Welcome everybody to the uh November 17th uh 2025 Rochester City Council meeting.

We have a full house today, and as always, we begin every meeting with our open comment period.

This is an opportunity for anyone from the public to speak on items that we will not be taking a public uh public testimony during a public hearing later in the agenda.

Each person has up to two minutes to speak for a total of 20 minutes.

I will be keeping track of time through a couple methods.

One, the clock up here to my right, left, left, and uh the uh the stop light here in front of the dais here.

And so when it reaches the yellow, that means you have one minute left.

I'd also request each speaker to be concise to allow more people to speak during the designated time.

And participants are also encouraged to limit comments generally to topics that are within the scope and jurisdiction of the council's ability to affect policy.

Council members and staff do not respond to your comments during public comment, but will instead follow up on any specific requests that you have separately.

If you have materials to share with the council, please give them to the city clerk to my right over here to uh distribute to uh the council.

And you'll be invited to speak in the order of which you uh signed up, and I will begin with uh the first person on the list, Natalie Victoria.

And you may have to press the button on there to get a green light.

Press very hard.

There you go.

Got it.

Good evening, Mayor Norton and members of the council.

Thank you for the opportunity to speak today.

My name is Natalie Victoria, and I co-own the Tap House downtown and Victoria's Restaurant.

I'm here to express my concern about the proposed changes to the midsection of First Avenue between Fourth Street and 2nd Street.

This plan would eliminate more than 40 diagonal spaces to make room for bicycle lanes and parallel parking.

Well, well intentioned, this change would create serious disruption for one of the most vibrant business corridors in downtown Rochester.

Right now, the largest construction project downtown is taking place.

Small businesses are doing everything possible to remain viable during this period.

Addition reduction in parking or access, even temporary, will make it significantly harder to serve residents, employees, and the many patients who visit Rochester.

We respectfully ask the city to reconsider.

Please represerve the current street design, and if safety is a concern, consider lowering the speed limits rather than removing the critical parking.

Our community is working hard to survive.

Please avoid disadditional disruption that could do lasting harm.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next up we have Pascal uh Pascal Pasqual Parisa.

I only know your first name.

I wanted to bring everybody a little bit of pizza tonight.

You know, maybe to make it really dumbed down, but my name is Pascual Preza from Pascual's Pizzeria.

I don't really write speeches.

I hate these type of events, but I think common sense is important here.

Okay.

How many of you come to eat pizza at the shop?

Raise your hand.

A lot of you do, right?

How many of you guys like the center only and not the crust and the outer parts?

None of you guys, right?

I'm pretty sure because when you come in from now on, I'm gonna give you the center of the pizza.

And when you complain, I'm gonna tell you why.

How can we allow the center of the pizza, right?

That looks like this.

Look at this.

This is the the center of the pizza is just like the example of Fourth Street and 2nd Street.

Just exactly what Natalie said.

We're gonna remove 36 spots for what?

To make sure from 6th Avenue up to it, you can get killed.

You know what?

We don't care about you.

You can get killed by a car where your kid.

I know Nick rides down there with his kid in the back.

We don't care about you, but when you get in the center, you're gonna be safe.

We have a safe zone for you.

By the way, we're gonna eliminate all these parking spots.

So this whole time through COVID through the construction, we didn't suffer enough.

Now we're gonna end up just knocking you down all the way.

What are we doing here?

Do we want to advocate for small business?

The mayor just signed up for a small business thing with five different cities.

How cool is that?

But time out a second.

We'd sign up for it, but we're still going to kick you in your mouth because we want to change this.

Who wants to do business downtown if we're not advocating for downtown businesses?

This is really disturbing.

We need you guys to think about it, understand it.

Some of you own businesses.

You left it, you know why?

Because it's hard to run a business.

If you had the guts, you still be in it.

Thank you, Pasqual.

We have the guts and we're in it.

So please consider it.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next, we have uh Christy Jameis.

Paul Mosco.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mayor Norton and Council, for letting me speak tonight.

My name is Christy Halmasco.

I am a manager at Victoria's Restaurant.

I've been there for over 15 years.

Um, I am here to speak also regarding the proposed biking on First Avenue, and I'm also here to ask you to reconsider.

Since February of 2018, this area has been affected by nearly continuous construction with no signs of abating.

Business has suffered, hiring has slowed, and customer traffic has dramatically declined for our downtown businesses and for Victoria's in particular.

I work both weekdays and weekends and have had an opportunity to observe downtown traffic patterns over the years.

As a long-established downtown business, Victoria's enjoys the kind friendship and patronage of regular customers.

But as parking issues and construction closures on First Avenue have continued over a long period of time, I have sadly had many of these patrons pull me aside to say that they will no longer be coming because downtown is so difficult.

These are not Mayo patient visitors, but longtime Rochester residents who are weary and angry at the ongoing craziness that downtown provides.

As a manager in an average shift, I am fielding a minimum of seven to ten complaints related to parking and confusion over construction and fear over navigating the next time these people come to visit Rochester.

And these are our male patients who have come to visit our restaurant while they are in town.

Lifetime residents are confused, so how can we expect our visitors to make their way as well?

It is not only devastating to downtown businesses, but it is terribly inhospitable to our Rochester visitors.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Next up, we have Christy Stahl.

Thank you, members of the council, for the opportunity to speak today.

My name is Christine Stahl, and I am the owner-operator of the Tap House on Historic Third Street and the businesses inside the Avalon building, also downtown.

I am here to express concern regarding the potential removal of diagonal parking on First Avenue and replacing it with parallel parking.

This would result in the loss of close to 40 spaces, which would be detrimental to small businesses in that area.

A major complaint by Rochester residents for years now, approximately since 2018, has been parking.

The downtown businesses here at every single day, every day.

Roughly six months out of the year.

Reshaping the streets to accommodate that small percentage of bikes while hurting businesses that provide tax revenue just makes no sense.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next we have Don Danson.

No, it's already pressed.

It's on there.

Hi, I'm Don De Hanson.

I'm a new owner at Center Plaza, commonly known as the uh Indigo Hotel uh condo up there.

I'm a disabled veteran that had to move here for medical care and just bought a very expensive place there to meet my needs to be near Mayo Cornet for health care.

When I purchased there, it was made known to me that I had a reserved parking spot.

And there are many other people here tonight that didn't sign up to speak, didn't feel comfortable doing here here in support that would raise their hands or whatnot.

But um how they canceled that.

And now it's the first of December.

I don't know if you're aware of this because it seems like a backroom deal that was done, it wasn't brought forward to the council because the one thing the city has always done well, in my view.

You just send out postcards, you say, here's something that's gonna affect you and give you a chance to speak and give your input.

This decision was made in the dark of night, to my knowledge.

Nobody that was affected was notified until after the decision was made.

And I have documents here that I hope you will read later that I'll leave because I don't have time to speak to them all.

But there are we the thing I think we sometimes do wrong in Rochester is we forget we're a medically fragile and aging community, and that's why the city exists to serve that population.

And when somebody relies on having a parking spot just to remember where their car is, just to know what they park in the same place and pull it back in the same place every time they come and go.

If you have not been in that position when you're getting older and aging and having medical issues, that is paramount to your very existence, just to know you have your spot.

And I just found out through an email, not even a formal letter in the mail, no comment period, no asking me how this would affect me, that I don't have a spot anymore.

And I relied on that and purchased a 440,000 hour condo that I bought to be near Mayo Clinic, and now I don't have a place for my car.

I believe you have the power for one of you to make a motion and a second and put this on pause.

This is supposed to happen the first of December.

And I thank you, Mr.

Hanson.

I beg you to take action on this.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next, we have Adam Busby.

Good evening.

I know y'all are uh know that we're in negotiations.

I'm Adam Busby for the record.

Um, but y'all can relax.

It's good news tonight.

I just wanted to uh thank the staff uh who's worked on the RFP and um as well as city council members, I'm sure, with their input.

Um, everything uh that we have seen so far on it has been uh pretty phenomenal.

Um it shows that uh the council and staff have been hearing uh us when we speak, so we do appreciate that.

Also, um, as I've told you uh you all in emails, but I would like to state publicly um the great communication and the workability that we've had thus far uh with my city transportation uh that's running the zipps program, and they seem to be doing a phenomenal job.

They seem to be turning things around.

I'm sure y'all haven't uh received as many complaints uh recently as I had in the past.

Um so that has been real good.

So it's all positive news, and um I appreciate your time and uh put this down on your calendar.

Thank you, Adam.

Next we have Linda Smith.

Hello, I'm Linda Smith from Optical Visual Flair, and I've been down here 24 years and never ever seen the last five years so bad.

I mean, I have customers coming in that are here from all over the world.

They come every year to buy glasses from me just because they like what I do, but they're so unhappy.

They they they just there's nothing downtown.

And when they say that tell your friends to come downtown, there's lots to do.

There's not a lot to do.

There's no more shops like there used to be.

I mean, if it wasn't for people that have been coming to me for years, I wouldn't be here.

And I'm so lucky that those beautiful bricks that you put in.

I have to have surgery on my knee now in January because I've tripped on them three times.

You know, and it's that's a bad thing.

And then not only that, the parking, I mean I hardly ever see anybody on bicycles.

I mean, you see a few, but I don't know how many times I've said this is Minnesota.

It's not your nice warm places, like you know, you want Rochester to look like.

I mean, it's beautiful what they've done, but it's really I mean, like our stores on First Avenue, those dang trees, they can't even see our stores, and then every morning when I come to work, I gotta take my blower and blow those all those leaves out of my from my store because it's just full and it looks terrible.

You know, and then the other best thing is the parking meter.

I don't know how many times I go outside and show people how to use those things.

But you know, not only that though, nine out of ten of those people that are parked there are working at the Marriott.

So I I hollered at one one time and I said, Told him, you know, these are for our customers.

And he said, so what?

I'm paying for it.

Well, then he comes back with one of his bosses from Marriott and said, Are you giving him a hard time?

I said, Yeah, this is for customers, not for your people that are working for you.

You know, I mean, you must agree with that, but we got to get those three-hour meters gone.

Too many people are using them that work.

I mean, 90 minutes, perfect.

That's all they need.

But otherwise, I love Rochester and I truly love what I do, but it's not like it used to be.

But thank you.

Thank you.

Next, we have Thomas Kramer.

Thank you, Count.

Excuse me.

Thank you, counsel for seeing me.

I'm Thomas Kramer.

Um, I know Randy, Andy, and Sean, and I take my hat off to you all, but my hair is a rumor.

But anyway, I've been in retail for 41 years.

I buy, I sell clothing.

And the last 15 years I've worked downtown here, and I've seen it degrade.

Ten years ago it was great.

Six years ago, it was great.

Being that we've had all the COVID and all the construction in front of our businesses, and I wish one of you could be in our business every day and hear the people that complain about no parking.

It's gotta be really hard.

We when we come down here and there's not a place to park.

And uh it's it's rather disturbing.

And uh, I'm hoping that things will be alleviated sooner than later.

Maybe in the next year, there'll be you know more parking, and we won't be taking parking spots away.

So I appreciate your time and listening.

And I do want to make a point.

One of you people that are sitting up here, um, I'm not gonna say who it is, but they want to represent Rochester all over and all over the world, but I pulled businesses in downtown Rochester, and this person never goes in any of the businesses.

So, how the hell can they know what Rochester is all about?

Rochester has been successful, but we're going downhill.

Thank you for listening.

I appreciate it all.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next, we have David Curry.

Hi, my name is David Curry.

I own uh City Market, Tilda's Pizzeria, and the Redwood Room downtown.

Um I really want y'all to reconsider the angled parking getting taken away.

Um that's a lot of spots.

We're a lot of small businesses.

There's a ton of people here, my colleagues, who are fearful of this.

This is gonna impact us.

Um Tilda's Pizzeria and the Redwood room when we lost all the parking around Central Park because of the transportation hub.

We felt that.

Everybody downtown is gonna feel this.

This is not a good idea.

Please reconsider this.

Thank you.

Next, uh, is Jason Belly Bachin?

Yeah.

Hi, my name's Jason Baelbach, and I spoke to you guys last month about your um constitutional oath that you take.

I mean, we pledge allegiance to the flag every time we come here, right?

So I just want to say that me last week when down here filing charges on the sheriff's department.

Not only did RPD sit by while they arrested me for doing this, which is against the law for them to do in the first place, because it's unconstitutional.

I thought that, you know, when people take an oath to uphold the constitution and it's people to the highest, that's what they're supposed to do.

I mean, that's when I say pledge of allegiance to the flag, I hold that to my number one thing.

So when I go get arrested for trying to speak my um discern with uh these tyrants that want to call themselves law enforcement and get punished for it, when I was in booking, they mace me.

Made me stand in a cell with nowhere to sit for six hours, covered in mace, yelling for medical help.

Nobody said anything, nobody helped, nobody did anything.

And the reason why I was arrested, I was trespassed by the sheriff for trying to file misconduct charges on him with um the county attorney's office first, and then they put a restraining order on me for trying to, you know, take care of things through them.

And now um, what is it, Mike at the county attorney's office here?

Every time I go to him, he just shrugs me off, like you know, constitutional rights.

What are those?

You know, those don't matter.

We don't deal with constitutional anything around here is basically what he said to me.

So what I am here to say is that there is a blatant disregard towards the constitution, I feel like, and I know that me, 30 others, but up to 300 that have my back that will definitely come in with our rights as you know, we the people to hold anybody accountable that takes an oath to the constitution and make sure that they follow that constitution or constitutional punishment.

Thank you, Mr.

Baalbachen.

Next we have Sammy Lowe.

Lou, sorry.

No, it's fine.

Uh I'm Sammy Lu from uh Bipap Corn It's in the first Avenue Cellus.

I think you all need to try to reconsider to take with a packing because they're not not allowed parking for customers or the employees.

If you want us to be in downtown, you want all the business to be downtown.

Thing about the packing packing is the main thing why people want to come to the business and enjoy a good meal or do a shopping.

The parking is have to be that if you take it away, it means that we all have to close down.

So think about it.

Please do not take away the parking.

Nothing is broken.

Don't change it.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next we have Molly Dennis.

All right, thank you.

Life is getting harder for people here in Rochester.

Families are struggling.

They can't afford to live in their beloved town.

Residents look to the city council not only to be their representative, but also to have specific solutions.

I can give you a few.

Perhaps debating livable wage or rent control or have a cap on taxation that's going out of control.

Or freeze the utility rate hypes.

When I sat on the dais, the first part was when I was a new council member, was learning policy and the position, mainly virtual during a global pandemic.

The second half, I was censored censured with the most harsh sanctions in the history of Minnesota with an illegal censure.

Those harsh, horrendous censure sanctions kept me from researching and proposing solutions.

What is all of your excuse?

I received a letter from a sitting council member threatening me from speaking at a city council meeting.

Our current mayor blocks social media that of people who disagree with her.

This is not democracy, not representational democracy.

As leaders, you need to meet the residents where they are at.

If you don't respond to me for whatever reason, please respond to someone here in Rochester on why you are rather your rubber stamping instead of coming up with real solutions to help Rochester residents stay in our homes and survive in our town.

Thank you.

Thank you, Miss Dennis.

That ends our public comment period.

Uh, we will now uh turn to uh clerk caseel to call the roll.

Good evening, councilmember Keene.

Here, Councilmember Miller.

Here, Councilmember Wall.

Here, Councilmember Fredericks, Councilmember Palmer, here, Council Member Doring.

Here, Council President Schuebring.

Here, Mayor Norton.

Present.

Next, we have our city administrators report, Administrator Zelms.

Take it away.

Thank you, Council President.

Uh, council members, Mayor Norton, members of the public.

I always start the report off by thanking our teammates for acting with respect, integrity, safety, and excellence in mind in everything they do, whether they are um in the field or at a desk.

So thank you to our teammates um for the service that you provide to the community and how you do that each day.

Also did want to highlight a couple of things that are forthcoming on Friday, the 21st, this Friday, at the public library auditorium.

There is a family Lego and craft night.

Um, so if you're a Lego lover um where your family is, um head on over to the public library, 4:30 to 5:30.

Um, drop in and check out um some of the work there and participate.

Also, um did want to note that we are um entering the phase where on Sunday, November 23rd, the fall service changes that have been being communicated will go into effect.

You can find information about the updated route at Rochester Mn.gov.

Um, also recommend um anyone that is a uh writer of Rochester Public Transit to download the app so that they can follow any changes uh quickly there.

And we are entering the holiday season.

So on Friday, November 28th, 2.30 to 7 p.m.

Excuse me, to 7 p.m.

We're starting off with Mrs.

Claws workshop.

Thank you to the Rochester Downtown Alliance at the Historic Chateau Theater.

The tree lighting around 5 15 at Peace Plaza, and then you'll have the opportunity for photos with Santa from 5 30 to 7 up on the second level of the galleria.

So we would invite the community to uh join in that uh celebration.

And also winter, um, we have uh completed construction for for the season at Silver Lake Park.

Um, but the West Playground is open.

So if folks are interested in that, um you can check out the West Playground.

Um, that's open for play.

Um I guess rain, shine, or snow if you're a hearty person from Minnesota.

So um with that, I would be complete with my comments.

Thank you, Administrator Zelms.

Next we have the mayor's report.

Mayor Norton.

Thank you.

I'm just gonna do a short uh report this evening.

I will say that this weekend um I was really pleased to know that some of the council members were able to go to the NAACP's event.

Um I ended up having being double booked and had to miss that, so I was happy the city was represented.

I did go up to the Japanese American scholarship event up in the uh Twin Cities because the consulate general was in town and um met with him, and he is interested in coming to Rochester, and it sounds like I've had a follow-up email already.

He will be coming after the first of the year uh to visit Rochester to see our community, visit City Hall.

I think he'd like a tour of May Clinic as well.

Um but he had a short turnaround time, so he couldn't stay this time.

But it was a very uh pleasant experience, and uh the organization raises scholarships for kids.

Uh, one owner state's one of those schools that gets a scholarship, so it's possible someone from Rochester could get it statewide.

Um, also just a reminder the National Civic League, a better public meetings event was moved from the November date to December 4th.

So we're inviting folks to come to that to um hear the um information that has been gathered, the research that has been gathered about public input, people who've come to these meetings and have used the QR code to share their thoughts about how the meeting went and how they perceived it, as well as some one-on-one phone calls and surveys that were done with people in the community.

So the results of that will be shared with the community on this evening of December 4th.

It's at RCTC, and I believe it starts at 5 30.

Um I don't, yes, thank you.

Uh Mr.

Councilmember Wall for nodding your head on that.

Um so you'd be welcome.

There'll be a light meal out there and then some table discussions to hear the information and share with us as well so we can improve our our meetings.

Um, also there uh we've done sister city trips.

Uh we did not do any from uh I guess the time I became mayor throughout the whole pandemic, obviously everything stopped.

So this past year we finally have kicked up the International Rations Committee and are trying to make contact again with countries, the cities and countries that uh Mayor Chakhazama started sister city relationships with during his time in office.

So we have re-established almost all of those, and we are looking to take a group of community members uh to Germany this summer if you're interested.

There's a QR code on there, and there's also uh handouts that'll be in the mayor's office, and we invite you to join us to visit both Mooseburg, which is one of our very early sister cities that uh Mayor Chakazama started, and then um Munster, which was uh the sister city for energy that we've had for the last eight or nine years that's helped move us forward in the area of energy sustainability and environmental issues.

And lastly, just a reminder again um uh board and commission vacancies.

We do have a number of them, and uh the press asked why do you have so many all of a sudden?

And so I think it's worth noting that at the end of every year by January, terms are up, and uh probably a third of each board and commission's folks' term expires at the end of three or four years, depending on what kind of board or commission they're on.

And so they can serve two consecutive terms, and many, many of our residents do.

After that, they cannot serve any longer.

And so this group that you see up here demonstrates those who have most likely served two terms.

They have termed out, and those positions are now available for someone else to fill.

So just wanted to clarify this is just a natural process that happens at the end of every year.

And we'll be doing interviews in the next month, month and a half, and hopefully the first meeting in January.

We'll have people ready and up for their boards and commissions to start work.

And lastly, I am going to clarify something.

I normally don't do this.

Um, but a comment was made during the public comment section that said I blocked people on social media, and just want to be very clear, it is against the law for an elected official to block anyone.

I do not block anyone on social media.

So I just want to be perfectly clear because that statement was made publicly here.

That's it.

Thank you, Mayor.

Next, we have our order of the agenda.

I have not received any changes to the agenda.

I don't see anybody any uh is there a motion to approve the agenda.

So move moved by council member Wall, seconded by Councilmember Miller.

All in favor say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed, say nay.

Motion passes.

Next we have our consent agenda.

Uh Councilmember Palmer has pulled item F 16.

