City Council - Regular Meeting

Good evening and welcome to the City Council meeting for Monday, June 1st, 2026. We will begin with a roll call and determination of quorum.

Lehman. Here. Maher. Roberts. Here. Stroman. Here. Pettigrew. Here. Sechrist. Here. Bieberdorf. Here. Tamang. Here. Evans. Here. Meyer. Here. We have a quorum.

Thank you. Next, we'll have an invocation by Pastor Ron McLaughlin, followed by the Pledge of Allegiance. If you're able and willing, would you please rise?

Please pray with me. Father God, we thank you and praise you, Lord, for this day, a new day, another day. We thank you for the rain recently as well. God, I'm grateful for the leaders in this room and the future leaders in this room and the mayor and the first responders. Lord, it's our prayer, God, that you would give them wisdom and direction and discernment. In Jesus' name, amen. Amen. Amen.

I pledge 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.

Thank you. Next I'll entertain a motion to adopt the agenda. Motion by Layman with a second by Meyer. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? The agenda is adopted. So tonight, we got quite a few things here up front. Look at this crowd. Have we ever seen this many folks since COVID? I don't know. It's been awesome. But the first thing we are going to do is a special recognition for a young man named Jalen Rood. So Jalen, would you and your family, as well as our team at RTS, join me up front here, if you wouldn't mind. Look at this look at this crew coming here you must know this must be a big deal tonight and it is actually we're doing something very unique as our Excellent team with our RTS rapid transit system. They do an incredible job keeping us going every single day. First of all, thank you all for what you do day in and day out, good weather and in bad, difficult circumstances and great circumstances. So tonight, I'm gonna share briefly and I'll allow anybody else who wants to share a story of heroism. You know, we talk about heroes pretty flippantly, but one of the best descriptions I can think of is that heroics are measured in sacrifice. That when you're willing to put yourself in harm's way, especially in service of someone else, and that's what happened. And what we have here today is a young man named Jalen Rood. Hi, Jalen. Jalen was on a bus, and I have it right here as a certificate of heroism. I'm gonna read it and then we'll try to do our best to expound on it as best we can. So this certificate of heroism is presented to Jalen Rood for his exceptional bravery, courage, and quick thinking in the face of imminent danger. While riding on a rapid transit system bus, Jalen demonstrated extraordinary presence of mind and selflessness. Jalen witnessed a passenger assaulting the bus driver and instinctively and without hesitation or concern for his own safety, ran to the aid of the driver. Jalen successfully stopped the individual and singularly removed him from the bus. Jalen's prompt and decisive actions directly contributed to the well-being of our valued Rapid City Transit system driver and exemplified the highest standards of compassion and heroism. His courage serves as an inspiration to the entire community and is deserving of this special recognition and heartfelt gratitude. Now, before we turn it over and we're going to have some pomp and circumstance, I'm sure his family is very proud and you should be. You raised somebody who's just by instinct knew what to do. I don't know about you, have you ever seen those videos online where somebody's recording somebody getting attacked or something bad happening to them, and they just walk by? They walk by, and then at some point you think, what about the person holding the camera? Shouldn't they do something? This young man, just by instinct, went and took care of a situation, had an opportunity to witness the video, and the poise that you had was remarkable. And I think it comes from somewhere deep in you. You haven't probably even been trained for it, but it just is something in you, which means that you're calm in chaos. You have heroic instincts. You should follow those instincts because it could lead you to some great places. And obviously, tonight what we want to do is give you this certificate of heroism. And I want to, before we give that to you, I want to invite any team members from Rapid Transit. Did you want to say anything regarding this incident or Drayland? All right, Vicky.

We want to echo the gratitude that the Mayor just shared with you, Jalen, and with the family. Jalen is a 17-year-old Central High School student. Now, it's one thing to see this young man ride a bus every day to school. That in and of itself is a very brave thing for him to do. We were trying to get him the award while school was still going, but then we learned he's a straight-A student and he didn't have to go to school the last week, so we couldn't have beat him to the day that he would be present at school. His parents are certainly doing something right. When you look at the size of the assailant, He was significantly larger than Galen. Dustin, Dustin if you don't mind raising your hand, is the driver that because of the way they sit in the Gillick buses and they have a plastic door that shuts tight, he was defenseless. He was stuck between the steering wheel and this door, but the assailant was coming around that door and pummeling him with his fists. So needless to say, this young man is our hero. And you see such a great showing of our drivers because each and every day they put themselves in jeopardy as they're serving the public. And it takes all of us working together as a community to make sure that we all stay safe. Thank you, Galen.

Thankfully, it's not a regular occurrence, but your quick actions helped our driver. And obviously, he looks like a guy who could take care of himself, but he's in a situation. But I don't want you to have to do that, Dustin. So first of all, thank you as well. And all the drivers, again, we appreciate you. First thing I'm going to give you is a challenge coin. This challenge coin is not given, it's earned. And it's for integrity, service, and excellence. And those are the values that we try to live by. So we exchange this with a handshake, actually. I don't think that's going to be the last one you ever receive in your life. And do you want to come over here with me and help present this certificate? So this is the certificate of heroism. And I'm going to have you, since you were directly there, help hand that over to Jaylen, if you don't mind. Okay. All right. Any other words anybody want to say? Well done. Way to stand up. Way to go, Jaylen. Pretty cool, huh?

Yeah. All right. Thank you all. Yeah.

Did we get pictures, Daryl? All right. We want to make sure we've got pictures, make it official. All right. Thank you all. Next is item two, this is confirm the appointment of Carla Cushman as Director of the Office of City Attorney's Office and authorize the Mayor and Finance Director to sign an employment contract. So at this time, I will invite Daniel Ainsley, who would administer the oath, as well as Carla Cushman, but we will need the council to take their seats. I think we have to vote on this item before we actually do it. So do we have a motion to approve item number two? Motion to approve. Second. Motion by Sechrist with a second by Tamang and a comment from Councilor Stroman.

Thank you, Mayor. I'm going to speak in favor of this appointment and confirmation of Carla Cushman as the city attorney. I think she's well qualified to perform the duties of city attorney and I think she will do a good job. I participated in her interview and we had a good discussion about what her responsibilities are. She knows what her responsibilities are. And in the course of this, since the previous city attorney left employment, we've had a couple of exchanges. And she performs admirably when she has to interpret the law and advise the governing body. One of the things about that she has shown me, in addition to her updating city ordinances to comply with current state law or soon to be current state law. In South Dakota codified law 9-14-3, it says that The officers are appointed by the mayor and the common council has to approve that, and that's what we're doing here tonight. And the statute also says something that we don't do, the current statute, which says such officers shall be appointed annually or at intervals determined by the governing body. And that's one thing that I want. her to look into when we're going on with compliance is updating to comply with STCL 9-14-3, which the new statute, which will take effect in July of 2026, says each appointed officer may be appointed annually or at interviews intervals determined by the governing body, except where property interest arises by written contract. the appointment does not confer any property interest in employment. And I think that's important that we know that these people are appointed because they're qualified, but they still have to perform. It's not just of once you get in, you're in for life. So I think that needs to be, and I know Carla's well aware of that. She expressed that in our interview. And she also expressed that she's familiar with what the duties of the city attorney are. There has been a long standing, since I've been on council since 2019, there's been a kind of a, the city attorney for sure will say, well I work at the pleasure of the mayor. Well that's not actually true. That's not what your job is. The mayor does have appointive powers, but the statute says that the attorney shall provide professional services incident to his or her office as may be required by ordinance or directed by the governing body. We are the governing body here. And so Carla understood that and she expressed that she understood that. So I think that that's important and I think that gives me more confidence in her abilities and her understanding of the law. The final thing I want to say is that being a lawyer and having practiced here for over 40 years, I know lots of lawyers both here in Rapid City and across the state. And I was contacted several times about how do we apply for this? Where is the posting? It's been the practice of the state bar or I mean I could look in the state bar newsletter. for this month and it'll have something for a deputy state's attorney or a deputy city attorney or a city attorney or a u.s attorney or judge anything it's it's published there this was not done in carla's case so we don't know what a more thorough search would have come up with and so and i think that it's important that the city do more than just a two-week posting i know that the mayor was quoted saying that we had a detailed search process that began in early April. That wasn't the detailed search process. And when you only have one interview and three applicants, I asked the mayor to reopen it and it never got reopened. So I think that going forward, and I notice that there's a posting. for an assistant city attorney going forward it needs to be published and it needs to be advertised in the state bar journal or newsletter so that applicants from anywhere that are qualified would have an opportunity to come here and work and provide their excellent services to our city so I think I had to say that because of the number of people that asked me, how do we find out, how do we apply? So with that, I'll leave it and I'll congratulate Carla because I think that it'll probably be a unanimous confirmation. Next up, Rod Pettigrew.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I totally agree with the comments that Councilman Stroman just made. Carla and I go back. I don't know if Carla remembers when I was on the library board. And so I've known Carla for a long time. And she's always done a very fine job with the groups I've been involved with giving good counsel. I have noticed since Carla's been there, there's a change in the attorney's office, and it's positive. They respond quickly. Even the environment's different now. The atmosphere is different when you go into that office. So hats off to you, Carla. If you created that, that's a plus for you. I've just noticed that, and I know Carla will do, a great job for the city but i do concur with councilman strowman's remarks i think this process should have been handled differently than the way it was handled and i go back to when we had a opening in our hr department we hired from outside we hired amber and again she brought new ideas new life new energy when we had our opening in our public works department. We hired from outside. I'm not saying we shouldn't have hired Carla, but there is an advantage to looking at people outside the typical city environment, because they bring new ideas and better ways maybe to run the operation. So hats off to Carla, I appreciate that, but I think this process could have been handled better. Thank you.

