City Council - Regular Meeting

To the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Thank you. And Teresa, please take the role. Okay. Mayor Jones here. Ke here. Carlson here. Project. Yes. Madson here. Chilling here. And Bone is absolutely. Sorry, I'm just not having a tough start here. All right. Do we have any additions or an approval of the agenda for tonight's meeting? Motion to approve the agenda. I'll second.

Any discussion? Hearing none, we'll vote. Carlson, yes. Matson, yes. Gil, yes. Yes. Chilling, yes. How about the uh minutes from the 12 to meeting? Motion to approve uh meeting minutes from 12 to 25. Second. Any discussion? Hearing none, we'll vote. Shilling, yes. Harchek, yes. Keel, yes. Matson, yes. Carlson, yes. All right. Uh, bills are in the packet. Any discussion or action on the bills?

Make a motion to approve the bill as presented. Second. Any discussion? Hearing none, we'll vote. Carlson, yes. Matson, yes. Keel, yes. Rach, yes. Shelley, yes. All right. Public comment. They uh aren't they left? It's not public.

Um I do have one thing that I will add in public comment. We are um I've been asked to organize a meeting with our South Dakota congressional delegation, Joy Ho, Bethany Soy, and Tessa Schwan on Monday, January 5th. We're going to meet here. We cannot go over quorum. So, I've asked uh Travis to set in and I am, but if a couple of you from the council would like to set in, you're sure more than welcome to come. Scott handling my phone and uh probably hour, hour and a half. Is that what time? 10:15 Monday, January 5th.

So, we should be able to make it. All right. Keith will be one. Somebody else. I will not. I know. I will not. That's a Monday you said. Yes. I should be all right. Okay. So, we'll put Keith and Daryl. Okay. And Travis and I. Yep. Good. Works right here at city hall. right here. River City. All right. Thank you. That should be uh I met with uh Joy Horn yesterday. Had a great visit with her. So, I Who asked you and are you discussing something specific?

Uh nope. They just uh they want to know if there's anything specific that we would like. What I talked with her about yesterday specifically was uh the feeling that our legislature uh how do I say this? Um there's concerns over tiffs. Let's just say that. Put it that way. That's probably the most politically correct way I can say it. Um and so we talked about it that we talked about it quite a bit yesterday, but uh I think it would be good for them to hear our two cents worth if you will.

Be probably a good time too to talk about what else is coming up on because you know there there's the you know property tax and that there's several items that are going to be up for discussion that could affect a municipality and our citizens. With it being a big election year, there is going to be there's going to be a lot of stuff flying.

I think you're going to see a lot of flying around. Yeah. Yeah. So anyway, thank you guys. That'll uh be good. Let's uh move down to our uh first it our next item of business is applications, agreements, hearings, resolutions, ordinances. We have a resolution 2025-12 to accept the utility improvement up at 1051 Rude Trail. And for those of you that maybe weren't here when we did this, what we this really boils down to is we oversized the sewer through these uh through this property. So if and when we ever need to go sewer underneath the interstate, we have it o oversized so we can do that.

And water and water. So we need the water and sewer mains basically made and take it to the property line which will allow us to hook on and go into the interstate at some point in the future when development what's happening there. So just a good plan ahead. Y and um it's been all inspected and reviewed by ISG and meets city standards. So this resolution basically states that we're going to take over those pipes as city mains now and we'll maintain and take care of them going forward. All tests on the main and exceeded city standards. So everything's passing everything. It's good enough. Yep.

Did I see a possible new water tower, too? Or did I read that wrong? Well, say it again. Water tower. You're not far off. years. You're not far off. In fact, we're Is that going to be in the water study? We're going to talk about that a little later when they go over the water study. But it's interesting that you say that. He's the only one that was right. Rest of thought I was going to be on the other side of town. Make a motion to approve resolution 2025-12 and accept utility improvements at 1051. Second.

Any more discussion? Hearing none, we'll vote. Shilling, yes. Harace, yes. Keel, yes. Matson, yes. Carlson, yes. Thank you. All right, we'll move down to reports. Uh, fire chief's report is in the packet. I think he will be here in person next month, correct? Yep. Should be. All right. Fortunately, with the snow, they haven't been uh too busy, I don't think.

I'll steal a little bit of his thunder. And during the hometown Christmas, while I was slinging pancakes back there, I was admiring their new gym equipment. Apparently, there was a grant that was they were that they received for some equipment, some gym equipment, I But yeah, like a squat rack and a bench, that sort of thing. Yeah. Okay, cool. The Yeah, there's a few of them. Yeah. Best bulked up player. That's why That's why you're looking like you are, Craig. Been down there bumping on a wire. It's a little lighter than that.

