Board of Aldermen - Regular Meeting

I call tonight's meeting to order.

If you would, please stand and join me in the pledge.

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.

Pam, would you do a roll call, please?

Mayor Kine.

Here.

Alderwoman Dobbs. Here. Alderman Fahey. Here. Alderman Donovan. Here. Alderman Huey.

Here.

Alderman Eidman.

Here.

Alderman Steiger.

Here.

Alderman Ross.

Here.

Alderman Prince. Mayor, we have a quorum.

Thank you very much. At this time, I will look for approval of tonight's agenda. Motion to approve. Second. Okay, I have a motion and a second. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Thank you very much. All right, it's my pleasure to start our evening off tonight. We have Aaron Smith and Ronnie Rayfield here to discuss this weekend's upcoming US 250th celebration.

Hi, everyone. Obviously, I came dressed up to talk about the U.S. 250. I want to start by thanking the National Park Service, the State Historic Site, and French Colonial America for all the work they've done to create some activities for this weekend in conjunction with what Mr. Rayfield has put together down at Jertifette Park. He has leveraged he and his wife's fame in that sort of reenactment circle to really bring in some of the best impersonators, vendors, and regiments from all across the country and world this weekend. It's going to be quite the show, and I'm really excited to hear Ronnie tell you a little bit about it.

thank you guys for having me here and first i'd like to apologize for not coming here sooner uh i'm from bloomsdale north end of the county we don't have such nice preceding methods or events um so um i'd like to apologize for not coming here to you sooner uh we like aaron said we have a massive event that we have put together there's people from all over the country uh even as far as puerto rico there's a handful of a small spanish unit coming here The 250th is upon us, and it lasts for, you know, all the way to about 2031. But 1776 is the most important, so this is 2026. So we really wanted to hit this with a big bang. And it's also the 246th anniversary of the Battle of Fort San Carlos, which 60 men from our county here in St. Genevieve fought in St. Louis in 1780. So it's a two-in-one event, 250th, and a commemoration for that. We have the Sons of the American Revolution, the SAR, coming down. They're going to mark the graves in the cemetery and bring recognition to those who are buried there for this. And like Aaron said, we have some of the best impersonators. We have General Washington, the gentleman who actually does it at George Washington's house in Mount Vernon, coming here with his lovely wife who does Martha. We've got Thomas Jefferson from Virginia. We've got Benjamin Franklin coming. We've got the governor of these Louisiana Spanish territories in the Red War period, Don Bernardo Galvez. He is coming here. And we have a local gentleman who plays our Lafayette. So those are some top-notch people that we have for people to interact with. Ask George Washington about his wooden teeth or his obsession with chocolate or maybe Thomas Jefferson's macaroni press obsession or his obsession with ice cream or Ben Franklin's lightning rods. I wouldn't ask about his flexible catheters, but he did also invent the odometer, which is actually pretty cool. But there's lots of great things. We have a six-foot long Declaration of Independence that Thomas Jefferson is going to read off and invite not just children, but all the visitors. There's six foot for you to sign, so hopefully we can get 3,000 4,000 visitors to sign it. I'm estimating up to about 5,000 people coming for this event. Given past events that I've done that are a much smaller scale on a $100 budget, where you had about 200 at its peak, pioneer days two years ago, So this has got some money behind it. Thanks to Jeff writing a nice grant and Aaron's hard work. And the Missouri State part's helping us and the national part's helping us. And like he said, we use the tools that we have. Our YouTube, I'm not boasting, I'm just saying. We have about 1.3 million subscribers and we've used that to help market and push this and push the town. Everybody can benefit from this, whether it's a gas station or a restaurant. I know there's no rooms left in St. Genevieve. Ben Franklin got the last room in St. Genevieve. So it's going to be amazing. We're going to have a dance. We're going to have food for people to try, historical food that you can't really find anywhere else. Special artisans coming from all over the country, as far as California or up in Massachusetts, Louisiana, and all the way up in Minnesota. So really all four, north, south, east, and west. It's amazing that we've been able to put this together. We were at the Missouri State House two weeks ago. We met with all the representatives. They're very excited. There's at least a handful that are serious about coming, which is great. And Brian, our local representative here, will be here as well. And Saturday night, we're having a grand ball. And we would like to shoot off a few fireworks. They're not commercial grade or anything like that. It's for what civilians can buy. It would last maybe two minutes. We just want to have a grand illumination at the end of it. at a grand celebration that we're trying to throw. And if you guys have any questions about it, I'd be happy to answer them the best I can.

I saw they're already setting up down there just today. They've already set up some of their encampment and merchant tents and things like that?

Yes, sir. They started setting up today, and they'll be setting up all through tomorrow, and it's going to be crazy tomorrow. Everybody's showing up on the last day of the setup. But it should be jam-packed down there. I've told them I want it to look like a slum. So it looks like a little village we've got going on down there. So we've got Spanish representation. We've got local militia representation. We've got some Virginians coming, some sort of American representation. We've also got some Native Americans coming and some British. So we've got all the powerhouse players for the Revolutionary War. And we also have a horse wagon that is going to circle or make a figure eight, per se, free for people to jump on to go to the next little station or the next historic house. And that's only on Saturday, the horses. I guess that pretty much covers it all. I apologize. It's been a long day driving states and everything out in the heat. So if you have any questions, I'll be over there, I guess. Thank you, Ronnie.

Thank you for all your work. Thank you. Appreciate it. All right. Next up tonight, we move along to our city administrator's report.

You have an updated report at your seat. I just want to cover a few things. Sent an updated budget calendar on May 16th that includes the June 11th work session we discussed a couple weeks ago. There's an update there on the McBride subdivision. They are still working on an agreement with MLC for the surface rights and we got our comments back on the infrastructure plans earlier this week and sent those to McBride and their engineers today. So things are moving along there. Under number four, we established three committees about a month ago. The third and final committee met a couple days ago and recommended that was the solid waste services committee that we bring their recommendation to a work session and discuss it and I will craft a short survey and share that out citywide within the next month. So that will be in a work session. Probably not the next one but either late June or early July. Last but not least, I forwarded y'all an email yesterday from Forward Slash, so they'll begin their next quarterly awareness training campaign on June 1st, and everyone with a city email gets that campaign, so you will receive that next month. That's all I have.

Any questions for David regarding his report?

Okay. Thank you very much.

I'll move along to some staff reports tonight. First up, we have Erica Bogenpole from Alliance Water.

Good evening. Mr. Corey is on a cruise right now, so you can meet tonight. Be sure to give him a really hard time when he returns.

You don't want him to be too relaxed. You guys treat saltwater too?

Nope, not yet. We're safe in the Midwest from having to deal with that. So I'm going to do my best to answer any questions you have about his report. But just going through it, some things to call your attention to. And Bob, I wouldn't be surprised if you're going to ask this question about water loss. It is higher than we'd like to see. And that's not necessarily a concern on any given month for it to go above that 10%. But when your annual starts getting to that 10%, that's when it becomes an issue. But Senate 12 for one month is not a concern. On the water treatment side, there's a reference to a Parkwood Drive water line. We did some additional potholing there and found that is actually looped in, so that's good news. We still need to find a valve, but we are not going to have to tie those lines together. That loop already exists. Let's see. I know the jokers has been keeping us busy out on the Hay Street with that water line project. We met with Midwest infrastructure to get pricing on manhole rehab. So there'll be more to come on that what those prices are and that that's looking to be several months out still but that's that's desperately needed work. And the other thing I wanted to mention within parks is if anyone hasn't been to Valley Springs lately, that trail is about 75% complete. It's looking good and we're excited to get that wrapped up. That's been a long time coming.

