##VIDEO ID:XFZjYd6bRbw## Dan Jennifer and Tony may please come right up to the table if you'd like or however you want to do it good morning Commissioners Tony Hansen Regional director with the University of Minnesota extension I'm happy to be accompanying some more of members of the Crowing County Extension team here this morning as I provide a annual update to the board just a few remarks uh to share before they take over and share their presentation I just wanted to thank the commission for their continued support of the Master Gardener program here in Crowing County this has been an investment for a number of years now and I think especially during our extension committee meetings um and with these annual updates there's a clear return on investment that's being seen with the programming and coordination that's being done throughout the county and so that's sincerely appreciated it's reflective of our 2025 budget proposal for extension as well um and we think that that continued investment will uh show dividends into the future in serving residents of Crowing County uh otherwise I continue to work with the extension team I appreciate being able to see a few of you out at the county fair uh and supporting our 4 program as well our next extension committee meeting isn't until November um but if any of you have questions about any of our extension programming here in the county uh happy to help you out feel free to contact me at any time any question questions before I turn it over to my colleagues I have none no thank you all believe you have uh our presentation slide deck uh in advance so I'm Dan Lee um I'm with the Crowing County Master Gardeners but I'm also part of the state Advisory board for the Master Gardener program uh we have five regions across the uh state of Minnesota we happen to be part of the Northeast region that goes all the way up into the arrowhead so we're as far south and and West as you can get to be in the Northeast region uh as part of my role and responsibility there we bring back ideas to the rest of the state Master Gardeners and I'm proud to be here along with Britney and uh Jennifer to talk a little bit about what we've been doing in Crowing County and what has been seated across the state of Minnesota uh in large part because of some of the things that you've helped us uh accomplish here so in croing County uh we have something that we call the community giving project and this started as a giving Garden project in 2020 at the start of the pandemic uh we knew there was a need for food uh people were hurting because businesses have been shut down and we started by growing fresh food donating it to the local uh Salvation Army and food shelves in Brainard from that start we've expanded the project to now have a beding plant team that starts beding plants for all the other projects that we have across the county since 2019 or 2020 we've started close to 2,000 bet plants that we've either used directly or donated to places like the shed and uh other organizations that serve people in need across the county we also started a patio Garden uh project and Jennifer is going to talk a little bit more about that later on but basically we plant uh bedding plants in a one and a half to 2 gallon container so that people can have a little bit of a garden in uh situations where they don't have uh the space for a larger Garden we've done over 700 uh patio Gardens since we started doing that three years ago uh we also uh as part of the Master Gardener program are uh tasked with educating the public both Youth and adults and we have a team that uh teaches youth gardening at the Northland Arboretum and we have a team that teaches adult gardening at the Northland Arboretum um both of those teams are charged with giving people basic Horticultural skills so that they have the confidence to go back to their home or their community and do some gardening on their own and it's very fun to watch uh Youth and uh novice gardeners for the first time actually have success uh see the joy in gardening see the joy in helping themselves and their communities that that we can Foster through that education and then lastly we have a giving Garden uh where we grow food for uh the community that is donated in the community um about two years ago uh commissioner Barrow uh challenged us with expanding what we're doing at the uh northr Arboretum as far as the size of our giving garden and this year we uh actually found the funding to expand the uh Community Gardens by about a third uh so we are now producing even more food uh than we ever have been able to do before to and that food is donated AC cross the county the nice thing about uh this that I think is a testament to Crowing County is we got the funding from a variety of sources that all saw the value in what we're doing uh Affinity Credit Wings mid mid Minnesota sourcewell Mike's Tree Company Anderson Brothers Fleet Farm all of these uh employers and organizations in the county are supporting the Master Gardener program like you're supporting the Master Gardener program because they see the value and what we're doing to the people of cring County and with that I'm going to turn this over to Jennifer so if you can move forward uh keep going there we go the giving Garden as Dan alluded or mentioned the giv Garden is was started in 2020 and it has expanded through the years and we are obviously very proud of this as many of you know um we have the largest area over at the Northland Arboretum but we have since added ideal Corners we have also added CLC uh Timberwood church and we have three individuals who have giving Gardens at their house that they then bring their produce to the local food shelves and one of the most interesting things that we have is a partnership with um Crosslake Community Gardens where one of our members has worked with those gardeners who have excess food or have no um they can't use it that week whatever and she spins by there picks up their food and then brings it to either Cross Lake or peat lakes or Emily as a donation we track that separately because we don't want anybody to think oh that's just Master Gardeners taking it no we want them to get the credit for the credit that they have been doing uh growing that food and we've partnered with a number of organizations Salvation Army Garrison um down south Cuna Cross Lake peat Lakes area Food Shelf Emily um Crowing County Wick and Social Services which I have to admit is always fun when we bring it in and we ask for the dolly and I think their eyes get a little large because we're bringing in the tomatoes beware the tomatoes haven't started yet just letting you know um also over to CLC and relationship Alliance and it's always fun and we tell our interns the first time when you get an opportunity to take your food delivery to that location that is your aha moment that is why we do it so the giving Garden by the numbers um it has been interesting through the years and that number as of of um the 12th is wrong well it was right on the 12th as of yesterday we are 1,185 pounds that have been donated yesterday in fact we had almost a whopping 200 pounds that were delivered to Emily um so we're now hitting our surge we were a little bit light you know and it's been a cold and wet season the Tomatoes haven't started but I will tell you it is going to be booming so unlike zucchinis this year it's Tomatoes um you can see the numbers from 2023 we like to differentiate too because we don't it's countywide um not everything is grown at the Arboretum and yet look at what cross like pulled through and ideal corners and our personal giving Gard so 4,000 lbs in one year from a number of of sources that helped fight food insecurity throughout Crowing County the patio Garden as Dan mentioned has been in existence um since about 2021 2020 2021 um it has been fun and last year you heard um the story about pepper man and um Pepperman is Pepperman did not get a new plant this year he still has his pepper and um it is my understanding that Chelsea Perkins has spoken with Pepperman for a follow-up interview so we'll let you know as soon as we know when that's going to be um either aired or in print uh but he is making his Resurgence and that's just one thing it's keeping the mental health it's that companionship it's something to do and it's the opportunity to get some exercise whatever it may be and the recipients we always love to hear our food our feedback on it and if you go to the next slide these are just a few of the pictures of our recipients when they show up of course they know they have to have their pictures and when we send out the email it's it's like we've had our C our customers guests clients whatever you want to call them asking if we were going to get one this year they look forward to it as much as we look forward to the day that we're able to say come and get your plants oh and by the way we were able to throw in a few extras this year um it was a bounty this year we had over 500 um plants that we were able to donate or our Gardens and it is always a very very fun time uh the next slide and as you can see the patio feedback um to have gotten emails from our client or our the recipients from their client saying it helped me in my health just to give something just to love something to give it and see it responding back those are why we do it and as you can tell those are pretty unique organizations um that we impact and it's because of your support and your willingness to help us um that make this so so important and so rewarding for all of the Master Gardeners and all of the recipients that we in fact have next slide and last but not least you can see some of our media mentions um as I mentioned CLC is a new big one for us they after last year they had gotten some funding and as you can see up in the upper right hand corner they had some Gardens built it is my understanding that they're already working on perhaps an expansion for next year um our gardeners who are out there absolutely love it they have signs welcome to the giving garden and posts now that say stop in and get your fresh produce um we're helping them stock and as you can see Home Instead in the upper leftand corner was um setting our posts of when they were getting ready to deliver these are just a few sometimes we have some other posts that we can't quite bring in but we wanted to to show you a few of our media manions and how um proud We Are of what we are able to do for the residents of Crowing County all right my name is Britney and I'm going to wrap it up today uh I'm the coordinator for all the master Gardner Volunteers in the County I'm really proud as a as a part-time employee to to Leverage The efforts of these passionate volunteers that see needs in their Community um take the mission of the University of Minnesota and and just put it to life uh throughout our County so if you look at the map right now we have 71 volunteers scattered throughout the county um this past year we did 28 different different projects at different locations that can be from you know the Arboretum is a longtime location that we work at or it could be a garden that we helped install or it could be a shoreline buffer that we were involved in um and then next slide uh this graph shows uh kind of a timeline of our efforts from 20120 uh as you can see every year both uh the hours that we've reported so we the volunteers report every um hour that they volunteer into a database uh has grown have over doubled since 2020 and our contacts that have also um increased fourfold since 2020 and that's important to us to document all of that so we can um show our efforts and quantify what we're doing uh we don't want to just be you know reporting hours we want to be educating the public and making an impact in their lives uh next slide just some of the other things we do the community giving project that Dan and Jennifer outlined is um our biggest project that we Undertake and over I think 80% of our volunteers participate in some aspect of that