City Council - Regular Meeting

All right. Can I get a motion to approve the agenda? Please make a motion to approve the agenda. I'll second second by Conrad. Any further discussion. All those in favor say aye aye opposed. Same sign motion passes. All right. We do not have anyone here for community comment, but we do have presentations and reports a plenty this evening. Commissioner Fahey. Welcome.

In your construction, road construction updates, I don't think you mentioned County Road 11 and 44 Big Woods Boulevard. That's still happening next summer, correct? Okay, great. That one has been. Troublesome, fatal. Pick your word. Our fire department's gone out there one too many times. We did have some great luck, and Whitney on Lyndon's team has been really helpful in making improvements there. I think last year at this time, we reached out initially and got those enhanced or flashing stop signs, which still don't seem to be doing much good. So that project can't come soon enough.

Any other questions? That was my question. All right. Okay. Thank you. Have a good night. John Carver, the ice cream shop is closed for the season. I know you like to plan your visits around the ice cream shop, so I'm sorry. All right. Up next, we have our county attorney, Mark Betts. How about that Packers game yesterday?

I have questions. Yeah. So we're looking at for 2027 a 20% jump for the city of Carver, it looks like, even though our contract percentages are going down by, oh, what? About three quarters of a percent. And this is year one of five of increases. So at the end, we'll... 5 years of 20% increases.

I don't think I understand the answer though. So clarifying question. So like I understand cost of living and you come here for 16 years and you've talked about 3%, 5%, whatever that has looked like. It's been reasonable in previous years. When we're looking at 21%, is it going to be another double digit increase for the next five years?

Okay. Yeah. And is it going to be a double-digit increase with a two in front of it, again, being the first number? You mean like the – Like a 21% increase again.

know consistent and that's because of the amount of cases that we have so yeah and my question is more long game of like what can we look forward forward to yeah look at the future of yeah to plan um and like is that the best partnership for us looking forward yeah so yeah i know i understand other questions

So you said those numbers really quick. The gap that we're trying to cover for the city of Carver is $6,138. Yeah. Or $6,138. We're going to cover that. Yeah. Over five years, the first year is $1,644. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. And then you said a $9,000 number?

No, and that's helpful. In Carver, we plan 10 years ahead. We have a 10-year long-term financial plan. So as soon as we have those numbers and plug them in, that's helpful. I don't love it, but it's helpful.

So I think that's my next question is, can you go over the why? Again, for this, the county is withdrawing their subsidy, if you will. So you are looking to cover your basis on your straight costs for your department.

Yeah, no, I appreciate that. And just, Brenda, are you running this? Can you go back to the cases by location? So we're talking an average of 46 cases a year, which is probably a value for $7,000 a year. Mm-hmm.

You know, I appreciate following the money and what we're going to be obligated to. But I also want to state that I've listened to your presentations. This is the fourth one now. And I think we've all felt that we receive a good value. I think our residents are well served. I've been impressed with... programs you've highlighted to reduce recidivism. I'll never get that word right. So I I'm satisfied with the service that we received. And we've just done some of our own bookkeeping and found out where we were short. So I appreciate that you went through the exercise to identify what you needed

Which isn't to say that I'm not happy either. I'm happy. I just am held accountable for the money. So I wanted to ask the same questions of you.

All right. Rounding out the presentations from our friends at Carver County, we have Allison Strike from the CDA. Welcome. How are you?

I wasn't familiar with this. You said it reduces the cost by the value of the land?

So when they go, they move on to sell the house.

Allison, for the LAHA, you said four communities in Carver County get it.

Is that all you're up to? Yes, just a little bit. You always do such a great job. I think you know more acronyms than anyone else. I'm sorry. I apologize. I try not to speak in acronyms. You're fine.

Keep it up. All right. All right. Can I get a motion to approve the Consent Agenda?

I'll make a motion to approve the Consent Agenda.

Motion by Pershmann. I'll second. Second by Pascoe. Any further discussion? All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed, same sign. Motion passes. All right. Certified levy project bid results. Mr. Schmidt.