Doing a little 10 pounders, huh? Yeah, that's good. And I would also I'll do a little steel thunder. I thought that they the trucks looked fantastic in the parade. Yeah, they were really close on the mayor's choice, but then I thought that's going to look, you know, I didn't want to Yeah. But yeah, they look great. All right, good enough. Uh, we'll move down to Kyle Christensen's report. Building inspector code enforcement. How are you doing, Kyle? Good. Uh, if you have any questions on my report, just let me know.

Um, do you want to ask or you want me to, Travis? You know the thing we asked about. I asked Kyle today about the house of Kitty Corner across and sure. Did you get a chance to talk to Paul? Uh, I did. So, the city last year, December 10th of last year, planning zoning, they lifted the condemnation. So, at this point, we're just dealing with a standard building permit just like if it were any other resident and I got an update from the property owner today and he's still doing some work and we'll just touch base in a month from now to see if we need to remove that permit. Okay. Okay. Other than that, but they are not loading in there. Correct. Right. Okay.

As far as I know. Right. Okay. Anyway, just curious. Yeah. Several community members had asked me about it. I didn't know. Hadn't talked about it for a while. So, all right. Anybody? How's the snow been? You had much issues with people parking here and there and everywhere. Uh, parking. No, I've sent out a few letters today for sidewalks. Okay. But I haven't touched maybe a quarter of the town today as all. So, okay. All right. Anybody got any questions for Kyle?

What is the ordinance? How quickly are they supposed to have sidewalks? 24 hours after termination of snow. So, when we put an alert on, they got day. Well, that's to clear the sidewalk. I mean, the snow alerts for parking on the I know. But I mean, do we kind of judge by that or do you judge by when it quits snowing? When it quits. Okay. The guys when they go out and plow for the parking on the street once they get done plowing, they'll call it in the metro and have them come out, start ticking. You know, you can see any vehicles they've gone around. If they're still sitting there, they'll get a ticket,

right? And then for the sidewalks, you know, Ma's and following the snowfall, he'll drive around and look, then I'll let I know that guy that runs the city maintainer, he likes to wait till my sidewalk's clear and then come by and wing it onto me. Wait for me. That's just Yeah,

I'm thinking about trading Patrick with them guys, too, so I can go Patrick. Yeah. All right. If there's nothing else for Kyle, we'll keep rocking on. All right. Next up, city engineer report. Most favorite time of the evening. I'll say that because the intern is with you tonight.

Good evening everyone. Uh reports in the packet. Uh as you can imagine with the snow and seasons, construction has slowed down on the water resource recovery facility and Western Avenue and are just tracking punchless items uh at this time looking at spring completion for both of those. um uh Mickelson Rose shared use path still anticipate um survey here uh in December um or this winter for following prior to design and uh bidding in the spring uh with that planned uh summer fall construction next year. Um still waiting on some approvals from DOT. Everything signed in their court.

Everything signed in their court. Um based on based on what we've heard, still still confident that schedule. Um but we'll keep you keep you in the loop should anything change. Um citywide water model comments have been provided to to AB2S. They're the ones assisting us on that water model uh there. So they've taken comments that that we've provided to them as well as Craig and Teresa uh with our review a couple weeks ago making those updates. Um don't foresee any of those updates drastically changing the report. Uh truly a lot of the changes are just to to increase the accuracy and there's a few remains that were actually undersized in the model that that will be um size will be revised to the true size which actually will increase the flow or uh improve the uh the performance of the system. So, um, we provide that final report once it's, uh, ready. Um, and happy to discuss that and then if you had a couple questions or just some queries on there.

Um, following up on last meeting, there was, uh, some discussion on the lift station, uh, some ballard some protection out there. Um, so as noted the previous meeting, uh, Ballards uh, along the north side of the lift station, approximately $12,000. Uh, additionally, uh, Craig wanted to look at some chain link fence around that just to secure that area with all that equipment there. Rice Lake did provide a, um, estimated cost for that uh, late yesterday. Alex, uh, with that including Ballards, uh, is about $31,000. Uh, I will say the estimate did include barbed wire on the chain link fence, which I know

is is not uh, allowable in town. So a revised estimate if necessary for that to at the top or at the at the top. Yes. Do we need a chain link bench event? You're recommending that it goes all the way around those. That was that was one of the things brought up with with your discussion just securing the site so you know the public or you know Sure. Yeah, couldn't couldn't come in. I didn't know if it was if it was a more thing or if it was a security. I don't know if they're going in if chain link is going to keep them out. Yeah, chain link is direct, you know, prevent people access, not necessarily cars coming off the road, which was

if they want to get in, even if there's a chain, they're going to get in all the equipment is locked and stuff. So, there you worked the design. So, you know, the question would be just going with ballards, which will help with the traffic. I mean, chain link fence will too. If we were going to do the chain link fence, I think it makes sense to go all the way around. A few things for consideration that we did talk about though early on is just understanding that chain link fence may catch a lot of corn husk and stuff in the fall. So, keeping that in mind, another thing from my perspective too, it goes a little bit green. Um, I'm going to call it directionally south, but it's actually kind of east, too. That would be our access to the gravity line. So, if I box in that area and on chain link, that's to our access to the rest of that gravity line. Uh, just some consideration as well. So, any additional comments from your perspective, Craig? No, that's like I said, if you do fencing or whatnot, it's got to be a fairly decent size fence and highway.

