Good evening and welcome to the Newport City Council meeting. Today is Thursday, May 7th, 2026. We'll begin the meeting with the Pledge of Allegiance. >> I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. >> Will staff please call the roll? >> Council member Schmidt. >> Here. >> Council member Engeman. >> What? Here. >> Council member Taylor. >> Here. >> Mayor Elliott. >> Here. >> Council member Sumner is absent. >> Thank you. Uh next on our agenda is to adopt the agenda. Do we have any changes to the agenda this evening? >> I move to the agenda. >> I'll second. >> I have a motion from Council member Engeman and a second from Council member Schmidt to adopt the agenda as presented. Any discussion? All those in favor say I. I. Those opposed? The agenda is adopted. Next on our agenda is public comments. As we have no members of the public in the audience this evening, we will move on to the consent agenda. Are there any changes to the consent agenda? >> I move to adopt the consent agenda. >> I'll second. >> I have a motion from Council member Taylor and a second from Council member Engeman to adopt the consent agenda as presented. Any discussion? All those in favor say I. I. Those opposed? The consent agenda is adopted. Next on our agenda is the Washington County Sheriff's Office report. We have Sergeant Leggett with us this evening and a cadre of of other people. >> A bunch of hoodlums came with me. Uh no, I'm kidding. Uh I brought in our crew. Tonight we're doing We try to meet quarterly as a crew cuz we work opposite shifts. We don't get to you know, work the same all the time. So, I figured uh bring them up here briefly so they can see how this operates and that you can see a few of them. Uh as far as updates, things uh summer's here and it is getting a little busier. Um activity out there with uh mentioned it before with kids playing, but school's going to be out pretty soon. So, I'd like to remind the public of that. With that, kids are outside. They are playing. Um bigger issues that we're seeing as far as citizen uh concerns would be again speed. That does typically go up in warm weather, but we are out there enforcing those. We recently I did the count. We have 116 directed patrols throughout the city thus far this year. And that's for different streets and areas where citizens have uh raised concern. Uh so, we are we are out there. We are active and we're educating uh the best we can for folks. Uh additionally though, uh the call loads are not vastly different. So, I have nothing nothing uh bad to say truly. Uh things are are going quite well. It just gets busier during the summer uh with with people out and about. Um uh additionally though, what I'd like to do is I I typed something up because next week is law enforcement memorial week and May 15th is the specific day. Um myself and our honor guard crew is actually going to be flying out to Washington, D.C. uh for this where we will partake in honor guard uh duties uh at the memorial as well as for the candlelight vigil to honor the officers that have fallen in the past year, but also just in the past in general and the surviving families. So, what I uh typed up here today, I usually I know I read some last year. Uh this is something different. It's just from my viewpoint. Um just kind of my own words to give a give a a different perspective for the public and anybody else who might might hear this at any point. So, if you feel that way. I call it I am. I don't I don't mean it in a biblical sense, um but it's just kind of a I guess that's what I called it. I am a sergeant with the Washoe County Sheriff's Office. I'm a person who has a passion and a love for this profession. I'm someone who wants to be there to help through the highs and lows in life to get someone on the right track for a successful life regardless of the stage one might be in. I'm dedicated to the citizens of this county and this city specifically to help make it safer so they do not have to worry about violence or danger lurking in their neighborhood. But what some people may not think about us or about is I'm a coach who volunteers time to help children learn a sport. I'm a father of three wonderful children ages 4, 6, and 9. I'm a husband of a kind, caring, supportive wife. I'm a person who wonders if the next person I encounter while working will hate me only because of my profession and not look past the uniform knowing not knowing who I am or what I believe in. I'm a person who puts on a vest when I go to work every single day hoping and praying should I be shot that the vest will stop the bullet. I'm a person who thinks about whether today will be a day someone tries to assault me or hurt me so bad I may not be able to provide for my family. I'm a husband who worries if something should happen to me, will my wife be okay? I'm a husband who worries if something will happen to my wife as she is also in the same profession with a different agency. I'm a father who wonders if I will get to see my 9-year-old hit the baseball at his next game something he's been working so hard at. Or my 6-year-old just starting to learn softball and has such a caring heart. Or my four 4-year-old energetic kiddo who says you're the best with a big smile and is going to preschool full-time starting in the fall. I'm a person who has dreams or thoughts that someone will do something bad to my children because of the things I have seen evil do over my 23 years in my career. I'm a person who is haunted by those I could not save. Adults, children, and yes, infants. I'm a person who has changed in my years because of what we have