##VIDEO ID:uPpH_J1ZpUs## e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e e here we I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all all right good good evening everybody Welcome to the St Paul Park city council meeting regular agenda December 2nd 2024 first item on the agenda is approval of the minutes for the November 18th 2024 regular council meeting and wave the reading of the same so moved Mr mayor I'll second I have a motion a second any further discussion all in favor signify by saying I I I motion carries 4 Z all right next item on the agenda is item number two mayal presentation um we have some awards here we'd like to give out uh so if I could I'll start seeing as the other person is not here um if I could get Cassie Hannon over here to the deis and can everybody hear me all right you can stand over here you don't get to hide behind the thing um tonight we are handing out a citizen life savings award to Cassie Annon I'm going to make this short I get emotional Cassie's my daughter and she really stepped up in our community um and when things like that happen when regular citizens in our city step up we did it a couple of months ago things we recognize for a gentleman named Mike Koy who pulled a man from burning car um and Cassie here the manager of our local Speedway stepped up and uh performed CPR on a gentleman that was um in serious distress um through the guidance of a Washington County dispatch um and I just feel that when one human being steps up in that manner to assist another human being especially someone that you do not know and did not know um deserves acknowledgement um within our city and our society that you go that extra mile for that human being and that person and that life so uh I'll read this and then I'll give it to you and then tonight we were also going to recognize um they were not able to make it we are also the city of is recognizing um the dispatcher who talked Cassie through this and her name is Sarah Garrison and sometimes we forget about the people behind the scenes um and the steady calmness that Sarah provided to Cassie to make it through this really deserves recognition um because I think sometimes that job can be harder Than People realize um being so far away and not being able to assist so uh we really want to thank Sarah the city of St Paul Park the citizens of St Paul Park want to thank Sarah for her good works as a dispatcher that Washington County dispatch and Washington County Sheriff's Office are a great partner to our officers and our city um so we want to thank them and we want to thank Sarah uh so I will briefly read this award this is to certify that the mayor of the city of St Paul Park has awarded citizen life savings award to Cassie Hannon for exceptional heroism demonstrated on November 19 20124 while helping to save the life of your fellow citizen who collapsed at Speedway you unselfishly provided CPR to a fellow citizen until First Responders could arrive um and what was great about this is uh you know the fact that not only that Cassie stepped up but he was able to get stabilized and get to the hospital um so just the fact that between the two of them the dispatch and Cassie these measures were taken and and um just the fact that it was stepped up so there you go thanks d [Applause] you know I still want to but I promised her I wouldn't make her say anything and then if I could get commissioner Bingham over here um County Commissioner Carla Bingham on behalf of the Washington County Sheriff's Office will be accepting this award for Sarah Garrison and making sure that she gets that recognition from the city of St Paul Park and everything that she did for our city so thank you and make sure to than Sarah and Sheriff star thank you and that's it I told you thank you won't be too hard thanks all right all right on to item number three [Music] we have items from the public so we're going to see if anybody signed up that would wish to discuss anything that is not on the agenda this evening have one for the budget Sharon that's for the budget are you um we were going to have a brief one oh okay item number four thank you to my secretary all right seeing no one on items number four items from the public concerning the final budget can they give a presentation first oh we weren't going to go to that until after item number six so if you just want to hi I'm Sharon orist I live at 11:15 Aurora Avenue um I have some questions on your final budget I was just hoping for a quick presentation I wasn't here in September when you adopted them um my house actually increased 4% in value and I know your report says most of the homes decreased 3% um so which in turn increased my taxes for just the city of St Paul Park over 15% so I'm a little confused as to your memo stating that was going to be only be like 5.4 4 9% you add my 4% increase that's only 9% and I'm looking at a 15% increase on my taxes this year just for city of St Paul Park only so that's why I was just hoping maybe a little clarification as to why I'm seeing that big of an increase all right well that's way beyond my pay grad um I guess I would say overall I from citizens that I've talked to a lot of stuff is going up a lot of stuff is some stuff's going down everything just kind of seems to be out of whack this year with the um the market and valuations and of all my properties