Any questions for Erica regarding the report for alliance?

Your production here says 20,970,000 gallons. Did a little math at the 12.29%. That's 2.5 million gallons. You're saying 10% is acceptable?

10% is the goal. You want your water loss to be 10% or less.

Have you seen an increase in that recently?

Off the top of my head, I do not remember what it was last month, but I feel like the average that we see is more in the 8% range.

Don't know where it's going, huh?

No. Again, that number doesn't jump out at me as concerning until that starts to become the trend. But on average, we're seeing more about the 8% range.

But you're looking for it?

Not necessarily. No, again, that doesn't have me concerned. I haven't seen a trend that... would trigger any additional looking for water loss, no?

Just thinking about all the cost involved, you know, and 12%, you know, loss and stuff, that's got to be a pretty big amount of money, though, that's being lost, chemicals, labor, all of that. So just a little concerning.

If we start to see more of that on a more frequent basis, there's definitely some resources we would want to throw at that to figure out where that water's going. Are we losing it in our meters? Do we have breaks throughout the system? Surely we don't have water theft happening. That would be unlikely, but yeah, that's definitely something to keep an eye on.

When you flush manholes or hydrants and stuff like that, Is that water considered in that percentage of lost water? It should be, yes. But it's not measured?

If we know about it, we are able to include it in our calculations, yes.

Erica. Yes. I noticed along Emerald, even 61 and going out, there's a lot of leaves and everything hard enough to drainage for stormwater. Okay. We need to take a look at that.

On 61?

No, it's on M Road. It's on M Road. Okay. Okay.

We'll check it out. Any other questions or comments for Alliance?

All right. Thank you, Erica.

Next up tonight, we have Police Chief Daniel Hallett.

Good evening. Everybody has a copy of my report. I don't really have a whole lot. A couple things I want to show is May 30th from 10 to 2, Colt Bradford's going to be doing a car seat inspection, safety inspection. At that time, he'll be handing out car seats to whoever needs them. We got, I think, 14 of them donated on a grant. Everybody got to meet K9 Kino last meeting.

Where are you having that event at?

It's going to be here.

City Hall? In the back? Okay.

Everybody got to meet Kino last meeting. Last month he was only on the road for one day. That's just when he came back on the schedule. He did get his first drug arrest that day. We got a traffic data collector that came in. That's going to be posted around town. Some of the main streets we're having issues with as far as car speeding through and everything like that. So it's going to tell us the times, average speeds, number of cars and everything like that so we can really vamp up enforcement in that area. Through grant funds we bought a simulator for the PD. So we'll be doing some indoor shooting scenarios and stuff like that. It's just better their training. I kind of want to give a little Praise to my officers because they're busy. They stay very busy. You can see all the traffic stops they do, the drug arrests they do. Last night they got another good drug arrest. Got over an ounce of meth and some fentanyl here in town. I know they don't get a lot of praise, but I'm here to give them some praise. That's all I've got.

You mentioned this device that you're going to be putting out that you've got. So what exactly is that?

It's a data collector. So we hang it up and we'll leave it there for, say, a week. And it'll tell us how many cars are coming to that street, how fast they're going. So we'll get average speeds, the times a day that it's all going through. Well, you know, we get a lot of complaints in different neighborhoods of cars speeding through the neighborhoods. So right now we got one. We're actually getting ready to put it up tomorrow. We're going to do a test run with it, get all the bugs worked out. But we'll be able to move it around. So, you know, if you have a concern in a neighborhood, we can move it, put it over there, let it run for a week, see what's going on. If it's a big problem, then obviously we're going to be out there enforcing. But we can get that data, and I can show it to you, you know, hey, no, we don't have that many speeders. This is the average speed. This is the time, how many cars are going through there. So then you'll know what's going on.

But does it actually identify that particular speeder? No.

It just tells you how many? Yeah, it just lets you know. I mean, you can get on there and do some live feed, but you go through an app and everything, and it starts costing money to do all that. But if it does good, then we plan on probably getting another one. Then we have two to run around and put all around town so we know where our problem areas are.

Yeah. I'll be talking to you the first day of school.

Oh, yeah. Well, we've already got plans for that. Right. Good.

Thank you.

These are similar to what we have to borrow from RPC. Right. But Chief, through a grant, was able to purchase one for ourselves. Good deal.

At a meeting where we, the board of all of them, approved the contract with the federal government in place, I thought the discussion was that you were going to report on the amount of activity.

I did. If you look under call of service and bold letters on the very bottom, it says 287G, nothing to report. I'm sorry, where is it? Very front page, calls of service at the very bottom. I put it in bold letters so anybody can see it.

287G, I see.

Any other questions for Chief Howell? All right. Thank you, Chief. At this time, we will open up the floor to public comment. Just a reminder to please state your name for the minutes, and please try to keep your comments to five minutes or less.

Hi, I'm Darwin Muzzy, resident of St. Genevieve, and just wanted to relate a little story about my friend. I gave him a call today. He moved down from Minneapolis to St. Louis. And he's an 85-plus Korean War veteran. But one of the first things he said to me was he saw St. Genevieve on the news and had to do with our ICE detention center. And his voice wasn't very complimentary. He seemed kind of disappointed. And I just wanted to relay that. Word's getting out. My friend just recently moved down and he's aware of what's going on down here. Thank you.

Hi, my name is Mike Stoll, resident of this county, and I want to particularly address the liberals, Democrats who have been attending these meetings. And I just hate seeing how misguided you have been. Your leader, your ex-leader, I should say, President Biden, will go down in history as probably the worst president ever. You can complain how many child rapists, murderers, thieves that we have in our St. County jail, but if Biden wouldn't have let the 30 million people into his country illegally, we wouldn't have to be in deal with in the first place. I'm glad Sheriff Stolzer has done, he's done a wonderful job incarcerating both legal and illegal criminals. In fact, I recently found out that we're doing such a great job that criminals request coming to St. Jim as they treat them much better here than they would while they're awaiting their deportation orders. One of the one reasons these liberals are showing up is right here in front of me, is to get on this camera and to get in the paper. And frankly, I'm getting sick and tired of it. These are plans you can move to a much place that's in line with your beliefs, like East, North, or even South St. Louis, and it might even be questionable if they want you. Our community has spent for the last 30 years been going conservative. Read the article that Eric Bennett published on Facebook on what's really happening in St. John. The Democrat Party, and I used to be a Democrat, no longer, has no policy nor platform except to promote socialism, communism, and our great nation. They're focused on promoting their left, liberal ideas, and actions on Americans, and especially in this town right here. As I see it, I'm sure the majority of Americans agree with me that Democrats are soft on crime, love these illegals, and dangerous immigrants who are in our country right here illegally. They hate the president, and they hate ICE. A small group of Democrats in our own town has taken on the calling to put our town and police, especially the county jail, on working with ICE which they despise and want to break our contract with ICE. They have no clue what they're doing in our community. They do not listen to reason nor do they want to discuss anything intelligently. Excuse me, I lost my place. Okay. If you have read Eric Bennett's article on Facebook on what's really going on in St. Genevieve. Because the truth is there. Also, read the comments. I hope the Democrats just grow up, change their liberal, hateful path, and accept our elected president, President Trump. Support our police, who is doing an outstanding job of protecting our community from these illegal criminals and providing the jail that we can be proud of. Thank you.

