Jack.

Okay, it's 4 30.

We're going to call to order the City of Rochester, Minnesota Sustainability and Resiliency Commission meeting for July 8th, 2026.

Um go to the agenda.

So we're going to start with our roll call attendance.

Um identify if you're here.

Seth Barns.

Present.

Amy Cockett?

Here.

Amanda Holloway, present.

Terry Kinsey here.

Casey McQuaid.

Here.

Edward Cohen.

Brian Morgan is traveling.

He sent his comments in advance.

Liam Arroyo, not here yet, but the weather is tough.

Stuart Racing.

Sure.

All right.

Great.

Our next order of business is to approve the minutes from our June meeting.

Were there any corrections, additions, or comments on the minutes?

Seeing none, can I get a motion to approve the minutes, please?

Motion to approve.

See it.

Second.

All in favor?

All right.

Motion approved.

All right.

Next is our open comment period.

This is an opportunity for members of the public to provide comments to the commission.

The commission welcomes public input, but will not discuss or take action on comments received during the open comment period.

According to the advisory boards, committees, and commissions rules of procedure and operation, each speaker is limited to four minutes.

And the open comment period is limited to 15 minutes total.

Do we have anyone wishing to make comments today at the meeting?

Could you please join us at the table so we can record your comments?

Okay.

Which side would you want to um how did you sit here near the microphone so we make sure we have to think better for the recording?

Thank you.

My name is Mike Deggerstrom.

Um, and I'm here on behalf of the Zelda Valley Audubon Society.

I've made copies.

I did uh late last night sent a copy to Ed uh Edward Um she's had a chance to review it.

So everyone has a copy.

Um we have presented letters at each of the past three meetings where we described in several ways how our ecosystem is rapidly declining in health and abundance.

We describe the shifting baselines concept where people see less of the healthy ecosystem and thereby are not inclined to averse trends because they haven't developed an affinity to the beautiful outdoors that is no longer here.

We keep emphasizing that the city should set criteria for measurable goals and move away from generalizations.

Facing a genuine water shortage, uh Nevada passed the nation's first permanent ban on non-functional turf.

Oh, that's in quotes.

Um that's their term, and that means decorative grass in medions, office parks, and HOA entrances uh requiring its replacement across Las Vegas Valley by the end of the of this year.

In arid regions like the Southwest, native plants matter enormously simply because they've evolved who survive on the water actually available there, unlike thirsty imported turf.

As a side benefit, replacing a turf with desert adapted native plants will also help sore habitat or Las Vegas uh own local food web.

Rochester doesn't face that kind of water scarcity, but the underlying uh question is still the same.

What is our turf actually doing for us?

Much of it, like the non-native ornamentals we discussed throughout these letters provides little habitat for insects and wildlife or ecosystem that depends on.

Replacing it with native plantings would restore the food with uh our declining species needs, just as Las Vegas turf replacement will do for its own.

It also brings real cold benefits.

Native plants suited to their site, generally need no fertilizer at all, unlike conventional turf, which is routinely fertilized to keep it green.

A difference that could help even if only modestly here with the elevated nitrate levels already found in real groundwater wells across our county.

Um that's a problem driven mostly by agricultural practices rather than city landscaping.

Uh, we understand.

Densely planted native uh landscaping, whether trees, shrubs, or shorter perennials and grasses also reduces the summer heat island effect and closing mold that closely mowed turf does little to address.

Um benefit from it, and we aren't suggesting it um a disappear for those uses.

Our focus is on the turf grass that served no purpose, the decorative, rarely used grass and medium boulevards, unused corners of the city property where well-designed native planting uh can provide the same clean intentional look while doing far more for an ecosystem.

Well, uh Las Vegas had a water crisis forcing its hand.

We have no such crisis.

And we have a quieter ongoing loss of ecosystem that native landscaping could help rebuild.

We appreciate your time and your commitment to these issues.

Look forward to continuing this conversation.

Thank you, my happiness.

Right.

No one online.

All right, then we're gonna move into the agenda.

We don't have any guests today, so we will follow the agenda as provided.

And our first topic is on old business, the community work plan, our sustainability and resiliency, community work plan, community-led tactic reporting.

Um we put 40 minutes on this because this is a topic we spent a lot of time on last year as well.

It's time for a review and a action plan for this year.

So I'm gonna turn it over to Kayla to go over um where what we did, and for those of you that weren't part of it last year and where we're going.

Okay, okay.

Well, we'll hold we'll hold questions until we get to um until she's done process.

Okay.

All right, so I'm going to provide an uh an overview of kind of the process last year, some of the challenges with the process last year, and then some potential approaches, and then kind of my recommendation, and then open it up to you all to kind of share your thoughts and any you know changes or improvements or you know, edits that you would have to that process.

Um, so kind of starting with what um we did last year.

So last year, and I did print out a copy of the annual report from 2025.

Um, 2025 was the first year that we had an annual report, the sustainability plans.

As you all know or may know, the sustainability plan was created.

The community engagement for that plan was done during 2019, 2020, and I believe was finalized in 2021, um, but was never actually um brought through the full council approval process.

So, one of the first things that I did when I came on board in 2024 was to break the plan because you all had recommended that and brought it to my attention right when I started, um, was to bring it to the city council process.

And so we did that in the summer of 2024.

It was um accepted by council as a guiding document.

So it was not formally adopted, but it was accepted as a guiding document by city council.

And so since that happened in 2024, the first year of reporting on the plan was 2025.

So shortly after its acceptance by council, we started developing what the reporting process would look like.

So it started by kind of taking a look at the 103 tactics in the plan, determining which ones were city-led and community-led, and then identifying organizations and individual contacts associated with each tactic.

So I kind of took the lead on the city side, SRC took the lead on the community side, um, identifying you know community organizations and then narrowing it down to individual contact names and contact information.

Then we developed one Smartsheet is um a company that the city uses to essentially create different types of interactive dashboards um and spreadsheets.

Um they kind of look like surveys sometimes to um uh folks who are completing the survey, but we developed uh one smart sheet survey that worked for both the city and the community tactics.

So we sent these surveys out and then asked these contacts to report on the status of the tactic, how many residents were impacted in the last year.

Um, we asked them to provide us with any relevant, you know, quantitative metrics, and then any stories or highlights that they had about that specific tactic.

Um that I would say there were only a few survey responses that we got community-led community contacts on um during that process.

Then after that, we conducted follow-ups.

So SRC members kind of split up the remaining tactics and reached out to those organizations kind of one on one.

I would say there was probably about 10, 15 additional tactics that were reported on after that process.

And then ultimately the remaining tactics were researched independently by the summer intern that we had last summer working for us through U of them.

So we did use all this information to create the dashboard that I post screened out of the dashboard on this slide.

It shows the status of each of the tactics, what percentage of the plan is not started in progress, in progress continuous, meaning the work will be ongoing and then completed.

So it we also did create an annual report from this, but overall, you know, it required several months of surveys, emails, follow-ups, outreach, intern support, and research.

So looking at some of the challenges, low response rate, we talked about that, the high administrative burden.

So you know, lots of repeated outreach, things like that.

We also talked a little bit about throughout those months that there was kind of an unclear value proposition for the community organization.

So reaching out to a community organization and expecting them to, you know, be excited to report on something that just really serves the city's sustainability division and not really kind of illustrating the benefit to the community.

