned back to the city, and everything in that right-of-way you're going to own and maintain the pavement, curb and gutter, and the storm sewer pipes. Um the storm sewer pipe and storm water management is the most complex um part of the maintenance. Um there's a the the pipes that are within our right-of-way we're going to own, but there are some pipes that run between right-of-ways and drain water that's city that's coming from the city right-of-way, but then goes on to county right-of-way, things like that. So, um basically a map and an exhibit is in your packet that highlights which pipes the city is responsible for, which ones the county is responsible for, and which one the state is responsible for. And then the storm water ponds um different agencies take the lead in which pond they have to maintain, but everyone sort of cost shares by a contributing drainage area into those storm water ponds. So, uh in that exhibit in the packet it spells out and it'll give an example where the state is maintaining that that storm water pond, but when they do major maintenance uh the city might be uh have to pay 54% of that of that cost of that major maintenance. Um the city of Lake Elmo is only responsible for maintaining the Keats pond, which is over on the west side of the project of the South Frontage Road, uh but but when we do major maintenance, we're also able to assign um or charge MnDOT for I think it's 30-some percent of that cost based on their contributing area. So, um that's that's how and these are policies from both the state and the county that are really mean uh operating and how this has been divvied out. The third agreement um that's in your packet tonight is the cooperative construction agreement. This is a three-party agreement from MnDOT um the county and the city. It's primarily between MnDOT and the county because uh it's a MnDOT trunk right highway, but the county's overseeing the project delivery. So, there's a lot of language in there about the county taking the lead and then how the grant funds are allocated and and managed by by the county through the through the project. But the city is also there mostly because of the post project maintenance and because of the cost participation that we've that we've addressed um here tonight. Um then the the last part that's in this is also in this agreement where it addresses the performance measure monitoring as you may um as you may recall uh the city requested that the um access off of Kitsap Avenue the right the eastbound [snorts] southbound turning move movement onto Kitsap Avenue be maintained and the state agreed to leave that turning movement in um with these performance um measures that they presented at a previously previous meeting. So those are embodied now in this agreement. Um and it and it's it calls out basically a collaborative approach to me- to uh monitor how that roadway is performing in the in the future. Um the key that it's been presented before but the key to that is the state does have ultimate authority to just close that if they don't think it's working although they are collaborative working with the city on on discussing that uh but those costs to close that would be the city's in the future. Um MnDOT is requiring the county to indemnify the state. I left that on there and crossed it off cuz it was an 11th half hour change your city attorney was negotiating um changes to that um somehow the city was getting roped into indemnifying the state even though we weren't controlling any contractors on the project so um your city attorney was successful in getting that removed at the 11th hour so that was a provision that's gone away. Um and then again um this is sort of repetitive cuz it's also in the the county agreement but um this agreement really spells out that storm water, storm sewer, and storm water management maintenance um, allocations. And then the last agreement is the change of roadway jurisdiction agreement. So, this is an agreement between MnDOT and the city. It's not the county's not party to this one. Um, and it's basically saying that um, the city is agreeing to take back the South Frontage Road at the end of this project and the state's agreeing to um, change that jurisdiction to the city at at the end of the project. And it's a standard agreement um, that the state use for for all of these situations. So, with that um, your options tonight are to approve the project agreements as presented or if there's anything that you identified in your review that you're looking to have um, revised, um, we would have to take that back for further negotiation um, with the state and the county. Um, the only caveat there is because this is such coming at coming at you so late, there would any contract revisions or or negotiations at this point would likely delay the start of the contract. The construction. >> And those delays cost would be attributed to the city. >> Uh, likely, yeah. >> Yeah. >> And the other the the um, it's really in the city's advantage to to get that June 1st starting date because the the way they're constructing this project is there's two construction seasons for um, this in 2026 and 2027, but they're really trying to get the entire South Frontage Road built this year based on their staging and how they're going to change over 36 between 2026 and 2027. So, they've got a they've got a huge lift to to get to that point before snowfall this winter [snorts] in order to make traffic control um, go more smoothly. Um, so that's all I have presented um, for tonight. It's the next three council, um, I have three motions on here. Each one's related to the next the basically the three agendas that you have before you. So, we're happy to answer any questions. >> [clears throat] >> Questions for Mr. Griffith. Were there anything Were there any things that we didn't get that maybe you're pushing for or that legal was pushing for in this process? With some of these agreements. >> Um, I would say we got some These agreements just 10 days ago weren't nearly as good as they are right now. So, I I I'm pretty happy with what we did. Um, it started off that the costs um, almost 4 million. So, we got it down to 2 and 1/2 by going through and scrutinizing the right-of-way cost assignments on the project and things like that. Um, there's a couple of significant pieces of infrastructure, one mainly a 30-in and 54-in um, storm sewer that was going all the way to the north side of Highway 36 that was assigned to the city that we pushed back pretty hard. It took us more than two meetings to to get that get that re-assigned back to the state. Um, and then we And then it was kind of the indemnity clause was I think the key legal one that we were pushing back on. So, um, I'm I'm pretty happy with where we landed. >> What type [clears throat] of maintenance will these items require long-term? Is this annual inspections is some of the There's a term for it. The number fours in >> MS4. >> That. Like what How much additional work capacity is being taken on with this? >> So, it's like any It's like anything you're adding in any development. If your MS4 requires you to inspect 25% of your infrastructure every year. So, that as you grow your infrastructure and add on to it, that's, you know, this infrastructure