All right. Well, this doesn't feel great, right? This is a position I don't think we've ever been in before in my almost 10 years on council. I don't think we've ever rejected a bid maybe it's been a while yeah it's been a minute um and um i think that i'm confident that the plan that you guys laid out is the right direction to go and i'm hopeful that we'll get some more favorable bits for this i don't know that i have too much more to say anybody else have any thoughts

I'm surprised that granite slabs were a volatile commodity in 2026. So what in all of this, and it's millions of dollars, what was outside of our decision control? What costs went up that we didn't anticipate in this process? Because granite slabs is one piece of it, but I would think you have a pretty good grasp on that. What else surprised you? Because I'm surprised.

It seems like we're getting a lot of preferential treatment then and higher cost.

So just to be clear, though, you could not really engage in that level of conversation until after this bid process. You couldn't. Prior to that, you weren't able to have these kind of conversations to put them at ease or help them understand what this would look like?

I wonder if there was a line item to remove your shivings from the levy.

So you mentioned that when we read that this we're gonna just read that the total base bid I'm remembering right total I'll Turn it alternative number two was lighting for the Spring Creek section here. Are we gonna read that as well?

And remind me, that was lighting in the columns. In the columns.

And that would be the only lighting in there or there's other lights along illuminating the walkway?

Okay, but otherwise, like, straight back out here would be pretty dark. Okay. Pretty dark. Okay. I think my preference would be to put it in there if we can't, if it's the best practice not to put it in as an alternate, but I'll open it up to discussion to take everybody's temperature on that one.

I'm in favor of putting it in just because you can't retrofit it afterwards.

Okay. Um, then I would like to make a motion to adopt resolution 1, 52 dash 26, rejecting the bits for the carpet levy improvement project and directing re. Advertisements and making sure that we have the total base bid and. Alternate to wrapped in there. Correct. Yeah. Okay. Uh, I mean, the motion, I'll give the 2nd to Eric any further discussion. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Opposed, same sign. Motion passes. All right.

So remind me the dates. This will go out for bid.

Okay. And this still feels that they could start this fall, winter. Oh, yeah.

Bats and bees. That's our problem. All right. Thank you, guys. Thank you. Thank you.

Okay, communications. Kayla, you want to go first? Sure. This weekend, I got to join the Carver Lions for their annual Trunk or Treat celebration. They had between 400 and 500 kids show up, and it was just a lot of fun. I like community events, and it was a joy to be a part of it. So that's what I've got. Thank you to the Lions for setting that up.

All right. For me, October 6th was a fire department and public services open house. That's always a fun annual event. It's almost Steamboat Day's light for the number of people that we get there. Free dinner, if nothing else, but also a good opportunity to talk to the fire department, talk to the public services folks. Meet your neighbors, all of the things. On October 7th, we had a Minnesota Mayors Association meetup at CHS Field in St. Paul. It's really cool. We got a tour behind the scenes and of the inner workings of that. Super cool. On October 8th, we had the Eastern Carver County mayor

I listened to it today. Oh, what did you think? You always do a good job with interviews.

Thank you. He started off with that weird question. I didn't know how to take it. He was showing a house in Kayla's neighborhood. Um, and I was out lit dropping and I knew he was going to be there. So I kind of timed my lit dropping for that neighborhood and went in, talked to him a little bit. And then as I, you know, he had some other people coming in. So I'm like, people are walking up the driveway. I'm going to let you do your thing. And he said, he asked them, do you know who that is? As I was walking out and they were like, Nope. And he's like, so how does that feel? And I'm like, Oh, I

So just kind of cool that we have a community where that's a thing. And the Carver lion wandering around.

Yeah, it felt really bad for the lion. I've done that and I don't recommend it. With that, I would entertain a motion to adjourn. Motion by Pascoe. Oh, second? Second by Sarah. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Opposed, same sign. Motion passes. Good evening.