And then some of the questions being challenging for organizations to answer.

So like number of residents impacted, um, specific metrics.

I would say some organizations responded with a lot of different metrics, and then some it was you know harder to get, you know, quantitative data for.

And then also ultimately most of the information being publicly available already.

So our intern really did fill in all the most of the rest of the gaps, um, finding updates on you know, websites, annual reports, um, things like that.

So the question remains how do we collect the meaningful information to provide updates on the progress of the sustainability plan without recreating this level of effort.

Um, next, looking at what do we need to know.

So, first, are we making progress on the plan?

That's kind of the most important thing.

What are the status of these tactics?

That's really the main thing that we are reporting out on.

Also understanding what happened each year.

So, what changes from year to year, so new programs, initiatives, accomplishments.

Um, how do we demonstrate impact?

And so, what metrics, you know, would be appropriate to be looking at or collecting from community-led tactics, and then what should we be showcasing?

So, this could be um how do we showcase um information in the community spotlight, sustainability e-newsletter in our annual report, things like that.

How do we highlight the um the accomplishments of the community in regards to sustain to sustainability?

So, what level of information do we need to really kind of tell the story?

Um, okay, so looking at some potential reporting approaches.

Um, I put together four here, and these are just you know ideas.

Certainly, it's up to you all to kind of discuss and decide what makes most sense for you all.

Um, one would be continuing the grant process.

So this would be sending out Smartsheet survey to the community-led tactics, followed by kind of that follow-up research and our continued outreach to the community contacts.

Um, second would be researching first.

And so this would be you all kind of dividing up the community-led tactics, doing some research to find out what available information is there online, um, what can we look through to kind of fill in the blanks?

And again, we're not starting from zero this time.

We have the reporting from last year.

So it's essentially figuring out what has changed from when these organizations or when either they reported or we filled in the blanks last year to now, um, and then you know, figuring out where gaps in that information.

Um, number three, organization level reporting.

So this would be sending out one request to an organization asking for major updates, um, and then kind of on the back end, figuring out how to apply those updates to different tactics in the sustainability plan rather than sending out a tactic with a list of questions and expecting an organization to kind of fit within our reporting requirements that we have for the sustainability plan.

Um, and then fourth is the idea that was brought up, I believe, last year in this um meeting, which was uh the community reporting luncheon.

So this is where we would host an annual lunch or workshop, um, and and we would invite community organizations, we would have the reporting available for them to fill out there, and SRC would kind of support them in um completing the reporting requirements.

Um my recommended approach here is kind of a hybrid um reporting model between the research researching first and then um that researching first and then kind of conducting some targeted outreach.

And so this would be first updating the baseline.

So carrying forward all the previous tactic um statuses and information from last year, then reviewing kind of what's publicly available, so looking on organization websites, annual reports, um, press releases, things like that, figuring out can we you know essentially figure out if there have been any updates with this organization since we reported last year, then figuring out where are the gaps.

So, what information do we have?

Do we need um and and you know, where what organizations do we need to reach out to?

Step four conducting the targeted outreach, so um sending you know, kind of one request out to certain organizations that would need to, um, and then kind of reviewing and validating that data.

So kind of taking on the organization on the back end to really review it and um you know, um apply it to the tactics that it refers to in the sustainability plan.

And then kind of thinking about the survey and how we can improve the data collection process this year, um, last year we asked, you know, this um on the left here kind of shows some of the questions that we asked last year.

So is this tactic related to the work that you're doing?

Whoops, wrap it up.

Um what was your team's role in regards to this tactic?

So it would list the tactic out at the um top of the page of the survey.

It would list kind of more information about the tactic that came from the sustainability plan, and then it would ask these questions for every tactic that related to that organization.

It would ask them what is the status of this tactic, so not completed in progress, in progress continuous, or I'm sorry, not started in progress or completed.

It would then ask them just open-endedly to provide metrics related to this tactic, understanding that you know, different community organizations have different you know ways that they measure things, and then asking them to provide any stories or or highlights.

So essentially one quantitative question, one qualitative question, both open-ended.

Um, thinking that you know, with a new potential approach, and again, this is just a starting point.

I think even today's um conversation about this is really just a starting point.

We certainly can develop a subcommittee or think through kind of um how to get more into the weeds on this topic as we move forward.

But my initial thoughts are that we can make um more of a streamlined request of organizations with you know simplified questions like what significant activities or accomplishments or changes have occurred within the last year.

Um, are there any programs or initiatives you'd like to highlight in our annual report?

Um, and then essentially outlining the tactics that we have identified that relate to the organization and asking them to correct us if it is inaccurate instead of expecting them to you know um answer all these questions related to the tactics that we have.

Another thing they may because people change in these organizations, you might decide say we identify these tactics as related to your organization, and this is what you told us last year or you didn't tell us anything last year um to remind you.

They might not have kept a copy of whatever they told us.

That's it.

Kristen actually started doing that this year for Greek web reporting, and it really helped to streamline Russia.

So when we reach out to city departments and RPU for metrics, she added, This is what you reported last year, so they had something to compare to um, which really helped.

So essentially rethinking the annual uh survey, the goal of this is to make it easier for organizations to tell us what they know, rather than requiring or expecting them to understand what we're talking about and what our reporting process is.

So looking at a potential uh role of the SRC, one would be researching, so reviewing the community-led tactics.

Um, are these tactics community-led?

Um, should some of them be city-led and vice versa, maybe?

Who would the best community contact be for each of these tactics?

And then what publicly available information is there that we can fill the blank in for these already to kind of reduce the amount of back and forth that we need to be doing.

Uh next, identifying the gaps.

Um, so which what information is missing?

Um what um when do we need to contact community organizations?

And then what questions are we asking of these organizations?

And then finalizing the reporting.

So taking that information, um, completing the reporting for the community-led tactic, um, and then evaluating which of kind of the stories or accomplishments or metrics do we want to be highlighting in the annual report and then submitting um back to me so that I can update the sustainability plan dashboard and essentially update the um annual report for 2025.

So overall, the question is how can SRC fulfill its responsibility for community-led tactic reporting in a way that is effective, consistent, and manageable.

And that's all that I have for you.

I would I will turn over to Terry to kind of lead the discussion.

Um so I'm gonna start by asking the commissioners that were here last year when we did this and remember this process.

Does anyone specifically have anything they want to share about sort of what we talked about last year and any reflection on that or any thoughts about what we did?

It was unveilable.

Yes, very different.

Thank you, Amy.

Anyone else?

I mean, I'm not sure.

And those of us who are sitting around the table who came up with perhaps this organization was doing it, you know, that we have such a view of the community that we contacted the right organizations or all the organizations.

And I also had the feeling when I reached out to some of the ones like ready and chamber of commerce, that this is so far down the list of things that they find important.

They're not going to gather stuff for us.

So I they said go to our website.

So I'm really glad that you suggest that because asking them to do what we think is important, and maybe we think they should think it's important and they don't.

Thank you, Amy.

Quick point of information on that, because yes, it looked unwieldy.

Just broadly, how many organizations did we try to reach out to last year?

There were 49 tactics, but some organizations had several, like maybe four to five.

So I would say maybe 30, 20, 30.

I should have just trying to get gathered scope.

I would say 20-ish.

Okay.

