City Council - Regular Meeting

We'll call the city council regular meeting to order for Tuesday, January 20th, 2026. Would everyone please stand for the pledge of allegiance? 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. [snorts] Call the role, please. Council member Wilson here. Council member Gordes here. Mayor Hoy here. Council member Bernett here. Council member Lean here.

Right. Any changes to the agenda? Holly. All right. Seeing no changes to the agenda, I'd seek a motion to approve. Motion to approve. Second. Motion by Holly, second by Jake. All in favor say I. I. I.

All right. Next item on the agenda is our citizen comments. Before we start, I'm going to go ahead and read a prepared statement. Before our last city council meeting, we met in work session to discuss organizational matters. The minutes from that work session are in tonight's agenda packet. We discussed multiple topics, including citizen comments during city council meetings. The concern was raised by one of my peers that allowing speakers to exceed their five minutes was not only inconsistent, but it frequently resulted in a lack of decorum. As mayor, I have the responsibility to maintain decorum while also using discretion to ensure fairness and equal time for anyone wishing to speak. I have given many speakers the opportunity to speak beyond their five minutes to allow them to finish their comments. However, this leniency has been abused. So, as a council, we ultimately decided that comments would be strictly limited to five minutes regardless of topic. This discussion or I'm sorry, [snorts] this decision was made as a matter of decorum, not in response to any one person or any specific subject matter. [snorts] In hindsight, I should have made a statement prior to our last city council meeting as to not create confusion as to why there was a sudden departure from how we previously handled citizen comments. To ensure consistency and fairness, we have installed a digital clock which is available at the podium on the screens in chambers and also for those watching in attendance or watching at home to see in their live feed. With that, we'll move on to our citizen comments. Anyone wishing to speak, please come up to the podium at this time. [snorts] Citizen comments are a time for anyone to address the city council on matters not on the agenda. Those speaking should state their name and uh name and address and limit their comments to five minutes. This time limit will be strictly adhered to followed by the clock regardless [snorts] of the nature

of your comment. The city council will not engage in discussion on your topic, but those issues requiring a response will be responded to by the next city council meeting. Go ahead.

So, uh my name is Steven Dendras. I live at 18040 180 Court West. Um, so I'm going to pick up on where I left off last meeting. Michelle did a tremendous job. I love you, baby. Um, but I want you guys to hear this for me. So, anyone that wasn't or hasn't heard the first half, I'm sorry. It's going to be a little uh kind in the middle and not make sense. Um, but here we go. The impact on how the city has handled my situation has not only affected me, but has had a significant impact on others as well. I've quickly touched on on what Michelle has had to endure. I have many challenges with the symptoms of PTSD that she gets to deal with. I faced many struggles and challenges at my full-time job. I was not able to attend the demolition derbies this year at the Dakota County Fairgrounds. This was something that my father and I enjoyed doing together. I couldn't mentally handle seeing the firefighters at the derbies, so my father and I did not go. Uh he tragically passed away on November 17th of last year. Because of the way the city has handled the injuries to my mental health and the lack of support I have received, I missed this last opportunity I had to spend this time with my dad. [snorts and gasps] Others on the department have seen how I've been treated. I have a couple of firefighters that privately reach out to me, but have expressed that they are not comfortable publicly supporting me. Over the years, several Farmington firefighters who were struggling sought me out because I was open about my struggles. But I've been told by the current by a current fire department member that since I left, there has been less focus on mental health and checking on each other after difficult calls. Um, I cannot confirm this, but that's what I've been told. I'm certain there will be private conversations attempting to explain why things were handled the way they were. I urge you to challenge these explanations. Understand that what I've shared tonight is just the tip of the

iceberg. For instance, the city administrator expressed that she does not believe the city should have provided me with therapy when I was unable to sleep for days at a time and would go into a full panic attack when something as light as a sheet was covered my feet. The excuse of that's what we had to do should not be acceptable. Supporting an employee who is struggling with mental health issues should be prioritized over concerns of liability, especially when the liability is with the League of Minnesota Cities. Why would the city prioritize the League of Minnesota City's liability over the life of its 2019 firefighter of the year or any other employee? The way mental health struggles are addressed should be just as important as how physical injuries are treated. If you would not treat a physical injury with indifference or disregard, then why should a mental health injury be handled any differently? You have the authority to demand change, and I encourage you to use it. Use your position to make every first responder feel truly supported. Not just in words, but in action. Be the ones that start the shift in how first responders with mental health challenges are treated. Your decisions and actions could be the difference between someone choosing to end their life or choosing to get help and keep fighting. Our family and friends deserve it. My dad deserved it. Um, to my fellow first responders, I want to challenge you all to have the same courage for yourself and your family that you do for the community you serve. It's time that we actually end the stigma. Um, and I have a minute here. I just want to express to city council, I don't have anything written here. This is just straight coming from my heart in the moment. I know almost everyone up there. I've worked with almost every single one of you and I I think you are all wonderful people. um what I've said last city council meeting and this one is not an direct reflection on you and I want to be clear about that. But you guys have the chance to look into why city administrators, why

city attorneys are doing this to first responders. And I want you to understand that this ends up being a barrier for someone that's struggling privately to get help because they know they're going to get treated like I have. I've had almost three dozen first responders reach out to me in the last two weeks sharing similar experiences, including multiple ones from this city alone. So, something needs to be done. And I I just I hope you guys see the opportunity in that. I I have I've had multiple organizations reach out to me, want me to speak up on this. I've had people on the national level reach out to me and go, "Hey, I want to work with you. This message is important. Your story is important." So, I just challenge you guys to please think about that and and just I want to be clear that I'm not directing any of this at you guys. Thank you. Thank you.

If there's anyone else wishing to speak at this time, please come up and do so. Hello there. Uh, my name is Daniel Crawford. I am not a resident of Farmington. I'm from Brooklyn Center, 490161st Avenue North. I serve veterans, first responders, police, firefighters who are living with trauma. That's what I do. Um, my story is public. I'm a guy that walked from Minnesota to Texas about two years ago. Uh, look it up. Daniel Crawford, Crazy Marine Walks to Texas. you'll find it. Uh what I'm here today is to tell you that Steven's story is is out there all over the place here in Minnesota, throughout the nation. Any place that you have these folks that are seeing trauma daily or thinking about it and and trying to come home and go to bed and take their uniforms off, they don't. They can't. Their nervous system is pumped up. They can't do it. a little bit of support, a little bit of compassion, and it goes a long ways. Um, I offer, uh, 23rd Veterans, a a nonprofit based here in Minnesota. We've been around for over 11 years now. All our services are free. Uh, we have a 14-week program. We take them out in the wilderness for a week, then we bring them back, and we work on our physical fitness and, uh, positive psychology. It's free for anybody. I encourage you to look it up and and see what we do and offer that to your first responders. The organization is willing to come to you, talk to your people and offer some solutions. Invisible Wounds Project is represented here. There are other places to look for help. The League of Mininnesota City should know about us. And if they don't, I encourage you guys to say, "Hey, look at what we're doing."

Uh we're funded through donations. We have two rucks that happen twice a year in Minnesota. Anoka and Duth. Encourage you to look at that. I don't want to take a lot of your time, but I'm so grateful that Stephen, you stood up. Thank you. You make my job easier. 22 a day take their own lives. That's just the veterans. That's a statistic from the VA. We really don't know that number. So many overdoses. There's so many people doing stupid things that kill themselves. I don't want that to happen. That's about all I have to say. My name is Daniel Crawford. I serve veterans, first responders, and people who want to a little bit better in their life. I'll be here later on after the meeting if anybody wants to talk to me. Thank you for your time, folks.

