City Council - Regular Meeting

Ready to roll. Call

the meeting of the Saint Paul City Council to order. Roll call, please.

Councilmember Johnson? Here. Jost? Here. Kim? Here. Yang? Here. Bowie? Here. Coleman? Here. Council President Aker? Here. Seven present, none absent.

Welcome, everyone. Thank you so much for joining us at our city council meeting today. We'd like to start by inviting everyone to join us in standing for the Pledge of Allegiance. Thank you. 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.

Consent agenda items five through 13 are before you for your consideration.

Is there anything to be taken for separate consideration? Seeing none, I'll take a motion from Vice President Yang to approve the balance of the consent agenda. All in favor say

aye. Aye.

All opposed.

Seven in favor, none opposed. The consent agenda is adopted as amended.

Take a motion from Ms. Kim to suspend the rules to consider a resolution to appoint Nicole Tender as our city clerk. All in favor of suspending the rules, please say

aye. Aye.

All opposed.

Seven in favor and none opposed. The rules are suspended. Resolution item 26 dash five twenty two, appointing Nicole Tilender as city clerk.

All right. Well, this is a really exciting day. I think we said earlier today that our city council department is now officially at full staffed capacity, which hasn't happened in a really long time. So no one can leave. That's what that means. And we are really excited to welcome our new city clerk, Nicole Teilander, filling the very, very big shoes of Sherry Moore. But we have been looking forward to your coming for some time. We're excited to have you. I would make the motion to appoint Ms. Teilander, then we will have an official swearing in. Is there any discussion of the motion? Seeing none, all in favor say aye. Aye. All opposed.

Seven in favor, none opposed. The resolution is adopted.

And our interim city clerk for this moment, Jay Wilms, will come down to do the swearing in. It's hard for a city clerk to swear herself in.

Please raise your right hand

and repeat after me. I, state your name. I, Nicole Tender.

Do you solemnly swear.

Do solemnly swear. To support the constitution. To support the constitution.

Of The United States.

Of The United States.

And of the state of Minnesota. And of the state of Minnesota.

And to discharge faithfully. And to discharge faithfully. The duties devolving upon me.

The duties devolving upon me.

As the city clerk. As the city clerk.

Of the city of Saint Paul.

Of the city of Saint Paul.

To the best of my judgment and ability.

To the best of my judgment and ability. Congratulations.

Thank you.

Welcome, Ms. Tullinder. We thought it would be cruel and unusual to have you immediately come up here and start reading, so we'll start that

next week.

Item number 14, Resolution 20 six-five zero two is before you for consideration. Recognize the contribution of Toshua Vang.

Ms. Yang. Vice President Yang.

Thank you, councilor president. I will head up to the podium for this. I am introducing in a resolution to recognize Teshua Vang for his contributions and leadership in our city here and to our Hmong community. And also to recognize Wednesday, 03/25/2026 as Sisual Vang Day in the city of St. Paul. So I do want to invite Sisual Vang along with his wonderful family members up to the podium here with me. So come on up and join me.

Welcome. Thank you so much for being here.

Well, this is a really special day. I am so honored to be here with Tishuo Ving and his family and I want to say thank you to my wonderful friend and sister here in Meiteny who reached out for a resolution to honor her father-in-law and these are her family members here as well. They had a really beautiful gala this past weekend to celebrate Tishua, and while I was not able to make it, I was very determined to get Tishua here, so that we could honor him in person at City Hall. I want to say thank you to my wonderful legislative April for working hand in hand with me to me to put together the resolution here. And the first thing I would say is that I'm so grateful to the council here, also previous councils for your support in always bringing forward resolution to honor our Hmong veterans when the opportunity arises.

This is our Hmong veterans hold a very special place in my heart because they fought alongside a US Central Intelligence Agency members during the secret war, during the Vietnam War and this was a secret war. That's why it's called that. And, to this day living in The US, they still do not get recognition for their veteran status, do not get benefits at all. But, they are still here sharing their stories, thriving, building communities, building our city, And, are so deeply grateful for them. Whereas, Sishuo Vang, born in 1948 in Samhua, Laos.

He is a respected elder and community leader whose life reflects on courage, resilience, and a lifelong dedication to service. And whereas, 1967, Sichuan Vang met Central Intelligence Agency CIA officer Jerry Daniels, and was recruited to assist the Special Guerrilla Unit, also known as SGU during the secret war in Laos, serving in a special scouting and support role by observing enemy movements, gathering critical information, reporting intelligence to SGU soldiers, and helping guide troops safely through unfamiliar and dangerous terrain. While thousands of Hmong soldiers fought alongside The United States in a covert military operation supporting American efforts during the Vietnam war. And whereas, the Hmong soldiers of the secret war made extraordinary sacrifices in defense for freedom. With many risking their lives to support The United States and its allies.

Whereas, following the fall of Laos in 1975, many Hmong veterans and their families faced persecution and were forced to flee their homeland seeking refuge in neighboring countries. Whereas, Teshuavang and his family sought safety at Ban Vinai Refugee Camp in Thailand. And later immigrated to The United States in 1979, where they rebuilt their lives. Whereas, after settling in Saint Paul, Minnesota, Sisuavang became a respected member of the community. Supporting fellow veterans, mentoring younger generations, and helping preserve the history and cultural traditions of the Hmong people.

And whereas, through volunteer work, cultural leadership, and participation in Hmong New Year celebrations, and other community events from 1998 to 2019, helped strengthen the community unity and cultural pride. Whereas, husband to. A loving father of seven children and a proud grandfather of 34 grandchildren. Leading a lasting legacy of family values and community service. Whereas, the city of Saint Paul proudly recognizes contributions of Hmong veterans and community leaders whose courage and resilience have enriched the city's diversity and strengthened the community.

Now therefore be it resolved that the Saint Paul City Council honors Tie Shuo Bing for his service during the secret war in Laos. His leadership within the Hmong community, and his lifelong dedication to preserving Hmong history, culture, and community. Be it further resolved that the Saint Paul City Council hereby proclaims Wednesday, 03/25/2026 as day in the city of Saint Paul. Thank you everyone. I would just like to make a few And so with that, I would like to welcome Maytani to say a few remarks on behalf of the family.

Welcome.

Good afternoon. My name is Maytani and I'm here with my family today. On behalf of our families, I would like to say thank you to Steve St. Paul and also our council member, Nancy Yang for this beautiful organization honors my father, Tish Levin. We truly appreciate and honors to be here today. We are proud of him and here, he worked hard his whole life. He's a strong leader. He's a great father for us and that's it's his journey as sacrifice for us. It means so much to us. And this recognition is not only for him, but also for our families and also for the community.

I will remind us to stay strong and hard work and continue to his legacy. Dad, we love you and we're so proud of you.

Thank you.

Thank you again to the City of Council and also Council Member, Nancy, for this beautiful honest today. And thank you so much. And I would like to say a couple of words, more words, so my dad can understand that. Georgia Gay, Hano, Hojo. Thank you.

Thank you very much.

Thank you. Council President, because the family, they'll probably most likely have to leave in a bit. I do want to make sure we get a photo with them. And so, if any of the council members would like to join me on stage, please do and we'll get a group photo and Poe will be taking the photo for us.

You. You.

Council member Yang, council vice president Yang, thank you so much for your leadership in bringing this forward. Thank you so much to the family members and to all of you for being it is really an honor, sir, to be in your presence, we're grateful for your service. I think we should take a vote on this, so I'll take that as a motion for approval from Ms. Yang. All in favor say aye. Aye.

All opposed? Seven in favor and none opposed. The resolution is adopted. Item 15 is Resolution 20 six-five zero three, recognizing District 5, Payne Phelan Community Council's Executive Director, Jack Byers, for his service in the East Side Of Saint Paul and declaring Sunday, 03/29/2026, as Jack Byers Day in the city of Saint Paul.

Vice President Yang.

Thank you, council president. I am introducing a resolution here to honor Jack Byers, the Executive Director for the Payne Family Community Council, and also to proclaim this upcoming Sunday as Jack Byers Day in the city of Saint Paul. One of the reasons why is because we have the community is throwing a very special retirement celebration for him this upcoming Sunday. But first off, I do want to invite Jack Byers along with your guests, your family, friends. And I know many of the community members who are supporting him are here in the room today too. So if you can join me on stage here, that'd be great. So come on up.

Welcome up. Thanks for being here. If you can crowd in between the two golden columns, then you'll be on all five live cameras at once.

Jack, come on.

I want to give a special thanks to Robin and Vivian from the Pain Family Committee Council for working with PLoA to put together the resolution here. And amongst our million viewers, as we always talk about, there's family members from Philly who are here watching us, so we want to say hi to them. Today's a really special day. I mean, I love about the work that we do here at City Hall is we come across so many leaders who wear their heart on their sleeves, who are so deeply passionate about the work they do to always improve the lives of our residents in this city. And, just really love what they do.

Like you can just genuinely feel that. And, Jack Byers is one of those people for many of us I know. And, which is why this resolution is both exciting, but also very bittersweet because Jack has really been an honor working with you. And, I will miss working with you and having our meetings with each other, discussing about what we can continue doing to bring justice, equity to the Pain Failing Community Council. And so, with that I'm going to read this resolution.