to see, do, and experience. The people I will encounter will never know anything of what I have told you. But I am human. Despite what may happen in life, I will never give up. I will never adjust my moral belief. I will show up for work every day and do the very best I can at those exact moments I am engaging with the public and my partners. I will run into danger knowing my possible demise if I know it will save the lives of others. Some of what I have said is a very small snip of my life. Each and every officer has their own stories, but I assure you there are some similarities. Like I have mentioned earlier, May 15th is Law Enforcement Memorial Day. And this day is dedicated to honor those brave men and women who have lost their lives in efforts to save others. They will never again get a chance to tell their story. They will never be able to see their kids at their baseball game. And when their child looks over to their parent, there will be an empty space on the bleacher where their mother or father should be. Or an empty chair at a dinner table while the family sits together and there's an awkward silence as everyone is on the verge of tears wishing they could see them just one more time. I do ask for the public on May 15th, despite one's belief in law enforcement, to please take a moment that day to reflect and thank those officers' sacrifices. And just as importantly, the family who must live with the empty seat and daily reminder of their lost ones. Cuz we're all human. So, thank you for letting me share that. I certainly uh stand here for any questions you may have. >> Well, I want to thank you for um bringing um sort of the humanity behind the badge um to your statement and for helping people to understand that an officer has the same worries and the same concerns and the same hopes and the same dreams of anybody. And that our you know, deputies are there to help people and to try to help them through a crisis time. You know, I think it's been said to me you know, our firefighters and and our deputies see people at some of the worst moments of their lives. And that you're bringing a human approach to that and a sense of empathy but also a sense of controlling the situation which sometimes can be a little more direct wording and a little bit more um I think straightforward approach um to make sure that they can help get people on that path. And I think it's easy to forget that uh with a uniform. So, thank you for just trying to help people understand that it's just no different than than the rest of us. So, thank you for sharing that. Very much. >> Thank you. >> Other comments or questions for Sergeant Leggett? >> I think you said it. >> Okay. Well, thank you very much. >> Thank you. >> No introductions here tonight. They're just going to watch. Watch and learn. Just the group. >> Yeah. I do want to say a side note today, um uh the fire department had to work on a structure. And the impeccable work that they do is is bar none. The citizens are lucky, honestly, to have the fire department that they have out here. Uh they did a great job making sure the house was good. Nothing spread and everything they did was wonderful. So, they should be commended for their good work that they did. >> They had good instructions. >> They had good instructions, yes, of course. Thank you for your time. >> You're welcome. And I want to thank you the crew for coming in tonight, um as well, and for the work that you do throughout the community. Uh we very much appreciated as a city council your work to keep us safe and to help our residents out when they're in need. So, thank you very much, all of you. Um next on our agenda is the fire chief's report and um we have Chief Marson with us this evening. And I see him whispering. He'll be paying the 20 bucks to Sergeant Leggett later for that compliment. >> I don't know how I'm going to follow that report up. >> That was your report. You're done. That's >> Exactly. That's good enough. I've been saying that that we definitely support and appreciate the law enforcement. They do great on scenes with us. We work very well with them. Uh Sergeant Leggett is definitely a shining star. So, we had that fire this afternoon and I think we worked pretty well together and everybody did a great job and um everything turned out about as good as it possibly could turn out, so I'll go with my report now. That's probably less emotional than his, but still there. 13 calls for the month. We had two out going. One was for a structure fire in Grove. And then the other one was for car fire in Grove on the way back from the structure fire. So, we were right there by the high school, so it was might as well knock it out. We had some folks complete first responder inspector at the end of the or beginning of the month. So, half of the department now is able to do fire inspections. So, that is nice and a very good achievement from them. A lot of time and effort in going to those classes and taking time off work to do those. Let's see, finishing up blue card ICS training. The last group is doing blue card training now, so our whole department will be certified as blue card ICS. And we have two instructors, so we can train people. I mean, basically we can go nationally if we wanted to anywhere in the United States. We're certified to do those trainings. Most of the counties or cities in Washington County are going to blue card. So, it's definitely helpful for everybody to be on the same page. Application period has ended as of April 27th at 5:00 p.m. for firefighters. We got We had 10 applicants and we are scheduling interviews