All right, I will call this meeting of the Oak Park Heights City Council to order. First item is Pledge 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. >> All right. Next is approval of the agenda. We have one addition under new business B, which would be approve architectural services and construction observation for city hall projects and the transfer of Norell um funds. >> I'll move the agenda as presented with that addition. >> All those in favor? >> I opposed. Motion carries. Um next up we have a police award presentation. Police chief, please. >> Good evening. Thank you, mayor and council. Tonight's a special night. Tonight, we recognize one of our officers for outstanding performance and work. Long overdue. We have a couple awards for this officer. If I could have officer Dave Win up here, please. We can all look at you and [laughter] run out of hands with all these awards. Today, Dave, we have a couple awards for you tonight for your outstanding performance. The first one is you're going to be receiving the police star. The police star is the second highest award you can receive at our department. I'm going to read the letter here so everybody can hear about the great work you've done. It's with great pride, Officer W, that we present to you the police star recognizing your 14 years of superior service and exceptional dedication to the Old Park Heights Police Department and our community. This honor is reserved for officers who demonstrate distinguished level of professionalism, leadership, and profound commitment to the safety and well-being of others. Over the past 14 years, you've stepped up to fill those critical roles that shape both our department's culture and our community. Those roles included school resource officer, SWAT team member, field training officer. Just a quick side note on that, we do something very special here that Dave signs off. He's the only officer. He rides the very last shift with all of our new officers and gives the final certification we call the Davalon. [laughter] Additional things he does use of force and fire instructor and our peer support member. Your exceptional character panelist approach to duty embody the very best of what it means to work to manage. Thank you for 14 years of exemplary multifaceted service. behalf of the department and the city of Oak Park Heights, we're honored honored to award you the police star. >> Thank you. That's one. [applause] So, he gets a medal and also he'll get a pin that'll be able to put on his class A uniform that he's wearing here tonight as well. You're going to run out of hands, so throw that in your pocket. Our second one, I'm going to have his supervisor come up here as well and Sergeant Brian's walk investigation. to assess. Your second award tonight, Dave, is a letter of accommodation. It's a medal of accommodation along with pin. It's presented with great pride that I present to you with this medal of accommodation for your outstanding service as a school resource officer at the Stillwater Area High School for over the past four years. Since taking on that vital role, you have demonstrated an exceptional commitment to the safety, security, and well-being of the students, faculty, and staff. Your position requires a unique balance law enforcement expertise, mentorship, community outreach. You have excelled in every area, building deep trust, and strong partnerships within the Stillwater Area Public Schools. Throughout four-ear tenure, you've gone above and beyond that standard duties of an SRO. You have created a safe learning environment while serving as a positive role model, a trusted component and a mentor to countless young people. Your proactive approach to school safety combined with your ability to deescalate complex situations with empathy, professionalism reflects the highest standards of the old park police. Your dedication has made a lasting positive effect on lives on the youth and has strengthened the bond between our agency and the community we serve. Thank you for your exemplary service, your unwavering professionalism, and your daily commitment to excellence. Thank you. [applause] [applause] [clears throat] >> Also, you didn't get the cheese coin tonight, too. >> Good job. >> Another pin. [laughter] >> You're going to have to get a bigger shirt. >> Congratulations. [laughter] >> Thank you. Thank you. >> Congratulations, >> Mayor. Get a quick picture real quick here. >> We'll get a back order. School starts less than [laughter] you're seeing Steward. [laughter] >> Congrats, Dave. >> Congrats. Hey, Rebecca. I'll just have the control over here. >> My leg's falling apart. >> Oh, you [laughter] were so rough. You were so rough with it. You ripped it. >> Okay, we will move on now to council and staff reports. Any of the council members have anything? Um, I would mention or I mentioned earlier that over the next month I'm going to be reviewing the um, Browns Creek wershed plan as part of my Bowser duties. So, if anybody's got any comments or questions, I'm going to talk with Lee afterwards and see what the city's ideas are. >> Okay. All right. All right. city manager. >> Uh mayor, council, good evening. Uh really quickly here, just wanted to give you an update on our well three project that is scheduled for a startup uh on August 6. So certainly appreciate the work Director Kegley and his team have done on this and and obviously our our Stantech team members too. It's uh been a long way getting to this uh standpoint where we're at now. Um I think as council