City Council - Special Meeting

Council of June 1st, 2026 to order. We do have a quorum. Individuals may address the City Council about items on the agenda or not included on the agenda. Speakers are required to state their name and address for the Council record and limit their remarks to three minutes or fewer. Speakers are requested to frame their comments around items that fall within the authority of the City Council. Generally, the City Council will not take official action on the items discussed at this time, but may place the item on file, take the matter under advisement, refer the matter to staff or committee for a future report, or direct the matter to be placed on an upcoming agenda. Does anyone wish to speak? Does anyone wish to speak? Anyone wish to speak? Hearing none, we'll move on to bill discussion. Any discussion on the bills? Hearing none, we'll move on to the consent agenda item discussion. Any discussion on the consent agenda? Hearing none, we'll move on to council information only items. The first one on the agenda tonight is 2021 Gulf Mower Lease Update.

Thank you, Council President. This will be quick. In 2021, Council approved a five-year lease agreement for, sorry, my computer just updated and took away what I was looking at, for three different mowers at the golf course. And we have completed that lease term and those mowers are now ours free and clear. So just an update that we own the three mowers we've been making payments on.

Very good. That's good to hear. Any discussion on that?

Mr. Council President, how much a year were we spending on the leases, Sony? Do you know offhand?

I should have thought you were going to ask me that. I do not know offhand. I want to say about $4,500, but that is... I can get back to you with the for sure amount of that.

I just, you know, I was just kind of wondering how much money we're going to save now. Yep. And it wasn't that we don't have the lease.

Yeah. And it wasn't a monthly payment. It was just a one time. Sorry. It was $26,000 and change one time per year for five years is what that was.

Okay. Thank you. Question. So now that that's paid off, can we take that lease money and put it away for the next mower?

However we set it up in our budget, it's not like it was budgeted for this year to make that final payment. So when we go into budgeting for next year, we'll be able to take a look at where those monies are and see if we want to do that. Yes.

Okay. Thank you.

Do we know how the condition of the mowers? Because I did not ask sometimes five years on a mower that's used quite a bit. It's not, that means they're pretty much worn out already.

I have not heard that we need any new ones with regard to these ones, so I do not have that information.

But we will be looking at our existing equipment when it comes time for budget to see when we should be planning for placements.

Any other discussion?

You're not? Yeah. I couldn't hear, that's okay.

Okay, then we'll move on to item B, which is restaurant sales tax update. Alex.

Thank you. Council president, a nice and short one, but just letting you know that the restaurant tax renewal did not get addressed at the legislature this year. So because of that, it did not get renewed the lodging tax. We're in the process of getting that. So everything is set up to continue with that. Uh, those dollars going to the chamber tourism, uh, and then at next council, we will have the appropriate ordinance changes. for the city to remove the restaurant tax references in our code. And if the city council wishes that we can apply again next year.

Okay. Any discussion on that?

I just, did I hear you right talking about removing the ordinance?

So as of right now we do have a co a city code that states the restaurant tax will collect 0.5% goes to the tourism, um, because that will not be active. We'd like to make sure that that's not in our code.

Well, I don't, I don't know that we should change our code only to get the situation rectified and then change our code back. So I'm just wondering if it wouldn't be a little bit more efficient to, suspended via resolution or something like that.

Yep. We'll, we'll look into it. I know that there might be an option, um, using state statute for that, but, um, either way we'll have everything sorted out for our next council meeting.

Okay.

Oh, this is about lodging tax. And I know that we're talking about restaurant tax, but I'm just wondering if all of the Airbnbs are compliant with that.

There are some Airbnb's are compliant with that. However, it is very difficult task to try to figure out what Airbnb's are operating within the city of little falls. Um, and also the city, not that the money's to the chamber is not important, but the dollars we're talking about are very low for the effort and time that will go into trying to find the Airbnbs. If, if council or anybody has any good way to figure out where the Airbnb are operating for us to be able to monitor that more closely, I am all ears.

Okay. Also, and this is again, maybe a little beyond the subject, but I would like to see all Airbnb Airbnbs have to be licensed to operate within the city. We have writing in our code that talks about regular BNBs and nothing about Airbnbs. So they're not inspected, they're not licensed, they're not regulated in any way, and I think they should be, just to even the playing field between BNBs and Airbnbs. We'll have to play by the same rules. I mean, we don't have any BNBs right now, but you know. Thank you.

I don't think finding them is difficult.

I'll find them for you.

