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OPENPUBLICA · PUBLIC MEETING RECORD

Record of Proceedings

Rochester City Council Meeting - June 15, 2026

City Council — Monday, June 15, 2026

BodyRochester, Minnesota

SessionCity Council

DateMonday, June 15, 2026

StatusFILED

Video Record

0:00 / 1:04:09

Transcript — VerbatimClick a timed line to jump · ⧉ to share it

1:19

Thank you for coming.

1:21

I am Norman Wall, Ward 3 Councilmember, and am honored to be stepping in tonight as uh acting council president in the absence of uh council president Schubring.

1:32

Good to have people from the public joining us.

1:36

Thank you to the staff for assisting us uh through our business this night, and uh good to have our colleagues here at the dais.

1:43

Thank you.

1:45

We always start with our open comment, our open comments uh are two minutes long.

1:51

We ask that the speakers uh talk about things that are germane to the policies that we have jurisdiction over here in the city.

2:00

There is a timer here, we'll turn red when the two minutes is over.

2:04

We also have a timer on the wall.

2:06

Uh I will call on the order in which people have signed up.

2:10

Uh please, Molly Dennis.

2:15

Please introduce yourself, and you have two minutes, Miss Dennis.

2:19

Okay, Susan, okay, thank you.

2:21

All right, thank you so much.

2:23

So Molly Dennis, and I am coming up to say that I attended I attend many events.

2:31

And as um as a resident, I think it's important for we us to have representatives, and I saw several representatives.

2:39

I saw Councilmember Miller, I saw I mean so several people during Councilmember Wall at the Juneteenth event.

2:47

So I thank you for that.

2:48

Um so okay, first off, I just I also want to say that public comment is my favorite part when I was a council member of the city council meetings, and now that it's so restricted to two minutes and at seven o'clock and a lot of restrictions, I see that very few people often attend.

3:05

So I just want to put that little plug in as well.

3:07

But also um, as uh person who attended these events, I see there's a lot of these wonderful things.

3:14

I have um there's uh City of Rochester gear, there's tons of I only brought up a few of the many.

3:20

Um I've asked for receipts when I was a council member for how much things cost.

3:25

Those were not provided.

3:26

And so I hope that people uh taxpayers know how much money is being spent, not just on media, but also on the uh things that are brought uh to all these events.

3:38

Um one of the things that was brought to the event was this really neat little Rochester Mayor City Council um passport, which I've never seen before, which is really super neat.

3:48

You put little stickers in this to you know, if uh Councilmaster Shoebring, you can put his little sticker here.

3:54

And then you get a free pool pass, which I thought was really a kind of a clever idea of connecting.

4:00

Um, but but going through this, I see that everyone has a dot gov email, Rochester Mn.gov, except for one of the mayor, city council members, all of them have a dot gov transparent data requestable email, except for Ward 5 Sean Palmer, who has a Gmail address.

4:17

And I had asked this question when I met with Councilmember Doring.

4:22

Your time is up, Ms.

4:23

Dennis.

4:23

Listening sessions, and I have not received an answer.

4:25

I would just want to know why Councilmember uh Palmer does not have to abide by the data practices and have have this uh personal Gmail instead of his dot gov email address.

4:40

So thank you so much.

4:42

I would love an answer, Councilmember Doring.

4:44

Thank you.

4:46

And we have Martha Grogan, please.

4:52

Hi, good evening.

4:53

My name's Martha Grogan, acting President Wall and Council members, nice to be here.

4:57

I wanted to take the opportunity to talk a little bit about the Lyme rental program.

5:00

I wanted to take the opportunity to talk a little bit about the Lyme rental program.

5:02

I attended the Pestrian and Bicycle Advisory Committee last week.

5:06

Lyme representatives were there, and I think we gained a lot of um important information.

5:11

And the session, the season is just starting out, but there are some urgent concerns.

5:16

Some of you may know I sent you some kind of terrifying videos that I captured last week, and I won't play the screams again, but I live on a scary hill, so I'm able to document these things, and I think we just want to make our city as safe as possible.

5:31

I'll say too, I'm all for alternate um transportation.

5:35

About 8,000 cars go past my house every day.

5:37

I walk to work, my husband was a year-round commuter, so I'm not at all against scooters.

5:41

I just want them to be safe.

