City Council - Regular Meeting

All right, it's a little past. We'll call the meeting to order. Please stand if you're able for the Pledge of Allegiance.

Pledge of Allegiance.

Good morning, everyone. I'm sorry, good afternoon, everyone. Obala, I hope everything's okay. He cannot make it with a family emergency. We're hoping the best for him. Bree, could you please take the roll?

Mayor King.

Present.

Council Member Atlarge-Austin.

Present.

Council Member Waller. Present. Council Member Baskin.

Present.

Council Member Postma.

Present.

Council Member Helle. Present. Council Member Obala. Present. Council Member Fisher.

Present.

Mayor King, we have a quorum.

You're good. Thank you, Bree. First item is adoption of the agenda, but I would like to note that there is a Two items that have the same resolution on item number 13 and 12. So 12 was certainly, I was expecting that to be on the agenda because there's been some work in 13 as a mystery, but it's the same audit help we're looking for, so I want to give the council an opportunity to either remove one of those or get to them as accordingly. So I'm looking for action because they are one surprise me that it made it on only due to the I Would like to see them both left on so we could talk about them. I move to approve as written All right, is there a second second? Agenda is adopted number two approving our minutes from June 1 2026 motion so moved second all favor opposed Motion carries under the consent agenda looking for a motion so moved

Second.

All in favor?

Aye.

Opposed? Motion carries. Nothing under item number four, recognitions and awards, and we do have a proclamation. Item number five. I will read the proclamation. It's a little lengthy, page and a half. Whereas parks and recreation is an integral part of communities throughout this country, including Austin, Minnesota, and whereas parks and recreation promotes health and wellness, improving the physical and mental health of people who live near parks, and whereas parks and recreation promotes time spent in nature, which positively impacts mental health by increasing cognitive performance and well-being, and alleviating illnesses such as depression, attention deficit disorder, Alzheimer's, and whereas parks and recreation encourages physical activities by providing space for popular sports, hiking trails, swimming pools, and many other activities designed to promote active lifestyles. And whereas parks and recreation programming such as youth sports and environmental education are critical to childhood development, and whereas parks and recreation increases a community's economic prosperity, through increased property values, expansion of the local tax base, increased tourism, the attraction and retention of business, and crime reduction, and whereas parks and recreation is fundamental to the environmental well-being of our community, and whereas parks and recreation is essential and adaptable infrastructure that makes our communities resilient in the face of natural disasters and climate change, and whereas our parks and natural recreation areas ensure the ecological beauty of our community and provide a place for children and adults to connect with nature and recreate outdoors. and whereas the U.S. House of Representatives has designated July as Parks and Recreation Month, and whereas the City of Austin and the Parks, Recreation, and Forestry Department recognize the benefits derived from parks and recreation resources. Now therefore, I, Stephen M. King, Mayor of the City of Austin, Minnesota, do hereby recognize the month of July as Parks and Recreation Month in the community of Austin. This designation highlights the importance of our community's green spaces, recreational facilities, and the valuable programs the Parks and Recreation and Forestry Department offers. We encourage all residents to take advantage of the numerous outdoor activities, events, and resources available this month, fostering a deeper connection to nature and promoting a healthy, active lifestyle for individuals and families alike. With that, that's our proclamation. I'll get that to Jason. Thank you. Do you have anything else further on park and rec, Jason?

Encourage people to get outside and play.

Right now? Okay. We have a presentation. Item number six, we have Nancy Schnabel with Discover Austin here to tell us all the good things that are going on in Austin. Welcome, Nancy.