Any other discussion? Hearing none, we'll move on to item C, which is ordinance number 627 series, amend city code chapter 10, section 10.18, regulating recreational and special vehicles. Mr. Police Chief.

Thank you, Council President. So in front of you is a draft ordinance for the, uh, special use vehicles within the city. Uh, this trick current draft is based on all the discussions that we've had in the city council, uh, with the, uh, planning commission and just, um, input that we've gotten, um, over the past several months and years actually. So hopefully you had a kind of a chance to look through it. again, this is a, it's a draft version. So we're just kind of trying to get things closer to the point where we can bring it to the council for approval for. And so if there's anything I've already picked out a couple of things, there's some, you know, some small things, you know, we got some, there's some formatting things that needs to be done, but more looking more for any direction on any changes to the content or how things are written at this point.

I read through it a couple of times and I thought the content was really well thought out.

I agree with that too. I thought it was laid out very good. Plus, you took a lot of the information on both those committees and you took a lot of the information that was shared and incorporated into that ordinance.

Yeah, and one thing I just want to point out, because I know it comes up a little bit as far as where certain vehicles are allowed to be and those kind of things. So what we ended up doing is there's a section D in here, areas of operation and permit-based use. So that allows the city council to say there's issues downtown with parking or ATVs or golf carts on certain roads, that kind of thing. By a resolution, council can vote to say that they don't want this type of vehicle in this area of town. So that doesn't have to have to happen now. It's written in the ordinance and that can happen later on if we do come across some issues. So I think that was kind of a, a way to minimize the, you know, things get a little muddy. I mean, you start breaking up, you know, certain areas of town, certain vehicles can only be in this area and that area. I think we wait and see where those problems are and then address them down the road. Any other discussion?

Yeah. Council president, if I may, um, and I spoke to police chief here before the meeting. Um, briefly, um, I was just wondering 1200 and we were discussing us and he has explained to me that that's a state requirement or state mandate or state sideline as far as the CCS.

Yeah. Yeah. So that, that comes directly from the state, just how they define certain vehicles. So the class one, there's a certain, there's measurements of wheelbase and then CCS, and then it goes to class twos. And again, they talk about CCS where there's a difference there, but really for us, it doesn't make a difference because we are distinguishing them by handlebar versus steering wheel use.

So, and then my other concern is, and I spoke to you as well as well about it as just, uh, out of towners visitors coming through on the weekend, um, with the permitting, situation if we can get some verbiage. Yeah.

I'm not sure. We've talked about this a few times and I'm not sure the best way to address that. Cause I mean, if we, he has somebody that's coming in just for the weekend, are they going to want to go through that whole permitting process? Even if it's temporary, they may not want to come into town at that point.

So they may not even know. Exactly.

And that's the other thing, you know, obviously our officers would be, um, you know, aware of that and they can make that judgment call at that time. You know, um, typically, you know, they're going to make contact with these individuals and if, if they've already made contact with them, they've been in town, we know that they're driving them regularly. They're going to be told you need to get a permit. Yeah. If they are just visiting, um, again, they're, they'd be advised that, you know, you are required to have a permit to be in town. Um, you know, if you do happen to come back and this is a regular thing, you need to get a permit. So I don't know if there's a way to change that or I know what, I really don't know the best ways to do that.

Well, just my thought and the council can add theirs. Um, I would just say if you're a little falls resident and you use it from, to go from your home to Coburn's, then that's when the permit is required. But if you're out of, if you're not a little falls resident and you're coming, cause these groups travel, I mean, there's quite a few people that travel in these groups. And if they've learned, no, you need, you know, if you want to go to little falls, you need a permit. They're not going to come through there and go and visit our restaurants and such. So, um, I just think it was, maybe we can get some language in the ordinance to address that.

I don't know if we need to, but just, yeah, I can certainly look at something and see if I'm sure it's going to come up with other cities so I can see if there's language out there.

But, um, well, I think the fact that, With the police department being able to supervise and locate and look and use your judgment as to whether or not, like you said, you're there. You see them. You know who the locals are that are driving. If you see someone coming up and you stop and he doesn't have a sticker on it, you ask where he's from. Well, we're here for the weekend. We're out of town. Like you said, a little discretion from the police department. You guys do an excellent job, so I think that would be one way that you could handle that, unless it becomes a problem, and then address it after that. But I agree, if we want people to come into the community and they're going to want to come in and they want to shop or go get gas or go get food or whatever and then head back out to their cabin or whatever, you know, I think that should be at the discretion of the police department to be able to observe that. That's just my opinion.