5:43

So, really important thing that we learned at the meeting is that Lyme has a requirement that to rent a scooter you need to be 18 years of age.

5:51

However, the city has chosen not to enforce that.

5:54

The technology is there, it could be turned on instantly.

5:57

So young scooters are going to be at the highest risk.

6:01

Kids are at the highest risk for any of this stuff.

6:03

Some of us were kids one day.

6:04

So you see these little guys.

6:06

Um, we heard that the reason we didn't want to require age verification is because we would be discriminating against certain demographics.

6:14

These kids, these little guys, we we need to discriminate against them.

6:18

Just as if they wanted to buy alcohol or a gun or whatever.

Discussion Breakdown — Share of Meeting

Public Safety██████████████████████████████████34%

Budget Equity Analysis████████████████16%

Procedural██████████████14%

Affordable Housing██████████10%

Personnel Matters█████████9%

Community Engagement███████7%

Public Engagement████4%

Transportation Safety████4%

Tax Increment Financing██2%

Summary of Proceedings

Rochester City Council Meeting - June 15, 2026

Acting Council President Norman Wall (Ward 3) presided over the regular meeting of the Rochester City Council on Monday, June 15, 2026, at 7:00 PM. Councilmembers Miller, Fredericks, Palmer, Doring, and Wall were present; Council President Schubring, Mayor Norton, and Councilmember Keene were absent. The agenda included a public hearing on conduit housing bonds for a 252-unit affordable apartment development, a request to apply for a FEMA SAFER grant to hire 15 firefighters, and a first reading of a comprehensive housing code update. Key decisions included removal of one agenda item and approval of the SAFER grant application.

Consent Calendar

The consent agenda (items F1–F17) was approved with Councilmember Doring voting no on item F12.
Item F18 (from the Destination Medical Center Corporation board) was removed from the agenda by a 4-1 vote (Councilmember Palmer opposed) to allow absent members to participate at a future meeting on July 6, 2026.

Public Comments & Testimony

Molly Dennis (former councilmember) expressed concerns about transparency: she requested receipts for city spending on promotional items for events (e.g., Juneteenth) and noted that Councilmember Sean Palmer uses a personal Gmail address instead of a city .gov email, raising data practices questions. She also encouraged more accessible public comment times.
Martha Grogan spoke about safety concerns with the Lime scooter rental program, noting that the city does not enforce the age-verification requirement (renters must be 18). She urged the council to require age verification, cited AI camera technology being tested by Lime in Seattle, and called for active city staff engagement with Lime.

Discussion Items

Removal of Agenda Item F18: Councilmember Miller moved to remove F18 (related to DMCC board) from the night’s agenda because key members who attended the DMCC meeting were absent. Councilmember Palmer opposed, stating the item deserved community discussion. The motion passed 4-1.
Public Hearing – DEVCO Rochester Apartments Conduit Bonds:
- Staff (Brent Svenby) and developer Trevor Martinez (DEVCO) presented a request for the city to issue up to $70 million in conduit multifamily housing revenue bonds for a 252-unit affordable housing development at 4395 23rd Avenue NW. The project will average 50% AMI levels, with total development cost of $85 million. The bonds are tax-exempt conduit financing with no financial risk or liability to the city; the borrower covers all fees.
- No public speakers opposed. Councilmembers confirmed the bonds do not affect city debt limits or levy. The project will add 252 affordable units, helping reduce Rochester’s documented affordable housing need (a 26% reduction in need per Maxfield studies from 2020–2025 was noted). The resolution was approved unanimously.
FEMA SAFER Grant Application:
- Fire Chief Pooler requested permission to apply for a federal SAFER grant to hire 15 additional firefighters (5 per shift). The grant would cover 75% of costs in years 1–2 and 35% in year 3; the city would face full cost of ~$2.5 million annually thereafter. Rochester currently has 26 firefighters per day, deficient for medium-risk (strip malls, garden apartments—need 28) and high-risk (high-rises—need 43) responses. The grant would help meet NFPA standards.
- Debate centered on long-term budget impact: Councilmember Wall noted the $2.5 million increase would represent about a 2.5% levy increase. Councilmembers Miller and Fredericks supported applying but wanted clearer metrics and conversations about growth patterns and fiscal strategies. Councilmember Palmer supported the application, highlighting the fire department’s professionalism and the city’s unique risk as an “island” with limited mutual aid.
- Principal Pooler stated that the city could choose not to accept the grant if awarded, but Councilmember Wall warned that declining a grant after applying could harm future relationships with federal grantors.
- The motion to authorize the SAFER grant application passed 4-1 (Councilmember Wall opposed).
Ordinance First Reading – Housing Code Update:
- Spencer Craig presented an ordinance (J1) repealing and replacing Chapters 7-1 through 7-10 and creating new chapters 7-11 through 7-15 of Title 7 (Housing Code). No further discussion was recorded.