Thank you. I'm just going to add to that. National Tourism Month was actually in May, and we encouraged all of the Austin residents to be a tourist in your own hometown. And part of that was a park passport. where they're encouraged to go check out all the Austin parks, and there's a little picture of each of them that they could check it off and bring it back to our office for a prize. So thank you for all you do for the parks. ALL RIGHT, AND THANK YOU FOR HAVING ME. I USUALLY COME ONCE A YEAR AND DO A QUICK LITTLE UPDATE ON OUR ANNUAL REPORT, SO I BELIEVE THAT WAS ALL IN YOUR PACKET. AND SO I WILL RUN THROUGH THIS REALLY QUICK, AND THEN YOU CAN ASK QUESTIONS THROUGHOUT OR AT THE END, WHATEVER WORKS BEST FOR YOU. ON OUR ANNUAL REPORT, YOU WILL SEE THAT 2025 WAS A YEAR OF GROWTH, CONNECTION, AND COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT FOR DISCOVER AUSTIN. If you remember last year, I handed each of you a deck of cards, and I've got a couple of them on there now. You can kind of see that we were ready to thrive in 2025, and so those are Austin-only playing cards, and they highlighted different, not only businesses, organizations, events, but also attractions in Austin. We printed, I think, 2,000 of them, and so we sold some of them, we used them at trade shows, and it was a great marketing piece for us to highlight all sorts of areas of Austin. We promote Austin at eight of the information stations that Explore Minnesota Tourism operates. And you will see in that picture that Thompson Hill was actually highlighted Austin as one of the destination. Thompson Hill is up by Duluth and they tend to get a lot of visitors through there. So we were pretty excited to be highlighted as one of the destinations there. Also, last year, we did the Mad Libs. I think we actually did that at a council meeting where you could fill out the Austin Mad Libs. And so after a year of doing that, we kind of looked at how everybody had filled those out, and the results are quite intriguing. If you ever need some nighttime reading, I can share some of those Mad Libs with you. On the next page, you will see that we participated in a lot of different trade shows with Chris P. Bacon. He is our mascot, the happy little pig. And we also highlighted and updated all the kiosks that are at Riverland Community College as well as Todd Park, which is nice because they welcome a lot of tournaments, playoffs, games, and a lot of visitors that come from outside of the area. And then we also updated and put lights on our billboards that are eastbound and westbound coming into Austin just so that visitors have a little bit of information before they get here or they can do those impromptu stops as they see our billboards. On the next page, you will see why we do what we do, the tourism impact in Maurer County. This information is provided to us by Explore Minnesota Tourism. It's $55.2 million in total visitor spending for just Maurer County and how they consider a visitor. That is anybody who uses a credit card that is 50 miles further than 55912 with their credit card zip code. And so if they pay cash, it doesn't count. And if they are within 50 miles of that zip code, it doesn't count. Tourism supports the county. You'll see that we have 674 jobs that are related to tourism, 91 million in economic impact, and that attributes to 8.6 million in taxes. So tourism really does matter in Maurer County. COMMUNITY ENGAGEMENT AND PROMOTION. WE INCREASED OUR SOCIAL MEDIA FOLLOWERS, YOUTUBE AND INSTAGRAM AS WELL AS OUR PODCAST. WE PRINTED 25,000 VISITOR GUIDES AND YOU'LL SEE THE MAJORITY OF THEM ACTUALLY ENDED UP BEING DISPLAYED AND THERE'S A PICTURE OF HOW IT WAS ON THE TOP ROW IN ONE OF THE INFORMATION STATIONS. Our lodging tax increased. Our group tours was over 100, and just from those group tours, there was about 3,500 visitors that made Austin a destination via group tours. We had a lot of partnerships. As most nonprofits do, they depend on those partnerships to make everything go, and that includes Explore Minnesota Tourism. They allowed us to go to a St. Paul Saints game and throw out the first pitch, as well as take their radio ads for that particular game. Thanks to Park and Rec for connecting us with the Republic of Columbia and South America for visiting some hockey players. And then not only do we highlight the Austin area, but also part of Maurer County. And we had a lot of visitors that stopped out at the Grand Meadow Church as a new attraction to our area this year. Outdoor recreation attractions is huge right now, and we were one of two convention and visitor bureaus that were welcomed into RAGBRAI. RAGBRAI is a ride that goes all the way across Iowa, and for the first time in 50 years, they actually jumped up to Minnesota for a couple of miles. And so we welcomed 20,000 visitors to our booth with crispy bacon. And then we also started a new bike borrow program for the visitors, and so that will continue on to 2026 as well. It was at the Spam Museum. It will be moving down right next to brick furniture, and it can be rented out or borrowed at Hot Off the Press. Destination branding, events, and tourism. You'll see it's really nice when other people actually help tell our stories. You can see the different pictures there from visit all 50 states, only in your state, and various other social media campaigns. These efforts help position Austin as a welcoming and active destination year-round. And the storytelling that others use elevate Austin's brand as a place for something for everyone. Looking ahead to 2026, we're moving forward with a lot of fun things. We continue to support the motor coach tour and travel groups. We have that underlying tone as the food city. We are film friendly and we are excited to have our feature film being shot here in Austin in October. Explore Minnesota tourism reports say that a lot of people will be traveling via car or automobile this year instead of flight, so we've put together a whole campaign with the road trips to Austin. We are hoping to have our forever home before the end of the year, and we continue to work on the whitewater project to move that forward. On the back page, you will see the leadership that guides our staff to make the decisions that we do and promote Austin to grow our community in economic ways. Want to do a couple special thank yous to Park and Rec. They're doing a wonderful job on social media highlighting some of those new playground equipment, the watering thing, as well as the trees for people to adopt, trees and boulevards. The library and the nature center, they fill up our community calendar for fun things, not only for the residents to do, but also for the visitors. The Culture and Arts Commission, they did a wonderful job highlighting some of those utility boxes that are youth decorated, so it's fun for all ages to experience. And then the police department, for Todd. That was an incredible campaign that not only captured the hearts of our local residents, but the area around.

Different Todd than our big people. A little hairier, hard to imagine.

It was very heartwarming, and a lot of people connected to it, and a lot of businesses took upon the AI to highlight their business, which brought promotions and recognition to them as well. Special thanks to everyone who helped with that. And then I also put a visitor guide in front of you.

We try to do something different every year with our visitor guide.

Like I said, we print 25,000 of these and they kind of do a snapshot of everything that's in Austin, whether it's outdoors, whether it's food, whether it's arts. And so new for 2026, if you scratch this, it is a scratch and sniff. So it is very, very popular, not only with people, visitors, but also if you happen to put it in your briefcase and you have four-legged pets at home, they may love that smell as well. So that's a quick little brief update on what we're up to. Does anybody have any questions?

