##VIDEO ID:VFXWS3NpSXo## all right we'll get this uh special city council meeting of the city of International Falls to order uh first thing on the agenda is uh um the roll call please note that all uh members are present first item is uh under new business this ended up uh being added in today just because of a um uh emergency situation obviously uh we had a um a report repair or uh remove order um issued for the property at 1020 9th Street uh with one of the the last uh big rains that we had it ended up caving in the uh the basement or the foundation to the building um the family that was there has been removed from the the property I'll hand this over to uh attorney Nelson uh thank you um so this one took quite a bit of research for me so this 1029 Street property the owners of it are actually in LLC out of Colorado if you remember we had to serve them by publication on this one um so first day of publication was um going off memory I believe August 23rd service is completed 21 days after that the they have 21 days to answer technically they have 60 days to repair it because we originally did the 60 days as a reasonable amount of time to correct the issue so going back looking through all of this we can technically file that motion a week from Friday Friday October 4th we can file that motion get it into the court system get the judge to approve the tear down even though that 60 days hasn't lapsed alternatively you can do an emergency order that gives them a shorter period of time um anything reasonable which in this particular case I mean there isn't really a reasonable amount of time to give them because the building may come down um but anyway so you could do a an emergency order with a shorter period of time than the 60 days the problem being we can't get them served we've tried serving them before um their LLC registered address um on the Secretary of State website in the state that they are um incorporated or they have their business filed under isn't actually a physical address where we can find them so we had to certifi publication last time and it would be a similar kind of situation that um we could probably do it by sending um certified mail they'd have to do a certain number of attempts and then we could post it to the property but I don't think it would be any quicker than October 4th and I don't think it would be any cheaper now there are other things we can do which I've spent time researching if the um building official Kelly um you're Kelly yep um Kelly make sure that you knew that that was that was what we were doing there the brothers mix me up so it's like a tiny Taste of probably what people feel like when they see Heather and I but anyway um if for some reason um there's a concern about imminent danger to other people other properties that sort of thing you do have the okay to do measure reasonable measures to either secure the property which I don't really know how you do with a structural issue it's not like I don't know if you can just like post it up so it doesn't fall or you can take it down and we can deal with it after the fact if it become if it comes to that issue but what I would recommend is we file on the fourth um hopefully get into the court pretty quickly which I think we would um and tear down that way and then there are bids so I think we can open those today so we're kind of like already prepared for as soon as the court signs the order but it's up to you guys okay and uh Ju Just so you guys know that we've again we've already went through the process for this we we um we're not going to do it we were not going to do it as uh as on today's uh agenda the reason it made it to today's agenda is because the foundation has completely washed away so um I would I would suggest that we move forward with uh opening up the bids and awarding it to the low bid and then moving forward with the October 4 um can we open up the bids at this time okay pleas asking yes sorry for a point of order mayor do you think we should chelse help me should we approve that doing the you know filing by the court on October 4th 1st and make a Motion in a second for that then open the bids and do that process would that be more appropriate to go through that row yeah and it would just mainly be we can file October 4th regardless what you're actually doing is shrinking that 60-day time frame that you had previously given him to correct it okay so the chair would entertain a motion at this time to move forward with the demolition on October 4th is that the correct file for Dem file file for demolition on October 4th oh make that Mo we have a motion by councelor Holden do we have a second I'll second second by councelor Kaylor any discussion shut it off S little bit discuss that was good discussion yeah I'm sorry so we have a motion and a second uh call the question I I I I and I'll I'll vote Yes motion carries 5 so at this time can we open up the the bids yes um we received three bids for uh demolition for the property at 1029 street I will open them in the order in which they were received uh the first bid is from Travis Thompson received on 918 the amount is 8,899 the next one is from um Steve boam on was received on 919 at 150 that bid is $1 5,425 the third and final bid received was from J&J Contracting and that was received on 819 at 357f that amount is $14,200 okay so the go low bid would be Travis Thompson for $ 8,899 the chair would entertain a motion to accept that bid some we have a motion by by counselor Buller we have a second second by councelor Wagner discussion hearing none call the question I I I I I'll vote Yes motion carries 5 Z is there anything else that we need to do at this time for this uh particular house no okay so next we'll go to uh review discuss and adopt