Whereas Jack Byers brought to District 5 his skills in collaborative community process, urban design, historic preservation, transportation planning, and creative place making here in his master of arts and PhD in urban geography at the University of Minnesota. And his bachelor of science in architectural studies at the Philadelphia College of Art. Whereas Jack Beyer served as the manager of community planning for Minneapolis where he was a lead partner in a groundbreaking national endowment of the arts that funded the creative city making pilot in Minneapolis in 2013. Creative city making fostered collaboration between local artists and city planners to develop fresh and innovative approaches for addressing the long term transportation, land use, economic, environmental, and social issues facing the city and local communities. Whereas in 2018, Jack Beyers became the executive director at the Payne Failing Community Council and brought his vast experience in urban and community planning to lead and develop a district plan for the Payne Phelan neighborhood.

Whereas the Payne Phelan community council has furthered their commitment and resourcing and supporting the Payne Phelan neighborhood from Jack Byers leadership with the board of directors. Whereas Jack Byers has dedicated his time to partner, fund, and develop projects with the community and environmental justice, economic development, transportation access, air quality monitoring, food insecurity, housing justice, historic preservation, and public art. He navigated the unforeseen COVID pandemic with his staff and the board of directors to bring resources to the community. Whereas Jack Beyers has invested invested significantly to foster and deepen relationships with other district councils, countless organizations, city and county staff, and elected officials to collaborate on initiatives benefiting the community. Jack has created a durable, holistic plan and far reaching district plan for pain failing in the coming decades.

Now therefore be it resolved that Saint Paul City Council recognizes pain failing community council's executive director, Jack Beyers commitment and service in the East Side of Saint Paul community and proclaims Sunday, 03/29/2026 as Jack Beyers Day in the city of Saint Paul. If you all would like to join the community for a very fun exciting retirement celebration in honor of Jack Beyers, it'll be this upcoming Sunday, March 29, four p. M. To six p. M.

At Karibu Grocery and Deli on 719 Pain Avenue in Saint Paul. And I want to give a huge shout out to the Board of Directors, the friends, the family members, and everybody involved who made this happen for Jack. So, that I'm going to pass the mic over to Jack.

Welcome.

Thank you council president. Thank you council vice president. Thank you council members. I'm a little dizzy myself hearing all of that. I didn't know that I didn't know that anybody knew. I was trying to keep it on the down low. This is a great honor, and I'm I'm really very appreciative. As I know all of you know because you work in community too that nobody does this alone. And so I definitely share this with our board of director. Board of directors, actually several boards of directors over the last number of years.

Particularly, our council chair, Rebecca Nelson, and before that, state representative, Athena Hollins. I don't think I've had an honor like this since Rebecca named a potato after me a couple years back.

This does not compare.

This is a little bit more, you know. There's no sour cream on this though. Right. Sorry. On a more serious note, I was asked to say a few words. As most of or many of you, anybody who knows me knows that that's not a talent I have. But I I will trust that you give me the hook when you need to. And I will try to keep it brief. But I think it's important to bring up a couple of questions that we've used in community. I forgot to mention Vivian and Providen staff, who are invaluable.

We bring these questions up in community. And they're questions that everybody can do and should do, I encourage you to do it often. Think about this present moment, how old you are now, and add 20 to that. So, then think about how old you will be twenty years from now, Right? When you are at that age, when your loved ones are that age, what do you need this city to be so that your lives are whole and complete?

It's hard to do that if you're thinking just about today or tomorrow. So, think about that twenty years from now. What will be worse if nothing ever changes, everything stays the same? What will be what will you miss if it's lost to the tides of time? And what is it you're going to hang on to and take with you twenty years from into those next twenty years?

I don't know. I have a hunch that no one sitting in this room today will be in this room twenty years from now. We will all have moved on. So I want to appeal to all of you, the council, all of our elected officials, the community, all of our volunteers, to think about one thing that's really not spoken on about enough. It's in the city's comprehensive plan.

Every single map in that plan has a gold line on it. It's called the area of concentrated poverty. That line shouldn't be on those maps. That line is there as a reminder. It's an appropriate reminder that there's people who are struggling, that there's people who don't they're not born with advantage, they don't easily gain advantage, but they certainly deserve every advantage they can get.

And the work of all of us should be rooted in erasing that line of poverty so that it does not become a latter day red line that stays with the city and stays around the neck of the city. So, I encourage you to, in everything you do, think about yourself 20 older, think about your loved ones, think about your community members. I am retiring from paid work. I'm not planning to slow down just yet, maybe a little bit. But in twenty years from now, I hope that I'm one of those old guys who's in the park playing checkers with other people.

Those are spaces. There's a lot of spaces like that in Philadelphia. There's almost none of that in Saint Paul. There's great places to go and be active. There's nowhere to really just hang out with community unless you're doing it inside. So think about that line of concentrated poverty, and please stay in touch. I'm not going anywhere. And I'd love to see all of you more often and talk more often too. Thank you so much.

Thank you so much, Jack.

Well, thank you, Jack. Again, we will miss you and thank you for your words of wisdom. I invite all of the council members to join us for a photo before our guests here have to head out. So come on up and Plo will take our photo again. Thank you.

Okay. Great. Thank you. I

will take that as a motion from Ms. Yang for approval. Is So any discussion of that motion? Ms. Johnson and then I think I saw Ms. Kim.

I'm like I want to invite Mr. Byers back up. You have to stay.

We have to like

basically give you our formal We're

not done with you. Yes.

It's weird talking away from the mic and also turning or or saying these words with my back towards you. So Okay. It's okay. You're fine. You didn't do anything wrong.

You're actually truly I would consider you one of my trusted trusted community members as well as, you know, being a part of the council and also being an elected leader. You get an opportunity to meet some really incredible people along the way and folks that you can be yourself around. Folks that will call you and be like, hey, I like this, I don't like this, folks that don't care if you're a council member or not because I treat you like a person, and you lead very much in that way. When you mentioned just being in the park and playing chess, I could definitely see that because that's your personality. You will just take someone up on an everyday activity and having an everyday conversation with an everyday person.

And I just really appreciated being able to work with you. I'm really glad that I was able to get back from maternity leave just in time to be able to send you off because I think if I had returned and you'd been gone, would have been really sad and probably found you just to be able to celebrate you because I think you're just that type of a person and you've always been warm and you've always been welcoming to me. And so I just really want to say thank you for your service and thank you for your important ESET work specifically, your advocacy, your voice, and most importantly your leadership when it comes to just ensuring that everyday people can do this work too. So I have really appreciated and enjoyed working with you.

Thank you so much.

Ms. Kim. Hi Jack. We I feel like started at the city around the same time. I was a fresh LA to the council president and I remember our first one on one. I remember the former council president Amy Brammon and I walked away from

that meeting thinking like, wow,

how do we convince someone like that to be an And executive director at a district what you've demonstrated year over year over year is the thing that has driven you into this work is your heart and your passion for community. And the East Side and Paine Phelan in particular deserved someone that wasn't just going to meet the bar but exceed the hopes that our community had for what the district council could look like and how it serves its residents. And in every big fight and every awful moment that we've had in the city, I'm even thinking back to during the pandemic, we were phone banking businesses together for business assistance. You've been there, transit fight, jack buyers, environmental justice fight, buyers, housing fight, buyers. So, you've got your name and your fingerprints on not just like the physical infrastructure of the things that you see in your neighborhood, but about the and on the people that you have been so passionately, diligently and tenaciously serving on the East Side.

So, we are incredibly worthy and thank you for bringing your heart to this work and yeah, exceeding all the expectations of hope that we had for what you might do and what you might accomplish at the Pain Family District Council. I'm so sad to see you go and you and I will be I think then having a coffee and checkers date soon.

Thank you. Kim. Any other discussion of the motion? Ms. Jost.

Thank you, Council President. I just also wanted to thank you. I know the critical role that our district councils and our executive directors of our district councils play in our community and just really appreciate your service. And I also want to congratulate you on your retirement and I hope to see relaxing around the neighborhood.

Thank you. Thanks.

Thanks, Jesus. All right, I will agree with everything that my colleagues have said. Jack, when I think of you the word that comes to mind as my people would say is just a mensch. You are a good, good guy. And I also want to thank you, as Councilmember Johnson said, when I became the latest council member to represent Rhode Island I know you've seen a succession of us with redistricting.

You were kind enough to welcome me to tour me around the neighborhood to help me get my bearings, and I'll be forever grateful for that. And I hope that when you go home, you do take a chance to look at the footage that millions of viewers saw today because you'll see all the people who are standing behind you. A beautiful representation of the neighborhood, of your work, of the people who love and care about you. And I think that that's your legacy as much as anything else. So congratulations.

Thank you so much. Really appreciate it.

And with that, I think we should probably take a vote. All in favor say aye. Aye. All opposed.

Seven in favor, none opposed. The resolution is adopted. Item 16 is Resolution 20 six-four 12, adopting the findings of fact, conclusions of law, and recommendations submitted by the administrative law judge with exceptions concerning the tobacco product shop license held by White Bear Tobacco Marketplace Incorporated doing business as White Bear Tobacco for the premises located at 1662 White Bear Avenue North and imposing the recommended presumptive matrix penalty and the cost of the tested case hearing before the administrative law judge.

This is what we call in the business a hard pivot. Well, come on.

That is

very astute, Council President. Council President Nacre, members of the City council, my name is Monica Schaefer. I'm an assistant city attorney for the city, and I'm here representing the Department of Safety and Inspections about this matter. So the purpose of today's agenda item is for this council to consider the hearing record that took place at the December. There are no new facts or arguments that are going to be presented today that were not considered by the administrative law judge, and the licensee is able to allege error on the part of the ALJ in this application, in the application of the law, or the interpretation of the facts, but cannot present new but the city and the licensee may not present new arguments today.