Is there any other items to be polled?

Seeing none, I would invite a motion to approve in block items F1 through F15 and F 17.

So moved.

Moved by Councilmember Miller, seconded by council member uh Doring.

All in favor say aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Any opposed say nay.

Motion passes.

Uh moving on to our public hearings.

We have seven public hearings on our agenda this evening.

And before we begin the uh public hearings, uh our public hearings are a little different than our open comment period.

Uh staff will first make an introduction on the item.

And then if there is an applicant or an applicant representative, they will have up to 10 minutes to uh present on the item.

And then I will open the public hearing.

Members of the public have up to five minutes to uh uh to speak during the public uh public hearing.

They can comment on the item, they can ask questions of the applicant or staff.

Uh please remember, however, that uh uh once the public hearing is uh completed, then the applicant will come back and uh and attempt to answer any questions during the public hearing, and staff will then also have an opportunity to uh answer any questions that came up during the public hearing.

After that, I will invite my colleagues to ask questions of staff and the applicant, and after after that, we will entertain a motion.

So with that, uh public hearing G1 is uh the 2026 Special Service District Service Charges.

Mr.

Josh Johnson.

Yeah, good evening.

Thank you, Mayor, Council President, Councilmember's Josh Johnson with City Administration.

Uh so tonight is our annual um request and public hearing uh adopting a resolution to for the imposition of the special service charges in 2026.

Uh this year we're looking at a 4% increase from uh 2025, which equates to 409,419.78 cents in total service charges.

Um, those go to help support the Rochester Downtown Alliance and represents about 30 to 35% of their operating budget.

Um just as a reminder, this is not the public hearing for the um to consider any removal or additions or any boundary changes.

Uh those need to be done at different times with different hearing and and notice requirements.

Um I am actually gonna hand it off to I'm joined by the executive director of the RDA.

He'll give an overview and update of of the RDA, and then we can open the public hearing and stand for any questions.

Thank you.

Thanks, Josh.

Uh good evening, Mayor Norton, members of the council, city minister Zilms.

Uh good to see you all.

It's been a year since I've been up here.

Um my hair is a little grayer, or it's your new lighting.

Um, but uh it's been a heck of a year in downtown Rochester.

Uh, yes, we have had impacts of construction.

Uh that is ongoing.

We're very nervous going into it.

We've had a change of our Thursday's downtown layout this past year.

Still working to figure out what's next year is gonna look like.

Um, but our small but mighty team has been uh busy with marketing and events and activating our downtown.

Um and with those impacts, I do want to give a special thanks uh to the collaboration that I get to have with the city of Rochester uh with uh deputy administrator uh Sydney Steinhauser's team, Steve Sampson Brown, Rachel's in the audience tonight, um, Emily, Jeff Hess.

Uh it's been phenomenal to have these great city partners uh helping us thinking business forward.

I've greatly appreciated uh their mindset and their willingness to help and work and do everything they possibly can, is what it feels like when I get to work alongside them.

Thank you to our partners at DMC and the financial support from Mail Clinic, especially this year, and allowing us to push further what it is that we're doing.

Of course, coming out of uh downtown task force meetings that were held shortly after the pandemic.

I had the opportunity to host the very first one in our studio uh on Broadway.

And a big part of what came out of that, we did here parking.

That was actually number two, I think, if I remember right for us.

Um, but a big part of it is marketing and promotion of downtown.

That is what the business owners wanted to see an increase of in downtown.

Uh that was a part of why I was thrilled to come into the office.

And when we talk, I like to just always give that refresher.

Where are we talking about?

It's uh essentially south of uh Civic Center, north of uh Soldiers Field Park, and east of the Mayo Clinic campus and west of just about the old Roscoe's, if you would.

They wanted to be part of it.

That's why we got that little island uh over there.

Uh a look at uh where our operating expenses are year to date for our organization.

Uh Thursdays downtown is a massive part of that 44%, of course.

Um, but uh marketing again is what we've talked about previously.

Um if you remember a couple uh last year when I had opportunity to present a few years ago, it was three to four percent of the RDA's budget went towards marketing.

Uh this year we're looking at 19%.

I have uh the lines blurred there a little bit.

I do want to make sure I incorporate that one of my uh team members' uh salary is a part of that marketing, and you'll hear a little bit further in a moment here of why that is.

So with marketing promotion being our number one that we look to do, uh we see ourselves as marketing uh as a downtown marketing organization for uh downtown destination marketing organization for downtown.

Uh we very much want to target who it is that we're talking to.

So we see it, we operate talking to three different uh groups of people, three different demographics.

Uh, our male visitors, they're here for a week or so, we'll say.

Um, we know about where they're uh visiting.

We want to draw them into our commercial district of downtown.

We want to turn them on to the art and culture we have going on downtown, uh, the incredible restaurants we have downtown, and of course, the unique shopping uh as well.

We do that very targeted.

We drop a pin downtown, we mark within about a mile of that to encourage people.

We want to solve a problem for them.

Maybe they need a break.

So retail therapy steps away from the mail clinic, is literally what their marketing sees.

We strive not to show that to our locals.

We target the visitor coming into our community.

And then we have our uh area residents.

Um we like to get our 55901ers and our 55906ers off their couches and into downtown as well.

Uh, I recently tallied up how many different tactics we use to try and get that word out to our community.

21 different tactics.

Long gone are the days of newspaper, radio, and uh television.

Um so we invest heavily into uh those different marketing tactics.

And then lastly, regional visitors.

Um we were just wrapping up a campaign here where we drew an 80-mile circle around Rochester, going after people with a certain dollar uh demographic to draw them into town.

We targeted four different demographics 55 plus, uh, a mom's ladies' night out, 20s and 30s somethings, and then uh families as well.

We produced four videos with ARC agency here in downtown Rochester to produce itineraries of what there is going on downtown.

Downtown is one of the very few places in Rochester you can park your car, forget about it, and have an experience of art and culture, dining and shopping.

Um, through those targeted ads, we drew them into landing pages targeted to them to show them the itineraries to help them connect further with hopefully staying a weekend in Rochester, um, if nothing else, a day and explore our downtown.

We're in to point this here.

There's a leg.

Yes, there it is.

There we are.

All right.

Next up on our silos of what we do in our office events and activations, of course.

We have our iconic uh events downtown, Thursdays downtown, social ice, dogs downtown, um, fresh air fitness adding the last year, dancing downtown, Zumba on the deck, yoga on the deck, music downtown.

Um, and I thank our partners at 125 Live for helping out with uh bringing in instructors for Zumba.

Uh it's incredible to see 65 people on a Saturday morning doing Zumba uh on the deck.

Uh we're excited to activate that riverfront area and what the city has in store for that.

Uh we've continued our startup event grants where we can award up to $5,000 to a new event.

We want to activate others.

Again, coming out of the pandemic, it wasn't nobody was saying do more events, RDA.

It was market and promote, um, but we know how to do an event really well.

We know how to hook people up with permitting.

Um, so we run along parallel with him.

One of my favorite success stories of this last year is CastleCon.

Happened in the chateau in January.

He came into our office thinking I'd like to attract 150 people to come for a weekend in Rochester, locals and people, a small circle around Rochester.

150 people to come play board games, come play tabletop games.

Um, and I said, David, I think you have one heck of a great idea here.

I think we can get you probably up to 350 when we with our help of the uh marketing and getting the word out further.

Come January, they had over 700 people came for the weekend to play board games in downtown Rochester.

Uh with that success, uh, there's ticket sales are already uh off and running.

They are now not only using Chateau, but also the Kaler Grand Hotel in downtown on their boardroom as that startup grows.

Other classic ones are Thaw Music Festival, and of course the first Oktoberfest that Mr.

Trahan put on this past October.

There's a photograph of uh said Zumba dancers uh going to town on the deck.

Um it's a big part of the placemaking.

Um we in RDA as a SSD, a lot of communities call them business improvement districts.

I think it's another nice way to think about what it is that we do.

Um we help we're charged with bringing life to these public spaces.

So the deck, the riverfront was a great space to activate this past summer, especially as Peace Plaza and nearby was under, or not the Peace Plaza, nearby is under construction.

We had to move a stage off of there for the uh year.

So another space that we uh turned to to activate to draw our our community into.

Uh it was neat uh one day when I was here to see some people that popped out of Hotel Indigo.

Uh they were dressed in their jeans, uh, they listened to the music for a little while.

The woman came over and said goodbye to her husband.

She came over and she joined.

So it's neat to see a visitor hop in as well.

The public seating areas that you see on Peace Plaza, uh Central Park, uh corner of Third Street and First Avenue as well.

Uh, our office is responsible for those.

Um and then along with the um holiday lighting I have on here.

Um, it was shared.

Uh, thank you, uh, Ms.

Zelms for sharing about Here Comes Santa Claus.

Um, do come down.

It's gonna be a unique and special year.

We are uh investing uh in thanks to a Mayo Grant into really decking out the West Peace Plaza for a special uh holiday lighting uh that I don't believe our downtown has ever seen.

And lastly, our clean and safe uh men downtown that are responsible for the sidewalks, the tables, the public spaces, so the cleaning of all those uh different tables that we have down there.

Uh I love it when I get a report from Mayor Norton or Don Sopala working the Experienced Rochester booth uh when we hear how great, how clean our downtown is.

That's in large part to these gentlemen that uh go around and cleaning up.

It was mentioned the leaves on First Avenue.

They just filled up about Ford Brutes past week and leaves.

Uh we saw it again today.

They'll be back out in the next couple days here to help assist that.

They do a fantastic job uh of cleaning and making sure our downtown is clean and safe as well.

A few stats that kind of bring us like what is all that happening?

What is that doing?

Um 225 free live musical performances this summer on the in the our downtown through the work that Elena, our marketing and content coordinator pulls off.

Why we count some of her salary into that marketing budget?

7.6 million views across our social media.

I'm proud that um we have risen up the quality of the social media to a point that we are one of the largest social media uh followings in Rochester, to the point that we actually get paid now for our content.

Now, don't get any wild ideas, Ms.

Zelms.

We not that much payment.

Uh a few bucks every month, but it's interesting that we have so many eyes coming into our social media now.

We're thrilled with that growth.

Uh, our recent fall ad campaign, 600,000 views.

Um 34,887 public infrastructure cleanings, tables.

Uh the um cleaning the tables.

Chairs, sorry, I saw the timer there.

I'll wrap this up quickly.

Something for everyone every day.

This is uh over 67 events were happening in programs in November alone.

So we hit that.

We try and get that message out uh into our community.

We'll invite you back up after the public hearing.

You'll you'll be able to wrap up.

All right.

Sorry.

No problem.

Thank you, Mr.

Fagan.

Thank you.

Josh, anything you want to add before I open the public hearing?

I do not uh council president.

Thank you, Sean.

Uh, we can open up for the public hearing, and then we'll stand for questions.

Great.

So I will now open up the public hearing, and uh we have uh Tim Schmidt who is signed up.

Good evening, uh Council.

Uh name's Tim Schmidt, uh 102 North Broadway.

I'm here to support the RDA.

Uh, they've been a great help to downtown.

The efforts come from a time this from the 1970s, and even before when retail moved out of downtown and downtown did need an advocate like the RDA to bring the business back in.

And even before then, the downtown businesses have been a community surrounding the mail clinic and part of the male clinic.

And as such, you know, we've we've heard testimony earlier about uh businesses helping the pay male patients, but we're also there for the male employees, which are also a big part of forming the male community.

Um so uh heard uh Sean kind of get going on the uh out of the RDA a lot of their good work.

Uh the Peace Plaza was uh was an RDA past uh Thursdays first, a lot of the other projects.

And a business, you know, you can put your product out there, but you need to invite people in, and the RDA does a great job of inviting people into the downtown area.

Um setbacks in previous years, uh, corona shutdowns.

Uh but the RDA has helped the downtown bounce back from that, and I believe that we're getting back to normal again.

Um thing with the invitation coming down, we need to think of what kind of a larger picture.

We got to people, no matter how good the invitation is, people will only take tolerate so many barricades to get into a business's doorstep.

Uh construction's always been tough.

Uh now at the bike lanes, they're talking about taking out the parking spots.

That's that's literally the welcome mat to these businesses.

Uh decades of work would be harmed uh if we did take out all the parking spaces in the first avenue.

Um, so the bike the bike lanes uh through First Avenue, they do go through the park uh Peace Plaza, which is a pedestrian area and it's also a community center.

Uh go right through where we have Thursdays on first.

And I feel if they would do bike paths, there's a much better option over on First Avenue East.

Right now, I I my shop is right next to Salvation Army.

I can tell you that there's a lot of homeless people through there.

And you mentioned the downtown ambassadors, they do a great job, you know, cleaning up and picking out and helping people through, and I see that with the when they're dealing with the uh homeless population.

Would it be nice to see a First Avenue East could be reimagined because uh First Avenue West is uh imagined quite well as it is.

Um so I'd like to the council to support the RDA, not just tonight, voting for my you know their their funding, but also all these other when they bring uh concerns of the downtown business community, listen to them.

They do speak for us, they do they're a great advocate, and there's a lot more pieces of the puzzle than just Thursdays on first.

So nice the council to support the RDA in uh any way they can.

Thank you, Mr.

Schmidt.

Alrighty, thank you.

Next we have John Creeso.

Mr.

President, uh members of the council, Madam Mayor, John Creasel.

Um to say the least, um Sean has played an instrumental role, I think uh uh for advocating businesses in downtown Rochester.

One of the first things I would like to ask is does this approval need to take place this evening?

I asked that for a reason.

I'll give you some of my reasons.

To say the least, to be able to coordinate now what is taking place on what potentially might take place on First Avenue, the project on Sixth Avenue, and on Sixth Street.

I know they are distinctly different uh projects, however, they all face the same problems.

How to safely move people around, how whether they are citizens or whether they are patients, how to safely move around bicycle traffic, which in my opinion, I think is very key to increase into density, the urban density of in downtown Rochester.

How do we safely do this?

Now each one of these projects uh somehow must work collectively together to know what is taking place uh collectively all the time.

Having spent some time with the project managers of First Avenue, they are not totally aware of what's taking place on Sixth Avenue or in 6th Street.

Well, I would say that's not having the proper vision to problem solve, moving people around in bicycles, which is a direct outcome of uh the bold move forward of mail uh having uh terminated the use of second 2nd Avenue, Fourth Avenue, and Fifth Avenue.

That is that's why we're all here today talking about this first this First Avenue project and even the Sixth Avenue project.

By the closing of those streets, it's made it more convenient for them, but less convenient for the citizens of Rochester.

And that problem really collectively needs to be solved with their total support.

So to be able to route people from East Center, excuse me, uh yes, from West Center South is no small task.

To try and coordinate all these events at the same time is no small task.

So the reason I said should we be increasing this uh the uh SSD uh fund by four percent uh this evening?

I think we need to know more.

Another ringer that's been thrown thrown into the equation is I would imagine all of you are well aware of UMR with their announcements as to wanting to increase the number of students that are to be coming here.

I would say that before many of these projects move forward so that we have to then look at them again collectively and maybe rework the projects.

I would say the UMR, who has been, I will remind everybody, was invited to our community.

They were invited to this community, given approximately 10 or 12 million dollars to be able to remove businesses down by soldiers field.

It still looks like a wasteland.

I'm gonna say there was an unbroken promise there initially, because that was supposed to be our campus, okay?

That is yet, we don't know what they're gonna do with it yet.

As far as I'm concerned, if they are not utilizing that particular piece of property, it should come back to the citizens of Rochester.

But the point I want to make here is UMR needs to play their cards.

They need to let the all of you elected officials know where their projects are going to be so that we can effectively route the people, the bicycles, the transportations around effectively to make a high uh a urban core that is effective for everyone.

I thank you all very much.

Thank you, Mr.

Creasel.

Next we have Sammy Lou, and I think she might have left.

Oh no, she's is she here?

Okay.

I can speak on her behalf.

Well, no, we have others, Mr.

Chris.

She gave me her face to share with you this evening.

Okay.

She wanted to speak on this, and basically her bullet points were the same as mine.

Thank you, Mr.

Crysal.

Um this that's all I have for G1.

This is a public hearing.

Anyone else besides Mr.

Creesel who would like to speak, uh, please step forward.

Anyone else wishing to speak on this item?

Anyone else wishing to speak on this item?

I will close the public hearing.

Invite Mr.

Johnson and Mr.

Fagan to join us for any uh wrap-ups.

Uh Sean, did you want to have any other closing items?

No, sorry for babbling so much earlier.

One last bowel.

Uh looking forward for 2026.

We continue to want to.

Oh, yeah, here we go.

I got the clicker again.

I really want to get this one up there.

One more.

That's not in the cards.

Okay.

Uh, we look forward to 2026 to increase uh the social media followings to get the more word out.

It drives me nuts to hear there's nothing going on in this community.

There's so much going on, I can't get to it all.

Uh, I see so many of you at our events.

Thank you for being there.

Thank you for your support.

Thank you for bringing your friends.

Uh if you hear anybody that doesn't know what's going on, direct them to the website, direct them to our social media.

It is hard to reach people.

There's a lot of noise in our world anymore.

So it's hard to get that word out.

But there's a lot going on in this incredible community.

I'm excited for what's going to be coming.

I've talked to so many business owners, other community partners, and we feel like we're on the cusp of something spinning that flywheel moving and momentum going forward.

I'm excited for 2026 as we do uh launch a new part of our website of do business downtown.

Um we want to consolidate those open spaces.

You may have heard about a retail pop-up shop this coming weekend.

There we go.

Bottom left.

The first retail pop-up shop launches and opens this week in a young woman's clothing store.

Crazy excited to have lights on in vacant spaces and life and activity in there.

I'm working with other property owners downtown, uh, thinking of how can we activate even for a weekend in the middle of winter?

Can we put a roller skating rink on the fifth floor of an associated bank building?

I don't know.

I toss it out there.

Let's see what we can do to help draw more people into our phenomenal downtown.

Um, so keep your eye open for that as well.

Thank you for your time.

Greatly appreciate your leadership.

Thank you.

Questions, council?

Uh council member Wall.

I very much enjoyed the color scheme of uh your map, purple and gold.

Uh in spite of yesterday.

Could could uh one of you uh explain for uh the public the difference between uh contributing and an exempt property, since there's a lot of yellows along with the purples.

Yeah, I can take that.

So uh currently the special service district, the parcels that are um charged the uh self-imposed service charge are well, not too technical, but class three properties.

So that just means commercial classification of properties, and it could be industrial properties, but we have very few industrial properties.

So any properties that are either exempt from paying taxes, um, like you see a lot of um government owned buildings there on the on the east side, or properties that are multifamily or single family, those are excluded.

So that's what uh are highlighted in the yellow.

Thank you.

Other questions?

I have a question.

Uh, Mr.

Fag, and can you talk a little bit?

I know this is not a part of the SSD today, but I know that uh you have a partnership with Mayo Clinic uh to uh bring more of the the patients and their uh their visitors into downtown.

Can you talk a little bit about how that effort is going?

Yeah, a piece of it uh President Schuberg, I believe, is maybe the wayfinding uh that we've been working on.

Uh we tested out a handful, a couple different products uh this summer.

Um, one failed miserably, uh, one worked phenomenally.

So we're leaning into that one.

Uh if you're down in the subway now, you'll see some of that wayfinding.

Uh, I didn't have any illustrations of it here tonight.

Um, but it is to again to add to that patient experience.

Uh the step that uh I hear is 80% of a patient's experience in our community is outside of the walls of the mail clinic.

We want to encourage them to come and find that comfort, that care, that joy that our business community like uh tells us tends to offer that hospitality.

So a piece of it is the wayfinding is to help direct them through.

I get lost in the subway system to today, uh, to help our visitors that are new in Rochester to find their way through the subway system, get out to the Peace Plaza, get out to these uh cores of our community.

Um, but then to ensure uh that patient confidence, that visitor confidence, everything's designed with a little tail, if you would, that's blue directing back towards the clinic.

So uh hopefully here in early December, we should be deploying some more of that uh as temporary wayfinding uh throughout downtown as well in the interior side of things.

Great, thanks.

Great project.

Another question.

Uh numbers.

Uh you and I talked right after uh the I think the last Thursday zone first.

Do you have kind of where the where the 2025 attendance landed as far as in your kind of trends?

Yeah.

Um 2025 Thursday's numbers in total was about the exact same as last year's.

We did have one uh less Thursday this year because we did have one that got completely rained out.

Um interesting when we look at uh the data and and the experience of walking around is uh we saw a decrease in the Mayo visitor finding us with not being on the Peace Plaza this year.

That definitely changed uh their visibility.

I'm I'd walk around the skyways on a Thursday uh with the event going on, uh, offer guidance to help direct somebody to find where they're trying to get to, and then hey, did you know there's a street festival happening?