Yep, that's that the spite sheet last year.

I was just it's the ones that I wrote in here, like now we can development center, the minister of bio business center, the workforce development center, uh, Hawaiian ready, IMAA unions, Rochester Art and Civic Centers.

Um the attorney general.

I'm really glad that this year, like we did a lot of hard work last year.

It felt a little bit like wading through mud and trying to figure out who even the contacts were.

So I'm glad that we went through that process last year because now it seems like we've at least identified some key organizations and agree.

I like your suggestion of being able to fill in some of the holes ourselves first and then ask targeted questions versus these like open-ended requests.

And I don't think we were allowed, I've never asked you could we change the wording.

No, you have to take the tactics as they're written.

And some of these are so nebulous kind of they're not very quantitative.

So very very broad.

Let's live with your nirvana.

Who's in charge of that one?

Yeah.

I mean, a lot of them for why some of you joined this commission or agreed or wanted to, it, you know, they seem a little far from what our general focus is here.

So I think it's also been a challenge.

I mean, I'll I'm gonna say that I thought the idea of bringing together people for luncheon while thoughtful last year, and we we would love to engage people at that point if you remember where we were a year ago and what the world was like, and you know, it and these people barely have time to answer our emails.

That I mean, I'm not opposed to some day this commission hosting some sort of a working group about the work plan and getting more feedback or starting a new plan and throw it out there.

Right.

But you know, I that plan I'm wasn't thrown with it last year, so I'm gonna say I'm okay with not doing it this year.

Yeah I think it's something that I would like to keep on our radar and maybe it's not a reporting workshop maybe it it is just an outreach and an engagement luncheon kind of event but something that is more about us giving to others than necessarily asking finding finding an incentive for what we're asking of other people to give us and I and I think that goes back to what kind of putting the re like the research component of this the low hanging fruit what's available publicly as one of the first steps and then if we follow up with organizations we have context in a group we saw you did this in the past year I'm hoping you can tell us more about that or can you talk to me about how that relates to this specific tactic yeah it just seems like a better a better way to start the process than kind of cold calling organizations with our round hole that we're trying to get their square bank to bear I like that too because then it shows that we've done our research and we're saying hey we heard about this you tell us more about it that's kind of building them up to anything we thought this was really great you know we'd love to hear more about that rather than us saying you tell us how you're meeting our you know our strategy kind of thing and more than bringing around them.

And and honestly to me the most interesting part of this report are the stories.

Yeah that's and to be able to go back to Rochester public schools and say you know we highlighted you last year you know we just want to make sure you have a copy of this and what have you got for us this year and make you know the art center these are and I think that we should you know have this conversation I feel very strongly that organizations that are part of the city structure have an obligation to help us with this process economic development or downtown alliance or whatever they're called those people they they know they are more than just partners they are part of our city and they should be responding so I feel like I would like to put more pressure on them to say you know we expect it's you know what it's it's one thing when you said I'm willing to send emails as the chair of the commission too because sometimes you know we tried the friendly approach like people we knew and things like that but but maybe again for some of these ones that are more structured and should have the bandwidth to give us a paragraph let you know would if that's the researching part of it I'm all for it.

This should we've got new members who maybe have their technical community in new places that can say oh I know that my church is doing something about this or I've heard another organization I'm part of this working on this one.

You know was just who was on last year trying to think in a brainstorm one brainstorming session and who to contact and then who we felt comfortable in contact yeah because I'm sitting here and I was looking at this and I was feeling like some of these I was like this is so far out from what I know but I look at the one that says use vacant space for community gardens garden education and I'm thinking about Mike who's you know bless his heart he's coming here and he's trying to get his message across how do we engage what they're trying to do somebody that's that cares that much about what we're doing how do we find those stories and those groups and give them a voice of even if it doesn't fit exactly into land and soil health we should be able to find a way to put something that important in here that people are so passionate about willing to contemplate right after this meeting and say we want something for now because it's because it is I think we we're tied by our plan but we can be a little broader when you talk you know it's about empty space again again stories that will resonate with people that we know want to work with us our community partners and we just put lean him on the internet because he finds things in like 20 seconds it's goes like twice but yeah you've done a great job of it honestly okay okay so the feedback is I think there's a consensus certainly of people that were here before that we're all happy to see us evolve community outcomes 2.0 all right um so what's the feedback let's go around the room especially people that haven't talked yet the research first approach does that seem like effective manageable for these community led products Amy is clapping Edward we're being research so if you know something ahead of time from organizations you work with that there's a great story or in in listening to the radio or seeing something on TV or in the newspaper or doing an internet search on a topic that's in this plan you bring something forward that we all sort of look at you know based on uh encourage or develop reuse stores I would take I will take that because that happens to be very near and dear to my heart and now this new

So if you know something ahead of time from organizations you work with, that there's a great story, or in listening to the radio or seeing something on TV or in the newspaper, or doing an internet search on a topic that's in this plan, you bring something forward that we all sort of look at, you know, based on uh encourage or develop reuse stores.

I would take I will take that because it happens to be very near and dear to my heart.

And now this new art supply store just opened.

Oh a brand new art supply store.

It's all donated, and then you go buy it as a thrift store for art supplies.

Brand new.

Great example.

It's amazing, right?

And so I happen to know that, huh?

Do they have like a they yeah?

It's been open like three weeks.

What's that called?

More.

More.

They were at they were getting started.

Or right down the street.

Right down the street here.

That is a sort of a quote research where we could very easily get that in here with some of the others.

And there's a so rochester has a pretty robust thrifting scene.

So this is what's new, and then there's some long standing, and then we bring sort of knowledge, you know, and yes, yeah, exactly.

And just looking at people's websites.

Yes.

I mean I talked to sort of brush me out.

They said it's on the website, and I thought, okay.

Yeah.

Instead of asking folks if they're doing something that matches uh what's on our list.

Could we contact them to find out what are you doing along these lines?

And if they share something, look on our list to say, oh, we tell us more about that because it's on our list.

I'm thinking of all the elementary and high schools that have earth clubs.

I'm thinking of all the churches that are like youth groups.

Um things just doing something.

I mean, we could always ask them with the six high-level topics versus worrying about, I mean, seven, they can go to the plan.

It's really easy to get to the website and the smart sheet works really well.

Uh-oh.

Yeah.

Oh, I thought it was taken off the website because of the AD is too my homework.

Okay.

All right.

It's not thanks.

I also agree that doing the research first approach makes most sense because there's information that we can find early.

We're not wasting our time waiting for people to get back to us.

They might not get it to us with the information we're actually looking for.

So we can find on our own, we should start there and then figure out what are we not finding that's important to find and then go find that information.

Agree.

I think it's better to do the research, not annoying others who then like if we keep asking them open-ended questions.

I think we risk eventually annoying them and then them not responding at all.

So if we're doing our research, asking very targeted questions, like we discovered this, we'd love to learn just a little bit more.

Um, I think we have a higher uh opportunity for success.

So I have lots and lots of thoughts about this.

So I do a lot of sustainability reporting, probably 20 plus a year.

Um, so lots of thoughts on how to approach.

I think one, I think the research first definitely makes sense, and and sharing what we've used in the past makes a ton of sense from a research perspective.

I think we can look at it like one past data.

Um, there's a lot of opportunity to look at um existing data that's out there's publicly available and use some of the AI tools that are out here to pull it all together into one location.