Thank you, sir. Anyone else wishing to speak?

Good evening. My name is Brandon Cell and I'm here wasn't planning to talk. I came here to uh support [snorts] my new friend Stephen on behalf of the Invisible Wounds Project. Now, three years ago, four years ago, I had Invisible Winds Project set up a meeting called Meaningful Connections. Sat with about 50 first responders in a circle. On my way home, I said, "We need to do something locally." So, I founded and coordinate the Ride Against Suicide. Over four days, we ride 260 miles through Minnesota, Wisconsin. We meet with fire departments, military, first responders, frontline healthcare workers, and their families. Those are the people that the Invisible Wounds Project serves. They have a support center up in Forest Lake. I encourage you all to research them and see what they do. Now, part of what we do during our bike ride is each each rest stop is multi-purpose. We rest, we uh energize a little bit, get some water, but we also meet with those local agencies and let them know about resources that are available to them. Whether you're whatever you do, we all have our way to deal with our stress. Whether it be music, go for a walk, talk to people, whatever it is. But where IWP is different is that it's a resource for when those times they they don't seem to work anymore. And that's what we like to get out there to people. Now, I've been in law enforcement for almost 20 years. I was there working. When you had a bad day, you were told to suck it up. That's what you were told. You're having a bad time at home, you come to work, you better be able to do your job. Because if it got out that you went and sought therapy at that time, you would risk losing your job. You would risk losing your badge. So, what you did was you ended up having

to go seek therapy services an hour or two out of the way just so your co-workers wouldn't see your car in the parking lot or even know you were even there. It's gotten a little bit better now. So, what we're doing, and like Stephen said, we got to get rid of the stigma together and let our first responders know, whether it's law enforcement, EMS, those on the fire department know that this is okay, that mental health should not be looked at as anything different than an injury, a physical injury. If you need to take a month off from work because you hurt your back or your broke your arm, you come back and you're always welcome with open arms. people are always reaching out to you during that time saying how are you doing and it should be the same way with mental health. If we have to take a month off to go to a impatient treatment or even take a step back or even take one shift off it is amazing what a shift off from work will do to be able to come back to work and maybe a supervisor or someone saying how are you doing? Are you doing better? Is there anything else we can do for you? So once again, my name is Brandon Cell. I'm a founder coordinator of the Ride Against Suicide and I'm here on behalf of the Invisible Wounds Project. And I can tell you right now is after last month's deal with Stephen up here. I reached out to him because what I needed is I needed someone to go out there with us. My wife is in the back. She comes with us on the ride to come out with us and to meet with other people on the ride and to help get that get our mission across. And he said he was going to. So that's why I'm here as well because he's here to support me just over a phone call and I'm here to support him. And that's what we need more of is people willing to drive from the north side of the metro down to Farmington on a snowy night to say you are not alone. Thank you.

Thank you, sir.

Anyone else wishing to speak tonight? All right. [clears throat] Excuse me. Seeing none, we'll move on. Excuse me. We'll move on to our consent agenda. I'd seek a motion to approve the consent agenda. Motion to approve. Second [clears throat] by Jake, second by Nick. All in favor say I. I. I. All right. First item of business [clears throat] 121, which is the appointments to boards and commissions for terms starting February 1st, 2026. Shirley, I'll take that, Mr. Mayor. Oh, yeah. Go ahead.

Uh, so on December 15, 2025, the city council conducted interviews for open seats in the parks and recreation advisory commission, planning commission, rambly rambling river center advisory board, and the water board. Following these interviews, the city council directed staff to conduct background investigations for the applicants who were selected for appointment and reappoint and then to bring successful applicants uh to this January 20, 2026 regular city council meeting for appointment. The following candidates have passed the successful background investigation and are recommended for approval for the new commissioners. Um, all terms for these positions are February 1, 2026 to January 31, 2029. For the Parks and Recreation Advisory Commission, two seats. The candidates are David Bar, and David McMillan. For the Planning Commission, there are three seats. The candidates are Lisa Ellis, Gary Rutherford, and Phil Winden Schult. For the Rambling River Center Advisory Commission, there are three seats. The candidates are Moren Kundy, Penny Paige, and Blance Blanch Riker. And for the waterboard, one seat, and the candidate is Mitchell Snowbeck.

Thank you, sir. Any questions or comments, Nick? I believe it's wind title. [laughter] That's okay. Sorry, Phil. I'm just kidding. Thank you. It's all right. You good, Holly? Uh, I just wanted to double check. Um, it says term end on a few of these is 2029. On a few others is 2028. Did that change? No, summer two and summer three. Summer two and summer three. Okay, that's what I thought. Just wanted to double check that. Is that correct as well? Nope. Otherwise, no other comments, Jake.

No other [clears throat] comments, Steve. The only comment I have to make is um [clears throat] it wasn't all that long ago that and I'm going to go back to like 2019 2020 where we didn't have enough people raising their hands to step for boards and commissions. Uh it's good to see that in at least the last few years we've had more applicants than we have positions to fill. Um it's somewhat discouraging when you have people who raise their hand and you don't have open vacancies for them. Um, but it's it's one of those best worst problems. So, it's good to see that we continue to have people that raised their hands, want to step forward and serve. Um, thank you to everyone that submitted their application, that interviewed. Um, and congratulations to those ultimately receiving their appointments this evening. Uh, with that, I would seek a motion to approve the appointments, the terms as listed above to the park and recreation advisory commission, the planning commission, the Rambling River Center Advisory Board, and the water board for 2026.

Motion to approve. Second by Holly, second by Jake. Call the role, please. [clears throat] Council me Council Member Gordes. Yes. Mayor Hoy, yes. Council member Bernetts, yes. Council member Lean, yes. Council member Wilson, yes. All right. Our next item on the agenda is 122, the professional services agreement with WSB LLC for the Willow Street MSA Improvements. John, thank you, mayor. Please give me a moment to prepare here and switch over to our PowerPoint.

Yeah, no worries. I'm looking for the mouse and it's right up here.

Thank you. Okay, we're here this evening to talk about the Willow Street MSA improvement project. MSA, municipal state aid. All cities in the state of Minnesota with at least a population of 5,000 are eligible to become state aid communities. Uh we receive both roadway maintenance funds and roadway construction funds. through that program. Uh the origin of the funds is the highway user tax distribution fund which is where all the fees and everything go to and then it's filtered down. One of the areas it's filtered into is the municipal state aid system. With a municipal state aid system uh when we have an eligible construction project, we can proceed with that project and we can spend our state aid construction funds that are held by the state. On this particular uh project, we've got a relatively limited scope. It's Willow Street from Fifth Street to 8th Street. And we're we earlier had talked about possibly doing a mill and overlay on Willow Street from fourth to 5th, but we've left that out simply from a cost standpoint for this reconstruction project. The scope of the overall scope of the improvements includes complete street reconstruction, storm sewer, water man replacement and uh sanitary sewer service replacement primarily due to the water man storm sewer installation. So the schedule we're at January 20th, 2026. So we're ready with the final um to proceed with final design. We've got

