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3 Reorganization IssuesCity Council Meeting - February 8, 1999 ORGANIZATIONAL ITEMS. Public Present: Name Address Janet Lash Fred Berg Dave Dummer Marcia & John Hull Jim Sloss Leah Hawke Patsy & Bill Bernhjelm Mona J. Kerber Pat & Lee Kerber Eldon B. Leslie Michel Wes & Carol Dunsmore Elizabeth Burgett Craig Peterson Michael O'Kelly Lydia E. Porter Doug Hale Barb Klick Jim Murphy Betty Hayes Vernelle Clayton Dean Trippler Mike Kerber Ed Jannusch 7001 Tecumseh Lane 6910 Chaparral Lane 8523 Drake Court 1421 Lake Susan Hills Drive 9360 Kiowa Trail 7444 Moccasin Trail 9380 Kiowa Trail 500 Chanview 1620 Arboretum Blvd. 9581 Highland Drive, Eden Prairie (Moving to Chan) 2840 Washta Bay Road 730 West 96th Street 1193 Harrison Street, Shakopee 1340 Oakside Circle 685 Carver Beach Road 7217 Pontiac Circle 12715 Highway 7 7116 Utica Lane 502 Highland Drive 6881 Redwing 422 Santa Fe Circle Chanhassen Villager 500 Chanview 6831 Utica Terrace Todd Gerhardt: Mayor, City Council members. At our last work session this past Monday night, staff was asked to bring back the different alternatives that were presented to the City Council during that work session. Along with that, to establish a third alternative B proposal working with the Carver County Sheriff's Department. Staff was also asked to list out comments, pros and cons of each of the alternatives and then present those back to City Council at tonight's meeting. Included in your packet is each of the alternatives and at this time I'd like to present those to the City Council and to the public for their comments. Once I complete my presentation Mayor, I would .1.eaYe .it -up -to the ~council if you want to askquestions of me or if you'd like the public to take comments at that time. Mayor Mancino: Okay, thank you very much. Todd, excuse me. This is what's in our packet? Todd Gerhardt: Yes. Mayor Mancino: Okay, thank you. Todd Gerhardt: Well it's not coming through as clearly as I'd like so what I will do is kind of read through it so everybody has an understanding... Option 1, under this option the public safety department section is, right now this is how Chanhassen City Hall is organized...Here you have the City Council working directly with the City Manager. From the City Manager... We have general administration in this area. Under general administration you've got the office manager, support staff, city recorder, MIS Coordinator and GIS Specialist. Then down below you have the six different departments other than administration. There's public safety, park and rec, public works, engineering, planning and finance. In our public safety department, there's a public safety director that oversees deputy public safety director, public safety officers, community service officers, fire marshal, fire inspector and support staff, building official, assistant building official.., and a volunteer fire department of approximately...members. Park and rec, you have the Park and rec director, rec superintendent, recreation supervisor, recreation secretary, senior citizen coordinator, park and rec center staff and park...park foreman and light and heavy equipment operators. Public works department. We have a director of public works in Charles Folch... streets and sewer and water lines. You have the public works staff, street superintendent, public works secretary, heavy equipment operator and light equipment operator.., support staff. Our engineering department consists of the city engineer, Anita Benson. Assistant city engineer, construction tech IV, mapping tech I1, engineering secretaries and an engineering intern. Our Planning department consists of a planning director, Kate Aanenson who oversees two senior planners, one Planner I, water resource coordinator and environmental resource specialist. Our finance department, Pam Snell is our Finance Director. She oversees...utility and billing clerk and half time intern. We also have the economic development authority which is a separate commission...You have the entire city council and two members at large. And you have the economic development director overseeing that authority. With Option 1, it is my recommendation that...organization and that you look at hiring a new public safety director or similar position.., and oversee the administration of the police contract. It gives the city one comprehensive professional managed safety department, both in inspections, police protection, animal control, and in public safety education .... working very well with Carver County and their department. I think that under this...both a police contract and community policing. It allows for patrolling of bike trails. Water patrol. The flexibility in call up situations where your Carver County deputies need to leave a scene and we have our own staff to back it up. And it also gives us coordination with our volunteer fire department. That Public Safety Director would also be responsible for insuring that the administration...of that organization are being met. Both from a training and administrative side. With that I have a second option that I call Option 2A. In Option 2A you have the City Manager that would oversee the Economic Development Authority, the economic development director. He then would be responsible to oversee both the building official, suppor~t-sta-f-f, -fi-re.marshal and ~heir support staff. Also the Economic Development°.. I would also establish a Board of Appeals to hear questions and concerns regarding building code issues and that that board would also be responsible.