Okay, the motion on the floor is to approve the confirmation. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Motion carries. Congratulations, Carla. Now she will be joined up here with Finance Director Daniel Ainsley. Daniel, I have documents there for you.

Please raise your right hand. I state your name.

Hi, Carla Cushman.

Solemnly swear that I will support and defend.

Solemnly swear that I will support and defend.

The Constitution of the United States.

The Constitution of the United States.

And the Constitution of the State of South Dakota.

And the Constitution of the State of South Dakota.

Against all enemies, foreign and domestic.

Against all enemies, foreign and domestic.

That I will bear the true faith and allegiance to the same.

That I will bear the true faith and allegiance to the same.

That I take this obligation freely.

That I take this obligation freely.

Without any mental reservation.

Without any mental reservation.

Or for the purpose of evasion.

Or for the purpose of evasion.

That I will faithfully and impartially perform.

That I will faithfully and impartially perform.

The duties of the director of the office.

The duties of the director of the office.

Of the city attorney's office.

Of the city attorney's office. Rapid City, South Dakota.

According to the law. And to the best of my ability.

So help me God. Congratulations.

All right, that takes us to item number four, and that is Youth City Council Year in Review Presentation. We'll have that first, and then we will follow that up with swearing in of the new Youth City Council members.

All right, is this on? All right, perfect. Thank you, Mayor Solomon. So my name is Shaurya Goyal. I am the last year's chair of the Rapid City Youth City Council, and here is Lea Romero, our secretary for the Youth City Council. And today we want to tell you basically what we've done over the last year and kind of summarize all of our accomplishments. So to begin, we have in June, which was this time last year, we swore in all of our new members and we elected our executive team, which consists of me, Leah, and then two other members. Lindsay Secrets provided us some information about what city government and leadership look like, and then later we toured the Remembering the Children Memorial.

In July, we focused more on committee work, so with our health and wellness community outreach committee and our summer retreat, we were given the opportunity to visit with our, and learn about One Heart, Care Campus, RCPD, and Pennington County Sheriff's Department, and the sports complex, and we also supported the community relations table at Pride in the Park.

All right, moving into August, we decided to focus on learning about TIFs through a presentation by Kelly Meyer, as this was a very contentious topic in city council discussions. Then we moved on to safe streets planning discussion. We participated in the public works department for a poverty 101 and escape room. were fully engaged with the leadership discussion hosted by the National Youth Leadership Council, and then some individual accomplishments at this time was that Sakurako Tennant, a member of ours, coordinated a proclamation to support the sister city work with Nikko Japan, and Sakurako and Arabella were recognized as bi-literacy certifications.

In September, we did have the YFS Harvest Festival collaboration with City Sustainability and City Waste Management. It was also Suicide Prevention Month recognition and awareness that we kind of worked in to everything that we were doing. And we learned more about the Journey Museum through a presentation at our monthly meeting.

All right, now we'll move on to October, where we created two youth positions on the city's sustainability committee. Then we participated in the Remembering the Children Memorial Walk, where we met the Sikangu Youth Council to kick off our retreat day. We learned about housing insecurities at that day and poverty during our afternoon sessions. And then later, Sarah V. Hill led a health and wellness project with the freshman seminar classes at Central High School. Remy and Cannon also participated in these presentations, and then later the Health and Wellness Committee implemented a food drive. Then at the end of it, we received the Diane Staefler Award from Zonta. And then here's some extra pictures of that.

In November, we had our Glow Walk and Wear Green NRPM Awareness. We had a food drive, and we recognized the state champion tennis team.

What's that? Okay, so then we move on to December, where Tony Broom from the Rapid City Regional Airport shared some information with us, and then later we had our holiday potluck.

In January, at our meeting, we welcomed Carrie Roble back to talk about youth philanthropy. The Health and Wellness Committee packed the boredom bags and delivered them to Oyate Health and Monument Health, and the Community Outreach Committee continued their work on the art auction and art competition.

All right, then moving into February, the President's Day Retreat focused on strategic and leadership planning, where we were excited that Mayor Solomon, Callie Meyer, and Dr. Tipton, and various civic organization leaders shared some information with us at the retreat. Then UC Council delegates attended the day in the Capitol at Pierre, Amy Suzu presented a Remembering the Children Wool Blanket Tour group, and David Holland shared some information with us about backyard chickens.

In March, we had the National League of Cities Congressional City Conference in Washington, D.C., which had our members Macy, Mason, Socko, Sophia, Isabelle, Ellie, Cannon, and Nashaw attend. We had the art competition recognition. At the art auction, $1,300 was raised. A youth philanthropy made decisions on the grant applications. Leah Braun shared some details about the 250th celebration plans. The Remembering the Children blanket was displayed at City Hall. And we had a signed thank you note for Pennington County Commission.

All right. Now I would like to welcome up our D.C. delegates to represent the National League of Cities for Rapid City. So, guys, here you go.

Well, first, I just want to say thank you so much for sending us to D.C., and this is just going to be a quick review of what we didn't learn. So this was our opening youth session, and we got to network with over 300 youth leaders from across the nation, which was incredible. And we gave out pins like Visit Rapid City pins, our state seal pin, and also Box Elder pins. And in our first workshop, we learned about policy. We had to either amend, reject, or accept the policy. And what we learned is that it can affect parts of our community. And we took away that when making decisions, specifically in policy, you have to look at all demographics in your community to make sure that you're not harming someone you're not thinking about.

All right, passing it off to me. We hit one of our first sessions, the form of government session where we explored the dynamic between Dillon's rule and home rule at state and local governments and how they function. And then that brings us to a new learning opportunity about our own governance framework for South Dakota and Rapid City where we found out that our primary framework is the Dillon Rule. And so then passing it on to Cannon.

The opening CCC session was really educational because we got to see how other cities operate and how important local government is. And a big takeaway I got from that was looking back on the history of your city and also how you want to go on. They talked a lot about that in their 250th anniversary of America. Is it down? Okay. And then in our last workshop, we worked on, like, doing different classes of, like, wealth and where to put different businesses in different neighborhoods according to the classes of wealth. And that, like, really helped us learn how we should include every single, like, genre of, like, doesn't matter, like, how much money you have. We want to, like, include more people and get more people's opinions on, like, when it live compared to like businesses.

And then on the last day of the youth session, we presented our previous work on the last workshop. And then we had a final discussion about what we wanted to bring back to Rapid City and how we were going to implement it. And our main takeaway was that we want to get to know our council members better, such as through individual talking sessions with each member on a quarterly basis. And this is just to improve communication and then have more youth insight on action items that directly affect youth.