is aware this is subject to a federal grant and so there's been a lot of work in the background here that our our whole team's been doing and so uh it's a exciting time for us and look forward to getting that uh that started up and getting it online here soon. >> Chief, do you have any report? >> Thanks, Mayor. Uh council, just a quick reminder, we've got nightight coming up next Tuesday night. Uh that's going to be at 5:00 start time 8. We do have 13 block parties already scheduled. We obviously can still take a couple more or last minute ones. We'll get you signed and all registered up if that's possible. Just give us a call at the main number. Thank you. >> All right. Thank you. >> And assistant. >> Yes. Mayor and councel, your recycling award winner, the second winner for the month of July, Vanessa and Terry Sevelco. They live at 5420 Ojiway Avenue North. They had the recycling out for collection and they are being awarded for their their participation in our recycling program. Secondly, I just want to announce we have a primary election coming up on August 11th. Been working with Washington County to make sure we have a nice secure and safe election. >> Thank you. All right. Now, we'll move on to visitors in public comment. Uh this is opportunity for public to address the council with any questions or concerns. Please limit your comments to 3 minutes or in length. Um first up we have an audit report presentation from Red Path & Company. Mayor and council members, thank you for having me here this evening um if on federal program compliance. But for this year, the first report that we issue in conjunction with the audit is an opinion on the financial statements. Um, it's primary purpose of our audit is to provide an opinion on the fair presentation of the city's financial statements. Not saying everything's exactly right to the dollar because it was really be cost and time prohibitive for us to look at every transaction you enter into. Um, but just that it's a fair presentation. The results this year is that we've issued a clean unmodified opinion on the financial statements. It's the highest level of assurance we're able to provide and in summary it's really the result you would want. The second report that we issue on con in conjunction with the audit is a report on internal controls over financial reporting. As part of our audit, we don't audit the city's internal controls, but we gain an understanding of the processes and procedures that are in place. And if we saw anything where we thought there was an insufficient design in internal controls or we saw internal controls that weren't functioning as designed um that had a significant impact, we would identify it in this report. There are also some items that we are obligated by audit standards to identify in this report and this year we just have one of those. It's an internal control finding for audit adjustments. Anytime that we as the auditors during the course of our audit identify a material change to the financial statement numbers as part of the audit process, were required to include it um as an internal control finding. This year there was just one minor adjustment that just crossed our materiality threshold that we're obligated to report. It is an extremely common finding. Um I would say the vast majority of cities get it um annually or at least occasionally. So ju with just one item in it this year, nothing of concern. and it's just something we're required to include. The next report that we issue in conjunction with the audit is a Minnesota legal compliance report. The Office of the State Auditor has a series of requirements that they ask us to look at with um in conjunction with our audit. And I always like to remind you that we are accountants, not attorneys. And so we're looking at this from an accounting perspective, but we look at uh the requirements that the Office of the State Auditor has and we test those that are applicable to the city. The results this year were that there were no compliance findings reported which again is the result that you would want and hope for. The final report that we issue in conjunction with the audit is a communication to those charged with governance and it is a communication letter from us as the auditors to US governance and it's really full of standard templated language and so I've pulled out uh a summary of the significant items that are really um specific to the city of Oak Park Heights. The first one is accounting policies used or changed. If the city implemented any new accounting policies or there are any new standards uh implemented this year, we would be required to communicate that to you. Nothing implemented this year, but coming up next year or 2026, there will be some new accounting standards that city staff are required to implement and some of those will be somewhat time inensive um for them to implement. So, just know that that's coming down um the pipeline for them to do. The second category of information in the letter is accounting estimates. Just a reminder that you know there's some known finite numbers in the financials and some items are estimated. There's two that we consider sensitive. The first one is the value of land held for resale. Anytime the city has property that it's holding for purposes of selling, it's really treated like inventory. And the valuation of that in the financial statements is required to be the lower of cost or net realizable value. And what that means is if you had a piece of property that you anticipated