will need to be um, inspected every 4 years. And so it'll it continues to increase that burden for sure. >> Got you. Thank you. >> Anybody else have any questions? Otherwise, I'll entertain a motion. >> Motion to approve resolution number 2026-024 approving cooperative agreements with Washington County for Trunk Highway 36 and CSAH 17 Lake Elmo Avenue interchange and South frontage road improvements. >> Second. >> So we have a motion and a second for approving resolution 2026-024. Discussion? Council member Jagunich. >> First of all, you know, we're in a tough position because if we don't approve this tonight, we're going to get stuck with additional costs. So that's kind of you know, it brings us to us without any real input. But I would just say my only concern in all of these is in the first contract 18-223. Under contract changes, there's a clause that says if the total costs approved by the city exceed the city's estimated project cost plus 10%, the city approval would come from the city administrator. And I'm not comfortable with that cuz it doesn't allow the council the opportunity to determine, you know, what's the appropriateness of that. Where are we going to get the money from? What if that changes $100,000? But you know, I don't think allowing an administrative person to approve expenditures like that without us standing them and saying where's the money going to come from is appropriate. My solution at this point would be that, you know, at some point we as a council instruct the city administrator that she has to get our approval before she approves. >> Is the concern there I wonder is it the same time delay issue? Where >> Yeah, we we we can't we got to get these passed tonight. >> Yeah. Or no, no, sorry. For if in the future there's this 10% over 10% is I wonder if that same concern arises where you know if they have to make a decision on moving forward with construction or it pushes it and I'm just I don't disagree. I yeah, I totally agree with that. I'm just wondering if that's maybe where that came from or if if it's not where it's coming from. I do agree. I think it's fair. >> I'm not sure where it comes from, but to me we're abrogating our authority by allowing the city to be by the city administrator and then we're going to be stuck finding a way to pay the bill. I'd rather have that discussion up front and um you know all of us be comfortable with that before we go ahead with the an approval. >> Clarifying question for either legal or for administrator Miller. We already have an ordinance that approval can occur for certain things without council. How does that apply to this hypothetical where it's over 10% and they need it again their language says administrator approval it there's a cost limit that we have, right? Where it has to come back to council anyways. >> Yeah, we currently probably have something in our purchasing policy about this. I can pull it up quickly. >> Purchasing policy >> Yeah, sorry. Go ahead. >> The purchasing policy we currently have allows the city administrator to approve change orders without coming to the council. That's why I've asked it to be brought to one of our meetings because again I got real uncomfortable if it's a $100,000 and we're not going to have any input in it. >> Um [clears throat] yes, Mr. Griffith. >> I can talk a little bit about the history of this too. So in this case, you know, when we have our own projects we have these authorities and and that we have to come back for every change order and and things like that. The county's running this project and the county's actually claim through their agreement they're actually claiming authority that they can just do it. And this this language started probably 10, 12 years ago. Our early projects with the county, we were pretty frustrated because um we weren't we don't see timely we don't see monthly bills like we run monthly bills with the contractors. We see a bill from the county maybe every quarter or sometimes 6 months go by or a year goes by. Um on some of the early projects, we didn't get a bill from them till almost 6 months after the project had finished and all of a sudden we were over budget by $10,000 or something like that. So, we're us putting this language in there is us trying to get the county to track those costs closer and pay attention to that and they're forced to come to us when they see that we're going to run over. That was kind of how that was originally designed. We're bringing it to you in this contract now because it we were successful in getting it in previous contracts and getting it through their legal before. So, we ran with the same language. Granted, this project's a much bigger scope, so that 10% is a much bigger number than when we're running when our cost share's maybe 200,000 or something like that. >> Is not the county Don't they have to turn over an invoice every 30 days? >> Yeah, but they don't have to invoice us every 30 days. So, it's >> have regular contact on state projects, county projects that they're involved with that involve us? >> Um yeah, we have regular contact, but they don't they're paying their contractor, but they're not necessarily running it through their spreadsheet of allocating whose components there are and they they don't put invoices to on a regular basis to us. >> Hm. >> Um and it's certainly not monthly. It's sometimes when the higher construction activity's happening. >> Yeah, I know there's different groups for for costs associated with the different you know, whether it's water or whatever and they come from different pots, but my experience is all that was figured out on a monthly basis. My from my previous professional experience. And so I'm a little amazed at that. >> Yeah, they've never invoiced us monthly and like I said in the early years ago, it's gotten a lot better, but years ago it it was we were getting very delinquent. >> But is that that that I I would think that that's something we would we could request from the >> Yeah. >> I mean, we're paying for contract administration on the project. We're a portion of that payment. So certainly Kimley-Horn that's going to be performing that should be able to also give us information related to what's what's being accounted for in quantities associated with our costs. >> Right, but our share of the construction costs are only 500 some thousand. So it the lion's share is right-of-way costs. >> Right. >> Um the other part is the engineering costs and so that's what I mean by they don't they don't when they invoice us, they do all of them together. And so then we don't have to worry >> but keeping track of what the costs are. >> Yeah. >> Uh as they go on associated with items that we're cost participating in. >> Correct. >> And it as it as it looks like you know, our >> So that's the point of that language is that we have some kind of a you need to you need to monitor these costs and you need to keep us informed and there's a threshold where you need to be coming back to us for approval. >> I mean, we're spending 15% of the construction engineering contract administration, rough number. Over 373,000. I don't think it's beyond our scope that we could be in touch with the contract administrator to make sure we're informed about costs as they