Good evening and welcome to the Newport City Council meeting. Today is Thursday, February 5th, 2026. We'll begin the meeting with the Pledge of Allegiance. I pledge algiance 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 role. >> Council member Schmidt >> here. >> Council member Sumner >> here. >> Council member Ingamman >> here. >> Council member Taylor >> here. >> Mayor Elliot >> here. Um, at this time I'd like to just take a brief uh moment before we move on to acknowledge the passing of Gordy Bailey, who is a longtime and dedicated member of the Newport community. He served the city for many years and contributed greatly to our civic life and we are grateful for that service and the lasting impact it had on Newport. On behalf of the council, we extend our condolences to the Bailey family and loved ones. And I'd like to ask for a well, I' I'd like to acknowledge, you know, the family has been in Newport since 1849, so many generations, and each generation has been very generous towards this community and has shaped it um in a way that we wouldn't be the Newport we are uh without them. and Gordy certainly had a vision for this community and what it could be and um his his memories will live on um beyond this and um we will be doing something a little bit more formal at our next council meeting. But at this time, I'd like to just ask for a brief moment of silence in Gord's memory. Thank you everyone. And um think of him as you go on Bailey Road or to Bailey Forest School or to the Bailey Meadows or Bailey Elementary or you know many many things named after this family and and certainly uh the Bailey School Forest. He was instrumental in that being uh part of our park system. So with that um thank you. I will move on to adopting the agenda. Do we have any changes tonight? >> Hearing none. Move >> the agenda. >> Second. >> I have a motion from council member Sumner and a second from council member Ingaman. All those in favor say I. >> I. Those opposed. >> The agenda is adopted. As we have no members of the public in the audience this evening, we will move past public comments onto the consent agenda. Um are there any changes to the consent agenda? >> So move. >> Second. >> I have a motion from council member Ingamman and a second from council member Sumar. All those in favor of adopting the consent agenda say I. I. Those opposed. The consent agenda is adopted. Um, Sergeant Leot was unable to be with us this evening and so we will move on from the Washington County Sheriff's Office report to the uh, fire chief's report. Good evening, Mayor and Council. Um, first off, I'd like to introduce our two newest promotions, Jason Hediger and Tyler Ivy. Let them speak for a second. >> Good evening, Mayor, Council. Uh, my name is Jason Hedigger, firefighter EMT. Uh, prior to coming to Newport, um, I spent three years with Woodbury Fire where they trained me as a a firefighter EMT. Um, and when uh they had some staffing shift, I came to Newport in uh 2022, I believe. Um, uh, but yeah, so I'm just uh want to thank uh Derek and the the the leadership to uh for for for promoting myself and uh just kind of look forward to um contributing more to the department and and I appreciate um the backing that the administrator and the mayor have and so yeah, just uh looking forward to the opportunity. So, thank you. >> Great. Thank you. Nice to meet you. >> Nice to meet you as well. >> Good evening, mayor and council. My name is Tyler Hipley. I'm the new fire captain uh with Newport Fire. Been on Newport for a few years along with being a instructor with the Northern Dakota Training Academy, >> uh local fire academy that we send all of our recruits to. Just like to thank you guys. Show my face. >> Thank you. >> Well, thank you um both for coming out. It it is nice to meet you and and put a face with a name and um you both seem like sound like you've got a real wealth of experience that you've brought to our department and so um we appreciate all of that. >> Mayor, >> Council Member Sumner has a question. >> Could you let us know where you live? Which which communities is your home? >> Um I think that might be cities I think might be private data. Yes, it cities are private data. We can do summary data. We have X number of people who live in Woodbury, X number who live in Cottage Grove, X number in Newport, but we can't I don't I think that's private. If it's not private, we'll get back to you. [laughter] >> Well, if you don't live in Newport, thank you for serving from the [laughter] outside. You You are welcome in Newport. [laughter] If you don't live in Newport, why don't you live in Newport? That's >> it. All right. >> He said, "If you don't live in Newport, why don't you live in Newport?" >> Well said, Council Member Sar. [laughter] >> Thank you. >> Uh for my latest report, I have Nearest is up and running. It's our new uh fire reporting system with the state. >> Uh it started January 1st, 26. Used to be Niffers, now we're nearest. So, uh state has turned over to that. So, couple hiccups in the road, but uh for the most part, it's been running relatively smooth. Um incident hours so far this in January, we had 174 uh 314 training hours, 371 activity hours, which are meetings and community events and stuff like that. 16 calls for the month. Uh four mutual aid, uh three to one to South St. Paul. And then we