We were also fortunate enough to spend a whole day at the Capitol where we were able to meet with both Senator John Thune and Mike Rounds. And we also were able to attend a private tour of the Capitol, which just allowed us to see the behind the scenes work of what goes into policy making and the amount of time and determination it takes to create policy, which would be really great to bring back to the YCC. We were also able to spend a whole day at the National Mall and monuments, visiting nearly all of them. I believe we walked around 14 miles this day, which just allowed us to reflect on what goes into building this country and all of the sacrifices that have gone into it, where we can now live in a place that all people can have meaningful lives.

see bringing it back to me we sort of talked about how we can bring this back to benefit our own community and we've learned a lot of beneficial things and how they can be applied, such as active community presence, the power of local government, and also proactive policy advocacy. And also something really important, the duty to amend in that policy isn't static. It's very malleable. And also overcoming polarization as well. That was a really big popular one. And then also inclusive youth engagement.

Okay, and then our final action items that we decided to bring back was we are planning on changing the Youth City Council bylaws to better fit the agenda of the City Council so that we play a more active role in the community and are more on top of it with what you guys are doing. And then we would also like to help start to break down societal barriers in youth-surrounded areas so that we can actually spark real change.

Perfect. Thank you, delegates. Next, we'll be moving on to what happened in April. So here in April, we had the Interview and Selection Committee work on who they would select for the next term. The Youth City Council members recognized the spirit of volunteerism event, were recognized at this event with the Helpline Center. Then we had the D.C. delegate presentation for just the council. We had the blanket work group gift display discussions on where we wanted to gift our blanket. Then we had support at the WDT Environmental Expo. We had preparation for smooth transitions of committees, and we had the youth philanthropy awards to MBIE, Children's Home Society, and Journey On.

In May, we had the selection of our new 2026-2027 members announced. We had our new member orientation, new and old member social, remembering the children, blanket gifting to youth and family services, and the senior spotlight and year in review with YCC member recognition at our May meeting.

All right, now moving on to the summer. We plan for new members to take their oath at this meeting just right after this. We have this year interview presentation, and then we'll have the first meeting and election of officers in a week at June 9th. And then we also plan to have a summer retreat for these members where we look forward to a day of learning and team building. And we'd like to end off our presentation with a thank you to Mayor Solomon, Callie Meyer, our Youth City Council liaison, and all of the other city council members who made this entire council possible with all the funding. So thank you all.

Well, thank you very much. That was an incredible presentation. What an outstanding group of young leaders that we have in our community. I have a couple of council members who'd like to say a few words. We'll begin with Councillor Evans.

Thank you very much for that wonderful presentation. As a person who spent their entire 40-year professional career as a teacher, I think this investment in our youth is one of the best use of our dollars that we have as a city council. I would like to hopefully in the future increase that. These kind of activities are like planting seeds. And everything's in a feeder program. It doesn't matter whether it was my orchestra program for years or the football team or whatever. But greatness comes from planting these seeds early on and letting a program grow. And if we're going to have good governance in this country, we need to be educating the young people as we are with you guys and allowing these seeds to bear fruit so that by the time you're ready to take over these spots we have people that actually understand how things work and have a sense of knowledge about what they're doing and so i want to congratulate you for participating and i and thank you for continuing what leah or lindsay got going and uh you continuing over there so i just want to say congratulations and thank you for coming tonight

All right. Next, we'll move on to the U City Council liaison and city council lawyer, Kelly Meyer.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. So I've gotten to serve as the Youth City Council liaison this past year. And some of you have heard me say these comments. But there's a lot of things that are hard about being in this seat. And it can be easy to become cynical. However, the time I spend around this group gives me so much hope, it just blows me away. And so I'm very grateful for the time we've had together. And I'm excited to swear at a new group. And I want to thank Kristen Kiner and Sean Bender with the school district. They are the adult mentors who move things forward there. And I think city council liaisons get a lot of undeserved credit at times when you really are the ones and staff and those folks who do things. So thank you very much. I have had just the most incredible experience with you all. So thank you.

Thank you.

Next up, Councilor Stroman. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you for the presentation. And thank you, Callie. I do think you deserve a lot of credit for the work you do and the other people that they have very humbly given credit to also. I am going to take you up on this quarterly meeting. I hope that you can find my email and let me know if you want to talk about something. I'd welcome that. And we all pick up on different things, right? that you guys walked around and saw all 14 monuments, that is a full day. And that shows some persistence and some drive and determination. It would be easy to just slough off and say, I'm going to go back to the room and chill or whatever. But those kind of things are important. So thank you for doing that. Thanks for bringing us an update.

Thank you, and thanks to all of those who are outgoing. We hope that this was a great experience for you, but it is time for us to swear in the new members. So all the new members, will you meet me here in the bullpen, and I have the honor of administering your oath tonight. So what we'll do tonight, we're going to do the oath, and then we'll have you go to the side room, because we actually have things for you to sign and have notarized, but I have up here our council liaison, Callie Meyer, and we were talking about you our last time we met last week, and talking about some of the most rewarding things that you do, and I thought she said that well. What you represent is the future of our community and our nation. leadership which is what you sign up for because you take time out obviously take time out to do remarkable things in service to our community so first of all I want to say thank you I thank you for stepping up I thank you for being the remarkable leaders that you are I've seen this over the years. I did not start this program. It started, gosh, I think Councilor Layman and others were involved in bringing this to life, former mayor, but it's a tradition that we'll live on. And it's living on because you're proving its success and you're learning all the time and you're teaching us as well. And so we're so very proud of you. The future looks bright. It definitely does. And to Sean and Kristen, thank you. You should be up here too, by the way, please. Krista, come on. You want to be funded this year? Come on. See what I got to do. Sean. Sean. Okay, that would have happened, I'm sure, anyways. But it's just a special moment. And so I'm sure all your family are here. Hey, Sean. Good to see you. How are things? Life's good? Oh, this isn't the time for that. Okay. All right. So I'm going to administer the oath. Before I do, I'm going to name all the names of each one of you. And when I do, I want you to say your name so everybody knows who you are. Hopefully I pronounce it correctly. Sophia Sawe. Hi, Sophia. Nasa Little? Naka? Nasa. Nasa. Thank you. All right. Remington Myers. Hi. Hi. Cannon Thomas. Cannon Thomas. All right. Isabel Schmid. Isabel Schmid. Preston Scanline. Scanlon, okay. These are going to be household names before you know it. Ellie Palmer. Ellie Palmer. Sienna Karam. Sienna Karam. Dublin Boyer. Dublin Boyer. Hendrix Isaiah Jones. Isaiah Jones. Who knew? I love it. Addison Carlson. Addison Carlson. Angela Vo. Angela Vo. John Lucas Fernau. John Lucas Fernau. Delcy Kernawan. Okay, good job. Say that again. Kernawan. All right. Sadie Rencounter. Sadie Rencounter. Ella Brock. Ella Brock. William Kenyon. Lila Riker Acevedo. Lila Riker. Lila. Lila. Oh, I won't forget that now. There's a song. I'm sure you've heard of it. Well, those are your youth city council members for the next year. And so, uh, what we will do is I'm going to turn this, this direction so I can look at you and put your right hand up and repeat after me. I say your name. I solemnly swear that I was support and defend the constitution of the United States. and the Constitution of the State of South Dakota against all enemies, foreign and domestic, that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same, that I take this obligation freely without any mental reservation or for the purpose of evasion, that I will faithfully and impartially perform the duties of the office as a member of the Youth City Council. Rapid City, South Dakota, to the best of my abilities. So help me God. All right, congratulations now. I'm going to come by. I'm going to give you a challenge coin. And you'll get some handshakes from these great leaders behind me as well. Daryl's telling me we need to take a picture before you leave.

Thank you.

So now we go next door. So now we go next door. Yep, I'm gonna take that very easy. Awesome.

Okay, now we will move on to general public comment. A time for members of the public to discuss or express concerns to the council on any issue not on the agenda. Action will not be taken at the meeting on any issue not on the agenda except by placement on the agenda by unanimous vote of the council members present. I do have a few speaker request forms. We will begin with Sandy Schwan. As a reminder to all our speakers, we have a three minute time limit and the countdown timer is right above me.