right now. We'll start interviews on the 11th and the 18th. And from there, there'll be conditional offers made and then they'll go through a psych test and physical and all that stuff. And if barring those, they pass that, then hopefully we have a few new folks on. And then that's all I have for the evening. I'll stand for any questions. >> Do you want to talk just a little bit for the public what the blue card means? >> It's incident command system. So, basically what it is is how you operate and run scenes, whether they're fire scenes or medicals or anything. Just it's a standardized system. Um Basically, it it organizes everything. So, you don't have a just a bunch of fire trucks running to the front of the house and people doing whatever they want to do. So, you have a command structure and then um you don't depend on the scope of the incident, you could have divisions, you could have levels. It all depends on how big the incident gets, but also even on small ones like today was a smaller house, room and contents, but we still had okay level one stage. So, they'll stage in their trucks until we give them an assignment. When they're done with their assignment, then they come back and they get another assignment. So, you're not just having the freelancing. It truly truly has saved a lot of lives because if you don't know where people are in a fire scene, that's the most dangerous thing out there. And firefighters all want to do something. They want to do something good. So, you have to give them tasks. If you don't give them tasks, they'll wander around. Because we're just like little kids. But, that's what we do and we organize it and it just everything's laid out. So, if we go to another city, say we go to Cottage Grove and we end up getting there first, they have no issue with us taking command and vice versa. If they get here first, I have no issue with any of their command staff taking command at one of our fires cuz we follow the same rules. And it's really nice. So. >> Great. >> Came from Phoenix Fire. So, came out of there after they had some big warehouse fire and killed 19 people, I think. So. >> Okay. >> Yeah, it's definitely good. >> Thank you. Um other questions for Chief Marston? >> No. No. >> Thank you. Thank you very much. >> And happy birthday to Tom. >> Oh. >> Just so everybody knows. >> How how old was he again? Was it 81? >> Oh, sorry. That's right. >> I thought it was 197. No, 81. >> Thank you very much. And um Sergeant Leggett too uh thank you for representing, you know, Washington County. I feel like we're part of that. So, I'm going to say for representing the city of Newport in Washington D.C. next week as part of their memorial activities. Yep. >> Take care, guys. There's more to the meeting. >> Yeah. You can stay. >> I don't think they want to. >> Well, next on our agenda is the engineer's report and engineer Hertigan is not able to be with us this evening. So, we will move on to the superintendent of public works report. Matt? >> Uh good evening, Mayor Elliott and council members. Um in John's absence, I have uh one formal request. Um uh it is a partial payment request um for A1 Excavating uh relating to the interconnect with Cottage Grove. Um the request is partial payment number six for $136,733.50. And mostly what this uh payment request is is basically putting in the uh the brains and the communication of the system. The The pipe have been in the ground since last fall. Um but now we've got a valve and a meter that we can control and read from from public works and uh Um so, within I would I would guess 2 weeks or so um pending power and everything else, um it should be operational. So, uh big big step towards towards the clean water. So, >> Um that sounds great. Any questions? This is a fairly routine uh request as um I'm sure the public can see it's partial payment number six. So, as they do work on this project, we do payments periodically because they are also paying wages and bills and parts and all of that, so they can't wait till the very end of a project to get paid. So, any questions on this anybody? >> I'll make a move to pass the resolution for payment number six. >> Thank you. >> I'll second. >> So, we have a motion from Council member Ingeman and a second from Council member Schmidt to authorize partial payment number six in the amount of $136,733.50. Any further discussion? All those in favor say I. I. Those opposed? The payment is approved. Anything else tonight? >> Yeah, I have two other updates. One relates to the Sheriff's Office and and the Fire Department. You know, they they really truly do work with us and protect our guys, look out for them. Um and on the week of May 17th is Public Works Week and uh we we talked to both Police and Fire or Sheriff's Department and Fire about going and doing a touch-a-truck event at Newport Elementary. They were both very on board, so on the 19th we're going to take Public Works and the Sheriff's Department and Fire all bringing vehicles and and different different things down to Newport Elementary for a couple hours and give the kids a chance to crawl around and have some fun and hopefully answer some questions from them. So. >> Well, that Do you know what time you'll be doing that? >> Uh noon to 2:00 is is the plan so far. Hopefully the weather cooperates because if, you know, if it's raining the the plan is to be, you know, not on a hard surface. So, if it's raining, we may have to cancel, but this is this is the first time in my memory that we've done this for for the kids. And I think I think it's really important for them to see some of the hands-on