also have two firefighter or assistant chief and a captain that are train the trainers for blue card engine command system. So we have moved to that for ICS. Um that means they can train just about everybody in the state if they want to be trained in blue card ICS. Um and then I'll stand for any questions. >> How did the uh fire department come out on the tug of war? >> We lost again. Kids were tough. They're tough as here. We won the first round, but the second and third we just did not have enough. >> So, but it was a great it was a great event. There was a ton of people there. Probably the most I've seen out of winter family fun nights. So, a lot of kids, a lot of skating around and uh firefighters involved in all the games and everything else. So, it was really it was a really good event. So, >> it was great weather that night, too. >> Yeah, it was perfect. Perfect for skating, perfect for everything. So, >> yeah. >> Terrific. And so far the new job as chief is going well. >> Busy. It's [laughter] busy. There's a lot to do, but it's been going well. >> Good. Very well. >> Good. Well, I know you worked with Steve, so you got a leg up by >> It made the transition a lot easier. >> Yep. So, >> okay. >> That's for sure. >> Well, thank you very much. >> Thank you guys. >> Um, next we have the engineers report. >> Good evening, mayor, members of the council. Uh, two items for formal consideration. Uh both are partial payment estimates for our ongoing projects. Uh neither of which are under active construction. So these uh both payments are uh reconciling some unpaid quantities that the contractor brought forth documentation and then we had reviewed that and then so we like to keep up with those quantities so they can pay their subcontractors. Uh the first is the 2025 street utility improvements project. Uh Meyer Contracting has made a partial payment number seven request. The amount of this uh payment request is $4,18. We would be looking for council to consider that payment number seven. >> I'll move that. >> I'll second. >> So have a motion from council member Sumner and a second from council member Ingamman. Um any questions on this partial payment? this discontinuation of work that was already completed. All those in favor say I. I. Those opposed and the payment is approved. >> And then the uh water systems interconnect project also uh A1 has submitted a partial payment. This uh partial payment request. This uh work is related to the electrical service that's going to be powering the water meter. Essentially we we require the contractor to do all the coordination work with Excel and then get that service uh integrated in with their work and it's essentially the pass through cost. So whatever Excel charges them they provide us that documentation and we reimburse. Uh so this payment partial payment number five uh is in the amount of $9,89718. We would look for council to consider partial payment number five to A1 excavating. I'll move that. >> I'll second. >> I have a motion from Council Member Summer and a second from Council Member Ingamman. Um before we approve this, just for the public's um understanding, this is for the Cherrywood development up on Century Avenue. And we need this meter before we can supply water to the um homes that will be going in there. So, it's a it's a missionritical um item that we needed to get done. I know it's taken over a year [laughter] to get to get to this point. So, I'm actually pretty excited to be approving this this payment tonight. Um, with that, any other comments? All those in favor say I. I. Those opposed, the partial payment is approved. Anything else? >> That's all I had, Mayor, but happy to stand for questions. [clears throat] >> I think we're good. Thank you, John. Next, we have the superintendent of public works. >> Uh, good evening, Mayor Elliot and council members. I have nothing formal this evening. Uh but I do have an update uh kind of related to the [clears throat] family fun night. Uh as of Sunday, we had just under 300 skaters so far this season. So >> uh pretty pretty great season so far and uh hopefully [clears throat] uh we've got a few more weeks of skating before it warms up to 70 degrees. So >> any questions for Matt tonight? Hearing none. Thank you very much. Um, next we have the administrator's report. Do you just have the closed session tonight or is there anything else? >> Uh, mayor, members of the council, that's correct. Just this, uh, closed session here tonight. >> Okay. So, um, as I typically do, we'll move the close session to after mayor and council reports. The close session means that we um are not on camera and then typically we come out if there's something to be approved um we'll make a motion to approve it that will go in the minutes um otherwise we just adjourn the meeting and I I think tonight is a little more informational um so I don't I don't expect us to be making any big decisions so with that we'll move on to mayor and council comments so um just a couple of things our county commissioner Carla Bigum she meets with the communities that are in her district within the county. So, um, Mayor Bailey from Cottage Grove and Mayor Frankie from St. Paul Park. Um, and I met with her earlier this week, [clears throat] last week, one of the weeks. Um, but there's a couple of projects coming up this summer. And one is I