And they're like, no, where?

Right there through the window and around the corner a little bit.

So we did see a decrease in that, but what we seem to have found, uh what we found was more locals coming out, even with construction.

So we get that word out.

If you put something on that's worth people's time, um, if a business is worth to come out for, our community is coming out for it.

And we're very excited about that, and we attributed a part of that getting that word out.

So there's tremendous things going on, so let's just keep that going.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Councilmember Keene.

Um, I'd like to make the motion go ahead to adopt a resolution authorizing the imposition of 49,419 and 78 cents in service charges within the downtown special service district for 2026.

Second.

Moved by Councilmember Keene, seconded by Councilmember Palmer.

Councilmember Keene.

Yeah, I uh I like that thought of RDA as an invitation to downtown.

I hadn't heard that before.

I thought that was nice.

I I think it has a good ring to it.

Uh as part of this vote, though, I I do want to stress that the special service district is voted on and implement and implemented by the properties that make up the special service district.

Uh the 4% increase in the RDA is not a decision that this council is making.

This is a decision by the board and as part of their bylaws.

So I want to make sure anybody who's kind of casually watching this, because I was confused with this uh in years past.

Um the district wants the special services that that the RDA organization wants, and that's the kind of give and take, and that's why they have a board.

And Sean talks about the switch from a little bit less marketing to a little bit more marketing, but it's it can be confusing.

Um, this is not the city of Rochester doling out extra services in downtown.

This is the businesses, the property owners down there contributing to this group that makes up the RDA so that they can provide those services.

And I think it's an important distinction for for the community to understand.

Thank you.

Any further discussion?

Seeing none, all in favor say aye.

Aye.

Any opposed, say nay.

Motion passes.

Congratulations.

Thanks.

Next up we have G2, which is certification of collection with taxes of unpaid special services, special charges, weed, snow, rubbish, and tree removal, secure property, property violation, and impound towing.

Uh Miss Caseau.

Good evening.

Uh, before you tonight, there's three public hearings.

Um, you just read off the items for the first public hearing.

Um, those are proposed assessments to abate nuisances on properties.

Uh these public hearings serve as the right for um citizens to come in and accept uh file any written objections for the assessments, which preserves the property owner's right to move their objection to district court.

This is the remedy they have under state law to object to the assessments.

This is the same procedure that we use for the street construction assessment hearings.

Prior to the adoption of the assessment roll, the council could make a motion to remove or modify any assessment.

Property owners have until December 29th to make payment before this would be assessed on their 2026 taxes.

There have been two objections filed for this particular hearing, one at 1303 6th Street Southwest.

That pin is 64.03.14.007 664 and 2891 Knowwood Drive Southwest, pin 63071107899.

And the council has received those particular letters.

I will also note in addition to the people who are signed up tonight.

There's two gentlemen that are behind me that would also like to speak on this matter.

Thank you, Miss Caseel.

At this point, I will open the public hearing, and uh we have um now the last name is Troik Baz.

There you are.

I'm sorry, I can't read your first name.

Please state your name clearly, and you have five minutes.

Uh Javad Trnchic, but I people know me by Voss.

Great, thank you.

Welcome coming to from Bosnia.

Uh I'm here.

I'm gonna use my five minutes.

Uh I'm um I received a notice of violation on uh uh that some shops was obstructing the sidewalk uh for the property one three zero three sixth street southwest Rochester, Minnesota, and I did the necessary work.

Uh I had the 10 days I did that.

I received the notice on uh 5th, August 5th of this year, and I did the work on August uh 13th of uh this year.

I took the pictures of work that I am done, and I told everything uh vent well, and on um I think uh September 30th or in October, I received the uh letter from City Park and Recreational that I needed to pay $837 for a contractor work.

And on I think uh September 30th or in October, I received a letter from City Park and Recreational that I needed to pay $837 for a contractor work.

I uh when I received this notice, uh I did uh the work, took the pictures of all work being done, had a step ladder there, brought so I made sure there's a clearance of eight feet uh on a sidewalks, also on a height.

And uh when I received this uh letter that I needed to pay that uh charge, um I went to the city park and rec and uh I try and I did speak with uh Mike uh I I don't know last name, Nickber.

And uh I was basically treated as a criminal there, which really surprised me.

I'm the respectful member of community in a Rochester.

Uh I'm in a process uh helping city uh solving some uh drainage problem uh which I will give the easement to my property on a pill hill.

And uh I brought all these pictures and uh by the mic's uh uh looking at those pictures, he still said that uh uh it wasn't done properly, or there's no height there of eight feet, and I asked him for uh contractor information, bids that they are done, uh, so I can see why it's that high, even if they needed, which in my opinion uh work from contractor wasn't necessary at all.

I call and I I think I spoke with Jeff also from the same uh and I asked all that uh uh paperwork so I can see the bids uh uh how much city was charged and all of that, and they uh they get they said they're gonna give me that information, but then they send me email giving me some website.

Then I spoke with the Jeff, and he said he's gonna give me information, email me next morning, and then he said he's being advised.

I'm assuming from Mike Nigber or somebody there, I think he's his director, that uh I still needed to go to website.

So I went to the city clerk and I requested that information on uh November 5th uh 25, and today is the 17th, and they told me I will have that information by this uh meeting, but I did not receive anything.

So normally I never spoke in front of this many people since I spoke in IBM regarding my war experience, and I'm a little nervous, but I'm hoping this city council, I send all the I sent all the paperwork and uh and I contacted uh my council member uh Nick Miller, which was really helpful and uh respectful.

And I did everything that I'm supposed to do.

I cleared that, and I don't know if you got all the pictures here.

I maybe got some pictures with uh that uh um my lawyer didn't send it uh, but I still have them like of the work, all that stuff being cut, and uh I don't know what's the word.

I think uh here we would say there was a highway robbery.

$837, even if was needed to cut uh uh little bit of shrubs, that's really work of some crooked uh uh contractor, and I I will find a name and I'll make sure that he doesn't charge.

It's not just about me, it's just for everyone else.

I mean, those charges are unbelievable.

You can have the like and plus that work, and I don't know if uh if something happened or some miscommunication happened between city and a contractor, I don't know, but uh uh all that.

Sir, if you can uh I I know that the city clerk has a lot of your materials, but if you have more materials, if you want to uh give them to the city clerk, and thank you very much for uh testifying about your situation.

I I got a couple more that I can give uh to show like uh what I cut, yeah.

And all of that I will I'll just give it to them.

And I got a mine work and uh work after contractor, so there's uh in my opinion, there's no difference there.

Sidewalk was cleared eight feet up and wide.

Okay, sir, thank you.

Your your time is up.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you.

This is a public hearing.

Anyone else wishing to be heard on this item, please step forward.

Please state your name clearly, and you have five minutes.

Uh uh my name is Joe Jenkins.

I live at um Southeast Rochester.

I'm here to discuss an assessment on some property that was on my boulevard.

Um, I actually live at another house.

This is my father's property.

We live there for since 73, I believe.

Um, there's been some passing of family members up becoming uh possession of a lot of possessions and stuff.

So I'm trying to sell, give away, so on and so forth.

Put some stuff out on the boulevard so people that in need could maybe use this item would take it.

Uh apparently that's not legal.

Um apparently a lot of people in Rochester don't know that.

Um so I was given a mailed something dated like the uh 28th of um September, excuse me, July, and I will re-inspect nine four.

Um mail nowadays doesn't seem to be very fast.

Um the timing of everything seemed to be moving very fast.

Long story short.

Um I got this.

I tried to contact Mr.

Lance.

We played phone tag a little bit.

Um, I removed one of the chairs.

Um I didn't realize it was gonna move so fast.

Next thing I know, the other chairs gone, and I was assessed uh 262 dollars for them to remove one chair.

Um I think moving forward, the city.

If they have problems with this stuff, they could maybe label that with a bright tag so people know they're in violation.

Um, I think 262 is a little excessive.

Um I don't know.

I'd open it up for questions.

Uh plus they um characterized it as a couch and it was two chairs and or rubbish.

Um the chairs were in good condition.

Otherwise, I wouldn't have put them out there.

Just trying to help the community.

That's all I have.

Thank you.

Uh if the make sure the uh city clerk has your address.

Thank you.

Thank you.

This is a public hearing.

Anyone wishing to be heard on this item, please step forward.

Please state your name.

And you have five minutes.

Hello, council.

My name is Justin Rudquist.

Um, I live on the northwest side of town, and I'm here due to a tree removal that was done at my property, my house.

Um they they put a tag on it because this was an ash tree, so I had to have it removed um about a year ago.

Um, so I started on that a higher demand to do it.

Um, and then as the process was you know, halfway done, part of the tree was taken down, but not completely.

I think the city stepped in and they removed it themselves or contracted somebody to.

Um, of course, I've already paid the gentleman to do the work already, so now I'd be paying double.

So I guess my request is to you know appeal the assessment that the city made.

Thank you.

Make sure that the city clerk has your address.

Okay, thank you very much.

This is a public hearing.

Anyone wishing to be heard on this item, please step forward.

This is a public hearing.

Anyone wishing to be heard on this item, please step forward.

Seeing no one, I will close the public hearing and uh invite any questions from council members or a motion.

Councilmember Keene.

I think Andy had his hand up first.

That's okay.

Uh yeah, I just want to uh understand through um staff or or maybe through the clerk's office the um the motion that's in front of us.

What how does it reflect the the ones that are under um that that have been have been uh spoken or written in?

Do they they are uh separate handed separately outside of this motion?

So when they file an appeal that preserves their right to file that further to district court as we treat the street assessments, so the motion that you would before you to adopt the assessment role would include those particular parcels subject to their appeal to district court.

Okay, so there they there's nothing, no special mention in a in a motion that uh less the four or the numbers that are that are at that are being uh challenged.

That's correct.

The adoption of the assessment rule.

Okay, thank you.

Councilmember uh Fredericks.

Yes, just a uh question in general to staff, maybe even the city attorney.

He he needs a little time in the sun tonight.

You know some of these things are on the scale of things it's not a lot of money but it it comes down to a matter of kind of right and wrong you know the the truth maybe gets lost along the way sometimes but the reality is somebody has a 200 chair and $800 tree a gentleman that paid to have a tree removed and all of a sudden somebody comes along and does it you know we have blanket rules and policies but it isn't always blanket so to speak to the point is there somebody that has the jurisdiction to look at these things as they come in and make a decision versus go through a whole bunch of time and effort just the time alone to spent that near four hours these people you know probably uh probably you know outweighs what what a chair costs and things like that and what our staff costs are they seem they seem trivial and obviously you can't look at every single situation and like be weighing it out I understand why we have policies but I think you know the point I'm making does somebody just have the decision look at like hey this was an oversight this was a mistake you know what have you is there anybody that can just make that decision or they have to go through the whole chain of process over a $800 tree or $200 chair Mr Spindler thank you Mr.

President Councilmember Friedrich's council mayor um maybe a couple layers to to your question I would presume that that kind of um problem solving is done by every department that is dealing with these kinds of situations and they're attempting to problem solve and um their preference is to not have any of these cases go to a contractor um who's needing to provide this service so I I think I could confidently say that they're bending over backwards to try to avoid those situations.

And yet we have ordinances that need to be um effectuated um some of these circumstances have um neighbors or complaining parties um who are part of the conversation and I think departments are trying to find that appropriate balance trying to give people enough time so they do have the ability to problem solve and use discretion uh and judgment along the way I agree with what you said too and I I I just want to say I I I agree that our staff is doing a good job looking at these situations and I hear shots fired at staff of ours that are doing a good job and working hard and it I just I don't feel right that they're not able to defend themselves when those shots are fired whether it's people sitting up here or our staff members or so on and you know they don't get a chance to just sit up get up and speak their piece in their mind and you know I agree I think we have a lot of people doing a lot of great things that I've really witnessed in my last 11 months in the daisy council member wall thank you I'd like to follow up uh on council councilmember keen's question uh and this might be for clerk case it's my understanding of the council could uh make a motion that exempted the one two three four properties uh uh from that list that's correct okay yeah he uh my understanding of council member queen's question was what was the motion presented um before um coun council member wall I mean council member keen yeah again I I was prepared to make the motion my question had to do with how would we deal with those and I think those would be amendments to if we were going to do anything like that that's that was my thought and that's why I was asking a clarifying question.

So with that uh could I put a motion on the table that's okay from uh Mayor Norton first thank you Mr.

Chair I had three points I can only think of two of them off the top of my head uh which happens when you start listening to other people talking um for first I just want to acknowledge that for for a city eight hundred dollars or two hundred and thirty dollars doesn't seem like a lot of money for an individual in the community that can be a paycheck that can be paying bill so I don't want to make light of the amount of money that we're talking about here it's significant for homeowners and that live in our community so I just want to make that point and um one of the things that has come up not just today but throughout the years and I would say years at this point is the timing of when we mail a letter to someone they receive the mail and the and the 10 day count is not working for for people in this community and we have heard that over and over over the last few years mail sometimes doesn't get delivered for a week or two in some neighborhoods and by the time they get it they have almost no time to react to it.

And I don't know how to solve that, other than mail where you when it's delivered, the time is stamped and they have 10 days from that.

I know that costs more to do something like that.

But I think we need to think of the fairness of the individual as well when it's amounts of money that can make or break people.

So I just throw that out there.

I know this isn't easy, and we're hearing from four or five people here today, and many people have been impacted.

And I did think of the third thing, so I'm gonna say that.

We don't go out looking for problems, and it's a this is a very touchy because usually these things come to us because someone someone alluded to this in the neighborhood has made a complaint.

So that point often gets lost.

It's not the city going out and just willy-nilly looking for people violating things.

It's because someone it is what has happened is bothering someone in the neighborhood in such a manner that they felt the need to file the complaint.

So that's not point pointing the finger at anyone here.

I just want that for the record so people understand why the city has approached them in the first place.

Those were my points.

Thank you.

Uh Councilmember Keane.

Uh yeah, I'd like to make a motion adopting the resolution levying proposed assessments for weed, snow removal, rubbish, tree removal under a thousand dollars, uh, secure property, property violation, and impounding towed uh assessed uh towing assessed over a period of one year with an interest rate of five percent, tree removal over a thousand and less than five thousand assessed over three years with an interest rate of five percent, and tree removal over five thousand assessed over eight years with an interest rate of five percent.

Motion made by council member keen.

Second, seconded by council member Fredericks, Councilmember Keane.

Yeah, I um based on some uh work gone today through the park district.

I'd like to make a motion to remove the assessment against properties at 1303 6th Street Southwest.

Second.

Second.

Yeah, there was some investment uh amendment made by Councilmember uh Keene and seconded by Councilmember Miller.

Um there was some assessment done today by the park and uh forestry department uh going through this, and I think there are some extenuating circumstances.

I I don't do the slightly doing a uh a move like this because I don't want to set a precedent of you know if you tell a good story on this, but I think this there was some unique situations here that uh doesn't allow this to become a precedent that this group would be, you know, just kind of uh without criteria, letting uh making changes to to staff decisions other comments, council member Miller.

Yeah, I'll just add I appreciate the people who have come tonight and I appreciate the work of staff to provide additional context.

I and I appreciate the mayor's comments as well of the timing of the notification when people are responding.

I also had an email today from a homeowner who's not here tonight who learned via citation that this whole is an invasive species and a noxious weed as a new resident.

So I I do wonder how we can improve our process, how we can educate the public, empower the public, and also have the context of if uh you know an inspection shows up after the notice and work is in progress to recognize the the work of the the homeowner of the resident to make some improvements and help guide them through that process rather than coming to the the letter of our ordinance and saying, well, the time's up.

So I appreciate the comments.

I'd love to have further conversation with that, but I also appreciate Councilmember Keene uh making the motion to accept this property.

And were you speaking of to that property?

Councilmember Miller, the thistle was that a part of that property of different property.

Okay.

Um Kirk Case, what is the what's the assessment for this in that the uh 1300 sixth street?

I I I can help.

It it's uh 837 and 50 cents.

Okay, and any further comments?

Councilmember Palmer.

Well, I'm gonna amend a motion the motion to um include the other three properties not listed.

Um remove them from the list.

Second and uh can we specify which three of those are?

There were two other speakers on the item.

You're speaking of those two.

Um so we had the two parcel numbers that I listed out in the beginning.

Um, Joe Jenkins and Justin Redquist.

I don't know their parcel numbers offhand, but I'm assuming we can get that from their names in the tax rule.

Okay, motion has been made uh to amend the amendment uh by council member Palmer.

I think I heard a second from councilmember Wall.

Uh so uh councilmember uh Keene?

I I just have a question and I don't know who uh the process question here.

It is my understanding that because these came up today, it reserves the right to go to court.

But is there also a city review of these that would come back at our next meeting?

Or is the is this that's already been done?

Since these are combination of parks and public works, I don't know who can respond.

Kyle the attorney.

Thank you.

Thank you, Councilmember Keene.

Council members, um, I would invite Mr.

Nangber to provide response too, but my presumption and my guidance to the departments would that there would be that there's continued um options to discuss, review, and consider um alternatives.

I don't say that with any sense of promise or encouraging that, but there would be that latitude.

I'd invite Mr.

Niggard, but just to clarify, there isn't a process where that would come back to us as the next meeting saying we want these to go through there that's not part of the process.

Mr.

Nickberg, please step forward.

Good evening.

Thank you for the question.

Historically, when the council's reviewed assessments like this, and the question comes up about the a particular property, they would defer that assessment until the next meeting while staff prepares a memo like you've seen tonight.

Yep.

And on those other parcels.

Um we happen to have those assessments or those questions earlier on about the appeals.

We provided the memos early on to you, so you had that information to to wait tonight.

The other parcels we just heard about that today.

So we didn't have any information for you.

Thank you.

Can I just add based on your motion though?

That is not what would happen based on the current amendment.

They're just removed from the tax rules based on the current motion.

Just to clarify if that if the current amendment passes.

Right.

Okay.

That's and the current amendment is two the first amendment, which is the 1300 6th Street South East parcel, correct?

Yes.

That that I'm point of order, I think the the mo the amendment on the table right now would be to make all properties that have we've heard from exempt or like take them off the the roll.

Okay.

Councilmember.

Go ahead.

Um the the reason that I would like to move this tonight and and take care of this because we've heard from the um citizens who have spoken, and I don't want to delay it and then in two weeks have them come back and open up the hearing again and then discuss it.

Um to me, uh the it just makes more sense and and and probably um better for our citizens that we we take these four who came down here and and move them off the um the roll council member keen.

Yeah, I I I hear what we're talking about, but I'm not gonna be able to support this tonight.

I'm still I mean w when we have these kind of hearings now.

We're hearing about the people that are affected by the the um the punishment side of this, but we're not hearing from the other side that that the idea that this uh you know why did our predecessors put these um rules on the books because it does make for a better community not to have things out on the edge or to take care of lawns and uh not not have to secure properties on and based on that I don't want to do kind of blanket exceptions, I'd want to do specialized so um I don't know where we'll be with this, but I I'm not gonna support it.

Other comments?

Uh Councilmember Wall.

Uh I I will support uh the amendment in that it sounds from uh the people themselves that uh they tried to abate uh the problems.

Um uh either removing part of the furniture on not understanding that some furniture or cutting down trees or making sure shrubs, they they have tried.

And not only that, they've gone to the extraordinary effort of uh coming to uh testify before a council, uh probably uh not solely on a matter of money, but uh for justice, and I would be with Mr.

Palmer and saying let's let's just provide that tonight.

Any any further discussion?

I I guess I need a little more clarification.

So my understanding and uh correct me if I'm wrong, Ms.

Caseel.

So the the first amendment that uh council member keen uh discussed the sixth avenue, that one has been through the assessment and the other three that we heard later tonight, they they're within they're in process now.

Is that correct?

All of the work has been completed on all of the properties.

Okay.

So the 1303, um, the first motion to remove that particular one, and then the amendment was to add an additional.

No, I get I get where it is.

I'm just is there a distinction between the four properties?

No.

As far as the process goes.

Okay.

Councilmember uh Keene.

I I guess I understand what uh Clerk Case was saying, but I think there is a distinction in that I uh staff did a review today, looking at because they were aware of this one on on uh sixth street southwest, uh, and they had come back saying this would not set a precedent or would not do these other things.

So I actually think from the way my thinking process goes that these are different.

Okay.

So then to clarify a little further.

So if uh if we did not pass this amendment, the those three properties would go through the process that Mr.

Nigberg discussed and come back to us for then a uh possible uh uh amendment to uh to uh relieve them of the the fee.

No, they would be based on that amendment, they would be included in the tax roll.

We you would have to make a separate motion or an amendment, another amendment to remove them and bring them back to a later date.

Got it.