the feasibility report prepared. We have had a couple of open houses uh not super well attended but um those that were there had uh very good input and highlighted issues we needed to take a look at in the feasibility report. The existing roadway is 44 ft wide. Uh that allows for two 14t travel lanes and two 8ft parking lanes. Um PCI ratings were completed in 2023. about 90% of the street we're reconstructing had a PCI of 40 or 43. Now that's three years ago. So the number is lower now uh based on the existing condition. So reconstruction is necessary. So the existing situation is very straightforward. Very wide travel lanes 14t and 8ft parking lanes next to the curves. Soil borings were conducted earlier in uh mid 2025. Uh proposed pavement section includes 28 and a half inches of materials uh inch and a half of workhorse 3 in of batonous workhorse as a base. Now you may notice that usually when we have a layer underneath the workhorse, maybe you don't notice this, but when we have a layer underneath the workhorse, it's a base course. But per state aid rules, everything 4 in and up, uh, top 4 in is considered wearing cores. So that's why it's listed as that. We'll have a 12-in aggregate base below that. And we have included based on the soil borings a 12-in subgrade excavation aggregate backfill. So that's basically we excavate all the soils and put a sand layer 12 in below the aggregate base. We want to talk about talk about the trails and sidewalks because that's one of the things that's kind of a um a a

consideration that's not as straightforward as simply reconstructing the existing roadway. So the original scope does not include widening, but per the 2019 bike and ped plan, it encourages an on street bikeway on Willow Street as a priority. Uh, but it also mentions they're not intended to be striped with dedicated bike lanes. However, with future increase use, the city may consider upgrading to dedicated bike lanes upon future evaluation. So, a bikeway is basically signage and making people aware that there could be bicyclists in the area. Bike lanes are dedicated. It's a portion of the pavement you basically set aside for bicycle use. And you can have bike lanes on both sides, which is common. They're minimum width of 5t, or you can have a shared bike lane that's minimum width of 10 or 11 feet on on one side. Uh, no new sidewalk is planned, but upgraded bike and ped crossing west of Highway 3 is included. That was another thing mentioned in the 2019 plan was improving that pedestrian crossing. That also ties into another option we're looking at, which is closing a street on the south side of Willow Street. In 2025, Mindot prepared a study. Uh they developed some preliminary concepts for various intersections along the corridor. Uh the Willow Street intersection included a concept that had additional turning lanes as well as a roundabout. But one of the commonalities of their analysis was they strongly recommended that a street be disconnected from Willow Street. Uh simply because it in it inserts traffic right at the intersection right next to Highway 3. Uh relocating access to Willow Street

for Dakota Lumber would be necessary if a street is disconnected. And I'll have a graphic shortly here. Um during early conversations, met with uh Dakota County Lumber, met with Peerless uh Plastics. They were both open to relocating Dakota County Lumber's main truck access to Willow Street. They'd still have access on the east side for staff vehicles and things like that, but the trucks would go out to Willow Street. Relocating to Willow Street would require purchase of a small triangle from Peerless Plastics. If those businesses do not support this, we would not recommend moving forward it with it obviously, but they've indicated support, so we want to be sure to carry it forward to you. So closure of a street would simply involve uh running the curb through uh highway uh stopping short of highway 3 at the end just about at the end of radius but then also significantly improving that crossing uh from south to north uh that we have a major trail on the north side that terminates there and it's really doesn't go anywhere from there. Um, the closing of ETH would still allow access to A Street from Dakota Lumber for staff. Uh, and their access would be shifted to the west. We would not be able to shift it far enough west to line up with the roadway uh because they have some existing storage buildings and whatnot that they'd like us to avoid, but we could get a significant distance away from the intersection and improve what's happening there now. So it'd be one small step toward improved traffic flow at that intersection. So because the original project was not widening the roadway, um you know,

basically two parking lanes again and putting a uh travel lanes through. We've scheduled another openhouse, an additional openhouse with a larger notice area, and we made sure to get something on the website uh to get specific feedback on the closure of a street and bike and peds and the potential loss of one side of parking on Willow Street for bike lanes. Now, remember again that the the bike and ped plans that talked about bikeways and they talked about sometime in the future bike lanes. We cannot construct bike lanes on Willow Street without removing one side of parking. Uh engineering's opinion is that the parking is necessary out there and we don't recommend doing that, but we wanted to be sure to get additional input on uh the desire for dedicated bike lanes in that area. Um the need for parking from the businesses. they've generally expressed some parking concerns, particularly the greenhouse during, you know, the six weeks that they're really doing their business in the spring. So, we're going to have that open house and see what kind of feedback we get and then we can take it from there. If we stripe a bike way, that doesn't affect the street section at all. Um, but if we did want to put bike ped bike lanes on, we would have to widen the roadway and we don't recommend doing that because we're not including any storm sewer ponding as part of this project.

As you'll recall on past projects, we've narrowed the roadway because that reduces the amount of runoff and we can't create any storm water ponds or storm water treatment and we have to be compliant with our MS4 permit. here. If we widen, we have to look for some locations to put ponding or stored underground or some way to provide treatment, additional treatment more than what we have now. So, the storm sewer, all the storm sewer would be replaced to comply with Mindot drainage guidelines and we'd have some additional catch basins east of Seventh Street. Water man sanitary sewer, we've got 6inch water man out there. We're recommending it be replaced with 8 in per waterboard's direction. We're also adding an 8 in main to connect the Willow Street main, which stops at 7th, to the 12-in trunk water mane on the west side of Highway 3. Again, we're always looping water manes and having those redundant connections so we can back feed uh in case we have an outage. The existing sanitary sewer does not warrant replacement, but you may recall some of our conversations about sewer sanitary sewer service maintenance. And the guidance at that time was count from council was if we encounter a sewer service on our one of our reconstruction projects, you want it replaced from the main to the property line. And that's what we do. Turf and trees, there's 13 trees, none of them are ash, are expected to be removed as part of the project. Um, in the next two to four weeks, the natural resources specialist, Ben Humley, will be marking the trees identified for removal. So, we'll be able to have those conversations about trees well in advance of actually starting the project. This area would be included on a future tree planning contract, but that would be part of the project cost, and all disturbed areas would be restored with top soil and sod.

So the way Ben approaches tree planting and road reconstruction areas, he wants to see what the finished product is and then get all the utilities located underground and also looking up which was a significant factor on the 2024 project and then recommending species that could be planted in there assuming adequate boulevard and then working with the property owners. So in the CIP we have just over a million dollars most of it uh state construction funds but also some sanitary and water. The feasibility report cost has uh 933,250 in street 255,540 in water and storm sewer 168960. So, with a 10% contingency still in there, uh 1,357,750, if we add 18% for all of the indirect costs, it's a $1.6 million project. As I mentioned, this is municipal state aid eligible. So, the project funding sources based on the those cost estimates would be about 1.3 million from our state aid construction fund and 300,000 from the water fund.

[snorts]

Um noting the state construction fund pays both for the street cost as well as a storm sewer that uh drains to the street and that flows across the street and sewer service repair costs due to water mane installation are included in the water costs. The general schedule um assuming act action tonight would have approving plans in mid-Marchch, bid opening in midappril, starting construction in midmay, completing construction, final completion in mid-occtober with a two-year warranty period after that. This is a very typical construction schedule that we use for our recon projects. So project scope it's recommended to be replaced at its current width for the scope presented in the feasibility report and the requested action in addition I can respond any questions would be approving the PSA with WSB to do the final design and also provide bidding assistance. Uh I've mentioned it before. One of the things uh we do different on projects where possible now is we do electronic bidding. So we don't have eight envelopes and I sit down with the city clerk and we open all the envelopes and look at the bonds and insurance and read read the numbers. It's all submitted electronically. We basically flip a switch. Our bid tab is done and we've got the low bidder right there and all the math has already been checked. So, we'd use that same approach on this project. With that, I'd be happy to answer any questions.

Thank you, sir. [clears throat] Steve. Hey, John. Uh, good good report here. Can you um as much for the public as well as my own knowledge, can you just give some common examples of what an indirect cost might be?