You need to be able to get equipment around snow removal and everything else too in there trying to keep open. So, no, I I saw there was a comment from a resident that uh mentioned, you know, just the site of of that area. Um I don't know if uh you know can you put up a chain link fence you know if you have you seen those strips like those plastic strips that go between the

So you know there there would be that opportunity with the chain link fence to put those strips in there. Uh sometimes those do become more maintenance maybe an alternative suggestion of mine. Mayor asked me to think about this and look into it. Um, I think you could get by with some lowcost landscaping, you know, just like a six foot pedro or something in there just to kind of mask that, especially when you're driving into town. Kind of visualize where that Harford sign is and then right behind it is that panel. So, you could do a small screening, whether it's maybe grasses that get up, they're going to be a little shorter, but some of those shrubs that get up about that six foot tall maintenance, you know, for public work side will kind of blend into that area. a little bit of that prairie natural feel in there that's going to be masked on that side, you know, the other side coming down. Don't know if it's as big a deal like your guys at some foot too because you're not seeing that sign. So, that would be my suggestion in looking at that some type of spread.

Yeah, I mean I think I'm open to the fencing discussion, but I'm with Travis. I mean, my thoughts too were just like damage. Um, somebody's sliding off that road because inevitably they'll hit it. So, I don't know what that is compared to what some ballers cost us. And I also like the idea of a little landscaping, right? Um, but if we feel strongly about a fence, I mean, we don't have a lot of room between the generator and the transport for the state do right away. So, it's pretty tight. So, we we have to watch that, too. Right. Right.

Well, we're in December. Is it something we're going to get done yet this fall or is it something that we should The followers definitely could. I mean, if we could have, you know, some direction on that, they'd be able to get those, right? Especially with a nice warmer week like this, you know, folks looking for something to do. So, we just do the ones like that are on the back side of it. Yeah. And we would recommend maybe going with like black cover versus that yellow cover. That way it kind of blends in a little bit more, too. And that 12,000 figure, Michael, is that what three six? How many is that? I believe it was closer to 10. Yes, there was 10. Well, you kind of need an angle, right? I mean,

you're going to go one one side and around the what I would call the back or the toward the sign. I was thinking we'd go two sides. Are we going to go three sides? We already got some on the back side. Look at you. Side toward the road and the side toward the sign or the Yeah, I think that's Is this that metal that big metal looking building thing? No. Well, it's on kind of pipes coming out of the ground. It's just before you get to Hartford Heights on the south side of the road right there at the intersection. There's generator there. There's a transformer there. There's you'll see some concrete down below.

If you look right by that Hartford, that new Hartford Road, it's all that stuff just to the west. That's all of our left station. a lot of the the personally I think my concern is those uh uprights with the panels on them. That's the that's what gives me the most that's where I was thinking where if it wasn't so much of an eyesore. Maybe you go more of an artistic realm versus, you know, like in downtown Sou Falls, all of their I don't even know like the big huge units that I have in the alley that are like Subali Energy and Transformers. Yeah. You know, they make them more artistic. They put wraps or one word starts with T.

Uh, you know, more of an artistic realm. Um, I think you could look. I don't know if they're big enough. I don't know. I mean, you can look at something like that, too, along with landscaping if Yeah, if we can, but I think the big concern was damage from cars in the ditch. For me, I was thinking cars going out of town. I was most likely someone in that lane, somebody coming around the curb, right? That's what I would think, too. a decorative cover uh in black is 100 bucks. So it wouldn't have to be just a standard ballard and just a a black

better than neon yellow. Definitely better than safety yellow. And then and then maybe we can talk about landscaping in the spring. Even something minimal if it's just putting in bushes or Yeah. And even when we get a little closer and have some of that, maybe a little display put together with some pricing on it and some options on what that cost. Is this money we can take out of our contingency or how does it how do we do this? Just pay for it. I don't know where did Rice Lake give you the price. So dollars. Yes.

So it's going to go through Rice Lake. So probably can come on if we want. So that's just going to be a steel ballard. And would we be responsible for the covers on it or the same? They'll just be different. We get to pick the ballard covers. What's that? Do we get to pick the ballard covers or they're like candy cane, you know? Yeah. We could go season them. Can we get Can we get Christmas covers? You can actually. I bet you could. We already budgeted for next year. That kind of takes care of what Michelle's after. We're getting, you know, we're getting sassy,

you know, but I do think depending on what we could put something you could do. I don't know if there just make if it's already an eyesore and they're going to put ballards out there and make it even more of an isore. I mean, what is this one? Hold on. Back up. What's that one? Yeah, I safety background. wrapper. What is that? Yeah. Ballard socks holiday assortment. Oh, all done. There we go. There we go. Definitely. There we go. So, what's the purpose of the chain link fence? Is that in addition to bers?