Can we call the question?

We will call the question on the amendment to uh include all the other three uh uh properties that uh were mentioned during the public hearing.

Uh did you ask for a roll call?

Please uh clerk Caseel, please call the roll.

Councilmember Keene.

Nay.

Councilmember Miller, nay.

Councilmember Wall.

Aye.

Councilmember Fredericks.

Aye.

Councilmember Palmer.

Aye.

Councilmember Doran.

Aye.

Council President Schuberg.

Nay.

Now motion passes four to three.

Thank you.

So now we have the uh the amendment that includes all four properties.

Uh one.

Oh no, I'm sorry.

Yeah, yeah.

Okay.

So Clerk Caso, please call the roll on the original amendment.

Councilmember Keene.

Um.

Councilmember Miller.

Aye.

Councilmember Wall.

Aye.

Councilmember Fredericks.

Aye.

Councilmember Palmer.

Aye.

Councilmember Doring.

Aye.

Council President Schuebring.

Aye.

Can we do something about the feedback?

Where's that coming from?

There we go.

Now we are back to the original motion.

Uh and uh any further discussion with amendment.

Seeing no further discussion, all in favor say aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Opposed say nay.

Passes.

Thank you.

Moving on to G3, which is the certification of collection with taxes for unpaid administrative citations for weed and snow removal.

So this is the second of the public hearings.

Um this is for administrative citations for weed and snow, as you indicated.

Um, in addition to this public hearing, administrative citations are also given an um another opportunity to appeal within 10 days of the fine.

There's been one appeal filed tonight, which was sent to council.

Um it doesn't have a property address, um, but the property ID is 6423 084256.

Thank you.

This is a public hearing.

Anyone wishing to be heard on this item, please step forward.

This is a public hearing.

Anyone wishing to be heard on this item, please step forward.

Seeing no one, I will close the public hearing and invite my colleagues to uh uh ask questions of staff or invite an a motion.

I'll I'll make a motion adopting a resolution levying parcels uh for proposed assessments for weed removal administrative fines, project number 70512601 and snow removal administrative fines project number 705 22601 assessed over a period of one year with an interest rate of five percent.

Second moved by councilmember keen, seconded by council member wall.

Councilmember Keene No, nothing to add.

Any further discussion?

Seeing none, all in favor say aye.

Aye, aye.

Any opposed say nay.

Motion passes.

Uh G4, uh certification for collection of taxes with for collection with taxes of unpaid utility charges, electric sewer water, and storm water.

Um this is the final public hearing for tonight.

Um, these are for registered public utilities, unpaid bills.

We have received no objections to this point in the hearing for these.

This is a public hearing.

Anyone wishing to be heard on this item, please step forward.

This is a public hearing.

Anyone wishing to be heard on this item, please step forward.

Seeing no this is a public hearing.

Anyone wishing to be heard on this item, please step forward.

Seeing no one, I will close the public hearing and invite my colleagues to for questions or a motion.

I move to adopt a resolution levying the proposed assessments for unpaid utility charges assessed over a period of one year with an interest rate of five percent.

Move by council member Doring.

Seconded by Councilmember Fredericks.

Councilmember Doring, any further councilmember Palmer?

I have a question for um RPU.

This seems to be a long list, and it seems to be 85 dollars is a lot of them.

Is there any reason or rationale for that?

Um I don't have an immediate answer to that question without familiarity with these counts.

Um I'd have to get back to you on that answer.

Do you think that this is a larger list than usual, or is it just common or not really?

You don't know.

In my experience, this is in line with the past few years of uh what we've seen for unpaid utility bills that are tax assessed.

So I don't think this is an unusually large.

And does this mean that they no longer have electrical use in their home or apartment?

No, many of these would still be active accounts where collections has not been possible through our normal means, and so they've been moved to tax assessments.

So these customers, many of these are active customers, I would imagine that are still receiving service.

So how would they get disconnected?

We are in the winter season, so we are not doing disconnects actively, and so a tax assessment is one means of collections of unpaid utility accounts during this part of the season during the summer or non-winter season, there would be disconnects with many of these, and many of these accounts likely have been through disconnection already this this season without any um without any successive recovery of the unpaid bills.

Okay.

And just to be clear, I I don't want to disconnecting people in the winter time.

I I understand state law, so thank you.

Any further discussion?

Councilmember Miller.

So another question for Mr.

McCullough.

I've asked this, I believe, in different ways, but what does uh RPU do to monitor the um cost burdened utility payers?

We work with cost burdened utility payers to connect them to services through three rivers and other agencies for income qualified assistance.

Uh we are at a time of year, if I could go a little bit further in the answer where uh traditional uh funds have not been available um through LIHEAP and other federal dollars with the passage of the um federal continuation bill.

I believe there are LIHEAP dollars returning here as well.

So we work with customers and try and connect them with services in the community, both through charitable means and available um other dollars.

And so that's a one-by-one engagement with customers.

Are there any reports that RPU has of the rate of cost burdened utility payers?

Do you do track that uh is there an ability to report that to us?

Yes, we could provide that data to the council.

Thank you.

I'll take that as a point of follow-up.

Any further discussion?

Seeing none, all in favor say aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Opposed say nay.

Motion passes.

Moving on to G5, which is historic landmark designation 225 Northwest First Avenue Central Park.

And uh our presenter is Miss Polly, Miss Molly Patterson Lundgren.

Or Miss Irene Woodward.

Good evening, Council President, Mayor, members of council.

Um, this item before you is looking at the historic designation for Central Park.

This item came before um the mayor requested that um Molly Patterson Lundgren and HPC look at Central Park and designation of it as a landmark back in July.

And so this has gone to the HPC.

There was an eligibility study completed by Ms.

Patterson Lundgren.

Um, it was reviewed by the HPC and recommended for approval as a landmark.

Um, under the two um historic significance under criteria one and five, which I will on the next slide have a little bit details on that.

Um and also in addition that the period retains historic integrity.

Um and the period of significance for this was identified as 1856 to 1946.

Um and so the historic integrity aligns with those years as well.

In terms of historic significance, it is under criteria one, which is character, interest or value as part of the development, heritage or culture characteristics of the city, state or united states.

And it really has to deal with the idea of the public square.

It was identified back on an early plat and identified in that area and making sure, and that has retained over time.

And once again, for historic integrity, um, these are the seven different items that are evaluated as part of the historic integrity.

There is more details in the attached eligibility study.

That is the quick summary.

Thank you, Miss Woodwick.

Uh this is a public hearing.

Uh and I will go to my sign-up sheet to start with, and we have Barb Hudson.

Good evening, Council members.

Central Park has been the heart of Rochester for the last 169 years.

The parcel is donated as a public square to be preserved in perpetuity.

Any changes in use and the property ownership reverts back to Mr.

Lawry's heirs who are living in present.

Landmarking it ensures that it remains vibrant, accessible, and a welcoming community square for many more generations to come.

It has been recognized as a community-centered public square since the birth of Rochester.

That has not changed.

The diagonal walkways are still there.

Horseshoe pits are still in use there today.

Rochester citizens continue to enjoy community events in this public square.

Central Park has always been recognizable and distinctive features of Rochester community.

It's a point of orientation and reference for citizens as well as visitors.

For all the facts I've outlined here, I hope you will agree it deserves recognition as a Rochester landmark.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Next we have Mr.

Barry Skolnik.

Hi all.

Nice to see you.

I just wanted to deal with the only controversy really about this property because again, I think I think it definitely deserves landmarking.

It's our oldest park.

Mr.

Skolnick, can you get a little closer?

I said I just wanted to deal with the only controversy about this park.

And uh and it's uh it's definitely the oldest park, and it I think the trees are still uh the same trees that were there uh at the beginning.

So I I personally think it definitely deserves landmarking.

Again, it's our oldest park.

And when you compare it, for example, with Soldiers Field Park, there was also a question about historical integrity because it had changed somewhat, although most of the features were still the same.

And this is sort of like uh Soldiersfield Park, which was approved unanimously by the uh city council uh when that came up about a year or so ago.

And um I just want to mention Michael Coop's letter.

I know he said that uh he felt that it wasn't deserved because of the historical integrity.

However, I think there's a big caveat there.

And I actually spoke to him after I found out about the letter on the phone, and he said it was a very borderline situation.

You could have gone either way on that.

And I asked him, well, why didn't you just give us the benefit of the doubt if it's so judgmental?

And he said, well, I didn't like the fact that the uh the house, the famous house that said that uh that that was uh put into the park, he felt that removed the history to it.

And I told him that I don't agree with that because that house is the is the second oldest house in Rochester as a residence, and uh it uh it it's uh it was the same time period as the park, and I just originally it was moved from three or three or so blocks away.

So the I the idea that uh that defaces it, I think it complements the park because it it gives an educational function to the park and and shows exactly the kind of house that existed in the community when the park was there in its beginning years.

So I I think that it really deserves, I think again, they complement each other.

It's like an educational tool, and it shows both the history and that those buildings that that house is both nationally uh landmarked and locally landmarked.

So to me, it's the the best of both worlds rather than hurting it.

I think it helps it and enhances the park.

So I I strongly favor um um adopting this proposal and making it a landmark, and I think we should approve it, and um hopefully we'll get the uh first and second reading as fast as possible so that we can actually finally make this park what it deserves, which is to be landmarked anyway.

Thank you very much.

Thank you, Mr.

Skolnick.

Next we have uh Mr.

John Creesel, Mr.

President, members of the council, Madam Mayor.

Uh to say the least, I totally support uh and compliment um Barbara with all the efforts she has put forth and uh fighting to see that this uh our first park is uh given landmark status, also support uh uh Barry uh as much as I can.

Um I'm not being cynical with that.

We talk we talk daily and uh um um oftentimes uh um maybe too much, Barry.

But but that said talking about the Barry, I've got the mic.

So and and to talk about uh the importance of this gathering space, it's always been a gathering space forever.

And let us not forget that if we didn't modify uh some gathering spaces with running water, indoor plumbing, uh that wasn't there initially, and even electricity, uh, then these modifications would have um made the gathering space uh less acceptable and less useful to the community.

Thank you all very much.

So I I'm asking for support uh and uh for giving it its landmark status.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Cresel.

Next we have Miss Bunny Kettlecamp.

Hi there.

I'm Sean Kettlecamp, the researcher at the History Center of Almstead County.

I'm in f favor of uh this becoming a landmark in Rochester.

Um Central Park was a gift to the city of Rochester in 1856 by William Lowry.

Um his home was actually where uh Kmart was the what we we know now as the Graham new now is the Graham estate.

Um but as far as that this was just a little square in the parcel of his land that went all the way down past the clinic and the old Kaufman building and everything.

It was a it was a huge um landholding, but he gave this little parcel to be um the public square, and as they've said, it's listed as such on the maps in the early um early maps of Rochester.

Um but in the 1850s, Rochester was fiercely divided into Upper Town and Lower Town, North and South.

And on June 20th, 1868, the Rochester Post ran an article reminiscing about Rochester's first days, and it said that it um the feelings then were as bitter as the feuds between the Scotch Highlands and Lowlands.

Um but by the 1860s the jealousies had been uh uh subsided, and uh the border between Upper and Lower Town ran roughly where the Chicago Northwestern Railroad is.

But by the 1860s, the jealousies had been uh uh subsided, and uh the border between Upper and Lower Town ran roughly where the Chicago Northwestern Railroad is, and the courthouse of Lower Town was where the Avalon Hotel is today.

And uh with the warming feelings um in the 1860s, uh the public square um that was given by William Lower, who's now deceased, the name was changed on all the maps to Central Park because it was the central point between the upper town and lower town, and so um yeah, the the harsh feelings and everything had gone away.

And uh so I'm hoping and praying that you will see that to make this a landmark in Rochester, Minnesota um for all time.

And uh yeah, I'm that's all I have to say.

Thank you.

This is a public hearing.

Anyone wishing to be heard on this item, please step forward.

This is step forward, state your name.

You have five minutes.

Um good evening, everybody.

My name is Lucy Creasel.

And really, I don't have much to add.

Um, I just want to echo these leaders who just spoke and all of the work that Barb Hudson has done to really elevate what this park has meant to um to the community.

And I'm thinking about you know the Olmsted County History Center is having their hundredth next year, right?

Did I get that right?

Yeah, yeah, they're having their 100th anniversary next year.

Um, and Chateau just had its 98th, and I'm just thinking um, you know, this really is demonstrative of where we've come from.

So I think about you know, the naval of the city, the origins, and I also hear um a lot um in the bike lanes and in Mayo, Forward Unbound, a lot of asks in our community for more places of respite um and reflection.

And so I think that this is a really ideal location and place to provide that in perpetuity.

So um yeah, just want to echo what everyone else just shared and um thank you, Barb, so much for your hard work in providing um context for how significant this is to where we are today.

So I just want to I'm in favor of landmarking the park and um thank you for your consideration.

Thank you.

This is a public hearing.

Anyone wishing to be heard on this item, please step forward.

This is a public hearing.

Anyone wishing to be heard on this?

One more thing.

Uh go ahead.

You didn't use your five minutes.

Um it was just said at the beginning when they moved the the Whiting House into uh it's now known as the Heritage House into Central Park, that the idea had been at the start that they were going to try and save some of these historic homes in Rochester and surround Central Park with historic homes, and it found was found to be so much trouble and so hard just to get that one that uh it ended up in the park, and it was difficult to get the land going around the park to you know do that.

So that's thank you for that bit of history.

One final call.

This is a public hearing.

Anyone else wishing to be heard on this item, please step forward.

Seeing no one, I will close the public hearing.

And in uh uh Mayor Norton.

Thank you.

Thanks to the folks who have who have testified.

Um, and I appreciate the work that the department, Molly, Barb, and others have done digging through the history and bringing this back to us.

Um, I found it fitting as I was listening to the testimony um about the upper and lower town and the the fights within.

And and part of what I found ironic was that uh the woman that we're going to honor with the statue in this park's middle name or maiden name was Hatfield.

And I was thinking of the Hatfield and McCoy's.

Um, but I I don't think it was McCoy's in Rochester.

But I mean, Hatfield Witherstein's statue is here.

It is sitting at Essex Park in a warehouse uh waiting for approval and for um some granite to be uh procured and placed in the park.

And it along with the hundredth birthday and the 90th birthday, when I started on this path to uh you do the statutes for equality project to recognize a woman of history in this community, it was in the year of the the a hundred years since women got the right to vote, and that's what started me down this path in the first place.

I did not realize it would take five years uh to go from start to finish on a project like this, but indeed it did.

So I I just want to say thank you to everyone uh for the work that they've done and um really ask for the support of the council for this designation Councilmember Keene.

Uh just yeah, question for staff.

There was that in the uh one of the uh um testifiers talked about the the comment in the thing that the SHIPO's comments indicated the that lacked historical integrity.

Can you comment on that?

Yes, thank you.

Um so as part of the landmark process, we send everything, the eligibility studies to the SHIPO, and they provide a letter.

Um one of the items that was noted in the letter in terms of historic integrity was the fact that the Whiting House was located within the park.

And that structure, just to also note, is on the National Register of Historic Places, and that was done in 1980.

And so they viewed that as having some um impact on the historic integrity.

I will say that the HPC did review that SHIPO letter and had a robust discussion and and felt that the integrity was intact and that that structure is not necessarily a contributing to the overall park.

So it is considered a non-contributing feature to the park.

Okay.

Thank you.

And then uh another thing from the narrative is the properties period, this is significance, is 1856 to 45.

I'm trying to understand 1945 is like what ends it there, what what how did that come to be?

Um so it was a little bit of looking at overall integrity of the property and the history, and around 1945 is when there was a decision to drill the well in the pump house.

And so some of those things started to make some of those changes.

So that has an impact on some of the significance and integrity.

So, but the period of time before that really remains.

And so that's the strongest part of that history, and wanting to make sure that the period of significance is really looking at that area.

Okay.

No, that's helpful.

I understand that.

Uh my last question had to do with, and I don't know if you can handle this parks, but um as this this will be our third park if we designate it.

What sort of responsibility is park uh and forestry taking on by having these historic sites under their care?

So if there's any improvements that are proposed for the park, um, depending on the extent of those improvements, they can need to be reviewed as staff level by Ms.

Patterson Lungren, or if if there's an extent that was something that would be a major alteration, um, it would need to be reviewed by the HPC as a certificate of appropriateness.

So we have a process in place.

We have consulted with the parks department as we've moved along, so they are aware of this study as well, along with some of their other parks and are familiar with the process.

Um and I don't know if this is you or maybe parks is as we've as we move from zero parks with designation and maybe get to our third.

Is there a cost in place that we should understand with this, or is it really as long as there's no major changes, we should be it's we're maintaining them the same as we did before.

I I'm really looking to parks to respond if I if you could.

Mr.

Neekberg.

Thank you for that question.

Um the reality is that if we do the maintenance as under the current, in this case, Central Park, there's really no additional costs that we're going to incur because maintaining the structures themselves, you know, roofing, et cetera, will continue on as planned.

Um again, as as I mean talked about, so we talked about if we're doing some major changes to the park itself, there will be costs for that because we'll need to go through the process with HPC.

They may have some additional criteria that we need to abide by.

But again, we aren't planning anything like that at this point in time.

Very good.

Thank you.

Uh Councilmember Palmer.

Yeah, I'm gonna make a motion approving the designation of Central Park as a historic landmark as detailed in the eligibility studies report and directing the city attorney to prepare an ordinance for first reading as soon as possible.

Council uh motion made by council member Palmer, seconded by council member uh Fredericks, Councilmember Palmer.

I think everything's been said.

Thank you.

Councilmember Miller.

I just have a question for Mr.

Nickbur.

Um following up on Mr.

Keene's questions.

When would this park otherwise be due for master plan study update, consideration of uses, connectivity to downtown?

Great question.

So we went through a master planning process with LGR, the LGR group.

I think that was in 2000 and I might get it wrong, 16, I believe it was.

And in that master plan process, they laid out a series of improvements.

Um taking the gazebo for example and putting it closer to the house, um, adding some art in the park.

So things that are not major changes, uh, adding shuffle board, for example, versus the horseshoes, things are more contemporary.

Uh so not a lot of changes that way.

Um, as you know, the bus around the park changed some things out there.

Um that will be modified back when that gets all resolved.

But again, there's no plans for modifying it further, connectivity to the other parks in downtown area.

There's really no changes for that unless the council wants to go through some first avenue changes for bike plans, things like that.

Okay.

Thank you.

And I I plan to support this.

I I just um I do question because um Ms.

Hudson brought up the horseshoe pits.

And I I see that as a recreational use, but I wonder at what point um that is allowed to change, as Mr.

Creesel also mentioned modernization, electric electrification, running water, et cetera.

So I I think the central point in my mind is that this is a prime gathering space in downtown.

We want to preserve it, even bringing the house and helps tell the history of Rochester.

But I do hope that we have this idea that it is a central gathering place downtown as downtown evolves, the uses of horseshoepets, etc.

What recreation looks like are very different today and into the future.

And so as long as that maintains its place as a relevant place that's connected to downtown provides recreation respite.

I'm fully in support of this.

Was there a question in there about the host?

There was a motion.

No.

We're already in discussion.

Yeah.

Uh councilmember Fredericks.

I want to say thank you to the historic preservation community.

I I've gotten to know your faces quite a bit, and just I want to thank you for being an advocate for these uh these important pieces of our community.

A lot of things have been lost in the past.

It's nice to not see things continue to get lost.

And it's an obvious uh piece of property that needs to be enrolled in this uh historic preservation.

But uh I'm I'm actually surprised it took this long too.

So I just want to say glad we're getting it done better late than never.

All in favor say aye.

Aye.

Pose say nay.

Motion passes.

Thank you.

We are taking we are taking a uh six minute break.

That makes more sense.

Yeah.

She actually wants us all to look good.

Exactly.

Okay, um, we are back in session, and we are on item G6, which is a vacation petition by Olmsted Medical Center.

Uh staff, uh Mr.

McGill.

Uh thank you, President Schubring, Mayor Norton, uh, members of the council, good evening.

I'm Desmond McGill with community development.

I'll bring you this application tonight.

Uh the subject application is uh a request from an adjoining property owner, OMC.

Uh they are requesting to vacate a public ride of way.

Uh the subject right-of-way sought to be vacated is a 450-foot stretch of uh 19th Avenue Southeast, uh south of college parkway southeast, uh, which roadway improvements are not intended to be extended in the future.

The corridor does have uh sewer, water, and electric facilities uh and a 10-foot wide multi-use path that runs along the east side.

Um prior to the recording of the vacation resolution, uh the applicant will need to record a public utility easement uh and pedestrian facility easement to accommodate those facilities.

Uh the applicant is the underlying owner of the west 33 feet of the subject right-of-way, and the state of Minnesota owns the 33 feet on the east side.