°. Comments regarding this option is that the economic development director currently has extensive knowledge in computers and maximizing ,the use of our new permitting process. He's proven himself as a capable of maximizing use of all software programs and to the extent that they can be used for. The economic development director understands the building and fire code issues. He has managed this department in the past as he served as the city manager for the City of Chanhassen. He is creative in coming up with ideas. One of them that he shared here the other day was establishing an escrow account for some building permits.., set aside for a person to get a building permit right away. Economic development director takes on the inspections. There would be the question if he would have enough time to do the duties as the economic development director. That would be one of the cons to this scenario. Separation of inspections from the public safety...what would be say the first alternative would, could be another potential con to this scenario and it does continue to lump inspections... It makes the department smaller than the original Option 1 which in some cases can make it more manageable and given the smaller numbers. That's Option 2A. Mayor Mancino: Todd, do you mind if we ask questions as you go? Just two questions I have. Number one. Would you suggest doing the Board of Appeals, you had that in 2A. Would you suggest creating that in 1 if we chose 1 too? Todd Gerhardt: Yes. I would include that in Option 1. Mayor Mancino: So you would include it in Option 1. Tell, can you speak to the fiscal impacts of this. Being that we have an EDA Director already and don't need a public safety director. Is ,there a fiscal impact? Todd Gerhardt: Well yes. Without the public safety director you would save money in his salary. However, there would have to be some offsetting costs associated with the hours that Scott was credited for under the police contract. At our work session we talked about the difference of 51 hours... The reason we have a difference is...got credit for both Scott, Bob and Kerri's time in patrolling Chanhassen. So somehow we would have to make up some of those hours by either adding...I would see that probably, and the thing I don't have a handle on yet is how many hours were associated...so if they gave Scott 4 hours of credit or was it 6 hours credit, I'm not sure. Mayor Mancino: But the main duty was supervising, advisory. Todd Gerhardt: Right. But he did get.., some patrolling. He would assist in funerals, traffic control situations, large events. But based on this scenario, the only option, the only economic impact would be that difference between the public safety director salary and what we give back to... Mayor Mancino: So nothing else in this option changes as far as people? You don't increase or ,eliminate or anything? Todd Gerhardt: No. Mayor Mancino: Okay. Same staff° Same numberofstaffo Okayo And I'massumingthat'sin Option I too? Todd Gerhardt: Yes. No additional staff... Mayor Mancino: 'Any other questions? Okay. Todd Gerhardt: Under Option 2B. What I've done here. You have Option 2A and B. Option 2A was to break up the public safety department into two sections with 2A being the inspections portion of it and 2B being more of the law enforcement, community education and animal control section. So in this scenario you had the city manager would oversee the chief law enforcement officer and I am proposing Bob Zydowsky to do that chief law enforcement officer and Bob has proven himself here the last few months that he is capable of continuing to oversee the police contract... Questions and concerns that Scott would answer at times. From that Bob will oversee the Public Safety Educator Coordinator, Beth Hoiseth. Would also oversee community service officer Henry Price and also our other sworn officer, public safety officer Kerri Nolden. Under this scenario the comments that I would provide is that it keeps local policing identity. You would still have the officers of Bob and Kerri and Henry walking or driving throughout the community in our blue automobiles and in a blue uniform~ That allows