uh a res resolution approving the 2 preliminary budget and Levy I'll hand this off to the um to Emma to walk through the process and where we're at thank you mayor and Council I'm for you today to give you uh and the public a high level overview of how we arrived at where we're at today and adopting our 2025 preliminary budget Levy our 2025 budget process began in mid July after the completion of our 2023 audit process I disperse budget worksheets to all department heads whereby they uh compiled their respective Department's budgets and I worked on Computing all of the salaries benefits insurances revenues and more and then I worked closely with department heads to ensure that we completed a thorough review of each departmental Budget prior to it coming before the council once I had all of the departmental budgets and requests from our outside partnership agents genes compiled we began overviewing the departmental budgets at our budget and finance committee meetings beginning on August 12th and every week thereafter all the way through last Monday September 16th once all of the departmental budgets were reviewed and compiled into the master budget the draft preliminary Levy was projected to be a 14.99% increase factored into this includes a 3% cost of living adjustment for staff wages which in total all wages benefits insurance and workers comp insurance adjustments had a net Levy impact of roughly 4.6% increase meaning that we were starting out with nearly a 5% Levy increase without even looking at other expenses overall the 2024 budget was reverted back to 2023 expense levels with the exception of wages and the addition of vehicle leases this left us behind with increases to things like utilities fuel Postage and other consumables that only increased over the past 2 years so there were necessary increases in these areas that needed to be made we reallocated some Appropriations to the 809 Eda fund that met the criteria in an effort to reduce the impact on the levy we also reduced the funding to the airport the airport was requesting an additional $129,000 over their 2024 C appropriation to bring it to a total of $480,500 after lengthy discussion the committee did not feel that it could support funding it at that amount given all other City departmental budgets had to take major cuts the past two years we did discuss the fact that there is currently a 50% City and 50% County local shareff for airport funding which causes city of International Falls residents to be taxed on both their city and their County portion of their taxes and the City of International Falls makes up just less than a quarter of the Cochin County net tax tax capacity however city of International Falls residents end up funding over 60% of the local share of the airport given the current funding model in place so um we just felt that it would be a disservice to the citizens to continue funding at that level given what they were asking for in 2025 there are many other services that the city of International Falls has to provide at citizens and that nearly $200,000 um uh cut that we took from their 2025 funding request was necess necessary to get to a palatable Levy figure the airport under the current preliminary budget Levy would still receive $281,100 from the city of International Falls overall I believe it was a smooth budget process and I think department heads and yourselves for your patients feedback and willingness to be flexible as this was my first um budget season in this role I felt everyone did a great job working collaborative ly um looking out for the best interest of the citizens and I really feel like we left no stone unturned in this process and measures were taken to get us from that initial 14.99% Levy increase down to the 8% Levy increase before you today all in all I truly believe that this is the best preliminary figure we could have hoped for and I think everyone who made sacrifices and their respective budgets to get us to where we are today the action being requested today is to adopt the resolution tion before you approving the preliminary tax levy col collectible in 2025 and setting the final budget and Levy input meeting for Monday December 2nd 2024 at 6 p.m. here in the council chambers the hope is that the public will attend with an open mind and willingness to listen and we will present an overview of um the 2025 budget Levy to them that that evening um thank you for your time and please let me know if you have any questions in regards to the budget Levy we have for you does anybody have any questions for Emma at this time all right so uh before you is the uh resolution and it moves forward everything that uh that Emma has just pointed out um from the uh truth and Taxation meeting um all the way to setting the budget or setting the levy at 8% for this year so if there's no questions uh before us um I'll I'll just quickly ask City administrator do you have anything to add I have nothing nothing additional mayor just that um I want to thank Emma for all her work on this she's put together and you know worked with the each of the department heads with along with myself and with you folks as well like she said weekly for the last how many weeks and um hasn't been easy not going to be easy um and um we just thank her for that and you as well and the department heads all right so at this time the chair would entertain a motion to adopt the levy at 8% and the resolution for the uh budget and Levy I'll make a motion we have a motion by councelor Holden do we have a second second we have a second by councelor Wagner any discussion hearing none call the question I I I I and I'll vote Yes motion carries 5 thank you so much all right with uh without anything else on our agenda um this meeting is a joury