October 7th Council Meeting Update

We had two public input items at the Council meeting tonight. The first was a family that had a terrible experience this past weekend where a granddaughter was choking and 911 was called. The information I had received from our police department shows that the County dispatcher sent our PD and FD to the wrong address although the Ambulance did arrive correctly. The mother wanted an apology for the incident and I told her that I do absolutely apologize for the frightful episode. There was confusion as to the cause of the incident but I felt it was best to handle this emotional exchange with all deference to the child's mother.

I had previously to tonight's discussion talked with the child's grandmother who is a City resident, and we will be meeting with our PD to ensure this is prevented in the future. I hope this will lead to improvements in the county dispatch system and how information is relayed. I nor the City Council have any direct control in this area but we need to fight for improvements for the safety of our residents

The 2nd item at the public input portion of the Council meeting dealt with what I wrote about previously. The enforcement of the nuisance ordinance. The gentleman present brought up an issue as to the process of enforcement that I believed was valid as it fits a pattern I have seen from several complaints. The issue was directed to the Public Works committee to get a handle on how this ordinance is being enforced.

The Council unanimously approved the hire of our new Finance Director. This is a great step forward for the City.

Now we come to a frankly bizarre moment at tonight's Council meeting. We were voting on an agreement that allowed the City to pull a letter of credit to pay for work needed on one of Mr. Iverson's failed developments. After the motion and 2nd Ms. Larson went on about how great it is to be getting the money to complete the project. She then stated that this takes care of all the problems for the City and that basically the developer is just a victim of the times. Isanti has many developers we are dealing with and only one has failed on his obligations, yes it is Mr. Iverson. A number of other developers were presented with open items to fix and they fixed them.... not Mr. Iverson. To my knowledge Mr. Iverson is the only Isanti developer facing Minnesota Pollution Control Agency action as well.

The letters of credit which the banks are paying, and losing a tremendous amount on, cover the project and not all the extra cost we have to suffer through. The item we approved tonight is a classic example, we have had weeks of negotiation to get the letter of credit released which cost the City in direct staff time and takes away from other priorities. I know Ms. Larson is in a tough spot having supported Mr. Iverson at every turn including not wanting to authorize the City to pull a recent letter of credit to get a needed project completed because she wanted to give Mr. Iverson more time. This seemed an odd moment to try to make a terrible situation look slightly better but we are less than 30 days away from an election in which we will be determining the future of our City.

I did point out the extra cost and issues to her and hopefully we can simply stick to doing the City's business at Council meetings and not listening to her campaign. I would love to get up at every meeting and say hey I told you so over and over again as we have had to deal with all the issues I had warned about my first 2 years on the Council. I do not do that because it is not in the best interest of getting needed work done. Campaigning is for outside of City Hall and I am as determined as anyone to fight hard for the issues I believe in - just not while I am sitting in the Mayor's Chair holding the gavel.

The last item we discussed tonight is the repair to well #1. This is our "safe" well that has a low radium count and is used to blend with the higher radium wells. The well was damaged Friday but Public Works and our City Engineer were able to keep it working through the weekend. We authorized its immediate repair and to have staff notify the public that there will be a few days when it will be down and that water with higher levels of radium will be pumped. The notification is not mandated by the state since it is only for a short period of time but it is critically important they we are completely honest with the public and they have the same information we as the Council have. When the Water Treatment Plant is in operation this type of item will no longer be an issue as all the water is treated a radium will no longer be an issue.

Frankly I was bothered that the State does not have a more stringent reporting requirement but I believe transparent government is the best government. When the well is down it will be posted on the city website and we will be offering all the information to our 2 local papers. This is a good example of one of the initiatives I want to bring to Isanti - email alerts to our Citizens. This would be a service that residents could sign up for to be alerted to this type of item any emergency within the City or updates on our recent hydrant flushing and MnDot canceled project. The email list would give immediate important information to those that sign-up. The list would be confidential and maintained at City Hall.