project but uh we do other we have a lot of other projects that we do uh we're always available to answer questions from the from the public whether it's through our help line or uh through our contact form or just stopping by the office uh we also are happy to do educational booths we were at the county fair this past um you know couple weeks ago and talked to over 500 people about their Gardens and answered their Garden questions uh last year in 2023 we had 50 calls to the helpline we tracking much higher than that this year uh we also hold monthly presentations at the brainer Library uh every the second Tuesday we talk we have a Master Gardener volunteer talk about a different horiculture subject uh we now are hybrid so we're in on zoom and in person and last year we had uh 463 people attend uh so we're always striving to uh reach more people and be uh inclusive and accommodating and make um you know make it easy and entertaining for them to to come learn Green Space in croing County uh this is 2023 stats we've maintained over 7,000 ft of garden space uh we are working on educational signage on that too um so people uh know know what they're looking at and can be inspired to improve their own spaces uh we're happy to partner with projects we do a lot on our own but we're also can have more imp partnering with other with other organizations uh so w POA has been a a good um contact for us to do Shoreline and uh buffers and installations and uh we're happy to Pro to provide some Manpower and also learn from them uh Dan and Jennifer they're a great impetus for me to they're always excited to expand um you know they're teaching their adult and youth gardening classes and they'll be like you know I but we could zoom this over to Emily and I'd be like you know that sounds great I think I could figure out how to do that so that's um still in the works but we're always uh looking for ways to expand and to grow our program and to take on more uh a few things that I'd like to highlight uh the food shelf Coalition like Jennifer said we're happy to sit on the Food Shelf Coalition and take their um input and and guidance on what we can do to help whether it's grow more Tomatoes or grow less you know tomatillos or um or just other organizations that we're not even aware of that could use our help uh my neighbor to love the picture in the bottom left we had some volunteers go over and install a food garden and also um kind of help with their Landscaping they have a great vision to have a Community Food Forest and give the people um that were used to be homeless now a home and the stability of growing their own food uh we're always happy to come and speak the picture in the bottom right hand corner is uh Sally Jacobson speaking at the Head Start conference that was Statewide and held in craigin uh and she spoke on gardening with youth next slide is just uh more pictures happy volunteers uh Diane cash is the mayor in Crosby and she also works with the youth at Port group homes um and plants flowers with them and guides them on like a uh weekly or bi-weekly basis well we have adults harvesting from their Garden we have patio Garden pickup uh we have the work day as we expand it in the gardens um so yeah thanks for sharing those pictures and then last but not least we're having having an open house tomorrow you're all invited it's at the Northland Arboretum um if you go kind of up the hill just through the gates that's where the community giving area is and the gardens are looking really good um the youth will just be wrapping up their class and they'll be leaving Dan and Jennifer will be having their class that evening and uh we have a plant Cale going on this weekend so we'll have volunteers there working on the plant sale so you'll get a good snippet of a lot of activity in a small space so thank you very much any questions about the program Mr chair I don't have any questions but I just want to thank each of you for what you folks do over there the impact in the community is outstanding when I see 11,000 PBS over the last what three years that's an amazing amount of of uh vegetables that are going out into the community and serving people that might have food insecurity so I appreciate that my challenge to to you folks you met it and exceeded it and I applaud you for that um I just I don't know what to say because I'm restricted by Geographic boundaries and but I think you even go outside of those and I think that the electronic component of your presentations allows you to go to almost anywhere I so I don't know what to challenge you with next other than wait to see be surprised by what you folks do so thank you for all you do I appreciate it I know that the the students that are out there the young people this is a great education component for them but also the adults and just having something to do and I know that food insecurity is a big issue right now and the cost of food in the grocery stores this just takes a helps a little bit with their budgets and that and and I appreciate it very much so thank you thank you Commissioners and administrator um I have one thing um I did make it out there and I think Rosemary did also to that extension that she did out at the at the arrum and to make it handicap accessible because you know right now I have a neighbor that that always had a beautiful garden and now he's gotten to the point where he can't really get down to work on it anymore and I'm I'm thinking like well maybe I'm going to have to figure out a way of raising those beds up for him a little bit because he used to bring me produce over from his garden to my house you know so but thank you guys for all that time you you volunteer and do that um I also notice I think that pead is looking at having some type of community garden I know uh Breezy Point has been talking about putting an area out and actually doing it in their in their plan in their City's plan to take an area and donate and dedicate it just like it Cross Lake had done so I think it'll be it just growing I guess would be the operative word so thank you all for your service I didn't have anything else is there anybody else on the board okay thank you thank you next on the agenda we have the proposed ordinance for the Cannabis regulation Gary Griffin and Chris Pence and Stephanie no before you go if I can just say one quick thing I was trying to average it out here at the senior center we talked about 19,000 hours of volunteer hours and the average wage there or value is about $35 per hour so when I look at your hours it's around $99,000 that you're throwing into this County that with the service that you're providing so just to put a little context to what your volunteers are doing and what you folks are doing so thank you very much thank you good morning good morning Chris Pence Crowing County Land Services environmental services manager Stephanie shook assistant County attorney so what we have before you today is a draft of the of an ordinance that would regulate cannabis within the county uh this would only apply to those areas under our zoning jurisdiction uh so it wouldn't wouldn't apply to any the of the uh municipalities within uh within the county this would actually end up being a a standalone or not a standalone ordinance but it' be part of the landy's ordinance would be just an article with an atlan ordinance because it's really just zoning and we're really talking about is what's the right location you know hours of operation and and and those sorts of things um and so what we're going to do today is just really kind of give you an idea of what uh of what this ordinance looks like uh Stephanie put this together this is based on a Model ordinance that came from the office of Canada management at the state and uh and so it's it's not a real long ordinance but we're just kind of want to walk through a few things on it and there's a couple areas where we just want to make sure we get your feedback and the goal would be to um you know get some feedback from you today and then come back either at the um September committ the whole or October committ the hole with another draft and then um once we um feel like we have a draft that's ready to go for public review then we'd put off a comment and public hearing process and all the you know typical ways that we update ordinances within the county you want to you want to walk through the ordinance a little bit or what we put together that'd be I think that'd be great good morning Commissioners um the ordinance that was in or in the packet is longer than um what we are proposing um we've actually met with um Debbie and um Gary yesterday and kind of short it up and cleaned it up a little bit because there were things that we do not need to do um as Chris indicated this was something that we put through um the model um ordinance so obviously the first thing is that this is required by the statute we have to have something passed by January 1st 2025 we have specific um statutes that give us the authority which is what we go through in this first part where we talk about all the different requirements um the you have already passed something with respect to cannabis use in public places so that is something that we did take out of this and doesn't need to be part of the land use ordinance because that is something that you have already done I think the biggest thing that you will want to take a look at um there's an enforcement statute or portion and that talks about um how we will be enforcing what um exactly is going on within the ordinance so there are two ways and two Avenues we have both what will need to be done by the Sheriff's Office and then what can be done through Land Services Land Services will be the authority since this is a zoning ordinance so the registration requirements will be something that goes through Land Services there are specific definitions and those definitions will be added to the land use ordinance table one thing that we do not have to worry about and that we are going to um remove or not um register businesses is lower potency hemp Edibles that is something that we could be a part of and we could require registration but we do have the ability to say we're not going to many of those businesses are already up and running because of uh the law that was passed um last year the year before so because that's already been done um the thought process is that it doesn't make sense for us to move forward with that I think the biggest thing um that we're going to need some guidance on is where you believe in the land zoning um each of these types of businesses should go through through um additionally there are um fees that will be collected they are um required to be a certain amount or less than a certain amount depending on what the um fee is with the state of Minnesota uh first they have to go through the office of can cannabis management go through a preliminary screen with them and get what would be a proposed license it then comes to the county where it gets review and we look at it with respect to the zoning requirements that we're putting forth on this once that is done it goes back to the office of can Canabis management and then the license through the state is done we can charge a fee for the registration and it depends on the type of business um how that fee would be arranged but that is something that you will have to look at and add to the county fee schedule I do have a proposed um land use table amendment that would show where we're thinking this businesses might best be located and I think I could share that with uh Courtney so I do have a question so when you put this together did you start from scratch or did you borrow it from somebody else and if you borrowed it from Minneapolis in St Paul I'm done listening to it right now because that liberal Bastion down there I don't have any confidence in so it's the lordin that was put out by the office of cannabis management so it come comes directly from the from the office that regulates this so all right uh