happen. >> So, hypothetically >> That's my two cents. >> Hypothetically, if they have a 9% increase, they in this language, they can assign it to us. >> Yeah. >> Doesn't require approval. >> Right. >> It's not going to Administrator Miller. It's going to come to Council cuz we're going to have to figure out where the money's coming from. >> Well, yeah, that's probably That's something for disc Korean discussion? >> Yeah, we want to discuss it. >> Okay. So, so So, in our in our budget, right? We've accounted in our CIP for 4.5 million. >> Yeah. >> So, we're at 2.4. >> Yeah. >> I don't think we're going to need to figure out where $100,000 is coming from. >> From the CIP. >> From the CIP, and I I certainly don't see us spending 100% increase in change orders. >> That would be a problem. >> Knock on wood. So, I I I I you know, I guess that's my my two cents. >> We we carry contingency in all of our projects for that very reason. You don't You get your bids, you don't lower your budget to that exact number because you're you're going to see some changes. >> And this this language is about the projected cost plus 10% contingency if we go over that. Is what we're talking about. >> Right. So, is this better served as a separate discussion internally to the city as far as the purchasing policy and coming back to the Council for approval of anything over the 10% versus trying I mean, >> I'm not suggesting we try to change the contract language, Mayor. I understand that there's just what I'm just saying, we have to have some kind of understanding with the city administrator that should bring those back to the council. >> Sure. And I think we can do that. I'll also indicate that, you know, I I do know the contract administrator personally and professionally. Uh I think he's a very high-quality um he is also a professional engineer and has obligation to all parties to do his best to make sure that as as professional engineers are to to look out for the good of the public. And so, um um that, you know, that's where I stand on this. So, I don't I don't think it's It could be a problem, right? Never say never, but I would be surprised. So, any more discussion? All right, I'll call the question. All those in favor of approving resolution 2026-024, uh please signify by saying aye. >> Aye. >> Aye. >> Move to approve resolution number 2026-025 approving cooperative construction agreement MnDOT contract number 1060495. >> Second. >> Any discussion? >> Uh this is the one where public feedback drove what this looks like. Concern was raised about the both the frontage road and the ability to go east to south. This exists because the public spoke up and raised it as a concern, so kudos to those members of the public who did it. >> All right. I'll call the question. All those in favor of resolution 2026-025, please signify by saying I. >> I. >> Resolution is approved. >> Move to approve resolution number 2026-026 approving the change of roadway jurisdiction agreement MNDOT contract number 1062311. >> Second. >> Any discussion? Hearing none, I'll call the what question. All those in favor of approving the resolution 2026-02 26 Please signify by saying I. >> I. >> Therefore, approved. Thank you, Mr. Griffith. >> Thank you. >> Uh item number seven, open burning ordinance amendments. >> Uh Mayor and Council, we bring this back to you. We first talked about this uh ordinance update back at the October workshop of last year. Uh we wrapped up last year's burning season and >> [clears throat] >> slowly worked into this year's kind of permitting season um looking at some options that you recommended from our workshop. Um So, today we give you uh kind of where we're at for our final recommendation uh of this move and I'll turn it over to Assistant Chief uh Anthony Savota who also acts as our fire marshal who uh many of his day-to-day interactions with our public are through the open burning and our burning permits. So, I'll turn it over to Anthony. >> Thank you. Um I intend to keep this brief so we can uh move along with our evening. So, tonight we're talking about the open burning ordinance update. Just a little bit of background about our current open burning ordinance. We last revisited this uh with you as a council in April of 2022. At that time, we were making some uh definition updates, just further defining the rules and regulations of open burning, providing common definitions and some language about uh recreational fires and just making it more clear. Uh since then, we've been reviewing um the open burning ordinance, you know, 2022 through 2025, and have identified some operational and uh community concerns. Uh we brought those to you at the uh council workshop in October of 2025, and uh with with the goal at that time being to improve safety, efficiency, and community impact. So, uh some of the key challenges that uh we want to highlight again are just gaps in our application process. We've made uh the information about the ordinance uh public in you know, to the best of our ability on the city's website and with our application process, um but unfortunately, uh sometimes we find that people aren't taking advantage of those things and are not completely aware of the safety requirements that go along with conducting an open burn. And then uh we've been finding an increasing number of times where people uh just aren't applying for permits in general, whether they are aware that we have an application or not. Um as part of my uh responsibilities as the fire marshal, in reviewing uh the permit applications, I often find myself planning burns, actually providing them information about how to conduct the burns themselves and safety requirements, all things that they should be taking care of on their own. Um more applicants are coming in for dense neighborhoods, which increases the number of complaints, and then we are seeing a a rise in complaints tied to uh nuisance smoke. What we would like to do, and what we discussed uh per your recommendation at the council workshop, is uh restrict open burning by zone of the city. Um we would uh permit open burning. We would like to propose that we uh permit open burning in areas of the city listed as agricultural, rural single family, rural residential, transitional open space planning and development, and on select public facilities. Um and of course prairie restorations. We would provide uh special circumstance permitted open burning. Uh we would have to review these a little bit further based on uh the neighborhoods. Um they all are a little different in uh the zones that you see listed there. And then we would like to restrict open burning to not be allowed in areas of the city listed as medium density residential, high density, the village area, high bit the village high density residential, and any commercial areas. Those are the areas of the city where we see most of the concern with houses being very close together. We get lots of calls for nuisance smoke. Um the setbacks and distance safety distances are hard to maintain and hard to meet. And uh we just feel like it would be safer for everybody to not allow those in those areas. There is one exception to um any of the restrictions, and that is uh open burning for the purposes of conducting a running fire, which