Engineering. Uh, mayor and council members, engineering is the largest indirect cost, but there also costs to advertise uh advertise for bids. Uh, there may be other administrative costs, permit costs, uh, that we have to pay directly. It's anything that's not strictly related to the construction, materials, testing, soil, borings, inspection, that all goes into indirect. All right. Thank you. Okay. No questions for me, but thanks John for a thorough presentation. Holly,

um, great presentation. I appreciate that. Just uh, as a point of clarity, if we are going to cap 8th Street right where Willow is, all of these costs include a new access point from um, County 3 into into 8th Street because there's not a way on that I can see from the south either, right? It dead ends on the south. So, does this in include a new way in there? South is connected to Pine Street. I'm sorry. Yeah. One block down. In my effort to zoom in and make it legible, I eliminated the street connection to the south. Okay. Right there. Yep. Pine Street will still be constructed. So, we'll still have access from the south.

That's DCL. That's okay. Perfect. And it's primarily the trucks that would be coming onto Willow Street because that's where that hairpin turn gets to be, you know, consuming intersection capacity. Okay, I appreciate that. Thank you. Anything else there? Are you good? No, I'm good. Nick,

um I think the first thing is your choice of road, the planning and the cost estimate, all that is boring. And I hope you'll take that as the most like possible highest possible compliment possible for something like that. Um, I really appreciate that you wanted to do a second open house about the bike and ped plan part of that because as someone who takes his kids to Dairy Queen a lot through Catera's entrance down there, I think whether you make a bike lane there or not, people use it as a bike road. And from my personal perspective, I'd be so much more worried about the kids that use that to go to Dairy Queen getting hit than parking just as a matter of priority. So, I know there may be parking problems, but I think the risk associated with not allocating for the bike is there, especially since we've basically extended the path down now. There's even more bikes than were there before. So, hopefully that feedback is I mean, that's my feedback right here, but hopefully the open house also kind of goes along with that. Um on Willow Speed Street, there's kind of a unique situation in that Kemp goes back and forth from the facility to the warehouse about I don't even know how many times a day, but it seems like it's constant. Is there any special consideration that needs to be taken place from an engineering perspective to to account for that extra wear from what is basically heavy machinery operating it on all day or would it be built like a standard street from that perspective? Uh, mayor, council, the proposed street section is is actually heavier than what we'd find on a typical street.

So, inch and a half, we'd probably have a 2 inch wear course and the aggregate base might be down to 8 in. And even though the soils may be usable, the extra sand layer provides insurance and a better road section and better drainage. So, this is actually a heavier section than we typically used and it's consistent with our standard detail plate for commercial roadways. Okay. Was I making a mountain out of a mohill? That doesn't actually impact it the way I think it would, but it seems like that traffic driving there is actually significant.

Truck traffic definitely impacts roadways. It's it's a computation that's that's used commonly as ESEL ESA equivalent single axle loads. And if you look at trucks, buses, uh, garbage trucks, things like that, there's less trips, but they have a significantly higher impact than a typical vehicle. So, no, you're right on right on the money there. Okay. Um, last qu I mean, this doesn't obviously include the roundabout, but have they ever drawn what a proposed roundabout, how much footprint it would occupy of that intersection?

Uh, mayor and council, they had a concept. Uh, I don't think it was dimensioned, so we could show the impact, but uh, I could certainly send that out to folks if they want to see it. They wouldn't likely eat into the existing bike trailer. I think they'd probably offset it to the east most likely a little bit and just account for how the roads let sit there, I imagine.

Right. All roundabouts are not necessarily, you know, you just have two crossing roads and that's where the roundabout goes. They're designed based on the traffic flow from the various legs. So, they could shift it over to the east if they needed to, but uh the trail that was put in was a cooperative project with Mindot, and I'm I'm certain they wouldn't want to disturb that or when they reviewed that, they made sure it was outside of any potential intersection improvements. That's perfect. Thank you. One more.

John, did you say that you had spoken to like Dakota County Lumber, Peerless, and Kemps? Uh yes, mayor and council members. Uh when this project started, I met on-site with Dakota County Lumber and met on site with Perilless Plastics. Uh and we have had ongoing conversations with Kemps because uh they have a couple of parcels on the west side of fourth

where we're proposing a storm water quality improvement project. and Kemp's uh during those conversations about their proposed expansion and our project, they did talk about their truck traffic. And one of the things they actually mentioned was um they would prefer not to see a roundabout because if it's a roundabout, you you're the platooning of the vehicles that would you would get coming from a traffic signal is all stretched out. So then they have to wait for a truck and trailer it, they have to wait that much longer to get into the roundabout just to get across Highway three.

And as far as um temporary access, so like I'm thinking specifically, you know, for those three businesses like taking nothing away from the residents and the greenhouse and you know, Dairy Queen and everything, but I think of those three because of the number of trucks day in and day out. Um, is there I assume that the temporary access and everything are going to be set up first. That way they can like I'm going to use Dakota County uh lumber as an example. They're going to have to section their fence, right? Put in a temporary entrance as they start um pulling off the existing road surface and and doing the subgrade work. Um I know they'll have access on the east side to Pine back through. They're probably going to go further to the west because that's tight there and traffic backs up from um from 3 and 50 there. I just want to make sure that we continue to communicate often as much as possible through that process. Um because it anything that prohibits their access, I mean it's it's the heat of their season, right? Um, so just if everything we can do possible to make sure that we're communicating and we're getting people out to the open houses and all of it.

Yeah. And and specific to that, Mayor, um, we're we're in the feasibility when we start doing the plans. The traffic control plan is going to be a key part of that, especially here, Chem Dakota Lumber, the greenhouse. Uh, in fact, I talked late last week um to the greenhouse owner about business signage to make sure that uh you know the the orange and black signs open to local businesses including whatever uh that can easily be incorporated into the traffic control plan. For the heavier traffics, uh we need to talk to Kemp's uh quantify the number and the time of day. Uh I think they're they're shifting trailers back and forth kind of throughout the day, but um looking for the predominant time. So if we have to try and schedule something for a closure that we could do that. Uh typically the first step on the project is going to be milling up the pavement and then just leaving it there and then they disturb what they need to disturb to start the water man work which would aside from the tree removal which would be the first work item out there.

Okay. and we can even phase the the water main work, but we do not want to send trucks onto any of the local streets. So, right, if we determine we can't come up with a practical route, we would probably have to send them down to County Road 50.

Okay. Thank you for that clarity too because I I mean [clears throat] when you look at it you know from 10,000 ft Willow doesn't seem like it's going to be a very difficult project but there's a lot of logistic logistical constraint in that area just from you know just the businesses alone right um homeowners definitely will be impacted and specifically to the north there's not another way out um but the businesses and the the the volume of traffic and the size of those trucks I just I see that being a lot of planning and preparedness and, you know, being adjacent to Highway 3 isn't the most conducive. Um, but we'll make it work and work our way through it. Um, I I appreciate the integration of the 2019 bike ped plan.

I mean, as we look at that, you know, we know that we have the path that comes down the west side of three. People typically get onto the street on Willow. They go over to uh Coutura's entrance at Ramling River Park and uh there's no sidewalk there, right? From and I'm not going to hold you to this, but hypothetically, if we were to widen the road to accommodate both side parking and a bike lane, I mean, are we talking two 300 grand? I mean, how significant I know it might be kind of loaded because there's other, you know, there's there's sewer in the water and possible extensions are moving, but um how timeconuming would it be to even get just an idea of what we're talking about?