Um I I do have concerns about 103 tactics.

Um, I think there's an opportunity there to really define like, all right, what are the priorities?

What are the themes?

Are there indices or indexes that you can create out of those um to get it a little bit more specific?

Um, and then I think from the storytelling, I think that that's our biggest opportunity for reaching out to the community, not the data collection components, so more and more storytelling.

And as we're doing that, we need to frame it up again as a specific as possible, recognizing that these are organizations that have little to no bandwidth, people that are not dedicated this time, they might be volunteers.

Um, it's not so much like what stories you have that we could include in the report, more of here are the seven types of stories that we are trying to tell this year.

We're trying to tell stories about this, we're uh young people involved in the community for telling stories about water, we're trying to and have the themes, and then we can go to like do you have here the seven types of stories we're trying to tell?

Um, and then someone can maybe like, hey, we have a uh young person in high school who's really active with this organization, or we're doing this in water.

So that it gives specifics um to it.

Um, I think the other thing, which kind of transitions maybe into the second point, but just broadly we've we've gotten into tactics very quickly, but I think there's a bigger question of why are we doing this and what are we trying to do?

And broadly speaking, when we think about communicating, we're thinking about um sort of like what are the vision and priorities for sustainability here in Rochester and communicating that out.

The second thing which we we haven't talked about, but might want to think about and will make our metrics easier is looking at reporting and recognition um broadly, and like what are the frameworks that are out there, what are the awards we want to win, um, and build backwards from that.

And then the third piece of storytelling, which we start to talk about.

So philosophy happy to help, subcommittees and the like.

Um, but that's there's yeah, there's there's a great first document to start from.

Your first report is always the hardest.

Um, and now it's just building on that success.

I don't know if there were no battle office.

Okay, right.

Just for something, we'll do it.

Oh, right.

I think a box are good at research.

Yeah.

Well, and I think I think also when we are reaching out to individuals or organizations, all of us being very comfortable in what the why is and being able to speak to that and why it's and not kind of broadly because sustainability is good, but or because we committed to writing this report every year.

It right what's the value proposition and and why is this important to us in our city?

And you know, having that elevator pitch kind of down that we can motivate and engage with.

I was wondering that to the split between city and no, no, no, yeah, the whole work plan.

Because that was done in 2020.

You know, we came up with like this massive list that we just got adopted, uh, you know, two not that long ago.

Um, but some of it is a little bit outdated too.

Uh so when do we revisit that?

That was a huge effort.

So in the the those of us that have had to do strategic planning, they used to be five year plans, and then they became three-year plans, and then they became continuous plans in a lot of places.

But three years would be that's probably what most people do now, in my experience.

Right.

And we're writing our second report.

The other thing that's happening is there will be a new mayor, and there's you know, there will be how many city council seats are open?

I think three.

I mean, so there's this is a time when that happens.

So probably to start, you know, I would be shocked if our mayor wanted to start that process now, right?

When she's retiring, right?

So the timing is probably really good for both reasons, in my opinion.

And I would say at the end of this year is when we start um the budgeting for 2028 and nine.

And so that's certainly something that we could, you know, submit for operating budget to support if that's something, you know, as we kind of move through that process if that's maybe the SRC we recommend.

I agree with you all.

I think working off of a very very broad plan that was written coming up on seven years ago, is you know, I think we're we're trying to develop reporting on a plan that is already outdated.

And so I could just to draw the distinction between tactics.

We may have 103 tactics, that's our activities, those are the things that we're doing.

Those don't have to be our metrics, right?

So we can we could have fewer metrics that then demonstrate progress towards tact.

Um, so we don't need, and just as we're thinking about this, is there a smaller number of measurements that can then demonstrate progress towards tactics.

Potentially, yeah.

It could be categorizing, or it could be, you know, we could look to something like sustainable development goals, or we could look to GRI, or we could look to the STAR program, which is like a sustainability city program, and align their metrics with the tactics.

They are in the plan, in the full plan, they're aligned with city council priorities and what is it, the UN sustainable sustainability.

The UN sustainable sustainability.

Yes, yeah.

Um, goals, and I will say, I mean, even the city council priorities have changed once, and then we updated the plan, and now they've changed again.

And so they're out.

I mean, the plan is outdated again since we have.

But that's good that they changed actually.

I mean, I think it's actually a sign of a vibrant city, right?

Right.

Yeah.

I mean, a search at the point.

And we so we could move those back and then go back to that, and we could say here's the sustainable development goals.

There's 17 prior 17 goals of that, there's a hundred and hundred and seventy-nine or two hundred and twelve indicators.

There's a lot of indicators, but we could use those metrics, those indicators to get something a little bit more concrete, and then kind of work backwards from there.

Edward?

Does it help that there were I think it was five working groups assembled and put us forward?

All of those ideas.

So there was a inherent categorization of ideas.

Uh we looked at Brooklyn and looked gone back to these categories to see what their ideas is more report we're looking at.

I will say the dashboard that we created does split up the progress based on the top areas, so the focus areas.

Is that what you're referring to?

Well, there we go.

Right.

Something about neighborhoods or private neighborhoods and help.

Health.

Yes, city for health, accessible transportation, environmental health, and climate change resilience.

Really wasn't much interaction between those groups.

We all met individually.

If you were lucky, we had a half a dozen folks who would show up to the Zoom meetings.

So the fact that when it was all done, they were all thrown into the pot and presented as a group.

Um, I don't think was the necessarily intention of the passport.

Well, I I yeah, I think if there was no winnowing that was done of the list, right?

Everybody contributed and everything made it in versus having a higher level where people can find out how they fit into the overarching goal versus being so prescriptive.

Some of this is we lose the planning the native plants because all we talk about are community gardens and open spaces, which you're not going to put in a median, right?

Because that would be dangerous and stupid, right?

But but again, if we had written that the appropriate utilization of uh vacant and city lands in a way that was more open, then we would have that, but we've also have potentially a city garden, or we'd have things like that.

So I think we we hamstrung people a little bit because it is more detailed than it needs to be.

The other thing is we should be using data that we already collect.

Like that should be a big part of this plan that you that your data the other dashboard, the sustainability dashboard overlays the plan directly that you're not doing things twice.

I don't think anyone was between people.

Greenhouse gas mission goals, the green step cities reporting, this reporting, and then B3, which is our facilities data, and second stuff, and then the municipal sustainability data that we're creating.

I mean, that's a lot of people for stuff all year long.

So I agree.

I think overlaying as much as possible.

And I think as we move through the conversation around what does the next plan look like, I think that's a good opportunity for us to discuss you know what sort of next plan do we want to create.

Does it make sense for it to be this broad next time?

Because we're kind of we can kind of think through as the ones responsible for the reporting on it, how can we create a plan?

But it's also something that we can be accountable for reporting on.

Yeah, so does the existing data is that all collected through separate databases, or is it all in one SharePoint, or how is that information?

Um for all of all the ones that were just listed there.

Well that kind of sure.

Um kind of relate to one another.

Yeah, so like right now, it's it's a good question.

That's what city council is asking us, and that's why we're working in the municipal sustainability dashboard.

So the goal is after this goes through city council, all of like the city data, like how the city is leading in many of these different topic areas.

That is what is going to be in that one spot.