is a prairie restoration. Those are important for uh natural wildlife or um habitat and things. So, we would allow those to be conducted in all zones of the city uh as long as they are being done so by a licensed contractor. Um I want to note on this slide also, it doesn't mention it here, but this does not affect recreational fires in any way. So, the 3 by 3 by 3 campfires that you would typically have in your backyard for the purposes of you know, socialization uh would not be impacted in any way. So, again, our recommendation um to you based on the feedback that we received from the October 14th, 2025 the council workshop is to restrict open burning in the city to areas zoned as those that we mentioned. We would give all consideration to areas that we want to have those special circumstances and we would continue to allow prior restoration and land management fires as they are conducted by a licensed company. We just have another graphic here that just it's a different way to look at the what's allowed the special circumstance and what we're proposing to prohibit. And then I have the recommendation um for the ordinance to adopt the ordinance in front of you. And I have time to answer any questions if you have any. >> Councilmember Holtz. Thank you for that. Uh It's good info and appreciate the qualifying that to being useful updates. I guess my question would be what are what would be special considerations at the time for low-density residential? Like what what would be something from your standpoint that would come into play? >> So we have some areas zoned in the city um Let me make sure I'm on the right slide here. Uh yeah, we have some areas of the city zoned as you know, let's say it's low-density residential that has um the proper circumstances for like setbacks, you know, distances from the property line. They have the the required distances from um other structures and things that would normally permit them. Or if there's special circumstances like beehives, for example, that's listed specifically in our city ordinance as an allowed um reason to have an open burning permit. So we may, you know, under special circumstance issue them a permit for to, you know, take care of their beehives. >> Got you. Thank you. >> [clears throat] >> Any other questions? Thank you. I'll entertain a motion. >> Move to adopt ordinance 2026-05 approving the amendments to one ordinance 5 12 for open burning. >> I have a second. >> Second. >> Any discussion? Thank you for coming back with this with with the recommendation. Appreciate it. If there's nothing else, I'll call the question. All those in favor of adopting ordinance 2026-05, please signify by saying aye. >> Aye. >> Aye. >> Move to adopt resolution publication of ordinance 2026-05. >> Second. >> I'll just call the question on this one. All those in favor of adopting resolution 2026-027, please signify by saying aye. >> Aye. >> Resolution's passed. >> Thank you very much, Mr. Svoboda. >> Thank you. >> All right, item number eight, RFP for sports complex and Central Park master plan. >> Okay, good evening. Here tonight to talk about the RFP for the sports complex Central Park master plan. So, the background on this for anybody watching is that the city purchased 76 acres south of Sunfish Lake Park for a sports complex and central park. The parks master plan mentions that the city does not have enough competitive recreational fields for the growing population. And since the adoption of the plan, community development um we've talked to neighboring cities about their challenges and opportunities developing sports complexes and talked to the local sports associations about their needs and capacity. Uh a timeline was shared with the council and parks commission. And the RFP to hire a consultant is the you know, described as the next step to developing the park. And the plan includes uh community planning and engagement. And more importantly, or say um maybe even most importantly, is the financial analysis for implementation and long-term maintenance of what was be built at the site. So, um the question tonight though is should the council approve the RFP to hire a consultant for the project? So, for the request for proposals, we're looking for qualified professionals interested in developing a master plan for a central park with sports facilities. The preference will be given to professionals with experience and success in multi-use sports complex facility planning from concept to implementation. So, there are companies out there that will go through the the concept, help you implement it. Some of them also manage um the sites after they're built depending on the scale. So, for this project, the scope and the project goals um just seeking for master plan for the park. Um the plan will serve as a guide for developing the site to include baseball, softball, soccer, and other sport possible sports amenities that we've discussed. We also want other features that were identified in the parks master plan and the comp plan to be included during the community engagement and should be considered and evaluated including analysis of appropriate revenue generating scenarios. So, if something comes up, we also want them seems like a good idea. Let's go ahead and look at whether they can generate revenue or you know, if they're going to cost considerably to maintain. So, task 1A is the specific analysis of the sports facility scenarios for the park. So, this would include the programming and the space needs and the financial analysis. So, the expectation here is an analysis for multiple scenarios which should include revenue projections, expenses, cost assessment, a market analysis, any type of economic impact that could be um generated from the site and a long-term maintenance and replacement plan. Replacement plan referring mostly to the AstroTurf and the cost. Task 1 um continued is the primary focus of the plan to determine uh the type of sports complex to be constructed. We've already mentioned sports uh would include baseball and softball fields and soccer fields to try to consolidate them on one site. So, that's been discussed. We definitely want the consultant to review that. Uh the scenario should include for example, number of baseball softball fields and soccer fields, the field surface, artificial turf or grass in different scenarios. Sometimes just the turf is in the infield for a baseball field for example. Um staffing and partnering with sports associations. So, I spoke with many sports associations and there are a few that are interested. So, it's really drilling down on what kind of partnership the city can have, what kind of um um the partnership and on the level of commitment financially that they can bring and how that could be structured. Also, the scale of the facility is important. Is this a tournament level facility? Is it more of a local that drives the features like field lights. Um also, the scale of facility will you know affect the financial analysis in terms of revenue generation. And then the amenities, right? Locker rooms, concession stands, storage, restrooms, shelter, seating. That all changes based on the scale. So task 1B is analysis of other sports and non-sports amenities as is determined after community engagement. So