Umc has executed a uh purchase contract with the state uh to acquire the 33 feet east uh on the east side uh um subject to council approval of this application and staff approval of a concurrently running meets and bounds uh lot line adjustment, which will create a new lot within that ride-away area.

Umce the the parcel has been created, uh the sale uh of the property to OMC will occur.

Um and upon taking ownership, the uh OMC will then record the necessary easements for for uh this area for the water line, sewer line, uh, and pedestrian facilities.

So um once those easements have been recorded, uh staff will release the uh resolution for the recording.

OMC Medical Center seeks to incorporate the right-of-way areas for a future uh parking lot expansion uh for their facility.

Uh we have not received any objection from any utility providers uh for this.

Um and uh the development committee uh is recommending approval of this application subject to um one condition of approval, and that is for the record recreation of the easements um prior to the recordation of this vacation resolution.

So uh that concludes my introduction.

I'd be happy to answer any questions after the public hearing.

Is the applicant or representative of the applicant here?

Yes.

Uh step forward and state your name, and you have uh 10 minutes to discuss the item.

You don't have to use all 10 minutes.

But uh and you uh want to push the button a little harder until it turns green.

There we go.

Thank you, everybody.

My name's Andy O'Hare.

I'm with HGA Architects and Engineers.

We're working with Olmsted Medical Center on this project.

I don't really have anything to add.

I think it's been described pretty fully, but uh I'm here to help answer any questions if there's any questions.

All right, we'll one point I would like to make um the street easement really doesn't lead anywhere.

The rest of the uh street is went to the south, has been redeveloped and is no longer there.

So it's kind of the future road to nowhere.

Thank you.

This is a public hearing.

Anyone wishing to be heard on this item, please step forward.

This is a public hearing.

Anyone wishing to be heard on this item, please step forward.

Seeing no one, I will close the public hearing and invite uh council members if you have questions for the applicant or staff.

Or a motion on this item.

Councilmember Palmer.

I'll make a motion adopting a resolution approving a vacation petition number CD 2025-007 VAC by Almstud Medical Center OMC with one condition to vacate a 66-foot wide public right-of-way, approximately 450 feet in length, dedicated for the 19th Avenue Southeast Street Alignment South of College Parkway Southeast.

Motion made by Councilmember Palmer and seconded by Councilmember Fredericks.

Councilmember Palmer, any more to add?

Nothing, thank you.

Uh Councilmember Keene.

Yeah, I just want to understand that the the they talked about that there need a utility uh easement, which means it would be on private property.

Um and I just want to make sure that there is no utility uh in the in the right-of-way at this point.

Uh Councilmember Keene, there are utilities in thank you.

Uh my apologies.

Uh yes, there are currently utilities um in the right-of-way right now.

There's water, there's sewer, and there is also uh uh an electric utility uh line in that and also the um the uh pedestrian easement on the east side.

So um the easements for those facilities need to be established prior to staff being able to take the uh the uh resolution down and record it, record that with the county.

Oh, thank you for that.

I do and can you tell me you mean we have the the condition that you have it has to be established, but how is that implied that the utilities be moved or how how is that gonna happen?

No, the mu the utilities will not be moved.

They um what what is the new easement for then?

Uh for the existing utilities that are there today.

All right.

So you're saying that it'll be a vacated right-of-way, and then that same place will become the easement.

Correct.

All right.

I didn't uh that that's helpful.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Any further discussion?

Seeing none, all in favor say aye.

Aye.

Pose say nay, motion passes.

Moving on to G7 growth management map amendment.

Oh, is that the right?

Yep.

Uh Ms.

Taryn Eans.

Good evening, members of the council, council president, mayor, Terran Edens with the community development department.

I'm here to bring you a growth management update presentation.

Uh this is a public hearing as well.

So generally, I'm going to provide a lot of context and spend some time at the end talking about what the changes are.

Uh so this is part of our comprehensive plan.

Um, the comp plan includes growth management strategy for the city of Rochester in a couple of ways.

It does provide guidance and direction as to where urban growth should occur.

It identifies the land needed to meet those future development demands, and as well as facilitate the efficient use of land.

So I've said this before, but the comprehensive plan is the foundation of all of our guiding documents for the cities.

You can see demonstrated in that image here.

What is a growth management map?

Um, you'll see an image of an ex our existing one, and I'll show you the updated changes shortly or at the end of the presentation.

Essentially, it establishes the area uh that will be potentially affected by future growth outside of the city of Rochester.

It provides guidance and direction on where we should grow in the next 30 to 50 years.

Um, and it highly considers uh the availability and accessibility of infrastructure to uh grow in those areas.

Uh it's very important for a number of reasons.

It is indeed a strategic priority of the council to be um thoughtful on our growth, uh, to be um uh fiscal stewards in that way and to specifically guide future sewer investment and which informs annexation requests.

Growth management is specifically a way that we apply our comprehensive plan.

Is it a tool to implement that and provides it and apply that growth strategy?

So, some context for you.

In 2021, some options for where we should grow abroad to council.

They were specifically around sanitary sewer extension or upgrading.

At that time, the council agreed and elected to proceed with the extension of the West Zumbro, I'll call it West Zumbro phase one for this evening.

Why that was important or what happened from that decision is essentially we aligned our multi-year capital improvement plan to align with that directive.

So what came of that was investment in 65th Street, 50th Avenue, the sewer sanitary CIP and sections of 19th Street Northwest.

So this is important to understand what happens after you make these decisions, and it guides once again where we grow and in multiple ways.

A big one is sanitary sewer.

I also think it's good to keep in mind when we're talking about context that our growth management map isn't very old, it's less than 10 years old.

It was adopted in 2018 when we adopted our comprehensive plan, and it's been updated once.

I'll also talk about amendments we've made along the way, but it's just good to keep that in mind that we are making recommendations to approve this, recognizing it's eight or so years old.

Other things to keep in mind, since it was adopted, we completed a sanitary sewer master plan, which guided and gave some more information on where we should grow, considering constraints and expenses to do that.

We then updated our growth management map in 2021 to align with that study, and the council gave direction on where we should grow.

And that West Zumbro extension began and it was completed in 2023, which just for interesting context, that's also when the UDC was adapted.

So that's what occurred as a result of making that decision and is good to keep in mind.

Another takeaway I want to make from this is it takes time to get these things done, right?

It took two years for you to give us that direction and complete that extension.

We're always looking two years ahead, which is a reason why this is before you this evening, right?

Essentially, we're going to be moving forward so that the map reflects West Zumbro extension two, and that needs to be done as a precursor to doing that work essentially.

And any additional work or asks will come before you, but this needs to happen before that.

So it's continuing that direction.

Um, just as well the growth management map does align with our proposed capital improvement plan that you will be uh considering at your next council meeting.

And then any time we do these updates, we consider additional opportunity for general maintenance maintenance in general, where we found we can't service or we can service, we make those little tweaks along the way.

I thought it'd be interesting to share as well what we saw with West Zumbro phase one.

I should point out that we didn't wrap that up in 2026, so my mistake for the record, it was completed in 2023.

But we saw a lot of development, all of it uh residential.

So these numbers reflect approved units, so just want to be clear they're not built, but they are approved.

So over 947 units have been approved as a result of this, and we know of 900 more additionally in the pipeline, and that's just residential, right?

So once again, seeing action from these decisions in this way.

With West Zumbro phase two, the timeline you'd be looking at once again, two-year process, we wouldn't see construction and design until 2027.

So that would be result, uh, one of the following steps after your consideration of this amendment this evening.

Uh so I mentioned we've made some amendments along the way, and we're thoughtful on how often we want to make map updates.

Uh at first, we had the intention of doing it with a comprehensive plan, but we're sort of adapting and we don't necessarily always want to be tied to that.

It really just sort of depends on things, and I'll talk about that as we go.

But whenever we consider amendments, we are always ensuring they aligned with these four guiding kind of policies and principles.

Uh the proposed development certainly has to demonstrate a need.

We're not reacting to every request.

They have to demonstrate that there is a need, and there's uh difficult difficulty in finding suitable land outside of this proposed development.

We have to ensure that there is adequate infrastructure and utility to service the proposal.

It has to be consistent with both our comprehensive plan and any other guiding documents, and we're in act creating negative impacts from these decisions.

So I just want it to be clear that when we do make amendments, they are thoroughly vetted and not reactive to everything that comes before us.

So, with that, we had eight amendments since we last updated the growth management map, which is just interesting to share.

You'll notice kind of the variety in the sizes of those developments, which is interesting for a number of reasons.

All of these were essentially reviewed and supported by our development review team based on the availability of infrastructure.

And certainly they're good examples of where our growth management map wasn't necessarily accurately representing availability and where we could service.

Why is that a lot of it is because these developments are smaller scale.

They take less requirements of our say sanitary systems to support them.

So when they're smaller in scale, we can more easily support them versus more uh more dense development.

From that, we we specifically gathered additional input.

Some of this was leading up to this evening, some of it was from the comprehensive plan, and some of it was since 2021.

But certainly we've at this information and these decisions with all city departments on their uh to make sure we're aligning with their plans for growth and their goals as well.

Specifically in this case, since we're making the recommendation to proceed with West Zumbro phase two in the growth management map to recognize uh growth in that location specifically, we did reach out to property owners to invite uh discussion and essentially just verify that there is an interest to develop those properties.

With a comprehensive plan update, we get general feedback from the development community around different varieties of uses that are interested in developing in our community, and then as part of this process, this went to the planning and zoning commission last Wednesday and was approved.

So, what have we learned after gathering all of this feedback?

We've learned a couple of things.

Generally, the way our growth management map has existed, it's kind of drawn a hard line of where we can grow now and grow in 15 years.

So they ask was can we can there be more options to better manage edge growth expectations?

There was discussion around refining our interim development policy.

Uh, what that is essentially gives us the opportunity to consider developments on a case-by-case uh basis that are outside of our city limits.

And there are generally situations where there are better candidates for interim development than others.

So it was more guidance on when is it a good situation to consider interim development?

And that led to our proposal of creating a near-term capacity constrained designation.

So these are the designations that are included in the growth management map.

There used to be three, now there are four, and they essentially just describe at what point we can service this area.

So near-term means essentially services are readily available, it could support uh urban-style development.

Near-term capacity constrained are areas with access to sanitary sewer, but they would require some upgrades essentially to fully service it, or uh a sewer extension is included in our six-year capital improvement plan.

A long-term designation means that we can serve it within the next 10 to 25 years, and then urban reserve beyond 2050 means we do plan to grow there, but we do not plan to service it beyond the year 2050.

Often those cases where we're not going to reach until later, like urban reserve, are good candidates for interim development.

Okay, so I'm gonna spend time on this slide, and this essentially shows you our current map and our proposed map.

And the question will be well, what changed?

Uh, the biggest thing is you'll notice, sort of indicated in the red square there, is where we are suggesting the transition to near-term development as a result of council's direction to proceed with uh West Zumbro phase two sewer uh extension.

Um, in running some estimate numbers on what would result from this uh change specifically just in West Zumbro phase two, it could free up some land for development opportunities as indicated.

It could create the opportunity to develop 107 acres for industrial uses, about 469 for residential uses, with which we took some estimates just to give a conservative uh estimate, and it could result in about 2800 single family units, and then support 273 acres of mixed use development.

So, this is sort of important to note the difference between West Zumbro phase two and West Zumbro phase one.

Phase one was just residential, right?

In this case, this development is near existing roadways that can support higher amounts of traffic and transportation, therefore it's appropriate to support other uses like mixed use commercial industrial.

Specifically, it's near a future highway 14 interchange, it intersect 60th.

Um, so it's more appropriate to consider alignment with other uses in this case.

Other things that have changed besides that big clear moving from long-term to near term in that area.

We did some cleanups, you might notice minor changes where we move something from near-turn to long-term or vice versa, where we've realized there are different constraints to accessing that land or servicing it, I should say.

The other big change is going to be where we indicated areas are near-term constrained, right?

So wherever you see the green hatched areas.

Whoops.

Pause for a minute.

Council member Fredericks.

I feel like I'm drinking from a fire hose here.

Okay.

Uh I just want to know quickly, tell me about 273 acres mixed use.

Tell me what that just for clarity for me and the public.

Yeah, mixed use means it can support commercial and residential, right?

So mixed use is a specific land use category or zoning district that we have that's designed to support support commercial plus, I'll call it.

So we've we took a look at future land use.

That was part of the comprehensive plan update.

Too fast, sorry.

Nope, you're okay.

Just take specific examples of what that looks like.

Yeah, that could be an office building, for example, an office apartment combo, um, a business district could be a number of things.

So commercial businesses typically.

Yep, that's good.

Continue.

Okay.

Development, near-term development constraint is going to be the green hatched areas on the map.

So once again, this is the change that we are recommending.

And essentially what it means is we're considering those three areas where we know of potential development opportunities.

We made conscious changes in land use or zoning to support different development in that area, and where new uses might be found that require frankly less infrastructure capacity, particularly sanitary.

So an example of this would be in Southeast, sort of by shops on Maine, if you're familiar.

Um it's a space where we could serve a use that would be dry commercial.

That could be like a warehouse with two bathrooms, right?

So that doesn't require a lot of sanitary capacity.

We could technically uh service that doesn't take a lot from us if it was a lower um uh a lower use, essentially, if that makes sense.

If it was an overall urban development, it would be a different store.

So we can essentially be a bit more flexible and assess those developments at a case-by-case scenario.

And that's sort of what we've learned from growth management map amendments that there are certain areas that are more appropriate for that.

Things to keep in mind in this map, entire parcels are indicated in the green hatch, but technically the entire area wouldn't necessarily be serviced through urban development, it could be a portion of that parcel.

Um just want to look at my other things to keep in mind here.

Uh, once again, previously hard lines were drawn on our map that said we can either either service it now or in 10 to 25 years.

So this is a way for us to recognize those small scale opportunities that frankly align with our goals, but do not have a severe financial impact on the city to service those areas.

In conclusion, there's certain some certainly some caveats to keep in mind here that you're probably familiar with, and you might hear more about that this evening.

One, in fact, is some of our bonding priorities as you as you realize we have a specific bonding priority uh to increase our capacity at the East Zumbro sewer district.

Um, certainly if that were to be fulfilled, we would have to reprioritize uh where we grow.

So just keep in mind that that is a consideration, and just as well, we are considering land uh land use map designation.

So when we make these recommendations and we consider changes, we're ensuring that the land is suitable for the different uses that are being proposed there.

So that's some of the work we do ahead of this, and want to make sure that's understood.

Uh, what will be the outcomes of your decision or consideration tonight?

Um, this does align with the capital improvement plan uh that will be presented to you.

There are more opportunities for adaptability of small scale development and growth plan.

So once again, the near-term constraint gives us some flexibility on a case-by-case scenario to ensure all of our goals are meet are met.

Um and then finally, this continues a plan for growth management that gives us fiscal responsibility, supports our housing and development goals, and it's a continuation of that.

So with that, I'll pause for any questions.

Thank you, Ms.

Terrence.

I do have a question to start here.

So one of the things that and this is a question on the uh the whole concept of the growth management map.

A point point of order.

Oh, I'm sorry.

I just declared this is a public hearing.

Oh, thank you.

Thank you, Councilmember Keene, and thank you, colleagues.

We will go to the public hearing.

Uh this is a public hearing.

Anyone wishing to be heard on this item, please step forward.

Anyone wishing to be heard on this item, please step forward.

Seeing no one, we will close the public hearing and invite Miss Terrence back up.

And we will entertain questions from the council.

And I'll start off.

Thank you, colleagues.

Uh so my question on the growth management map, it uh seems to be all about edge development.

And so my question is I do like the near-term uh capacity constrained, but I know there are some uh some uh infill.

I mean, we have 60 acres right out the door here uh with the Kmart empty site that are capacity constrained, maybe.

And so why aren't those on the map as potential growth opportunities?

And just to make sure, specifically you're asking why they are or are not well, I don't see them on there.

Why they're not yeah, essentially it's just not the intention of the growth management map to provide direction on um growth within within the city limits.

This is specifically to talk about where we should prioritize prioritize outward growth.

Uh so conversations around infill and supporting that is a frankly a different prioritization and a different discussion that's not require additional investment.

And then I would ask a friend for follow-up on that.

Is there follow-up on that?

I guess what I would say is it kind of gives I look at Rochester and I say, you know, we are uh 55 square miles.

We are a tight little community, and one of the values of our community is that uh you can get from northeast edge to downtown in eight minutes, and uh and I don't think this is really expanding us a lot, but I it it it creates a sense of that's the only way to grow.

And so I would really encourage staff to somehow incorporate in-field development into our uh our thinking when it comes to growth in the city and not just edge, and whether that means you know, incorporating them together or uh or bringing them side by side so that we see there is infill, there is uh edge development.

So yeah, I think that's fair.

The only thing I would add perhaps is I recognize that it's a city council priority specifically to find ways to incentivize in fill development.

So we recognize that that's a need, but I understand your point.

Uh Ms.

Woodward.

I would just also note this is intended for kind of that edge growth and how we grow.

The other way that we incentivize density is through our UDC and zoning.

And so that has already been done in those areas to look at infill, and this is really looking at how we expect to grow over time.

Thank you.

Mr.

Neeberger.

Uh thank you, Council President.

I also just wanted to add that uh the Sanitary Sewer Master Plan also gives more detail on some of those constraints and what development may or may not be able to proceed inside of the city limits.

So those those levels of detail are available in published reports.

Thank you.

Uh Councilmember Miller.

Yeah, I have a question following up on Council President Schubring's question about timing of this map, and I I think the granularity is nice, but I'm I'm curious about the um financial analysis that's on track for presentation maybe early next year, looking at cost of service provision.

I mean, uh again, thinking about our transportation systems, the request from the library to provide services farther out.

How is a financial analysis of the growth management map beyond the cost of sanitary sewer being incorporated into this analysis?

And is this the right time versus waiting for that report to come back to us?

Ms.

Woodward?

Uh thank you for the question.

So there is we are starting to look at more of a fiscal analysis as it relates to the maintenance of facilities and what does that look like into next year, and there will be a presentation before city council at that point.

Um I would note I think this update is needed as we are kind of looking at some of those other opportunities of where we can see some of that smaller development, and I think that is why these are smaller tweaks.

I think if there's a larger policy discussion about overall growth, but I think this is really updating an existing policy if we've really looked at growth management and how we're doing that going forward.

Great.

Councilmember Keene.

Uh thank you.

Um you talk about the importance of the this the map for just uh like guiding municipal investments on that, you know, one to seven year and how the long lead times.

Um do we also use this to communicate the boundary to outside landowners.

Uh yes, in short, we do, right?

These are this is used to guide discussions.

Uh typically uh frankly, this map is shared with edge growth and property owners.

And so um frankly, sometimes we see these open up or or close conversations early on.

So, yes, we use this tool specifically to talk to folks that own property outside city limits.

Yeah, I again I I would think that's an important part of it.

Um, and almost all the land that's on the edges of town that's it's either suburban or ag.

Is that is that accurate suburban or urban reserve?

Um I'm sorry beyond urban reserve is I'm trying to picture, I'm looking at township areas outside.

Uh most I I'm of the impression most of it is listed as ag.

I think urban reserve is our something we use a term for.

It's not a it's not that it's not the zoning out there.

Yep, yep.

Generally, I would say beyond its it's suburban development, ag and perhaps resource protection.

Oh, resource protection.

I was thinking of industrial too.

Yeah, some but but all right, so just uh um trying to understand, but um I don't have this sewer districts on here, but is this really being driven by sewer capacity?

Sewer capacity is a large driver of this conversation.

Um almost all of the near-term urban expansion, this new thing is in southwest and southeast, and it does seem to be tied to our uh bonding request.

Is that do you think that's accurate?

Are you talking about near-term constrained?

I'm sorry, did I call it?

Yeah, that's what I meant to say in the near term.

I would say all the hatched red agreements.

Sure.

I would say we were very intentional the development services team and how we're gonna make these recommendations.

Uh so I would actually make the case if you look, it is a lot of it is in the southern part of town, but we have um tracts of land that are indicated on the east and the north, and that's because primarily on the west, we already have near term development.

Yeah, uh, so no, we I would make the case that we were intentional looking at frankly geographic buffers and boundaries and beyond that asking the questions of where there's anticipated development, land use changes, and where we can serve.

So we did look at it holistically in that respect.

Okay.

And when we're looking at this, are we are we sitting at a map, or do we also know the topography that's of the these properties?

Both.

Yeah.

We'll spend conversations looking at map um teams will do further analysis once again on feasibility of actually reaching and other constraints to connecting to services, whether that be environmental constraints or um topography.

Okay.