Your creativity never ceases to amaze, Nancy. What you bring in and how you do things is absolutely, you outdo yourself every year, so I appreciate all your effort. You're pretty happy with your Mike Postman on your board, so you want to change that?

Absolutely.

Keep him on there then. Anybody else have anything for Nancy?

Nope. Congratulations. Very happy. Thank you, Mike, for your service. And as soon as I saw the Todd the bear thing, I said, This is literally what Convention and Visitors Bureau directors dream about at night. Absolutely. Thank you, thank you. It was truly viral. It was truly, everybody got into it. It was truly just like one thing after another and just blew up. Congratulations. I think that you've sort of set the conditions for things like that to happen, and I feel that they might keep happening for us.

That would be wonderful. It makes our job a lot easier, and it really is heartwarming that Austin gets recognized in that positive manner.

Nance, the feature film folks, they were here last week doing some preliminary.

That was actually the state of Minnesota. So the feature film folks are coming in to do film in October. They've been scouting for, they've been here scouting twice. And so that will actually be one that will go on the film festival circuit. The one that you knew about last week actually had to get rescheduled for next week. And that is Explore Minnesota Tourism. They are coming down to do a lot of filming and B-roll for Austin in general so that they have those assets in their portfolio. And then they will also be highlighting SPAM on its anniversary, its 90th anniversary in 2027. And then they are also coming because there's motor coach buses coming that day and they want to get some film for that too. So that is going to be more of a statewide promotion. The feature film in October will be through the film circuit. And those... film crew and producer and writer actually flying in from LA for that one.

Excellent. Very good. That'll be exciting. All right. Well, thanks for the update, Nance. We'll see you again maybe a year. Okay. Sounds good. Take care. Thank you. Looks like nothing under public hearings, bids, and awards. We have item number seven, hazardous housing asbestos removal. Stephen?

We've identified this home through Hawley and the Planning and Zoning Department as a hazardous structure. First step is for asbestos abatement. Two bidders on this with JMAX specialty contracting being the low bidder for asbestos abatement, $6,345. This will come out of our nuisance fund, and we would recommend approval.

Very good. Thank you. Counsel, any questions? Mr. Lang? Looking for resolution. So moved.

Second.

Rhee?

COUNCILMEMBER HELLY. AYE. COUNCILMEMBER FISHER.

AYE.

COUNCILMEMBER WALLER. AYE. COUNCILMEMBER POSMA.

AYE.

COUNCILMEMBER AT LARGE AUSTIN. AYE. RESOLUTION PASSES 5-0.

THANK YOU. ITEM NUMBER 8 IS 2026 STREET STRIPING PROJECT. STEPHEN.

YES. WE ACCEPTED OUR ANNUAL BIDS FOR PAVEMENT STRIPING. And as with previous years, Sir Lines-A-Lot was the low and only bidder at $13,554. This will come out of our signed department general fund, and we would recommend approval.

Thank you. Council, any questions? Looking for resolution. So moved.

Second.

Free.

Council Member Helley. Aye. Council Member Fisher.

Aye.

Council Member Waller. Aye. Councilmember Postma.

Aye.

Councilmember Atlarge-Austin. Aye. Resolution passes 5-0.

Thank you, Bree. Item number nine is the, under petitions and requests, wastewater treatment plant expansion and phosphorus reduction project change order number 12. Stephen.

We discussed at the work session the process that goes into these change orders and how these work change directives are created throughout the course of the project, and then they're brought to the council quarterly for approval before you tonight are seven work change directives and those costs are split amongst the different funding sources on the project between the domestic fund and the industrial fund here are some spreadsheets showing that we have one of the work change directives is a large cost reduction so that's something that we're always looking for and the others are cost increases so the ultimate Changes to the budget, the domestic budget has a $175,000 decrease with this deduct. The industrial budget has a $148,000 decrease to the budget. Where we are at to date with this being our change order number 12, our total amount of change orders is right at about $3.4 million or 3.4% cost increase to the overall budget. And when we look at where we're tracking overall with the project cost, we're at about $54,900,000 for the domestic budget. That's when you include all the engineering and everything else involved. We're also at about $54,400,000 in the industrial budget. And our total project now is tracking just under $110 million at $109,282. So with this, we would recommend approval of this change order and open it up to any questions that the council might have.

Very good. Thank you, Stephen. Council, any questions? Looking for resolution for change order number 12. So moved.

Second.

Three.

Council Member Helley. Aye. Council Member Fisher. Aye. Council Member Waller. Aye. Councilmember Postma. Aye. Councilmember Atlarge-Austin. Aye. Resolution passes 5-0.

Thank you. Item number 10 is an agreement with our interim city administrator. Dave Unmocked will hopefully be our, once the resolution is signed, be our interim city administrator from at least through September 25th. And at a rate of $175 an hour, he made his way down here and spoke with council in an open meeting with staff involved. I believe it was last week. He's eager to start. He's interested very much so in helping Austin through a transition from Mr. Clark to our next city administrator and I think nobody out there in the state of Minnesota is more capable of being an interim than Dave Unmock. He has several cities and counties that he's helped out with administration work before in his career and then he retired from administration work at county and city to go be the League of Minnesota City's executive director for many years and retired from that. So he's got Just gobs of experience. I think it'll do great. So if there's no other questions, I'll look for a resolution to appoint Dave Unmarked as our city interim administrator. So moved.