Uh mayor and council to to evaluate that we we'd have to start with what the widening would be that's required. And if we put in bike lanes, the recommended guidance is that they not be in the gutter line. That they actually between be between the parking lane and the through lanes. And so you'd have bike lanes between parked cars and through traffic. That's the recommendation. And uh if it's a shared bikeway on one side, we'd actually have to have a delineator there of some sort,

right? So, uh, to have, um, five foot bike lanes on each side with parking on both sides would require about 50 feet. So, that's about a six foot widening, 3 4 feet on each side. Um, to have a separated bike path, so that's a shared one. Um that'd be about 52 1/2 ft because you have area consumed by the buffer uh the clear zone on the one side and then the delineator. You don't have a road width there to do that.

Yeah. No, it's 44 feet. To have bike lanes, five foot bike lanes on each side with parking on one side uh would be 42 and 1/2 ft. That we can fit in within our existing pavement section, but that requires removing one side of parking. And to have a separated bike lane on one side with parking um would be uh 46 1/2 ft. So, uh you're looking at the difference of just adding the adding uh parking there. So, it's to to widen and accommodate the you know bike lanes if we wanted the parking there is significant.

Yeah. The path of least resistance would be eliminate parking on one side for the bike path. Right. It's okay. Right. and to um you know the driveways out there. We'd have to look at those because when you move the roadway closer, we've talked about moving roadways away from houses and that gives us more flexibility when we're reconstructing because then we can flatten the grades out on the driveways if they're steep, right?

Well, if we move it closer, that steepens the driveway because they have to get from point A to point B over a shorter distance. We haven't really evaluated that at this point. Um, but uh we can report back after that open house and see if there's, you know, where the where the concerns fall on the parking and whatnot, but we could at least provide bike lanes if we took out one side of parking. And you did say that in the first open house that the general feedback you received was to not eliminate parking. Correct. That's tough because there's first first two open houses. Yeah, first two open houses. [snorts] Mr. Mayor, can I ask different question here?

Um, you know, obviously we we do have the the trail that runs to the north and then, you know, basically ends right at Dairy Queen and we've also got, you know, plenty of kids that are coming from our downtown areas and from around that area. I expect the the Dairy Queen being the primary point of interest there. Um, what sort of information do we have just specifically about the use of Willow Street as that avenue of getting there? Um, I look at this and I just to me it's it's a miracle that we haven't had a

bike [laughter] and a car and a semi all in the wrong spot at the wrong time. And so while I appreciate the bike pad path and the work that we're doing to make that interconnected, Willow Street as a as a testing ground for this actually worries me because we aren't a community that's familiar with bike paths on our roadways. We haven't had them marked at this point. It's a street that is being used by semi-truckss um and large vehicles both from Kemps and from Dakota County Lumber. Um, we do have parking needs on both sides of the street as as we know it right now when it comes to the greenhouse. So, actively mixing in pedestrians

intentionally in that area just to me seems like a a concerning idea. Um, so I I'm curious to know two things. One, do we actually know how heavily used it is and is there a way to figure that out? And two, is there an alternative option that exists to separate our pedestrians a little bit from that particular roadway as a primary so source point in in future even if we're if we're going to abandon the idea of a a dedicated bike lane here. I don't like the the lack of interconnectedness, but I also don't particularly love the idea of just right everybody use that same street.

Yeah. Integrating a bike lane might be ideal in like the grand scheme of things, right? But we don't have them yet. You won't have them until you start to implement them. Um, there is that gap in the in the trail. Willow does get used to what volume. I mean, depends on what day of the summer, right? It's not as I don't think it's as used as much as we might think it is, but it's it's definitely used. And there's not a whole lot of um setback from the home to the roadway on the north side of Willow that one would even entertain like a five or six foot bike path. I mean, yes, there's trees that are going to come out, but you get into the grade issue, right? And the driveways and the continuity of it. It's just it's it all sounds good on plans and it comes to implementation and it just real world. Um,

yeah. I mean, I just I even look at Main Street access going up to ETH and, you know, I I don't know. I I don't have the answer. I just have I just want to express concern in the area. That's all. Well, and I'm with you. It's first thing I think about is the minute we redo the road, what are people going to do? They're going to drive faster, right? Um, and then you mix two sides of parking with people traveling faster with bikes. It's not ideal, but there's not a reasonable there's not a reasonable plan short of rerouting the path to the north. And we've talked about that at Nauseium with the railway or with the railway. So,

yeah, mayor and council, even if we tried to put in maybe just a sidewalk, you know, a five foot walk on one side of the other, um, we could reallocate some of the the space uh to sidewalk and maybe scoot. You know, we've got two 14 foot lanes, 8 foot. So, we've got minimum lane width is 12 feet. So, we've got four feet. We might be able to shift one curb line in and try and fit a sidewalk behind it. But on the north side, we have I want to say at least a dozen driveway connections coming out there. And we would probably have to put it right behind the curb, which is not provide that real separation. You've got parked cars, so that adds some comfort, right?

But it's not a separation. And then you'd have these aprons going down uh from the sidewalk. So um here may maybe at the open house just [clears throat] see what the conversation is.

I mean you know you think about it and it it's not ideal to come down a path, cross a road, go down cross back the same road to get into the park. However, if we're at least exploring and trying to vet out all options, I think that's the due diligence that the residents and the businesses deserve and and um who knows, maybe maybe it's not as big of an issue as as we're as we're talking about it. Um but definitely worth the conversation at the open house. And if you if you get some compelling feedback that makes you want to go a different direction, let's absolutely have that conversation because we want to make sure that we we do it right and we don't come back later and go, "Oh, I wish we had." And then it's astronomical in cost, time, and all the things. Um,

thank you for that. Yeah. No, go ahead. I just I'm sorry to interrupt, but I don't know if parks and recreation as part of that 2019 bike and ped plan if they did any bike and ped counts out there. Uh but you know, we really can't do that this time of year obviously, especially not later this week. Um so I don't know if there's anything available that we might be able to draw on for that. Yeah, not that I'm aware of. I haven't seen anything in my records that they did any counts out there. I just a lot of community feedback, but I don't remember going to extended counts or anything.

Um, even though it's not convenient, uh, we will be reconstructing Pine Street in one or two years. Uh, the north side of Pine Street might be an opportunity. There's houses on one side if you want to get a trail connection eighth to Pine and over and then back up. I don't know. But, um, that might be an option to help.

Okay. No, good point. I like that. Um the second question that I had was when it comes to the the reforestation, right? And maybe this is a question more for Kim. Um do we have the ability to assume cost in the project for reforestation, have it allocated for future planning? So, are we able to if we said we want to fill in the blank 20 grand, whatever it is, 30 grand as part of the project, would we be able to essentially close that project out, transfer the funds, they've been earmarked and restrictive for that use to come back later so that we don't have to find an alternate funding source for the reforestation? or is that not even something

based on what other finance directors have told me that you really can't do that and if you do it becomes more of a bookkeeping issue. So Okay. All right. No worries. But I I if if we are allowed to do that, that's an option we could look at. I don't disagree with what John said. Okay. That's fair. I appreciate that. Okay. Any other questions or comments? I'm good for now. Anybody else? Just so I understand what we're voting on tonight. You can still change the roadway plan to whatever these bike [clears throat] plans end up being. We can change this down the road from what we're voting on tonight. Right.

Uh mayor and council. Yep. So we're right now we're voting on 44 ft. Um if we put a bike way on there, that doesn't change anything. If we put bike lane bike lanes on and take out one row of parking, that that basically doesn't change it either. So we we have options. We're just going to start the process, get the open house feedback, bring it to you or communicate that to you one way or the other. You know, if we hear, hey, we use that all the time or or we're really concerned about, you know, parking, um, then we'll definitely bring that to you and we can adjust that on, you know, during the process and it won't affect the budget.

