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HomeMy WebLinkAbout11.21.11 Council Minutes 7a.- COUNCIL MINUTES REGULAR November 21, 2011 1. CALL TO ORDER The meeting was called to order by Mayor Larson at 7:00 p.m. 2. PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE Mayor Larson led the audience and Council in the Pledge of Allegiance. 3. ROLL CALL Members Present: Members Absent: Also Present: Audience: Larson, Bartholomay, Donnelly, Fogarty, May None Joel Jamnik, City Attorney; David McKnight, City Administrator; Teresa Walters, Finance Director; Randy Distad, Parks and Recreation Director; Kevin Schorzman, City Engineer; Cynthia Muller, Executive Assistant Tim Thompson, Scott Provost, Mary Scheide, Steve Wilson, Lenny Hall, Chris Zweb 4. APPROVE AGENDA MOTION by Fogarty, second by May to approve the Agenda. APIF, MOTION CARRIED. 5. ANNOUNCEMENTS a) Introduce Promoted Employee - Parks and Recreation Parks and Recreation Director Distad introduced Mitch Faber, who has been promoted from Facilities and Parks Maintenance to Park Keeper. b) Introduce New Employee - Parks and Recreation Parks and Recreation Director Distad introduced Scott Provost as the new Facilities and Park Maintenance worker. c) Library Update - Mary Scheide Ms. Mary Scheide, Dakota County Library, distributed the Winter Program Guides. A program was held with the Dakota Valley Arts Council for residents to make ornaments for the tree lighting on Dazzle Day, December 3, 2011. Also on that day, the Library will be hosting a Minnesota author, Chuck Frederic. The theme of the winter mosaic is "Armchair Travel." A second program will be held in February, "Cultural Exchange." Free computer classes are available at the Library. There is also a full schedule of children and teen programs. The Kindle e-reader now has an application that allows you to download e-books from the Library. An adult reading program begins January 17,2012, and runs for seven weeks. 6. CITIZEN COMMENTS 4 Council Minutes (Regular) November 21, 2011 Page 2 Ms. Ruthe Batulis, Dakota County Regional Chamber, stated the Chamber serves over 500 members, representing 30,000 employees. The membership includes 85% small businesses. Ms. Batulis has visited over 40 employers in the past year to discuss the economic climate for their businesses. Their number one issue of concern is property taxes, second is the rise in health care costs. The Chamber opposes any taxes in the Farmington 2012 budget. The Chamber believes that government, just like small business, must live within their means. We all face a poor economy which is the new normal. Small business owners are going without paychecks to make sure they can keep employees on the payroll. They are restructuring expenses, dropping health care coverage, and stretching out capital equipment purchases and going without. They are unable to access previously available lines of credit to cover those revenue gaps. Their accounts payable is stretching from a net 30, 90, 120, to 180 days. Additional taxation in Farmington is not the answer now or in the future. Higher taxes in Farmington will strangle economic growth and job creation. It could cause additional business failures. Government must live within their means, just like business owners. Mr. Steve Wilson, 5342 203rd Street, stated he received his property tax statement which increased $400. He presented his budget ideas to the Council. Based on the proposed budget with a median value home of$175,800, in Apple Valley, Burnsville, Eagan, Hastings, townships, etc. are all lower than Farmington by 19% - 40%. When families are looking to move to a community, they look at education and taxes. Farmington would be in a precarious situation to attract those homeowners. Mr. Wilson then gave some budget suggestions such as merging po lice and fIre services with other cities, bring the annual sealcoat into the general fund, get out ofthe liquor business, use an outside engineering consultant to evaluate historical contracts to determine needs for the short/mid/long term, continue to bond for necessary projects while planning for longer term projects, vigorously determine any available funding sources for infrastructure needs, voluntary resident "adopt a trail" program where a resident would contribute annually for trail maintenance, discuss with school district all possible partnerships, develop a citizen budget commission composed of residents, business owners and one or two Councilmembers to analyze the budget from a different perspective. Mayor Larson stated on Friday, the City received information from the County that the original taxing amount we received to put the plan together was wrong. We had said the average house would have a tax increase of$80 with the full plan and it will be closer to $200, so at the workshop tomorrow, he will propose tabling the plan. We spent five months working with a number that was not correct. He did not know how in good faith we could be asked to make a decision in three days using another number. He will ask the City Administrator to come up with a plan to phase it in over the next 5-10 years. He was very unhappy with the information received on Friday, and feels we wasted five months. The public and Council received good information throughout the budget process, but we also wasted a lot of our time, residents' time and staff time. He hoped this never happens again. Councilmember Fogarty stated we had two Councilmembers who voted against the preliminary budget and three who said none of us wanted that to be the fmal number. We knew we had a lot of work ahead of us. She would fund sealcoating for 2012 and discuss future planning. The numbers we saw on Friday are no where near the numbers we had. At every open house she had great conversations with residents and received good ideas. 