Good evening, Mayor and City Council. I'm not here to express any concerns. I'm Sandy Schwan, resident of Ward 3, downtown business owner and president of Rapid City Supper Nights. I'm here to thank you for the opportunity on behalf of my board of directors to reboot summer nights on 16 Kansas city. Our first night was not without challenges. Uh, the footprint while similar is not the same, which created some challenges in terms of the space and the businesses on that particular footprint. Um, we haven't set up in almost two years, so that all by itself creates some real challenges for us. Uh, it's been a long time, maybe six or seven years since we had a clear cars from a street that didn't have parking meters. So we had some unique challenges there. And last and certainly not least, while we very much appreciate Public Works hard barricading our event to protect our patrons from any kind of disastrous event in terms of cars driving through our event, also created some unique challenges because working alongside of payloaders and other equipment, bringing in the concrete barricades kind of slowed us down and caused us to not be able to adjust very quickly to some of the challenges that we met. We did get together tonight, because Monday nights we reload the beverage trailers, and we had a brief meeting to talk about those challenges and the adjustments we can make. And I just wanted to give you all the information that we are going to be making some adjustments. The street's going to look a little different this week. Hopefully we can have the grace to continue to work out those glitches when we come across them, but sometimes we can't do them on the street that very night. And part of that is because once the hard barricades get in there, it's difficult to adjust, um, equipment, but we'll do our best to adjust wherever we can and we'll continue to do that and try to make sure we have open lines communications with anybody that sees an issue or challenges summer nights. Um, and again, we very much appreciate the opportunity for the reboot and our, um, our, uh, first responders, uh, appreciation night is June 25th. We want everybody to come down and appreciate them. And if we could figure out a way to bring the young man, Jalen up on the stage and congratulate him at summer nights, we would be happy to do that because that was a wonderful story. And we'd be happy to incorporate that in summer nights along with maybe some of the first responders and someone from the council or the mayor. Thank you for your time. Hope to see it summer nights.

Thank you, Sandy. Next up is William Wagner.

Good evening, city government. Congratulations on the promotion. Good evening, members of the city council. I'm William Wagner. I'm standing here tonight to extend an olive branch from my heart to the Rapid City Government Council and the people out here. Around 2007, I read the Bible to Henry Big Eagle, a World War II prisoner of war who was shot down over the Baltic Sea and captured by a U-boat as a POW. Henry looked at me and said, what you see in the movies is not the truth. He told me the prisoner survived by pulling together. He said we were cross-referencing each other, teaching each other, making each other's minds occupied, and making each other smarter. That knowledge was fulfilling to their souls. It kept them alive. On April 15th, I did exactly what Henry taught me. I cross-referenced our foundational laws. I brought South Dakota codified law 46-1-3 and 46-1-5 to light. Proving all water belongs to the people and the domestic use takes absolute precedence over commercial data center rights. Furthermore, our new data center bill of rights, Senate Bill 135, Section 3, legally mandates that data center water consumption must be fully compatible with local supply, protecting our authority to restrict or deny them. To protect this community, I formally served the Bureau of Reclamation and the State D.A.N.R. with these laws alongside Federal Title 18 Section 241 and 242 using historical 1950 and 2000 drought data. I demand that they halt commercial depletion. Right now we are under water restrictions because our aquifers are low. The city cannot supply enough water for a homeowner to water their lawn. We do not have a single drop of water to give away to a private data center or a mining. On April 22, Mayor Solomon heard the truth and moved the project towards conditional use permits And that was a victory for transparency, and I thank the administration. But a permit is just a paper unless executed under South Dakota's standard, a good faith under South Dakota codified law 55-7-3. Our statutes define good faith as a thing done. In fact, and honestly, our state code mandates an absolute obligation of good faith in enforcing public duty. An olive branch and a conditional use permit Both require honesty. Acting in good faith means this council cannot use these permits as a corporate rubber stamp. You must use them to honestly enforce the law, restrict the data center's water, protect our aquifer, and ensure this project elevates our people instead of draining our resources. Let's take Henry's advice. Let's keep cross-referencing. Let's act in absolute good faith. Let's protect the future of Rapid City together. Thank you, William Wagner, Operation FTW, which is for the water. Thank you.

Next up, Renee Hagland.

Hi, my name is Renee Hagland. I'm a registered voter in Ward 5. I apologize for wearing sunglasses. I forgot my regular glasses at home. But the irony isn't lost on me that I am wearing shades tonight because I'm going to talk about dark money. $31,500 was donated by a super PAC that lists their address in Alexandria, Virginia. That money was divided between Mr. Maher, Lindsay Seacrest, bear with me, I'm having a hard time seeing up here, Josh Beberdorf, and PAT ROSELAND. AND SO I GOT TO THINKING, WHAT IS THIS SUPER PAC? AND WHY IS SOMEBODY IN ALEXANDRIA, VIRGINIA, RIGHT NEXT TO WASHINGTON, D.C., INVESTING $31,500 INTO A LOCAL CITY COUNCIL ELECTION? I'LL TELL YOU WHO DID NOT TAKE ANY SUPER PAC MONEY. MURRAY LEE. ANDREA SHAFER. Dr. Valeria Big Eagle, and Murray Lee. So that's my first point. My next point is the ballots for tomorrow's election, if you go and vote early and you live in Ward 4, Arden, and I really don't want to butcher his name, so correct me, Cisjeros, is still on the ballot. And so we asked the city auditor why he was on the ballot. because it's confusing and it could divide votes amongst the two people that actually are running when Arden actually stepped away April 15th. And the county auditor said that the city did not notify them of that and that is why there's three candidates on the ballot instead of the two that are actually running. My third point that I'd like to bring up is what I think is actually voter suppression Yesterday, or today, excuse me, construction, road construction began around West Middle School. West Middle School is a voting polling location and road construction will make it incredibly difficult to park or if you're disabled to be able to go into your polling place and cast your vote. I don't have any idea why that construction was started today and not Wednesday after this election. But in my opinion, it is pure voter suppression. You're making it difficult for constituents to vote for their candidates. And that isn't cool. That's not right. So, so much for transparency.

Time's up, Renee. Thank you. And just for the record, all construction will cease tomorrow, and we'll have a clear pathway. I've already talked to the public works director about West Middle School and asked that it be cleared away to make sure everybody has access to go and cast their vote, which we encourage everybody to do. Thank you. Next up is Mark Thalicker.

Thank you.

Good evening. I'm a long-time resident and a first-time speaker, but I got interested when the Liberty Land TIF was being voted on. And I found out from Dr. Tamang actually before that this was going on. And so that began my interest in what's going on down here. I grew up on the other side of the interstate. where that dirt road goes along the interstate and then goes back up over the hill. We lived at the top of that. My mom was a Pennington County health nurse and my father taught over at North Middle School. When I was five years old, I couldn't go to General Beadle Elementary because I lived on the other side of the interstate. What my dad told me later was talked about either at a school board or a council meeting, I'm not sure what, was that anyone that lived over there doesn't need to start early and get a good start because they're going to fall out of school later. This is when Sioux Addition was over there. It wasn't that. And that was a third world place. I remember my mom going there to check on children. in tar paper shacks, dirt floors, chickens going in and out of the buildings. And what I saw at that time was racism in this city. Now, 60 years later, I'm 65 plus, 60 years later, there is still a problem with racism in Rapid City. A lot of people want to wash that away. I said, no, it's not. Look at all this advancement we have. But that's not true. It's still out there. Oh, Renee took off. She gave me advice to write all this down and to time myself. I did that three times and finally decided to give up because it wasn't working. So I just wanted to come up here and introduce myself. After I retired, I did some substitute teaching, and I ended up going over to North Middle School, where my dad taught back in the early 60s. And it really felt good to complete that circle. But that's a tough job, and teachers need help. I guess one of the last things I want to say is that one of my Most important issues is the separation of church and state We've got people thinking that the United States.

Mr. Mr. Thallaker your time is up.

I will be back All right.