So the licensee can also contest the recommended action that the city council will take. So this is about White Bear Tobacco, which is located at 1662 White Bear Avenue North. It is owned by Anand Barberawi. He has a license, a tobacco products shop license. As part of having a tobacco product shop, you the state requires that there be regular inspections, annual inspections, where an underage buyer who is contracted with the Department of Safety Inspection, so that means the person is between the ages of 18 and 20, and you have to be 21 to purchase cigarettes or tobacco products here.

That person goes into the store and attempts to buy a tobacco product. The tobacco licensee must or their clerks, whomever it is, must ask for identification and confirm that that person is over the age of 21 in order to purchase them. In April 2025, White Bear Tobacco did sell an underage buyer a tobacco product. Did not ask for the person's license. All of our DSI youth that come, they do not pretend to be anything other than who they are, and they do not withhold any information about who they are.

This was the second time that an underage buyer was able to buy a tobacco product from this business within two years. Therefore, the city attorney's office, well, the Department of Safety and Inspections recommended the imposition of the matrix penalty here, is $1,000. The city attorney's office issued a notice of violation to the business owner, mister Barberawi, and and instructed him on the options to proceed. He selected to choose an administrative law hearing. And that means that he challenged the facts in the court and we went and had a whole hearing.

The city entered '19 exhibits and three witnesses. All three witnesses were from the Department of Safety and Inspections. And ultimately, the ALJ represented or determined that the city had met its burden. And so the ALJ found that the recommended penalty was appropriate, that a violation had happened. So in addition to that, the city is requesting or in that notice of violation, the department the city attorney's office notifies the license holder that the city may choose to impose the fees associated with that hearing on the licensee.

And here, the department has requested that the city council do impose them. Under the Saint Paul legislative code section three ten point o three subdivision k, the imposition of the licensing excuse me. The administrative law hearing fees, thank you, are appropriate to impose when the violation involves the sale of a cigarette to a minor or if the position claim or defense of the licensee was frivolous, arbitrary, or capricious, made in bad faith, or made for the purpose of delay or harassment. The department believes that that has happened here. The facts found by the judge illustrate that the violation was a sale of cigarettes to a minor.

After that, the evidence, the memo that you have attached to this resolution explains the ALJ found that the licensee's testimony was self serving and not corroborated and was not credible. It was logically inconsistent. He did not provide any arguments or evidence to excuse me no evidence to support his arguments of his claim and all of the evidence admitted directly contradicted his claims. So for that reason, the department concludes that under either one of these justifications, the imposition of these fees is appropriate. So the department respectfully requests that the counsel impose the matrix penalty of $1,000 and the licensing or excuse me, the hearing fees in this matter.

Great. Thank you. I assume the appellant is here or not?

I don't see him. Okay.

But he We'll get there knows us in a moment. Okay. Any questions before we potentially hear from the appellant? Doesn't look like it. All right. If you are the appellant in this case, it is now your time to come up and testify. You'll have five minutes. If you are the appellant in this case, now is your time. And last time. Okay. Thanks so much, Ms. Schafer. I would look to Ms. Yang for a motion.

Thank you, counsel president. I appreciate the presentation. I did get a chance to review all of the documents. And my colleagues here would know that I take these cases very seriously. I am just have heard so much about how tobacco corporations do target our use and this is why whenever we do have these cases before us, I take them seriously because I believe that it's incumbent upon our license holders to follow through with our code and make sure that they don't violate it and also take very seriously and have integrity in serving our communities and really protecting our use as well. So, with this being the second violation in two years, I do support the request from our staff. So with that I move approval.

So the motion from Vice President Yang is to support the recommendations of the city attorney's office on this matter. Any discussion of the motion? Seeing none, all in favor say aye. Aye. All opposed.

Seven in favor and none opposed. The resolution is adopted.

Thank you so much counsel.

Item 17 is ordinance 26 dash 17, administrative ordinance establishing the minimum qualifications for the vacancy for the position of fire chief pursuant to the provisions of sections twelve point twelve point one of the city charter.

This brings us to the ordinance section of our agenda. All of our ordinances have three hearings. We first hear them with a staff report the very first time. The next week, we have a public hearing to receive public comment on the ordinance. And then sometimes we take a couple weeks to make amendments. Sometimes we go straight to the last step, is final adoption. So if you see something before us for final adoption, that has already had at least two hearings in front of the council and is now before us for that point. You'll also see today we also have a first reading of a couple of items and public hearings of a couple of items. We take them out of order for some reason. So this item is before us for final adoption, but I believe that Ms. Coleman there is an amendment.

There is. Thank you, council president. Everybody should have a version two in front of them. It's also been entered in Legislature. So I would move version two, which would require us to reopen the public hearing on this item, I believe, because there are a couple of substantive changes.

I'll go over them very briefly. Before I do, I just want to thank the union, Local twenty one, the mayor's office, our HR team. We've had a lot of folks who have looked at this to just make sure that we're not making any changes that would adversely impact the process. But when we had our staff presentation on this last week, I think there were a number of us who were concerned about the move to not permitting a substitute for the education requirement to requiring a bachelor's. While I think that there are likely many qualified candidates who do have a bachelor's, something that I'm deeply committed to is ensuring that we are not needlessly imposing a higher degree requirement when it is possible to show similar competencies and leadership qualities through work experience.

I think that it is there are some rare instances where specialized degrees are absolutely essential. But in many instances there are other ways to show that you are qualified for a job. And after consulting with folks in the department and folks throughout the city, I think that there is a lot of support for the idea that this may be one of those cases. So have added, so made that change struck the clause substitution for education allowing for additional qualifying experience to be a possible substitute on a year for year basis. That needs to be experience that shows increasing leadership responsibility, command level duties, etcetera.

Couple of other small tweaks here right at the bottom. Just really wanting to get at some of the things that makes our fire department unique and uniquely challenging and wanting to make sure that that's reflected in the candidates that we're considering. Demonstrated leadership in budgeting, strategic planning, and our governmental coordination being preferred. Experience working in a department that operates a high volume EMS system. Some is something that and then, obviously, we have a very strong union in our city, it's critical that the leader of the department have experience working in that unionized environment, experience with labor relations and collective bargaining. So we've added that as something that was in there but have sort of tweaked the wording to make it clear that that is something that we would really value in this role. Happy to take any questions but that is the version that I would move.

Great. Thanks, Ms. Coleman. Really appreciate your hard work and attention to detail on this. I strongly support this amendment and in particular appreciate that the union was able to weigh in on this. I appreciate you reaching out to them. And I think this operating high volume EMS system in particular is something that is really important in our department and couldn't agree more that experience is often just as relevant as specific credentials. So thank you for that. So the motion is to adopt this amendment and then reopen the public hearing. This will lay over for a week before we could take a final vote. Any further discussion of the motion? Seeing none, all in favor say aye. Aye. All opposed.

Seven in favor, none opposed. The amendment is approved and the public hearing is reopened.

And this will lay over a week for final adoption.

And the public hearing is continued to 04/01/2026 for final adoption. Item number 18, ordinance 26 dash 18, amending section one ninety three point zero four of the legislative code to temporarily extend the pre eviction notice period in section one ninety three point zero four from thirty days to sixty days.

Great. So with the permission of the sponsor, I want to introduce version three, which is in Legistar. This is an amendment that keeps the balance of the pre eviction notice to sixty days but exempts the public housing agencies owned and managed properties from that ordinance. And I just want to start by naming the values that are behind this amendment because I think especially in this time of heightened political rhetoric, think it's very easy to sort of take an all or nothing approach or to sort of kind of assume intent. And I think it's really important to be very clear about the values that motivate things.

So I want to be very clear that the motivating factor here for me is care for those who are most vulnerable in our community and particularly those who have been impacted by Operation Metro Surge.

And I know that those are

the same values that are motivating the entire sixty day pre eviction notice idea. I think when a trusted partner like the public housing agency that is unique both in how it operates and also in the number of vulnerable people in our community that they serve, 4,200 units owned and managed by the PHA by far the largest affordable housing provider in our community when they reach out and express concern. Think it's important to hear them out to listen. And I really appreciate that all of my colleagues took time to do that. Last week we had a really robust conversation.

I also want to recognize that I think all of the PHA leadership staff, maybe not all but a lot, are here with us right now taking time to be here because this is important. So thank you for being here. And after our discussion last week, I took away two main points that are motivating me to bring this amendment. First of all, the fact that tenants in PHA owned and managed housing will not be helped by this ordinance because they have a unique protection that other tenants in the city don't have. Their rents are income adjusted.

So I know that the purpose of this extension is because we're trying to help people who have been impacted by Operation Metro Surge, folks who haven't been able to work, haven't been able to leave their homes and therefore haven't had income to pay rent and need more time to either go back to work or to access the emergency rent assistance that we've made available. But in the case of public housing tenants, they actually have a unique protection when it comes to rent because if they are experiencing a hardship, they don't have to pay rent at all. Their rent goes down to $0 So they don't need sixty days, thirty days, any time because they are not at risk of eviction because their payment of rent, their rent becomes zero if they're in that situation. So that is a unique protection that they have that other tenants do not have. And I think that's important to know because we've heard of a lot of other providers who have asked for exemptions to this, that's just not true of other providers.

Their rent stays the same regardless of their income, and so they are in a vulnerable position. I think the second thing I heard that was really influential on me is that the public housing tenants could be hurt by this ordinance because this is likely to lead to cuts in federal funding and specifically federal funding for capital improvements to the units. And if you've toured any of the public housing units like I have, you know that they are in need of repair and that when the public housing agency does repair, they do a really good job. But we're not talking about luxury repairs. We're talking about HVAC systems. We're talking about plumbing. We're talking about the basics that I think and as I said earlier at the HRA meeting, I think affordable housing should not be low quality housing. It should be quality. It should be safe. It should be dignified.