so if you look you to listen then all right well thank you very much so if you would look this is from uh article 10 of the land use ordinance and here's where we list out all the different uses uh that are you know people can do within the county and then the zoning districts are across the top and then the um down as you look in the different columns a CU is a conditional use permit um a stands for allowed P stands for permitted and if you see a blank it means it's not allowed in that District so um there's basically four types of cannabis uses that we would be looking to uh regulate um one would be the cultivation of it commercially the manufacturing the retail and the wholesale and so um if you would look at what we would have for for somebody to come get a liquor license um where that's allowed that's in the commercial One commercial 2 uh and then the Waterfront commercial and um in the airport district and so we're proposing basically the same similar standards of where you could put a liquor store would be the same as this okay so that that begs a question to me so I know that liquor I used to own liquor stores and I couldn't sell potato chips and snacks and there are they able to sell uh this type of products in liquor stores I don't think anything would stop them from doing that provided they got the registration and license of you know from the State and then it was from our zoning ordinance that it would meet the requirements in the ordinance so I don't believe they could combine them they could have them in the same place yes just if they get the munchies they can't sell they'll have to go somewhere else for the munchies right the food part I don't know what they can sell as far as potato chips but uh that I don't know but uh we can figure that out so in these zonings that you have listed here and you said that we're not going to worry about the people that are already doing it but but now let's find out the people that are already doing it aren't doing it in one of those jurisdictions now what are you going to do so there's two different things this is for cannabis only what's already being done is the lower potency hemp Edibles so you already see signs about Edibles and lower hemp that is what is not going to be covered because that's already out there is that the 5 milligram that they talk about it's a lower amount lower when you say hump when we're talking about the lower lower that's still THC in that lower that you're talking about but it's a f but it has that there's a cap on it yeah available pretty much anywhere they want to buy it it's when you want to go up to the higher potency is when you have to go so the the 32 beer will be available wherever you want to buy it but if you want to buy strong liquor you have to go into the liquor store that's a good way of putting it that's the only way I can figure it out my brain yeah I'd agree I'm sure Paul had that figured out too of course and and what we're proposing uh would be very similar um in that is really you me we could require a conditional use permit for this if we wanted to or require a permit or but really it's they're just getting approval from us for the location um and you know hours of operation those sorts of things are from us so I really don't think there's much to do as far as a conditional use I think it's just you know these are districts that we're going to allow that use to be in they ultimately will get their license from the office of can's management to be able to run um the business at that location so our involvement is pretty minimal it's just more of a where and a when um discussion Mr chair that is basically what our approval or our part in this process is is to basically say where can this where can this type of activity take place that's the only Authority we have and if we did not adopt an ordinance that would say where can this take place or where can we allow this they could issue a license for any cultivation manufacturer retail wholesale whatever it might be at the state level and we would have no say in where that goes so we need to get we are doing here correct why we need to have this adopted before December 31st is so when those licenses happen and the state provides that comment period to say is this permitted in Crowing County when we're saying it's allowed it's basically that it's in the right zoning area of where that can be time manner Place those are basically the only things that we have perveance of here yeah I know and so my my head kind of goes where okay we do that 32 beer versus strong beer we don't know then when when it's allowed we can't say that they're there're selling moonshine you know I mean you know because the potency isn't there once you get past this point there is a there isn't a potency level right now that I know of in the state statute once you're saying you're H you're selling the th product that's above the 5 mgram or whatever it is there is no other cap on top of that that is correct the legislature did not put a cap did not put a on the THC levels y um that is something that they will have to show and it will be part of the labeling um but there will not be anything else and the state regulates that that's not a county reg we don't have but it's something that that that will change how that is I mean it like if I would gone into Paul's liquor store I know I would have been able to buy this proof liquor if I go into one of these establishment I can buy moonshine at you know 200% or or 100 proof or whatever it will be labeled as my understanding is that it will be labeled for example 10% THC 25% THC so there will be labels on the products so that there will be the consumer will have the knowledge as to the potency okay okay um within the um zoning areas we were also able one of the things that is allowed is buffer zones so we did look at the buffer zones and specifically um Cy could you go to section three in the ordance we should probably go to 2.6 first before we jump to that so we're proposing in the ordinance would be that there would be um according to the statute we are allowed to limit the number of retail businesses within the county based on population so we have have to allow at least one per 12,500 and what this 2.6 would say is that once that number is hit then there'll be no more licenses issued and that is so that'll require us to have a um a working relationship with our municipalities because it's a combination between the municipalities and um where our zoning applies in the townships so so that's up to our discretion whether how many licenses we want to have Y correct yeah we have to allow at least one per 12,500 people right so Mr chair quick question on that there's no residency requirement for where who can get that license correct you mean if there were a resident of Minnesota or a resident of cow County for example right I am not aware of any um requirements of there seems to be a concern I was reading in the Minneapolis paper that there's outside people so other parts of the country buying up these licenses is there a concern there that would be out of our hands yeah that isn't so I I the way the process works is kind of like when you go want to go buy a home they have to go get pre-approved first at the state and then once they get that then that comes to and then comes to us for a review from a zoning standpoint and then we have once we make our decision we've got 30 days to give that information back to the state so they can decide if they're going to issue that um license to them or not so would you advise Paul to get all six of those licenses and then that would take care of so there was a process that started back in July that went for about 30 days where people were able to start making a preliminary application to ocm to get that and um and so once those are kind of and that that time's been been closed now they're getting pre-approved the process um and then that would be when we would start so um my understanding at least was if if you hadn't put your name in the hopper during that initial time frame to get your name in for a you're going to have to wait and see how that plays out um first before there'll be other opportunities to apply for a li that actually is a kind of an interesting and it's sorry commiss bring it up sooner it actually is a good question so so could I have could I have applied for all six of those licenses and got those and then I turn around and sell them to Don Corleone or you cannot transfer the licenses okay um Commissioners it is um there using a lottery system uh ocm is doing that what we have listed is a first come first serve so the first from ocm to us would so would be the first six um that would come we have to look at one comes in has brainer has Baxter has niswa Cross Lake Crosby Crosby have they already issued registrations once we hit the six within the County regardless of where they are we're done we're done um so we may we may never see anything Y in in with respect to our zoning districts because most of the businesses at least as we were brainstorming And discussing this are probably going to be in the higher retail areas which are going to be in the cities so quick question so six here is about retail correct this is six cannabis businesses total total so they can be cultivation or any all the all the ones that you have listed there so you can have we could have four retailers and two cultivation and that's it okay so you can't have six retailers six cultivation it's six but that number is up to us it is it's it isn't it's required that one per 12,500 people and you can do more yeah minimum we have to allow at least six that but this we could go we could say we're going to do 15 right right and I think the thing to keep in mind too is that they have this you know they have a micro meso business category too where so you could open a business where you grow and you manufacture and you wholesale and you sell it and that would be you know that would count towards that one because it's all Under One Roof Under One Roof right kind of synonymous with a brewery yeah you know the brewery where they do everything that would be yep what they would um the any of the Cannabis products that would be in Minnesota have to be grown in Minnesota no so it can be exported in from wherever they want it wouldn't have to be cultivated here correct okay so somebody could hit the street running because they didn't have to grow a crop they've grown it someplace else and brought it in well and it's I think it's going to be grown in a pretty controlled environment because they're going to have to manage the potency of that and so I don't think it's going to be a lot of that you know grown outside no it won't be grown outside no it be grown in yeah in buildings and then if you look at section three as Stephanie had mentioned there's um some buffer requirements uh that would be in place so for example um they need to be with can't be within a th000 ft of a school 500 ft of a daycare 500 ft of a residential treatment facility um 500 ft of a public attraction like a park that has a playground or an athletic field uh so there are some of those um you know buffers that they can't be right next to you know certain um certain types of uses so a question on that so how Brainard we're not telling brainer what to do no but when you're saying a th000 ft of a school anything in brainer that's nothing to do with us correct correct just so if there's a school that's in our jurisdiction okay I and typically it's probably not be a school is much more like a church or like a park maybe that sort of a thing probably not a school in our jurisdiction have you had much reach out from other from the cities in our County looking at what our ordinance is going to be asking us at all to see how they're going to do theirs well they can actually delegate authority to us so cities could ask that we um take on that responsibility for the registration if they are not within our zoning District um Mission Township has passed a resolution um