this whole process through community engagement we'd be looking at this. This would also include a financial analysis, revenue projections. We want them to identify it's a good a good idea comes through but it's a substantial maintenance cost. Let's identify this so we know what we're on the hook for. So task two is the community engagement. Basically um we're going through a process that would develop so based on tonight Polco the idea would be develop survey questions for a national community survey using appropriate analysis and recommendations. So what I heard tonight and I just want to make sure this open question to the council that we want to make the um the the polling through the NCS which is uh um what's the word where they send it to a certain group of people? We want to include that in this process with a sports field so we have a better idea of what the community wants at the location. Um a web page dedicated to the project, updates to appropriate city commissions, town hall special events, and city staff and project team coordination. So just real quick NCS this idea is to have this run concurrently, correct? Okay. >> I believe so. >> Okay. So the confirmed uses to study ball baseball, softball fields. We've talked about five to six. That's at the larger scale that we talked about. Soccer fields at four were kind of the higher end. Obviously this going could come back lower or even higher. That's what we want to see from the consultant. So these are the amenities to explore. So any input would be helpful in the RFP but pickleball courts, disc golf, amphitheater, farmers market area. Really like the idea of the food truck area with electrical connections. Um shelter, seating area, restrooms, playground equipment, a community garden, tennis courts, basketball courts. We um looking at maybe some revenue generation like outdoor area for like mini golf. That's something that community would like. Um skate park and I believe um Adam mentioned through parks a veterans memorial came up in the past. This is part of the RFP. So, task three is just development um recommendations, phasing, and site plans. We're looking for a very basic site layout and renderings. Um but then each amenity feature should have a cost estimate, estimates for site work included but not limited to grading, road construction, parking, retention ponds. When we talk about environmental conditions, that's more like identifying wetlands, slope, anything that could could limit where features could be placed, not an environmental phase one or phase two. Uh a phasing plan should be provided to the city for financial flexibility during development. We want to definitely have a phasing plan if we go that route. So, the other thing is providing recommendations on uh potential funding sources such as grants and partnerships. So, the partnerships will be the sports associations and obviously any grants out there. Task four is this is I think very important too is the preparation of long-term management plan, partnership, and staffing. So, looking at a long-term management plan and staffing plan aligned with the recommended scenario. So, you say this is a really good scenario, you want to go with this. Well, what does this look like to staff um long-term? So, summary of aspects of management that could be uh also managed by local sports associations or other users. Is it necessary for the city to manage the baseball fields or should a a baseball association manage that site? And what does that look like? How's that structured? Um potential required maintenance and frequency of maintenance and cost assessments. Just 2026 numbers of AstroTurf, lifetime of turf, um cost estimates and staffing requirements for the different scenarios. It could be um requiring several staff members at the site if it becomes a large facility. So, just um giving us options there to consider moving forward. Timeline. The timeline is how we we see it if this is um recommended to go forward tonight, we would like to release it on the 7th. One of the things that we're looking at with the purchasing policy with RFPs, it would be also advertising. So, you would see the proposals would be due on June 22nd. Uh this gives us enough time to advertise. Currently, we are proposing to advertise online on our website and then with um through LMC. And that that's it for now. So, that's something that I know has been discussed recently. So, if you have any other places you'd like to see it advertised, let me know. Uh but then what happens with these proposals, we release them. We have a deadline for question submittal. There's always questions, clarification on the RFP. We take a week to answer those and we set out um send out an addendum so everybody gets the same response. And then proposals are due on June 22nd. And then we'll evaluate the proposals. Depending on quickly we can get the evaluation turnaround, we would try to bring it back for contract approval um either July 7th or the 21st. The project duration says max 4 months. That's what we consider for if they were working completely full-time. With the NCS um incorporating that, it may be closer to 6 months making sure everything aligns. But, we want to start the contract, work on the questions with the consultant for the NCS, and then that may add a couple months, but that's what we're looking at in terms of a timeline. The anticipated park construction is just if we uh we talked about the referendum route, it would be pushed back to 2029 if that was the approach. So, that's just I received that question in the past, so I think just wanted to add that to the presentation. So, the evaluation criteria, we're looking at experience and qualifications. We're looking at also the approach and methodology for the project. Make sure they check all the boxes and we feel comfortable that they're going to do an adequate job um with each task. So, we want to be able to evaluate them on that. We want a community engagement plan would be evaluated. Timeline, make sure it works with our timeline. And then, obviously, the compensation and the cost proposal, grading that. Fiscal impact, the city has budgeted $60,000 for the project. That is in the in the the department budget for 2026. And then, the recommended motion is just um motion to approve the RFP as presented by staff. So, I'll stand for any questions. Do you have any questions about the RFP? >> Councilmember Rhodes. Thank you for for that update. That was uh substantial amount of uh good info to know. On task three, when uh you know, Shell determined financial modeling starts to do some analysis and possible grants. The the language of grants, would that also include their ideas of whether donors are possible? Or is grants an explicitly separate concept from donors? >> I mean, I'm going to ask them for all sources of funds that they think of. They've done this, they're the experts. >> What does this look like for fundraising, grants? >> So, we're we're not limiting it to grants. >> No. >> All right. >> Did you Where did you say you were going to advertise this again? >> LMC and on the city's website. >> Okay. Thank you. >> Would I need a code to fill out this survey, or would I just go to any or just go to follow the URL and I could fill out