selling to a developer, say for a dollar to entice development, really the net realizable value of that property then is $1, and you'd be obligated to write it down, which is why it's considered an estimate. And because there's some judgment that goes into that, we consider it a sensitive estimate. The second one is the net pension liability. This is one you've heard me talk about in the past, but city staff participate in the state pension plan, PAR. and PAR on an annual basis gets an actuarial study to calculate their planwide net pension liability. And then they take that planwide net pension liability and allocated to all the participating employers and say, "Okay, this is what your little sliver of the net pension liability is." Uh, for 2025, Oak Park Heights share of that liability is just under $1.5 million. um it's an estimate because it's an actuarily determined number and you don't have to pay on this but for your regular payroll contributions but I can showed a history here because you can see over the years how significantly this fluctuates it changes bas based on investment market conditions actuarial assumptions and state contributions to the plan. So it's reduced significantly over the past couple years. The third category of required communications is any corrected or uncorrected misstatements. I mentioned that there was a finding for an audit proposed adjustment. But if there's any other audit adjustments that didn't rise to materiality, but just things that we considered during the course of the audit, we're required to communicate in that in this letter. This year, we had some discussions with staff about how to appropriately account for the deep well number three project. There's various funding sources that are going into that project and a lot of construction activity and we just worked really closely with staff to make sure it was accounted for correctly. If there were any difficulties encountered in performing the audit or any disagreements with management uh during the course of our audit, we would include it in this letter and quite likely you would be hearing about it before this letter. But happy to report there was uh no such instances this year. And then if there's anything else that we thought you should know about that didn't fall into any of our other reporting buckets, we would include it in this letter as well, but nothing of note this year. Next, I just have some summary highlevel financial information. Up first is a summary of the city's um excuse me, governmental funds. Your governmental funds are those funds that are supported by property taxes or intergovernmental grant revenues, maybe a debt issuance. um if it comes to that. But what you're looking for here is really any significant unexpected swings. And so the second column over from the right, your increase or decrease in fund balance, that really tells you what changed over the course of the year. Um all the changes this year I think are well within um normal uh experience that we see in cities. But if you go to the next slide, we'll look at the general fund. If you saw previous on the previous slide, the general fund had an increase in fund balance of about $637,000 and you had budgeted for a net zero in uh change and that's really two different factors. Your revenues came in a bit ahead of budget. A significant component of that is your investment earnings. Investments did well this year and you had some um earnings in excess of what was planned for which I don't know if you actually budgeted any investment earnings. So, um, positive contri contribution to general fund there. And then your expenditures were significantly under budget. That was in a couple different areas, but public safety salaries was one of those. Um, and then snow clearing and maintenance as well was significantly under budget. So, those two impacts really um contributed to your increase in fund balance there. Um, what this slide shows is a history of the city's [snorts] fund balance. It's extremely important to have reserves within your general fund to cover cash flow, to cover unexpected emergencies or problems, um to fund acquisitions in other funds. And so what we have here is the bar is the minimum fund balance per policy. The city has a minimum fund balance policy that says this is the minimum amount of reserves we want to have. And then the line above is showing your actual fund balance. and you do have a gap there. Um, in times of rising costs and inflations, I think it is prudent to have a gap there. [gasps] I mean, especially as you plan for upcoming expenditures within the city, uh, be conscientious of that gap and how much you're maintaining it at. The next slide will show you why it's so important to have a reserve. As you know, the city receives its property tax revenue payments primarily twice a year. And so when you start the year on January 1st, you won't get a significant inflow of property taxes until halfway through the year. So you need sufficient reserves on hand to get you to that first property tax payment. And so what I have here is a summary of cash balances within the general fund over the course of 2025. And you can see from the end of 24 to midpoint of 25, you're dropping several million dollars. And that's what those the fund balance reserves help you cover is that cash flow. Um, next up I have some historical summaries of your business type funds. As a reminder, your business type funds are those funds that are intended to hopefully be self- sustaining. That the