but they only they don't do their full zoning um but we have not heard at least that I'm aware of I haven't heard anything from other jurisdictions um the office of cannabis management really put a lot of information out there for townships cities and counties and that's where this model ordinance came from um so the cities probably have something pretty similar if they were using that um as I indicated there's been um webinars and meetings about these things and they've been very open about accepting questions from anyone um you can just send an email and they will go forward with that but brainer I think is the only one at this point that we know that has actually passed one yeah but there is a cap of that six across the whole County the number is countywide not jurisdiction correct right we can we have to have it's not a maximum we have to have a minimum of one per 12,500 people once we hit that we can say we're done so we may only end up with two no jurisdiction in that in our County then can actually have more than that correct okay so we do have the cap in our in our zoning in our Z not in the city's though so I mean if a city wanted to have if brard wanted eight brard could have eight so brard could have eight the rest of the county could have six is that what you're saying no no I didn't think so that's what I was getting to it's so ard's ordinance for instance says that they are capping theirs at a minimum or at a cap of two because they have to allow at least two since they have to have one for every 12,500 however if there are five that are issued other areas within Crowing County since we are putting a cap of six on ours they would only issue one okay yeah that's I just wanted to clarify that right okay that's why we have to be able to keep track um and the other municipalities will also be going with that I was going to yeah so another question so cannabis cultivation and then you get commercial and parenthesis so if somebody down in St Mias Township has 40 acres and they want to I'm assuming cultivate is grow it correct so they can't do it if there if that 40 acres is agricultural they they can't do it there is that so so this is just referring to when you're using for commercial to sell if you're if you're growing it for personal use that's not that's not something this ORD dis regulates but 40 acres would not be personal use pardon me 40 acres wouldn't be personal use there's a there's a limit in the statute as far as how many plants that you can but I mean if they wanted to grow it for commercial for for selling purposes that would have to be commercial land correct and that would be your decision or you could you could allow you could allow it in agricultural I mean you could allow just cultivation in agricultural if you that's your decision as the County Board that was one of the questions that we had today was from that culation standpoint Rosemary just showed me a picture who is it your cousin no I don't think she wants to say oh I'm sorry Garden well hypothetically there was a a picture and it was like a big it was like a big field of you know like somebody's growing it well where would they find commercial property to grow it well what I think Chris has mentioned earlier is that they have to we figure that it'll be in a controlled environment because they have to you mean in like a greenhouse or something correct right regulate temperature light that sort of thing because if it's grown outside your inability to regulate the potency is is more challenging and we live in Minnesota so the growing season is much shorter versus being able to plant it year round but I mean do we I mean it could be an allowed use to to cultivate in the egg District if that's what we want that's a question right now well that's yeah that we weren't but that's a question that we want to that was a question that we were going to ask you okay I mean there's a lot of and and we could allow it it could be an allowed use they would still need to have a license from ocm for the cultivation aspect of it if they were going to do it regardless of where it is permitted to be allowed to be used for that purpose all we're regulating is where can these activities take place so can authorize that would be part of an acceptable use or an allowed use in an agriculture Zone but to be able to cultivate it for retail type purposes not just personal use which as Stephanie mentioned there are restrictions around how much you can grow how many plants correct that you can grow for your own personal use to actually cultivate it would also require them to have a license from ocm for that as well and that would be one of the six that would be one of the six correct correct I'm maybe getting a little ahead on this but who's going to who's going to watch this is it land services or is it the sheriff's department 10 more employees with this don't even go there with me falls under the jurisdiction of the land service department to administer it partnering with the sheriff to help do some of the enforcement pieces that we need them to do but it'll be a land it'll be our responsibility for Land Services to enforce the complaints would come into you or or a question would come into you you would look at it you would have the officer or somebody come out there and and check it or is it just like we would for anything else in our zoning ordinance right from a zoning standpoint from a zoning from a zoning this is one of those that is really a little bit convoluted because we regulating the zoning aspect but the state is the one who is going to be issuing the license so the state is the licensing Authority all we are basically regulating is is an acceptable use within this zoning ordinance under our perveance and if somebody were to call in and say um somebody over on you know such and such street is operating a retail business we'd call ocm right away because they haven't started the process to even begin that the licensure process so it wouldn't even be on us to I mean to inforce it would really be starting with ocm to to get a hold of them and say hey you you can't operate because of you know of those reasons too and or if there's the six or more then we're we're done at that point too so you know our enforcement is going to be you know fairly limited just more of a numbers and then if they start one they have to have the prelimary license from the state to begin the process of even operating a business so and if there's any violations of our zoning ordinance we can suspend the license based on any violations and then that would go to ocm to determine the length of suspension and if it would need to how it would be fixed um the other thing that's been put on the counties is uh compliance checks um and that involves law enforcement um so we'll have to partner with the sheriff's office um so would you see 10 over there and 10 back there employees absolutely oh Lord administrator Erikson I don't think convoluted is a proper word but I don't think we'll use a proper word right improper word right now so that brings up another question I know when I had a liquor store and I had a a tobacco license helped me with this so when I when County had it it was $75 and then Baxter decided to take it over and then it went to $200 roughly in there does that that money 75 and the the 200 that's the money used for the compliance supposedly the compliance check correct so how would would we incorporate that into the fee so the fee that we can charge as Stephanie has mentioned there are limits on what we can charge for a fee half of the amount that the license fee would be up to a certain amount and it's more for a renewal than it is for an initial license so and correct me if I'm wrong Steph but I think we can charge $500 for an initial registration fee basically we can collect a registration fee when an applicant applies to ocm ocm will reach out to the county and say this agency is applying for a retail license does it meet your criteria Chris will check to see that it fits within the zoning of that area they will say yes it fits in that zoning ocm will issue the license and that applicant will have to pay a registration fee to the county of $500 for an initial registration and a thousand it's the initial registration cannot exceed $500 or half of the amount of the state license fee so for example if the state license fee currently is $500 then we can only do 250 but as that increases the maximum we can do is500 right for renewals it's $11,000 or half the amount of the state license so that's actually put we put that actually right into the situ into this portion of the ordinance the other thing is you have to make sure we're not this is a registration fee there's no application so even they app essentially just going we're kind of aunel of aist so goes to ocm then it comes to us we look at the registration once they submit a registration the fee isn't it's non-refundable and does it fit if it fits then it goes back to ocm and they essentially put their stamp of approval on that and the person and they get a license and then we're notified that the license was then that fee that we are collecting that registration fee would be used to help offset the compliance checks that the sheriff's office is going to be required to do can we charge I'm sorry commissioner can we charge 5% on that for process to state I'm sure we can probably look at that so then that begs the question I know that our great Chief Deputy Andy Bradley is always looking for money to help with his budget or the sheriff's budget so when Gary Gary collects that fee at Land Services would Andy be over there asking for his cut well Andy probably wouldn't be standing there with his hand out for it but the way that the fee would be built into our uh accounting system it would automatically associate some of that fee to the Sheriff's Office yes so Gary I'm sry like our tobacco licenses for um keep in mind we're talking a maximum of six in croing county and keep in mind that if it's within a city if the license is actually within the city we don't worry about the registration it's not going to be the we are not going to get the registration fee and we wouldn't be responsible for the compliance checks unless the sheriff's office is already responding for for uh law enforcement in that jurisdiction so who figures out what the compliance check is it in here yes okay so is it kind of the same as cigarettes where you you you you go get your 14year old kid and you send them in there and try to trick them into yep well they're requiring the person to be at least 17 but younger than 21 which I think and that's each and it's not Rand I mean it's each business will have it every single year so it wouldn't be oh we're going to skip a year and we may not get a compliance check every year I don't think much of that anyway because I think it's just trying to trick somebody and I just don't y in TR you're an attorney isn't that a trapment when you go and try to trick a business you don't have to answer that you have to answer that you're not under old here really go down the rabbit hole on that but yeah so the other the other piece is just jumping over to uh the last page hours of operation um we'd be looking at um the hours of being 10:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m. would be the hours of operation that they'd be limited to being open to so Chris then what I said is like let's say a a liquor store puts a section and they have this stuff in there and they open at 8:00 then they wouldn't be able to open that section until right that okay I what where where do you where do you come up with those hours what why those are the mandated minimums for from in the the statute yeah okay uh Chris or or Stephanie does this mean there could be multiple enforcement policies if if those that the County May manage operate under this but the cities can set their own no the standard would be the same for the compliance for enforement yeah it just matter it's just a matter who does if it's in the