the survey, or is it only going to a certain amount of people? >> So, the plan was, you know, to use Polco, right? So, the Polco has the engage and they also have the um national community survey. So, the way this works, the way I understand it works, is that we are going to come up with set several questions. I think he said about a page, page and a half. Could be specifically for the park. So, that would go you would need the PIN and that would be a random selection. So, we would get the statistically um >> 3,000 households, correct? >> He said 3,000. He said something about maybe four. So, >> Okay. >> So, we'll have to see, but but what ends up happening is that survey is also shared for the parks and we can share it and everybody can weigh in. So, one of the things that is really good about surveys in general, uh thinking of about them more of digital engagement tools, too. Some people don't show up to meetings, some people won't email you, but it's just good to just get input. So, it's nice that we have the NCS with the specific questions about this project, but then anybody can fill out the poll, you know, different poll that's very similar and answer the questions. >> Got it. Okay. >> Yeah. >> I just clarify um when you do the statistically sound survey and then you release it to um all community members, those results are separate from each other, so they don't go together. Okay. >> Any other questions? >> Just real quick with that. >> Yeah, go ahead. >> Yes, I had the same question about task three with the fundraising, so it was good to hear that. And then the only other question I had and and maybe it's part of it, but I'm just wondering if parking is maybe considered as part of task 1A when you talk about like the supporting amenities. >> That So, we're also if it's a large facility, having a secondary access, too. Considering that we may need a roadway [snorts] that goes to the site. So, parking, definitely. >> Okay. Yeah. Thanks. >> Yeah. All good? Entertain a motion. >> Motion to approve the RFP as presented by staff. >> Support. >> We have a motion and a second. Discussion? All those in favor hold. >> I mean, this is the next step. It's just an RFP to start this process that we are There's 4,200 steps after this, but I appreciate the work that's being put into this. This is one of the priorities that we listed as a council that we're going to tackle. Um so, I I appreciate that and it's good to see that yes, we are taking the steps one by one. >> All right. If there's nothing else, I'll call the question. All those in favor of uh putting out the RFP as presented, please signify by saying aye. >> Aye. >> Aye. >> Motion's passed. Thank you. Item number nine, stormwater management utility code review. Mr. Stanley. >> Not seeing it in here. I have a presentation that I should share with council. >> Is that >> Um 1 second. >> We can talk about Highway 36 again, though. It's a pretty big deal. >> Could I Is this There's a number of things in the background. >> Can I pull it up through the website? >> You can. I also I'm just going to What's faster? There you go. >> Thank you. >> [clears throat] >> Okay. Apologies for the for the delay. Um So, I'm I'm before you um uh [clears throat] been before you a couple of times on this matter, Mayor and Council, to discuss >> [snorts] >> a uh review that's been asked for to look into some potential revisions to the stormwater utility code. Um So, some background on this matter is um one of the city's goals is to review fees like this from [clears throat] time to time. So, there was an initial discussion last fall. Um There was at the time there was a a scope put together, uh reviewed with uh staff and brought it before Council March 3rd. And ultimately the scope was rejected with some input to include some additional items. So, I have kind of a list of proposed services here and I want to kind of elaborate on some of the some of the items. So, um review calculation methodology and recommend changes, review land use categories and recommend additional as necessary, review appeal process and recommend improvements changes, review current ordinance with specific attention to equity. Research and assess possible homeowner association credits or payment reductions based on public infrastructure maintenance responsibilities and ultimately just to make sure that whatever we we have complies with state law. So, just to kind of talk about some of the um tasks that are associated with this work. So, when I look at, you know, calculation methodology, um land use, and special attention to equity in in particular, um the plan here, um and apologies for um not as much detail in in the um scope letter here. But, >> [clears throat] >> essentially what we're going to have to do is get kind of a baseline representation of what the runoff is from a single-family home. The way that the ordinance works is that there's a utility factor that's applied to the city's fee, um which is termed the utility charge. So, that's the 90 Currently, it's $95 per year for a residential property. So, that $95 is what gets factors applied to it and and other numbers in order to apply to um the number of uses in the code, which include agricultural, um manufactured home park, commercial or industrial properties, vacant land, uh golf course type or or park space, a school or a church, and then there's a conditional use which says uh site-specific. So, we're you know, that's that's going to remain, but you know, when looking at, you know, this list, um the intent is to, you know, largely maintain this. This is a high-level review of this code. Okay? So, the steps to go about, you know, uh gathering data [clears throat] is to essentially go and start looking at a cross-section of residential properties in Lake Elmo and determining the impervious surface on that through GIS uh delineation. Um when we think we have a representative sample, and by representative, you know, we heard earlier tonight that there's over 5,400 households in Lake Elmo. Uh we have no intent on going through every single, you know, we don't have the scope and we don't have, you know, our our our our our schedule here, which I'll get to at the end. We're trying to keep this moving. So, going through 5,400 households would be, you know, that that would be several months of of work for an individual to do to gather all that data. And so, what we're trying to do, like I said, is develop a baseline um, you know, representation that's that we think for specific, you know, housing types. So, um, you know, we're talking about like 50, 60, 70 delineations is what we're we're kind of anticipating based on conversations with my staff and similar reviews that we've done. So, when we have that and we can kind of determine what that that baseline is, then we the analysis that goes into um the additional properties is cuz it's kind of where that that factor comes from is based on it's all based on that utility that residential equivalency runoff. Okay? So, if you look at the code, which is included, I don't have it up on the screen, but it's uh included in the council packet. Uh agriculture or I'm sorry, um commercial industrial property. Right now, um there's like a it's 3.08 times the utility charge at $95 times