Second.

Agree.

Council Member Helley. Aye. Council Member Fisher. Aye. Council Member Waller. Aye. Council Member Posma.

Aye.

Council Member at Large Austin. Aye.

Yeah, I would say that Dave is an excellent choice. He's familiar with us. You can hit the ground running, so I will vote aye.

Resolution passes 5-0.

Okay, item number 11 is an I-90 business park plat. Stephen?

That's actually mine.

Holly?

During the June 9th meeting of the Austin Planning Commission, the commission reviewed the I-90 business park plat. The property is owned by Austin Port Authority, which proposes the plat to facilitate the development of the property. The area is approximately 25 acres and consists of 11 lots. Two will be utilized for standard ponds. The Planning Commission reviewed the plat prior to Port Authority approval. However, the Port Authority did approve the plat in essentially the same form as the Planning Commission. The Planning Commission, with seven members present, voted unanimously, seven in favor, zero against, to recommend approval of the final plat to Council. Our requested action is to approve or deny the final plat.

Any questions of Ms. Wallace?

I don't have questions on the plat, but I do have just a gentle request for a more creative name for a business park. But we don't have to do that tonight. I was never a fan of the Cook Farm Business Park either. If you're not from Austin, you have no idea where that is.

We have a history of being creative naming like Eastside Lake. It's on the east side of town.

We have a northeast industrial park.

Check that out. Yeah. We can't go against tradition.

Anyway, motion to approve the plat. Just the plat.

Mr. Mayor. Yeah, Greg.

Before you take a vote on this, I just want to put on the record that Holly mentioned that this is owned by the Port Authority. Almost all of it is owned by the Port Authority. There are two small slivers that are owned by the City of Austin. So, in a sense, as an owner of this property, you are also voting to approve this plat, both as a regulatory agency and the owner. The two parcels are a tiny sliver along the west boundary, and that was acquired some time ago for this purpose and intended future uses to put into that right-of-way of that roadway so that that roadway can eventually be straightened out. This plat accomplishes that. And then along the south border, there is currently a bike trail along there, but that is also being incorporated into the right-of-way for what will be a future street there. So City of Austin is approving this as an owner and as the regulatory agency.

Excellent. Thank you for that, Greg. All right, now looking for resolution. So moved. Second. Agree.

Council Member Helley.

Aye.

Council Member Fisher.

Aye.

Council Member Waller. Aye. Council Member Postma.

Aye.

Councilmember at large Austin I Resolution passes 5-0.

Thank you Bree. I'm number 12 is audit assistance services contract agreement So this this one in the next one are very similar with just different people so just a little background on on this one Bradley Carlton is a the person we're gonna Wish to have a contract agreement with and mr. Byram did a nice job writing up that contract so Brad comes to us highly recommended from our auditors Clifton Larson Allen and comes at a rate of $175 an hour to do the job in 60 hours, be done by July 15th so that the auditors have enough time to forward it on, do their work and forward it on. So that's certainly what I was expecting to see here. Again, there's been multiple emails and communication from June 1 when council made a note that we'd like to get their financial director some help. So this... This came about through some work and effort and taking that on from taking the I guess recommendation from Cliff and Larson Allen that this person would be a good addition to get us over the finish line. I'm sure every council member up here is included as what we want to do is get that audit done. Certainly this person seems capable so I would open it up for discussion and go from there.

If we had that one on there Why was there another one added? How was there one added?

The finance department added it. It did surprise me. It surprised a few people. But I think it was June 4th when I had Trish Weichman send out an email on my behalf about what I was hoping just to hold the line if there's anything unusual that we should talk about. This one did surprise me. I wasn't aware of it until Mr. Unmont called and was surprised that it's also on the agenda. So I would open it up to anybody interested. Emily, how did it get on the agenda?

At the direction of Craig Clark in his email that he sent me on Tuesday, June 2nd, he had asked, in his words, what are the constructs of Tom's availability and how do you see it moving forward? This agreement should outline specific tasks and have an hourly rate. Do you see any issues with this? And that pertains to a request that I was preparing for Tom Dankert on this. And then, as you will note, in the email that I sent to Mayor and the HR Director on Sunday, June 7th, I said in my memo, it's page two, Under the audit update, bullet point two met with Tom Dankert about proposal for audit assistance to present during June 15th, 2026 council meeting to which I received confirmation that you both received the email. And all of this began June 1st during the regular city council meeting where I said that I would provide an audit update which consisted of a request for an extension for our Office of the State Auditor filing. I did receive that. The deadline has been extended to August 14th of 2026. And then during that update, I also indicated that we would like to have Tom Dankert assist us with the audit, as he has historical knowledge of what occurred in 2025. And during that, it was indicated to me by counsel that we needed to contact Tom, and so that is where this arrived from.

All right, thank you for that the council. I don't know didn't made any formal resolution or direction given on that but On the June 4th and June 8th there was certainly a discussion with Bradley Carlton you had so that's what surprised me there we were moving forward with that and I didn't hear anything of Tom tankard so either way we have a very capable person that did it and Craig did a beautiful job doing a contract for 175 dollars an hour at total price of ten thousand five hundred dollars and to assist and get that audit across the finish line.