city of brainer then the their police department will do the compliance check yeah right and let's say if this like the City of Baxter hasn't done one yet if the City of Baxter says we don't want a part of this we're going to delegate authority to Crowing County then they have to pass that and then that would come through to us so anything within the City of Baxter would then have to follow our land use ordinance requirements and do our fees if they delegate the authority so they have the ability to do that but they're not required to okay and I doubt they would I think they'll want to keep that control local so so in the case of a compliance check you go and check it the person [Music] failed the severity of that failure is loss of license do we have that listed do we say you get one we get one that's and that's determined on those six licenses or whatever that's determined by us and that would be an ocm issue if there was a violation that is an ocm issue that is not us to decide what the we could suspend the license immediately but it would then go to ocm because we would have to notify them but if there was a compliance check where we where law enforcement said they failed um we can immediately suspend the license and then ocm takes care would take over and then they could make the determination and then if it comes back and we said you know the county could reinstate the license if we deemed that there had been compliance for other things but with a li with a compliance issue that's going to all be on ocm convoluted I don't like that word but I can't use the other one so just just so everybody knows o we keep saying ocm ocm ocm office of cannabis management correct okay yep and so I I just want to Circle back to the land use districts again just to I didn't get clear Direction on the cultivation if we want that to be allowed use in the agricultural zoning I guess it doesn't make any difference to me I guess I just think about that you know other than for there's I've always been under the impression that there's so many uses for cannabis I mean for for cannabis rope you can make rope that's more that's hemp hemp H okay what's the difference I guess I don't the potency yeah oh oh okay okay could be stronger rope it doesn't work Paul it doesn't work that way that that was funny but uh you know I I think because pretty much it's known if you do the homework in what other states have done it is pretty much a cultivated product inside of a controlled environment I mean if somebody wants to have their eight plants or whatever it is for their own use in an agriculture in their back Garden you know I mean that's that's something I don't think it's in our and wheel and that those are and if a private citizen um grow more than what the statute allows that is a criminal issue yeah y that is not that's not a licensing issue it's not it's not covered under this or ocm actually correct if if someone is cultivating in the backyard and we've prosecuted people for that um you know if they've got I think they're allowed six plants so if they have you know a garden of 40 plants then that would be looked at on the criminal because it they wouldn't have a license they had a license yeah they're going to start growing Oriental poppies and stuff like that that's a criminal issue it doesn't follow any other things yeah given the fact that the cultivating license is I think $30,000 a year for the license you probably don't see a lot of folks who are taking risks with an open environment that's not controlled with how they are able to grow but then on that let's say somebody has a giant greenhouse and they decide that they're in and they live in same Township and they decide they want to do the Cannabis cultivation they can't do that because it's not commercial unless we say it's allowed in that District y so this is the only this is the only holds we have this is the only controls we actually have as a County on it correct yeah and I I could see somebody wanting to cultivate you know that's not I mean do we really want maybe we don't want cultivation as much maybe in a C1 commercial area maybe that would make more sense to be agriculture cuz that's really not a you know we want that more retail and Commercial based and not maybe cultivation based but it's a small it's so small right and I think you know probably the meso businesses are going to be those that are end up in larger areas I don't know I mean it's it's obviously up to you but the meso business like we talked about a brewery so would that be something that would go in agricultural where they cultivate do everything um like your the farm wiy yeah is uh is the is it eight plants that you can grow for your personal use I believe it's six I think is that per person or is that per household or per so you had six for the husband six for the wife six for kind of how does that work I believe it's six per person but it has to be adults over the age of legal y so okay so if you have 10 college kids living in the same but that's not my app that's I'm not handling criminal cases anymore so I believe it is six though restricted per that is six mature and it's mature yes flowers So based on the information you heard from Chris and Stephanie today are there any changes you would like to see to the number of licenses we would allow or to the allowed zoning districts of where this would be at or to the hours of operation any of the things that you heard that you have some perveance of if not then we will refine and come back to you with a um updated draft for you to review and then we'll go through that process as Chris outlined and then we'll have we'll have public input if somebody thinks we'll public hearing common periods all that sort of thing yeah yep and correct me if I'm wrong Chris but the public hearing piece that would all be done through the Planning Commission correct yep since there'll be an amendment to the to the zoning go to the plan commission yep the plan W public heing in front of you so justful to grow up to eight C maximum four being mature in Minnesota eight okay eight and four thought it was two I think it's I know I know in a year or two years down the road I'm sure it'll be come back to be Revisited our ordinances but this is at least something to start with and a pretty solid base to start on so thank you so anything else from the board thank you I think I'll come up with that word yet I think next we have on our agenda we have the uh tax wer process with Gary Griffin I guess we have Jessica yes okay right good morning Commissioners uh we have before you uh an update on the new tax forfeiture sale process I'm sure you've heard a lot about it but we just kind of wanted to give you a high level show you how it's been done in the past what the changes are and then um what we think it's going to look like going forward uh so we did add one page to the packet that I originally submitted we added kind of our old process so it's showing you you know here's the steps the tax has become delinquent um then they go through a Redemption period if they do not redeem then it becomes forfeited we get our approvals or denials from the cities or townships or DNR and then we sell the property it goes into our tax forfeited fund and it gets a portioned out every year that's basically the old process um now we have kind of two new processes depending on what bucket they're in uh so most of our properties are now in three buckets so we have a pre 2016 so anything forfeited before 2016 uh we'll follow those old rules like on that first page anything that forfeited between 2016 and 2023 are what's in our good faith effort sale is what we're calling it the state's calling it um and we have to make a good faith effort every year to sell these properties at the estimated market value until June 30th of 2029 um when we looked at this we have about 170 give or take a few uh Parcels that are in this 2016 to 2023 forfeiture I did include a map with your packet today that shows by commissioner District how many there are in each district it does not add up to about that 170 because there is quite a few undivided interest Parcels so those we didn't pick and pull out because it's really one parcel is just an interest in that parcel so it's just a highle quick view of how many are in each district uh so each year we have to make good faith effort to sell these properties and then report our efforts to MMB what we sold what we didn't sell and remit 75% of that sale to the state the county gets to keep 25% of that up until 2027 after 2027 and until 2029 we remit 85% of that sale proceeds to the state and we keep 25% after 2029 if we still have any of these forfeitures in our possession then we revert back to the old process of uh selling and keeping the full funds in our possession um the new forfeiture process as you see below is basically that first page plus everything in Green in that next flow chart is all the new processes so everything will forfeit like it did before it'll go delinquent uh we just have to include some more information in that letter that we send out letting people know that they're about to Forfeit giving them uh giving them a heads up that if it does forfeit and it does sell they may be entitled to a claim on those proceeds uh then it the Redemption period ends if they do not redeem it the property forfeits and then here's where a whole bunch of new processes come in where we have to notify the DNR within 30 days of every property that forfeits or most properties give the DNR a chance to withdraw any from sale and initiate a condemnation proceeding if they do not withdraw them we send notice to all interested parties that that mineral interest if there wasn't he was sold to the state for $50 so before there was no funding exchange there there was no $50 um so we have to send a letter letting him know that the DNR has purchased that for $50 then those interested parties can challenge that value if they think the mineral is worth more than $50 they can challenge that and then we offer the property for sale within 6 months of when the property forfeited or when it vacated so if it was a home and someone lived there and it took us a few months to get them to um vacate the premises then we have that six months starts from the date they vacate the home um so we offer it for sale within 6 months if it does not sell and that's at the estimated Market value if it does not sell within 30 days we then reduce the off or the sale price to the minimum bid and the minimum bid is the pass due taxes any fees interest publication fees we have staff time um it's kind of left vague on like the fees that we can charge but it's basically our staff time Publications um and then it's offered at that minimum bid and then if it does sell we keep keep that minimum bid same with if it sells at the estimated market value all the county can keep is a minimum bid and then the Surplus is what the previous owners have that right to claim um once the property sells we notify those interested parties again of any surplus they have 6 months to make a claim and then they submit that claim and then we verify it's valid and then we pay out that Surplus or we can initiate a court action to determine rights to Surplus so if there's multiple owners things like that we goes through a court action to determine who gets what percentage and then if it does not sell it just goes back into those old tax forfeiture processes so just some examples of kind of how the money flows with the old the current process or the previous process so the County Board would set the sale price for the public auction the tract is offered at public auction or if not sold it would be available over the counter for sale let's say the track sells for over the counter for $80,000 the county would receive $80,000 towards that tax forfeiture fund under that middle bucket the good faith effort bucket of 2016 to 23 forfeited properties we have to make a good faith effort to sell those by June of 20129 at estimated market value