Okay. Yeah. If but we we are excluding like the dedicated with median probably by saying that right I mean I think we kind of decided that just because we said it's not feasible from right just an easement perspective more than anything but the other options are still on the table right okay yeah by by motion we approve it as it's presented if there's an amendment or a change to the scope and plan it would come forward consent agenda move as needed okay thank you okay

because I I Honestly, mayor and councel, I think based on the budget, um, you know, we've got some uncertainty with regard to closing a street right now. We've got some uncertainty regarding, you know, that that other driveway location and exactly where that is and going through the process. So, um, we've that's included, but that may not fall out too. So, we may have budget available. Okay. Thank you, sir. Um, I want to ask one question maybe of our city attorney,

and it's probably inconclusive, but could cities face liability for situations that happen in a constructed dedicated bikeway. Is there any case law around that? Finding the button there. Um, I don't believe so except the general rules of liability. Um, and so that would just depend on the situation and how that incident occurred if if that came to be. Okay. Thank you. All right. Um, I will seek a motion to approve the professional services agreement with WSB LLC for the Willow Street MSA Improvements final design and bidding. Motion to approve. Second.

Motion by Jake, second by Steve. Call the RO, please. Council Council Member Burton. Yes. Council member Lean. Yes. Council member Wilson. Yes. member Gordes. Yes. Mayor Hoy. Yes. Thank you. Thank you, sir. All right. Wrong table. Petra, you get to go first. I do. Now, Amy gave you Amy gave you kind of the rules up front, right? She did. Okay, good. [laughter] She did tell me about the bison. [laughter and gasps] Um, yeah. Well, I just wanted to thank council for having me here today and Amystead and um glad I could kind of watch this this process for you guys for my first time here. Thank you.

Thank you, ma'am.

Nick, I guess I just want to thank the speakers who spoke tonight. I don't want to say a whole lot just because I don't want to diminish some of the great words that were said there. Um, I've been wrapping my head all week trying to decide if we're supposed to say something or not say something or what the best thing to do is in current environments. And I'll just say that there are people in our talented community right now who I guess are afraid or are nervous or on edge. And I think we could all do a little bit better about having compassion for the people that are right in front of us. And that's all I think I would ask for in this current environment. Thanks.

Thank you. Thanks, Nick. Hi.

Um, I'm actually going to talk about some happy things. So, huge congratulations to the Farmington High School debate team. Um, they won uh Will and Nicola as a team won the final round of the 125th Minnesota State High School League uh debate tournament. and this is the first time that that's ever happened in FHS history. So, that's pretty cool. Um, debate doesn't usually get a lot of conversation, but I would say that's worth some conversation. Um, and then also just general support of the arts. Um, the community ed department and Farmington High School choir are collaborating on a showcase musical theater and jazz showcase coming up on February 20th and 21st called Cabaret. It is, if you know, musical theater is not Cabaret the musical. Um, this is familyfriendly. You can bring your small humans to this one. Um, but, uh, it's a a great program that highlights, uh, elementary age students from fourth through sixth grade from all of the schools as well as FHS students, um, that prepare solos, duets, um, and they do this all under their own direction and they audition for it. It's a fantastic fantastic way to expose your families and children uh to the arts. And my tieback to that is that there is a lot of information out there and um studies that have been done around how um the arts help and support all kinds of health journeys. Um and so this is a a great thing for you to be able to do with your friends, do with your family, um and support some kids locally.

Thank you. Jake.

Um, just a couple of things tonight. Earlier, we appointed members to the boards and commissions, but I wanted to take a moment to thank the members who are uh ending their terms uh whether at the the end of their normal length of time in office or or resigning early for one reason or another. Um, so thank you to Chrisa Christa Tesy who served on the planning commission, Megan Merik on the parks and wreck commission, Pat Hannon who served on the Rambling River Advisory Board, and Lel Cortis who served on the water board. And I'm going to exercise a little point of personal privilege. Um, for anybody who didn't know, uh, both Pat Hennon and Lel Cortis went by other titles to me growing up. They were Grandma Pat and Aunt Pete. So to grandma Pat and Aunt Pete, thank you for demonstrating what [clears throat] uh civic engagement looks like and being a role model in that part of my life. So thank you to those four women.

Well said, Steve. We do like those two two individuals. [clears throat] Um I too want to thank the individuals who spoke tonight. A lot of times we have an empty chamber and so um um I do appreciate those that uh came from near and far to speak to us tonight and and share what's on your heart. Thank you Lynn.

Uh couple comments tonight. I do want to thank the speakers and uh thank you Stephen for sharing your comments tonight. And while I'm able unable to discuss personal matters publicly uh due to privacy and confidentiality, I believe there is always room for improvement. And if you would like to meet with me uh privately, one-on-one uh and we can have a conversation and I can listen to you and and hear your thoughts on how the city can improve. Um and thank you to the other speakers that were here. one uh technicality. Uh I was informed by the IT director that our streaming was not live in the beginning, but um David went back and checked and it is streaming and the full meeting will be uploaded. That's all I have. Thank you.

Thank you, ma'am. Shirley, I don't have anything. Nothing. David, nothing this evening. Thank you, John. Thank you, Mayor. Uh, weather's going to be turning colder later this week. Uh, we'll be out there salting and and clearing snow where it occurs and whatnot, but when it gets extremely cold, salt doesn't work anymore. So, uh, just be patient. Uh if needed, we put sand out to in to introduce some grit to the ice if necessary, but uh hopefully it'll be shortlived and we'll be back to more moderate temperatures the next week. Thanks, sir. Kelly,

good evening, Mayor and Council. Uh to celebrate National Skating Month, we'll be hosting a open skate this Sunday, 1:30 to 3 p.m. at the Schmidz Mackie Arena. Uh it is free if you bring a Goodwill donation to the food shelf. And then the next uh skate park design meeting will be February 9th, 6:00 to 8:00 PM at the Ramling River Center. Um that was uh two weeks uh uh later than originally scheduled. We had some soil issues we needed to look at at the uh park there. So like I said, February 9th, it's a Monday evening, 6:00 to 8 at Ramling River Center. Um Spawn Ranch will be presenting the two conceptual plans and um he said they're looking good and he's excited to show them. So hope to see everybody there. Thank you, Kim.

Good evening, Mayor and Council. Today, the city kicked off its official start to the financial audit. We had a few auditors on site. Uh they will return to their offices and we'll continue to work to close our books for 2025 and they'll be back at the end of March to finish up the audit. Thank you, Chief.