And so we will include several different things that are city focused.

And so right now it's all in different spots, but the goal is to by next year have it in one spot.

And I'd say for the other reporting, so the green subsidies, that's a lot of different city departments and contacts that we reach out to.

Everything from number of trees planted to facility energy use to water consumption and stormwater.

Um that's in the spring.

We report that to the MVCA.

Most of the data we collect through that gives us the data that we need to submit for our greenhouse gas emission reporting.

And there's maybe one or two additional contacts that we reach out to for that.

So we mostly have those two done.

Our facilities, um, energy reporting is done through our finance department, like our utility bills.

Um this plan is completely separate because it is much more broad.

It's not submit the energy use.

It's you know, what are you doing in this really broad, you know, strategy um topic area?

So there's one as a little bit of an outlier.

But I do love the idea if we could find any of those numbers that we could plug into any of these.

And that I don't know yeah, but even on the what we know about the quote city, that's about the community.

So if we have some number about the entire city that becomes community in the definition that we use for this program to add in some clients, you know what you're saying?

Yeah, but that we already have that fit.

I I I don't feel personally feel like as long as it's close, right?

You can't expect from six years ago that that people were so especially in COVID, nobody knew what they were.

I mean, it's we didn't know what was gonna happen.

Even like just some of the topic areas like resilient economy.

I mean, you can kind of tell that.

I mean, I feel like that's it's a product of us.

So our so let me then I'm I'm hearing consensus here that we like Taylor's approach.

Yeah, I think the updates are very good for what I've seen.

Okay, yeah, okay, and are we saying that we will come up with some sort of a next step is some sort of a file where people know what they're being asked to look up?

We talk offline about how many how many community goals, maybe there's 40 community goals?

49, I think, tactics, tactics, some of which are completed, so we don't have to do them.

There's there's a significant number that are done.

So we aren't gonna report on ones that are done.

Okay, yeah.

Have you reported on that being done?

Yeah, they're like saying it's done.

I would say well, it's somewhere between the geo dashboard.

Yeah, yeah.

So it's not an unwieldy number.

So that takes, yeah, yeah, like okay.

So we'll we'll work offline all list, and then we'll know the ones that we know we can get the data from or that we've been successful in the past.

That'll probably winnow it down even further.

Okay.

When did we publish this last year?

Because their center in and worked on it.

Okay.

She said there isn't a summit.

And I took the information and then worked with our comms team to put the report together.

So I want to say, and then we emailed it to city council with our annual report, our sustainability annual report.

So by the end of the year, I don't think.

I mean, we need to have the information probably by October, but they're just updating again.

It's just like you said, Sterry, it's not re we're not creating it, right?

Not really that there's we're just updating this document and the doctor that should be faster.

Right.

So it sounds like do you feel like you have everything that you need to make this workers than it was last year?

Amy's happy that no one's gonna yell at her.

Thank you.

I think that's when you showed up and plopped out my 300 page material.

And I'm not gonna have line.

Okay.

Oh, um, I think we have consensus.

Do you want to call a vote?

I feel like we have consensus to be on.

We might as well call a voice for recording it.

Okay, that's fine.

Okay, so uh get a motion.

I know that we accept Cal's plan.

So all in favor?

Uh post, none.

Okay, all right.

That motion passes.

Can I just put in another word?

I know you didn't like the idea of a working bunch, but we might want to think about if there's any funding at all to have some kind of a luncheon that's a recognition launch.

Yeah, I think how much publicity, the mayor's recognition luncheon, or she gives awards in what 25 different categories, how much recognition that gets in the community and in the media, and if we want to be promoting um uh sustainability, not just talking about it.

We can say here we don't have awards for the most the examples of the sustainability, you know, give somebody some little plastic award, and then do that at luncheon and have have uh the media there.

It's just something to think about.

Well, I think this gives us um a bunch of potential uh nominees for existing awards programs.

I will, you know, for the mayor's medal mayor medal of honor, uh RPU's sustainability award.

Do they still do that?

Yeah, there's one sustainability award the mayor has, but there's some other ones that are more nebulous that we might maybe kind of horn in on.

Yep.

It's not the I've done it.

It's not that hard.

And my understanding is it's not like they get a million submissions.

So they get it up.

So the one I keep putting in never wins.

So I'll have you with the position.

Okay, so I will tell you another tactic is get multiple people to nominate the same papers.

No, I just nominated you.

But yeah, there's I do know someone had nine people nominate them last year.

Okay.

Because it's everybody has different perspectives.

So I think we should look at the ones not just the sustainability because a lot of these are broader environmental sustainability.

The person that won last year for the fix it van, that is like the most sustainable thing you can do is helping people with their, you know, he had a van, he went around and helped people fix it.

The bike repair.

No, not the bike.

No, no, it was a car repair guy that helped people.

Yeah.

Yeah, he won an award.

It was he was very moved, it was very moved.

The whole thing was very moved.

So wonderful.

Okay, awesome.

One of the thoughts maybe in doing a recognition, like there's a level of application process, different things like that.

Um maybe a less less of a uh ask would be if celebrating what people have done or contributions is key.

So maybe we instead of doing a working session at the beginning to try and solicit information, we do a celebration at the end.

So it's like a launch.

So we're launching the report, we invite everyone who participated.

So who all the people that brought the data, all the people, all the stories, all the different that are in there, like here, so like the report comes to life in I guess if it gets if it goes out in December, we do something in January, February, something like that.

But then we bring everyone together, they see all the work that's been done.

Hey, this is the final result.

We've got them all together, there's energy.

All right.

So since last we talked to you in the summer, what do you been up to?

It can be more of an informal session.

We start identifying stories for the next year, and it just kind of gets creates a snowball effect.

And it's a way to help sunset this plan and bring these people in and say, okay, now we're gonna be thinking about what's next.

So here's the are you interested in having to do it.

Some stakeholders here we talked to them.

It's sort of like here's a uh a stakeholder engagement strategy for this group, right?

So that's like here's all the people that we want on our board.

All right, now we reach out to them, here's the thing we collect here.

Hey, we saw these really cool things.

Hey, what's an update?

Oh, join us for this celebration of the reports out.

So we can we're not asking them once a year for data, like we've got two or three touch points a year now.

And a cheaper way to give recognition is how Mary Burfine was head of the youth commission always did it.

She had uh parents and and uh teachers nominate, I think five youth outstanding youth, and she brought them to give give the recognition to the company board, and the county board just loved it because in the youth, and then it was all over the newspapers, and these five young people had turned their lives around, etc.

And it it took about 20 minutes to do all five, but if we if we picked the five top stories and we could parade them for the city council, because then we'll let the city council know.

They a lot of those people need informing so something we have a little work to do to find out about the limits of our done this after we get wonderful response with our new method.

Okay, great.

Thanks, everyone.

All right, new business sustainability spotlight.

Right?

We have 15 minutes there, might go a little faster.

Yeah, I don't think we'll need 15 minutes.

Thanks to Liam for doing the last one.

Yeah, essentially I just wanted to take a few minutes to talk through some changes that we have been thinking about.

Um, this was they put it in your packet, which is the sustainability spotlight guidelines document.

Um just wanted to I think we um so when we started the sustainability spotlight, we started publishing it at the beginning of the sustainability e newsletter.