It should be beautiful housing. And that's what this money is going to. And so I find it very ironic that if we are responding to the horrors that were inflicted on us by the federal government with this legislation that we would be also letting the federal government off the hook for a penny that should be going to our public housing agency. I don't want the impact of this to be that they get an excuse to not give dollars to our public housing agency to our most vulnerable residents who need that the most. So this amendment seeks to avoid that harm to our public housing tenants.

I think it's also important to note that this is consistent with how we've treated the public housing agency in other city policies. So for example, we exempted the public housing agency from our rent stabilization ordinance because once again we recognize that a one size fits all approach doesn't work there because the public housing agency operates so differently from any other provider of housing. And finally, I just want to say very clearly, I think I saw some language in some of the emails we received and I appreciate all the input we got. I think I saw some people over profits messaging that was being used. This is 100% about people.

It's not about profits because the public housing agency doesn't make a profit. Every dime that they make goes right back into the people who are living in public housing. So that is what is motivating me in this 100%. And then finally, I did talk to some folks and I really appreciated some folks who reached out who are in Section eight or Section 42 housing, Section 42 housing in particular, and said, you know, my rents aren't income adjusted, so don't include me in this, that not all Section eight, Section 42 housing is treated the same. And that was a really helpful conversation with the constituent who reached out.

And I just want to be clear that this exemption does not include Section eight or Section 42. So they would still be covered by the sixty day. This is just housing that is owned and managed by the public housing agency, which is again rent is adjusted according to income. So I'll stop there. Thanks for hearing me out, for the thinking that has gone into this. Again, I want to thank the Public Housing Agency staff who are here and who responded to a lot of our questions over the last week. And I would welcome discussion on the motion. Ms. Johnson.

Thank you, Council President. I appreciate being rooted in values. I have been pretty vocal with this council and on my time as council as an adamant supporter of tenant protections. And one of the concerns that I had going going into 2024 and beyond has been that we have had ordinances that have been in place to really support renters and there have been exemptions that have been made by this body, to the rent stabilization ordinance in addition to the tenant protections ordinance that passed. We had to make a lot of edits and I think also just overall successions to it in order to make sure that that passed.

This to me seems like an effort that is also a form of tenant protections that I truly would love to see across the city. And I know that we are talking about this amendment and I am not going to be able to support this amendment today. I think I also want to make sure that we're correcting the record because when we talk about income base and adjusting the rent, there are still individuals that are housed within the St. Paul public housing agency whom are evicted due to the inability to pay and non payment of rent. So I think if that was true, meaning if you had a financial hardship and the amount of your rent was just wiped out completely or because your income was non existent, I think that the numbers of evictions that took place, including evictions that took place just Friday, you know, with 45 evictions filed and sixty two percent of those evictions being under $1,000 I think we really have to talk about the bigger issue, which is that we can choose to exempt the largest landlord in the city on the principles and the values in which I think you've so eloquently outlined.

The cost analysis of that though when we're talking about a potential loss of $100,000 on federal funding when the cost to the individual who is evicted goes well beyond $100,000 And when we think about thirty days or sixty days or fifty days, we want to be able to allow individuals to not have to face an eviction for $50 to not have to face an eviction for $150 To not have to face an eviction period for any amount of money due to their inability to pay. And so my value is really aligned in keeping individuals housed. And I think that we have alignment in that within the partners of the St. Paul housing agency. So I also want to just thank folks for coming out as well and really making the effort to talk to all of us.

I've read every email that came through from leadership, from community members as well. But I once again, and I shared this last week, it is counterproductive and counter and contradictory to pass the tenant protections ordinance and then to exempt the largest landlord in the city from that ordinance. That is not values aligned with me and not to mention that of the 4,200 units of housing, you are talking about not just units and housing and fixing and repairing buildings, you are talking about people. And I think not to reiterate, I don't think I think you're right, but the people for profit isn't necessarily probably the correct characterization of the conversation, but it has to be people period. And the reality is we have too many evictions that happen in our city.

I have a zip code of 55106 that I share with my colleagues all the time has a large amount of evictions and often it's due to inability to pay. This exemption that started with the thirty days, we moved from fourteen to thirty days because we recognize in the system right now you cannot get through the county rental assistance program. You can't get through the city's rental assistance program. You often can't get access to resources in a short period of time. And depending on if you're connected or not to a caseworker, your timeline is extended.

And so whether you are a resident in the St. Paul Public Housing Agency units or not, you should be able to explore all your options before you are permanently unable to find housing again. And when individuals are looking at it, it's really hard to find options including here in the city of St. Paul once you have an eviction filed period. And I think that as long as that remains true, it's hard to say this individual gets thirty days notice, this individual does not when we're posing the option.

And so I just can't, know, my value is really aligned in that piece as someone who comes from a family of renters, someone who understands that oftentimes evictions happen because of non inability to pay, And that's actually what we're trying to do here. And so it's not necessarily this conversation did not start just about federal funding. And it can't end there. And so my vote today will be really because it starts with protecting residents. And residents aren't going to care about federal funding if they can't afford to be in their home to benefit from it.

And so that's just something that for me is really important today and one of the reasons why I won't be able to support that. I'm happy to support the exemption and I'm thankful again for my colleagues who are bringing this forward. It's an important conversation. You cannot pass an ordinance on tenant protections and then begin to exempt individuals. Once you do that, you open the door to future exemptions to go forward. We've seen that with rent stabilization. We saw that with the repeal of tenant protections. As the tenant protections ordinance leader of the ordinance that would be amended to include this exemption, I just simply cannot my values don't allow me to vote for that today. But thank you.

Thanks, Ms. Johnson. Other discussion of the motion?

Ms. Yang. Thank you, president. Know we have guests from the PHA here, I do want to say thank you all for being here. I have learned a tremendous amount about your agency and just really the status of just even the unpaid rent that you all are experiencing. And it gives me a snippet of also the experience that your tenants are going through as well. You all do really incredible work. So I want to commend you for that. And I'll be frank, if I were you I would be in your same position pushing for the exemption two because that is your role. Like your role is to advocate for what works best for your agency.

And so again, I really applaud you all and it took a lot of work to put together data for us. I will say that for me personally as a council member at the table here, I do echo what the council member chair Johnson has shared at the table here. I won't be supporting the exemption. And I do wanna say that, you know, I don't know how the votes will land for today, but what I'm very interested in is a conversation with the Saint Paul PHA about our emergency rental assistance. We as a council invested more dollars into this and to me this is a really critical moment for us to be having conversations with stakeholders about how we as a body can be supporting their work knowing that they are housing our most impoverished residents.

And we don't want them, their residents to, their tenants to get evicted. I know they are not in the business of wanting to get their own tenants evicted either. I believe that you all are truly in this work because you care and want to provide housing for the people that you serve. And so, few I have thoughts simmering in mind about what that sort of support would look like and how we can possibly even change up guidelines of the future for our emergency rental assistance program to better serve tenants that are currently living in public housing. But, I also believe, and I also acknowledge that that would be a larger conversation that we would have have as a body with each other during our housing redevelopment authority boards too.

Thanks, Vice President.

And so, Ms. Bui and Ms. Kim. Thank you so much, Council President.

Thank you so much, Chair Johnson and also Vice President Yang for your comments. I also share a lot of those approach in terms of the thoughtfulness. I really want say I appreciate Miles per hour leadership here. I learned so much. I really appreciate being able to make an informed decision and I appreciate the follow-up particularly with the requested information, learning about the agency, learning about the most recent roster of the history of rents unpaid and also some of the evictions.

I also just want to just uplift that my values lie in this being a people first approach. And when I think about the people who are impacted and the people who actually live inside of our public housing buildings. You know, these are people who are on very fixed incomes, deeply low incomes. Some of these people are solely dependent on social security, Medicaid, and also on disability assistance. And when I think about just all the negative impacts that we've seen from the federal government regarding like the freezes and also major cuts, I'm also thinking of it's just not an institutional impact like individuals are also experiencing that.

And I see this extension for the eviction as a catalyst and we've said this before, but I see it as a catalyst for tenants and landlords to secure more resources and to increase access to our rental assistance. Like we had made a really bold stride with adding more funding to our emergency rental assistance. We have seen tons of mutual aid efforts across the metro area. I know Frogtown Neighborhood Association just launched their rental assistance program. And I see this as an opportunity for us to really protect our most vulnerable.

And when I think about just our most vulnerable, not only our agencies, but making sure we're protecting our most vulnerable residents. And some of the qualifications particularly with this program or some of the qualifications for people to even live inside of public housing requires for them to demonstrate economic hardship. And many of them are going through life changes or challenges and have been going through transitions. So, I do see this vote like I mentioned as a catalyst to prioritize matching those resources to the landlords to ensure that they can be made whole. So, would not be supporting this amendment and just be supporting with adopting the version as is.

Thanks Ms. Bui. Ms. Kim. I really

hold for the applause. I really appreciate the thoughtfulness of this conversation. For me, I'm also not inclined to support this amendment. Homeline's tenant hotline has seen a 94% increase in inquiries about financial aid from St. Paul households since January 1. And statewide eviction filings were below last year's trends. However, comparing to a three year baseline, statewide filings are 10% over the baseline as of just last week. St. Paul eviction filings were 1% over last year's trends and as of this last week only 1.1% above. But comparing to the previous three year baseline of eviction filings were 16% above the baseline.