Thank you that will conclude general public comment and we will move on to non-public hearing items 6 through 42 an open public comment for item 6 through 36 I do have two speaker request forms for these items. The first one is for item 7 and that's William Wagner and Mr. Wagner?

This is about the TIF, right? The $19 million TIF? Or is this what I read?

We're not dealing with that tonight.

Oh, okay. I apologize. That's what I thought I read on the agenda. Well, if so, if it's about anything about the TIF, so I want you all to know that South Dakota standard of good faith under South Dakota codified law 55 dash seven dash three that if we don't vote on that TIF or if y'all get that TIF, what I understand at minute 26 on the finance director's video the other day, it caught me really off guard when it says if we don't vote on it, y'all going to use the money from the city already, the contingent fund or something. and that that would build the new roads, but all the existing projects will be put off it. Am I correct? I saw, I saw you the other day and I didn't get to ask you, but that's what I was trying to figure out on that. If we could have a conversation sometime off, off the record or on the record, whatever. I just want to make sure we're not spending our money that we need. Thank you. Thank you.

Uh, next for item 17, the veteran banner project. Uh, we actually have, The person who's leading that, Brian Schnell. Brian, are you here? There you are. Banners sure do look good. It's nice seeing those up. Thank you.

Good evening, Mr. Mayor, members of the council. My name is Brian Schnell, chairman of the Veterans Honor Banner Program, and I appreciate the opportunity to speak with you tonight, give you a quick update on our program, and speak to the MOU you're going to consider later here. The program honoring veterans began in 2017 with 17 banners. Twelve days ago, we hung 430 banners. As you recall, we hang the banners before Memorial Day and take them down shortly after Veterans Day. There's an extraordinary amount of work that goes into behind the scenes, especially between November to May when we're getting ready to hang the banners, and enough to keep one to two full-time employees busy. Of course, we have no full-time employees. We're a total volunteer organization. I consider myself very fortunate to serve with a highly skilled group of professionals and retired professionals on our board of directors. This veteran honoring program only happens because these committed souls make it happen. Some of our board members are here tonight. I'd like to ask them to rise and be recognized at this time. It's about half of our board here. Thank you very much. Over the past year, our program has conducted a number of significant internal procedures and overhauls. Our financial records, fee structure, sponsor item terms, sponsor terms have all been updated. We've gone to a three-year term. for banners to ease tracking and to minimize the bookkeeping and record keeping burden on our volunteers. We charge an equivalent of about $117 a year at the present time. For that fee, the sponsors get a five foot by three foot approximate vinyl professionally prepared banner of a picture of their beloved veteran with service details hung. The banner is displayed for approximately six months on a major thoroughfare in Rapid City. It's professionally hung on brackets that are paid for by sponsor fees. Those brackets on each pole cost about 130 bucks per, so you can do the math and it's 430 and see where we're at on that. They get the banner taken back down in the fall by a professional crew. The banner's placed in secure storage for the winter. In January, the sponsors have a chance to come out and touch their hero's banner, clean it off, take pictures with it. And then we also replace the banners during that term for free under general wear and tear. Additionally, we now have a fully integrated website, thanks to another very skilled volunteer. The website contains the images and service details of current and past honorees, as well as their current location, hometown, and a portal to communicate with us and order new full-size or smaller banners. The MOU before you tonight memorializes the relationship between the city and the Veterans Honor Banner Program. Places our current routes in writing and describes the duties of each party with the process of expanding our route should we choose to do that.

Mr. Schnell, so we'll let the pause you right there. And if we have more questions when we get to item 17, we may have council members call you back up.

Thank you very much.

All right, thank you. So that would conclude the comment period for items six through 36, and we will move on to consent items six through 36. Would the council like to remove any item for separate consideration? Councillor Tamang.

13, please.

All right, Councillor Stroman. 17, please. Okay, and Councillor Roberts. Item 24. Okay, I'll entertain a motion to approve items six through 36 with the exceptions of 13, 17, and 24. So moved. Second. Motion by Evans with a second by Tamang. All in favor? Any opposed? Motion carries. Item 13, approve a request by Kimley Horne on behalf of AutoZone Inc. for variance to waive the requirement to install sidewalk along School Drive as required per 12.08.060 of the Rapp City Municipal Code. And with that, we'll go to Councillor Temeng.

I'll move to approve, but I'd like to hang onto the floor if I can get a second.

Okay, we got a motion by Tamang with a second by Sechrist. The floor is yours, sir.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I don't have anything against this variant. I think it's reasonable. I just wanted to make the argument publicly that I think we might want to change the way we're looking at doing these sidewalk variances in general. I've been on the council for about a year. I've tried to make good decisions, but it's incredibly difficult to understand them, frankly. It takes quite a bit of time, and so I think we tend to rely a lot on city staff as we should. But when you think about a sidewalk variance, it's more than just a sidewalk. It's really about public pedestrian obligation. And it actually, in a lot of data and a lot of models, it actually has like a public health benefit. And we're kind of riddled with parts of our city where sidewalk variances have happened and now it doesn't make sense. There's big areas where at some point a decision was made that was incorrect and so we try not to make those. Attempting to find a way to improve on that process, I tried to look at other models. And one thing that some other communities do is they understand that, so every project of a certain nature does have a requirement to build a sidewalk. And if it has a variance, instead of just saying yes or no, they create a fee in lieu of. And the idea of a fee in lieu of, it says, okay, you are correct, we will not require you to build a sidewalk. But instead of that, you are still required to submit money to a pool that goes to a pedestrian infrastructure obligation. Now, it gets tricky. It goes far beyond my understanding of the legalities. It can't be a tax. You can't create a fee that just is a tax. But I've asked Carla to investigate something of this nature, and I would appreciate that coming back to the council at some point for consideration. And I guess the other point I'll make is there's a practical incentive piece to this, too. Right now, I think it's possible that developers are incentivized to make the case that the sidewalk is not appropriate. that will remove this incentive because there will be a fee in lieu of such a variance. And I don't know this for fact, but my suspicion is that we may have more reasonable requests coming forward. I think it could result in a more efficient system. And then if we had some sort of fund that we had that could repair damaged or sidewalks that need work, I think that could have a really profound effect going forward. And I want to just quickly say that If this is a bad idea, it's entirely mine. If it's a good idea, someone else gave it to me and I'll give them credit when that happens. I don't want to take credit for someone else's comment, so thank you very much, I yield. All right, Councilor Evans.

Well, I think, Councillor Tamang, that's a great idea. And the reality is some of these sidewalks we ask people to put in are just prohibitively expensive. And I'm looking at this one we have and the amount of money it would cost to put a sidewalk there would be ridiculous and really kind of prevent them from building at all. So I think such a fund would be a great idea and perhaps kind of even it out. Certain sites cost a fortune to put a sidewalk in. Other sites cost virtually nothing in the percentage of the money required to build on that site. So I think it's a great idea. I think we should immediately get on it and come up with something that equalizes this so we stop this argument of whether sidewalks are important or not or necessary or not, because they are. And you're exactly right, that it's a quality of life and a public health thing. So thank you for bringing that up.

Next up, Councillor Pettigrew.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Since my time on the council is coming to an end, I thought I would take one last opportunity to talk about sidewalks, because I am obsessed with sidewalks. They are what make a city beautiful and functioning. Just as an example, Councilman Tomei, my daughter lives in Denver, and they get a monthly bill for sidewalks. And I guess our state legislature has something, an ordinance, a law that we can't do that. But I don't know, it might be 50, 75 bucks a month. And that just goes into a fund. And if your neighbor's sidewalk or a sidewalk on the other side of town is broken, that fund pays for that. or if they're gonna put in a new development and there's no sidewalks, that fund pays for that. So it's just an evolving fund to keep the sidewalks updated and current and safe. To your point, Councilman Tomei, I walked the... SCHOOL LANE WHERE THIS REQUEST IS FOR AND SCHOOL LANE THAT IS A BEAUTIFUL STREET I DON'T KNOW IF YOU GOT OVER THERE BUT IT'S PEACEFUL IT'S NICE ALL THE LAND IS FLAT SOME REALLY NICE HOMES THERE BUT WHERE THIS PROPERTY IS AGREE WITH MR EVANS IT'S JUST NOT FEASIBLE SO I THINK AS DEVELOPMENT OCCURS IN CITY or in the county, these two organizations gotta get together, and if they're gonna put in a development, that's the time to do the grading and get the sidewalk in. Yes, it costs money, but it does benefit our community. One last thing on sidewalks, where my business is located, before I put on my addition, I bought the lot next to me. The city put in the street, I think it's called North Creek Drive, but for whatever reason, they didn't require I put a sidewalk in. And it's a long sidewalk, I don't know, it's maybe a block long or longer. And I required or asked my contractor to do that, because I said for future growth, there was nothing out there but my store, the bread store, and Menards. And you know what, we are surrounded now with businesses and multi-family housing, and that sidewalk is being used every day. So you have to have foresight when you plan, and you have to have foresight as a council member, realizing that, yeah, you may not need the sidewalk today, but in the future you will, and if we don't do it now, it's pretty much up to the city to pay for it and put that in, and I don't think that's fair to the city.