think we've all kind of been aware of is this um se uh 65th Street also trunk highway 74 that is just south of Newport Cemetery and it's the road that comes down that bluff line and there's issues there with storm water uh management and runoff and it's it's degrading the underpinnings of the road. So, um, that is going to be done and that's seems like a pretty significant project is they're going to have to, I think, bring in some dirt and stabilize all that. Um, the other project they're going to be doing this summer is, uh, trunk highway 38. And trunk highway 38 is over here by city hall, 21st Street. It goes down 7th um, avenue to the Glenn Road, over Glenn Road, south on Hastings Avenue, all the way into um, St. Paul Park and Cottage Grove. And all three of the communities are going to be affected by the work that's going to be done. So, they're going to be doing some reconstruction um on that road coming this summer. And I'm I'm sharing this with you to kind of just brace yourself to be a little bit patient. There's going to be cones and there's going to be some uh detours. We're going to talk a little bit about that later um in our workshop. Uh I think the detour is planned for about three weeks um down for the uh 70. Oh no, that's for the highway 38 stuff. So just kind of be ready for that and we'll talk about it as it as it comes up a little bit closer. So then I asked her what was going on in 2027 and she said, "I don't have anything for Newport in 2027." So let's tough it all out this year and then um next year it should be a little bit quieter from a county construction standpoint. Um, also a couple of months ago I was named to the Minnesota Association of Small Cities um, board of directors and we had a meeting earlier this week and probably I think of note um, this is sort of an advocacy type group. Um, so we talked a little bit about what their legislative priorities were going to be for this year. Um, this is uh, funding for EMS is on their list. um local government aid, which we get over $400,000 a year uh for that. Um also housing and the housing industry is making a pretty hard push to not want to have um public hearings or cup conditional use permit hearings. Um they want uh standardized building heights and setbacks so that um individual cities can't um have uh input on how um or where homes are constructed on a particular lot. Um they have issues related to administrative processes that they think are too lengthy. And um I think maybe for some of the larger larger communities that could be true where you've got a housing board and a zoning board and a planning commission, all that. We're pretty small. We've just got a planning commission and the city council and and so it goes pretty smoothly. And if you watch these meetings in general, we get um pretty positive feedback from builders that work with our staff and our council about, you know, how much easier it is to work with Newport. And you know, some of that just comes with being smaller um as well as having great staff and a fabulous council. Um and you >> say that again, please. >> Yes. Fabulous and great. [laughter] Um the other you know kind of bigger issue that is sort of s you know kind of relates to Newport is what they call unfunded mandates. So this is when uh state legislation gets passed and it requires cities to do work um but there's no funding to help offset the cost of doing that work. So, um things like the um office of cannabis management and you know cities having to do uh regulatory uh and enforcement work on behalf of the state um and how that how that plays out and you know certainly things that you know you might think was good or not think it was good but paid family leave there's an administrative time that goes into that and there's a financial cost that goes into that you know sick and safe time there's there's you know I could go on and on about mandates. There's, you know, there's dozens of mandates um that come in and many are good. Workers compensation is required by state statute. That makes it a mandate. They don't give us any money to do it. I don't think any of us think that workers compensation is a bad thing to have. So, it isn't really a a you know an anti-mandate um stand, but it's just that they want this the state to be aware that these mandates put a burden on in particular smaller communities. And we had a very brief discussion at our last council workshop about you can't just continue to add more work and add more work and add more work to an existing staff load. you either have to take something off their plate or you have to hire more staff um in order to accomplish all of it. So, you know, it's it's a lot of moving parts and I'm really simplifying, you know, I'm really simplifying it and so my apologies to to the association for for that. But just understand that there are organizations out there that do try to make sure, you know, citizens at the very, you know, community level get a chance to have their say on things and that, uh, we are um, keeping an eye on how dollars are being spent. Um, I do want to do just a plug. I talked about a lot this a lot probably a year or so ago, but um the Dolly Parton Imagination Library is still active. If you have a child under the age of five, you can get a free book sent to you every month. And it's about early literacy and early