Um it's a little harder, and it's a little more subjective, but I've heard that there are properties going back to the 1970s that were listed as long-term urban expansion 2020, and those same lands now are listed as like longer or midterm constraint or longer term or midterm constrained.

And I'm just wondering if there is this idea that there's sometimes we think something's gonna happen and it doesn't.

And that happens multiple times in certain and maybe mainly in those areas where we're constrained.

I'll answer that and and recognize anyone can jump in.

But my understanding is a lot of it is around reprioritization, frankly, and where we have capacity to serve.

So typically if things get delayed, as I understand it, it's often re-prioritization of projects and where we can serve, more or less.

We thought more or less putting something off because we can't serve is it, if that makes sense.

Okay.

Yeah, I think it does.

I think it does.

And I I'm of the impression all of this um uh urban reserve and that other sort of the whole map, it would stop at any sort of municipal boundary.

When we bump up to Byron, we don't kind of make any claims there.

That's a hard boundary.

We're gonna bump up to Stuartville.

Right.

Uh those are like those are generally things we're gonna take under consideration, right?

This does guide um uh annexations, if you will, but right, generally, if we're gonna bump up to a community, that's gonna be a stop that we consider.

Yeah.

Um, last question.

I I don't see any special consideration on this map for the airport and the airport zoning.

We uh did make some changes to reflect possible growth around the airport.

I'm trying to get my lay of the land to describe where that is primarily as you'll see around the southern corner.

We added an area for near-term expansion capacity constraints south of the airport, and then a little above it, we added some long-term urban expansion versus being in the urban reserve.

So we made some slight changes to recognize some development opportunity around the airport.

Okay.

Um, thank you.

Council member uh sorry about that.

Councilmember Palmer.

For the record, I turned his mic off.

Oh, uh Woodward does want to respond to Councilmember Keene.

I just wanted to make a note to one of the items that Councilmember Keene uh mentioned, and part of what we're trying to do is have better coordination between the growth management map and the sewer master plan and the other departments in terms of their planning, and some of that wasn't done.

So as we're looking at some of those dates that were probably put on there early, there wasn't great coordination amongst all of them, and I think we haven't taken steps to make sure that we're coordinating those efforts so that we're providing more realistic dates as we're looking at the growth management map.

That that's helpful.

Do you mind just when you say coordination?

Is that within the city services or is that other where other than just city?

I mean, that is also looking at um within the city in terms of also like RPU, those sewer master plan, and the other departments, including fire, making sure that everybody is really taking a look at the growth management map and what is realistic, what is what plans they have and what can be served.

Thank you.

I appreciate the clarification of the added comments.

Councilmember Palmer.

Thank you.

It would be my understanding that on the north boundary of Rochester, we have an agreement with Orinoco where we can go to.

Uh we have an agreement with Byron where we can go to, and we have an agreement with Sturtville.

Am I wrong in that assumption?

We do have a number of um agreements with surrounding municipalities in terms of annexation agreements.

Is that what you're referring to?

Um I would have to check on all which ones we do, but we do have those, and we're working on making sure that those are all mapped as well.

Perfect.

Um can you go back two slides to um page 42?

You've got on this um map on my right here a bunch of X's.

What are those X's for?

To be clear, this is just an image to show some of the behind the scenes work we do.

We're looking at land use, it's not specifically related to the growth management map.

So this is just making some thoughts, chatting some thoughts on paper.

So not necessarily indicative of changes that are before you this evening.

Okay, because I was just assuming they're already built or they're not available.

Likely that's the case, but just want to make you aware this as a brainstorming map.

So that likely they are not available anymore.

Is that kind of I'm I'm trying to it's a graphic image that they put in there that we're not supposed to look at in detail.

Is that a correct no, you it was a work in progress at some time in the past, correct?

Correct.

But do we need more money to get an update map for you or what is our it's just part of the brainstorming process?

We don't always take photos of finished product.

Go back to your your uh your original the next two pages that you were at.

Sorry, I'm just trying to figure this all out.

No, actually the other thing for the sewer, which is which is hand in hand with everything else that we're doing.

If if in if we have a large amount of homeowners like we did on the 19th Street area out there, and they say they will sign up for a sewer, then we go in to look at the sewer.

We're not looking at a piece of the map and say, oh gosh, we're gonna run sewer out here and hope someone's gonna build.

We have a commitment so that the city isn't out there bonding for money that we're not gonna get quickly for lack of a better way of saying that.

That's right.

We're getting assuring that there is an interest to develop development understand public works has certain requirements that must happen in order for us to grow there as well if there's an interest.

Okay.

And so every month we get an update from you about the number of single family dwellings.

Um I don't think we're gonna hit 200 houses this year.

Not a betting man, but I don't think we are.

But we've had three redemption three times we've had the Maxwell study, and almost every single time it's 900 plus single family dwellings that we're supposed to be building.

So how do you I mean, how do you tell me that geez, we're working on 900, but we're only getting to 200 and we're doing well.

Naturally, I don't have this number memorized, but I can recall, but that the most recent update showed a slight decrease in our demand in the next 10 years for single family units, albeit slight.

That shows some progress that we're meeting the mark in a small way.

So I wanted to point that out.

But alternatively, I would say, or in addition, I would say um we recognize that these projects take time.

And I think a point that we like to make is there's a lot in the development pipeline.

So it's a matter of timing and when things come forward.

Um, but this is essentially to demonstrate there's there is a lot of opportunity and this supports um those that needed demand essentially.

But to be clear, we we as a city do not build houses.

Correct.

So we zone property to let property owners, if they want to, develop their property, and we're trying to do it in a controlled method so that the city's resources are well used.

Is that not what we're doing?

I think that's a fair assessment.

This is a regulatory regulatory tool that we use, and we are ensuring that can be used to meet our housing demand needs in the future.

Thank you.

And thank you for everything you do.

Councilmember Fredericks.

Thank you.

While in fill is important to renew and make the most use of our existing city limits.

I I like to see that.

I like to see areas renewed, you know, things being done in areas where it's allowed.

Uh I applaud the staff for being ahead of the development that the area is dictating and demanding.

The the infill doesn't fit every need, and we need to be ahead of it to fill the needs that arise.

So we're not turning away said business, said residents, so on so forth.

We want to be the city where people can come here where everybody does have a place.

And that includes this type of stuff, and I'm glad that you're ahead of it and you're doing it.

So thank you.

Councilmember Keene.

I'd like to make a motion to adopt a resolution approving the growth management map amendment CD 2025 003 G MMA to amend the city's growth management map in accordance with changes in sanitary sewer availability since its last update in 2021.

Second move by Councilmember Keene, seconded by Councilmember Fredericks.

Councilmember Keene.

Yeah, the only thing I'd say is I really do see the value, and then I do see the waterfall from the comprehensive plan, and then having these other sort of things that that basically implement some of the policies that are that are the aspirational goals that are in the comprehensive plan.

Um I I do also think of this as not just uh a tool for municipal planning and municipal coordination.

I think there's a big role in communicating to a development and landowners of what's the city intents.

And because of that, I like to see us staying true to it as opposed to uh basically be in uh changing it on on a regular basis.

And just to just to follow up on uh councilmember Keene, I I do as well see it as a as a tool that we use when it comes to developers and builders.

And so I want to make sure that when they do come to town that they see this, but they also see where there are opportunities within the city limits.

And I do know that on our bus tours and uh with the bonding uh committees that we do highlight those in fills, and so I just want to make sure that we're still saying that message as well that it's important for us uh to put density where where we think density should be.

Uh councilmember Miller.

Yeah, I'll just reiterate what I said about the fiscal um considerations of future growth, and I I do think that that's a missing piece here, but I also believe, as some of my colleagues said, the adding the granularity of near-term capacity constraint is is helpful, particularly in that communication piece.

Um so I'd still just really like to, as we think about the CIP planning and what West Sombro phase two looks like, that that be a consideration because again, over the course of this year we've heard many challenges of a growing community, uh a growing footprint of a community providing services, had service cuts in transportation just this fall, consideration of where satellite libraries go.

And all of these are costs of a growing outward city.

So I just want us to have a more detailed conversation about that.

And just a minor logistics quibble is I feel like your presentation was a much more helpful way to understand this than the information in the packet, and I would love to have presentations in the packet when possible.

Thank you.

All in favor say aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Opposed say nay.

Motion passes.

Moving on to reports and recommendations.

H1 is the 2026 legislative priorities and bonding resolution.

Um Ms.

Heather Cochran.

Thank you, Council President, Mayor, Councilmembers.

I'm back again after we had a similar conversation on October 27th at a study session, and now these are in front of you for your formal consideration and adoption.

I don't have a presentation uh slides with uh me today, as we did have a good conversation previously.

Um you'll see in your packet the proposed priorities that are uh in much better design format than they were about a month ago, and uh appreciate our intercollaborative um departmental feedback that folks have shared since then.

With that, uh turn it back to you.

Questions on the legislative priorities and bonding resolution.

I do know uh Ms.

Corcoran, that uh at our study session that there was a lot of discussion on prioritizing our bonding requests and whether to go with a one, uh just a one or a one and a two.

And I notice that we are going that in the recommendations, it's the one and it is the uh the East Zumbro sewer and water infrastructure for housing bonding, and I support that.

I think it it really says that this is extremely important to us.

I think with the discussion that we just had uh with the previous item on near near-term capacity constrained, it really illustrates that we do need to increase that sewer capac sewer and water capacity in order to not only uh fulfill edge development, but also a lot of that infill that gets us to that edge.

So uh so I'm supportive of that.

Is there a motion?

I'll make a motion um adopting the 2026 City of Rochester's legislative priorities and adopting resolution supporting the city's 2026 state capital investment bonding priority in alignment with the adopted 2026 legislative priorities.

Second uh motion made by council member Palmer and seconded in stereo.

Uh I'm gonna give it to Councilmember Doring.

Uh Councilmember Palmer.

No, I agree with what you um your statement and um 110%.

Thank you.

Councilmember Miller.

Yeah, thank you.

I'd like to um set a context for why I plan to make an amendment um and then make an amendment, uh a motion to amend.

So several of us weren't here for the uh last study session discussion, which I totally understand is my schedule and um I didn't have the chance to formally talk about this.

Uh but as a member of the ROCOG policy board, we are currently in the process of completing a Safe Streets for All uh safety action plan.

And uh it identifies variety of corridors throughout the county and the metropolitan service area that are particularly dangerous and looks at reasons for those.

One of those consider uh continuing concerns is speed management.

And I would be remiss to not mention that um Minneapolis and Mendota Heights have legislative authority to participate in an automated enforcement trial.

Just last week in the Star Tribune, there was preliminary data released um and reported on that in the areas, even before the citations have gone live, that speeding generally is down 30 percent in the areas with cameras and signs and speeding over 20 miles an hour above the posted speed limit is down 76 percent.

And so that seems really striking to me as an opportunity.

Uh obviously would require legislative authority for us to participate.

I've um had also a conversation with Mr.

Nemeyer and Chief Franklin.

There are some concerns about how that might be administered should we go forward with that, but I I would propose that we have some possibility to still have that conversation because there would likely be a long lead time, even if the legislature were so inclined to allow us that in this session that we would be at least into the 2027 budget year, which we have not yet approved a final budget for.

So I would like to make an amendment that on page 22 of our legislative priorities document, we add that the City of Rochester supports authorization to install signage warnings and allow for enforcement of automated speed camera cameras similar to Minnesota statutes 169.147 motion uh has been made by councilmember Miller.

Is there a second?

I'll second.

Seconded by Councilmember Keene.

Further discussion, Councilmember Miller.

I think I gave a good overview of where I am on this.

Councilmember Keene.

Yeah, again, I just did a little checking with this too.

I heard it, I under had heard it was going to come up.

I think it's important to distinguish that what we're doing tonight is not talking about what kind of design or what we would do.

What we're doing is getting this into our legislative priorities so that if there is a um an um an interest at the legislation, Rochester would be the largest city that would could participate outside of the metro.

Um and I think if we got to that point, then we have the questions that Chief Franklin would want to have answered and that public works would want to know.

And it's important, you know, you when you look at the implementation of this is dramatically different how they do this stuff.

Uh and it's in um Minneapolis, I don't even think they use the police force.

They're doing it all through public works.

So there's different ways to do this stuff.

And um I I um I yeah, so I I'd like us to at least be have a leg there so that if there's a possibility we could get into that discussion in the in the future.

Councilmember Palmer.

Yeah, I won't be supporting this amendment for a couple of reasons.

Um the one in Minneapolis is is a pilot program.

It's been there for very little period of time.

I don't know from a court perspective or how many people are gonna actually be paying the ticket.

I think once their pilot is done and it's something that's been successful or tweaked or whatever it's going to be, um, then I would I would be supportive at least asking questions from our staff of how would we implement this?

What does this mean?

You know, are we gonna have you know 120 cameras?

Are we gonna have two cameras?

Are we gonna just do Southwest Rochester or or how are we gonna actually um place all these um cameras?

So I would I would not be um supporting this.

Um I'd like to watch and see what happens with the the two pilots that are running right now.

Councilmember Wall.

Uh with Mr.

Palmer, I can't support this.

Uh it seems uh uh that we're implying an openness to this by putting it into an official document without actually ever having studied it.

It seems to me we need some kind of study session first.

We need to have some input from public.

We need to have uh public safety.

We need to uh uh hear about our current uh ability or inability to uh write citations and control speeds.

I there's just I this is adding something at the 11th hour, which uh I just don't think is uh a great idea for us on the dais at the moment.

Uh Mayor Norton Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

I I mean I think this is an interesting concept.

Um I think there are cities that use it around the country where this, you know, we could learn from Minneapolis, certainly, but we can also learn from communities that are already using it.

And I think this is just like putting our toe in the water saying, Are we interested?

But in the broader issue here is we're being asked quite early, in my opinion, and and I felt this way since I got involved in this, uh adopting the priorities and the bonding resolutions.

I understand bonding.

I think it's a little early for that for to form up the legislative priorities, partly because we're not even in the new year, and things come up throughout this session.

So I I I guess I'm also wanting to say no matter what we do here, whether we choose to support this now.

There needs to be the open-mindedness from this council that as things come up and actions move throughout the year or new ideas come up, we can add things.

This is not a in the cement decision that lasts forever.

We can take things out and put things in as we move along.

It's a starting place.

And as I said, for me, it seems early as a starting place, except for bonding, which we definitely need to firm up.

So, you know, I would like to see us uh discuss these issues.

The uh council member Miller's brought up, but I also want you to know that this is a living document that can and should change as issues come up in the legislature that we don't even have the thought about yet that are going to show up over the next five months that we are going to want to take action on, and we have to be flexible enough to bring those back and discuss them.

Thank you, Mayor.

I I would I agree with the mayor.

I think this puts us in the queue.

And uh as uh we all know the legislature is a very nimble and fast moving place, and uh things come up, and they're often things that come up that we want to grab hold of when they come up.

And so this is something that I think in concept, and this is a concept is a what would be a valuable addition to our great public safety uh system here in Rochester, and uh it would not be Minneapolis's uh pilot or Maplewood's pilot.

What's that?

Mendota Heights, I'm sorry.

It would be Rochester's, and so we would design it, our uh staff here uh and uh public safety uh uh leadership would be those that we would be putting this together.

So I uh I think it's good that we we can uh jump on these things and put it in the queue.

There are a lot of priorities in here.

It's a 24-page document, and so it just says, hey, we'd be interested.

Councilmember Fredericks.

Yeah, not that I wouldn't be interested, and I I hear what uh council member Miller's saying.

I'd be more inclined to hear from the people that are going to be enforcing it, said something like this comes into play.

I'd be more interested in hearing how that looks if they're excited about it, so on and so forth.

And I'm actually a little slower.

I'm not quick to be a guinea pig.

I wouldn't mind seeing what they're doing in other cities and how it goes and see some results before we try to lead a charge on something.

I feel like we're trying to lead a charge on a lot of things as a community right now, the way it is.

And uh I guess I want to do them right when we do them.

So sometimes it's okay to be the second mouse to the trap, you know.

Uh councilmember Doring.

I'm still getting used to the new button.

I plan to support uh I plan to support this amendment.

Um I I think it's a uh I think it's just fine to be a pilot uh for public safety uh in in this manner and and and like has been said by colleagues before.

Uh this is just putting us into a uh a queue of of priorities, right?

So we don't have to make any uh rash decisions today for implementation.

This just express our interests.

Um and I am very interested, interested in um increasing uh safety for uh for pedestrians in our community.

So I'm I'm all for it.

Uh Clerk Caseau, please call the roll on the amendment.

Councilmember Keene.

Aye.

Councilmember Miller.

Aye.

Councilmember Wall.

Nay.

Councilmember Fredericks.

Councilmember Palmer.

Nay.

Councilmember Doring.

Aye.

Council President Schubring.

Aye.

Motion passes four to three.

Uh back to the original motion.

Any further discussion on the legislative priorities and bonding resolution.

Seeing none, all in favor say aye.

Aye.

Opposed say nay.

Motion passes.

Thank you.

Uh next up we have H2 bid advertisement management operations of public transit services.

Uh Ms.

Fouch.

Hi, good evening, uh, Mayor, Council members.

I'm Rachel Fauch, the interim director of transit and parking.

And here tonight to look for additional input and approval for to release the RFP for the management and operations of public transit services.

So a quick overview of our existing uh contract services that's fixed route, effective this Sunday with our fall service changes.

That's fixed route effective this Sunday with our fall service changes.

We'll have 26 routes with over 650 annual riders covering around 75% of the city population and within a half mile of 93% of the employment opportunities within the city of Rochester.

We also have link bus rapid transit within our existing contract, and we anticipate 11,000 riders on the first day with frequent every five to 10 minute service.

And our paratransit or zips uh currently has over 50,500 rides, and that was our 2024 number.

So we have on average around 4200 uh rides every month from zips.

So in our request for proposals, uh we have uh all modes represented, and so that's fixed route, that's BRT, that's paratransit or zips, and an ad alternate for our fleet management services.

And it's important for these to all be together because we have one transit system, we want unified services throughout, and we want um the ability to have cross-training and efficiency within those routes.

The proposed term length in the RFP is an initial 60 month term or five years, and for one uh renewal for an up to an additional 60 months.

So a total, we could have up to a 10-year term length.

Um for the renewal, the price adjustment for that is either the lesser of the consumer price index or 3%, so whichever is lesser.

For the research and input that went into the RFP that's in front of you all right now.

I'd like to take a moment and just highlight the efforts and energy of the transit team.

And they're all here tonight.

So we have Roxanne and Mona and Sandra and Lindsay, and they've really dedicated a lot of time and effort into putting this together.

Some substantial research, over two dozen, multiple dozens of um different RFPs and different services were looked at.

Rochester is really unique.

We don't we have uh external contract for operations, we have BRT coming online, we have a really extensive ZIPS program and our fixed route, which obviously uh 55 square miles.

We have a lot of service to cover.

So it's really we're very unique, and there weren't any identical um cities that we could look at.

So cities that we did look at were DeCal, Illinois, Gunnison Valley, Colorado, Durham, North Carolina, Charleston, South Carolina, and Sioux Falls, South Dakota.

So a variety of different cities were looked at for us to kind of pull together this pretty robust RFP.

And ultimately, I think it's important to look at transit as a people first approach, and how do we do that effectively and efficiently?

And we want to really highlight the importance of innovation throughout the RFP and throughout our expectations for operations.

And we can do that through operations, management, and technology, but ultimately we want innovation on customer focus, which is a highlight of our team.

We look at um transit is more than numbers on a piece of paper.

These are individuals that rely on our transit services to get to work, to get to their doctor's appointments, to see their parents, to see their friends, and so it's really important that uh we have a very people-first approach.

So we've we've done some legwork to lead up to this RFP, and then some additional highlights that you'll notice within the RFP as we put out.

So one is Equons or Equins or however you would choose to pronounce it, but equals is how we say it around the office.

And it is a computer-aided dispatch and automate automatic vehicle location, which is that CAD ABL.

So that allows us to do that uh real-time bus tracker system.

It also allows us to count the riders as they come on to the buses and um determine on-time or missed trips.

And so prior to the implementation of equals, which is something we are currently finalizing right now, we had multiple different technology systems.

So equons provides one source that's agreed upon by both our contractor and our team for a source of truth, which is really important as we're moving forward and looking at these performance metrics, as uh maybe we didn't all agree on what those numbers were previously.

And so this provides a source of truth and allows us to really look at that contract holistically.

Um, additionally, it seems like a strange item on here, but a city phone system.

We're implementing that in uh Q1 and 2026.

So you might have heard some issues with the existing uh contractors phone system, individuals sometimes roll straight to voicemail instead of reaching a number, and implementation of the city phone system allows us to create phone trees and also queuing and collect those metrics and those data.