No, chain link is just another option of a way of maybe controlling traffic in there and then also for security, but we really don't need security or secure down here. So, I'd like to see what the balls look look like all by themselves. And then we can always add on sprinkles of candy cans. I do like that by the way. Peppermint sticks. Oh, that's cool. That'd be fun. Change lively. Change them seasonally. Lively. Some of them would say lively. You guys got it. The mayor's face. We can change them season. Like my picture. Like my picture over at the brewery on the beer deal.

You get the alchemist club. Change those up. Right. Maybe too. How do we proceed? I see it's for discussion only on our agenda. We would clearly like to proceed and I don't know. Is it going to cost a lot more to do it now for some reason or it'll be the same in the spring? We're going to do it and we're going to do it for the premise of protection during winter months. Recommendation is that we would since we have it on the agenda, can we vote on it tonight? Even though it's a discussion, we make a motion. So you can after your discussion you can make your motion whatever way you want to do it. So

motion to approve the installation of up to 12 ballards along the uh with station at highway 38. Would that be with like the black covers then blue? Okay, I'll second that then. All right, any more discussion? Can we add covers for the neon yellow ones or do they have to be yellow for some reason? Might as well cover them while you're They'll be black. Are the other ones? They're just covers. So, we could take the yellow ones off if we wanted and put black ones on there. I mean, might as well. We might as well have them all look at once. Yeah, we can work that in as we're going. We like to match, right? And do we want them to order a set of Christmas?

We're not going to get a man in time this year. Okay, we better be looking at Valentine's Day. Okay, never mind. Okay. Any more discussion on this? All right. Let's roll. Carlson, yes. Matson, yes. Ke, yes. Harach, yes. Chile, yes. All right. Thank you. What else you got, Michael? That was great discussion there. It was you took us down a great uh No, that's all I had unless there was any other any other questions for us. Um, were we going to do a short

I will give just a quick little update on the water model. know how one meeting was going to go tonight. So draft report is being updated into the final report. Um you know a lot of good news to report out of uh the water study system does look really good for where we're at today. Um which does say you know that it was a good time to do it. That way we can continue to plan for the future. So, some of those recommendations are some main um updates running parallel with main along Western Avenue and then a new water tower um at a time once once our demand meets it that proposed water tower would be on the west side of town. Um and I know AR and I had a discussion on this. He was

he was a little a little surprised that I was for sure on the east side of town large region for the west side is just elevation reason. So, uh, with water main having everything in pressurized system, so water power on the high side of town to put that pressure all the way through. So, everything looks really good. Um, like I said, proposed water tower, few main extensions, uh, would be proposed for future projects. Once we get that full report, I'll be able to provide that to you guys. I will have some cost estimates, too. That way, when we do look at capital improvement planning in the future, understand what those timelines are, we can pull those projects in. We'll also use this to um facilitate conversations as the city continues to develop. So as partials of land continue to grow, understanding what that size of needs to be as we continue to push out development. So um overall said really good no major concerns which is a relief on that existing system. So

good there's so there would be I mean eventually there there up to three water dollars. The one is out of service. Oh, it's just uh basically just a tower for antennas. Yep. One over by landmark. Okay. So, this would take us to about 2055. So, after that there may be the potential for another water tower after that. I was counting the the nonfunctional one. Yep.

But 2055 potentially two after water towers. So, I know Sean has asked a question several times. I know it's not here, but I'll just note it. Um, the maximum day in 2024 for water usage was around half million gallons in your guys's average state is about 22,000. So, all right. Any questions for Justin on the water survey or study? We'll see beautiful maps and stuff next time. Beautiful maps. That's what we like. Pictures. Big, beautiful,

big, beautiful map. Beautiful maps. All right. Do you want to share the other uh thing I got for you guys? Just wanted to congratulate you guys on an award. Uh so ISG did submit award for the Harford wastewater treatment facility through ACC Iowa. So it was an award across our border that we did submit it for you guys wastewater treatment plan. So it did get selected based on all the projects um that did allow for projects to come in from instate and out of state. So congratulations on that award American Council of Engineering Companies. Got it. What is the award for?

So the award is the honor award in the water or wastewater category for the 2026 excellence. So kudos to the engineering department, too. Kudos to you guys as well. So, thank you. It's pretty cool to see a good project like that. Uh, not only have the ribbon cutting, um, but also an award pack onto it. So, congratulations. That boom won an award. Wow, that's great. That's nice little hardware that that Ardan can bring back. You bet. They're giving it when it's on. It was on Facebook. Call it dog. Yeah, it's in May 21st of May or 20th May. May 20th and 21st.