Does Mr. Carlton have experience with city government audits?

What I understand, yes. He has great experience, comes highly recommended. I know some folks on council are aware of him. I am not, but I take our auditor's word that he is the person for the job.

Well, it's my understanding that Mr. Carlton was contacted, and the impetus behind this was started without discussing with finance department first. It's also my understanding that Mr. Carlton will need some assistance from Mr. Dankert to complete this work. So I'm thinking we've had Mr. Dankert willing and able to assist us from the get-go and has been shot down at every turn by the city administrator, HR, and the mayor, which I cannot understand because if you want somebody to succeed in a job, the best person to teach them is the last person to do the job and the problems that they are struggling with are processes and different things like that that Mr. Dankert can explain to them and work through and if we had just let Emily work with Mr. Dankert from the beginning we probably would have the audit done by now and wouldn't be in this position. So I guess on this resolution to hire Mr. Carlton I would think that we should turn this down and accept Mr. Dankert's assistance and get it done and over with and move on.

Thank you, Jeff. But just to provide some more input, since June 1 when Council initially wanted to get help for Emily, there's been 10 different days of consistent communication back and forth. Emily was certainly on some emails on that as well.

Well, I did see an email that was started before that was sent to, that there was communication Communication between former city administrator Craig Clark, HR director Trish, and possibly yourself talking to CLA, Craig Papenfus, that did not include Emily's input, and then she was included after the fact.

Yep, that's true.

Why wouldn't we go to the person that's struggling or that needs help and ask them what kind of help they need and where they think it would best come from? I mean, we solicited help from a person in Albert Lee that had no history with Logis, provided no help whatsoever that I'm aware of. She did a very nice job. She did a very nice job, in your opinion, but the department's still struggling, so why did we waste the time and effort? Also, again, I'm looking at a contract on one, not the other.

All right. And $175 an hour. and a $10,500 bill rather than a $30,000 bill and $300 an hour. I'm understanding it. He's very capable.

And if you would have accepted Mr. Dankert's help back in December, we probably wouldn't have had no bill from Mr. Dankert, and we'd be far ahead of where we are right now.

It was never the case. He always wanted money, but there was a conversation I had with Emily, and she agreed at the time that we want her to understand it and learn it and not to have it done for her. That's why we didn't accept that offer. Here we are with a valid contract. $175 an hour again.

I'm not too pleased about the way it came about on the other one Because Emily wasn't well, I'm not too pleased either with the way this came about so we're even so the way came about shouldn't happen because everything's got to go through the mirror now to get on the Agenda this was put on the agenda on Friday without the mayor even known Right there is a red flag how to get on here shouldn't have been on here Tom Tom should Tom's proposal should not have been on this agenda.

Doesn't a department head have the right to submit items to be put on the agenda?

I would have appreciated just if there was communication that she was adding. Well, it sounded like she sent an email to you that you were included on that this was coming. There was never any email that said, you know what, I'm more comfortable with Tom Dankert. There was none of that. I'm going to reach out. There was none of that. None.

I think it's clear that communication is a problem. And I think it's been a problem on this particular issue for months now. It is my view that what Emily has been asking for is not anybody who can help with an audit, anybody who has accounting experience. What she's been asking for is a person who has the specific knowledge of the city of Austin in the year 2025. And that's only Tom Dankert. She's been asking for that since January, maybe February.

When presented the opportunity, she never brought that up. Can Laura please finish?

So I think that communication has been a problem, that getting what is really needed has been a problem, and that's why we keep going over it and over it and over it. I understand your frustration. I would also say that when we got to June 3rd and we knew Craig Clark was leaving, the instruction was just business as usual. We don't really need... somebody in charge just don't make any changes don't do anything big that was the instruction status quo unless you need something well it turns out you do this couldn't have waited no I agree it should have been discussed I totally agree with you and it wasn't and it was and I guess to me it's more um poor communication if you have two different department heads submitting two different resolutions onto the agenda. I don't think we're going to clear up all that communication stuff until we get a new city administrator in here and it's probably even more water than what Dave Unmock can carry but I guess I would like to hear from Emily if in fact she thinks Bradley Carlton can do this work without consulting Tom Dankert. Because if we approve a contract for Bradley Carlton and he has to call Tom and come in, I'm going to lose it. That's ridiculous.

Not my understanding.

I guess the bigger point is we have a finance director and now we have to hire somebody else to do the budget when we have a finance director.

We should have given this discussion. If we'd have given the finance director some help and direction and training at the beginning, some onboarding to give them the structure and the processes, training that they needed in the beginning, we wouldn't be here. I mean, just because they're a former finance director and they're walking in doesn't mean that every city does everything exactly the same. You can't expect somebody to start a job and say, here, welcome to Austin, you're the finance director, go for it. It doesn't work that way. It's just like when you start a new job, if you're a salesperson, you're You've got to learn the product. If you go sell something new, you've got to learn that product. Just because you're a salesman doesn't mean you can sell everything. I think we set this person up to fail, and until we have Mr. Dankert come in and show her his processes, walk her through it, get this thing done, we won't have any idea what we've got going here.