So it gives us some additional benefits to our customer service.

And so that is going to be implemented before the RFP is awarded.

And then with the RFP, uh you'll notice we have included some additional incentives, and so that's new comparatively to our existing contract.

And um additionally, the contractor is responsible for the city's deductible.

So if any damages happen to city vehicles or property, the contractor will be responsible for that.

And it currently that deductible is $5,000.

All right.

Now it's time.

So getting into the performance metrics, these are broken down into uh zips uh or pair transit first, and then we'll look at zip uh fixed route and then uh metrics for all modes.

So you'll notice liquidated damages on here, and you'll notice some numbers attached to that.

And liquidated damages are a balanced assessment, and they need to be reflect, they will be reflected in the overall proposal costs.

So if we implemented really high liquidated damages, we would see those in the costs as they came in for the RFP.

So we need to be really thoughtful and and what these are, and these are all based off of all of those multiple dozens of RFPs and consultations with MINDOT, which um I did forget to mention, but we did send the draft RFP to both our MindOt partners and Mayo partners for approval and evaluation of these performance metrics and um and the proposal itself.

All uh 95 pages.

So and both of those parties were really um in favor of what we had outlined and really uh thrilled with the increased performance metrics.

So for zips, um, you'll notice not much has changed, but I really want to highlight that last one, which is the enforcing suspension of service notification.

So if somebody were to call for a ride from zips and then didn't show up, um zips would still uh charge for that ride and that individual, but there would be no ride given.

And that is on solely on the contractor for that enforcement, and so we need the contractor to say, hey, this person has a pattern of not showing up for their pickups, and we need to suspend their service.

And there's an escalation in there.

First, it's a warning, and then it's you know suspended for a short period of time, but that is completely enforced by the contractor, and so we're adding this additional liquidated damages in there because although they're being paid for the service, the service isn't being rendered.

Um other questions on or any questions on the zip's performance measures.

No, uh council member.

Are you going to ask for questions?

Yeah, council member keen.

I'm just trying to understand this because when you did someone I looked at the schedule further down.

I mean, in order to bid on this, you've got to really understand what the service is, what the vehicles are, what the current loads are, things like that.

How what what type of efforts do you expect a company to put in to put in a bid uh to be able to respond to this RFP?

Yeah, so we would anticipate that there's a substantial amount of experience applying for these and um the knowledge and what needs to go, but we can also provide any additional information on the terms of what vehicles we have, what our service routes are, but also that's all included um in the packet when it's finalized.

Okay, this is a little early for this type of question, but whenever you are an RFP, you probably know that there's you know, this number of people that are going to be in, and then there's surprises.

Would you expect to have like six bids on this, two bids?

I mean, I'm like um, we've kind of been actively saying um I would anticipate at least four, if not more.

Okay.

And I intentionally rhymed on that.

So I think it's we it's it's a lucrat, it's a very interesting RFP with all these combined services.

And so with BRT with fixed route and paratransit all together as an external contract, is is pretty unique and we have a lot to offer.

Plus, you know, who wouldn't want to come to Rochester?

Thank you.

Continue.

So for the fixed route and link, so these have um the same metrics for both fixed and link.

And those um again, I want to highlight more specifically the operator failure to log on, and that's utilizing that equon system that we talked about a few slides ago.

If the operator of the of the bus or the driver fails to turn on and activate their equons and say, okay, I'm here, I'm logged on.

It will not activate that real-time tracker.

So it very negatively impacts not only the riders because they can't utilize our app and utilize our live bus tracker, but it additionally impacts our metrics because now it's registering as a like a no-show or a mis trip.

Um, and so it there are a lot of negative implications for that.

So that is a new um comparatively for that, and that's a $500 liquidated damage per occurrence.

Um, and then just to highlight uh completed trips is a metric of 100%, which means we would hope to not have any missed trips and that on-time metric of at um 90%, which perhaps feels maybe low.

Um, but we do have a substantial amount of construction.

I don't know if we're where um and it does make our on-time metrics a little skewed.

And so we do think 90% is attainable with our current um current construction routes within our downtown.

Great.

Continue.

And finally, these are performance metrics for all modes.

And I really want to highlight um the ADA compliant ones with the addition of Link BRT, it's really important for us to maintain those standards throughout all of our our transit services.

And so we have added um wheelchair ramps and the inspection of ramps on there, so to make sure there's always operational.

And the buses are inspected and cleaned on a daily basis, and so this is just getting added into that daily routine and making sure that everything's operational.

Great.

Any other oh, council member Doring, go ahead.

So this is all great so far, and I'm not sure where to ask this question, so I'm gonna ask it now.

I'm well, it's really a statement.

I'm kind of surprised not to see any customer service metrics in here.

So metrics regarding uh communication to customers about canceled routes, uh metrics about timeliness to respond to customer complaints, um, metrics about uh uh incentives for positive customer reviews.

Uh why isn't any of that built into the information that we were presented in?

Right.

I think that's a great question.

And we um I didn't pull it out specifically, but I can cover it, which is like our complaint procedures.

And I think these metrics, and this is where you know the the area is unfortunately a little gray.

Um complaints come in to our staff, they come in actually to Sandra, our transit planner, and then she evaluates those complaints and determines if that is an us complaint or a contractor complaint, and then elevates it there.

And so there are metrics, um, it's on page 35 of your RFP.

Um, section 10.

And so depending on what that complaint is, there is an expectation of resolution within a certain amount of days.

However, those days can be impacted by the amount of research that would have to go into it.

So if it was um let's see, uh I'll use driver complaints on here.

So if a driver is is being complained as being rude, unsafe, or unhelpful, um, we would have to evaluate all of that footage.

And so we'd have to pull the video footage from the buses, which is through our Lytics system, and that would be with our operator and collaborating with them.

And so it would, okay, when did it happen and go back?

So that could create some delays.

And so although those metrics are in there, it is more of a shared metric between the city and the contractor.

Um, and then the additional ones um for uh you know uh app updates and things like that, that's actually performed by our staff.

And so those aren't within our operators or our contractors per view.

I think that's great for our community to know because sometimes the provider or the operator gets thrown under the bus a little bit saying that that communication is not happening on a timely basis.

So I appreciate that clarification.

Um so thank you for that.

Continue.

And um really wanted to highlight there are this is not an all-in-inclusive list, but there are some specific questions that the um applicants will have to answer.

And I want to highlight um our top two on there, which is how do you plan for service disruptions such as strikes, employee shortages, or call-ins?

And additionally, how will you minimize delays to prevent misservice?

And one of the the performance metrics we're not the evaluation um categories that we're looking at is value added, and we would anticipate really seeing if somebody's shining an innovation in these categories, it would be reflected within that value added section.

Um additionally, uh, really want looking for the uh retention and encouragement of existing employees within our contractor, um, our existing contractor, and if there's a new contractor to come on, we just want to ensure that the employees have um the backing of their their employer.

Great.

All right, so um next steps.

Uh, we're here right now, and we're hoping to uh release the bid in December with any additional feedback provided and around mid-December and then uh January, we would have our pre-con meeting or pre-con, yeah, pre-com meeting, and then have proposals due in February.

Now there is a pretty lengthy timeline between February and awarding in November, um, but we would anticipate being able to shorten that based off of the process.

So this is kind of a worst case scenario timeline, but we hope it would be a little bit more expedited.

Great.

Any questions?

Any questions, Council members?

Is there a motion?

Councilmember Keene.

Yeah, I again I'm kind of trying to still try and uh get my head around a 95 page RFP.

Is this is this like is this modeled on some other service the city's done or is this modeled on a different city on how they do transit or where where did the concept where did the like the structure of it come from?

Yeah, like um just the overall girth of the document.

I think it's important um to really highlight the fact that we have both FTA and MINDOT regulations that are embedded within that RFP document.

Additionally, their reference to those documents, but we have a lot of expectation and a lot of um in what what our services are and what needs to be provided to our riders, and so that is really what kind of built up the foundation of the document.

And again, to to tie back into how unique our um our transit system is.

It allowed us to kind of build this RFP because there wasn't there's not another city that looks like us in terms of transit, and so we have to have to build it up from the bottom.

Okay.

Um we I assume we did this bidding about 10 years ago.

Um, and again, which whichever way I I guess I'm gonna make a comment here and see if it you correct me with this or when I watch the airport doing some of their work, they bring in consultants to make sure they've they're following the industry stuff, RPU with all the regulation.

In our transit, we seem to be just our department doing this, and we don't really have outside consultants.

Is that a positive?

Is that an is that a risk?

Um I well I would also say I don't think that's fully accurate.

Um and so we do we do consult regularly with both MINDOT and FTA.

Um, but uh to to tie back to that is our hope and our uh that our um contractor would help bring some innovation in, and we're a pretty small team as you can see.

We only have a couple extra staff beyond what's here tonight.

And so we do rely on our contractor to bring those innovative strategies to us and present them to the team.

Very good.

I you mentioned did you shared the draft RFP with with partners and you said Mail Clinic and MINDAC.

And I'm assuming, and I I think I you've already answered it, but the MINDAT people you're talking about are the ones we work with as far as our our reimbursements.

Well, we actually sent it to their procurement staff.

Okay.

And did you get feedback on structure on metrics that things that they think could work better?

It was um I I believe MINDOT provided three comments back, and it was swapping out specific like terms.

Okay.

Um so both MindOut was very favorable of the RFP as it's outlined and has indicated it's one of the best ones they've seen.

Good, good.

And Alchemistrator Zelms, did you want to add something to before we council president council member?

I did just also want to point out there was a consultant that was that came forward probably a year or longer ago as part of the review of like.

Thank you.

I was not aware of unaware.

Yeah.

My my last thing, this is on it's more feedback.

You mentioned Mayo Clinic, and I I did talk to some people there that they were sort of overwhelmed with getting it, but considered it a really good teaming thing and really appreciated getting that draft.

And I think the one person sort of said, like, but it was nine, you know, 90 pages, and I you know tried to get through it.

But still, I just want to commend you guys for thinking of that and making sure doing that partnering early on.

Right.

And uh I just I did let him know what pages were relevant to to VRT so they didn't have to comb through the entire document.

So thank you.

Councilmember Miller.

Yeah, I'd like to make a motion authorizing the solicitation of responses to a request for proposal for the management and operations of transit services.

Motion made by council member Miller.

Second, seconded by council member Doring.

Councilmember Miller.

I'll just add that I I really appreciate the active um management of this process and the public opportunities to weigh in and the engagement of partners.

Um I think we are in a much better place with understanding what we need of a transit service moving forward, and I look forward to being able to see this process forward.

So thank you for your leadership.

Thank you to the team, and thank you to everyone who's been involved and for the opportunities to engage throughout this process.

Agreed.

Any further discussion?

Seeing none, all in favor say aye.

Aye, aye.

Oh, say nay.

Motion passes.

Thank you.

Uh moving on to H3, which is opposition to a land use plan amendment to remove approximate approximately 140 acres from the city's urban service area.

This is an item that was pulled by council member Palmer.

Councilmember, did you want to preview?

I will make a motion adopting a resolution opposing an Almston County land use plan amendment requested by Adler Metals LLC to remove approximately 140 acres from the city's urban service area.

Sorry.

F 16.

Motion made by council member Palmer, seconded by council member Miller.

Council member.

I have five, I have five questions to get through.

So I don't know who on the staff is going to answer these.

Ms.

Terrance.

Oh, okay.

What makes Terran Eden's.

Thank you.

Thank you.

What makes this site a strong candidate for interim development?

Yeah, essentially this development to low as you learned this evening.

This development is located in our long-term expansion designation.

So that means we do plan to serve it with sanitary service.

For example, we do have an extension that leads up to this site.

We don't plan to do it within until the next 10 to 25 years.

So interim development is really created essentially to acknowledge that a property owner might want to develop and not wait for the city to service it.

But it allows us to have the back and forth essentially, case-by-case scenario to recognize what parts of the development should meet city standards today and what parts can be addressed later.

Common example, which I might answer at a different question, is uh septic and sanitary.

That's a big one as we relate as we realize it has a high cost, right?

So in this case, the development could perhaps install a community septic system, which the life cycle of that is about 15 years to get your investment worth of that investment.

Um then we could service it with uh we we could essentially service it at that point.

So we would time that investment probably closer to 25 years, but it's a way for them to get their money's worth while uh recognizing it should and can connect to our system in the future.

So it's a way this is this is ideal based on its location when we plan to service it, um, and the opportunity to adapt to what should be developed now versus later and have less impacts on the city for what we're uh already and what we have already invested, and what could be um uh absorbed by a homeowner later if they were to connect to to um city services.

And so every every site is unique, and so I'm assuming that the developer would come to the city with we'd like to do A, B, C, E D, whatever, and we would look at that and say, well, we like A B, but C D let's let's let's talk about it, or is do we have a set set of rules for everything?

We just follow that to the T.

Yeah, that's a great question.

Interim development specifically is pretty adaptable, right?

We generally are requireing some things up front, such as paying certain connection fees now, but we do once again have the opportunity.

Do you need to bring it these sidewalks to City Sandwich today, or do we agree on some timeline on when that can happen?

So, no, we're not strictly following everything that needs to be done now.

It is a back and forth discussion that we can have with the development.

Okay.

And would that end up being a city council decision at the end, or is that a staff decision?

It's a great question.

We have not had very inner very many interven interim development policies.

Trying to recall if that comes back to council or not.

Okay, that's that's fine.

So the the third question I have is earlier tonight, we added a near-term capacity constraint designation to our growth management map.

Could you please kind of shed some additional light on why we added this type of destination and how that impacts this request?

Yeah, once more, near-term capacity constraint essentially gives us the opportunity to be adaptable in cases where proposed use might need less sewer capacity, essentially, and can be accommodated without much investment from us.

Uh, this proposed development in Northeast outside Northeast Rochester in the Haverhill Township is a long this is long-term uh development um designation.

So once again, it's ideal for interim development because we cannot service it now and we should not service it in the near future, but we have investments to plan to service it in the future.

So, generally speaking, suburban development is it more environmentally friendly than an urban style development?

Uh there is some evidence to support that that uh urban style or more dense development um has less impacts on the environment, particularly as it relates to water resources.

So the environmental protection agency does have a publication in which it analyzed um a handful of different developments at different densities, and what they found essentially is the more dense you are or the development, the less um stormwater runoff, for example.

Uh you're you're better using the land, and therefore you have less um impervious service as well over a watershed.

So generally there is some evidence to support um that higher densities have less impacts on the environment.

I'd also like to add that in the event of perhaps a septic system failing or regulations around a septic system changing, um, it's possible sanitary sewer would have to be installed anyways, and this is the particular environmental concern that the applicant cites as it relates to disturbing sensitive soil type.

So want to point that out in two respects.

So uh one of the examples that I think Mr.

Wall and I would would would uh bring up to you is north of 18th or wet east of 18th Avenue, north of 55th Street.

Um we've got um right there we have suburban subdued subdivision three to five acre lots.

So we really we can't expand into that.

We can't serve it with bus, we can't serve it with with sewer because of the large lots.

Is that a good example of what we're talking about?

I I would say yes.

Okay.

And then my last question, I think uh generally speaking, how does this type of request impact the housing goals established through the Olmstead County Housing Study?

So as many of you are aware, the updated housing study essentially spelled out we still have a demand for over 18,000 housing units in 10 years.

Uh specifically 4,800 are single family, single family homes and 2100 are for sale, multifamily, right?

Could be attached condos, you name it, specifically in Rochester.

Um the report and our comprehensive plan will support that all types of housing is needed.

The report specifically spells out, and and many folks I think experience this that for sale homes available at attainable price points are less available.

Most of our listings that we see today are $500,000 or more, which does limit access for specific type of property owners, right?

So we would just make the case that there does seem to be a higher need uh for lower cost for sale housing, though we recognize at the same time all housing is needed.

So what we would say essentially is that um suburban development can make density more challenging, right?

Um if uh urban development was supported in this area, we could get density.

Generally, when you have density, you're going to have lower price price points, and it better equips us to meet our housing goals and we can get more in that land.

So in my last, I guess, question is in the past when we were consolidated with Olmsted County, and then we separated from Almstead County.

They we still work well with Olmsted County, they're still our partners in in development in Olmstead County.

Um, and so this came about because the last year they changed how they want to be informed of our development.

Is that not true?

That's correct.

This is a new process change based on the land use plan amendment process that the county directed.

And then my last one, I keep saying last, but but on 48th Street, which which we have a large sewer investment because we thought we were picking up this watershed or those drainage shed shed for lack of better way of saying it.

We have a large investment in doing that, and we're planning on when we put that in servicing this entire area and taking bits and pieces out of it makes that less cost effective for all the landowners on that.

Is that not right?

Yeah, so specifically for this land, we did some estimated calculations about how some of those investments would be recovered through fees to connect to the trunk sewer line cost.

And that estimation for we make an assumption that we're gonna use a little bit more than half of the this 140 acres could be developable.

That's loss of over 580,000 dollars of what we would expect to be returned for for our investment made to connect to this land in the future.

Is that answer your question?

It doesn't, and just a uh one last more question about the the It's your last last.

I'm not a sewer guy, and so I'm gonna ask our engineer there that's that's sitting there waiting for this question.

You have a big pipe and you're expecting to fill this pipe.

If you don't fill that pipe, don't you have more maintenance problems?

Yes, uh Mayor, President, members of the council, thanks for the question.

Councilmember Palmer, yeah.

If if we have a pipe that's oversized, it's not gonna maintain its cleansing velocity as we build out the area, it leads to more maintenance because we have to be in there flushing the sewer system, jetting, uh, and just again, more ongoing maintenance that wouldn't be planned for had we had the full development that it was sized for.

Thank you.

I appreciate your patience.

They were great questions, council member.

Councilmember Wall.

Thank you.

Uh I'm grateful to Mr.

Palmer for polling this item uh for the opportunity to highlight for the community the good work done by our staff and by our council a year ago, because I believe that this council and our staff are trying to make decisions that will be effective for our community, not for today or tomorrow, but for the next 25 and 50 years, long after we are gone.

That we are trying to strive for orderly uh growth within our community, sustainable growth.

Uh as has already been said, we already have infrastructure and utilities that come very near to this, and by uh ignoring that capacity, we raise costs for everybody in the city, every taxpayer is going to help pay for uh that unused capacity.

Uh the reasonable density of housing as the land borders the city limits and would curtail uh other developments like the one that Mr.

Palmer uh mentioned uh very uh near to where I live.

And finally, the environmental responsibility and that using city waters and city suit uh uh uh city utilities are so much more environmentally responsible and cost effective for everybody.

So I will enthusiastically support this letter uh to our uh colleagues uh in the county in hopes that uh we can come together for this uh very important planning in the long-term future.

Any further discussion?

Seeing none, all in favor say aye.

Aye opposed say nay, motion passes.

Moving on to our council initiated actions.

We have one, uh, which is refinement of the disconnected parcels and trail gap analysis.

Uh councilmember Miller.

Uh and council member Palmer.

Councilmember Miller.

Thank you.

Um so this is bringing back an item that council member Palmer introduced earlier in the year for a specific neighborhood as part of that item, which did not pass at the time.

We had requested that staff propide a GIS analysis of the concept of neighborhoods that are disconnected from our multi-use trail network.

So I'm grateful for Councilmember Palmer and the opportunity to engage with staff to talk about criteria to refine this and look at a process forward that's in alignment with our our priorities and principles.

And so what we're proposing is that um staff would continue to work on this GIS analysis by adding prioritization based on street classification, population density, and access to key destinations.

In that process, collaborate with the pedestrian bicycle advisory committee and the new mode shift coordinator to improve those criteria, and then present results and potential funding strategies to city council during study set a study session by the spring of 2026.

And I would just uh tie this back to the process that we had throughout the year of developing new strategic priorities and refining those, particularly in our community vision that Rochester is committed to health and wellness for all for its people, and that it's connected both physically and socially to our strategic priorities of inclusive growth management and responsible environmental stewardship and our foundational uh principles of quality services and social equity.

I think all of those are represented in this idea of how we improve our multi-use network, multi-use trail network, providing people alternative ways to access key destinations outside of owning their own vehicle, particularly through our extensive trail system.

But also highlight that our our uh colleagues at Olmstead County have renamed their parks department, their parks and trails department, and through ROCOG and other avenues, they're looking at a comprehensive trail planning process.

And I think this fits right in line with how we're providing access to all people in the community in coordination with our peers at Olmstadt County.

And I look forward to refining our our sidewalk gap analysis to include a more robust process that looks at sidewalks and trails as uh key parts of that network.

And I appreciate Councilmember Palmer um joining on to this with me and allowing um some additional conversation to expand the access beyond a single neighborhood in his ward, because there are others that are impacted by the same problem.