the amount of acreage in the property. I have no idea how that was developed. We're here to essentially cross-check that in this process to make sure that that is equitable, right? And if it's not, we're going to make changes to it. By equitable, I mean fair, you know, fair amount to pay. So, that's that's really as far as um the process for what we're going to be doing, the analysis that we're going to be doing. That's kind of a a high-level outline of it. I just wanted to put that out there for everybody to understand what we're doing. Um to touch on some of the other items, um the uh the review of the process appeal process, you know, um I have been in preparation for uh resubmitting the uh scope and fee letter, as well as uh just doing my due diligence. We've I've done some research. I've had conversations with the city attorney, and um just looking into um you know, this this will largely be a comparison to see what other cities are doing. You know what I mean? Like, are they do they have a process that comes to council? Is that required? Can Is it an Is it more of an administrative process? You know, and how does that work? So, that'll be that'll be um you know, the results of all this will be presented to council at a later date. Um the uh HOA matter I want to talk about for a second here. So, again, we heard earlier, maybe to my benefit cuz I had no idea we had 41 homeowners associations in the city, but thank you uh Jason for sharing that earlier. So, again, the research that was done in preparation for this was mostly just like targeting, you know, five or six HOAs around the city and doing um research based on our what what the ownership is of of these areas. So, you know, if you if you go on to um the city's GIS, you can see an outlot, what's contained in the outlot, and who owns that outlot. And so, what I found largely was that stormwater facilities were owned by the city of Lake Oswego, and all these areas with homeowners associations. Not to say that we're not going to look a little more and you know, you know, kind of assess those situations to see if there are some um some anomalies, but that's going to be that that research is going to be done by um targeting again not we don't have the the budget here to do 41 homeowners association reviews, but we're going to grab some representative ones. We might have to go pull some records, you know, we might have to request some records from the county that are filed that that city staff doesn't have. Um in preparation for this I did work with staff and we we don't have um every maintenance agreement for every homeowners association on record at the city. So um so those are the big that's that's kind of the process for those kind of big tasks. I just wanted to put that out there for you guys and obviously um but you can ask me any question later. So, the appeals process is a little bit on this. Um I kind of went into this a little bit, but um state law actually does uh not require an appeals process for storm water utility charges. Um right now um our our our code says that um there's a council hearing once a year, okay? Um do we want to look at changing that? I don't know. Um I will note that we we all think that it's best practice to have uh some sort of mechanism for, you know, errors to be corrected or people to ask questions. So, we're I don't think we're going to be shutting anybody out. Um but you know, I I think we're going to be looking at going more towards an administrative staff level process. That's just based on kind of like the preliminary research. The HOA credits again I touched on this. So, it's really a question, you know, are there situations [clears throat] where homeowner responsibilities are doing public stormwater maintenance. Um sometimes a certain agreement might be titled something and it could could have been titled something different. It could there could have been a better mechanism to memorialize something. These are going to be, you know, kind of property specific things that we're going to um need to need to dig into a little bit. But again, uh I shared earlier that I did uh look at a number of different areas of the city, established neighborhoods, newer neighborhoods, um that have homeowner homeowner's associations and and largely those areas that look like they contain public stormwater um infrastructure were owned by the city of Lake Elmo. Um but there will be more to come on that. There was also a question that came up at the March 3rd meeting about um can stormwater utility fees for the public right-of-way be assigned to private properties based on that property share of traffic generation in the area around that roadway. And after thinking about that, I consulted the city attorney and the opinion that came back was it's very likely not legally defensible under state law um as, you know, there's a number of things um such as, you know, stormwater fees for a property are generally tied to conditions that create runoff. Um and, you know, the fees must be proportionate to those properties. So, traffic generation can change wildly based on a number of factors. Um but but the long and the short of it is, you know, based on that opinion, um I decided that further review of that matter was not going to be included in the scope of services. So, I'm before you today um bringing the scope back with some additional information. Um, if if approved, uh, I'd propose to come back in June and, um, present our recommendations to the city council. And then, over the course of the year, as deemed appropriate, um, code updates can be made. >> Questions for Mr. Stanley. >> Councilmember Dragicevich. >> When you look at the appeals process, we have three of them on our consent agenda. So, is that's that's part of what you'll be looking at, the basis for those appeals? >> Um, actually, so the appeals process is is a little different than, um, than the basis for the appeal. So, like um, the the there's two things here addressing that in the in the ordinance. Um, you know, so the appeal is base is the appeal is asking for either a reduction or a waiver of the fee, right? >> Yeah. >> So, we'll be looking at the appeals process, the process by which those appeals are reviewed and evaluated by staff, but as far as, um, any sort of credit or reduction or whatever, that's not part of the scope. You know, so to to provide some additional information there, you know, it's how do cities handle appeals when they come forward? You know, that's that's maybe different than us. Does it need to go before council? Is it administrative reviews? Does it go to the planning department or engineering department for review? So, and and then how how do they evaluate that? >> The evaluation of the appeal will be part of the process. >> Mhm. >> Okay, thank you. >> Any other questions? I will entertain a motion. >> Motion to approve the scope for review of storm water utility code as provided by Bolton & Menk, Inc. Support. >> Discussion? >> You got some work ahead of you. >> Yes, we do. >> It'll be a valid gain for the city. I appreciate Council Member Dragicevich bringing the topic and pushing on it, but it, you know, we need process improvements at all times. It's continuous improvement, so it's a it's a good win for the