Okay. Yup. And I'm thinking we designate a one east west route and a north south route and that way the transient people are, taken care of. And if you're anywhere, but on those routes, you need a permit. I kind of thinking out loud here. I just, I don't want to put it in the, well, our department needs to know, and while they're generally good at no one who's who, and it's like, well, what kind of policy is that?

Yeah, and I know we did discuss the route option and that does create some issues figuring that out too. So, yeah, I mean, we can reevaluate that too. If you want to go back to the road system and you're talking just for visitors or everybody, people pass and again, people pass them through.

I don't know where the closest trail is. I don't have one, so I don't know. Yeah, I don't either.

Um, and I don't know how, like, you know, we mentioned the permit thing, how are they going to know what the routes are when they're just passing through? So,

Well, I think I'll go ahead. I guess part of my concern is that when Like like I say people this is a big hobby a lot of people do use it use TVs on the weekends or whatever and I Was just speaking to my brother-in-law because he has one and he travels quite a bit I guess he drives all the way down to Mankato and a buddy of his was saying did you go through such-and-such town and I He said, yeah, I did that on the way here. Oh, you don't go through that town. You know, they'll confiscate your, your, your UTV and they'll take, you know, they'll find you and this and this. So word gets out. Right. And even if so, you know, one police stop and say, well, you know, you need to have a permit. Well, then all of a sudden the word will get out. So don't go to little falls. Cause you, you know, you're supposed to have a permit and you know, we, we all know that sometimes information can get misconstrued. So. I don't know. I've just, it's a concern of mine. I want people to come through little falls and feel welcome here. So, um, if there's a way we can resolve or figure out a way for that issue.

And is there a way that we can, obviously this is going to be new. Once we start doing this, there's going to be some adjustments that have to be made. So maybe that's one of them that we make down the road. And if we do have that many issues with people coming in and not having permits and that kind of thing, we readdress it maybe. I said I haven't written into the permit currently. Again, having that section D in here that allows for those kind of changes by resolution. So that's an option too.

Another option is most of these trails coming into town are grant and aid trails and they're actually maintained and run by ATV clubs, off-road motorized vehicle clubs. And there's signage and maps for that. This could also, like Lake Lausanne, east-west, north-south, just put that right into that map. That's what they're going by already. And this way, when they hit Little Falls, they have the routes they can go on, and they're not allowed in the residential areas and stuff.

Yeah.

Anyway.

Are we not... The... We just have it in here as permit fees to be set up by the fee schedule. So we're not, we're not really going to address that right now.

Nope. That'll be a separate resolution.

Okay, good. Cause it is still my goal to have the whole permit part of this be a moot point at some. Yeah. Yeah.

No, I think, um, the, uh, we, we're getting quotes for, uh, what the actual stickers cost and we're trying to work out a figure, figure out how to do the actual payment process. You know, there's gonna be some staff time involved in there. So I mean, as long as we recoup that, you know, obviously not looking at it. Okay. So that's what we're looking at.

My desire is to not have that. Yeah.

Agreed. Any other discussion? Thanks for all the hard work you put into it and thanks for the update here too. Absolutely. Thank you.

It must be getting somewhere because we're not discussing as much.

Good. Okay.

I'll take that. All right. Any other constituent messages?

Mr. Kim is not here tonight.

No, he's on vacation.

A lot of people. And I, as has, does anybody know as BNSF been reached out to as far as fixing the railroad crossing? Yes, they have been. Okay. Cause I'm getting a lot of people complaining about that and it's really bad.

Yeah, they are aware.

Okay.

So, okay. Are they aware they need to mow their grass off of forest street Northeast to notice that on my way here? I can certainly reach out to the rail master in town on that one. Don't give them a break on the standards. They don't give us a break on crossing fees.

It sounds like they're planning to repair that crossing and fill it in. It sounds like, again, the granite was a temporary thing that they'll pave over in some way.

Any other messages?

Council President, we own a couple of really ugly buildings over by Dairy Queen. There are trees growing in front of the garage doors. I believe the city owns them.

Nope.

No. Did we sell them? I know at one time we owned them.

There's a trucking out there.

Okay, well.

Are they Dairy Queen?

Mm-hmm.

I know who it is.

I can, I thought the city owned those. No, no, I apologize.

Alex, I can tell you who owns it. If you want to shoot them a message.

Thank you.

Any other messages? Hearing none. It's seven 19. We'll adjourn to our regular meeting at seven 30.