Good evening. My name is Jeff Giuliorano. I'm the executive director of French Colonial America. And one of the things that... There's a lot of history things going on right now besides the 250th, which we're involved with. It is also that we recently opened the Francois Veillet Fille, or Francois Veillet II's house. Some of you may remember it as the Sex Hours old house on Gaboury. Underneath that little Victorian house, there's a... Yeah, 1790s vertical timber house. It was part of the Commandant's house at the time. And we did ribbon cutting this last weekend during the 250th. It's going to open to the public. Part of what makes things work for us here is our partnerships and the collaboration. And one of our most important partners is City of St. Genevieve. It's you folks and the different departments and all of the people who make the city work. And we had invited Mayor Keim to come and say some words, I think appropriately so, as you say, vital partner with the city. And the mayor had a previous commitment, unfortunately couldn't make it. I wish you had, I think you would have had fun. But we did get the city administrator, David Bova, was kind enough to come. He and Mrs. Bova attended and went through the house, and David gave a really, really excellent speech as part of the ribbon-cutting ceremony. Very thoughtful, very well informed, and I just wanted to come here and say thank you.

Thank you for allowing a substitute.

Well, next time.

You got it, man. Thank you, Jeff.

Thank you. My comments are not just to this board, but it's also to the people that have come here.

Ma'am, if you could stand by the podium and give your name first. I'm so sorry.

My name is Terri Sushian.

And if you can direct your comments to the board, it's public comments to the board.

Okay. My name is Terri Sushian, and I'm running as, put my hat down. in the ring for prosecuting attorney and i appreciate everyone the people behind me and the people in front of me who are giving me five minutes to speak to you i know you're all real busy and i want you to know that i'm a local attorney i've been here 13 years i've served I went back to school and I got an additional certification above my Juris Doctorate as Guardian Ad Litem. And I believe that Judge Inman has appointed me to most, if not almost all, cases involving abuse and neglect of kids. And I have seen some things that I think need to be changed. I think some of these molesters need to be prosecuted. They're tough cases. But I've done so much of this. I've done thousands of these things. And I'd like a chance to be able to be prosecuting an attorney so I can work on it. And if anybody has any phone calls, they want to call me, my number is 314-709-7915. It's on all my signs that are outside up and down the streets. My phone number, I put it real big so people can call me and they can always call me. I've never been a politician before. It's the first time stepping out of being working with criminals or with kids, which is a big thing. But I went into kids because I couldn't stand what I was seeing. I did that 13 years ago. I have served on, I think, every honor protection, child protection case in this county for about 13 years free. I volunteered on all those because they're so important. The county doesn't pay me. Parents have to, and they don't have the money, so I just did it free. That's just something I've been doing. I'm not asking nor accepting any campaign contributions. I'm paying my own way on this. I intend to encompass everyone, Republicans, Democrats, Independents, the older people, the younger people, the kids, and represent everybody without any bias toward anybody. So I'm paying my own way. I'm paying my own expenses. And although people have Many people have offered campaign contributions. Like I said, I'm refusing all, but thank you for the people who have offered them. And if anybody wants to give me a call, they can call me any time, day or night, and express their concerns. We can talk about it. So thank you very much.

Hi, everyone. My name's Heidi Walker. Thank you, again, everyone, for all your hard work. I really appreciate it. And I really appreciate you letting us come here and exercise our First Amendment rights and just... Let us tell you how we view all these things that are going on. And I'm not here as a Democrat. I am only here, and I only come here because I've heard the stories from the people at the detention center, the ICE detainees. how they're suffering and how their families are suffering. That is my only agenda, okay, is to speak out for them. I'm not on a political, I really am not. And so I just wanted to just offer the... idea out there you know we had a visit from the representatives that came in toward the facility you know the part of their duty is oversight and i feel like oversight is uh... really an important part of every elected officials I had requested that Bryant-Wolfen, you know, if people aren't happy with what those two representatives had to say and their perspectives, maybe someone like Bryant-Wolfen could come and tour the facility and give his perspective. Or maybe some of you guys might have that opportunity. I don't even know if it's allowed or not, honestly. But, you know, as elected officials, maybe, I think the more information we have and the more transparency we have, the better. So I just wanted to put that out there. But thank you again.

My name is Tommy Borgelt. I am a lifelong resident of St. Genevieve. I'd like to touch on the treatment of the individuals in ICE detention centers, including our own, and the appearance of approval of this treatment, the signing of the 287G contract by our city and county creates. I'm unsure if the board or if you, Mayor Keim, are familiar with the conditions of the ICE detention centers across the nation in general or our facility in St. Genevieve specifically, but I'd like to bring some things to everyone's attention. I've heard repeatedly that our facility in St. Genevieve is one of the better facilities to be sent to. As far as conditions go, and knowing that, I was deeply saddened to learn that even in what are considered the better facilities, the detainees nationwide are being treated so poorly. In recent months, concerns about pregnant detainees nationwide were brought to light. Pregnant, postpartum, and nursing women in detention face severe health risks. Despite Department of Homeland Security directives barring the detention of these vulnerable populations, except in exceptional circumstances, hundreds of pregnant and nursing women are being detained, with many experiencing medical neglect and inadequate prenatal care. Over a recent 14-month stretch, federal reports reported 16 miscarriages inside ICE facilities. Just this week, there were additional concerns raised on the conditions in our detention center specifically. Among those concerns were reports of pregnant women who aren't receiving proper medical care or nutrition. Other concerns included individuals going for extended periods of time without water and being made to sleep on plastic trays referred to as boats. These boats help to get around the issue of detainees sleeping on the floor and are hard plastic tubs that place the detainees' mats around six inches off the floor. My understanding as our county law enforcement stance is that making detainees sleep on the floor would be inhumane, but these boats are an acceptable alternative. I find it hard to call someone being made to sleep on hard plastic trays six inches off the ground anything but inhumane. I think you would agree with that sentiment, especially if it was someone you cared about being forced to do so. I'd also like to remind everyone that over 70% of detainees being held have no criminal convictions, and out of the remaining 29%, only 5% have violent convictions. These statistics are verifiable from several sources, including the Department of Homeland Security. I think it's all too easy for any one of us not affected directly by these detainments to ignore the basic human rights that are being denied to these individuals. I'm not talking about the denial of due process, which in and of itself is unconstitutional. I'm talking about the common decencies that should be given to every human being. This treatment not only shows what our county thinks is acceptable in the name of profits, it also shows what our community is willing to turn a blind eye to if it's not them or someone they care about being directly affected. Chief Deputy Schott released a statement saying, we believe we operate an excellent detention center and provide excellent care and service, not only to ICE detainees, but to every individual housed in our facility. I don't consider being denied proper medical care, nutrition, adequate access to water or a bed to sleep in, excellent care and service. Many of the individuals detained in these facilities were here the right way, until the current administration took away those avenues. These people who were working diligently through the long and expensive process of becoming US citizens, who in many cases overnight became vulnerable to deportation. People who were detained at their civil court hearings, the very hearings that they attended because they were following what they were told was the proper process. Or people seeking asylum from assault and even death in their home countries. People who love our country and want to be part of it, who were taxpaying documented individuals until our government moved the goalposts. In 2024, there were 11 deaths reported in ICE detention centers. In 2025, there were between 31 and 33, making it the highest number of deaths in over two decades. So far in 2026, there have been 17 deaths in just the first four months. This puts us on track to exceed 100 plus deaths and means someone dies roughly every four to six days. Experts say a majority of the 51 deaths that have occurred since January of 2025 were from natural causes and many would have been preventable with timely medical care. The reports of these deaths highlight an increase due to medical neglect, inadequate care, and suicide. At least 10 detainees have died by suicide in just the last 14 months, seven of which happened since October, more than any other fiscal year in the agency's history. ICE normally records one or none annually. And again, a significant number of these deaths occurred among individuals with no criminal charges. Seven out of the 10 individuals were individuals with no record of violent crimes. In our own detention center, Leo Cruz Silva, a 34-year-old detainee, suffered an acute mental health crisis following his detention. For two nights, Cruz screamed, hid under his bed, and reported hallucinations according to an ICE report on his death. Yet he did not get help. Quickly, a nurse ordered antipsychotic medications and planned to get him treatment the next week. On the third day, he was found dead in his cell. If these detention centers are offering such excellent care and service, then why are suicide rates rising at such an alarming rate? Far exceeding the proportional growth of the detainee population, they account for nearly 20% of all in custody deaths. The profits by the county for the detention center housing immigrant detainees in 2026 are projected to be several million dollars. I'd like to ask,

