County Council - Regular Meeting

Great work. Well, actually for us just don't seem normal self.

Okay. You remember Matt's not here, right? Oh, okay. Yeah. We don't have that on Patty. had

perfect. Thank you.

We don't have anything that needs to be amended on the agenda, right? Hello, Mr. Reno. Hey, how are you, sir? Good.

What's up, man? How are you? Doing well, sir. How you doing? Good. Ready to get your bill passed? Yeah, they did a really nice article. Yeah. Where'd you play at? Golf club. Golf club or Yeah. Good place. Good. Very good place. Played in the half tournament Friday out at Bear Creek. It is not in good shape.

Yeah. We played there about a month ago. I think chamber tournament was there and it's in shape. It's unusual. I know.

Well, right. Right now, everybody's grass looks good, even if you don't do anything with it. Yeah. Even the rental homes look the weather is so good. Even the short-term rentals look good.

We'll just introduce it. ask for questions and then are you speaking tonight?

Just depends on how long you want to be here.

That's who But I haven't heard anything from anybody on either one of those groups yet. So I don't I haven't heard anything from anybody. Ethan had the story in the paper, but I think that's what he was calling me about Friday, but I was playing in the golf tournament and I said, "I'll call you back when I finish."

That's what I'm saying. Oh, you're bring

your staff and everything. So, spry. Spry is not a word anybody likes to hear. Mike, it implies you're so elderly. We have to talk about you being spry. Well, you know, are you pinch hitting for Brian tonight? Yes. And no, I'm Rob and Brian. Brian's at the uh the police thing in Washington DC. Oh, my daughter was supposed to be there. Oh, really?

Mhm. But they So, St. Louis City messed up their reservations and she ended up not being able to go. So, I think after it was all said and done, she was kind of happy about Oh, okay. I don't I don't need to go. So, you must have the same people who do renovation are the ones who do snow they got the same reservation.

I said you can you can go next year with

you. I don't I'm tired. There he is. We can start now. I don't remember

says he says she comes to work for providing a tour. All right. I hate to interrupt you, too, but we're going to start.

Good evening, everybody, and welcome to the Monday, May 11th, St. Charles County Council meeting. Feel feel free to go ahead. You're leading the way. So, we're going to start with our invocation. Scott Graham is here. He was the general secretary of the United Pentecostal Church in Welden Spring. We appreciate you joining us. And Councilman Terry Holliver is going to lead us in our pledge. If you please stand and remove your cap. Lord God, I thank you for the wonderful privilege we enjoy of freedom in this nation and those who serve it and serve in our county. Thank you for them. I pray your blessings on them, Lord. I ask the virtues that you extol to us in Proverbs be their portion tonight. Wisdom, justice, judgment, and equity. Give them a wisdom from above to guide their deliberations and the decisions they make tonight and an equity to do so fairly and with impartiality. I pray these blessings on them. Smile on this time together tonight. May it all bring honor to you. I pray in the name of Jesus Christ my Lord. Amen.

Amen. 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. May be seated. Please call the role. Councilman Swanson here. Councilman Brazzle here. Councilman Hammond here. Councilman Elum here. Councilman Hollander here. Councilwoman York. Councilman Baker

here. We are up to public comments. On public comments, we will have three minutes in which speakers can speak. It will be on that clock that's on the end. At the end, you'll hear a box and at the end of that, we will thank you for speaking and we will move on to the next speaker. First speaker tonight is David Venisiano regarding the non-aggenda item.

I got two. This is fast. All right. So, last time I was here, um I'm sorry. My name is David Naniano. I'm a resident of District 7. Uh, last time I was here, I was asking for the appeal of 287G and and honestly, I I maybe shot too high. So today, I'd like to just focus in on one person and that one person is well was a resident of St. Charles County. So her name is Armande Rea. She was originally from Cameroon and while in Cameroon, she was actually persecuted for speaking the English language. She fled. She was accused of being a spy and she ended up in the United States. Once she arrived here, she immediately declared herself at the border, that she was declaring asylum in accordance with the United States and international law. And for seven years, she has been here following every law, every statute, attending every single check-in. She couldn't be a more model asylum seeker. So, unfortunately, in January, she was attending a regular check-in and she was detained. She was accused of shoplifting. This was a false charge. We now know that this was misattributed to her. We know that she was detained falsely for it and ICE knows this as well. Um, but unfortunately right now she is in a Texas holding cell. She does not have a bed. She has been there for 5 months. So what does that mean for us? So she really established the life here. She was here for seven years. She was part of the community. She had a job. She was part of a church. She was a personal trainer. She had friends and family. What I'm asking of this council is we made an agreement with ICE. We made that connection. We have that connection and we can help this one person. And I would just ask that every single member of this council just take a little bit of time in the next two weeks. Call our connections at ICE. Say, "Hey, you're holding this person. She shouldn't be there. Can we release her? Can we get her back to our community?" Because she followed every law. she was a model

citizen or model sorry a model asylum seeker and we have two weeks to do it and I would just ask that in two weeks when we meet again just let us know your progress uh and if you want to do your research I printed out some articles you're free to read them um and you're free to do your own research but I would just ask you take that action and show us that we can protect one of our own thank you thank you can give those materials absolutely to the folks there is our clock broken No. Okay. Michelle Woods regarding bill number 5490.