charges for services within those funds cover the costs and the activity of that fund. Um, first up I have the water fund. The bar there is your expenditures, your operating expenditures for the fund and the line is your revenue. Infrastructure costs in your utility funds are extremely expensive. Infrastructure does not get less expensive over time. Uh and it's really important that you maintain a gap between your revenues and expenses here so you can save for either debt service if you end up taking out debt or to pay cash for these infrastructure improvements. So, um as you look ahead to the coming years and utility rates, really be aware of the need for that gap there. um and it it's sufficient to cover your upcoming costs. A similar message here for the sewer fund. You can see over the past number of years, you have a gap between your operating revenues and your expenses. Um but it's not very significant in the grand scheme of things when you look at the depth of costs that these funds have. The most significant expense you have there is MCEES expense and that's the Met Council environmental services fee that the city has absolutely no control over. if council tells you what you owe and that's what you need to pay. Um so again, as you're looking ahead to utility rates, maintain an awareness of the need to cover infrastructure there. And finally, we have the storm sewer fund. Um the revenue and expense activity in this fund is um lower dollar amounts and so the gap might look bit bigger than previous slides. Um but really the scale is just smaller. Um, this fund can be used to cover any storm water cleanouts that need to happen and those can be expensive when they in excuse me when they occur and so maintaining a year-over-year gap of your revenues and expenses so you're saving to cover those costs will be important. That's all I have prepared for you. Happy to answer questions if there are any. >> Thank you very much for having me. Thanks. Thanks Rebecca. >> Thank you. All right. Any other visitors or public comment? Okay. Then we will move on to consent agenda. We look for a motion to approve consent agenda as written. >> I will make that motion. >> Second. >> Okay. Roll call. >> Council member Johnson. >> Yes. >> Council Ligan. Yes. >> Council Rock. >> Yes. >> Council Swanson? >> Yes. >> And Mayor Dhy? >> Yes. All righty. We have no public hearings this evening. So we have old business. Reszoning to R1 single family residential preliminary and final subdivision flat for 5676 Oak Green Avenue North. Scott. >> Yes. Uh Mr. Mayor, members of the council. Good evening. Uh this is an item that you considered at your June 23rd meeting and you continued the discussion uh and the applications to uh uh the meeting this evening. Uh it was primarily to review options [snorts] uh for pre-preservation in this area. Um the city administrator uh Jake Reich um uh director Andy Keguay and arborist Lisa Danielson walk the property. Uh that is the south end of this property or the trail that uh we have 150 foot uh area uh with a trail that's uh uh owned by the city and maintained by the city. Um and then the you have the residential neighborhood uh to the south and then the uh development uh by Mr. Junker is uh immediately to the north of that trail easement. So that u trail was walked uh by uh uh city staff. Uh and there was some discussion at the previous meeting about a a special easement, a conservation easement, whatever it may be, uh to cover uh the subject property with uh any uh condition that would be above and beyond our current uh tree ordinance. Um there was a resident, I believe a maybe a farmer or current park board member, I wasn't at the meeting, uh that had made this comment. Um staff at this point recommends that uh uh the current tree ordinance is appropriate uh is sufficient uh for uh uh regulating the the trees the removal of trees um if there is some tree removals again uh with emerald ashbor and other tree diseases that is a foregone conclusion they have to remove but again we have a strong um tree ordinance and uh uh we feel that that is adequate uh to conserve uh the uh screening and the tree cover uh in that area. Uh the resolution uh for approval of the preliminary final plat uh includes language uh that addresses that. Uh we did uh previously have an uh condition uh we uh it's different from what you reviewed back in June and it reads uh number five the tree removal replacement and landscape plan is subject to city garbage review and approval and should be in conformance with check excuse me [clears throat] chapter 1307 of the city code it was foregone conclusion that we follow that but again I think it strengths strengthens that condition there's also some discussion about um utility lines in that area. Um and uh uh the uh there will be an extension of utilities uh city uh engineer man is here this evening if you have any more specific questions but we did add condition 8 that that and any subsequent property owner responsible for all installation and maintenance of utility service lines. So that is the from the main into the uh into the houses that would would occur uh uh in this area. So again, it's a preliminary uh plat um preliminary final subdivision plat. Uh there's the existing house on the corner um uh and 58th Street. Uh and then two additional lots uh would be platted. There was some discussion at the planning commission meeting uh you know concerns with the residents as part of the public hearing that uh uh what if u Mr. Junker wants to