Yeah. May 20th. So, I'll go down. Yeah. You a co-pilot? Well, somebody I think will take the ISG corporate jet. Where is it at? I want to go De Mo tour of the Kinsey plant on your Toyota. I've been in Kinsey so many times I could give the tour. All right. Thank you, Justin. Anything else for the engineers? If not, we'll move on to Craig.

Uh, just a few updates from my report. Uh, tomorrow we're going to be working on that speed limit sign. Uh, we got framework done for. We just been kind of busy today with other stuff going on for the wastewater facility. Um, slurry seal project. I'll be working on that today or tomorrow or Wednesday. Wednesday. Thursday. getting that done. Um, it's all done. I just got to review what Michael sent back to me. Um, lift station. Now, we did have a uh issue with that light shining and the homeowner up there. So, we are going to uh get down the loader basket and lift it up and just turn it 90°. Hopefully, I'll take care of the issue. Working on that this week, too. Which one? I'm sorry.

The lift station. There's a that LED light. It's facing north and it's of course they've never had light almitted before. So all of a sudden it's bright north. So we're going to try turning it and see if that works. First while you're there um if you're eastbound and you happen to look towards this welcome to Hartford sign that light uh is a bit of a distraction as well. So the ground mounted light. Okay. Turn it. Turn it. Yes. I think a little bit towards south maybe. Okay.

Haven't been all the way up. Okay. Yeah, we can certainly look at that. Get that turned. Um reports, uh DMRs, we did finish up the November DMRs for both the ponds and the wastewater treatment plant. So, them are sent in, submitted. Uh parks, uh we did Eric did get started on that bathroom again. Uh he's got the rafters up and the sheeting up on that. He's going to start working on the steel work tomorrow, so we'll keep working on that. And we did u pick up a liner and fill the ice skating rink. We just got to trim it yet and then um wait for the ice to get hard. So, and as soon as we get it done, then it turns 40 degrees.

Yep. But every year and that's all I got in my report unless somebody has something for me. Any questions for Craig? All right. Thank you, Craig. We'll move on to Karen's report. Anything exciting to add, Karen? No, not really. Other than you got a new desk. I got a new desk. I'm excited about that. Yeah. What increase in revenue did we What percent did we figure on in sales tax increase for next year?

Do you remember during a budget? We do not. Just curious since looks like we're we backed it down because this year we were not on track for what we proposed to have. Usually we the last few years we've gotten like around 10%. Well, we haven't got that. This year we're not increasing by that much. I think our our third penny we are. I think we're around that 10 to 12% increase. Our first and second penny we're lagging them behind a little bit. Sometimes it's a matter of timing for when payments hit.

And that is true if you're looking at the sales tax report because a lot of times we get them right at the end of the month. So it depends on if it hits the first or that may not be as ugly as it looks here, right? Okay. Well, I mean if we're less than last year and we know we had an increase that we built in for last year and we're already behind from the year before. Like how far off are we? And this year we budgeted 920 first penny 920 second penny and next year we're budgeting 900 first penny 900. So we did bring it back because we know we won't hit budget from this year.

This year so we knew we are laying a little behind. So you know we tried to anticipate that for next year. So our budget isn't way off. Yes. Looking at it towards the end of the year it's more a little more reality maybe than when we were entertaining budget this summer. Okay. Yep. Exactly. That then again that's how we kind of try to look at when we do budget of how we're on track for so all right is the I see there's been some some cash spent uh for various supplies and appliances at the wastewater treatment facility. How's the buildout on that going as far as like cabinets and desks and chairs?

Uh cabinets were supposed to be here Friday. they haven't showed up yet. Um, otherwise I think they a lot of the other stuff that we're supplying and doing is pretty much like you said the desk and the chairs and the conference table, the fridge, the we trying the mats, the wines. Yeah, we're we're trying to get it all supplied with this budget because we put quite a bit in this budget. So, sounds good. So, it's been like Christmas out at the wastewater plant. It's all coming in. Well, it'll make attracting new hires easier. Yeah. Yeah. It's not done just a baron, right? But we have no cabinets or counters yet.

Okay. But that's that's Rice Lake. All right. Anything else for Karen? Thank you, Teresa. Let's move to your report.

Okay. Don't have a whole lot to add from what I have in there. Um, I will let you know I did have a meeting um with DSU and Homeland Security Day about our cyber security assessment on our system. Um, this was basically kind of to go through the steps and the process of of what that's all going to entail. Uh we did kind of an assessment of we had to get it in on it to see you know what we do have in place already you know and um get all our IP address kind of give them them the technical information their assessment um is actually going to be I think February 2nd is when they're going to start the assessment it's about a 3-week process um at the end of that they will give us a report to say here's where we're good and tight here's where we're lacking in um say the report says, "Hey, you will need to get a better firewall in or whatnot." With Homeland Security and the grant that is out there with government, any upgrades we need to do, hardware or software, that's all paid through the grant 100%. So, literally this um cyber security assessment and if any upgrades we need with a grant out there now and if we got on this program like we did, it will not cost the city anything to get us the best possible, you know, system in place. really glad we got on top of that.