Good evening. Hello and thank you for this opportunity to speak and for your service to our community. My name is Michelle Woods. I'm here today representing Habitat for Humanity of St. Charles County in support of bill number 5490 regarding short-term rental properties. Housing advocates like Habitat have concerns about short-term rental properties and their impact on the rent on the market and cost of homes. So, the concern is that short-term rentals take up residential properties, repurpose them into commercial, and since there's already a lot of pressure on the market right now that's causing prices to spike, any additional pressure is a concern. Uh even if it's just a small part of the problem. Uh this ordinance will help the county provide a clear picture on how to how many short-term rentals exist. And so we applaud this county's efforts for this step. There's a lot of agreement in our community about the need for um starter homes with moderate with moderate prices. And there's often a lack of movement towards solutions. and everybody, you know, quotes the normal things, the high cost of land, cost of labor, uh the supplies, and a lot of that is out of our control. So, tonight's ordinance is one small policy that can make an impact um on our local housing market conditions. Um and then lastly, I just want to suggest that you um consider something like the city of St. Charles did where they limited the number of short short-term rentals to a certain percentage of the total housing stock and to a certain area. For instance, the county could limit it to the agricultural tourism district. Um, so thanks again for this opportunity to speak. Myself along with several other housing advocates support this bill.

Thanks Michelle. Next speaker, Arie Dino regarding contracts, county council response and academy instructor. Is this our final speaker? This is our final speaker. Okay.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, members of the county council. My name is Arie C. ACO, county public advocate. Running to be the next county executive in August. The state legislature has four more days to go. Of concern is HB uh 2818. There was a compromise reached last Thursday and Friday of last week to move the benchmark from 15% to 18% of contingent property for annexation into a municipality. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you to County Engineer John Lions and Assistant Administration Director Rob Wy for believing in my concerns and taking action by bandating and providing a new base level of blacktop on Piney Road uh on the county portions. This was the right action to take and I appreciate their due diligence. I now need to lobby the Wville Mayor Nick Guiani and the board of alderman to pave their city segments of Piney Road to make it safe for the residents. On the consent agenda tonight is a $1 million of playground equipment and Kleinike Park. Is that a mistake? $1 million. Again, on the consent agenda is another $1 million to the Gateway Greenlight program, which is a political pork waste. And I've heard Steve Elman bragging on the radio of how good this program is, but it really sucks for our county and sucks for the traveling public. And so, we need to curve in our wasteful spending. Why are we investing in another county uh on the instructor at the police academy of St. Louis County and not investing in our own law enforcement uh academy right here in our own county. And why are we investing heavily in the police training center? Not to they don't have the property yet, but it's probably going to be in St. Louis County when Ofallen is building a $38 million law enforcement training center right now. And from my last

request, which I'm requesting again under chapter 610.021, 610.022, 22. All reports from lobbyists Mike Gibbons and Tom Dempsey who are getting $250,000 of taxpayer uh money. On May 1st, the county councelor who is a resident of St. city in violation of our county home rule charter for the last going on six years in August and he states in his letter to me to the extent that we have open responsive records available the cost estimate to provide you with a response open records is below 2.5 hours of employee complication and retrieval time at $771 per hour for $1542 and so I have to ask Why is this? Why are we having secrets and non-transparency? Hence why I'm running to become the next county executive. We deserve answers and information, not to hold the response for money and keeping our county records hostage. I'm appealing to the county council to vote to release all the reports which are paid for by taxpayers expense.

That'll wrap up our public comment tonight. That'll move us to oral report from the county executive. Nothing this evening. That'll get us to the consent agenda. Any items to be removed from the consent agenda this evening? Seeing none, I'd entertain a motion to approve. Motion to approve. Motion and second. All those in favor say I. I.

Any oppose? Consent agenda is approved. Now we're two bills for final passage. We have two this evening. Start with bill 5487. Bill number 5487, an ordinance amending the 2026 budget as adopted in ordinance 25-082 to move a training coordinator position from Bureau 81000 to Bureau 8400 to reflect the St. Charles County Police Department's current organizational structure.

Any questions or comments about this bill? Seeing none, please call the role. Bill number 5487, an ordinance amending the 2026 budget adopted in ordinance 25-082 to move a training coordinator position from Bureau 8100 to Bureau 8400 to reflect the St. Charles County Police Department's current organizational structure. Councilman Swanson, Councilman Brazzle, yes. Councilman Hammond, yes. Councilman Elum, yes. Councilman Hollander, yes. Councilwoman York. Councilman Baker. Yes. Bill 5487 passes. Our last bill tonight for final passage 5488.