subdivide some of these lots and add more houses than what uh would be allowed. Again, it's we're going to a reszoning to R1 single family residential, so you can have only one house per lot. And the only way that he could accomplish more density would go back and have to replplat uh that area. Uh the u comprehensive plan would allow up to eight single family dwellings uh in this area. Again, there'd be a total of three with this uh uh current proposal. So, uh with that, there is a resolution uh of approval of the tonary final flat. Um there is the uh ordinance uh for reszoning from O open space to uh R1 single family and uh for your consideration and I stand for any questions. >> Scott, can you just talk about the access to Oak Green? I did get another call today and I told the resident that there is no access to Oak. I don't know where that keeps coming from but there will be no access. >> Right. the way the the lots are going to be uh drawn. There was a a proposal at first went to that went to the planning commission that lot two that's the middle lot of the three [snorts] uh would have had a small access area off to Oak to be part of the lot. Uh the condition uh uh following that planning commission uh uh discussion uh condition two was added that the north south lot line between lots one and two shall be redrawn and extend straight to the south property line. So there would be no opportunity for lots two and three to access opening. Obviously the the lot with the house that's already there has access to opening but that's not going away but the other two lots were not. >> I do appreciate uh Jake and myself and the mayor we took a ride back there and public works had actually gone through and put marker stakes out there on where the city easement did come through. Um that answered 95% of the questions that I had with was what it was. I have a question for you on the utilities. Is that a like where would those run? Would those run through our city property? Would those go just through that house on that? And we make a condition that those be run underground. >> I'll let our city engineer answer that. >> So, uh, Council Member Johnson, um, the utilities are planned to be run along the front of the lots along 58th Street. So, they would be within the the lot properties with an easement to the city. >> Okay, perfect. I think on the trail question, I use this trail at least multiple times a week. I mean, it it's important to me. I went back on my notes when I first talked to the developer about how important that trail was five years ago when this first came around. Um, I walked it with the city administrator and then I walked it again once it was flagged. I think looking at where that line of hopefully we can keep those property markers up while the development's ongoing just so that people who use the trail can kind of monitor making sure there's no encroachments. >> So the markers are the markers are just a guess. I mean there wasn't anything scientific when they put them out. It was >> but to give a you know idea a rough feeling of what it will look like especially for residents who have questions. But one thing that the city administrator and I discussed is we lost a lot of city trees in that area and maybe looking at replanting some city trees on our property and even maybe moving some trees closer to the trail. We'll still have that overhead to be very clear on the emails we received from their council. I disagree with the legal analysis. I think our city attorney Sandstöm was very right on the law. >> Correct. Um, and so I feel confident, but walking that trail, walking it, I'm disappointed that it's what we're going to lose that and the trail will change for a bit, but I think with our efforts from the city side, we might be able to reconstruct it a little bit and hopefully >> for the better. >> Yeah. And with the tree policy, I think we'll maybe we'll have some of that and also knowing that this property has been marketed, that trail is an amenity to the properties that we'll all work together to keep it as covered as possible. So with that, I'll make a motion to approve the ordinance with the changes pipeliner. Do you want me to give an >> So there's there's ordinance in the resolution. I would start with the ordinance for reszoning. Make that a motion and then vote on the resolution for the >> I'll make an approve motion to approve the ordinance as presented. >> All is a roll call. >> Yep. Okay. Any more discussion? Okay. Roll call. >> Council member Johnson. >> Reluctantly. Yes. >> Council member Lulerid. >> Yes. >> Council member Runk. >> Yes. >> Council member Swanson? >> Yes. >> And Mayor Dhy? >> Yes. >> And I will make the motion to approve. Is that one in the packet here yet? [clears throat] Make motion to approve the resolution >> with the conditions outlined. >> All second. Any further discussion? >> Roll call, please. >> Council member Johnson, yes. >> Council member Ligren, yes. >> Council member Runk, >> yes. >> Council member Swinson, >> yes. >> And Mayor Dhy, >> yes. All right, we will move on now to new business, a conditional use permit for the construction of a new advisory building at 15026 Upper 63rd Street North. We'll just >> Thank you very much. Y Yes, mayor and council, if you'd like a little background on this. Uh, we have conditional use permits. It's uh to allow construction of a new garage. Um, the existing garage will be removed. Uh, they're also requesting construction of a deck at the front entrance uh of the house uh within