We're about five minutes, okay?

Okay. I have just a couple more points. Is that the price we're willing to accept to treat others as less than human? Will the city be content to use money made off the unjust treatment of others in the name of profit? I hope the answer is no, and I hope you'll take steps to make that clear. I'm asking again that the 287G contract the city signed be canceled. Thank you for your time.

Good evening. As you all probably know, my name's Asa Lemons and I'm a taxpaying resident of St. Genevieve. I've grown up here my entire life and I love St. Genevieve. It's made me into the man I am today. First off, before I start, I just wanted to applaud the city for continuing to mention that we residents are speaking here in your meeting minutes. I was not aware that this was a bar for success in St. Genevieve until I saw that in the May 11th St. Genevieve County Commission minutes that a nearly 30-minute conversation with a constituent in a public meeting primarily regarding the county's transparency of all topics was completely erased from the public record. Those meetings are not recorded. They functionally just erase that concerned citizen and our words from the public record. We're all here, for the most part, St. Genevieve County residents, both myself, all the wonderful people behind me, and you guys as well. I say all this because I hope this scares you guys just as much as it scares myself, the audacity of it all. I just wanted to applaud you guys for continuing to record and document your meetings accurately and transparently. Now onto the 287 contract. I noticed in the new St. Genevieve Police Department FAQ, there were rather notably six different questions regarding the differentiation of the city and the county. I don't disagree, obviously, and I understand your frustration with the potential conflation. I mean, hell, I wouldn't want to be associated with some of the horrors and inhumanities that go on across this nation in ICE detention facilities. But do you ever ponder why this conflation happens so much? Because in my opinion, I think it's because whenever we residents hear that our city police department has a contract with ICE, oftentimes they don't particularly care about the nuances that our contract does have a per person incentive structure or the fact that it's not using taxpayer dollars directly. or that it can hypothetically be terminated in the future. In my opinion, what people care about is they go on social media and they see the 276th video of a gang of unidentifiable masked ICE agents nabbing people in the streets with no idea where they're taking them, They hear stories of grotesque inhumanities committed in ICE detention centers. Then they get to see ICE agents execute unarmed American citizens in the street. And how in the case of Renee Good, a single mother of three, by the way, the head of the DHS before the mom's body was even cold that evening, labeled her a domestic terrorist. Oh, and fun fact, by the way, the ICE agent, Jonathan Ross, who shot the unarmed mother and orphaned her children, is back... On duty, working for ICE again in a different state. Astounding standards for DHS. And those same people that care about bad things happening in our society turn around and they see our statistically supported, very safe city of St. Genevieve voluntarily and secretly entering into a contract supporting ICE. Our local police department is under no obligation to enforce civil immigration law. And in the history of the city of St. Genevieve, since the police department was founded, this has never been the case. This conflation happens, in my opinion, because we have a contract with the literal agency also perpetuating these inhumanities. And now that we've officially picked up somebody with the 287G contract, we can now literally say that as a city, we are participatory in this process in a literal sense. Was that guy you picked up a murderer, a hardened criminal? I'm sure you all heard about the two US House representatives that visited our county detention center. Presumably also the literal detention center this 287G contract sent that person over to about how both representatives and the detainees inside as well spoke on there being overcrowding issues. And that these detainees sleep on plastic trays inches off the floor in rooms as dense as 48 people. And they spoke on lacking medical treatment for sick people. And last but not least, the insufficient prenatal treatment for pregnant women. The Board of Aldermen does not manage that facility, let me be clear. But our city resides in a county with one of four ICE detention centers in Missouri. And in the eyes of the resident, the state, the country, the world, and the history books, they are well aware that we are partially participatory in that process. Most people don't know the specifics of the great municipal work you guys do here. Sadly, there's probably a significant portion of the population that doesn't even know what the Board of Aldermen functionally does. And the reality is, in my opinion, people in 2026 will reflect on this dark period of history and the city not for the hard and, in my opinion, underappreciated work you guys do with infrastructure, zoning, land use, community development, budgeting, or your transparency especially in juxtaposition to the county or all the other amazing and hard work you guys do 2026 for the city will be remembered for the year we secretly signed a contract with ice without informing the public thank you any other public comment