for if the forfeited home were to sell for for $80,000 before June 30th of 2027 the state would get 75% of that money so $60,000 and the county would get 20,000 or 25% of that money and then on the new process moving forward so any um properties that forfeit in 2024 or forward um we'll say the home for that forfeited was has an SMA market value of 120,000 they don't redeem it we must first put it up at public auction within 6 months at that estimated market value if and leave it up for 30 days if it does not sell within that 30 days then it goes back to public auction at minimum bid which would be those costs such as the taxes special assessments and our fees um in this scenario the minimum bid let's say is $15,000 a bidder wins this at auction for $80,000 then we have to we would receive that 15,000 to the tax forfeiture fund but the additional proceeds from that sale would have to be offered to the interested parties the prior owners to make a claim against that and if they were to make a claim they would receive that money of $65,000 they have to make a claim they have to be a own part I mean let's say it's somebody who who died left Noah estate whatever who is the previous who nobody can make a claim on it can they there could be an interested party such as a children that could make a claim against that even though they've never owned the property and it's not in their name correct who determines that then um if there's a question on that then that would go to the courts to make that final determination okay and if they don't have anybody then where does that money go then we get to keep that money we get to keep that and that's for after the 24 that's process after 24 in 23 it's all all spelled out by the the new state statute that's been done correct and and a question so this was all due to of course our our lovely Judicial System again because of this right isn't that what happened oh uh oh we got somebody who represents that coming to the podium it was the US Supreme Court who made the determination so as just a farm boy sit here I just looked up forfeit means that you have lost or surrendered your property because you didn't so once you've lost it or surrendered it I just don't know how you can go back and and collect money it just doesn't make any sense to me because you've surrendered that property commissioner cing the the way the easiest way for me to describe it is they essentially look looked at it almost like a condemnation or a taking that the property is being taken and so that they should be entitled to anything that they put into the property um which would be the equity um increased value by market though it's not really a basis it's the yeah it's estimated market value which is determined by the county um and the case that went up to the US Supreme Court was um a woman who had a condominium that went tax forfeit um she did not redeem the property and I believe she owed approximately 10 or $15,000 in back taxes it was then sold by the county for I think $80,000 and she didn't get anything and so she sued saying well you only lost $155,000 that was my property I should get the rest of that as a surplus um and that's where the US Supreme Court found in her favor and said that what the what the state of Minnesota has been doing um is illegal and so that's where all of this has come through the last year with the new state statutes that have come in with the class action that has been settled um that the state appropriated the $109 million to settle all of the things which is what they're talking about with the um middle 20 2016 to 2023 properties and the good faith efforts um so could we Stephanie as a county because they're turning us into a real real estate person as a seller couldn't we take the seller's fee out of that whatever portion they should get even though I disagree with any of it but that's beside the point um besides our 15,000 that you're identifying is the taxes couldn't we do that so there was um there had been a proposal at the legislature for a 5% fee that the county would claim which would be similar to a Real's fee um instead of that I can't remember the exact wording but it's costs and it's vague um but the examples that have been used are publication costs staff time um we have to be able to show that it was for this specific property we never charged for those things previously that was something that was essentially part of doing business with Land Services um but now we can assess if we have six properties that have to be uh go that go through publication that can be a portioned and assessed to that property as cost that we actually had I suspect that there are going to be a lot of questions and a lot of um things that go through this process and I can anticipate that we're going to see changes um within the next I would expect even next session that there will be tweaks to this because this was passed we needed to get the um appropriation and there will be continual changes and I've been working with Jessica and Mac on this and one more follow-up question the sale example from between 2016 and 2023 that bucket the state gets to keep 75% or 60,000 of that $80,000 sale why that's because they appropriated the $19 million $9 million back is what they're going and so that is their going to go away at some point and we could still have some of these sales going past the and that's why they they limited it to the 2029 so if it doesn't sell if the property that was forfeited in that 7-year period of time does not sell by 2029 then that money will come back to the county but we have to make good faith efforts to sell that um and there are going to be properties that have probably been out there for quite some time and nobody has purchased and they'll continue to be out there um unsold you know until someone decides that that they want to purchase those but that's the bucket that 2016 to 2023 that is that class action part of the litigation that occurred and that was the agreement for the look back period And so that we actually aren't administering the surpluses and things of that sort that is all being done through a settlement and so we just had to provide a list of all the properties that had been forfeited during that period of time whether there was a sale or not and they can make a claim immediately that's why there are two different ways that these things are going to be administered now moving forward with these pre 2016 with the 2016 to 2023 and then anything that forfeits from here on out that's why we have these different processes that have to be followed um basically those folks whose property forfeited during that look back period or 2016 to 2023 they don't have to wait for the property to sell to make their claim they can make their claim through the settlement claim that Stephanie was talking about they can get their Equity that's why we have a short period of time over the next four years three four years to try to divest ourselves of those properties to pay back that settlement amount but they can get their settlement I mean that property even though it hasn't sold yet correct even though it hasn't sold it's sitting out there in foreclosure they can get that net and that is through this that's to the state of Minnesota that's where that $109 million was appropriated because all of the counties put together lists of the properties that had sold as well as what the um EMV was on all of those and so that was how the money and the number was determined on that $109 million obviously I don't know the exact numbers Crowing County is um we're pretty active when it comes to the sale of tax forfeited properties how many do we have in our 2016 to 23 Q as far as property it's going to I mean you have already done that homework right yeah it's about 160 and that's what's shown on that map um like I said these numbers don't add up to that 160 because of those undivided interest Parcels um but it's right around like and they would be able to apply for those people that are in that situation can apply for the state to get their settlement to get their settlement the that what we've estimated market value of that at less whatever they all there's a formula we do not have to do anything there's actually a formula that's involved it does include the estimated market value um but I don't remember the exact numbers because it's not something that we have to do on a county level but had the appropriation not happened and had this they could all individually sue us we would then have to go through and deal with you know there's 170 even if there was a 10,000 you know Surplus that would have been $170,000 that the county had to come so they get the Surplus we get the money back that's owed supposedly in the back taxes that property now is no longer foreclosed well there's different between foreclosure and forfeiture forfeiture it is forfeited once we once it's forfeited if they get the Surplus it's still forfeited who owns the property then the state of Minnesota and and then the county manages it okay okay and if it's sold if it gets sold that new person gets that money okay the new if it's sold the sorry if it forfeits the DNR doesn't want it it goes to auction somebody purchases it at estimated market value then we take our cut any cost that we have and then the property goes to the new owner whoever bought it the Surplus goes to the previous owner and if there's issues like let's say there's three people did you say that once they value that property they can apply for that money now that's only during that 2016 2023 and then then what happens with that those properties they've applied for it they've got their money out of it because the state reimbursed them did they actually lose that property yes so they've already lost the property who and who owns that property at this time it's still forfeited it depends if it's been sold the new owner has it if it's another another one of those words I got to come up with I just sent a message to Wikipedia and said you need to change the definition of forfeited because apparently it's not forfeited so I CH I the the only other thing I see here is on some of these because it's it's happened in the jurisdiction I served before here you know there was a property that went and the city wanted to get that property to add on to its Park property because it was next to its Park property in this situation it has to be offered to the DNR and it doesn't allow for a city or a jurisdiction to put their name on it correct correct okay only after auction yeah huh what's that after auction so that's one of our one of the talking points we have is there's like the H or cities have in the past reached out to us and said hey we'd like this property and depending on what they're using it for we're able to sell it at a reduced cost to use for schools Parts low income housing now we are not able to do that it needs to go to auction first at estimated market value then reduce to minimum bid then if it doesn't sell then we can do H city of peat City but that's only in the 2016 to 2023 group and that's for on ongoing after that correct okay okay did state of Minnesota Define what good faith effort is no really great I think we got some opportunity here looks like we don't need any new people in Land Services thank god oh um and then I just included a chart here to kind of show you I know it looks pretty bad because we've had pretty large a portion mins which is funds that from these tax forfeited sales in our Timber sale Revenue which this does not affect our Timber sale Revenue we're we should still receive approximately the same amount as we have been and that's not included in any of this um but our apportionment has been anywhere from 500,000 to just over a million dollars which some of that goes into the county general fund our Recreation fund to the city schools um our Capital project fund with this we've reduced a lot of expenses out of our tax forfeiture fund just to be about right in line with what we expect our Revenue to be because