Bill number 5488. An ordinance authorizing the county executive or his designate to execute a temporary construction easement with the city of St. Peters for a portion of property located in Lone Wolf Park. Any questions or comments about this bill? Seeing none, please call the role. Bill number 5488, an ordinance authorizing the county executive or his design to execute a temporary construction easement with the city of St. Peters for a portion of property located in Lone Wolf Park. Councilman Brazzle, yes. Councilman Hammond, yes. Councilman Elum, yes. Councilman Hollander, yes. Councilwoman York. Councilman Baker, yes. Councilman Swanson,

Bill 5488 passes. That wraps up bills for final passage. We have seven bills for introduction tonight. Starting with bill 5489. Bill number 5489 requested by Mary Dempsey, sponsored by Mike Gillum. An ordinance amending the 2026 budget adopted as ordinance 25-082 as amended by transferring unencumbered appropriations between line items line items in the recorder fund budget of the St. Charles County Recorder of Deeds. Any questions or comments about this bill? Seeing none, that'll move us to 5490.

Bill number 5490 requested by Patty York and Tim Baker, an ordinance enacting section 660, Ordinances of St. Charles County, Missouri, relating to short-term rentals. Mr. Baker, anything you want to say about this one?

I think we we did the work session on it last time, so we're making progress. Final vote will be on that uh in two weeks. Bill 5491 is next. Bill number 5491 requested by Mag Elum and Matt Swanson, sponsored by Mike Elim and Matt Swanson. An ordinance amending section 210.105 and 210.110 ordinances of St. Charles County, Missouri relating to the sale and use of fireworks in unincorporated St. Charles County.

Any questions or comments about this bill? Seeing none, that'll get us to 5492. Bill number 5492 requested by Mike Herbert, sponsored by Mike Elum, an ordinance authorizing the county executive to execute an intergovernmental agreement relating to mutual aid for building and code services between the county of St. Charles on behalf of the community development department and municipalities within the county.

Comments or discussion on this bill? Seeing none, 5493 is next. Bill number 5493 requested by Chief Kurt Frizz, sponsored by Mike Gillum. An ordinance amending sections contained within the title 6 business and occupation chapter 605 of the ordinances of St. Charles County, Missouri. Revising sections 605.010 605.040 605.070 605.080 080 605.120 605.130 605.140 All concerning the private watchman and security guards licensing.

Any questions or comments about this bill? Seeing none, 5494 is next. Bill number 5494 requested by Chief Kurt Frizz, sponsored by Mike Elum, an ordinance authorizing the county executive to execute intergovernmental agreements relating to mutual aid and assistance for the upcoming 2026 FIFA World Cup matches and associated events that are scheduled to occur in Kansas City, Missouri from June through July of 2026. Any questions or comments about this bill?

Yes, sir. Um, I guess if I could ask the chief a question. Chief, I know we talked about this probably what, six months or a year ago. Is uh, apparently they're not expecting the same crowd they used to. Is that going to is that going to change anything? Yeah, they don't know what to expect. They scaled it down a little bit in their projections, but um, they're still it's still a high security. They still want us available

risk. Yeah. So, our our commitment that we're looking at is no more than two days at a time and probably sending two officers over there at at a time. So, uh it's all reimburseable uh by the federal government through the state and they're working on that part of it now. So, uh it's not a huge commitment, but um we wanted Kansas City PD put out a statewide appeal to get officers because it's way beyond their uh the scope of their what they could do. Thank you. Okay. You might not want to go all the way back to your uh to your seat. I think the next one's bill 5495 is next.

Bill number 5495 requested by Chief Kurtz sponsored by Mike Elum. An ordinance authorizing the county executive to execute intergovernmental agreements with political subdivisions and their respective law enforcement agencies regarding the transmission, receiving, and dissemination of the information captured through the use of like captured through the use of license plate readers for approved law enforcement purposes. Questions or comments about this bill? Seeing none, that wraps up bills for introduction. We're up to announcements and miscellaneous. Any comments for the good of the order. Um, Mr. Chairman. Yes, sir.

I'd like to thank John Lions and his uh and his crew for the they did some emergency levy repair out along Highway C on a on a levey that uh if it had broken before we got it fixed uh would have been really bad news for the people living out there. And they got it done in record time. Um, so thanks John.

It is kudos for John and and his folk tonight. Well done. I appreciate that. I do want to uh pass on condolences to Councilwoman York's family. They had a death in their family. It's why she's not here tonight. And a congratulations to uh Councilman Swanson. Um he is wrapping up his teaching career this month and he will join the ranks of retired teachers which I hear is is very very good. It's great.

Uh but they had an award ceremony uh tonight for his kids u that he's been teaching. So uh excited for him and being able to wrap that up. Anything else for the good of the order tonight? Entertain a motion to adjurnn. Motion second. All those in favor? I. We are dismissed. Thank you. Another quick one.