Councilmember Palmer, any more anything to add?

Well, I think Mr.

Miller hit it pretty much on the head, and and we did meet ahead of time with some of the staff to ask about this, and they were very helpful in uh I think giving them a long term to be able to come back with an answer, I think is important so they can fit into their um busy schedule.

Can I ask a question about that?

Uh Ms.

Woodward, can you talk about how how you see if this passes uh when will this come back to us and the process that your team will be working on?

I I think the first step is really doing kind of that GIS analysis, and then after that is completed, um, being able to kind of evaluate how the prioritization happens, and I think that's more in the public works realm, and so I'll punt to the person sitting next to me to kind of answer answer some of those questions.

But I think ultimately we'll be bringing back kind of that overall analysis through the GIS to be able to help inform some of the other policy decisions.

Mr.

Nebyer.

Yeah, agreeing with uh what Irene said there.

Uh starts with the GIS analysis.

Um, frankly, you know, a lot of this data exists, and it's just a matter of slicing it up and combine it in different ways in GIS, and then it comes down to more of those conversations, prioritization, um, identifying um, you know, what projects may be on the horizon that might address some of these discontinuities that we wouldn't have to come up with with funding strategies for conversations like that to be able to come back by spring to to have this full discussion in front of council, and we're we're prepared for that.

Thank you.

Councilmember Fredericks.

Yeah, just for the record, there's a couple areas in the Southeast I'd like to address all and ask as I get a place at the table when we're discussing some of these things.

I didn't ask you.

Councilmember Keene.

Yeah, just I want to understand.

I would uh I I have a little slightly different view of this.

And when I was reading through the the um fiscal and resource impacts, it said there's no cost to this uh request initially, other than the cost of staff time to create a policy to re for review.

I I was reading this differently.

I thought the policy was to you know to address the gaps, and this is more of a technique of doing it as opposed to a new policy.

We you can you can agree with that?

Go ahead, Mr.

Nimer.

Um, I would agree with that understanding that this initial step is more to take uh a look at the data and identify where those discontinuities might be and come back to council for further direction on how we should should or would proceed from there, both from uh um if it becomes a policy or a program, um, but also a funding perspective, how we how we might start to address some of these as our identity.

See, see that's where I'm I'm struggling because I think we already have a policy of doing gap analysis and we have some funding.

This shouldn't be changing.

The way I'm reading this, it doesn't change any.

That is just a technique for how we're going to go about and maybe a more efficient technique um for how to do that.

Yeah, if I can, council president.

Um, some of this comes down to nomenclature here as well.

So we've got a specific definition for a gap, and that is a discontinuity in the system that's under 600 feet.

That's a specific definition, and we have a program for that.

What we're talking about here are some of those gaps in the system that might be much longer than that in cases approaching in some cases approaching a mile or more, where neighborhoods feel like they are disconnected from the broader system that exists inside the community.

So this falls outside of that program we have for gap fills.

Um, and is kind of a uh a different exercise looking at very large gaps that traditionally have been left to CIP projects, frankly, whenever we get a grant, most of the time to address things like that.

Okay, and again, public I just gonna council member Miller.

Did you also want to respond to what council member keen's question?

That's just a question to refine that as well, because the current gap analysis is for sidewalks.

Is that correct?

Yes.

And so this would look beyond a definition of a a pedestrian sidewalk as well.

Correct.

It would expand into trail systems.

But we council member keen, you have the floor.

We've done trail system gaps before too.

We've we that's not new.

I believe there's a policy for that that we do it as part of uh I mean uh parks at least has brought at least two or three in my time.

So they that that thing is already happening, but um that's how we came up with uh the recent uh trail on the on the rail system.

That's the and and I I think the way I'd respond to that is um like I said earlier, that's been more of from a CIP project perspective, like we see a need and we address it through the CIP.

This would take a more systematic look, I think, at disconnected parts of the community and whether or not we want to implement additional programming and/or dollars to address those gaps outside of a CIP project that comes up occasionally to address those gaps, if that makes sense.

This might be more systematic and may have more of a rhythm to it, if you will.

Um, but all you know, we're getting ahead of ourselves.

That's conjecture at this point, I think.

I think it's more to take a look at the data and see if that's warranted in the future or how the council feels about that based on what we understand.

That's good because I I I view this as very like procedural almost and working towards something, but I I would hate for it to be viewed as this gets approved, and we're now going to you know have uh whole new programs because I don't think I don't think that's what we're doing when I read the council initi action.

Um and the quite the this thing about coming back, and I think it's that I'm not sure if the language was spring or spring 2020.

Spring of is that that's our feels reasonable.

It does, yeah, both for community development and public works.

Yes.

And is parks in this discussion too, or that's a different discussion.

We will bring parks into the conversation to be sure.

Yep.

Okay, thank you.

Is there a motion on this item?

I made the motion when I started.

Oh, you did.

Yeah, okay.

Sorry.

And who seconded that council uh Mr.

Miller?

I'll suck it if if it hasn't.

Was there a motion?

I think it was the other way around.

Miller made it.

Sean seconded.

No, I don't remember.

Okay.

Motion made by council member Palmer, seconded by council member Miller.

Um just a point of order.

Can we confirm that there was that?

Because I'm I remembered the discussion, but I I didn't know if it was in the form of a motion.

Yeah, I didn't hear you uh clerk case.

Was there a motion on this item?

I don't recall a motion.

I'll yeah okay.

May I then I'll make a motion considering a council initiative to action requesting that city council direct the staff to refine the disconnected parcels and trail gap GIS analysis as presented in the packet.

Second.

Motion made by Councilmember Miller and seconded by Councilmember Palmer.

Any further discussion?

Seeing none, all in favor say aye.

Aye.

Opposed say nay.

Thank you.

Um ordinance, second readings, Mr.

Spindler Craig.

Thank you, Mr.

President.

Item K1, an ordinance of the Rochester City Code approving the renaming of roadway section of 36th Street Northwest, located south of 37th Street Northwest between 21st Avenue Northwest and 22nd Avenue Northwest within rolling green's third edition to 22nd Avenue Northwest.

So approval.

Second.

I heard moved by Councilmember Wall first and seconded by uh Councilmember Keene.

All in favor say aye.

Aye.

Poe say nay.

Thank you.

Uh we have one tabled item, which is designating the Office of the City Clerk to administer and regulate administrative citations and enforcement.

Mr.

Cartwright.

We need to have a motion to take the item off the table before we can have discussion.

Is there a motion?

I'll move to remove the item from the table.

Second.

Moved by Council Member Keene and seconded by Council Member Doring.

All in favor say aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Pose say nay.

Nay.

Oh, uh, what was the count?

Uh how many where were the names, nays?

Two nays?

Okay.

Motion passes.

Mr.

Cartwright.

It sounded like it was more than I thought.

Council President, members of the council, Mayor Norton.

Thank you for the chance to speak tonight.

I wanted to save you from some of the mic feedback, so bear with me while I'm up here.

In September, this item was tabled with a message that the people governed by these changes needed direct outreach and an opportunity to weigh in.

That was fair feedback.

And we took it seriously.

Over the past couple of weeks, our office reached out to more than 900 license holders.

We held two public forums, we answered questions, clarified concerns, listened, and outlined the process.

The outreach was intentionally directed at the regulated class because those are the individuals and the businesses that would be directly impacted by the reference framework.

They're also the grouping with clear available contact information.

That's the foundation for a process like this.

Making sure that the people who are governed have a voice in shaping the thing that governs them.

But I also want to take a moment to acknowledge something that's equally important.

There are residents in this community, some who've expressed concerns about this process who care deeply about how the city approaches enforcement, even if they're not current license holders.

And their perspective matters too.

Public comment exists for that reason for individuals to express themselves over issues that this council can affect.

And it's open to everyone.

No one is shut out, and we welcome their commentary.

The distinction I'm drawing isn't about whose voice counts.

It's more about how we structure notice, fairness, and consistency.

Our office operates off of a process that direct administrative outreach relies on clear, predictable lines, or we end up in a process that feels inconsistent to the people who rely on us to be steady and even-handed.

It is within this framework that the Office of the City Clerk conducted our outreach on this item to the regulated class, those 900 licensees to make sure that they were informed and heard.

Tonight's question whether that outreach required has been met from an administrative perspective.

It has.

All this said, the Office of the City Clerk is committed to supporting whatever path and direction the council chooses to move forward with, and we will wholeheartedly do everything in our power to be supportive of that.

Thank you.

I'm open for questions.

Questions from Mr.

Cartwright.

Councilmember Wall.

I will make a motion to postpone consideration of the item to January 5th, 2026.

Second.

Motion made by Councilmember Wall, seconded by Councilmember Palmer.

Councilmember Wall.

I'm very thankful to the clerk's office for all the work done and uh for the reaching out that uh was done.

What I am disappointed about, and Mr.

Cartwright and I had a good great conversation earlier today is that the two people that were instrumental in calling into question some of the uh uh policies that this would change were not consulted because they are not of the licensee class.

Doesn't necessarily mean, as Mr.

Cartwright said, that they uh don't have a voice in the process, but they never heard about these meetings, and we never reached out to them.

And I would like to see them uh reached out to prior to our council taking a position, uh taking action on uh the uh administrative citations and enforcement further discussion.

Councilmember uh Palmer.

Mr.

Cartwright, uh is there is a reason that this motion would be a hindrance to you, or or would it be um okay to do this in January?

I think the question that I have about or my office would have about tabling the item and moving it to January is less about impact and more about process and policy.

The direction, I think the clarification that I would want to note is from uh outreach perspective from an expectation perspective of this council when individuals who express rightly so engagement, passion, and an understanding about an enforcement or general regulatory process to other members of this body in open comment or elsewhere, if the framework and the understanding is such that specific and direct outreach is obliged to those individuals.

That's a policy consideration that I would want to note and take home to my office so that we can implement it.

And I think that would be the guiding star that I would be looking for.

Is this a one-off or is this a policy change in expectation from this body?

I have a question.

So when we tabled this back in September, uh it was that there was going to be more outreach.

There was going to be some public engagement on uh on this item.

And you did mention that in your presentation.

Can you give us what what was that public engagement?

Did you have some sessions, invite people?

Did was it publicly uh noticed?

Yes.

So the primary outreach was for 900 plus licensed classees who are updated and communicated with within our system because we have a clear framework of communication to them.

So they were directly invited to two teams meetings uh electronically.

One was held in the evening, and then one was held during working hours.

The idea there was to have two distinct meetings that were electronic and easily attended and available for people that they could do through the comfort of their homes.

Part of the context there is that our office has clear communication frameworks with these entities.

We work with them over the course of multiple years to make sure that their email addresses are up to date, that the small cohort of them that do not respond to emails, we can call directly, and that we have a very clear understanding of how we could outreach to these individuals so that they get information from our office about something that is going to govern them.

For other individuals, I will admit that part of our consideration here is that outreach or questions, because our office is always open to responding to outreach and questions from individuals who we don't have contact information for, a certain level of burden is upon them to ask the questions to reach out to us so that we can then within a timely manner respond to them.

And part of that tiering system is again because those that are governed by these particular changes, we feel haven't we have feel we have a direct obligation for outreach, whereas those from the general public we are happy to answer questions for, but such directive does not necessarily extend to them.

Got it.

Um thank you.

And I I'm I'm kind of surprised that we're at this place that we are right now.

I'm pleased that this has been taken off the table and we can finally act on it.

To uh respectfully to Councilmember Wall and his constituent that contacted him.

He is the conduit for questions for that individual.

He acted on the individual's behalf and asked for action.

That action has been taken, and we cannot expect in this body that every single person in this community that wants a question answered will get it personally answered.

And we cannot expect in this body that every single person in this community that wants a question answered will get it personally answered.

The way a question is answered often is in a group dynamic outreach to 900 individuals that are affected by this.

And so I would just say we asked them to put together a process.

They put together that process.

And now just you know, they're asking for the action, and I think it's our job as elected officials, your job, my job to go back to that individual that's called the question and explain to them the outcome, not to hold it up any longer.

So I would ask that you vote on this and move it ahead.

Councilmember Wall.

I can acknowledge that, Mayor.

I have uh led thousands of people through thorny uh thorny questions in the past.

And if I knew that there were one or two people for whom this was a particularly critical issue, I would not ignore them and I would go out of my way to ensure that their voice was heard.

Uh they are part of the public.

We are public servants.

I believe that we should serve the public.

I'm simply asking for another uh month or so so that we can reach out.

Uh I I don't think that it impacts the the integrity of the uh enforcement at all.

I I just think it's a reasonable thing to do for people who have raised questions.

So that's all I'll say.

Uh Councilmember Palmer.

Well I would agree with Mr.

Wall and I would to Mr.

Cartwright's question.

I I think this is just a one-off.

I don't think this is a policy um decision.

Um and that would be my answer.

Okay.

Uh I'm gonna uh I'm not gonna vote uh to continue to table this.

I believe that um that there was ample opportunity for members of the public to uh contact the city clerk's office to uh uh be informed about uh uh these uh changes when it comes to citations and enforcement.

And uh I feel like it what it's doing is it's taking time on our council agenda, and this is uh uh I think I think we've had September through November, and I think that's ample time to for the individuals or individual to get their answers to their questions.

Uh Councilmember Keene.

Uh yeah, I again I feel a little bit I I saw some information today on this exchange with uh councilmember Wall with um with uh staff on this.

And again, I see some things in here where uh you know I I really do struggle like the mayor does to say we pulled this to table it to get this information in September.

We get to November and still say, like, no, we didn't do it right.

So I I'm not gonna support uh the continuation of this.

I I'm still going back to the original thing here, the designation of the office of the clerk to administer and regulate administrative citations.

I mean, that's not that complicated to me.

That's pretty straightforward.

We have the um park does this, public works does it.

So I I'm I'm struggling with what the real root causes.

I tried to go through these different questions, and it's it feels it feels just like a food fight.

Any further discussion?

Uh so the it uh uh there's a motion to uh table to January.

Uh Clerk Keysel Caseel, could you call the roll?

Uh Councilmember Keene.

Nay.

Councilmember Miller.

Nay.

Councilmember Wall.

Aye.

Councilmember Fredericks.

Nay.

Councilmember Palmer.

Aye.

Councilmember Doring.

Nay.

Council President Schubring.

Nay.

Uh so uh is there a motion I'd like to make a motion adopting the resolution designated the Office of the City Clerk to regulate and administer administrative citations and enforcement pursuant to the authority and parameters outlined in the Rochester Code of Ordinances Chapter 1-2.

Okay.

Move by Councilmember Keene, seconded by Councilmember Miller.

Uh no.

Uh all in favor say aye.

Aye.

Opposed say nay.

Nay.

Nay.

Motion passes five, two with uh councilmember Wall and Palmer voting nay.

Thank you.

Moving on to other business, Councilmember Miller.

Do you have other business?

I do.

I will be brief.

Um so this is related to item F4 that we passed on consent regarding the assignment of polling places.

Had some conversation with our city administrator and also with uh clerk Cartwright uh about the assignment of these and the criteria.

I don't want to I didn't poll it because I don't want to change these for 2026, but I will just highlight that within Ward 2, residents of Cutski Park are expected to travel west to Harriet Bishop Elementary School to vote, while residents of precinct 10 who are nearby travel to United Way within Cutski Park to vote.

And it seems like we're not adequately taking transportation into consideration, and especially as we grow and look at our city priorities.

I have been accused of being a council member who only cares about transportation, and I will just say I always think there's a transportation angle to policy.

And so I would propose that we just include pedestrian advisory uh pedestrian and bicycle advisory commission and the citizens advisory on transit in conversations about how the polling places are assigned leading into 2027 and beyond.

Councilmember Keene, did you have a question on this?

I don't have a different all their business.

Oh, you have a different okay.

So I just wanted to invite um comments, feedback from from us on council um regarding that consideration.

Uh councilmember Palmer.

Question for the clerk in the last election.

I'm I'm just asking for a general question.

How many people voted um absentee?

Oh God.

Maybe around 20 to 23 percent.

It was right in there.

More than 20 percent.

Yeah.

Yes.

I guess my question is is that's easier than then to they make it so simple to do that that um throwing that in there.

I have in my ward, people will have to walk more than um a mile to get to their polling place.

And I I just think if you want to vote that day and you want to walk, you walk.

So I'm I'm not I'm not discounting what you're saying.

I'm just saying there's lots of different options to vote than the day of the election.

Uh councilmember Miller.

I'll just say I I don't disagree with that, but as we consider the assignment of polling places, uh I I don't feel like transportation is adequately considered, and I would just am proposing that we include our boards and commissions in that process to provide feedback on ultimately the clerk's office will bring us a recommendation, but I would prefer that we include those groups in and providing feedback in the process.

I don't want to assign as a council where those polling places go, but just want to set at a policy level that importance of transportation.

Clerk Case so how uh uh or or clerk cartwright, how do we determine polling places in the city of Rochester?

What's the process for that test?

Oh, it's me.

There's a variety of factors that go into it.

Transportation is certainly one, but we also look at the polling place itself in terms of maximum usage in terms of parking lots, the actual ability, whether it's a combined precinct, how many voters it could serve, and how we could best utilize the space.

So going to the example of two-way, which was Edison.

Oh, that's council member Millenose.

That particular area has 800 registered voters.

And so historic does two factors there.

So to maximize the effect and the efficacy of that particular polling place, that's one precinct.

The decision was made to use 210.

Those voters at Edison, those voters at Edison, then to his point, go to Harriet Bishop, which is able to be a combined polling place.

So that is another consideration there.

The other thing to consider as well is coming to transit and coming to ADA compliance.

How well can these polling places uh work for curbside voting?

What's their parking looking like?

What is the line of sight for the election judges?

And that's all reflective as well in terms of how many voters they have to serve.

So this is my very long-winded way of saying there's a multitude of considerations that do go into each of these polling places.

And whilst distance is one of them, it's not necessarily always the driving factor that's determinative.

Any further uh councilmember Keene?

So, but but I I I think the the message here is that we should take into account distance and uh not assume uh automotive automotive access.

Is that taken into account the distance from the the voters?

We do.

We do take that into consideration.

I just wanted to add one more thing to what Mr.

Cartwright said.

Um each year, obviously the legislature is handing down additional mandates that we have to abide by.

Um each year, obviously the legislature is handing down additional mandates that we have to abide by one of those mandates coming up for next year, is that there's a locked polling or a locked closet or storage space that can be dedicated to the polling equipment for the overnight.

We've had to drop polling places because they can't provide us with that particular thing.

So you know there's a there's a multitude of factors, but yes, distance and um walkability is always our you know one of our goals with the fact that we have to try to make it work in all the places that we have the opportunity to be in.

Thank you.

Yeah, I again I'm not uh I take into account the complexity at the other I know we had a city clerk many years ago that wanted like certain things she didn't like us going into churches as much as we were, so there was changes like that.

I I think we lack I think we the goal of stability would be helpful too as one of the items in there.

I think I've had like seven different polling places in the last 20 years.

Um and but I I uh I is as long as the process includes distance and access, I I'm good with it.

Any more on this?

Just a final comment that uh as far as stability.

I I just would recognize that those neighborhoods, particularly near downtown, have a quite a higher turnover of residents.

Yeah, and I personally knocked on several doors and people said, where do I vote?

Yeah, and had no idea when choosing to live near downtown where Harriet Bishop elementary school was in Country Club Manor.

And all I'm asking is not that we set a new process, it's just that we appropriately utilize our boards and commissions to provide those feedback, particularly on transportation access, and I think those two boards are relevant, and so I appreciate that transportation is included and is there is some complexity.

I I just do believe that there is a an additional community lens that would provide a different perspective than staff in the clerk's office on transportation access.

Thank you.

Uh Councilmember Keene, you have other business?

Uh yeah, and I think this is just quick, but we had extensive open comments on the first Avenue Southwest and the discussion we had had before about how our uh the Sixth Avenue and where where our our future active transit network would be.

Uh some seem to know that we are looking at options, while others seem to imply we'd made decisions, and I just thought it was worth making a comment that there are options including First Avenue, but no decisions have been made.

Um there was a major decision made last year to vacate third and fourth avenue for males future building, uh, and that created this problem.

And now the staff has brought to us this idea of uh sixth Avenue, first Avenue or Broadway.

And I think what happened at our last meeting is we also said we should also be looking at second avenue, but that's where we're at right now, and we're not really made a decision that we have a chance to change or not.

And I just thought it was worth bringing up because when I was listening to the testimony, I I couldn't tell what people knew or didn't know.

Thank you, Councilmember.

Uh Councilmember Palmer, go on.

Well, I'm I'm gonna I guess that's a sore point for me because I think that the the people out there believe that the decision's been made and it has been made for six months and that they're going to do first avenue.