I think we've kind of um come to realize that it might make more sense to kind of switch up the order of the sustainability spotlight in the sustainability newsletter.

And so I just wanted to communicate that to you all in a meeting so that someone doesn't feel like, oh, well, it used to be first, and then I wrote the article and then it got dropped down to you know the third or something like that.

I think we're just trying to think through um what is the most, you know, what makes the most sense for the order of this um sustainability e-newsletter based on the content in that quarter's newsletter.

So that's one of the changes that I think we may shift the the um article around based on based on uh just the topic and things like that.

Also, um, you know, we had kind of originally talked about this um, you know, being um kind of written more objectively and just kind of sharing facts and not really written as a narrative.

And I think I've found that you all consistently go back to writing it as a narrative, which is and I think at this point I've really thought it through.

And I do think it makes sense for you all, you know, as members of the community and voices of Rochester to write it um from your own perspective as a narrative and with your own experience and and voice.

And so just wanted to formalize that change that I think that it's you know, it's your choice when it's your you know, turn to write the article.

If you'd like to write it as more of an objective piece of here is the topic, and here are some facts, and here are some resources, or if you want to write it as more of your own voice.

So here's my you know, experience with this topic, like the adoptive drain or something like that.

Um, so kind of including more of that, the personal observations, experiences, reflections, and insight.

Um let's see here.

And I think the only other change was um allowing you also, we also had kind of up until this point shied away from publishing your names as authors.

And so that's something too that um, you know, I'd like to offer you all the um the choice if you want your name published as the author or not.

But I think you know, it's certainly especially if you're writing as a narrative, that's something that um we would like to include um if you want us to.

And then just knowing that it is included in the sustainability e-newsletter, and then also posted on the sustainability e-newsletter page of the city's website.

So those are the major changes.

Um, you know, we're still looking for um, you know, relevant sustainability topics, um, you know, avoiding, you know, political advocacy, things like that.

Um, and then you know, we do reserve the right to edit um city staff does and then publish it in the sustainability spotlight.

We do also trim it up to be about you know two sentences with a read more link that then goes to the city website um for the full article.

So those are the major changes.

Um just share this again.

Did we excuse me?

Did we vote on what we're going to use these topics?

Because why this was she clear about sustainability?

I'd love to see an article about our thrifting opportunities in this town.

And I know who can write it because something I don't know about.

And their church runs garden box, and she told me exactly how that works.

And that little thrifting place brings in 100,000 in your church.

Cool.

Yeah, I can understand why the salvation memory got on a bit of this.

It was so lucrative.

And she said, Well, they come from all over Montana and Wyoming.

It's because we have a Walmart.

They go there, and then there's our store, and we even hand out where the other thrifting opportunities are when they find us.

And I mean, they've got it down to a science on how they do it.

And I I thought I don't even know where the thrifting opportunities are in my town, other than going to uh garage sales.

So they actually had a thrifting Southeast Minnesota Thrifting Day, and a lot of the boutiques and the consignment shops and even down to Red Wing got together and they actually had a thing where if you went to multiple ones, you you know, you'd get like stamps and discounts.

And so I think it's it is becoming a vibrant community.

But yeah, I think we're um at Jakey here, they have this whole brochure.

And it's like they said some uh graphic designer in Rochester put it together.

I don't know who the person, I don't know the person's name, but it's all it's a huge map with all the different um thrifting and assignment stores with all of their names and addresses listed, and so much.

How do you not know about this?

Um and people make a lot of money out of it, that can sign people that can sign.

So okay.

So I guess what the answer is we don't vote on the topics, it's always since I've been on here, it's been people volunteer topics they're passionate about.

This is one there's no volunteer for interest December 15th, and why business should hear about sustainability?

And I think that would be you know, get your holiday presence by thrifting or something.

That would be great.

So I think we're I think you have on this one.

I'm looking for first year approval of the sustainability spotlight guidelines document, which these are just the main changes, the flexibility and format, um change the us knowing that we may change the placement in the e-newsletter, and then you all having the option to be listed as authors, and then improving the remaining 2026 authors, which I think we had Edward you for um.

So yours was about leaving the leaves, which was again they have to be seasonal too, right?

Was that you who was writing the one about leaving reviews?

Yes, yes, and yeah.

Okay, that was Edward.

And then the other one had been this one was mine.

Is yours for December?

That still works.

Okay.

Or we can push that one to the next, and we can put the thrifting one for sprists.

Well, when does when that one?

That one wouldn't come out in June.

That's in two, but it would all go out until January.

Okay.

So the thing would be to do it.

Well, it's what you can leave the prisons should be.

And trade it for something you really want to.

Well, everyone is welcome to make suggestions.

I mean, if you want, I'll write a thrifting one.

I actually, you know, I did something I care a lot about, but but anybody else can have topics and bring them for this is great because normally we've been begging people to do this as I recall.

It took a little while to get this rolling.

Now you want to read okay.

All right.

Do you want the vote on that?

We're approving those.

Okay.

So can I get a motion for the uh motion to approve the updates to how we format the e-newsletter as well as um uh the order in who we're gonna have the Edward's gonna do fall, Stuart's gonna do the winter e-newsletter.

That's the motion.

Second.

Anyone opposed?

All in favor say aye.

That backwards, that's fine.

Motion has next.

All right.

Let's keep going.

Next year um is just an update from yeah, and so this is something that um I feel like the air quality alliance is a big piece of our work in the sustainability division, but not something that I typically bring before you all.

And so this is just me providing an update on what we've been up to this year.

Um, and you know, if you have any thoughts or feedback, um, we'd be happy to hear it, but no real discussion or action on this IDO.

Um, more just an update for me.

Um, okay, so our progress update and throughout this uh presentation, we will see um several new graphics.

So all of the graphics um and the logo is all new.

Um a little bit of a background, I guess, before I get into 2026.

So up until uh 2026, this organization or collaborative was known as RAN, the Rochester Air Network.

Um, and then we did some strategic planning around this time last year, thinking through, you know, um a rebrand essentially and um a different name for the organization because Olmstead County is one of the partners and it's more broad than just Rochester.

Um, and so we kind of talked through names and then we got into logos and designs and things like that, and ultimately came to this design.

So we changed the name to Air Quality Alliance or AQ, right?

And then the logo is here um with kind of some of our you know, branding and things like that.

Um, we also, and I'll get into as one of our strategic priorities the series communications and outreach, but we created social media graphics for every month of the year, and so the partners um or the member organizations each take turns posting um basically once a quarter, but we have all the graphics and all of the um captions and everything like that written.

So you'll see those graphics throughout this presentation.

Here are kind of our priorities this year.

So communications and outreach, our sensor network and our data dashboard memberships and partnerships, our data validation and co-location studies, and then thinking through each and governance of the organization.

So first is um our co-location and hanging valid agency studies.

So we have a network of air quality sensors all around Rochester.

We have 25-ish that are out right now, two different brands.

Um, one is Purple Air, which is a low-cost um sensor that that's most of our sensors that we have out.

We have a few in the downtown corridor that are by Salah, which are a more expensive brand of sensor.

We've also had problems with those.

And so you'll see that we are also talking about what changes we may want to make more longer term.

But Omstack County also has a bi solid sensors out at their county buildings.

Yes, I think mostly out on east side of their county buildings.

But we do take half of the purple era sensors down in the spring and half of them down in the fall.