Good evening, Mayor and Council. Uh this evening, I'd like to make a response about comments that were made at the last council uh meeting and this council meeting. Uh, we would like to thank you for raising your concerns regarding firefighter mental health. Farmington acknowledged the battles with mental health are a serious problem that affects many first responders. Minnesota firefighters worked tirelessly to keep our community safe, but they're significantly and disproportionately affected by serious health conditions both physically and mentally. The city takes very serious the risk faced not only by firefighters, but by all first responders who are employed by or volunteer for the city of Farmington. However, it is important to clarify that the city's intent has always been and continues to be to support its first responders and promote their long-term health and well-being. We recognize the mental health support is not always visible. However, city takes ongoing steps to inform firefighters of available resources and to maintain access to those resources. First, the city takes full advantage of the resources available through the Minnesota Firefighter Initiative or Menfire to the vast resources of menfire program include menfire assistant program which provides 247 access to mental health support resources including counseling services for firefighters and their families. Menfire training program which provides annual training focused on emotional wellness and occupational risk associated with firefighting. also do include menfire critical incident program which provides up to $20,000 a medical expense assisting for qualified conditions including PTSD. The city also realizes that certain menfire resources require firefighter firefighter uh initiation. The practical reality that in that and many firefighters do not feel comfortable seeking help to help mitigate this. The fire department also implemented wellness that fits on June 5th of 2024. This program provides annual wellness check-ins, confidential counseling sessions, which the department pays for, critical incident and trauma event response debriefings, and additional

therapy sessions. The city of Farmington recognizes mental health as an essential component of firefighter safety and public safety. The city also acknowledges the stigma surrounding mental health remains a challenge within the fire service and that even established resources may not always feel accessible or sufficient. This is not a challenge unique to Farmington. It is an ongoing issue faced by first responding agencies nationwide. The city remains committed to addressing the challenge through uh continued evaluation, education, and resource development. The city is committed to regular reviewing its support system to ensure consistency with evolving standards, best practices. This includes listening to firefighters and leadership regarding how those practices can effectively be implemented. The city remains confidence and ability to continue providing services to the community safely and effectively with a workforce that is supported and prepared to serve. In closing, the city reiterates its respect and appreciation for its firefighters who serve this community and for their families. The city again thanks you for raising the concerns and remains committed to ongoing dialogue, learning, and improvement and support of those who protect our uh community every day. Thank you.

Thank you, sir. Chief,

uh just uh a few things. First, I wanted to recognize on the consent agenda, the first center contract was approved um in my 20 years here with Farmington Police Department. That is the biggest uh accomplishment in advancing our training um in that time. It's going to be an incredible uh addition to our training sites. uh two ranges, large classrooms, mat room for defensive tactics, a virtual virtual reality training room, and uh force on force training settings as well. So, thank you for that. Um tomorrow night is our first a movie with the cops. Uh we're going to have 20 20 kids 5 to 10 years old at the PD serving pizza and watching Lilo and Stitch. So, um if you're in the area, stop by and see. I'm sure it's going to be amazing. Um, hot off the press, I just got an email during the council meeting to confirm uh Siobhan Anderson with uh Farmington uh high school boys hockey confirmed that Thursday, February 5th will be their first uh first responders night. Uh so they're offering free admittance to Farmington first responders as well as uh collecting donations to raise uh funds for the Zjac family. Um, and then another thing, uh, I know a lot of people are, um, you know, feeling a lot of tension and maybe a little iced out these days, uh, with everything that's going on, but, uh, I've heard personally and have relayed to me that there are questions about Farmington Police Department's response. So, I wanted to make sure and give a statement just so that everybody is aware of where we stand personally here in Farmington. Uh, I want to take a moment to clearly explain the Farmington Police Department's position regarding uh, immigration and customs enforcement or ICE operations within our city. First and most importantly, the Farmington Police Department does not conduct

immigration enforcement. We do not arrest individuals for civil immigration violations. We do not conduct traffic or pedestrian stops at the request of ICE. And we do not assist with apprehensions or detentions related to immigration status. That is not a role under Minnesota law, nor is it uh consistent with our department's mission. That's it. Thank you.

Thank you, sir. So, I'm a little torn because [clears throat] one of the things that happens when you get in to an elected capacity is the purview of your comments and the purview of um your area of responsibility are pretty clear. or they're defined by the League of Minnesota Cities as to when you talk about certain things, what you talk about, um, as to not be confused with the individual and their stance and the position of the city. I hope that makes sense the way I said that. Um, the reason I struggle is because there's a lot that I wanted to say to you, not just after last meeting, not just over the last couple of years. Um, there's a lot I wanted to say in response to the comments, what was done, how it was done. I wanted to first start by clarifying why we changed the citizen comments portion of this meeting. Even after you spoke last week, the Castle Rock resident that spoke immediately after you disregarded the time. And even after I had said, "Your time is expired." And I gave, she still continued to talk. That is the lack of decorum and the lack of respect for decorum that this council is trying to curb. It's unfortunate that that was interpreted as we didn't want to hear you. We didn't want to listen to what you had to say.

And it certainly wasn't in response to any number of people being in chambers. Put a thousand people in here. I'll stand up and have the hardest conversations with anyone. What I struggle with is what I want to say and choosing whether or not to do it publicly or to do it privately with you. And I'm not going to air on the side of caution. I will say it publicly. I am very familiar with your situation over the last couple of years. There are certain components of that that are protected by law. There are confidentiality um rules and policies that we have to follow. That's not just for your protection, but it's for the protection of others. That's something that we will never deviate from. However, as the guy who stood up and rallied while you were in a medical situation, who put himself on the line, who went through the process to donate a kidney, I didn't appreciate how it was handled. I didn't appreciate the running to social media and the stone that was cast. I just didn't. And I'll leave it at that. Okay. Manto man, I'm going to leave it at that. Um, when you sign up for this job, there's a lot of things that, you know, are going to come your way. There's a lot of people that are going to disagree with the decisions that you make. There's a lot of people that are going to attack every component of every decision that

you make in everything that you do. From I mean, hell, I've heard it all, right? From my tattoos to my beard to my jobs to what I drive. I know what I signed up for. What you don't sign up for, you don't think is ever going to happen is to be is to have people read the post that was made and then start accusing me of being a fraud in the mental health realm. Right? And that's not on you, Stephen. I'll be very straight. That's I know that's not on you. But everything that we do has consequences and sometimes that was the reality of the situation, right? And that one stung. I'll be very frank. It it stung because as someone who lost their dad to suicide, who's had too many people in my life lose their battle to suicide. I've gone out. I've spent hundreds of hours speaking to high schools, speaking to our kids, advocating at regional levels, being involved in in more things that I ever anticipated in the suicide awareness and prevention realm. That one that one stung. However, I'm not going to let it sit there. There are there are parts of human resources and employee handling that even council is not privy to nor should we be privy to. There are surveys that are done of teams that should never be discussed at any level should not be shared because it takes away from the sanctity and the integrity of the process.

I've been doing a lot of work with suicide awareness and prevention for the better part of the last two decades. I will stand on the hill that our city, we're not perfect, but we have made a lot of strides from where we were when I came in in 2019. Do we have room to grow? Absolutely. The one challenge and I think anyone who who spends time in in advocacy in this space will will tell you is that the hardest thing that you can do is get someone to raise their hand. You can fund programs all day long. You can throw millions of dollars at programs. Somehow we have to break down the barrier of our men and women, not just our first responders, but our men and women who serve in any capacity when they're dealing with something to raise their hand. There's there's privacy involved with that. And as much as we want to know like how are our programs working? How are are they reaching the audience the way that we intended them to? Truth is, we don't get answers on some of that. I wish our counselors would tell us, "Hey, we had these people stepped in." And we really think there's laws that protect that. There's there's things that will just that will preclude us from wanting to do more even when our hearts want to do a lot more. But we won't stop. Like, we will not stop. The city of Farmington, as long as I'm involved, the city of Farmington will continue to put the necessary resources in place to make sure that everyone has an opportunity to receive the help that they deserve at whatever expense.

But we need people to raise their hands. And I encourage anyone, not just within the city of Farmington, wherever you work, wherever you interact with within your circles, please, when somebody is visibly changed, when something is off, ask the question. Just go raise the alarm. I will always heir on the side of caution that I would rather someone be be pissed off at me because I dug a little bit too deep. I maybe struck a cord that they weren't comfortable with than to get the notice of their their passing. And I think we can all agree on that. But we've got to get more people to raise their hand and talk about it. And that's part of why I've done it. Because if if I can sit here as the mayor of the city of Farmington under constant public scrutiny, if I can talk about my mental health, I hope the next person can before it's too late. What we went through with Pete and his passing, I don't wish that on anybody ever. Even though even though you have Even though you have moved on beyond the city of Farmington's police department or the the city of Farmington's fire department, even though you've moved on, I hope that you still believe that you can reach out. You can pick up the phone. You've got my number.