Yep. Yep. Like I say, getting getting signed up and getting part of this grant really um is a good thing. Um with Homeland Security, they too at least for a year will um every month monitor your system too on top of our IT and on top of DSU. So, we're getting kind of a a third level of security monitoring, too. So, yeah, it's a good thing. So, like I said, they plan to start that in February. Um, and like I said, we'll see what comes out of that report to see whether we need to do some upgrades or not and hopefully get something covered to I will warn you that too. One thing they are suggesting is all email systems go to a.gov email that is through Homeland Security and that's the safest email system. So like your Gmails will probably go away. We're like through our um website domain Hartford SD. They want everything to go to a.gov gov domain which which is probably good. We'll get everybody on the same domain and that is actually monitored through homeland. So it's a lot more secure than just a like I said a Gmail account.

It'll be a pain in the butt. But I think it will be and we'll have to change you'll be changing your change your cards and changing this a but I I think it'll be good in the long run for all it. So that is one thing they did point out that does that include the wastewater treatment facility? Yeah, it's going to include everything. Yeah, with it skater system. Yeah, I told them now, you know, we we just have the one computer out there now. I said, you know, we're working on the skater system. We don't have cameras out there, but maybe by February, we might cuz those are supposed to those are getting ordered and whatnot. So, we'll just kind of evaluate that when it comes in. Is that a system that we went with somebody professionally for? Yeah. Yes. Trying to remember

that security system. Yeah. Yeah. the ability to log in and set different alarms and triggers capacity of up to 16 cameras throughout. At this time, we went with just a little bit bigger nice capacity. What's kind of good about the system is that those 16 cameras don't all have to be out the wastewater plant. You can have them sports complex. You can have them in the dumps. I mean, it can be they don't need to have all of them Wi-Fi in. We can use some off of cell towers, some off the Wi-Fi. So it could be, you know, like I said, multiple DVRs with that or what's the There'll be one that'll be at all point be secured out there.

Yep. Okay. To be able to monitor now with the laptop there, but like on your phone and then you know all that stuff and get alarms sent in. So sounds like a pretty good system. Yeah. Yeah, for sure. Sounds good. Thanks.

So moving ahead with that. Um just a little update on the Windsor TIFF. Um, so the where we're at in the process is we've got we created the district for the Windsor tip. So now we got to officially approve their plan and we showed you the plan when we created the district, but so at the last PNZ meeting last week, they did approve the plan. Now this plan, which there hasn't been any changes since you've seen it, um, comes to you guys along with a development agreement. So, those are the two components that you guys are going to have to look at and get final approval on before the TIFF is actually done and complete. So, we're working right now on the development agreement. They have drafted it. It's been sent to Tom. He has a few suggested revisions that'll get sent back to their attorney and whatnot. I'm hoping we got three weeks till our next meeting that can get all hammered out between attorneys. Um, but if it does, we'll get on the first meeting in January. If not, we'll put it on the second meeting in January. So that's up and coming. Uh Kyle and I met for the ISO audit. We said that was coming up with the gentleman there. Um I think it went really well. I it sounded very positive. Um I think with you know when we had our last ISO audit, we had just hired Kyle. He didn't have any of his certifications or whatnot. Now that we have him on board, he has got certifications. He did training or what. I think that's going to help us. It kind of sounded that way to to me that that should help kind of you know, he he obviously can't give us any promises, but he says, you know, that definitely gives us points, you know, as far as our rating or whatnot. So, that all went well. That takes a while, too, to kind of get the final results from that. So, I'm sure it'll be a month or two before we'll hear anything, but keep you updated on that. Um, besides that, we did close on the reed loan today. Ardan was here and we signed that. Gave Kieran that big check. Hopefully, she's deposited. So,

so, uh, yeah. So, that's all taken care of and that's about all I have unless you have questions. All right. Anybody got any questions for Teresa?