And, it is incredibly likely that without mutual aid, this number would be a lot higher. We also are seeing that the PHA is filing eviction notices and as of last Friday, 62% of the filings there were 45 eviction filings as of last Friday. 62% of the filings alleged less than $1,000 owed to the PHA and have eviction filings. So I share I'm not going to reiterate the values of why I think that data set is incredibly important but also illustrates why zero exemptions to this policy is really important as we think about protecting our renters regardless of who's providing their housing.

Thanks, Ms. Kim. Any further discussion of the motion? All right. Seeing none, so the motion is for the amendment. I think we'll take a roll call vote.

Councilmember Johnson? No. Jost?

Yes.

Kim?

No. Yang?

No. Bowie? No. Coleman?

No. Council President Aker? Aye.

Two in favor, five opposed. Those being council members, Johnson, Kim, Yang, Bui, Coleman. The amendment fails.

And now we will consider the, ordinance as a whole, which is now before us for final adoption. Looking to Ms. Kim to see if there are any comments.

Yeah. I would like to make a motion to approve. And my comments will be brief. I think a lot of us have sort of spoken to these the context of why we're moving this policy forward. But Operation Metro Surge did not just terrorize our migrant neighbors, it laid siege on entire communities. Families locked themselves inside of their homes. Children miss schooled. Workers stopped going to jobs. They needed to keep a roof over their head. People lean on neighbors and mutual aid networks just to survive.

That is the resiliency of a community that has always had to protect itself. We are witnessing with this administration is just the most brazen manifestation of a long political tradition of using migrant communities as scapegoats to justify increasing militarization. Families and businesses are still figuring out how to recover. They're still standing in the rubble of what the federal government damaged and mutual aid can only go so far. We are looking at a multi year recovery and we are looking at a looming eviction crisis that will arrive if we do not act now.

Our tenant legal aid organizations and housing advocates have been naming this for years. St. Paul's housing conditions were already fragile before Operation Metro surge. The surge did not create that fragility, it weaponized it. Fourteen days was never enough and thirty days is not enough now.

It's not enough time to find legal help, it's not enough time to navigate a bureaucracy or an application process, it's not enough time to pay down a balance that accumulated while a family was in crisis, while a worker was detained, or while a parent was too afraid to leave their home. Time is one of the few tools this council controls directly with this policy and today, we will use it for the betterment of families. This temporary extension is the floor of what our residents deserve from us. The voices of our housing advocates, our legal aid providers, our tenant organizers have been clear. What is coming will be worse than what we've already seen.

I'm grateful to my colleagues for your support and for continuing to stand up to our residents when it counts and continuing to stand up with our residents when it counts. I'd also like to extend my deep gratitude for Homeline for their advocacy and most importantly providing us with real time data on this ordinance.

Thank you Ms. Kim. So that's a motion for approval. Is there discussion of the motion?

Ms. Johnson. Thank you, Council President. I just want to share and I'll be brief too and I won't reiterate some of the things that I shared prior. I'll just take this opportunity to share that during the public hearing of this item, we heard a lot of requests for targeted emergency rental assistance.

And this body did act alongside the mayor to bring almost $3,800,000 this year into emergency rental assistance. And that is not inclusive of the $900,000 that we're putting towards staffing, but that's with 2,500,000.0 that's going to go straight to residents. And I want to be really clear on just the of the motivation behind that is also to ensure that folks are not having to get to that eviction filing. And so with this extension, I don't think this extension alone, if it just operates in itself, that just delays you're getting maybe sixty days to figure it out. Without the emergency rental assistance, without our targeted emergency rental assistance programs in multiple places without that funding.

It is really a standalone. And so for individual landlords and for folks that came for all of the different affordable housing developers who made the time to come down to speak about why there is a need for emergency rental assistance. I want folks to know at least from the city side that we are working internally as quickly as we can to ensure that by April 1 and April 2, the opening for the emergency rental assistance is returning back to the city of St. Paul. And I hope that residents are working to, especially right now, April 1 is just around the corner.

And if you are a resident watching and listening to this conversation and you realize that potentially in April 1, this might be genuinely you where you're looking to get emergency rental assistance and are in need of that. This is the earliest notification, that website is up to date, be monitoring as well as being subscribed to the newsletter, but also begin to monitor the city of St. Paul's emergency rental assistance website because April is the goal for reopening. It's open for two days because of how important it is and because of how quickly the city wants to move. And so the application will be open, the materials that you need are there on the website, prepare for it, and if you have any questions or anything that comes through, I want you to know about the St.

Paul, STPAULERA@St.Paul.gov, S T P A U L dot G O V. Also want you to know about (651) 266-6671. That's the phone number for questions, that's the phone number for inquiries, and that's the email contact to ensure that you see that notification and that you get it. Because in reality, we received over 600 applications when this opened the first time. And that was within that first week.

And so when we think about the demand and we think about the need, it is there and so is the financial assistance. And so I just want folks to know how to access that and I wanted to take the opportunity to share that that'll be also why I'm supportive of this because if you miss that two days, it's going to be thirty days again until you're able to apply. And those things are really important and that's why ordinances like this and that's why exemptions like this temporarily provide an opportunity for folks who may be missed the first time to be picked up again the second time. And that happens all the time, not just with government programs, but nonprofit programs and pretty much every other program that has the assistance piece that requires individuals to apply. So, thank you.

Thank you, Ms. Johnson. Other discussion of the motion? Ms. Bouley.

Thank you. I just have some closing remarks just to deliver as well. I just want to say this action is about dignity, is about granting more time. It is also about recognizing that people are not problems to be moved, but neighbors who deserve stability. Today, we choose to give breathing room.

Sixty days is not just a number, it is time for a parent to find support instead of panic. Time for a senior to stay rooted instead of displaced. It is time for housing providers and tenants to come together, access rental assistance and find solutions that keep people housed. We know eviction does not solve a crisis, it deepens it, it disrupts families, it destables communities and it creates greater cost for our city to for our city in the long run. So, are doing what leadership requires, we are stepping in early, we are making space for assistance, we are also creating space for partnership with our housing providers and we are saying clearly that in St. Paul we believe housing is a foundational is foundational to public safety, to economic stability, and to human dignity.

Thank you Ms. Bui. Other discussion of the motion? All right. Well, seeing none, I just would echo many of my colleagues.

I would say first of all a huge thank you to colleagues who worked on this, brought this forward, especially Councilmember Kim. I want to acknowledge all of the folks who reached out to us. We heard a lot about this topic, folks who were excited about it, people who were concerned about it. And I want to recognize that for me this decision really comes down to, again, the harm that has already been caused to so many people in our community and doing everything we can to avoid further harm. And to me, it's unconscionable that after someone would have gone through what they have gone through during Operation Metro Surge that there would then be compounding disaster and pain for their family through an eviction.

So, I agree with what my colleagues have said about breathing room. I also just want to note and I know there have been op eds about this and we've heard from a lot of people in the affordable housing community in particular concerned about this. To me, this 60 is not a period of time to prevent rent from being paid. It's a period of time to give the time for rent to be paid. And I know that's what we're all saying around this table, but I think it's a really important point.

And both from our own rent assistance fund from the states, which we hope will come down the pike, please, and from the counties. And I also want to note, I know I sent an email to colleagues about this, but I reached out to Ramsey County's emergency rent assistance folks because we did hear some testimony from providers of affordable housing who said you can't get Ramsey County assistance until you have an eviction in hand. That is actually not true. You can have a formal notice of non payment rent such as we require in our tenant protections ordinance and with that that is considered proof of imminent eviction. So I want I think that's important for our affordable housing community to know.

I think it's important for our tenants to know that you can go to the county for help. In fact, I have a note on my to do list to make sure that I email the manager of that program as soon as we pass this today so that they stand ready because we want to make sure all hands are on deck to help with this rent assistance. With that, I think the motion on the table is for approval. If there's no further discussion, all in favor say aye. Aye. All opposed.

Seven in favor, none opposed. The ordinance is adopted.

I will take a motion from Ms. Coleman to suspend the rules to consider ordinance.

Ordinance 26 dash 19 adding chapter 44 a to the administrative code to institute training reporting and programming related to the city's relationship with civil immigration laws and enforcement practices under administrative code chapter 44.

All in favor of suspending the rules to do that, please say aye. Aye. All opposed.

Seven in favor and none opposed, the rules are suspended.

And this is the ordinance that Jay just read. We will have a staff report because it's our first reading. Welcome up Mr. Greenfield, our chief policy Officer.

Thank you, Council President, members of the City Council. I just wanted to start by offering a few thank yous to specific council members. The first is council member Coleman for your leadership and clarity, a purpose on getting this draft together. I really appreciate the commitment throughout the process to, you know, work with different directors, different departments to get to a place to put this language together. And I'd also want to issue a special thank you to councilmember Bowie for the public safety committee today.

I didn't get a chance to thank you in person, but I thought that the public safety committee, although a coincidence that it was scheduled for today, really offered two lessons that I think are really important right off the right off the bat. The first is that it shows based on the scheduling of the speakers and the topics that were presented on today, the strength of the city council's committee process, to hear specific subjects and hear about, the impacts of the federal immigration enforcement activity in our city. And then the second is just the need, kind of that really resonated coming out of those presentations was the need for strong organizational support in response to the crisis that was imposed upon us. And so I think that that special acknowledgment should be made from my behalf because it really helped clarify and set the table for this conversation today. It's been about six months since I or it's not six months, six weeks since I've given my last staff report on the last of the three legislative ordinances that were brought forward related to immigration and enforcement.