Good evening. I'm Sheriff Gary Stolzer. I'm the sheriff of St. Genevieve County. I've been your sheriff. I'm in my 26th year now. I kind of want to come here tonight and give you a little bit of history of the Sheriff's Office and get to the current history, too. But you need to understand the history and understand where we are now. And I realize a lot of people are uninformed. They have no idea the history of the Sheriff's Office. So in 1987, we had Sheriff Bosler here. Sheriff Bosler was here for 23 years as sheriff of our county, I think from 65 to 1988. In 1987, the old part of the sheriff's office was built at the same time, or the new sheriff's office was built out where it is today, and the new part of the courthouse was built in 1987. The jail moved from here to where it is today, and that all took place in 1987. in 87. 1988, Sheriff Bosler had to step aside. I think he had some health issues within his family and he was taking care of that. And Sheriff Bob Macklin was appointed in 1989. And the other sheriff was in 1988. I might have said 2008. But So anyway, after that, the commissioners in 1992 were approached by the federal government, and the federal government offered the commission a million dollars to add on to our jail. At that time, they had no place to house any U.S. Marshals, and they came to our county asking if we would do it. The commissioners that were there at the time, they agreed to do it. In 1993, another piece of the jail was built. In 1988, you could hold about 30 inmates. After they were done, you could hold about 120 after that million dollars was given to the county. So the seed that was planted in 1993, I don't think the commissioners then could ever imagine what that's created and what good it has done for the county. So those commissioners need to be applauded for what they did then, because if they wouldn't have done it, our county would be in a world of hurt, and our law enforcement here would be like every other third-class county in this state, well falling behind what they should be paying their people. And we just wouldn't have much, folks, I'm telling you. Go visit and study every third-class county in the state of Missouri and come back with that and tell me to see what you got now. So I'll move on with history. And I'm going to say a little bit about my family. You know, my grandparents, my wife, our great grandparents, we're all from here. We're from here. We raised our family here. Andrea and I, our wedding anniversary is June 1st, 35 years. I always say she's a lucky woman, but honestly, I'm the lucky guy. We have a deep sense of family and community. We raised two kids. Me and Andrea graduated from Valley. Our kids graduated from St. My son is a first lieutenant in the United States Marines. He graduated Naval Academy. He went through St. Jen High School. I think we got a great education there. And he's now stationed out in North Carolina. He's 25 years old. My daughter, she graduated from Webster and St. Jen. And she's now working up in St. Louis in marketing. And she married a young man from here. His name is Nick Colburn. One of the greatest guys that I think St. Jen have ever created. And we're very happy to have him in our family. I don't get up and talk much and I don't get out much because that's just me. I'm kind of a strange politician because I'm probably a little bit of an introvert and I don't politic much. So in 1997, me and my wife, I grew up a carpenter's son, or a contractor's son, and I was a carpenter until my mid-20s. And in 1993, St. Peter's Jail was built. Me and my wife built the St. Genevieve Dairy Queen in 1932 and 1955. And in 1994, we opened one up in Grandpa Pigeon's. All the while, I was still doing some carpenter work, and my wife is a full-time school teacher up at St. Jen. Hey, Gary, you've got about one minute. Yeah, one minute. Me too. Sorry. So I'm going to fast forward a lot then. Anyway, I just wanted to give you a sense of our family and what this community means to us. But I became sheriff in 2001. 2005, we were able to pass a sales tax here, which was very hard after several times. And we passed the sales tax, and that helped give us a shot in the arm. And we were able to add on to the jail, and we were able to get a little bit more revenue to keep paying our employees. And we kept adding on to the jail until we got to the point where we are now. And we did that without going back to the taxpayers. It all came from a federal contract we had with the U.S. Marshals. We've never signed a contract with ICE. It's the same contract that was signed back in 1993 but amended many times. So there's no immigration contract out there regardless of what is said. And... You know, so we are today where we are today. We do house ICE. We do house U.S. Marshals, Bureau of Prisons, and we also house the Department of Corrections of the state of Missouri. We have several contracts. It kind of diversifies us, so when our inmate counts may be low somewhere else, we're able to sustain ourselves. We are a self-sufficient sheriff's office. I don't think you will find any other sheriff's office in the state that can do that, and most of them are drains on their counties and their budgets that they just can't afford, nor could we afford it in our county either. But in result, we have some of the highest-paid sheriff's deputies in the state. We also have deputies that are staying here to raise their entire families, and now their kids are working for me at the sheriff's office. And I think that's the type of law enforcement you want here, people that invest in our county and stay in our county. So that's about all I got to say here tonight, but I just wanted to come and say something after all the turmoil you guys have been hearing. This is maybe the second Board of Aldermen meeting I've been to in 26 years. Again, I don't get out much because I'm not good at talking. I just kind of want to go to work every day and live off of merit and keep the county safe and just do my thing every day, just get up and go to work. So thank you.

Good evening everybody. My name is Jason Shotton, Chief Deputy for the Sheriff's Office. Like the Sheriff, I have long felt that we did not need to publicly defend how we operate our detention center. We've established a standard of operations that we refuse to compromise and until now we didn't feel we required defending. However, there comes a point when enough misinformation has been spread that response becomes necessary. I'd like to address several claims recently reported by St. Louis media outlets regarding the detention center. These reports allege that cells are overcrowded, individuals are not receiving proper medical care, food quality is poor, the facility was not designed for this population, individuals not charged with crimes are housed with those who have been charged, there's a lack of drinking water, pregnant women are not receiving medical care. First, our facility is routinely inspected by multiple federal agencies. We're inspected by the U.S. Marshal Service twice a year, the Federal Bureau of Prisons annually, and DHS ICE on a weekly basis. These inspections have occurred consistently for approximately 25 years. In fact, I believe our facility is inspected more frequently than the Missouri Department of Corrections. Our detention center was specifically engineered and designed to house both individuals charged with crimes and civil detainees. Housing assignments are based on classification provided by federal holding facilities. I'm sorry, federal holding agencies. This classification process is why we are able to safely and appropriately house criminal detainees alongside individuals being held on federal detainers. Regarding the allegations of inadequate access to drinking water, every cell and housing pod in our facility contains a sink with hot and cold running water, as well as toilets. Multiple showers are available in each pod. Every incarcerated individual is issued their own drinking cup and continuous access to water from the sinks in their cells. Additionally, each housing unit receives a large cooler vise daily. As for medical care, we currently operate a dedicated medical unit within the detention center staffed by three LPNs, one paramedic, one deputy who is also an EMT, and one correctional officer with medical training. All of our staff are CPR and AED certified. We also contract with an outside correctional health care provider, and a physician visits our facility weekly for medical appointments. If any incarcerated individual experiences a medical emergency, our medical staff can respond within minutes. If hospitalization is necessary, the ambulance district is located immediately next door and a hospital is directly across the street. Few facilities are in a better position to provide immediate emergency medical access than ours. Since medical care has been questioned publicly, I also want to specifically address allegations regarding prenatal care of pregnant women housed in our facility. Pregnant women are not something new to our facility. We have housed pregnant women for many years before we housed for DHS. Upon intake, a pregnant woman is given a pregnancy test and immediately started on prenatal vitamins. Authorization requests are promptly submitted to the appropriate federal agency so OBGYN appointments can be scheduled as quickly as possible. All the current pregnant women are in our custody as of today are seeing an OBGYN. Additionally, pregnant detainees receive extra mattresses, linens, are placed on a high-protein diet, additional evening snacks, increased medical monitoring, and more frequent vital checks. In many cases, these women receive more consistent medical oversight and nutritional support while in our custody than they had prior to their arrival. Regarding food services, our meals are provided through a contracted food service provider under standards established by our office. Every person housed in our facility receives three hot meals per day totaling approximately 3,800 calories and 130 grams of protein daily. Pregnant detainees who receive high protein diets receive as much as 220 to 250 grams of protein a day and much more than 3,800 calories. We also accommodate medical and religious dietary requirements including diabetic, kosher, halal meals, just to name a few. Everything I outlined tonight was explained and shown during the recent facility tours conducted just days ago. Unfortunately, during the press conference that followed, none of those facts were shared with the public. I stand firmly behind this statement and our detention center. I refuse to allow a one-hour visit and a distorted press conference and people who do not have first-hand knowledge to simply regurgitate what they hear from politicians and media to define who we are and question the level of professionalism and care we provide. Let's see if they regurgitate the facts now. Thank you.

Any other public comment at this time?

Okay.