as you saw most of this money is going to go to the state we're going to have very little Revenue um coming into this fund so we're not expecting an apportionment next year very little is what we're planning for once we see we get a year under our belt 2026 we might be able to better estimate but again we don't know what's going to sell we don't know who's going to make a claim we also don't know because of the timelines of when the sales have to happen some of those uh claims they have six months to make a claim and if it has to go to court well that might roll over another year and it might so it's really an unknown right now so we're just kind of planning for the worst and hoping for the best here with really a lot of unknowns still so of of the the 37 that are in my district do we are we required to reach out to those people or do they just have to come in on their own and make a claim so the 37 that are listed those are the properties that are in the class action which is the 2016 to 2023 so that is not something that we have to deal with at all with respect to Surplus or notification that is all being done through the settlement and through a company that has been um retained to handle all of that the only thing the county has to do is make the good faith effort to sell the properties and then the division of the the 7525 good faith effort to sell them so that that money gets replenished into the fund correct so those 37 properties somebody's going to reach out to those correct oh yeah yes and yeah the state does that through that settlement that isn't anything that we're required to do and every year when we have our auctions we always it's called 120t radius letter is what we call it we send a letter to every property owner within 120 ft of a parcel that is going up for auction so that they know and sometimes that alerts a neighboring homeowner like I didn't know that was tax forfeited I do want to buy that I had no idea so they do get that letter from US it has nothing to do with the Surplus it's just alerting them that hey this is going up for sale okay I I don't want to prolong this well why not let's go for it of the 37 in my district how many uh do we still own or are they are they long gone sold to a private somebody else do you know that these 37 yeah are ones that have not sold these are what's going to go up for Action here hopefully by the end of September is our goal okay which it's the ones that have sold already that fall under that window that could be a challenge or they're already done all of them anything all of them from 20146 to 2023 that all goes yeah through the state we don't have anything the only thing is that good faith effort to sell the remaining properties that are still under forfeit I I just I'm I I don't again I won't try to understand what the state's done there but it says until 27 and 85% from 28 to 29 so there's an incentive for us to sell that as soon as possible that's that's the that's our it's going to cost us 10% more if we liquidate them after that date correct or we we'd get 10% less of whatever that proceed we would get right okay anybody else have any questions for experts here totally frustrated we Shar your frustration good we do have a few more things um we wanted to kind of get your thoughts on um so one thing that we'd like to look at with this is to move to online auctions for the sale of these tracks um part of the reasoning for that is because there's going to likely be more sales throughout the year that for example any of the new process they have to go out for auction at estimated market value and then if they don't sell it estimated market value in 30 days they have to go back up for auction at minimum bid so right there there's an additional auction right off the bat okay so so that's okay so no no he's getting excited yeah so well none of us can buy I know I know Commissioners can't but so so if it's hypothetically if it's 80,000 and it doesn't sell then it goes back to minimum which minimum would be the taxes of whatever the taxes are if if it's 16,000 something that's where the starting point then correct and it can get bit up from there but that would be the the starting point at that point it would be assessments if it's in a city and it has assessments on it that's also included in on that correct so online auction so the auction is just like you know for from 9: until noon but then people can be online and do it or or how does that mean what does that mean it would be the online auction like she said the first chunk it would be on there for 30 days available for 30 days and then it would be dropped down to minimum bid for 30 days and then we could go to our oh I think I see like sometime they sell a car and it keeps you know I bid 13,000 and the next guy bids 14,000 and and then it eventually there's a it stops at a certain time right right and you would be looking to use the same Public Surplus auction site the highway department does you could you could look to buy a piece of property you could look to buy an old vehicle you could look to buy any of the forfeited property that the Sheriff's Office sells we would utilize that same Crowing County Public Surplus site to sell all of these items okay wow and there's multiple other counties like St Louis County MAAC Swift there's a few handful of others as well that have already been using that site to do this to do that already prior to this okay so there is a pattern out there that we can adopt or look at and I believe you will start to see more counties doing that just given some of the timelines Michelle was talking about where it has to be offered for a 30-day period Then you have to offer it again think of the Manpower and the hours gut go into holding an inperson auction once or twice a year now if you're doing this multiple times because of what that forfeiture timeline looks like this is a a much more effective plus it's going to expand your reach to potentially maximize whatever opportunities there are so the cost of the auctioning there would that come out of the proceeds there would be no cost to us there would be a 5% buyer premium that the buyer would pay okay and that pays for all the auction supp auction stuff okay yeah so this is the way we would go forward with it now Gary wouldn't sit there with his gavel and say sold and no more of that okay so then like the 40 uh that's left out by the school farm that would go on and be the same thing we wouldn't or wouldn't that be the same thing that's before that one pre 2016 go to online auction that bill keep selling it the same way we did with something like that correct we can do online or we can do a traditional if we want okay okay um with that of course additionally if a parcel forfeits and we need time for that person to move out of the home that would ALS we still have to follow the timelines of it has to be sold within six months so we could have additional properties that go up for sale at different times maybe one or two alone that would have to go up for sale at some different times um there could be more expense involved of course with having just the staff time involved with managing um those timelines that are involved and reaching out to taxpayers to notify them if something's hold and if there's a surplus on the new process moving forward that is our responsibility to reach out to them and let them know that there is a potential Surplus for them to claim and these are only properties that the county actually holds a title on through forfeiture correct okay yep not somebody who's for closing on a house or a loan company right we're not involved in any of that no okay um as we said mentioned earlier the properties would not be easily available for local jurisdictions until it got through the auction process and didn't sell then that would make it available at that time um the other thing with these processes cash is king um we need those funds available to be able to give to the state to be able to have that Surplus available to in case they the property owner does claim that so there really wouldn't be any options for contracts on sales moving forward um you know and we're hoping that to kind of move that forward across the board would be the hope so that administratively we're treating all of our sales the same and not having contracts as an available option for purchase so no more so it isn't where you can come in and say put what was it 10% down or 20% down 15 15% down and then the county would Finance you for 10 % we got to eliminate those on 2016 forward all on all all of them we would like to make standard okay okay yeah yeah y y y so we would allow those that obviously currently have a contract we have about 126 of those to finish out their contracts but we would not allow contracts on any new purchases okay um and on that with repurchases we're also looking at keeping those as not allowing contracts on those potentially on a Case by case basis um just to keep everything consistent like mac was saying across the board so we're not is this a contract is this not when did it forfeit we just want everything cash could we get to a point on one of these where where the county wants that property back because it adjoins other property and then the the county would purchase it we could um put in a conservation status but it still has to go through that two aution thing first go through all the processes but we get down to the end and the county would like to have that in there 105,000 Acres or something like that okay what else questions or concerns for Jessica or Michelle no everybody everybody on board with the concept of the online auction yep and is everybody on board with the concept of no contracts for everything moving forward yes yes yep got what you needed great thank you thank you thank you very much for your presentation I did you're famous Thomas that's a kick good morning good morning Tom believe it's still morning yep so here today to talk about a easement request um this easement request is a little bit different than other ones that we've received in the past and we'll kind of get into that a little bit but um we received notification from a realtor and a potential future owner back in June July that the easement that was on the property wasn't sufficient enough for them to close and so there's a little bit of history on this um piece here so this is in uh the tax Warfare properties in Gail Lake Township p number is 641 0533 um you can see up on the map here um it is listed as TF property this is almost a 40 acre chunk um on CL Road and then woodpecker Trail uh woodpecker Trail is a pretty wellestablished private road nicely graveled and so in 1996 um properties a b and c here was one chunk of private property and the County Board granted an easement to a landowner um between 96 and 2005 the property was split in half between parcel a and then parcel B and C were together at that time um the easement the County Board granted another easement uh in 2005 like I said to the um properties that were listed as B and C and when we granted both of those easements they were listed to an individual land owner they didn't run with the property and so then here recently um B and C were split and C was sold and so the title company is claiming that they don't have technically legal access to close on the sale and so we were approached um and asked if we could just update the easement um for a Kyle Rogers and the benefiting property um let it as C there so this one's a little bit different in that normally we would come to you and ask you know to give the thumbs up or not um for the landowner to move forward to complete their survey and then come back with a drafted easement the survey has already been done it was done twice and so we already have that on file um Stephanie has been working hard to um go through that easement to make sure that um this time it's going to run with the property and not with the owner so that we don't have to come back and and do this once more for property listed to