Thank you.

Next up on this topic is John Roberts. Thank you. Sidewalks has been a contentious thing for a long time. I think I'm going to ask our public, I think I'll ask Vicki a question. Because at this point, when you bring in a commercial subdivision, sidewalks are required. But at that point when this was plotted, which was probably in the 60s, they weren't required. So now when subdivisions are being done, they are getting their sidewalks in the majority of the time. Am I correct on that, Vicki?

Mr. Mayor?

Ms. Fisher.

Thank you for the question. That's how we used to do it. For years we did it that way. And then the builders of the future structure were complaining that the developers- I'm talking about commercial, not residential.

Commercial.

Even on commercial. And so the platting of the property does not trigger the construction of a sidewalk. It is required when the building permit comes in so that you build your structure, whether it's a commercial apartment, single family home, and then you put in the sidewalk at that time.

Doesn't it get triggered by if you're platting too?

Only if you're in outside the city limits, but within the three mile platting jurisdiction. We don't issue those building permits. So those developers do have to bring in sidewalks as a subdivision improvement.

OK. So, and I agree on the residential side, because on the residential side, when they were putting sidewalks in before, you put the sidewalks in, then the builders come in, they build the houses, all the trucks are going over the sidewalks, they're breaking the sidewalks up. So, you know, then the homeowners were having to replace the sidewalk, because at that point, they owned the lot, and it's adding another expense to them, and that's the reason, but I didn't realize it went to commercial, too. I thought that was just in the residential. Because in most of these commercial projects, I mean, but anyway, that's a discussion for another time. So thank you, Vicki. I appreciate it.

So the motion on the floor is to approve this sidewalk variance. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Motion carries. Item 17, approve memorandum of understanding between the City of Rapid City and the Veterans Honor Banner Project. Councillor Stroman, you've pulled this item, sir.

Thank you, Mayor. I'd like to move to approve and retain the floor if I can get a second.

Second. Second. We got a motion by Stroma with a second by Roberts.

Following up on the Mayor's suggestion, I just wondered if Brian would come back up and finish his explanation. And maybe even, I know he comes from a family of Marines, maybe he would give us a send off in the Marine way. Semper Fi, I suppose, huh? Yeah.

I went in this previously. You ought to put big numbers up there or something that somebody can see and read if they pay attention, I guess. So I'll try to be brief and finish up quickly here. So where I was belaboring my point when I ran out of time, as I... I want to close in my remarks. We wanted to use this forum to explain to the public that we're at a juncture with our program, and the program has been wholeheartedly and enthusiastically accepted by the community. So we just hung the 430 banners. We have 440 spots. That means as of today, we can only grow by 10 banners next year. So we expect to be and essentially are sold out for 2027, unless we negotiate for additional routes through the provisions of the MOU in front of you. Will we do that? Honestly, I don't know. We don't know. We need to do some strategic planning. How big do we want to get? The public appetite for these banners is voracious. One of our considerations is the manpower required to physically organize and hang the banners. We have retired people and working people as well. So it's tough for the working folks to get off time to hang these banners and do the planning. And some of the physical constraints on some of our retired people is also not inconsequential. Over the two days we hung the banners a couple weeks ago, it's not uncommon for our volunteers to walk 20 miles. And so that's a lot. Now we have help from a professional sign crew at Rosenbaum's, and they gave us a very good deal for their professional equipment. We have some very good helpers from active duty people at the base. But it's a lot. But without boring you further, we have some decisions to make. So regardless, we remain appreciative of the support from you all. We proudly honor these heroes as part of the CITY'S POLICY TO HONOR U.S. SERVICE MEMBERS AND THE CITY OF RAPID CITY. THE PROGRAM IS FINANCIALLY STRONG AND WELL LED BY THE PEOPLE HERE TONIGHT. THE AFFECTION FOR THE PROGRAM FROM YOUR CONSTITUENTS DEMONSTRATE THAT YOUR SUPPORT REPRESENTS THE FEELINGS OF THE COMMUNITY. I'LL TAKE ANY QUESTIONS AND AGAIN I APOLOGIZE FOR RUNNING OVER EARLIER.

MR. STROHMAN.

THANK YOU AND THANK YOU FOR WHAT YOU DO AND FOR YOUR PEOPLE THAT HELP YOU AND I YIELD

Uh, there's no other items in the queue, which is a good sign, Brian, but I want to say, uh, uh, thank you to you and your team. When I first became mayor, you know, there was always question marks year to year and said, can we get an agreement? So everybody feels at peace about the program, uh, on all sides of it. And the fact that we're here tonight finally took some time, but your leadership this last year has really helped bring that forward. Appreciate our staff and their willingness to work on that too, to make sure that it is secured. And it's become a tradition in Rapid City. And of course, your predecessor, Bill Casper, had a lot to do with that as well. He did. We're grateful for all he did. So this is a deeply veteran community. We love the United States of America as we celebrate America 250. I thought what better way than to have these veteran banners all over the place. And you're not doing it because of America 250, you're just doing it because we already love America, despite whatever year it is since we signed the declaration. So it's really a beautiful thing. And it really is an honor to see that up. And thank you all who are here tonight and to the rest of your team that aren't here and your volunteers. Good work. Thank you. God bless America. Amen. All right. So the motion on the floor is to approve. All in favor? Any opposed? Motion carries. Item 24, approve resolution number 2026-050, a resolution amending certain fees to be charged starting July 1st, 2026. Councilor Roberts, you pull this item, sir.

Thank you, and I'd like to make a motion to approve, and if I can get a second, I'm going to hold the floor.

Second.

Okay, got a motion by Roberts with a second by Pettigrew. The floor is yours, sir. Thank you very much, and can I ask the Public Works Director a question real quick? I've had a few phone calls on this, Mike, and I think it's mostly just because of the way that it's written, You're also requesting increases for commercial tipping fees. The only one that I saw was for railroad ties, and I believe that's the only thing that's getting increased. Because I had a few people call me because we had such a huge increase to the commercial tipping fees for some of our businesses in town that were concerned that their already doubled garbage rates were going to go up some more. Public Work Director Mike Tice.

Thank you, sir. That is correct. The only increase on that section of fees is the railroad ties. All of the other fees just didn't get updated when we updated the pricing end of last year. So those are still consistent with what they were at that time. Just the resolution did not reflect those increased prices.

I appreciate that. And I have just one other thing I want to discuss. And this is just a complaint from me. And I don't complain very often. I happen to go out to the landfill here recently. I don't go to the landfill very often. I took a load of garbage with my coupon. I think the coupon was a stupid idea. I was against it from the beginning. And so I took my coupon out. I didn't realize, didn't really take a look at it. Didn't notice it said 2025 on it. Didn't notice that it said on the bottom, only used in that year. Well, I only use about one every three years. So, in my opinion, now the city has got to pack these coupons. I've got to get these coupons. We've got to pay postage. We've got to pay, you know, to send them out. How many other people is that happening to? And how much waste is there because of that? I mean, that coupon should last 10 years. What difference is it if you use it in the same year? Anyway, that's my complaint, and I'm done. And I hope something gets done. Thank you.