We bring them to Ben Franklin Elementary School and we put them up on the roof and we do a pro-location study where we allow them to collect data and measure it in comparison to the MPCA's regulatory sensor.

Then we pull all the data from all of that, graph that data and essentially verify that the sensors are still reporting accurate data.

So we took the sensors down in April.

They were at Ben Franklin for April and May, and now we are in the middle of the data validation and analysis.

So this is just something that we do to kind of continue to ensure that they're reporting accurately.

We also this year uh developed a community sensor host pilot program.

Um if any of you remember when we went to city council and presented on the AQA last summer, um, one of our council members is very interested in what basically um community engagement or a community scientist program.

We call it participatory scientist program.

Um we recognize that a full citizen science or resident scientists program is maybe more than we can handle with our staff capacity right now.

And so we're kind of dipping our toes in by creating this pilot program.

Kristen helped to kind of create all the program documents this year.

And it essentially is a community sensor host program.

And so what that means is a community organization.

So think like neighborhood organization, neighborhood association, um, and sort of community group like um, you know, um family service register.

I don't know, any community group that has maybe a physical location or or somewhere that they um know of that has a physical location, can apply to host an AQA owned sensor.

So this would be a sensor that goes through our co-location studies, um is owned by the AQA, but is hosted at a community location.

Um our first target uh neighborhood.

They are hosting a sensor.

We're working with them to develop a final location.

One of the main things is that you know you do need um reliable Wi-Fi at the location of these sensors.

That's probably our biggest challenge with this sensor network is connecting the sensors to Wi-Fi and keeping them connected to Wi-Fi.

So the location that they go to needs to have them be able to connect to the Wi-Fi.

So we're working on a final location for that.

Um, but we have developed site agreements, um, kind of a program overview, and all of that is available on our website, um, which I should have linked here, but you search air quality alliance.

You can visit our website, and there's a page where anyone can register to um be a community sensor host.

We approach the uh Edison Administration building.

So with this, we're not we're not really approaching is that an RPS building?

School.

So I'll get into RPS.

They are one of our main partners.

Um we have done kind of an analysis of the city, and we have targeted specific areas of the city that are lacking sensor coverage right now.

I don't think because that's downtown, right?

Yes, 6 Avenue and 6 southwest.

I'm very busy intersection, especially during work shower.

We do have pretty good coverage downtown.

I remember the neighborhoods that we selected for kind of our target areas.

It's East Side, Slatter Lake Park, and another neighborhood on the east side that we are targeting right now for centers, or that basically we have we did a gap analysis and understand that those are really where our gaps are.

Um, but just due to limited staff capacity, we aren't we aren't conducting outreach at this point for more sensors this year.

This is more of a us trying to understand are there community groups and organizations that are interested in hosting sensors?

So it's more of a it's more of a data collection initiative for us to understand if there is interest from community groups to host sensors more so at this point than us getting new sensors out.

Last year we expanded our sensor network significantly, and it um requires significant um staff time just to kind of keep the network up and running.

Uh East Latterly Park and Meadow Park neighborhoods are the ones that we're targeting.

Do you have anything over Northwest and City or Scream Western Highway 50 to we do?

We have pretty good coverage.

I would go to our website and check out the um if we have time, I can bring it up, but I don't know that you will.

Um, just one thing on the Wi-Fi challenge.

I don't know if you've gone into this, but there's there's Eastern Burn um products that are out there now that are lifetime 4G wireless networks um that seem very cost effective.

Or actual actual Wi-Fi.

We do have some Wi-Fi packs.

Okay, so basically, and they seem relatively cheap.

I was looking at for other reasons, but I think they could be that that might be something that yeah, I'm looked at it's a good idea.

We use those for co-location because we don't have Wi-Fi app on the top of the school.

Um, so we have different data plans for those.

One has a lifetime plan, one we just paid for it separately, but it's also just kind of another piece of equipment that we have to be, you know, my law before selling five five bucks out of my st I have been on top of so many roofs lately.

Why then behind you doing this?

And I'm putting the ladder up and go behind the marquee on the chateau, and there's a sensor back there.

So I have to climb up there all the time.

Um next is memberships and partnerships.

So we are um kind of you know, looking at how do we grow the air quality lines right now.

The three members are Olmsted County, the city, and DMC.

We have an MOU that the leadership of all three organizations have signed.

Um we also have developed a clear structure that distinguishes the difference between members and partners.

So members are official organizations, they've signed the MOU, they attend the meetings, they help us set the direction of the or of the collaborative and um you know implement develop and implement the work plan.

We also have partners that I think support the work, um, may host sensors, um, may you know um provide recommendations, but ultimately don't um aren't responsible for the implementation of the work plan.

So we are interested.

Oh shoot, well, surprise.

We're interested in pursuing um either membership or partnership with Rochester Public Schools and Mayo Clinic this year.

And so that's um, those are organizations that we'll be reaching out to to see, you know, does membership make sense for the organization?

Is it more maybe they just want to be a partner and just kind of be a supporter of the alliance?

We do host many sensors at RPS schools, and so that's kind of why we feel like RPS is um a potential new member.

Also, the CAPEC school system has been really great.

Um, so that's memberships and partnerships, communications and outreach.

So again, um, we have updated our website, put additional FAQs on the website.

We talked about the new branding and communication materials and the um communications calendar.

We tabled at the EarthBust Expo and asked some targeted questions um to the community about um improvements to the website and the dashboard, and that's a conversation we're having at our upcoming meeting is how can we continue to improve our website and dashboard and make it more accessible and useful for the community.

Um we talked about the social media campaign, and then we are um publishing a mid-year press release that will be coming out soon, just kind of essentially going over everything we're talking about today.

In true on the Midwest access.

Um here are just some additional graphics that we've created.

So looking at where is air pollution come from, um, showing just a graphic that says air quality changes over time, and then a graphic that kind of shows the different sensors that we have.

And then looking at uh planning for the future.

So we are right now looking at um additional sensor brands.

So does it make sense to continue with Vicella?

Does it make sense to potentially transfer to additional sensor brands?

Um, what do initial costs, ongoing costs, hidden costs look like with all these different sensor brands?

They get very, very expensive very, very quickly.

Like we're talking tens of thousands of dollars.

So it really is um a conversation that we're trying to to be thoughtful um and collaborative and in moving forward.

Almost a county is really leading on that work because they in a sense have the most skin in the game because they're using these sensors to report on air quality um in relation to their waste to energy facility.

So we are really relying on them to kind of lead and not in this space.

And then looking at 2027 budget priorities for the group.

So that is everything for me.

Is there a board that oversees the air quality alliance?

It's just um it's just members from each of the organizations.

Yeah.

So we have monthly meetings.

Um and I would say we do a lot of work in those meetings and then a lot of work in between the meetings.

So if sometimes I feel like, wow, it's this whole other part of the work that we do that we don't really share with you all very often.

But it is kind of it, I would say it is a big part of the work that we do.

Yeah.

Because there are just so many different uh priorities on the work plan this year.

And then what what are the you may have all this data?

What does where does the data get shared and why are we collecting that?

Yeah, so we have the website.

So right now um we have all the sensors that um that report, you know, real-time data.

Um, we have some sensors where we graph the data, we graph trend data over time, but we are looking to be more mindful of how we are storing data.