see there so a little bit different um but still asking uh for your comments concerns questions and then um hopefully potential approval at the next County board meeting just oops go ahead any cost that's related to this Stephanie's cost or or any uh redoing the deed and everything they're they're paying for that we're not paying for that the County's not paying the taxpayers are not paying for that that the um normally when we present an easement you know there's certain certain fees that we charge um because they're you know taking a piece of the county property that's already been done but if there was fees that um you wanted to impose as part of this so like the recording fee that type of stuff will all be done by the landowner um but if there's any fees Associated that you guys would like to charge that's something you could handle them all good morning the answer is really no other than the recording fee we haven't charged back any of our administrative costs in a situation like this um why good question I don't know I mean what do you think I think before when the the county board's um you know uh point was to put these easements with people instead of property that was probably I don't know that was the the best choice because people move on they pass away and then we have these issues right we're just trying to to correct something that uh we did in the past so how many of those do we have I mean I you know the little bit of work I've done with land it's usually you'd like the easement to be on the land so it doesn't matter who the owner is do we have a lot of easements that we have on County properties that are just to the person I um can only make an assumption uh board chair I came in 2009 and this was the practice when I started was to give easements to people and it wasn't until was probably 2011 we got you know the County Attorney to agree that we're going to start doing it to the land so that we don't have these types of issues so we might have some coming up down the road and and all the proper stuff has been done for the easen it was just the easen instead of went to a name instead of to a property ID correct and so then we instead of going out and searching for all those uh we let folks come to us if they uh incumber a issue with their title so in essence just where my point is everybody all the other taxpayers are paying for this you know for staff time for the county attorney's office and I I don't know it just don't it don't meet the smell test for me I mean I think there are a couple of things to consider number one these are going to be random and hit or miss they're they're not something you're going to see on a regular basis it's going to come up when a property wants to transfer when you're selling ownership or transferring ownership of a property you're going to find find a situation where you have an easement that is specific to a name versus to a a property or to a parcel number so to be able to know what the implication is going to be in the long term to commissioner luy's Point hard to tell it is it is going to be difficult to see what that would be number two is how do you establish the fee for what this will be typically for us to charge a fee you need to have it in your fee schedule SCH or you need to have statutory authority to be able to charge a fee for a particular service there is some portion of the fact that you already are paying your taxes to cover that cost of what's associated with doing the business of the job so where is the authorization to establish the fee for this purpose now that does not mean that you couldn't if you wanted to establish a fee for what uh transfer of an easement maybe would be the way of stating that you could determine what the applicable fee would be based on the estimated amount of time that one would take you could establish that as part of your fee schedule and it would be something that could then be charged in the future if if I could Mr chair um when we looked at these and um thinking about charging or not one of the um considerations I I've looked at is if we don't do it what kind of issues do we have with parcel C from a taxation standpoint that now that they have no legal access other than by air um I I supp water they have access by water if there's if there's a legal water water water I don't know that there's an access on that I guess they could walk through the tax for to get to Little Lake but anyways yes and uh just trying to say well that increases the value and helps with the the property tax side of things too so I'm not saying that's 100% right or wrong I'm just saying those are some of the considerations charge or not charge and the reason it was that we're here today is because the best practices that we did previous to this was to give easements to names and not to property IDs that is correct so it was our best practices back then that said that's what we're doing we're changing those now and saying now you need to pay for our change in doing doing our procedure right I would yeah I I don't unless you could really delineate the amount of money that you're actually doing I don't know if it's worth the the time and effort to put it in the fee schedule cuz then that fee schedule you're going to have to show that you use that St that amount of staff time to do that in all these yeah I no i' make it happen I think so if there's no other questions um this will be on consent if that's okay for next week or would you like to see it in the packet in the full I'm I'm okay with just getting it getting it taken care for those people okay thank you for your time thank [Music] you and now my favorite [Laughter] thing the comprehensive plan good morning again I don't know if that's the the favorite thing or the favorite item on the agenda being the last is what I'm guessing so um well we're all awake yet so that's good so I figured this should only take me about an hour and a half to go through so I think we'll be fine I think uh you know I don't if we need a break beforehand or not but uh I was wondering if we should have a break beforehand I don't know so just to this is uh just one last uh visit with you about the comprehensive Plan before the plan is for to go to the regular board meeting uh a week from today and requesting approval um I was here back chat with you back in July and had given you a little bit of update on the comments we had received at that point we had received about six comments and then after that to the end of the comment period end up receiving about another probably 70ish I suppose we end up with 82 comments total um the last comments that we received were were a lot on AIS and concerns that there weren't enough um AIS um comments that were in the plan and so we did add a little bit of language around the one was one plan section because all those have AIS discussions and all those plans so we we we brought that out a little bit to to clarify that um and then we also um after the because then we had a public hearing um back at the Planning Commission meeting in July and the Planning Commission did recommend um uh approval of the plan as it was submitted uh but they we did add a little bit of language under if you remember in the plan and generally put in Trends and so we did add a trend for aquatic invas species to just talk about um some of the opportunities and issues that AIS do pose within the county um didn't have any um impact or any changes over the policy in there but just talked about the uh the trends that we're seeing with that and what type of a threat it would be to the Water Resources in the county um the other change that we made was just a clarification for uh for high Department about the uh lost sales tax we just had a little bit of just a couple couple um brief changes to that and then um there's also a brief change that uh um when you get back into Again part of the Transportation piece about some of the trends um instead of being an assessment the term we use was to be evaluate so um but otherwise the plan is in you know pretty much what we've been talking about every month for the last six months about all the items and all that we've chatted and so um the interesting part about doing a um account plan for a county is that we actually have to adopt an ordinance to implement our comprehensive plan which is a little odd um but that's what so that's what be before you at the meeting um um next Tuesday would be to do that and uh and so there'll be a resolution and a uh then an ordinance to adopt the comprehensive plan and so the resolution will have two components one would be to um adopt to approve the ordinance that adopts the county comprehensive plan and then second would be to um adopt the future land use map that's in the comprehensive plan as a current land use map and would be effective upon publication as we've discussed before and then the third component would be that that um for those uh citizens that had any changes to their individual property based on the update to the land use map would have a 12month window to come in and um be able to apply to the Planning Commission at no cost and and have their individual parel looked at we did that same thing back in 2011 we made that last update and we had um some folks come in that wanted to discuss their um specific you know zoning on their property so um I think we're almost there we're right we're just coming to the Finish Line I'd be happy to answer any questions that you might have or where we're at with the process Mr chair if I might I've looked over the comp plan and I'm very impressed with it because what I really appreciate is you looked at some Trends and the opportunities and potential issues that are out there that will be coming I don't remember seeing that in the previous comp plan that was no developed so I think this is a very good 30,000 ft look at at our County and where it'll be going in the next number of years so I appreciate this I think you've done a great job and with the assist assistance of uh Balton and mink yes I think it's it's just a great document so thank you I appreciate that thank you I I thought when we were talking about it we were talking about a 20,000 foot and rather than 30 well he moved it up another Tet a little more okay the ground's coming up to meet us we're not we're not flying any lower right and it it's like any of these things you know like like some Great Sage says you know it's really hard to predict the future because it hasn't happened yet but you know I well that some Sage I don't know who it was some guy said that and uh but I mean and that's the same thing when we go back and look at look at where we were at from our the old plan we had to you read that one and you go holy mackerel nobody ever thought they would be doing this nobody ever thought this was going to happen nobody you know you didn't plan for that in the plan and so we need to keep it we need to keep it more of a living document I would like to see us you know maybe five years down the road maybe take a little bit of a look at it and say how do how are we doing so far we do that on our on our Watershed plants you know we set those in place for a long time and we come back every year I think and revisit a little bit I know that's what Land Services does when they're looking at ordinances you're tweaking them as we go along so um but um yeah I think it's a it's it's it's well written and it's uh I was questioning the fact that we would have an outside service helping us with it and not do it inhouse but I was wrong this they did a really nice job yeah Bolton bank did a great job they they were really a definite posi of addition to the process for sure yep yep so question Chris you'll see this on your agenda then on Tuesday for approval of or adoption of the ordinance without the and the land use map and the land use map yep okay and look at that it didn't even take me an hour what a deal thank you thanks Chris thank you Chris anything else nothing on the agenda we're done we have today yep okay we're