city. >> And and just to clarify for Aaron Council, what I'm bringing for what will be presented will be, you know, our findings or or recommendations that you can choose to implement or you can't you don't need to though. You know what I mean? So, um and there'll be explanation with that as to how we got to where we are what we're presenting. >> All right. Call the question. All those in favor of the motion to approve the scope for review of stormwater utility code as provided by Bolton Menk, Inc., please indicate >> It's getting late. >> Uh or approve it, please signify by saying I. >> I. >> I. >> Those opposed, same sign. Hearing none, motion's passed. All right, we got three more things to take care of. Uh item number two from the consent agenda that was pulled is denied stormwater appeal for 4180 Urban Circle North. >> All right, so the city had three stormwater appeals submitted. Number two, 4180 Urban Circle North. Um I went to each site. At this particular site, I looked at what we have outlined in our ordinance, and I was looking for any sort of retention or any practices that were done on the property. Um I looked for rain barrel, rain garden, rain retention pond, swales or ditch or man-made water courses, and riparian area plantings or other practices may be deemed as intentional in detention of surface water runoff. At that particular property, I did not see any of that whatsoever. >> Okay. >> Councilmember Jerry, since you're the one that asked that, do you have any specific >> No, I just I appreciate went to the site and I was trying to My questions are how do you determine that there weren't any um you know, stormwater management facilities on the site. So, that's fine. >> Okay. >> All right. >> Number three was uh stormwater appeal for 11243 30th Street. >> Okay, so for that particular address, I did go to the site also. Um I happen when I went to the site, the homeowner was there also. It's a little over 4-acre property. Um that particular site, he has dug two retention ponds within the property behind the homes. The property also has drain tile going to those pond areas to capture the water to direct them to that storm pond behind the home, that particular property. >> So, my question there is how we came up with the 75% amount. >> I did not do a 75. I thought I did a 50%. >> I thought there thought it said 75 on the Thought this one said if I'm wrong, I apologize. >> 50. >> It says both. >> It has an option of 75 and a recommendation of 50. >> Oh, okay. I'm sorry. I thought it was a recommendation for 75. I misread it. >> No. >> So, we have a recommendation of 50%. >> And that seems reasonable based on your description. >> Yes. >> Okay. >> All right. For the last we do have the uh property owner here and she would like to talk about her property, but let's let's hear your findings first and we'll let property owner address that. >> So, 11081 Upper 33rd Street North, number four. I did also go to the site. Um I also looked for the same requirements as in the ordinance. I looked for the same as all the other properties and I did not see any rain barrels or rain garden, retention pond, swale ditch or man-made water course, riparian plantings or any of practices deemed intentional detention of surface water runoff also at that particular site. I did not see. >> Ms. Dended Dunn, did you want to approach the and speak to your request? >> Late good evening to everybody. I'm glad I'm glad that you did come to the house, Pete. I'm sorry I didn't get to see you. I do have a rain barrel that's behind my garage. And I live in the bowl. If anybody ever looks at the topographical numbers, you can tell that everything comes into my home. It was extensive uh development done to the east of me and they took out dirt and they increased the elevation about a foot above so even more water comes into my my land. So, all I'm saying is I live in a bowl, the water doesn't run out, and I do have a rain barrel, which we've had ever since they offered them to us to purchase through the through Washington County Conservation, which was probably 10 15 years ago. >> Okay. >> So, next time knock on the door and I'll give you the tour. >> All right. Thank you, Ms. Dunn. So, individually, I guess I'll need a motion for each of these. >> Can I just ask a quick question on that one? >> Well, can you do it after your motion's made? Oh, you want to ask a question? Yeah, go for it. >> a question. With That's all right. With the rain barrel, would that have changed the interpretation? >> Not necessarily. I'd have to see how much water comes off the roof and I don't know what else is contained within that area from that particular property. >> And then how about with the topography that she mentioned? Is that Is that something that's calculated typically? I mean, obviously, with storm water ponds, the topography works in in that favor, but I guess yeah, is there knowing that the topography that comment, I mean, does that change the decision at all from your end? >> It did not because it's not outlined in the ordinance for that particular for this >> Okay. >> for storm water. >> Got you. So, to clarify, I mean, it Yeah, I'm looking at the ordinance. The credit can be 25 to 75% for only these things. There There's nothing else There's no subjectivity that's allowed. >> That is correct. >> Got you. Thank you. >> Okay, I'll make a motion to not approve any reduction to surface water for 4180 Urban Circle North. >> Second. >> Any discussion? Call the question. All those in favor of the motion, please signify by saying I. >> I. >> You. >> Motion to approve the stormwater appeal for 11243 30th Street North. >> Second that. >> Any discussion? All those in favor to approve a reduction in surface water fee for 11243 30th Street at 50%, please signify by saying I. >> I. >> Motion is approved. Motion to not approve any reduction in the surface water fee for 11018 Upper 33rd Street North. >> I'll second. >> Second. >> Motion is second. Discussion? >> I think the the fact that we don't meet the specific requirements of the ordinance for uh uh you know, stormwater detention really prevents us from doing anything. My concern, at least when I got here, initially my thought was you know, if a topographic survey they only could do a topographic survey and prove there was no net runoff from the lot, but ours doesn't allow that anyway. So, we kind of have our hands tied. >> Agreed. >> I'll question all those in favor of the motion, please signify by saying I. >> I. >> Motion is approved. That concludes our regular agenda items for this evening. We have council reports. Council member Dragicevich. >> No report. >> Council member Holtz. >> None at this time. >> I do not have a council report at this time. Council member Hearn. >> No report. >> Council member Pregler. >> Uh yeah, really quick. I will be attending the Lake Elmo Airport Advisory Commission next Monday. So, I will have a report for you guys next time we meet. Thank you. Staff reports. >> No report. >> Bruce >> No report. >> No report. >> Sopa >> No report. >> Keith >> No report. >> Christian >> No report. >> No report. >> No report. >> So quiet. Is is it the hour? I mean, come on. All right. With that, we'll adjourn this meeting meeting at 10:44. Thank you.