reading. There's no cost to you. You just have to go in. You need they need obviously a name and address so they can mail um the books to you. and you can kind of build a small library um for children from birth to age five. And um she started this program because her father was illiterate. He couldn't read or write and she saw how hard that was for him and she didn't want anyone else to be going through that. And so this is a is a program that's near and dear to her heart. I just want to put another plug in. you can go to our website and just put in imagination library and in the search window and then you'll be able to find it and click through to to sign up. And then lastly, at our um council meeting, I talked about the congressionally directed spending we had applied for and that we were waiting to see if it did get signed off by President Trump. It did get signed and so that's 1.092 092 million for inflow and infiltration which has to do with our sewer system and our sewer pipes. And so I'm very grateful. Everything that we can get is um really helpful and it it saves our tax dollars and that's really what we're gunning for is how do we move the community forward um and really maximize the the tax dollars we have and um take advantage of other money that's out there. And you know, you have to make your case. Uh this was a third round of um asking for this congressionally directed spending. We got on lists in previous years. We had at least one legislator sponsor us. Um this year all three legislators sponsored us at the federal level and um finally it it did come through for us. So I'm I'm very grateful for that and um that's really good news for us. So a lot of stuff going on. Council member, >> I have nothing. No. Council member Taylor, >> I'll just note that there was originally planned a public hearing for the planning commission next week for the East Ridge Heights, which is the development up by public works, but that's been rescheduled to March 10th. So, if you were looking forward to that, that's for the preliminary plan on unit development and comprehensive plan amendments again on March 10th. Now, >> very good. Thank you, Council Member Schmidt. >> Nothing formal, >> Council [clears throat] Member Sumar. Well, I did attend the family fun night out at the the ice rinks and it was just a wonderful event. There were so many people there and kids of all ages up until the oldest firefighters were there and they they were doing their very best to challenge the kids on the tugof-war and they just failed again. those guys. They need more training, but uh [laughter] they did the best they could and I attended the library fun event. The fun fox was there and this consisted of a gentleman who's well known within the native community and he came and he told stories and he played beautiful fu flute music. They served tasty meals. There were about 28 grade school kids that were there. The music was so enchanting that the kids were just mesmerized by it. So, keeping kids under control and they sat very pleasantly and it was just nice to see and be part of that and reminding every member in Newport that once again our library and community center provides a number of events throughout the month. There's no reason to sit at home and be sad on these cold nights. You can go nights and days you can go to the library and have fun with your neighbors. [gasps] Those are things that have happened. >> Great. Thank you so much. Um with that, we will move into close session. There is a a statement that I read before we um close uh turn off the video cameras. So um I will do that at this time. So, the agenda item is a close session pursuant to Minnesota statute section 13D.05, subdivision 3B, due to uh threatened litigation by Isla Clingb in regard to property located at 1657 2nd Avenue, Newport, Minnesota. Um, so the agenda item is to consider threatened litigation by Isla Clingb in regards to property located at 1657 2nd Avenue. This portion of the meeting [clears throat] will be closed pursuant to Minnesota statute section 13D.05 subdivision 3B under the attorney client privilege exception to the Minnesota open meeting law. The city's need for confidentiality outweighs the purposes served by the open meeting law in this case based on the following. Absolute confidentiality is necessary so that the city council and legal council can have a candid and open discussion to determine the available legal options to handle threatened litigation including strategy and any possible areas of resolution. The purpose of the closed meeting is not to make a decision behind closed doors but instead is to determine all legal options for handling the threatened litigation. The only business to be discussed in this meeting is the or in the closed session is the threatened litigation. An open session would be detrimental because it may take place in the presence of individuals involved in the threatened litigation. >> A closed session would benefit the public because the ultimate outcome of the threatened litigation may impact the finances of the city. >> I will now entertain a motion uh to close this portion of the meeting. I'll make that motion. >> Thank you. >> A second. >> I have a motion from council member Sumar and a second from council member Ingamman. All those in favor say I. >> I. So we are now in close session.