The words I said there, the, you know, the things going through my head, they're they're not enough. What is needed is the words before you in the ordinance, and that's what we're here today to discuss is the culmination of many weeks of work to get to a place where we're discussing essentially three concepts, training, reporting and information sharing, and, citizen accountability, related to the separation ordinance and civil immigration enforcement in the city. So, just, you know, kind of jumping into the the interest and the purpose behind twenty six nineteen, I think the fundamental, purpose behind this ordinance is to learn about the activities, of the surge, learn from and about federal immigration activity in Saint Paul observed during the surge, ensure that the guidance and resources offered to city employees remain durable and best reflects city values found in the separation ordinance. One thing we heard time and time again in putting this together is the separation ordinance has existed across different mayoral depart mayoral administrations, presidential administrations, and so too should the guidance and implementation of that separation ordinance be just as durable. The sec the third is formalizing best practices and public safety response to immigration enforcement activity, including a multi department coordination approach on scene response and safety.

Establishing policy mechanisms to prepare the city for future immigration enforcement activity. We know both here and across the hall that there are somewhere between four hundred and five hundred ICE agents still located within the city, so I would argue that this actually applies to current immigration enforcement activity that we might find within our city. And then finally, to create formalized communication and information channels related to immigration enforcement activity to improve policy outcomes and community relationships. You know, I think things we items we heard time and time again, questions, concerns, feedback was how do we move forward? What is the information that we're gathering?

And how as elected officials can we relay that information, that we are getting from our city employees, our city officials, our department directors back the people that, with whom you represent. So I'll skip the definitions as they're not really directly related to or super important to the to the crux of the ordinance. But I think it's really important to kind of create a level set and, provide, some clear exemptions as to, what ordinance twenty six nineteen is not. Chapter 44 a, the proposed chapter 44 a, is not intended to restrict, interfere, or limit the civil immigration authority of the federal government. It exists within our own administrative code, so it only applies to the conduct of and performance of duties within our own city and by our own city employees.

It does not restrict or interfere with the execution of court orders or judicial warrants in or the enforcement of criminal law. It does not limit the rights of any person or entity under state or federal law. And the latter column on the right, I think, are very important to emphasize that it does not regulate, restrict, limit, modify, repeal, or change anything about the permitted actions under the separation ordinance. If you review chapter 44 of the administrative code, you'll see that there are some there's a general prohibition on inquiring about immigration status and a general restriction on using law enforcement resources solely for the purpose of enforcing federal immigration laws. This is then they are there are specific exemptions to that general charge, and this is saying we don't touch those.

The fifth bullet point, restricting, limiting, regulating, or modifying the chief of police or fire chiefs or mayor's discretion to set departmental operational priorities or staff. So what this is not is dictating when and where police can and can't go. Instead, that is still left with the chief of police. And finally, creating a private right of action for a violation of this ordinance, which is also found in the separation ordinance. So to begin, I would gonna start with the first of three, you know, thematic, policy goals behind, ordinance twenty six nineteen.

The first of which is general service employee training. So the first section, 44 a zero one, directs that the general service employees will receive annual training and information on the city's implementation, policies, regulations, protocols, guidance, revisions to chapter 44, also known as the separation ordinance. And then the content of the training will include the follow following formalized guidance, which is intended to reflect current guidance that exists within the city attorney's office to city employees. Talks about a variety of different circumstances and examples of where city employees have felt further guidance would be needed or formalized in order to account for enforcement activity in the city or on city property or at a city workplace or in a city vehicle. The second prong of the general service employee training is specialized training for supervisors.

So the supervisors or the city attorney's office will be responsible for providing the training specified for general service employees. Then supervisors will also receive role specific training offered by the city attorney's office and the content of which is specified here. The next piece of the training elements for ordinance twenty six nineteen is a public safety training requirement. So section 44 a or chapter 44 a provides that the Saint Paul Police Department will create a training policy on the requirements of chapter 44 mandatory for all current and future employees. So the idea is to incorporate this into, you know, future classes as they as they come aboard.

Training shall include guidance and best practices for sworn personnel responding to calls for service involving civil immigration enforcement. And finally, training shall include operational guidance and cooperation between police the and Department of Fire during emergency incidents like Selby and Western, where Sylvia civil immigration enforcement activity may be present. The next phase of the, ordinance twenty six nineteen is what I would call the the purporting mechanisms, the mechanisms that allow information to be shared between employees and departments and employees and policymakers. So a goal of 2619 is to establish those formal mechanisms of communication. And the first of which is an employee interaction reporting system.

So the city will implement a policy that establishes an internal reporting mechanism for employees to promptly document any interaction involving civil immigration enforcement activity that occurs on a city property, at a city worksite, on a city lot, or in a city vehicle. And then documentation requirements are specified along with certain exemptions and qualifications for how the data is used. This interaction reporting does not apply to public safety employees, so this would just apply to employees in the general service. The next component of the reporting piece is establishing a public reporting mechanism for potential violations of the separation So this will establish a mechanism by which members of the general public can report alleged violations of the separation ordinance. It must be made available on the city's website in addition to a non Internet reporting system and specifies what individuals shall be allowed to report under the mechanism.

And except where required by law, where there are some specific statutory guidelines for for peace officers, the reporting mechanism shall not condition submission of a report on either the provision of personally identifying information or the disclosure of immigration status. The wrinkle on the information sharing piece that I think I touched on earlier but I wanted to emphasize and as a standalone section in ordinance twenty six nineteen is the sharing of summary data to be reported weekly to the city council and the mayor's office regarding city resources that are expended in relation to civil immigration enforcement by any public safety employee and will include any public information on the call for calls for service. So this weekly cadence is intended to be reflective of the intensity of immigration enforcement activity in the city. So if no known calls are occur, then the report is not required. But I think every council member here or at least most to my knowledge receive the weekly reports from the police.

This just peels out a specific piece related to civil immigration enforcement. So that's a policy that we're formalizing, but recognizing that it will only really serve its value should that activity continue to occur. The other piece of that is in the spirit of Selby and Western, for any public safety incident necessitating a call for service. We're establishing a, you know, essentially a hotline system, a mechanism by which the chief of police or their designee will report certain specified information to the city council president, the council representative where the incident occurred, and the mayor's office as soon as practicable, recognizing that the first call on a scene response probably shouldn't be to the city council, but eventually, you know, the immediate incident review or processing of a scene, elected officials should be notified so that they can serve their purpose of relaying that information back to the people for whom they serve. So the information to be reported includes known information about the incident, the resources or reasons for personnel at the scene, any other identified law enforcement agencies.

So if those council members or the mayor have questions they can you know, get connected with them or any other relevant public safety information useful for constituent services, public distribution, or media inquiry. So reestablishing more formalized lines of control, lines of information to allow for, you know, that representation on behalf of, you know, the office of which you serve. Finally, the third piece of the of ordinance twenty six nineteen is what I would call the transparency piece. So chapter 44 a establishes clear reporting mechanisms to improve transparency, accountability, and ensure residents' awareness of the operational impacts of immigration enforcement in the city. These reporting mechanisms reinforce the city's commitment to the values underlying the separation ordinance, but really I should just pivot to the chart.

These are the reporting timelines because one major question as part of the deliberation of this draft was when would reports come back? Why are they coming back at the time that they are? And what is the purpose behind the reporting that is being requested in this draft? And so I think this timeline provides a very clear both representation of how it should move through time, but also the interests that are upheld throughout each of the report. So the weekly report on public safety resources, if needed, is to communicate to the community, to allow for community trust, better policymaking and resilience should immigration enforcement activity escalate, continue, reemerge, whatever description we want to place on that.

Same would apply to counsel notification or information about a public safety incident if related to civil immigration enforcement. So as soon as practical or within forty eight hours, those two top boxes are designed to be kind of the more immediate information flow. Then as we'll get into a yearly summarized report and report on public safety training outcomes, this is designed to build resilience, accountability, and ensure that best practices are being reflected in the actual operation of how law enforcement conducts their business if civil immigration activity exists within our city. And then the third phase of timelines are the kind of the yearly reports. So we would have a report come back to counsel on And year.

Then we'll we'll with the second of to sequence with that report that's due yearly April of each year. And so the values on the right there are to strengthening existing reporting requirement while sequencing and building the community trust necessary that the separation ordinance is implemented to the city's values. So I'm going to go very briefly over what each report covers because I kind of already described that. The first is a training report on general service training and supervisors on the requirements of Chapter 44 and the separation ordinance. The second is a public safety training outcomes report.

This I do want to provide a little bit more detail because it's not just the reports and recommendations on the training that is required by Chapter 44 a, but it also provides a descriptive element that I think is bolded on the last bullet point there to say that part of the report should include an analysis about any observed operational challenges to public safety from calls to service during civil immigration enforcement. And because this report is put into the public about what the policy is, this also allows that feedback and democratic process to say if there are observed challenges, the people should hear about them from the police's perspective, allow for that ground up information. And if there is then further direction that needs to be given or if there is input that needs to be relayed, that is the way that we do so. It's not attempting to be prescriptive about the conduct of a certain department, but rather learn from their experiences and adjust accordingly. And the report requirement for public safety training expires on 12/31/2029.

That's the only report that is sunsetted in the draft twenty six-nineteen. The next reports that will come back to counsel. Again, like I said, the sequence report with the existing report required under the separation ordinance regarding implementation of the public reports of the separation ordinance. So the text below here is what's currently in our administrative code. Then we have a public safety summary report, which I haven't described yet, so I'll provide a very brief overview.