the setback. Our property is on the corner of of Upper 63rd Street North as well as Panama Avenue. Uh so it has two frontages and then the uh setback requirement of 30 feet applies to both of those frontages. Uh the proposed accessory building is 28 by 35 ft a total of 980 square ft. Uh this property is zone R2 single and um [snorts] single and two family uh uh district. The uh uh planning commission uh reviewed this uh at their meeting uh on July 9th. uh recommended uh unanimously in favor of it. Uh really no issues, not a lot of questions from the planning commission. It seemed pretty straightforward. We've had some other requests uh in this neighborhood uh for some setbackes. It's an old part of town uh and a lot of it was developed before current zoning ordinances. So, uh what they are asking is really not out of character uh for what you see up and down the street on either side. And uh uh you know again the planning commission took that into account uh when they um uh uh when they looked at this uh applicant is here uh this evening if there's any questions but uh there's a resolution uh granting approval as per the planning commissioner recommendation uh with their conditions. >> I drove by it. They've done beautiful work on the house so far. Looks really nice. >> I'll move the resolution second. All right. Any more discussion? Roll call. >> Council Johnson. Yes. Council >> Liger. Yes. Council member Ron. >> Yes. >> Council Swanson. >> Yes. >> And Mayor Dhy. >> Yes. All right. We'll move on to the um item B which is architectural services construction observation for city hall projects and transfer of Norwell Norware funds. And maybe we can write it all up much better than what I just said, but >> we'll get her done. Get her done. Uh, mayor, councel, uh, just for the public's benefit, this is an item that's coming off our, uh, work session discussion here this evening. Uh, the city is looking to uh, move forward with uh, renovation improvements uh, to city hall and police. This is to not only include or improve the security at the front counters, uh, but also the functionality of the uh, back office police area. And so we had discussed a proposal um that was before you at the uh work session of approximately uh 88,000 I believe from Santech um for architectural services um bidding work and then uh design and um construction observation as well. uh the council was favorable about moving that forward uh to start with that work and so that's what we're seeking here tonight is approval to move forward with that uh proposal from Stantech to begin that design work and work with staff uh and then also the transfer of the Nurell funds here to help pay for the uh subsequent uh construction work and so appreciate your support of that. So moved. >> Second. >> I could given that we don't have any particular materials or a quote in your packet at this point, I might recommend that approval of that work and those services would be subject to uh review and approval of an acceptable contract by your city staff and your city attorney. >> My motion as described by the city attorney. >> Second. >> All those in favor? >> I opposed. >> Motion carries. Any other council items or announcements? >> City administer Refe, could you please provide an update for the public's benefit on that cyber security thing and just the email you sent earlier that we weren't impacted because I've received some requests primarily also [clears throat] from my parents. Yeah, >> freaking out. >> Yeah, absolutely. Well, um luckily there wasn't a freakout here, right, Director Kangley? Um yeah, I think uh uh for the public's benefit and then also uh just for the council here, there were several articles um related to cyber security issues that uh local area utilities were having with their water systems. Uh this was happening across this the state. Um I think it's probably a national issue. Uh the police chief was on on a call here today uh too to gain some more intel on that. Um it's impacted several water systems uh here throughout the state. Um we had a a meeting this morning uh to review internally here um our protocols and security um and our director team has just been outstanding in in triaging this. Um there's no issue. I just want to uh confirm there's no issue here. Um we are secure. Um we're very fortunate with that. It's something that we're going to continue to to monitor. Um I'm sure this is going to be monitored, you know, throughout the the state and probably the nation. Uh but yeah, there's bad actors out there. Unfortunately, they've they've gained act access to certain water systems uh throughout the state. Haven't heard of any any severe issues that folks have been having. So, uh we've been fortunate here and and uh we'll continue to keep our eye on it. >> And then I just wanted to thank Scott Richards for his service to our city. um this might be his last meeting unless something comes up in August, but um appreciate everything you did and wish you good luck in your retirement. >> Thank you very much. It's been a privilege to work in this community for all these years. Uh it's always been a great group, planning commission, city council, staff, always topn. So, thank you. >> Thank you. >> You did a good job, Scott. >> Yep. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. [applause] Somebody want to make a motion. >> Make a motion to adjurnn. >> Second. >> All in favor? >> I >> I opposed. Motion carries. We are adjourned. Thank you. >> Steve, why don't you have a coin for Scott?