You can call I that's not a that's not a a false promise. That's not a an invitation to not deliver on. I I hope there's something still there. Moreover, I I applaud you for standing up because God knows I've I've spent time with too many people that have not spoken up and it's resulted in the worst possible outcome. So, from Joshua to Stephen, I hope you sincerely know and believe that I have been there. I will be there and I will do anything I can within my capacity not only serving the city but also as a human being to help you. Okay,

you absolutely can.

Um sorry. So, um, first of all, mayor, I want to say thank you for that. And I I want to clarify again, everything I've said the last two meetings is not intact on you guys. I understand you guys probably didn't know a lot of things that happened to me. Um, and my decision in coming here to talk to you guys was to start to raise those questions. Like I said, I've had, I don't want to overestimate, but two to three dozen first responders across the country reach out to me in the last two weeks going, "The same things happened to me. The same thing through HR, city administrators, city attorneys happening to me." And that's preventing people from speaking up that they see the way we're treated. You know, I I I have friends that have spent 21 years on fire departments that had to resign because of PTSD. They didn't get a thank you from their city, just like I I I never got a thank you from a single chief on the fire department for my service. And so I I absolutely appreciate you saying I can reach out to you and and as a human being, I I wholehearted believe you, right? I wholeheartedly believe that statement. But my experience with the city is that that's not the case, right? Like I didn't I didn't get like I said, I didn't even get invited. There's two other people that retired the same week I did. I didn't even get invited to those retirement parties. Like I've been completely blacklisted. So the the support's not there. and and I've and I've posted I 100% Chief Price. I applaud you in in getting the um contract with Wellness that fits. That's amazing, right? And and and I champion that. That is that is great. Um where my voice is and sorry I'm a little nervous here. It's hard to talk about some of this stuff, right? I don't

disagree. I think most cities, I can't speak for all, but in in what I've experienced, cities do a really good job on the front end of going, hey, if you're struggling a little bit, we have a program, right? Like that that's a really and and that's amazing. That's amazing to have that. The issue comes in when you have someone that ends up in my situation that's really struggling with PTSD. I mean, you you knew John, right? Like I Right. He's both our friends. my best I did CPR on my best friend for like 14 minutes, right? Like that's messed me up, right? I've been on more suicides than I like to think about, right? Like those sounds, they'll never leave my head. And so when you end up in a spot like I am like really like deep in the weeds dealing with PTSD, there's the support's not there because then it turns into we have to worry about what the League of Minnesota City thinks and their liability versus taking care of our people. And that's not again that's not attack on you. That's not even attack necessarily on anyone here. That's just the reality of the way it works. And so that's where we need to change, right? That's where we need people to like have the courage to stand up and go, that's not acceptable. That's not acceptable for us to see me or anyone that served being blacklisted like that and not appreciated because they end up with a mental health injury, right? Like it would be completely different if it was a if it was a physical injury. And people see that and I don't know what was in Pete's heart. I never will, right? But there are people out there that see this treatment and go, I'm never going to speak up. I'm never going to get help because if I end up struggling that bad and they know it, I'm going to get treated like all the other people. And that's where we need to change, right? That's that's that's where the true change is going to come in and preventing first responders dis

and I and I just want to be clear, I include dispatchers and first responders because they right, I've talked to a few of them. Um, and [snorts] that's where I want to encourage you guys to really start digging and deep and and digging deep into what what cities can do to actually support their people cuz like I said and I mean we're going on a year and a half of since I've been off the department and I can count on my hand the number of people on the department that have ever reached out to me even knowing I'm struggling and and that's where that's where change needs to happen. and they don't feel comfortable. The ones that do reach out privately have asked me to not out them, right? And I never [laughter] will, right? Like I'll never out any of them. But that's that's the problem. They they don't feel like they can like no one feels like they can publicly support me. And and I honestly thought that was just a volunteer firefighter thing, right? Because we don't have a union, stuff like that. But I'm learning it doesn't matter if you're in a union, right? Like they're treated the exact same way. There's this there's this concept that there's a brotherhood sisterhood family and it ends the moment you end up with a medical or a medical disability due to your mental health. It ends that second and that's where we need to change. So I know you saw me shaking your head cuz I it's not that I don't feel comfortable reaching out to you directly but at this time I don't feel direct I don't feel comfortable I don't feel supported by the city. Right. And that's

the the only thing that I would ask of you, Stephen. And again, this is just an ask. Lynn extended the invite, right? I'm going to ask both of our chiefs and myself to be a part of that conversation. Yeah, I I was going to ask if there could be a few I understand there can't be public, right? And I do have a disability claim, a worker comp plan claim going on. So, I got to work out some of that, right? I have to ask my attorney. Yeah, we we'll work out the

We can figure that out. I would I would open that because in December of 2024 when I when I told Chief Price and Lynn, and I'm telling you guys, like I word for word said, "If something doesn't change, there's going to be a first responder in this city that hurts themselves or worse." Like I said that 10 months before Pete did what he did. And in that meeting I was promised that that the chiefs would get together that Chief Price would go to the the police chief and that they would come to you and request more. And like that just never happened. And and I get told, well, it's because like we didn't support you because you didn't tell us. I've been so open about my struggles since the day John died. I I I couldn't tell anyone more. I I've talked to Chief Price about my my depression medications, my anxiety medications, the things they were they were causing me. I I talked to every single candidate. I was during my time as instructor, every single candidate that came through, I told them about my PTSD. I told them about what I went through, the importance of having someone to rely on and checking on each other, right? And like you talked about, if something doesn't seem right, talk about it, right? And have that person that that you trust. Like if if it was me and you, I would tell you, Josh, like I'm going to trust you. If you go like, "Oh, things you're telling me aren't right. You need to get help. I'm I'm promising you ahead of time that I'm going to listen to you, right? Because in our heads, we can tell us this is normal." I mean, I'm telling you, when I I could I literally couldn't put a sheet on my feet without going into a full panic attack. And in my head, I was telling myself, "Well, you just did CPR on your best friend. That's normal." And I was lucky enough that at the time, my lieutenant, Lieutenant Hansen, said, "That's not right. [laughter] You need to talk to someone." Right? Um,

but so I've been very open about my struggles for the last, well, you know, I mean, I think it was five or six years I was on the department before I left. And so I feel like I hear a lot of excuses of why we we didn't and can't. And I I I certainly want to move past that and move forward. But I Yeah, I'm sorry. I'm kind of going off. Oh, you're fine. [laughter]

I'm super nervous. But I would definitely welcome that conversation with the two chiefs, Lynn and you, because I I do think there's a huge opportunity here for the city of Farmington to be the change. And that's that's why I came to you guys is because you guys have experienced something that no city council wants to experience, right? Like no one wants to experience what you guys went through. And and I was here the the first meeting afterwards and my heart broke. I know you all, like I said, I have respect for all of you. I know you all sincerely were heartbroken and devastated. And I and I think like we need to take that and we need to go, how do we make that not happen again, right? Right? And I know there's legalities and stuff like that that we have to figure out,

but but let's be the city that starts the change. And that's what I want, right? I want to be the city that goes the city of Farmington's the one that said enough's enough, and we're going to be the ones that figure this out. I'm with you. Thank you for all the extended time. No, you're good. You're good. Appreciate you. Thank you. I appreciate it. With that, I would seek a motion to adjurnn. Second. Motion by Steve, second by Jake. All in favor say I. I I we're journed at 8:30.

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