people behind the scenes that, you know, make make life happen and and keep the world running. So. >> So, May 19th, you're doing this. So, it's a Tuesday. >> Correct. >> And the elementary school is going to let kids come out and try things out. Great. >> Yep. Drive it around the No. >> And if anybody's got kids at home that are getting homeschooled, you're welcome, I think, to come out as well and participate in that on Tuesday, May 19th. That sounds like a really fun event for people. >> Um and then I have one other update. Um we've been working hard in the background to work with the Minnesota DNR to secure a grant to remove both public and private trees that have that are dead or dying. Um we don't have all of the forms necessary and stuff yet, but um right now we're uh looking at roughly 120 private trees and also 60 city trees that uh like I said are either dead or dying. Um there'll be a there'll be some paperwork that it's required to fill out and some uh in- income requirements to qualify as a private resident. Um but um the the rough amount is 132,000 that uh we're going to try and get to help people get rid of, you know, the ash borer trees. And they're not they're not variety specific, but that's a obviously a big portion of the of the trees that have died. So, um you know, I think just one, it's going to save public works time without trees falling into the streets and storms and stuff like that, but this is the first opportunity that I've seen to ever take a tree on private property and get rid of it, get the stump ground, and give them a new tree to plant. Um, you know, we just we just don't have that opportunity ever. So, pretty happy to happy to say that um, as soon as we complete the paperwork and that kind of stuff, we'll be putting be putting out notification on the website, flyers, newsletters. So, you know, if you have a dead tree in your backyard or front yard, for sure, get a get in contact with us and we'll do what we can to try and help you out. So. >> Yeah, see if people qualify in. I did notice there's a dead tree at uh the end of one of the ped bridges. I think it's the northeast ped It's near the northeast ped bridge and it's closer to Highway 61. So, it's, you know, technically on probably MnDOT or state property. Um, but I saw all of the others were getting green leaves and that was the the sad tree in the back was So, I don't know if that's on your list or if we can potentially look at that one as well. >> Well, what what our plan was is to um get as many private trees as we can possibly get taken care of first and then fill in with the city trees afterwards cuz we still have, you know, with our public works crew, we have the ability to take some down. We also have sentence to serve and other methods that we can deal with them as well. So, we're going to try and maximize the, you know, the effect on private property and then move from there, but um, you know, it really depend on how many people sign up and, you know, all the other meeting the qualifications that need to be met. So. But, I think it'll be a great great process to uh, you know, help clean up the the city and and prevent more emergency type work as well. >> Yeah. Great. Um, any questions for Matt? Okay. Next we have the administration report. >> Mayor and members of the council, I have no formal updates tonight, but I'm happy to stand for questions. >> Questions for Joe? No questions for Joe. We'll move on to mayor and council reports. Uh, for those of you who may not have heard already, uh, Bev Bartel passed away on April 26th. She has been and her husband have been a long-time member of the Newport community. And she has been a volunteer uh, in Newport for well over 30, I'm going to say probably approaching 40-plus years um, or more. She was a founding member of the Newport Heritage Preservation Commission. And in 2022, we actually planted a tree in her honor for 30 years of service on the Heritage Preservation Commission as well as being an inaugural member of that um, that organization or that uh, committee that we had. She's also been serving on our library board. Uh, we know since before 1989. We think probably as far back as 1984. Um, she's been an election judge. In 2008, she was named Newport Volunteer of the Year. She's just been um, a wonderful community booster and served in many capacities when needed uh, beyond what I I've listed here. And her and her husband ran John Bartel Hardware. Really stalwart supporters of uh, you know, community events and um, always stepping up when we needed it. And Bev was part of a cadre of volunteers that for many many decades helped make Newport, you know, the best it could be, whether it was, you know, weeding plantings or, you know, trying to get a community garden up and running or, you know, just the volunteers have made a big, big difference and the uh playground equipment that was originally in Pioneer Park, that was all constructed and put together by volunteers in the community. Um they would work all day and they would come home in the evenings and they would piece together the playground structure. Um took a couple of weeks to do it. So, she is part of that group and part of that mindset of, you know, giving back to the community um when you can. Um her service will be Saturday, May 9th. Uh the visitation starts at 9:30 with the service at 11:00. They'll be at Saint Thomas Aquinas in Saint Paul Park for anyone who's interested in attending. Um also, I just want to let people know that the park board has been meeting and discussing the summer family fun night that will be Tuesday, June 