you know one stayed the same one went up one went down and valuation and on all of them the taxes went up so um I guess maybe I could say ask um get call Melody and get a clarification later on well you're going to be adopting that budget toight right it's only $117,000 [Music] increases I just don't know how tonight we could by not accepting the budget or the levy to deal with your specific situation correct or get the answer about yours alone you know what I mean right but yeah because that might be also require some discussions with the county on the evaluation and other stuff I don't know okay all right thank you Sharon all right on item number five the consent agenda this evening on the consent agenda uh adopt ordinance 774 updating the city fee schedule uh pay the bills um up approve our inter agency agreement with the awesome Washington County Sheriff's Office we're going to be handing out some uh annual wage increases uh recognizing legal holidays in 2025 approving licenses for alarm users garbage collectors and home occupation and that is it for the consent agenda this evening thank you mayor Frankie tonight's consent agenda pretty much looks like year end type of housekeeping items and as such I will move that we approve tonight's consent agenda I'll second have motion second to approve the consent agenda any further discussion all in favor say I I motion carries 4 zero all right item number six new business Melody if you could just come up and give us a brief uh overview I know you don't have a presentation we got already got the big presentation but I would like to hear how far you got it down so as you recall we've done a couple workshops um and so I think um through the conversations that we've had prior about where the council wanted to see our numbers um in September we gave a preliminary budget just a high look at what we needed as far as the city's concerned and what we can do for the resident um and we did that preliminary around eight little less than 8% um based on our um last Workshop that we had we heard that the council um hearing and seeing other cities and other municipalities and other government agencies having a high increase but still trying to cover our expenses as the city is concerned you wanted to see us to get under at least 6% um to stay consistent at least with Washington County so we got at a little under 5974 um as far as the gross Levy is concerned I think that was consistent with what we heard as far as what the council um could live with as far as the expenses and based on our our loss of some Revenue that we were going to have based from 24 to 25 um and we believe that that was a pretty consistent budget so the initial Levy was set at the initial Levy was set at 7.43 [Applause] eight but we are now down to 5.97 4 5978 all right and can you uh I'm sorry Mr Mayor yep please remind the audience that this was not due to any increases large increases in expenses this was mainly due to Lost Revenue that we had previously had been receiving but we had been cut in the $150,000 range that was over um I think $240,000 it was public safety Aid that we received in 2024 and it was a one-time Aid and so we are not going to receive that again so um in order to kind of um we do have other revenues that we do bring in but we're not going to make up for our small um City we're not going to make up almost a quarter of a million dollars so um we had just a small increase but we also tightened up some areas as well trying realizing that we have to be very um cognizant of how we spend the residence dollars okay thank you all right do we have any other questions for Melody all right thank you [Applause] melody you're looking at me all right uh thank you Mr Mayor I would like to move that we adopt resolution number 1733 which is approving the final City budget and establishing the tax levy collectible in 2025 I'll second I have a motion a second any further discussion Mr Mayor yes I just like to say we uh we sent City staff back after their initial proposal and they did a lot of uh pencil trimming a lot of erasing uh and got it down to where we were looking for so we appreciate that hard work Melody uh I we just leave it at that thank you council member Swenson no I would tend to agree I mean that first initial number we came in with three options and that last option really kind of threw me for Loop and uh the fact that we were able to come down so far and that the staff and our organizations are willing to work to do the best with what we can I greatly appreciate that so good job Melody thank you to the staff all right no further discussion all in favor signify by saying I I I motion carries 4 Z Item number seven um Council m whitre hemingson is not here this evening she is excused uh council member Conrad anything to report on heres J nothing really new our next meeting will be December 9th at 5:30 p.m. at Heritage Park all right thank you council member Conrad and for myself just been helping finish up some new things um today we did partake in some new uh we're looking for one new officer and helped out with uh interviews so hopefully that's going to come to fruition we can get another good person on and we'll go from there so it's all that I have item number eight anybody have anything else this evening all right nothing further before this conso this meeting is adjourned e e