Is that what will actually be happening? Is that Mr. Danker will be showing her and walking her through things? Or will Mr. Danker just be here doing it himself? That's my biggest question.

These weekend nights and holidays.

I'm available any time after hours as needed. Tom has indicated that, yes, it would be evenings, weekends, early mornings, that kind of thing. Melissa and I have both agreed that we can definitely be here as needed. And to answer your previous question, Mr. Carlton did state when we met with him that he would need to create a list of items to reach out to Tom because there are very Austin-specific items like our special assessments that he has no knowledge of. We have probably a combined total of 100 worksheets just on the special assessments. Those are the areas that we're struggling in. It's not the technical side of things. It's not the accounting side of things. It's the what happened to create a deficit in this place or when did we receive funding for this? How is this grouped? Those kind of things. It's not... an issue as to we're lacking the knowledge needed to just perform a general audit. It's that we're lacking the very Austin-specific information.

I just want to say that it's unfortunate that we have these two competing proposals. They are both, I know both gentlemen, they're both very good at the work that they do. And so, whatever direction we end up going, you know, I hate that they're both up here not knowing that they're being pitted against each other inadvertently because I don't think that's fair to either one of them.

Yeah, that's why I thought maybe we could take one off, but here we are. So we do have a difference in contract price. We do have a difference in one has a contract and one doesn't. I would absolutely implore the council if you go with anybody that they should have a contract written up by Mr. Byrum. And I don't know if time is of the essence on that, but that is very clear to me that that's absolutely necessary.

Has Mr. Carlton begun work on the audit?

He's got a laptop and access, and he's working remote. Trish, do you have any more on that? Before we approved the contract. He was given the authority to at least get the stuff with Michael Gauchet.

Who gave him that authority? We did. Why would we give someone authority before council has voted on this contract? I don't know.

Contractually, he could start. That sounds a little suspicious to me. Go ahead, Trish. Jeff? No. Go ahead, Trish. Excuse me, sir? Jeff? No.

To answer your question, I would say Mr. Carlton probably has begun some of the work. He has been given the access, has the laptop, has the city email, and moving forward, I will say that last week as we were getting that all put together and the multiple times that Mr. Carlton had met with the finance director, at no time was it told to me or to anybody to say, We should wait. I'm also working with Mr. Dankert on an agreement, or actually no agreement, but working with him on a proposal. At no time, Mr. Carlton was here at the City of Austin on Friday. He was here at the City of Austin on Thursday. He was here at the City of Austin on Monday. All last week and at no time was it stated that perhaps we should not be meeting with him or perhaps we shouldn't be moving forward with a laptop or email access. We moved forward proceeding assuming that he was going to be in this role.

And we heard nothing from him. I'm not thrilled about the idea that we assume council is going to approve a contract so we go ahead and get started on it. That's not Think that's not the way we should be doing business if in fact we are doing business I would say that that is not typical.

I would say that when why was it done at this time I? I would say that when Mr.. Clark met with the CLA auditors, and they are the ones that provided the name of Bradley Carlton to Mr.. Clark I I would say time was over the of the essence and some beginning work could groundwork could have begun. And that was what was intended as some groundwork, some, uh, basis things, some early meetings that occurred, um, early meeting early prior to the, uh, contract approval, uh, with the finance director. So those are the type of things that begun. Um, and there probably may have been some work maybe, I don't know if over the weekend or today, um, I, I don't know, I haven't checked with Mr. Carlton on that. But the work that has been started is not a lot and it's not, we're not into many, many hours of work. But for sure last week he was in multiple times meeting with the finance director.

Yes, thank you Trish for that. Mr. Byron, what about a contract? Your side of the deal on having a contract?

So the contract that's before you tonight for Mr. Carlson's services was brought to me with a request that I work with the facts and circumstances I incorporated in, finance department, HR, and others into coming up with that contract. I was not told that there was an alternative proposal or contract under consideration. But if there's a decision that Mr. Dankert is the better suited person, We could work with Mr. Danker to create a similar contract that has some of the similar, how is this going to play out, how many hours are we talking about, what's the schedule supposed to look like. I know that part of the goal that I was given, at least, for Mr. Carlton's, contract is that his time be spent in direct contact with existing staff so that it wasn't do it for them but do it with them with the idea that the end goal here regardless of who it is that's trying to work through this process is that we have a staff that's ready to do it on their own next time. I understand tonight seeing this for the first time that Mr. Dankert is available on alternate times but it sounds like finance department has committed to being also available on alternate times. I'm just laying out that when I was doing Mr. Carlton's contract, the understanding I had is that we wanted this to be when staff was available. I imagine that was during regular hours. It could be done otherwise. The same goal might be achievable. But we don't have a contract tonight for Mr. Danker because it wasn't asked of me to do that.

And we also have a difference of $175 to $300 an hour. I know this council is very budget conscious. That's our lead impact.

All that's fine, but maybe Mr. Dankert's negotiable too. I do note that the contract for Mr. Carlton does say the start date would be upon execution of the agreement. Since the agreement hasn't been executed yet, I don't understand why he started it.