This is just a report by July 1 of each year from St. Paul Police in cooperation with St. Paul Fire where applicable on an annual report related to calls for civil immigration enforcement. It shall summarize available public data and provide any related costs to the city and the calls for service and then specify certain parameters for the summary report, including rationale for the resources, known information, whether police reports are filed, whether medical assistance was required, and whether any arrests were made. Finally, a portion of that section, section 44 a o seven that establishes the summary report, also has a descriptive report that requires the police to provide their protocol for how calls for service are identified, routed, and prioritized, for calls for service related to civil immigration enforcement.

And, the police may request assistance from the actual dispatch entity in the city, the Ramsey County Emergency Communications, in preparing the report. So that serves as the final organizational overview of ordinance twenty six nineteen, but I just wanted to give some final thoughts of what I think this ordinance is intending to do. The first is ensuring consistent understanding and implementation of separation ordinance. That's something that the chief author and myself have heard time and time again as a council priority. The second is strengthening institutional knowledge so that compliance remains durable across administrations and staffing changes.

This point was really emphasized to me yesterday in a conversation I had with Interim Chief Duran, talking about the opportunity costs that came from Operation Metro Surge, where so much of our time, effort, energy and resources were devoted to responding to citizen concerns, providing scene response that the cost to everything else was so great. And that's something that really can't be measured. And so the purpose behind durability and ordinance is opportunity cost to ensure that expectations are universalized so that should this enforcement activity ever re escalate, there's already the knowledge, there's already the protocols, there's already the procedures in place based on learned experience and that should hopefully lessen the indirect cost to city operations if that resiliency is built in throughout all of our employees and supervisors and public safety officials. Finally, this ordinance acknowledges the impact on city operations but also on city employees to its residents. Again, speaking back to the Public Safety Committee, I think the message from the Chief of Staff of Ramsey County was really resonant here, talking about the supports that the staff were provided in Ramsey County and how training and resources and organization and durable support really makes a difference for the provision of services, for the residents to trust that the city will continue to move smoothly operate smoothly and in times of great stress and great crisis, that reassurance essential.

And finally, it provides clear, unambiguous legal exceptions and clarifications to address concerns about regulating or limiting federal immigration activity or authority, creating additional employee liability or changing and limiting the chief of police discretion or operational control. And this, I think, is essential to again emphasize that this process for putting this draft together was deliberative. Many steps went along the way, and we heard the feedback and incorporated the feedback as much as possible. And that last bullet point is proof positive of that. So with that, stand open for any questions on any specifics or general or anything else.

Thank you very much for the comprehensive summary. Questions from Mr. Greenfield? Doesn't look like it. Thank you so much. Any comments from oh, Ms. Buies.

I guess I do have a question. Just out of curiosity, well, one, I was going to say this was very comprehensive. I appreciate the fast track legislative framework that we had in terms of approaching this and making sure we get a chance to hear it. And I also agree like it worked out perfectly with today's public safety meeting where we heard from county attorney John Choi and AG's office and other Ramsey County particularly around the need for more training and reporting and crystal clear directives from the selected bodies. I see this as very timely.

I do have a question particularly around, because and I can't remember, it might have it might be 44.05 where it's just the reports of or actually, no, not that one. It was the training. It's the protocols of the training for employees Mhmm. Forty four zero two, it looks like. I'm just out of curiosity, I I understand, you know, that the council has, you know, or is making this informed decision and has been involved with not only the mayor's office and the CAO, but I'm just curious, particularly since this is requiring employees to go through this training if the HR director was informed.

Because I I really see this as like a more of a training and like employment onboarding to where some most of our staff already received this training, but thinking about future, you know, future employment and when an employee is is being hired on into our city. So how was the HR department looking at creating a standardized training? Because I know different departments and different employees have different interactions with the public, right? So, I'm just curious if there's been any deliberation from the HR department about this required training?

Council Member Mubui, I think that's a great question. We did circulate the draft to different department directors and I believe HR was included in that. What I would say also is that the separation ordinance itself requires that information be given to employees as part of their orientation and as part of their regular ongoing training. So I'm not sure exactly how that's operationalized necessarily, but the spirit of these additional parameters based on Operation Metro Surge are kind of in that spirit where we wanted to have the cadence of initial, here's what the city code says, here's what expectations are. But then add in that additional layer of real challenges that our city employees faced during that crisis.

I just have a follow-up comment. I just want to say I really appreciate Vice Chair Coleman's leadership on this and one of the things that I appreciate is that you know what's important to say on the record that we're not expanding or creating a new method or a new requirement for employees. We're just codifying and making sure that this is in our ordinance. I do think that is really important just as we are you know passing this ordinance to ensure and strengthen public trust right and one of the things that we've been hearing over the months is the public wanting to have more transparency around like what are we doing? And although this particularly isn't actually changing any of our requirements, we're just like putting a standard and making it clear in our ordinance of the best practices that we have.

So I really appreciate the work that went into this and the thoughtfulness particularly around, know, how our staff is leading on this training, our required training and making sure it's codified. So for future immigration enforcement or any issues or crisis that we have it rooted in our ordinance. Thank you.

Thanks Ms. Lee. And just a reminder to the public watching, this is first reading, basically the purpose of today is to get a summary and an explanation of what's being proposed. Next week we will have a public hearing, so we really welcome folks to submit testimony to come next week to let us know what you think about this. And again, we would take a final vote either week after that or if there are amendments potentially later on.

So this is just the beginning of

the conversation, actually the midpoint of a long process to date, but the beginning of the public conversation. So any other comments before we let this lay over to next week? I see Ms. Coleman and then Vice President.

Thank you, Consul President. I want to say a huge, huge thank you to our Chief Policy Officer, Tim Greenfield, both for the presentation and for all of the work that as the Consul President said has gone up to this point. This has been a tremendous lift and both Mr. Greenfield and Jenny Nelson have done just an incredible amount of work on this. We were looking at a timeline last night of the work that had gone into this effort.

And it was a four page timeline, which I think starts to capture how many different stages and conversations and points of feedback and conversations with everybody at this table have gone into this process. So really can't thank you enough to everybody who has worked on getting us to this first point of introduction recognizing that we still have quite a long ways to go until we take a final vote on this. I also just want to say thank you as Mr. Greenfield referenced to the money departments who have been involved in providing feedback and in having conversations. It's been really something that has taken up a lot of time and consideration and really thoughtful care and intention from people across the city.

Not least of all the residents who have shown up to talk to us about how they are experiencing our separation ordinance, how they are experiencing our city's response in a moment of crisis, and who have really been foundational to the introduction of this item. For over twenty years, as we all know, Saint Paul's had a strong separation ordinance in place. It was one of the very first enacted in the country, and it has long served as a clear statement of our city's inclusivity, our embrace of our immigrant community, and our deep commitment to public safety. But as we also all know, our separation ordinance has been tested over the last five months like never before. The horrors of the federal government's occupation of our city have been well documented in this room through public hearings and community conversations.

Suffice it to say here that January 2026 could not possibly have been imagined when the separation ordinance was passed by this body in April 2004. As we've been living under and responding to the occupation, we've also been learning. We've learned about where our separation ordinance and our city practices are strong and where we have opportunities to make needed improvements. To that end, this draft ordinance, we believe responds to key concerns that we've heard from constituents in months of public testimonies and conversations. First, it increases council oversight and most importantly, public oversight of our city's conduct and resource expenditure when federal immigration enforcement officers are in town.

Time and time again, we have heard that the public wants to know how city or employees are being trained on our separation ordinance, how it's impacting their actions, and what is taking place when ICE is operating in our city. By codifying a series of reporting requirements, we are creating the tools that the public needs to determine if the city is carrying out the commitments articulated in our separation ordinance. Two, it codifies training requirements for city employees, both general service employees and public safety employees. Ensure that regardless of who is in city hall, every single person who works for the city will understand how our separation ordinance works, what their rights and obligations are when ICE or other federal immigration enforcement officers are present, and how other city ordinances including our ban on ICE staging on public property, ID requirement, our mask bans come into play. In addition, it requires additional training on department specific policies for the Saint Paul Police Department ensuring that every single sworn officer in our city has received comprehensive training on best practices for responding to calls for service involving immigration enforcement.

And three, it develops reporting mechanisms for the public to immediately notify the city of any suspected violations of the separation ordinance. Providing a pathway for accountability if the city fails to live up to its obligations under the separation ordinance. Today's introduction follows months of work as I mentioned, conversations with residents and community partners, months of meetings with the city attorney's office and the mayor's office, and ongoing engagement with the departments who will be impacted if this ordinance is enacted. As part of this ongoing work, have been diligent about ensuring that this proposed ordinance is an appropriate exercise of the council's authority. In a strong mayor system, it's essential that each branch of government understand its role.

As a body, as mister Greenfield mentioned, we do not direct the day to day operations of city departments and this ordinance does not attempt to do that. However, we set essential boundaries for the conduct of our departments based on the values and resources of the city. A key example of that, of course, being the separation ordinance itself. And then, a body, we have an obligation to ensure that that ordinance that our ordinances are enacted. That's our training and reporting come in.

Our council has made regular use for authority to enact training and reporting requirements including just earlier this month when we required additional reporting by the police department on the festivals and event security credit under resolution twenty six thirty seven. It's also something that we've seen other councils and strong mayor systems that we have seen councils and other strong mayor systems do. Including quite recently as we've heard in Minneapolis where similar training and reporting requirements related to their separation ordinance were recently passed thirteen zero and signed by the mayor. No single piece of legislation can possibly capture everything we've learned from operation Metro Surge and its impact on our community. However, it is essential that we take steps to codify what we have learned from months of occupation because we know now with certainty that this could happen again.