5 Council Minutes (Regular) November 21, 2011 Page 3 She did not feel it was a waste. Residents liked the long term planning and not continuing to bond. She heard from residents that planning is important, but this is not the time to increase. Mayor Larson stated he cannot support the plan at this time. 7. CONSENT AGENDA MOTION by Fogarty, second by May to approve the Consent Agenda as follows: a) Approved Council Minutes (1117/11 Regular) b) Adopted RESOLUTION R54-11 Accepting Donated Trees Meadowview Park- Parks and Recreation c) Amended Ordinance 2012 Fee Schedule - Engineering d) Approved Various 2012 License Renewals - Administration e) Amended ORDINANCE 011-641 Subsurface Sewage Treatment System- Building Inspections f) Approved Master Engineering Services Agreement Assignment - Engineering g) Approved Bills APIF, MOTION CARRIED. 8. PUBLIC HEARINGS a) Approve Various 2012 License Renewals - Administration Staff presented renewals for On-Sale Liquor, On-Sale Sunday Liquor, On-Sale Wine, Club, and Therapeutic Massage licenses for 2012. MOTION by Fogarty, second by Bartholomay to close the public hearing. APIF, MOTION CARRIED. MOTION by Bartholomay, second by Fogarty to approve the above license renewals for 2012. APIF, MOTION CARRIED. 9. AWARD OF CONTRACT 10. PETITIONS, REQUESTS AND COMMUNICATIONS a) October 2012 Financial Report - Finance The general fund revenues are at 55% ofthe budget. Expenditures are at 78.9% ofthe budget and 83% ofthe year has passed. 11. UNFINISHED BUSINESS 12. NEW BUSINESS 13. COUNCIL ROUNDTABLE Councilmember Fogarty: The Farmington Cheerleaders created a competition cheer squad. They had their fIrst competition and took fIrst place. Councilmember Bartholomay: Regarding the budget, he was extremely disappointed with the numbers given by the County. We spent a lot of time receiving feedback from residents which was good and Councilleamed a lot about their concerns and ideas. In the future he hoped we would have the correct numbers especially if we spend time bringing in residents and making spreadsheets. He cannot support a tax mcrease. 6 Council Minutes (Regular) November 21, 2011 Page 4 Councilmember May: She was looking forward to the workshop tomorrow. She asked if resident comment would be limited. Mayor Larson suggested ifpeople have a question on what they were told and what their tax statement says, we will let them ask. Councilmember Fogarty felt we should not open the workshop for people to bring in their tax statements. Those questions should be directed to the Finance Director. Mayor Larson agreed. Councilmember Fogarty stated it was a very complicated tax year and people were doing their best. The legislature made some huge changes and it was complicated. They made up a new math problem for people to understand. Councilmember May felt whether there is a math problem or not, we are still talking about setting up some funds. No one disagreed with the concept. She gave staff a lot of credit for their work. It started with CIP planning and that helped her immensely. To budget forward for those items is a great idea, but these are really tough times. Ifthere is any disappointing part, a lot of the meetings we have had since May were helpful, but even though last year's budget process was painful, Council as a group had more opportunity to have some heart to heart discussions about cuts to keep the tax levy down. Now it is down to one meeting and we have not had a good opportunity to talk about possible cuts. It has all been focused on coming up with revenue to cover the spending. There hasn't been any discussion about cuts to cover the spending. She will be looking for dialogue at the workshop tomorrow on cuts to cover the increases. We still have the $300,000, setting aside the plan, which was proposed for increases right before the plan and then it was all about the plan. She hoped for a good meeting tomorrow because we have some work to do and unfortunately it is in one meeting. City Engineer Schorzman: Staffhas received a lot of questions regarding the market value shown on the tax statements. The taxable market value shown on the 2012 column is after it has been reduced by the market value homestead reduction. To back figure the true market value of your home, take what is on the tax statement, add $37,240 and divide that total by 1.09 and that is your market value. Mayor Larson: Winter parking restrictions are in effect so no parking on streets from 2:30 - 5:30 a.m. Toys for Town is underway and drop off locations are throughout town. December 3, 2011, is Downtown Dazzle Day and the Christmas Tree lighting will take place in the Second Street parking lot. He encouraged everyone to support local businesses. 14. ADJOURN MOTION by Fogarty, second by May to adjourn at 7:39 p.m. APIF, MOTION CARRIED. Respectfully submitted, Cynthia Muller Executive Assistant 7