He would also have it done by July 15th, and Mr. Dankert was not. We could maybe request that of Mr. Dankert as well. So here we are. We've got two capable people. One's a different price, different timeline. I feel very confident in each of them. Again, my right, wrong, or otherwise, I feel this was... put on the agenda without any vetting or input or notice. That's why we look silly here tonight. Would you have put it on the agenda if she had actually given it to you first? I would have loved to have heard that she's interested in Tom Dankert. What time did I hear that? So here we are.

I can't support hiring Bradley Carlton when he has said he's going to need to call Tom in for specific information. If somebody was supposed to go to my house and get one specific thing out of my closet, I would be five times faster than anybody else. I think Dankert's the one we need. I think we're not asking for a generalist or somebody who has audit skills. We're asking for a specific narrative about the 2025 City of Austin finances, and that can't be filled by just anybody. So I can't support... Item number 12. I will not vote for that.

I can honestly say I would have absolutely loved to have this information before. I never got access. I never got any inkling that they were working with some other person for this. Not one time.

Well, you might want to check your email. I could forward the email again if you'd like.

Not one time, Emily, from June 4 to June 8. I met with them and you, yep, I met with Brad. Everything was kind of stuff. Would have been a great time to say, what about something else? Not one time. So interested in the resolution, just end this thing.

Well, I move to approve item 13.

So we're looking to resolution on 12 to not approve the independent contractor. Is that your motion? Yes. Is there a second? Second.

Brie.

This is a motion in favor of not approving item number 12. Council Member Helle. Aye. Council Member Fischer.

Nay.

Council Member Waller. Aye. Council Member Posma.

Aye.

Council Member Atlarge-Austin.

Aye.

Resolution passes 4-1.

Thank you. Moving on to item number 13 is an audit update.

Make a motion to approve... Seeking temporary assistance from Mr. Dankert with Mr. Byrum reaching out to Mr. Dankert to approve a contract.

At the same amount or you want to negotiate the price?

I don't know at this point. Except his price. I think we've messed with him enough. We need his help.

Second.

Okay. Motion to second. Taking on Tom Dankert as our audit help.

Councilmember Helle. Aye. Councilmember Fischer.

Nay.

Councilmember Waller. Aye. Councilmember Postma.

Aye.

Councilmember Atlarge-Austin. Aye. Resolution passes 4-1.

Very good. Thank you. Item number 14 is Council Chambers Panic Hardware Door Replacement Lock Replacement. Free.

So I recently had attended and completed training on some city hall and council safety. So following that training, I reviewed potential improvements to enhance the safety and security of the council chambers for elected officials, city staff, and members of public attending meetings. As part of that review, the state fire marshal is requiring the city to install panic hardware on all the doors in council chambers. So I collaborated with Brian Mason. He obtained the quotes for the installation of the hardware. Southern Lock and Glass provided a quote for installing panic hardware on all the doors in council chambers. Additionally, the southern door that's leading into the hallway no longer closes properly. So the quote would include an undersized replacement door slab specifically designed to fit that existing frame. So the total cost for that work is $6,750.91. and we're requesting that funding come from contingency funds. Another secure door located in a lower level equipped with a simplex mechanical push button lock, it's also known as a cipher lock, has failed and that needs to be replaced. So Mr. Mason informed me that this door had been drilled and stamped for this specific lock and trying to replace it with a different lock would require additional time and labor. So we received a quote from sellers, locking key for that replacement and the amount was $1,172 and we're requesting that funding come from the building fund. So we are recommending approving the quotes and authorizing Mr. Mason to coordinate with the vendors to complete that work.

Very good. Thank you. Much needed. Council, any questions? Looking for resolution to replace all the door hardware and panic.

Motion to approve.

Second. Three.

Councilmember Helle. Aye. Councilmember Fisher. Aye. Councilmember Waller. Aye. Councilmember Postma.

Aye.

Councilmember Atlarge-Austin. Aye. Resolution passes 5-0.

Thank you, Bree. Moving on to citizens addressing the council. Anyone in the audience here wishing to speak to the council? No. Honorary councilmember reports. Stephen, you have a report.

Yes, we recently, at a recent council meeting, there was discussion about the point of sale, so I wanted to provide council and the public an update as to where we're at with that program. As of June 8th, which was Monday, June 8th, all of our backlogged inspections were all up to date, and all the properties were notified of their current position, whether that be pass, fail, or... needing more additional information so the program is currently up to date we've also been there was discussion about a public facing program to allow residents real estate professionals and others to kind of see the status of where a particular property falls in the review or even down the road when years pass there's been a request for real estate professionals to be able to just automatically look up and see the current status of a property if it's passed previously. So we are working on that. We're working with our consultant WHKS and working through our GIS programs that we have to see if we can find a way that will work to get to push that information out to the public so that there are less calls to our department and people can just get that information readily at their fingertips. So That is an update from our previous meeting where that was questioned. Also, I want to talk a bit about the bridge reconstruction that's going on. 14th Street Northwest Bridge closed last Friday. And so, of course, we are seeing a great deal of traffic right now on 4th Street Northwest. That will continue as people will start to acclimate to the different routes around our community. We anticipate that some of those traffic snarls that we're seeing on 4th Street from I-90 North to 18th Avenue will start to lessen over time. But the 14th Street Northwest project, the bridge, is planned to be completed at the end of October. The 21st Street Northeast bridge is planned to be completed around Labor Day. And going back one step, the reasoning for the 14th Street bridge closure is is some underground utility work that's currently occurring around the bridge. Part of that is a sanitary sewer project for the city. There is a sanitary sewer line that crosses underneath Highway 218 north, just north of I-90. With the reconstruction that's going on, we're able to replace that pipe. It was originally constructed in the late 90s as part of the Target development. And at that time, we weren't able to open cut it across the road because the road was active. We're now able to replace that line, get it set to grade, get it at the proper depths and grades. So it's been a very beneficial part to our sanitary sewer system to be able to incorporate this project, get these pipes replaced, and get rid of some aging infrastructure that was not functioning correctly in that area. With that, that is a quick update on our point of sale and where we stand with the current bridge projects.