If not, we will close out public comment for this evening. I want to thank everybody for joining. And then we will move along tonight to our consent agenda. Motion to approve. Second. Okay, I have a motion and a second for approval of tonight's consent agenda. All in favor?

Aye.

Any opposed? Okay, thank you very much. Now at this time, the Mayor and Board of Aldermen will hold a public hearing at which time citizens may be heard on the proposed water sewer rates to be set by the Board of Aldermen. We will open this public hearing at 6.53. Read to you the proposed water rates and changes. Currently, for the fiscal year 2026, these are water rates specifically, or water rate minimum is set at $12.50. Operating and maintenance of $6.91 per 1,000 gallons. For the fiscal year of 2027, the proposed increase is 4%. which would take the minimum up to $13 and the operating maintenance to $7.18 per 1,000 gallons. My apologies, I should have clarified. So that was within the city limits. Moving on to water rates outside of the city limits. This would be users connected to city water outside of our city limits. Current fiscal year of 2026, that minimum is set at $18.75 with an operating maintenance of $10.37 per 1,000 gallons. The proposed increase for 2027 is also 4%. That would make the minimum $19.50 and the operating maintenance $10.78 per 1,000 gallons. Moving along to sewer rates, within the city limits, current fiscal year of 2026, the minimum is $12.02 with operating maintenance of $7.55 per 1,000 gallons. The proposed increase is also 4%. For the fiscal year 2027, that would take the minimum to $12.50 and $7.85 per 1,000 gallons. And then finally, for sewer customers outside of the city limits, current fiscal year of 2026, that minimum is set at $18.02 with $11.33 per 1,000 gallons for operating and maintenance. It's also a 4% increase, taking the minimum to $18.74, and the operating maintenance to $11.78 per 1,000 gallons for the fiscal year 2027. Any discussion at this time? If there's any public comment, too, on that, we welcome you. If there is no public comment I will go ahead and close this public meeting at 6.56. next up we have a second public hearing uh the mayor and board of aldermen will hold a public hearing to consider a request from ernest and lisa kovac for a special use permit to operate a guest lodging establishment hostel at 539 north main street in an r1 single family residential district we will open that public hearing on 657. robert

Good evening, Mayor, Alderwoman and Alderman. As the mayor introduced that request for a special use permit by the Kovacs at 539 North Main Street, that is located in an R1 zoning, which is a single family residential zoning. Again, he said they're operating what's called a hostel. So let's define really what a hostel is. A hostel is typically a small dormitory-style room with very limited accommodations in the rooms. These rooms are used for short-term rentals, usually like one or two days, or maybe even overnight for those that come and visit our community and just want to stay overnight and then be here the next morning. A room typically consists of a bed, couch, chair, TV, mini fridge, and possibly a microwave.

There's no cooking facilities in these rooms.

The bathroom facilities in this case and in most hostels are kind of communal, if you will. So in this case, there'll be a full bath on the second floor where all the rooms are located. And there'll be a half bath near the entry level on the main floor, so on the first floor. The request was made on 4-23 of this year. Staff, which includes the police chief, fire chief, and myself, reviewed the submittal and approved it to go to planning and zoning on 4-27. The case went before planning and zoning on May 7th of this year and was approved to move before you guys tonight unanimously. The notice for the planning and zoning meeting and this public hearing tonight were posted in the paper for the required two times posting prior to tonight's meeting and surrounding property owners on this property were all identified and sent notification letters for both meetings as well. To this date, we've received no complaints or issues concerning this request before you tonight. If anyone has any questions for me, I'll be more than glad to take them. And I see that Ernest is here. It looks like Lisa is not. So if there's any questions about that, feel free to ask, and we'll get the questions answered for you.

I got one. This is in an area where there was flood buyout property on, I guess, on two sides of it. How does that affect? You know this because there's not actual property owners. I guess the city owns that property next to it.

The cities do, but there's property owners on the backside and across the street. So if you take the street and the railroad tracks out of it, then when you notify people, you have to take the streets out and you jump across the street. So those people got notification as well. That property across there is actually split up into several properties. It looks like one large field, but it's split up into several properties. So they were all notified.

So that doesn't have any effect on the city's ownership of those vacant?

No.

And how many rooms are you talking about in there?

How many rooms?

So we'll have three rooms to stay the night in. They're approximately probably 13 by 15. Same accommodations as he said. There won't be a microwave in the rooms. It's very limited, as he said. Microwave in the lobby. That's it. A couple Keurigs, a water machine, and a microwave. We want them to come at a cheap rate and spend their money in town with the vendors, with the restaurants, with all the events going on. We don't think you have to be rich to come to St. John's because some of these B&Bs are pricey. And we just want to make it for everybody. I mean, we're not going to get rich, but I'll have a nice retirement egg after your blessing. There will be available parking outside of the main street, but with only three rooms, we're not going to have that much traffic. So that will also be limited traffic.

I think as a board of aldermen, and I'm not referring to this property, at some point we have to have a discussion of what direction are we going to go that every vacant house or apartment that comes up is increasingly turned to a B&B or an Airbnb. And the amount of available housing for families who want to rent and stay in the city goes down every year. Because we're filling it with busy, all for tourism, busy on the weekend, nobody here during the week. People don't go to the grocery store, they don't send their kids to our school. And we are letting the whole market decide what kind of a town we're going to become. I would think we should have a discussion and say what percentage of our available housing is going to be for out of town renters as opposed to people from St. Genevieve. I don't know what session we do that in or how we do that.

Or is that something we can even limit?

there are many many cities in the uh in the state of missouri and as i said we've got plenty of airbnbs and uh let's limit it at this and so that we have more rental housing available agreed but i might add there are zero hostels between st louis and cape and the bicyclists

the hostels. We have the gravel race. We have a few things with the cyclists, but that's it. Cyclists are going to bring a good tax income to St. Gen with this hostel. I mean, I'm not going to be buying any more properties. I can guarantee you that. It's too much work. But the hostel is a good thing for the cyclists, which is going to bring in more revenue for the local businesses and the town.

So the fact that this is just one room in this hostel, concept, differentiation from an Airbnb?

Correct. An Airbnb would have cooking, a refrigerator, private bathroom. The rate is about triple what we're going to be charging. So, you know, I mean, not everybody, like I said, can afford to go to a B&B. I mean, they're nice. The B&Bs are great. Somebody on a budget wants to visit St. John and frequent the restaurants and the stores. I think this is an opportunity for them to do that. Any other questions?

Ernest? Yeah. I'm just glad that you're doing something with that building. I've passed that building many times. And I've always wondered, I hope somebody does something with this building. And I tell you what, I'll stay in the hostels. I'll stay in the hotels, motels, and whatever. There is a need for a hostel in town.

I promise there won't be a hostel in there.

Low price for people that just... Want to come and see and not spend a lot of money on lodging.

Exactly. And we have, that address has the best sunrise view in this entire town. Because you have the entire levee over there, the tree line. I'll sit down there and watch the sunrise and I live five blocks away. I mean, it's going to be an opportunity for many people to experience really neat stuff in St. John's. We're going to be right over by the trail. I've heard that they're talking about putting a trailhead in somewhere close to the proposed hostels. So we may offer some bikes if they want to take them, go on the ride the trail levy. I mean, it's going to be a very positive thing.

That's the downstairs thing to be.