Yeah, I I guess one thing point out so I I haven't, you know, lagoon remediation. The city's responsible for doing the environmental and we did get a grant for that to to do that. Um Steve Watson with Teton Ridge helped us secure that. Um, so basically they had sent out an assessment form for us to fill out. Me and Craig did that last week. Uh, they've been in contact with Craig. We're getting them some stats on the lagoons, the report we had on sludge ISG kind of sent their testing um that they did. We're going to get that all to them. Um, Craig's meeting with him tomorrow. Tomorrow

to kind of for the facility and whatnot. So So we're we're moving forward on that. And I thought they said what Steve is the one who told me, not you guys. It was going to be like a two to three week process. I think it was I thought it was a two or three week process. The grant covers the study,

this environmental assessment. Yeah. And that has to happen first before any remediation can happen. But the remediation will happen with the new entity. We're just responsible for the assessment at this point. The environmental I assume that's probably been discussed, but a hopeful it would be like other developments where if there are grant opportunities, the city could still partner or suffice as a grantee if there's

so from what I understand it this the city has to do this environmental. We did get grant funds for that. the new entity that's going to transfer will um we're working on a grant to get a Brownsville grant to help them with the remediation to help cover that and will get that or the speciality special entity to get that. Yes. Because that's like number one thing on their list. Yes. Yes. City can't own the I was just curious some of our other experience where the city had to be right in it was

Nope. Um, actually me and Steve Watson sat in on kind of a webinar to go through this Brownsville grant and it's going to be the new entity will apply for this grant and then basically kind of under their realm. Um, the good thing about it though, it sounds like right now there's no 8020 on the grant. The grant's 100%. So, we really want to or they really want to get in now and move to make sure we get that Yeah. covered. So, seems like the smart thing. January January 28th. I think it's January 28th deadline date. So it's I mean it's going to be here before we know it. Yes. Yes. So but we I think we're in pretty goodstead right now. Well, we can discuss some of that. Yeah, we're going to discuss

Yeah, we'll discuss that a little bit more, but detail give you guys an update. Y So I got All right. Anything else? All right, let's move to new business. First up, we have a review approval of a billboard lease renewal for Dave and Co. Real Estate. Motion to approve billboard lease renewal agreement with Dave and Co real estate. Second. Any discussion?

We look at um fees. Do we look at billboard rental fees at the same time as the ordinance fees or do we have to do that separate? I know we did it about a year ago. We did about a year ago. I have it slated for the beginning of the year again. Time to review and we'll review fees where we Makes me think of it. We're at the end of the year and approving another one. Correct. Yep. Yep. We'll we'll review all that stuff for 2026 and uh any other discussion? If not, we'll vote. Carlson, yes. Matson, yes. Ke, yes. Yes. Jelly, yes.

All right. Next up is to review, approve the 2026 fire protection agreement with Hartford Area Fire and Rescue. This is our every year commitment of $80,000 to pay their loan for the new fire station. We've been I think I ask every year how many years do we have left? I think this is going to be payment 16 of Okay. 20. Is it 20? Okay. So, we're getting there. It's 20. We're getting there. Okay.

So, We have to have an agreement with them, right? To with someone to provide. So they got a rural development loan and basically they had nothing to guarantee that loan. So rural development required the funds to be secured and they we said as a city we would secure those funds. So that's why we had this agreement in place. They said we would give them funds. in the agreement, if you've read through it, it says, "Okay, we want fire protection service from you. We're going to pay you $80,000. Um, but the $80,000 has to go towards that building payment." So, that's how we

That was my how that's how we satisfy the rural development loan. It's kind of a pass almost a pass through, if you want to call it that. Well, but as a municipality, we have to have we don't So, before this, we never had an agreement with the fire department. I mean the fire department is part of a greater, you know, fire service area. They they have to cover our area. So we don't have to have it. Oh, we do for the loan, though. Yeah. This was set up this set up quite well, but I don't know why I thought we had to have something and until we built the building, we never had any kind of a agreement with them. Do we have to have one for law enforcement is that I mean

we do sign a contract with law enforcement because we're contracting with the county. Um that's more of a department I don't I don't know if you guys have districts or what how how is it they're set up that and they've got to cover those district because they cover more than just Harford. they cover wall and they have their district is bigger than just the city of Hartford, you know, with it. And um the various departments have their own certain districts that they have to cover. Like I said, we we have this agreement and we work the way we do just to show that we're getting some kind of an exchange for the $80,000.

Fire department had an agreement with Wayne Township, too. When Wayne Township fire department dissolved quite a few years ago, we took over their territory. Um, so they we've got a contract with them if they pay us so much a year to take their coverage. Um, so we actually cover the fairgrounds. Uh, we cover the trailer courts on 12th Street there. We actually cover all the way up to 41st and Marian Road. So it's a huge area West Acres. Yep. Yeah. Pretty big territory. Yeah. Yeah. We drive by a couple fire stations usually to some of the get to ours. Yeah.

All right. Any action on this uh on that agreement? Motion to approve 2026 fire protection service agreement. Second. Any more discussion? Hearing none, we'll vote. Shilling. Yes. Ratchick. Yes. Kio. Yes. Matson. Yes. Carlson. Yes. All right. Next up is review approve our 2026 contract with the Sou Falls Humane Society. This is for um animal protection I guess.