And it's a good question, actually. Okay, Councilor Sechrist has a question on the fees.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. And I have a question for Director Tice as well, if I may. I'm curious that now we're taking the $100 deposit that was previously required for our yard waste container and no longer charging that fee or assessing that fee. So I think that's really confusing. The messaging is confusing. I'm not sure why we originally placed a $100 deposit, and then now we're taking it back. But I was curious, are the folks that paid that deposit that have the yard waste collection container now going to get a reimbursement for their $100 that they've paid?

OK. We'll go back to Public Works Director Mike Tice.

So part of the issue that we had when those were implemented as they were called a deposit, they really were not a deposit. They were meant to cover the cost of the container, not a deposit that sits in an account and get applied to the last bill. So part of this is correcting that and actually calling it a fee rather than a deposit, which is what it is. But that fee would apply to any type of container if you need a new container. So whether it's a yard waste, solid waste or recycling container. If you need a new container at your location, that fee would apply consistently across the board for all containers. The exception to that would be if we damage the container or if it's just normal wear and tear that the customer has, so say they've had that container 10 years, normal wear and tear wears it out, they would not recharge that fee in those situations.

So that fee is going to be charged now rather than a deposit. Would that be applied to each container that you have for your house? So you'd have $300 you'd pay for when you open an account?

Yeah, if you needed all three containers, that is correct. You would pay $100 for each one. And that covers the cost of the container. Also includes the service fee to take that container out.

Thank you for that clarification.

Okay, Councillor Evans. Thank you, Mayor. I just want to go back to what Mr. Roberts said. With all of our information retrieval devices available these days, I don't see any reason why these coupons are even necessary. You would think somebody would punch a couple buttons on a terminal and say, by the way, you can go ahead and dump because you already have an account with the city. That would make more sense than this coupon thing to me. Now, granted, if they don't have an account, that's different. But I think with this Tyler system, which seems to be so complete, I think we should investigate whether that's an option, and we can do that. So just check that out, please.

okay well the motion on the floor is to approve all in favor any opposed motion carries that takes us to the end of the consent items we are moving on to non-consent items 37 through 42. we will open public comment for items 37 through 42 i have no speaker request forms for those items so we will close the public comment And move on to item 37, first reading of ordinance number 6717, an ordinance amending certain chapters and sections of the Rapid City Municipal Code regarding the common council and the mayor. Motion by Layman with a second by Roberts. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Motion carries. Item 38, first reading of ordinance number 6727, an ordinance amending Rapid City Municipal Code section 3.26 regarding the tax increment financing district review process. Motion by Roberts with a second by Beberdorf. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Motion carries. Item 39, first reading of ordinance number 6722, an ordinance amending section 17.06 of the Rapp City Municipal Code. A request by April Malik for zoning request from low density residential district one to low density residential district two for property generally described as being located at 619 37th Street. Move to approve. Second. Motion by Evans with a second by Roberts. All in favor? Any opposed? Motion carries. Item 40, second reading and recommendation of ordinance number 6724, an ordinance regarding supplemental appropriation two for 2026, and the total amount of $23,897,448.56. Okay, we got a motion by Stroman with a second by Tamang, and the floor is yours, sir.

Thank you, Mayor. I would just like to go back to Finance Director Daniel Ainslie, who has explained this several times. This is his second reading. I think he's done it at two legal and finances and one other council reading. Anyway, inevitably, people are going to say, well, we just spent $23 million that we weren't going to spend. So Daniel, could I have him just explain what's going on here? Absolutely.

Finance Director Daniel Ainslie. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Yes, essentially all of this is from contracts that were entered into last year but were not completed last year. So they were part of the 2025 budget and those contracts are still ongoing this year. So there's capital projects at the airport, there's capital projects with water as well as wastewater that are very substantial. And so as those contracts are ongoing, we have to continue to pay the contractors. So it doesn't mean that there's not money available. It just means that the money was appropriated by this body in 2025. And since the work was not completed in 2025, you're just bringing forward that authority into 2026. There are a few additional new items that go above and beyond that. Those were for some capital projects like the $1.5 million in the Dakota Fields Lighting Project that was included in your overall allocations of the Vision Fund, but that deal was not struck with the soccer association, Ignite, I believe. I'm sorry, I don't remember exactly which soccer association. with the soccer association until after the budget was adopted. And so there are a couple projects like that that they were contemplated to begin, but they were not approved at the time of the adoption of the 2025 budget. So it's not $26 million of new expenditures. It's really just continuing mostly capital projects that were started last year or a couple of additional capital projects that the council reviewed and approved in the fourth quarter of last year. Good explanation.

Anything else, Mr. Stroman?

Thank you, Daniel.

Okay. All right, the motion on the floor is to approve. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Motion carries. Item 41, a request by DGR Engineering for City of Rapid City Parks and Recreation Department for preliminary subdivision plan for proposed tract one of Nolwood Park addition, generally described as being located at Nolwood Drive and Racine Street. The recommendation is to approve the stipulations. Motion by Layman with a second by Evans to approve with stipulations. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Motion carries. Item 42, approve the attached list of 2026 and 2027 malt beverage at South Dakota Farm Wine Renewals upon the approval from Rapid City Police Department and Rapid City Fire Department. Move to approve. Motion by Roberts, that is second by Sechrest. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Motion carries. That takes us to the public hearing items 43 through 50, and we will open the public hearing for items 43 through 50. I do have one speaker request form for item 49 from Mark Millar. Mr. Millar? As you know, you have three minutes, sir.

How you doing, Mark Millar? I'm here to speak on 49 but I'm gonna touch on a couple other things. I agree with Renee talking about the ward for election We seem to have quite a disagreement between the leader of the city and what the county is claiming on this election So I don't know how much this is gonna cost us but I'm pretty sure we're gonna chase the rabbit hole that the rabbit down the hole and And if you guys made mistakes, it's just going to cost the city. John, I'm sorry you're so disconnected with what's going on in council about the garbage rates, the water rates, the sewer rates.

Mr. Millar, we've got to keep it to the specific item on 49, please.

I'm headed there, sir. And this is part of 49. Can I have my minutes back? Anyways, I was going to praise Councilman Pettigrew and Councilman Stroman on their comments earlier about the attorney's process, that we shouldn't be rushing the process, that it needs to be thorough. Well, so that's why I'm here talking about 49. This is a new TIF, but we left the F out, so we're just gonna call it a TID. And this tid actually has some valuable, needed public points in it, mainly finishing Anamosa off. which should have been done years ago, because we've built a mile of neighborhood without a decent street. But now in order to build that street, which should have been built years ago, we're gonna have to include all of that private land north of where Anamosa will be, the old antelope pasture. Now, you guys, this came to life 11 days ago. If this TIF goes complete life, Almost $100 million. 11 days ago, this was introduced in planning and zoning. Last weekend, both committee meetings barely touched on. Boop, rubber stamp. Boop, rubber stamp. And now it's here. And I bet you guys won't know any more about it than John knows about the container problem. What really is happening here is we need a $10 million road on Anamosa so that the people on Diamond Ridge where, by the way, their sidewalks are literally the driving lane, okay? How those streets were ever allowed to be built that way, that's on you all too. We need a $10 million addition to Anamosa to fix those neighborhoods. You guys have grown this up to a $73 million TIF. 60% of the money that we're spending on these TIFs is interest. We need to learn how to spend our CIBP money as it comes out of the cow instead of spending it 30 years ahead and paying all the interest. And until you guys do that, we're going to be in financial trouble.

All right, that will take us to the end of the public hearing. So we will close the public hearing for items 43 through 50 and move on to consent public hearing items 43 through 47. Would the council like to remove any item for separate consideration or approve all these items at once? Motion by Sechrist with a second by Maher to approve items 43 through 47. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Motion carries. That takes us to the end of the consent public hearing calendar. And we will move on to non-consent public hearing items 48 through 50. Item 48, second reading and recommendation of ordinance number 6715, an ordinance adopting a new chapter 17.68, CP cement plant zoning district in the Rapid City Municipal Code. Motion by Roberts with a second by Evans. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Motion carries. Item 49, resolution number 2026-042, a resolution creating East Rapid City Transportation Improvement District. Move to approve. Second. Got a motion by Roberts with a second by Layman. And Councillor Meyer, you have the floor, ma'am.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I just wanted to add one clarification on the item, just to say that approving the district is why we call it a TID, Tax Increment District. And I did appreciate, I believe Director Ainslie spoke on this at Legal and Finance, and I think you did a very good job. And if you'd be willing to speak a little bit, I would appreciate it. Thank you.