That's going to be a while. My wife is thinking about running a craft store where she's going to do classes. It'll be segregated because a lot of the ladies in town want to do craft classes. They have nowhere to do them at. And that's the next, I guess, phase of that. We won't be clogging up parking, obviously. It's all alone.

There's a hostel all on the second floor?

Yes, yes.

So they come in the front door, go right up the stairs, have no access to the front door? Correct, correct.

Unless the store is open, and then, well, obviously, go come in, buy something, do a class, experience St. Gen. But it is completely segregated from that. I just got done with that. But that's a waste. We will have more meetings on that. But we'd like to get the hostels going to finance the store. Because he's bankrupting me.

So a little bit of background on this house that he's talking about now that I know which house it is. That house has been run down and vacant and nothing happening with this house since 1993. And I've been living right down the street from you around the corner for 23 years. So I think it is actually good to see a little bit of life come to that. I've been seeing you guys working on that.

All the time.

And I appreciate that to where we don't have a run-down building in town. I think it's great.

A nice little gem on Main Street by itself.

Yeah. Any other questions regarding the request for the public hearing portion? We'll be coming back around to vote on that.

I have one small question.

Yes, Sam.

Are you going to limit the amount of days somebody can stay in there? Yes.

Yes. Now, if we have, like, say, a traveling nurse or doctor that they run out of room at the house that's owned in town for them, there may be a medical professional if they need to be here a week or something, but it's not... Like a week max or something? Yes, correct. You know, for, like, a medical professional, not for stays, you know. We will be... Offering one thing, if there ends up, we're going to work with St. Vincent de Paul, if there ends up and we're not booked and a family gets displaced for a short period of time, we want to give them a temporary place to stay free. So that way, you know, we can give back to the community also. But that will also be a limited amount of time. Hopefully they have homeowners.

Any other questions? Any other comment from the public? Yeah. All right. If there are no other questions, I'm going to go ahead and close the public hearing. It looks to be 7.08.

Thank you very much, Ernie. And don't forget, if you ever can make a Muni Band concert, our first concert's tonight.

Thanks.

Thank you.

So following my question, are we ever going to have a discussion about this or do we just kind of go along with capitalism and decide how many Airbnbs we're going to have?

We can certainly add it to a future work session. We've had the conversation before when I was in Robert's role that we were going to let, like you mentioned, capitalism dictate how many there are and they were I don't know, peaking. So we had around 26, 27, 28 rooms available. Some have shut down. So it's come back down to about 24, 25 in the city limits is all I'm talking about. Where's the number 40 that I keep hearing?

Does that include the county?

Maybe.

That is something we can take before planning and zoning. And planning and zoning can work on a recommendation. I can do research and then present that to planning and zoning and let them do their functionality, and then bring something to you all before work session if you would like.

Sounds good. Let's go ahead and consider that, and then let's move along. We do have one more public hearing tonight. At this time, the Mayor and Board of Aldermen will hold a public hearing to consider a request from Lauren Odenwald. For a special use permit to operate a guest lodging room Airbnb at 996 Market Street in an R2 residential district, we will open the public hearing at 710. Go ahead.

And this particular request, unlike the one you just heard, it will have two units, and the units in this case are fully functional with cooking facilities and restrooms and multiple bedrooms. They'll be separated by floors, so you'll have an upper floor and a main level floor. Just to give you a little back history on this particular building, the house had a special use permit. On the first floor was a beauty salon, and on the second floor was an existing approved Airbnb already. by the previous owner. So Lauren here purchased the property and wants to make both of them be Airbnbs. So she made this request on 4-8. Staff, again, once again, which includes police chief, fire chief, and myself, reviewed the submittal and approved it to go before planning zoning on 4-27. The case went before planning zoning on 5-7 and was approved to move before you guys tonight. The notice for planning and zoning, once again, as required for the public hearing and the planning and zoning meeting were posted in the paper two times prior to tonight's meeting. Once again, surrounding property owners were all sent notification letters individually. In this case, there are several more property owners that surround this particular piece of property, so they were all given proper notification. And again, on this one to date, we received no complaints or issues concerning the request. I know if anyone has any questions for myself, obviously I'm here. Lauren did let me know late this afternoon. Unfortunately, she can't make it. She is a respiratory, and she allowed me to share this with you. She's a respiratory therapist for people that are placed on life support. And like I said, she let me know late this evening that she was called in and couldn't make it tonight. She's very sorry she couldn't be here to answer any of your questions, but hopefully I can answer anything that you might have.

Questions from the board? Questions from the public? Okay. If there are no questions, then we will go ahead and close the public hearing at 7-12.

Thank you.

Thank you, Robert. Okay. We'll move along to some old business tonight. First up, we have a second reading of Bill number 4721. This is an ordinance of the city of St. Genevieve, Missouri to establish a procedure to disclose potential conflicts of interest and substantial interest for certain officials. Motion to approve. Second. Okay, I have a motion and a second. Pam, would you do a roll call, please?

Alderman Dobbs. Yes. Alderman Fahey? Yes. Alderman Donovan? Yes. Alderman Huey?

Yes.

Alderman Eidman? Yes. Alderman Ross?

Yes.

Alderman Steiger? Yes. Seven yes, zero no's, one absent. Bill number 4721 now becomes ordinance 4645.

Thank you very much. We'll move along to some new business tonight. First up, we have a first reading of bill number 4725. This is an ordinance approving a special use permit for Ernest and Lisa Kovac that will allow the operation of a guest lodging establishment hostile at 539 North Main Street.

Move to approve.

Second. Okay, I have a motion and a second. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Okay, thank you very much. Next up, we have a first reading of bill number 4726. This is an ordinance approving a special use permit for Lauren Odenwald that will allow the operation of a guest lodging establishment at 996 Market Street. Option to approve. Second. Okay, I have a motion and a second. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed?

Now is she requesting a second reading?

Is there a reason for a second reading?

So, yes, again, when I explained during the public hearing, the upper unit was already there and in place. They've got the second or the first floor already taken care of. So she is operationally ready to go. From our standpoint, as soon as she gets everything taken care of with her licensing and all that side of things. So as soon as it's approved, she's ready to go and get things open. Unfortunately, we couldn't make it happen any quicker far than what we're doing right now. Otherwise, we'd have some room for Benjamin Franklin to stay in or whoever it was that's coming to town. So she made that request, and we're honoring her request tonight. Thank you.

Motion for a second reading of bill number 4726. Okay.

Mayor, I mean, there's a lot of adjacent property owners, so I'm not going to move forward a second reading. I won't second that motion.

Okay. Is there a second to the motion for a second reading of bill number 4726? Okay. If there's not... It will fail for a lack of a second there. We'll bring it back at the next meeting. Next up, we have a first reading of Bill number 4727. This is an ordinance of the City of St. Genevieve, Missouri, amending Municipal Code Chapter 715, User Charge Systems, specifically Section 715.040, User Charge Rates, subsections A and B, by revising the water use charges.

Move to approve. Second.

We have a motion and a second. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Thank you very much. Next up is the first reading of bill number 4728. This is an ordinance of the city of St. Genevieve, Missouri, amending municipal code chapter 715, user charge systems, specifically section 715.140, sewer charges and billing, subsection D, by revising the sewer use charges.

Motion to approve.