If and when it does, every resident of this city deserves our thoughtful and collaborative action to make sure that Saint Paul is better prepared. I believe that chapter 44 a is an important step to ensuring that we are and I look forward to the public conversation that will take place on this in the weeks to come.

Thank you, Coleman. Vice President Yang.

Thank you, Council President. I want to thank Tim for his presentation earlier, very thorough and it's very important for the public to get that same information as well. I want to recognize you, Councilmember Coleman, and also your legislative aide Jenny for the immense amount of work that you did to get us to this point where we have this very polished language in front of us and really doing the heavy duty of having tough but important conversations with staff, with representatives from the mayor's office, and I'm sure many departments and colleagues as well to get this done really on behalf of the council knowing that this is a priority that the council cares deeply about. So thank you both for your very hard work on that. I am very grateful and I'm just excited about this ordinance because I mean there's many reasons why I'm sure many of you feel the same way as me where we wish that an ordinance like this was already in place at the beginning of Operation Metro Surge.

And frankly even before that because people in our communities were getting detained prior to that. Just in a very different way compared to what we have seen. To me the ordinance here is about transparency. It's also about setting up our staff for success because whenever there are gray areas that's where mistakes can be made and people get hurt. And the consequence of not having an ordinance like this, well we have seen that and the operations at Rose Avenue is a prime example of that.

Also ICE raids that took place, I mean even the very first one over in Ward 5 and many of you have experienced even more rates in your wards as well. So it's clear that an ordinance like this is needed and it is important. Also, it's how I think a lot about what we as council members receive every single day when we open up our emails at the beginning of the day, we get an email from the St. Paul Police Department and it really details high profile cases that have happened the day before. And to me it's really similar to what we are wanting in terms of the types of interactions that boy encounters with ICE that's happening in our city here that we want reporting on.

Well, there's a parallel there when I think about that. And Tim mentioned that briefly in his presentation. And so to me, it's this what we are asking for. It's not work that cannot be done. It's work that is actually really important for us to have so that as elected officials, we can be informed about the state of our city especially during a time of crisis.

And to me this also sets it's a model for what we should be what we should be asking for for future crises. And I know none of us want a future crisis at all to happen in our city. But we need to start thinking in the future and I'm really grateful to be a part of a body here that cares deeply about making sure that we are working hard and pounding to get the information we need to be able to make informed decisions and most importantly look out for the residents that we represent and serve every single day.

Thank you, Vice President. Any further discussion? I know we'll also have a lot of comments probably in public hearing and final adoption phases. Okay. Seeing none, this ordinance will lay over until next week for public hearing.

Item 19, Ordinance 20 six-twenty, deleting Chapter 54 of the legislative code pertaining to rental application fees.

And I believe we have a staff report from Lynn Perknoff on this one. Am I right? Since this is a first reading, we'll get a quick staff report. Welcome up.

Good afternoon, President Nacre, Vice President Yang, and council members. My name is Lynn Furkenhof, you got that right, and I represent the Department of Safety and Inspections here this afternoon. I currently administer the rent stabilization ordinance, but I will be adding tenant protections to that later on when it becomes effective. So I'm here today just to introduce the first reading of the updated of deleting of Chapter 54, excuse me, have another item right after this. Deleting Chapter 54 of the legislative code pertaining to rental application fees.

And I understand from David Holben, the deputy director, that the deletion of this chapter is basically a housekeeping item that's long overdue. We have a fire certificate of occupancy program that absorbed the scope of Chapter 54 about fifteen to twenty years ago. So again, this is overdue. I don't have a lot of other information. I'm just representing him here today because he cannot make it. But that's basically the nuts and bolts of it. So, if there are questions, I'm open to them. And if I can't answer them, I'll bring them back for Deputy Director Hoban.

Thank you so much. So just to make sure folks listening at home who see this and get alarmed that we're deleting a chapter about rental application fees, as you mentioned, this is housekeeping, cleaning up because we now have a tenant protections ordinance that is robust that covers all of this, and so this particular chapter is covered. Yes. We don't want have contradictory chapters.

Correct. Great.

Questions for Ms. Bergmann? Doesn't look like it. Thank you so much. This ordinance will lay over till next week for public hearing.

The ordinance is laid over to 04/01/2026 for second reading public hearing. Item 20 is Ordinance 20 six-twenty one updating Chapter 13 of the Administrative Code pertaining to the Department of Safety and Inspections.

Welcome back. Thank you.

Again, I'm here for the first reading of a change which will update Chapter 13 of the Administrative Code pertaining to the Department of Safety and Inspections. This also is a technical change which will authorize the Department of Safety and Inspections to manage and enforce the recently passed tenant protection laws.

Great. Pretty straightforward. Also, questions for Ms. Perkin, not from anyone? Not seeing any. Thanks so much. Perfect. Thank you. Appreciate it. Thanks for your patience. Sure. No worries. To this point.

The ordinance is laid over to 04/01/2026 for second reading public hearing.

And this just before we read the next item, this brings us to the public hearing section of our agenda. So for the next few items, if you're here for a public hearing, when your item is read, we ask that you come to the front, stand in between the two microphones. You don't need to adjust them. They'll pick you up just fine. You'll have two minutes to testify. We ask that you start with your name and where you're coming from. And when you're done, please sign in on either of the two sign in sheets.

Item 21 is resolution public hearing 20 six-sixty '8, amending capital fund budgets to provide additional funding for the Hayden Heights Library renovation project.

This is a public hearing. Is there anyone here to speak on this item? Seeing none, I'll take a motion from Ms. Jost to close the public hearing and approve. All in favor say aye. Aye.

All opposed? Seven in favor, none opposed. The resolution is adopted. Item 22 is resolution public hearing 26 dash 70 approving the applications of white squirrel bar for two sound level variances in order to present amplified sound for a Saturday patio music series and a Sunday patio music series every Saturday and Sunday, May 30, 09/27/2026 at 974 7th Street West, the White Squirrel Bar patio.

It's always a nice time of year when you start seeing the word patio appear on the agenda. This is a public hearing. Is there anyone here to speak on this item? None. We'll take a motion from Ms.

Buoy to

close the public hearing and approve. All in favor say aye. Aye. All opposed.

Seven in favor and none opposed. The resolution is adopted. Item 23 is the resolution public hearing twenty six-seventy two to amend the Parks and Recreation 2026 grant aid fund for a $500,000 donation from Como Friends, a nonprofit to promote, support, preserve, and enhance the Como Zoo and Marjorie McNeely Conservatory.

This is a public hearing. Is there anyone here to speak on this item? Seeing none, I'll take a motion from Ms. Kim to close the public hearing and approve. All in favor say

aye. Aye.

All opposed.

Seven in favor and none opposed. The resolution is adopted. Item 24 is Resolution Public Hearing twenty six-seventy three authorizing the Office of Financial Empowerment to accept a grant in the amount of $490,000 from the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation and to amend the 2026 Office of Financial Empowerment budget in the amount of $390,000

This is a public hearing. Is there anyone here to speak on this item? Seeing none, I'll take a motion from Ms. Johnson to close the public hearing and approve. All in favor say aye.

Aye. All opposed?

Seven in favor and none opposed. The resolution is adopted. Legislative hearing consent agenda items 25 through 31 are before you for your consideration.

Welcome Ms. Mormon. Council President, I'm not

aware of anyone here to testify on a hearing item.

We will then hold a hearing on all of the legislative hearing items. If you are here for item 25 to 31, now is your public hearing. Please come on up. Seeing none, I'll take a motion from Vice President Yang to approve the balance of the legislative hearing consent agenda with all of the legislative hearing officers' amendations and recommendations. All in favor say aye. Aye. All opposed.

Seven in favor and none opposed, the legislative hearing consent agenda is adopted as amended.

That brings us to the end of our agenda, which means it's one of the best parts of our agenda, which is news from awards. Is there any news around the table? Vice President.

Thank you, Council President. The Eastside Freedom Library is hosting a community conversation on the impact of immigration raids on housing. It's an honest conversation on the devastating impact immigration rates have had on housing, renters facing eviction, and neighbors living in fear. This is on Monday, March 30 at 04:30 p. M. Again at the Eastside Freedom Library. Thank you, Vice President. Miss Kim.

So next Thursday, April 2 because we Yeah, next Thursday, April 2, McDonough has an egg hunt. There'll be carnival games, face painting, tons of activities. It is free and welcome to all ages.

So, please come to McDonough Rec Center 1544 Timberlake Road. Come compete in a little egg hunting. Very exciting. Miss Bui, two items, good news and award one. So at 04:00 there will be a pop up engagement event at Ryan Park.

It's a small park, small but mighty park in Frogtown. We're gonna have some of our parks leaders actually engaging the neighborhood about a redevelopment or or yeah. Redevelopment for that park. Also, the second good news, tomorrow as well, from 05:30 to 06:30, Mitcham and E. Mays Elementary School is going to rename their lobby to Toni Stone Lobby, where Toni Stone, who's actually recognized at Dunning Rec, who's a first African American woman baseball player from Rondo.

Her house actually was where now Benjamin Mays is. So they're gonna be renaming the lobby after her, also doing the ribbon cutting for the new Afrocentric curriculum that's going to take place at that elementary school.

Very exciting. Thank you, Ms. Bui. Ms. Coleman, is the CBS still down?

Great news from Ward 4. The CBS is still down. How weeks many can I do?

Expect it to be I mean, I don't think there's nothing. Alright. Any other news from the wards? Seeing none, thanks for a great meeting. As always, we are adjourned.

It's always the best news

from Ward 4. It's, like,

so it's, like, done.