With that, we go to Finance Director Daniel Ainslie.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. This tax increment finance district is being presented essentially from a lot of work of trying to find a way where we can get a lot of the private property owners that are in this area to agree to proceed with development if the significant infrastructure would actually be in place. There are several different developers that own land in here, including Dream Design, as well as Elevate and a couple others. And so we have been working to ensure that if the infrastructure is actually put in place, then they would actually proceed with the development. Because the problem is, It's a significant cost to extend not just Anamosa, but there are other storm drainage, there's other water utilities and sewer utilities and stormwater utilities that need to be put into place. And no one wants to take on that burden because, frankly, the cost of that exceeds the cost that they receive from actually selling the lots. And so by working together, getting everyone together, we're able to ensure that that growth would actually pay for growth. What we have tried to explain is that the only other alternative between the tax increment finance district would be for the city to use its CIP fund to construct these needed utilities as well as the needed street infrastructure in here. The streets that are going to be constructed exceed $25 million, I believe. That's a couple years worth of our CIP budget. And so that would mean that we are not doing any road work anywhere else in the community, and instead we would be investing almost two years, sorry, not a full two years, but almost two years only in this area. Instead, it makes a lot more sense to allow the growth to pay for that growth so that we can protect our capital improvement funds to reconstruct the roads that we have in our existing built environment. We're also looking at doing, I believe, almost $10 million worth of water infrastructure here. That water infrastructure was supposed to be paid for through our water rates, which means our existing utility rate payers would be paying to construct these water lines as well as a water reservoir that would be needed for this new growth area. Instead, by using the tax increment finance district, we're able to allow these new areas to actually pay for that new infrastructure. That relieves that burden from our current customers. And so what we are trying to do by doing a lot of these projects through TIFs as well as through state revolving loan program and other things like that, we are anticipating being able to bring back to the council in probably about 12 months a change to our water rates so that we don't have to continue to increase our water rates at 10% every year. That was already adopted I think two years ago by this council. Some of those rates are still needed but we are trying to reduce that as much as possible so that we don't have to continually have our existing rate payers pay for that expansion. When we look at the significant cost of this, yes, there is a lot that is for interest. However, I think it's important to note that this infrastructure, the city is actually going to be self-financing. And so the city retains that interest income. And so when you're looking at I believe it's about $25 million worth of interest on the city side of this. That's money that's going to be coming back to the city that we can pay for operations or other capital projects. So this truly is being as responsible as possible to make sure that we're able to complete our built environment so we can do more infill development so we can save our capital improvement funds to repair our existing deficit that we have in our infrastructure and to hopefully reduce some of our water rates in the future. And Mike is here and he can go into a lot more detail if anyone has any specific questions on it.

Okay, next up, Councillor Pettigrew. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. You know me, I'm not a big TIF guy, but I think this one is great. My business is on East Anamosa. When we moved there, 10 cars a week went down that street. Now it's 10 cars a minute. That street is... is gonna be a major road through town. And the completing of East Anamosa will certainly improve how traffic flows, not only for convenience, but for safety. So I think this is a great project.

Thank you. Councilor Evans.

I just want to kind of validate what Mr. Ainslie said. I think this is one of a number of very creative solutions he brought to us over the last few years. It's not only saving the city money, but generating money, in particular through this interest back to the city way of financing. And I don't know if this was Mike's idea for this, or his, or whose, or dream design, all I know is this is one step toward having the old parts of town not paying for urban sprawl. And I think we all need to do that and we've talked about it for years, but this seems to be a very creative way of starting to make that happen. Where new development pays for itself and we still have money to protect the old parts of town so that they're not neglected. So thank you for that, I really think it's very creative.

Next up, we have Councillor Roberts.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. I was extremely excited to see this one come across. This is probably one of the top three TIFs that I've ever seen come across the city council. When Anamosa Street was built to where it finishes right now, I figured it would stop there and I would never see it done in my lifetime. because there's too many people involved out there. Nobody wanted to take responsibility for it. And this plan, I'm amazed that we got that many players on board to be able to do this. This is gonna be one of the busiest thoroughfares from Rapid Valley east of Elkvale that Rapid City's gonna have. It's gonna alleviate a lot of traffic on 44. It's gonna alleviate a lot of traffic on Campbell, which at Campbell Street, East North Street intersection has been one of our more dangerous intersections in Rapid City and one of our busiest intersections in Rapid City. It's gonna open up a lot of, future growth and a lot of possibility out in that area for hundreds upon hundreds upon hundreds of homes and businesses. It's a, in my opinion, it's a win, win, win. And this is one of the best ones that I have ever seen. And I'm very proud that our city put this together. Thank you.

Thank you, Councilor Maher. Yeah, I'd just like to add one of the things, when Mike and Daniel presented this to the Planning Commission, I thought they did an excellent job of showing the value to the public of this infrastructure. One thing I think is important to understand is that this TIF also pays for the infrastructure and the road going to the property that has been donated to the school system. So here's where the city is helping the school district get ready for that new elementary school that eventually will go in there. So thank you.

Thank you. If you don't mind if I just say a few words too. We've heard obviously from residents in that area who've needed traffic relief. I know from an economic development standpoint, we've talked about the need for this Anamosa Street project. And so it's something that we've set a goal for, but it's tough to figure it out. We want to all use our CIP funds to address our ongoing current needs with our current roads. And the idea of trying to switch this philosophy of growth pays for growth, that's what a good TIF should do. It should pay for the growth which relieves the pressure on the CIP so that we can address streets like my parents' streets or the streets that Tamang rides his bike on or whatever the case may be. We all want that. Nobody wants bad streets. We have severely underfunded that for years based on decisions our city has made. I want to say thank you to Daniel Ainslie. He deserves a lot of credit for this. And also just the great community spirit that we have, because when you talk about various players that are a part of this and getting everybody to sign up, that's not an easy thing to do. It's like herding cats, but Daniel is a great cat herder. And he was able to do that. So I want to show appreciation to our community partners. This is about benefiting the community as a whole. And obviously we're fortunate to have good leadership. So I also want to say thank you to the council Because the council, you have expressed a desire to see this happen as well. So you're part of making that a priority. And I hope that you feel like you've been heard and that you've actually got a solution to actually bring it to life. So thank you as well. And we're going to go to Finance Director Daniel Ainsley.

Thank you very much, Mr. Mayor. I really do appreciate all the words, but I also want to make sure that Kinsley from the attorney's office as well as Mike Dugan are recognized they put in a tremendous amount of work For this as well as dream design and elevate Without their partnership. This really wouldn't be possible.

So thank you to all of them as well That's right public service as a team sport. Thank you all as well for your effort. So a great job all around I look forward to signing this TIF and so right now we're approving the district on item 49 all in favor aye Any opposed? Motion carries. Item 50, resolution number 2026-043, a resolution approving the project plan for East Rapid City Transportation Improvement District. Got a motion by Roberts with a second by Maher. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Motion carries. We have a need for executive session to prepare for contract negotiations with employees or employee representatives per SDCL 1-25-24. Do we have a motion? Got a motion by Meyer with a second by Tamang to go into executive session. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? We're in executive session.

Good morning.

Good morning.

Looking for a motion to come out of executive session Motion by Roberts, second by Meyer. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? We're out of executive session. Now we will move on to the bill list, and with that we'll go to Finance Director Daniel Ainslie. Thank you, Mr. Mayor.

Tonight's bills for Visit Rapid City total $5,953.34. Move to approve. Second.

Okay, we got a motion by Lehman, second by Evans. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Motion carries with one abstention from Meyer. Item 52.

Thank you, Mr. Mayor. The remaining bills total $12,760,283.32.

Got a motion by Meyer with a second by Maher to approve item 52. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Motion carries. Motion by Lehman to adjourn. Second by Stroman. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? We're adjourned. Thanks, everyone.