Second. We have a motion and a second. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed?

Okay, thank you very much.

Next up is a first reading of Bill 4729. This is an ordinance approving a budget amendment to the City of St. Genevieve for the fiscal year 2026 budget relating to the various revenue and expenditure increases. Motion to approve. Second. Okay, I have a motion and a second. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Okay, thank you very much. And then last up on our agenda tonight, we have a first reading of bill number 4730. This is an ordinance of the city of St. Genevieve authorizing the mayor to enter into an agreement with Jokers Incorporated for the Crest Lawn Cemetery expansion project in amount of $65,454. I have a question on that.

What is the time frame that we're allowing, you know, with the whole subdivision and the availability of the dirt?

They have 180 days to complete the project from notice of, uh, to begin.

So this bill will not actually give them the notice to proceed? Okay. Motion to approve?

Second. We have a motion. Second.

Okay. I have a motion and a second. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed?

Okay. Thank you all very much.

That concludes our business on the agenda tonight. Is there any other business to bring forth at this time?

I just had a quick comment back to our second reading and stuff. Joe, I understand your reasoning for that. You know, when people make a major investment I think it's proper that they get to start recuperating that as soon as possible. That's why I made a motion to do that. I don't see what the big deal is, but anyhow.

I think there's a lot of adjacent property owners that might want to have input on that. I think it's fair that we... I'm sorry?

They had their time.

No, we have first and second reading on it. They've been notified, but they might not be able to make it tonight, and they might not write a letter and try to rely on Uncle Sam to get it here. Yeah, that's fine.

Yeah, I think we should wait for the public input on that and just see if they think about it. We've got half done. I'm sorry? We've got half done.

good news to talk about things you want to mayor I'd like to consider changing our agenda for the next meetings I'd like to maybe consider moving public comments towards the end of the meeting a lot of times there's people that do make public comments and then they leave right after and they use our forum which is fine it's their right but I think they ought to be a little more engaged in other city activities and if they really do want to make a public comment maybe they ought to participate in the rest of public business that they're preventing us from getting to. So I'd like to maybe consider moving public comments towards towards the end of the meeting.

I mean I assume that public comment could be moved.

Eliminate it or you can move it to the end of the agenda. Most most cities do it at the beginning just because people want to be heard usually before they have to sit through the boring meeting. But also, I'm not arguing, I'm just saying why other cities do it and why we probably haven't. I'm absolutely not arguing in favor of whatever you guys do, whatever you want. Sometimes it's not great to have it at the end, because people might be sitting there and they get angry and then they weren't planning on making a comment and then here it comes you know so so it cuts both ways but whatever you guys want to do is is absolutely appropriate to put it wherever you want on the agenda or not to have it at all

It could be a work session discussion or some kind of discussion.

You can make a decision now. I don't think it needs a motion. I think it's just agreement that we move it towards after other business.

I'd certainly like to have like a straw poll.

Yeah, absolutely.

A what?

I'm fine with it.

A straw poll, a vote. Yeah, I think we should keep it at the start. I think it really is inconvenient to anybody who wants to make a public comment. Some meetings at 7.30, some meetings end at 9 o'clock. And Gary Stoltz is sitting here all night waiting to think. I think it may be a little irritating at times to hear the public comment, but it's short, and the inconvenience, every one of them will be sitting here for an hour and a half before they would be able to speak, like it shuts down free communication.

I disagree. I don't think it's an inconvenience. If they want to participate in public comments, then they can see how the public works and how we operate. It's an inconvenience for us, too, when they talk about things that we have no jurisdiction over.

Sure. For five minutes, and it's over at 15. These people are going to be sitting here for an hour and a half.

Sounds like it may need a longer discussion.

don't know that you need to work i mean you can do whatever you want i don't know you need a work session on this topic either do it or you don't do it and i think it was a consensus you know i think you believe it like it is i mean you put it at the end it's going to discourage people from coming and making a comment if they had to wait the whole time and i figured people that come here early and make their comment if they want to see how the city operates they will stay here and see how it operates. But they don't. You should not be forced on them.

But don't you think that's a little disingenuine that they're just using that podium to get their thing apart and not really participate, and then they leave right after? I mean, you see a lot of people leave right after they get a chance to get on the camera, and then they leave.

And I agree with you, Joe. I don't know if that's the answer.

I think we should try it for a couple months and see how it works.

Okay. So you're in favor...

from coming up and making comments. And unfortunately, what's been going on, I don't know how people...

But we also have personal appearances, and if they really want to talk, they can ask to be there, and that's our...

So you're in favor of keeping it at the beginning? I'd like to move to the end. Alderman Ivan at the end. End. End. End. End. End.

I'll go with the N because the citizens that's got a request, like their special use permits, they have to sit through all that to get to what they want to do. So it's kind of unfair that they get to sit for what they want to.

I'll go with the N. I know Alderman Prince kind of shared the same. I know I can't speak for him, but he told me that today.

He voiced some concerns to me prior to the meeting as well.

Well, the mayor sets the agenda. You know, you always amend it at any particular meeting. So it's really up to the mayor, you know, like what gets sent out in the administration. Okay.

The agenda is a matter of public record, so they wouldn't be surprised. You know, they wouldn't just walk in there and say, well, we're not talking until the end of the meeting. What the heck? This is a matter of it's supposed to be agenda, correct? Yes. That's what I'm saying. Yes. It's not going to become a surprise to them that it's been moved. No. I mean, not if they're reading the agenda beforehand.

Not if anybody reads the agenda beforehand, correct.

As you know, no matter where you have things in order, you'd always amend the agenda and put it somewhere else. It's the notice to the public of all the topics that's the most important. And then, you know, it's up to the people that show up, you know, what do they state for the whole meeting. So you can always put it at the end and decide, well, when everybody shows up, we'll have it at the beginning or in the middle or wherever.

You know, it looks like the majority of the board would like to have the end, like Joe recommended. I don't have a problem with that. I just voice my opinion about what is best for the city and for us. I'm for it.

Okay. Well, it seems like, you know, the board came to a pretty good consensus there. We can try that at the next meeting and... You know, we can see how that goes in subsequent meetings, see how that works and if we like it. And if we feel like it's causing a new problem, then we can revisit it.

The problem will be nobody will be here for public comments.

I'm not trying to search people for public comments. I'm just trying to get the other people that are here a fair time, you know, and maybe first before sitting here for... you know, hour and a half meeting before their thing gets brought up and stuff like that.

Let's be realistic. How long have public comments gone on? It's not a huge chunk of the meeting. We're going to discourage people who have to come here and try to figure out if they're going to talk at 7.30 or 8 or 8.30. We put the last agenda item, the least important thing on the agenda. We're telling them that. So I think it'll discourage people from coming. And I think it's a minor inconvenience to have to listen to people.

We're still going to listen to them.

If they're here.

If it's important to them, they'll be here.

Maybe. I guess it's a question, do we have to be beginning or end? We can't go somewhere in between? During the meeting, you can place it wherever you want as you approve the agenda.

Maybe there's a compromise. So I'll talk with the mayor after the meeting and produce the agenda and we'll move forward? We can experiment with moving it around.

Okay. Thank you all for your input on that. I appreciate that. If there's nothing else to bring forth at this time, then we will go ahead and adjourn.

Thank you all.