2nd from 6:00 to 8:00 p.m. in Loveland Park. Um per usual, there'll be ice cream, so bring money. Um they're also working on their Pioneer Day um planning or the Pioneer Day committee is. Uh one of the uh park board members also serves on the Pioneer Day committee. Uh the website is up and running. They will do a Friday night movie and they're going to have it up on the website at some point in May that the kids or the families will get to vote on whether they show Hoppers or the movie Goats. So, get ready to um vote online for that. Um and then August 8th will be the Pioneer Day events. There'll be the parade, the 5K run and the kids dash um and other activities. Um there will be a little bit of a route change on the 5K due to some construction projects, so uh keep your eyes open for that. Also, the library adventure 55055 is back and they're adding a little library up at the Bailey School Forest. That'll be one of the locations for a park or a an adventure activity. So, um there's a lot going on with the uh park board and um a lot of activities for kids keeping busy this summer. Tom? >> I have nothing at this time. >> Thank you. Council member Taylor? >> Uh just to tell you that the Red Rock Corridor Commission meeting last week. Can I just kind of use this as a chance to kind of reflect on where transit's gone here in the kind of the East Metro in recent years and it's like we had the kind of the revival of the transit station with the 345 route, which for those not familiar runs from the Gold Line in Woodbury to Newport to the mall uh and the airport. That's a daily service every hour. I got in front of Met Transit more recently this past month. We started kind of the local circulator system through Darts. I think that's on Thursdays, I believe, and it picks up at a couple spots. So, just go to the city's website. You can find more information on that. And I think that's part of what the Red Rock Corridor traditionally was a a vision of connecting Hastings to downtown Saint Paul kind of a bus rapid transit or a And I think what we've gone with in the direction we started to recognize a couple years ago is to less that kind of home run project and more varied projects to meet people where they're at. I think you're going to see that's You're not going to see much progress on the the big idea in the that kind of that red traditional Red Rock Corridor probably the next 10 years, but you're going to start to see more this slow expansion with the Gold Line extending to Minneapolis in a couple years. There's going to be a bus route connecting into the Gold Line that'll run down Radio and Hinton down in Cottage Grove. So, you're going to see this system slowly build out. You might not think where's the Red Rock Corridor? That isn't the really where things are going to happen, but there is to me the excitement to see that's different options serving different residents. I think just be mindful, you know, and they will they will benefit if we use them, too. So, I want you know, there isn't a probably a great awareness on many of these projects at this point, but they are definitely out there and will continue to grow in the next couple years. So. >> That's great to hear and I it feels like you're the commission is really focused on kind of the day-to-day needs and uses, getting people to you know, grocery stores, jobs, services, um that you don't necessarily need to be going down to St. Paul or down to Hastings to get. So. >> think it's it's layers of, you know, the council we've had our re-envisioning at the county's work on this, the cities, I mean, Met Council. So, it's lots of different entities kind of right now it's kind of the ball's in the county's county level a little bit more with their transportation plans, but this is you need buy-in at community level, too. And I think what we've we've shown that we have buy-in. Hopefully, the next meeting will be hosted in Newport, too. So, there's a they're excited about what we're doing here, too. So, you know, we're trying and I'm excited to share that some of the some of what we're trying to do, but it's it's it's building some momentum after a few years ago there was no momentum. So, it's nice to see that there's steps being taken, but a lot more to be done. So. >> Yeah. And I just heard yesterday, too, that the the Darts bus, they're very happy with the numbers they're seeing. >> That's what we were told, yeah. >> Yeah, that they're and and remember the Darts circulator is free. And so, if you go online on Newport's website you'll be able to see the three main pickup spots and the drop-off times, and then you kind of let the driver know where it is you want to be dropped off, whether it's at Kohl's to do some shopping or you want to go to Cub Foods and buy some groceries or something like that, or if there's a medical appointment you need to get to, you can you work that out. So. >> We're hoping to maybe add a second day of service to that. But you know, these things again, this it's a slow build-out, more meeting people where they're at. >> Yeah. >> Rather than like again the the home run project. But >> Well, I think that's fantastic. I think a lot of that change started happening when you got on board. So >> I It was more of the >> I give you credit. Thanks, Mark. Council member Schmidt. >> Uh nothing formal. Thanks. >> Thank you. With that, I'll take a motion to adjourn. >> So moved. >> I second. >> So we have a motion from Council member Ingeman and a second from Council member Schmidt. All those in favor say I. >> I. >> I. >> Those opposed? We're adjourned. Thank you for watching.