Yeah. Basically our animal control services, dog bites, running at large, sick animals, wildlife. That was a big jump in uh fees, but they're the only uh they're the only game in town, unfortunately. Yeah. Yeah. Last year, they restructured it. We had we had quite a discussion of the fees director. They were paying a lot more, but Yeah. short of us having our own animal services, which would probably cost more than this, it uh it would uh Yeah. New title title, animal control officer.

We'll slap that right on the bottom. We'll slap that on the bottom. We'll put that on there with duct tape though, just so I will be finding another job. Other duties as a sign, but we do have the connection to try to recoup. I mean, we have that big long We did. Well, if you were here and Keith wasn't, but you know, we did pass that ordinance where we could pass along any cost we incur if the owner is known. There's been a few times where Yeah, not many. Yeah. So, I had it noted somewhere. I don't know if it's in the spot. Yeah, we haven't got recouped very much, but but we have some. We will if we can. If y'all can, we will.

We have the mechanism in place. That's the Karen build a few. So, if we can, we do. So as we change that ordinance. So I think that's probably the the best we can do. Yeah. So when it says the city is now responsible for boarding fees, disease prevention, emergency medical care needs, is there a maximum? I mean is there only so many days of boarding? Is this until I say there is a so many days? What about like emergency medical needs and disease? There's no maximum dollar amount that if they deem a dog maximum

needs a surgery or that's been picked up in Herford, we are responsible for that. There's no dollar amount. I think they're pretty reasonable about I gonna say when asked about that last year and we discussed it, they said they they're going to do what's going to comfort the pet or whatnot that they're not going to go take have a major surgery on them in those three days, but they they will try to do comfort care for the animal. I think that's more or less what they're doing through these three days. I suppose could be rabies.

Yep. And yeah, and if they rabies, they distemper or whatnot, they'll give them the the required, you know, safety shots and then comfort care if they have an injury. Um, um, they they don't I don't think they go crazy with giving them surgeries and whatnot. Yeah. Like a limit, you know. Yep. Yeah. And we never were responsible for that before. That's last year's one was one of the major changes we talked about. So and I don't think we've had any crazy costs this year with cons, you know, down that avenue. Do they break it down? Do they give you an

itemize? If they bored them, they're required to give them some kind of shot before they'll bored them so they're not sickly with the other animals. So there's that now. And then I think there were just maybe one or two where we had to pay rabies, but one of them we knew the owner. The owner came and collected. So, we were able to get some of that back. So, that's all we've seen for medical so far. So, it is cost us about $700 a month to just to have this service thus far this year going to that monthly fee. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Costs for 24 were 4,100 with costs for 25 being 82 88 or 8,300 bucks. Yeah, that's about a double. That's double. Yeah. Hopefully that's a little higher. Yeah. All right. Action on this one. Motion to approve the contract for 2026 with animal control uh with Sou Falls Humane Society. Second. Any more discussion? Hearing none, we'll vote. Carlson, yes. Matson, yes. Ke, yes. Yes. Shelling. Yes.

All right. Next up, we have to review approve our updated attorney's contract.

Looking at the fee, it looks pretty reasonable according to our normal region. Yeah. Yeah. The only change to this is basically the per hour charge and we we don't pay a retainer on it. It is just whenever we engage their services, we pay an hourly charge on it. So, we don't have like a monthly retaining charge with our attorney. They've been quite low for quite some time in the last couple years. They've kind of jumped up a little, but I think they're still reasonable compared to other attorney fees per hour. So, motion to approve the attorney agreement for legal services as presented. I'll second.

Any more discussion on this one? Hearing none, we'll vote. Shilling, yes. Harchek, yes. Ke, yes. Matson, yes. Carlson, yes. And also, thanks the guys from ISG. You guys kept yours the same. And now we keep I got to throw that in there for you, Justin. You know that. I'm glad you know this. I am reading my back and I'm just telling you. All right. Uh last one tonight is review approve the surplus equipment list. Motion to approve the surplus items as presented. Second. Any discussion? Hearing none. We'll vote. Carlson, yes. Matson,

yes. Ke, yes. Yes. Jelly, yes. All right. Uh we need a motion to go into exec for personnel legal economic development. So moved. Second. All in favor? I I kind of made that motion, but I didn't really make that motion. Was kind of Thank you. Hey, thanks guys. Exciting times here in little old Harford.

We're going to be there. It's Tim's birthday the day before. So, party. Yeah, I'm sure. All right. Do we have a motion to adjurnn or do we have any motions or actions from the council? Excuse me. I'd make a motion uh to approve the bonuses uh Christmas bonus for employees as discussed. Second. Any more discussion? Hearing none, we'll vote. Carlson, yes. Matson, yes. Ke, yes. Horrace, yes. Shelley, yes. All right. Do we have a motion to adjurnn? Some move. And a second.

Second. All in favor? I