That's something that we're adding to the 2027 AQA work plan is what does long-term data storage look like?

Um, and what could future uses of this data be?

Do you know do we want to have more data that's graphed over time or you know, things like that?

Um, we are having a conversation at the next meeting to talk about the feedback that we heard at Earth class, so understanding I think first, what is the community saying that they want from us, and how can we distinguish ourselves um from you know the weather app or something like that that tells you how to quality?

So I think it's really an ongoing conversation that we are having.

Um this all started as a research project um and has kind of landed um with the city to manage long term.

Um so I think those conversations are ongoing.

This kind of like what is the longer term role of this group?

But does the data be it it could be graphic if you did we can do lots of things with data, but I guess why what was the initial reason for like why does the data something if there's a peak somewhere in real time, does someone get informed and they're gonna shut down something?

Not currently.

Okay, and so that's something that we'd like to more so work towards.

So what decisions are being enforced by this information?

Yeah, I would say um I don't know.

I mean, do you have any thoughts on that as far as the community sensor hubs?

That's a good question.

I feel like right now, as Kayla mentioned, this is something that like last year has really taken off.

And so it's still in its like early development phase, and especially after EarthBust, we can see the massive need and desire for this, especially with all the construction that's going on downtown.

Residents want to know and they kind of have a right to know the quality of the air that everything.

So right now we're just focusing on having process to get the information.

And as far as where that can lead in the future is I think things that were so more interesting.

Hopefully coming up soon.

And we do provide regular updates to city council um on this.

And so I think again, I think we're I think last year was really the getting organized.

This year is really kind of moving things forward and it and engaging more with the community, both on online on social media and at events and just kind of making people more aware of the organization and the work that we're doing.

And then that strategy piece, I think is really coming in the future.

Okay of how you know how where do we go with this data?

How do we use it to inform things like that?

Aware of meaningful business community sensor.

Um how can involving community and community sensors potentially help with that?

Was it you that brought up, you know, where if there's a spike at one of them?

Yeah.

Like actually a good example of that is at Lords.

Um, they have somehow integrated the sensor that we have on top of their route into their building automation system.

So they now are notified when it spikes up.

And so they found out the other day it was spiking way up to some crazy number, and they went out there and found out that there's a bunch of cotton in the bottom of the firmware and cleaned it out for us.

This is a month ago, and the cotton was everywhere.

So I think that's a really interesting application of that, where it's like as we involve more community partners in this, we are seeing that we can kind of share um the administration of the network because it's not gonna be me running up on the road through saying there's a spike, but it's more like an opening source potentially action thing than what we're seeing in their local areas.

Think of how aware we all were last summer because of all the uh forest very small as luckily has not been where you haven't been okay.

We're doing all right.

Last question, Edward.

Sorry, I gotta keep us moving.

What's the website?

Yeah, it is it's a little bit of a stream time.

Can you send it afterwards?

I will it's a line.

I know I feel like we need to work on this because it's got a yeah yeah, it's all said yeah, in the whole thing.

So a Google search brought me to it very quickly.

Yep, air quality.

So yes, you can so under the sustainable page.

There's the air quality page, and then right at the top is air quality line for so Rochester Mn.gov slash sustainability.

That's why two performances and then uh quality.

Yeah, I will send it out.

Thank you.

Okay, staff updates.

Staff updates.

Um Linkwesses are starting, um, our entry in production.

Um, all of the buses are expected to arrive in Rochester by August.

Um, so keep an eye on the Link BRT project.

Part of why downtown is tour up, I think.

Um Energy Integration Committee um has finalized this new five-year plan.

Um, energy integration committee is basically uh a group of um organizations that are working on energy related topics in town.

It's something that we could I can provide more information on in a meeting.

Um, but also there was a webinar that I think would record it as well, so we can maybe send that out.

Um healthy home assessments are available.

We are still you know trying to stay on top of all of the interest forms that we're receiving.

Um, can't seem to get the inbox down below 10 to 20 at any given time.

So it's a great problem to have.

We're scheduled out in September right now.

Um, uh options.

We are continuing to work.

We talked about the pilot programs a little bit last uh month, but we're continuing to work with RPU and our DEI division to develop the pilot programs.

Um, I will provide more information and you all at next month's meeting about this.

I can't really share much more right now.

Um reminder to participate in Slow Mouse Summer and move to the market, which is the mayor's office um initiative with the village agricultural co-op also highlighted as the community spotlight in the sustainability newsletter, and then at the August meeting, we will also be receiving an update from our motion coordinator on the bike and pet initiatives.

That was something that came from you all last year when you pitched ideas for the work plan.

So we are moving those forward, and then not gonna go through all of these, but here are the list of events.

Umorks, farmers market, um, and then we didn't put these on here, but there's also all of those um concerts that are coming up.

So the riverside and then the forward concerts in the different boards.

Yeah, thank you.

Right.

Is it going to commissioner comment period?

Everybody see all the great press on the green steps that's come out in the last day.

No, the news this do you know that's the news?

Sometimes the good news, there's actually good news.

There was actually a lot of really good press about the green steps award.

So yeah, and that's the press release yesterday.

So yeah, so congratulations.

It's a lot of work, but it's important.

So I think they're doing a social media post too.

There's lots of city council members in that in the photo.

So yeah, that's a good show at the LMC conference.

Wonderful.

All right, other commissioner comments.

One just piece of the end news I wanted to pass.

Thanks, Amy.

Or share who said it's kind of distressed.

They put a big solar array where they cleaned up all the tires and 8,000 tires got cleaned up and heavy soundship of that property.

You know, the person just left it, didn't pay to access with the county.

Got it, and he had to clean it up.

Um, and they put up the solar array, and people's co-op is not interested in buying the electricity.

Right.

And it's because it's outside of the RPU district.

Uh uh.

So I went on the Germany Netherlands trip that the city ran, and we went to this amazing biopark, which I would be love to talk about because we got to go inside of a wind turbine, and we got to see their their farmer partnership on biofuel or um bioenergy generation and their solar panels on cold war ammunition bunkers and everything.

And they said that frequently until their community moves from oil and gas for heating, uh, because they don't have air conditioning, they have they have way too much capacity, they don't have their things running.

And so they said the only thing that will make their park really do everything it's capable of doing right now is the fact that they're putting all of their effort into trying to get their community to change to electric heating and electric stones.

So it was a very sort of this is great, this is great.

Oh, but by the way, we're not even using it at full capacity.

And you're in Germany, my understanding is has done better with the European crisis with fuel because they are used, they're sheep grazing under every solar array that you see on the side of the highways.

But yeah, so I think it I think that there is an interesting problem.

So if any of you are not an RPU, but people's co-op is what's in the problem.

And I don't I you know we can go to RPU because the meetings are open because it's public, but this is a co-op, so I don't know who gets to influence their decisions.

And did you guys get a cert grant to help with the healthy home helpers as well that we should congratulate?

Yeah, no, I know it all thought we can do that with that here.

Yeah, yeah.

So but again, we want to congratulate and we got just an MCA grant as well.

Okay, yeah, we got the local funded active grant that and the CERT grant.

So CERT grant funds the program for this year, and MECA funds it all through next year.

Thank you.

All right, anything else?

Right.

Move to a turn.

Second.

Okay, all in favor, stand up and walk out the door.

That's an concern.

Could you meet