Thank you, Mr. Lang. Is that bridge out there, the 218 bridge, going to be down until it's done?

It will now be closed through the end of October, as it currently is, yes.

Thank you. All right, on to council members' comments. Rebecca.

Yeah, I just want to say that I'm really disappointed in tonight's meeting with the lack of Communication and the way that this is all come about and I'm excited for Dave to be on board and to see what leadership he can bring the city because obviously we need it at this point. We really need to start building some sort of trust within this city. We need to build a culture that everyone in this room can believe in, starting with Council. the heads of departments, and what the employees can believe in. As of right now, I'm disappointed in what we have going on in the city of Austin. Our culture is not there. Tonight's meeting is a really sad statement that we need a strong leader to be put in place of the newest city administrator. And with that city administrator, we need to find someone who is going to build our culture back up. We're going to build something that everyone can be proud of. I am looking forward to the search for the new city administrator and looking for someone to build strong relationships going forward. Again, I'm not happy with tonight's meeting and the way things have been going about. Communication needs to be key and everyone needs to communicate with each other and things cannot be surprised going forward.

Thank you. Thank you.

Mike? Nothing. Jeff? Yes, the library board met last week. Some of the takeaways, the board appreciates the improvement in the financial reports received. There are some follow-up questions that Sarah and Julie will be bringing to the finance director. Fourth Avenue Fest, the library participated in that. They had almost half of the summer reading program sign up so far happen at this event over the course of about three hours, which is awesome. And we are currently exploring how to refresh the current strategic plan which spans 2024 through 2026, and they appreciate Julie leading the effort on that. I would like to say that I am disappointed that we did not appoint an acting city administrator to cover the time from when Mr. Clark left to appointing an interim. To think that this city could get by without anybody in charge for that period of time blows my mind that that the mayor felt that was necessary or not necessary to do. I think the communication part, I think including council on more communication, as you noted earlier in an action, you do not have a vote. We have the votes. So assuming that you know how we're going to vote doesn't necessarily give you... the right to just go ahead with an action because you think we're going to approve something I think there should be more communication between you and council on some of these matters but hopefully now that we do have an interim city administrator selected that we can move forward and improve these things and like council member Waller said work on our culture because I think we've gone backwards on that so that's all I have thank you well

So I want to share something that I learned about this morning and it was really upsetting. A friend of mine was in downtown Austin this weekend with a companion. They were having a night out at a local business like all of us enjoy doing. A stranger approached her and demanded to know the gender of her companion. And then when he didn't get the answer that he wanted, he physically attacked both of them. This is not okay. It's not the Austin that I want to live in. And this is why June is Pride Month. And this is why people like me are not going to stop talking about it. Because Austin is still a place where people will hate you and hurt you just for who you are. I believe that physical violence usually starts with dehumanization. It starts with name calling, it starts with saying that certain people are less than or animals or parasites or whatever. It was a year ago, I was in the same chair talking about the same thing when Melissa Hortman was assassinated. We have to interrupt people when they are dehumanizing others. We all have to do it. We have to take responsibility. We have to create an Austin that we want. This is our community. Austin is ours to take care of and we can set the norms and we can accept or we can reject the behavior that we see. So I'm asking everyone to take it to heart, interrupt and call out that dehumanization when you see it and help me make an Austin where everybody truly is safe and belongs.

Very good. Thank you. Paulie? I'm just going to thank the park and rec and all those involved with the downtown dish on Saturday. It was great to see a lot of you down there, the mayor, Holly, a lot of folks down there enjoying some great entertainment by the young group, Flywheel, and some food, some beverages. And thanks to all of you that came out. It was a great day. Thanks, Paulie.

The only I don't report on is Thursday had the opportunity to kick off the global cancer consortium at the Spann Museum With Hormel Institute sponsoring it a ton of doctors from around the world Noted that it was the seventh global cancer consortium in the first time in the United States, and it was in Austin, Minnesota Doing some good work out there. I know they're gonna unlock that formula to the cancer and treatment or cure With that looking for motion to adjourn So moved.

Second.

All in favor? Aye. Opposed? We are adjourned. We'll wait five minutes for Marty to rewind the tape and we'll do a work session.