Key Outcomes

Item F18 (DMCC) was removed from the agenda by a 4-1 vote; will be rescheduled for July 6, 2026.
The consent agenda (items F1–F17) was approved (Doring voted no on F12).
The public hearing on the DEVCO Rochester Apartments conduit bonds was closed, and the resolution to issue the bonds was adopted unanimously.
The request to apply for the FEMA SAFER grant to hire 15 firefighters was approved 4-1 (Wall opposed). The city will submit the application by June 22, 2026.
The first reading of the housing code update ordinance was received; no vote was taken (first reading only).

Meeting Transcript

Thank you for coming. I am Norman Wall, Ward 3 Councilmember, and am honored to be stepping in tonight as uh acting council president in the absence of uh council president Schubring. Good to have people from the public joining us. Thank you to the staff for assisting us uh through our business this night, and uh good to have our colleagues here at the dais. Thank you. We always start with our open comment, our open comments uh are two minutes long. We ask that the speakers uh talk about things that are germane to the policies that we have jurisdiction over here in the city. There is a timer here, we'll turn red when the two minutes is over. We also have a timer on the wall. Uh I will call on the order in which people have signed up. Uh please, Molly Dennis. Please introduce yourself, and you have two minutes, Miss Dennis. Okay, Susan, okay, thank you. All right, thank you so much. So Molly Dennis, and I am coming up to say that I attended I attend many events. And as um as a resident, I think it's important for we us to have representatives, and I saw several representatives. I saw Councilmember Miller, I saw I mean so several people during Councilmember Wall at the Juneteenth event. So I thank you for that. Um so okay, first off, I just I also want to say that public comment is my favorite part when I was a council member of the city council meetings, and now that it's so restricted to two minutes and at seven o'clock and a lot of restrictions, I see that very few people often attend. So I just want to put that little plug in as well. But also um, as uh person who attended these events, I see there's a lot of these wonderful things. I have um there's uh City of Rochester gear, there's tons of I only brought up a few of the many. Um I've asked for receipts when I was a council member for how much things cost. Those were not provided. And so I hope that people uh taxpayers know how much money is being spent, not just on media, but also on the uh things that are brought uh to all these events. Um one of the things that was brought to the event was this really neat little Rochester Mayor City Council um passport, which I've never seen before, which is really super neat. You put little stickers in this to you know, if uh Councilmaster Shoebring, you can put his little sticker here. And then you get a free pool pass, which I thought was really a kind of a clever idea of connecting. Um, but but going through this, I see that everyone has a dot gov email, Rochester Mn.gov, except for one of the mayor, city council members, all of them have a dot gov transparent data requestable email, except for Ward 5 Sean Palmer, who has a Gmail address. And I had asked this question when I met with Councilmember Doring. Your time is up, Ms. Dennis. Listening sessions, and I have not received an answer. I would just want to know why Councilmember uh Palmer does not have to abide by the data practices and have have this uh personal Gmail instead of his dot gov email address. So thank you so much. I would love an answer, Councilmember Doring. Thank you. And we have Martha Grogan, please. Hi, good evening. My name's Martha Grogan, acting President Wall and Council members, nice to be here. I wanted to take the opportunity to talk a little bit about the Lyme rental program. I wanted to take the opportunity to talk a little bit about the Lyme rental program. I attended the Pestrian and Bicycle Advisory Committee last week. Lyme representatives were there, and I think we gained a lot of um important information. And the session, the season is just starting out, but there are some urgent concerns. Some of you may know I sent you some kind of terrifying videos that I captured last week, and I won't play the screams again, but I live on a scary hill, so I'm able to document these things, and I think we just want to make our city as safe as possible. I'll say too, I'm all for alternate um transportation. About 8,000 cars go past my house every day. I walk to work, my husband was a year-round commuter, so I'm not at all against scooters. I just want them to be safe.

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