us flexibility for doing special... We'd also be able to provide bike patrol, water patrol... Kerri has proven herself to do that last year. She took it upon herself to contact local businesses and get :them to grant or give or allow us to use, the water patrol...and also Kerri will dress up and get on a bicycle and patrol our trails and parks in the summertime. Continue to complete the background investigations and criminal history reports...under Chanhassen administration, o ~ It also allows us to retain our Operation Identification and I think continue our successful relationship with the county and city policing function° The benefit of not having that of course would be the police 1/ability.,. Under this scenario I still would recommend keeping the public safety commission. Basically to oversee, to do an overview of the police contracts and that the City Council would have direct responsibility over...Any questions regarding Option 2B? Mayor Mancino: I just have one. The.,. Todd Gerhardt: Yes. It takes it out of City Hall but we would have to wait for them to get.°° Mayor Mancino: So you're saying the difference is probably timing. Todd Gerhardt: Tinting. It's kind of nice when you're doing employee checks or for new hires and things like that, to have... Mayor Mancino: And what about hardware? Does that mean that the city, that we bought hardware to be able to do this to? I mean are we duplicating what the county has is what I'm asking. Todd Gerhardt: I'm sure the county has their own set of hardware. Mayor Mancino: So we have another set of hardware that basically does the same thing. Can we rent it? Todd Gerhardt: Do we rent that or? Leslie Michel: No...The initial hardware would have as a separate... Mayor Mancino: That they would be doing. Okay, thank you. ~Councilman Labatt: What about liquor licenses?... Todd Gerhardt: Yep. We'll coordinate with some of the county on any... Mayor Mancino: Okay, thank you. Todd Gerhardt: I'm not short on options tonight. Here's Option 3A. Similar to Option 2. We have broken out the safety or the policing function versus the inspection function under Option 3A. We have the City Manager again overseeing the Community Development Director. And then the Community Development Director would oversee planning...staff right now, Planner I. Would have to oversee Environmental and Forestry and Fire Marshal and...support staff. And the inspections support staff, building official and the 6 ½ building inspectors and mechanical inspections. The Economic, I did include the Economic Development Director under this option and... Again under this option I have included the Board of Appeals and you also have the Planning Commission, which again will be overseen by the City Council. The additional staff under this option may, there's no additional staff...the size of this department, you would have to look at maybe doing some upgrades in positions just because of the size of it. The Community Development Director...different elements is added responsibility to that individual. The planner under the old scenario.., environmental and forestry and then...would have a lead person to go to to get an answer... Mayor Mancino: So you're saying you may consolidate that and make one of the senior planners .oversee, excuse me. Okay. Todd Gerhardt: ...not knowing exactly what direction you're going to go tonight. I did make it as a comment... I think there's some pluses in this. There definitely would probably be more interaction...planning department and inspections... It does put most of the development issues under one department. Planning is reviewing the subdivisions and code enforcement of the zoning ordinance. That brings in the building department occasionally and so there is a positive in having it all under one umbrella. It's a better understanding of how each of the departments operate. It makes the...development department much bigger. The planning department. Building department would no longer be under the department of safety per se. More in development and there may need to be an educational curve for all employees on how things function. You know-establishing a commission and coordination of goals and administrative responsibilities. Any questions regarding 3A? Mayor Mancino: Any questions? Todd Gerhardt: The last option is 3B. I have all kinds of disclaimers on this. The concept idea essentially a couple of weeks ago. Don Ashworth and myself were going to go down and meet with the Sheriff Bud Olson to discuss this option with him and unfortunately my son was ill so I couldn't make it. I felt it was important for Don to continue to go down and meet with the Sheriff as a fact finding trip. I know that Bud has had discussions with the Carver County Board but feels there needs to be more discussions...presented under preliminary discussions... Under concept idea, Option 3B proposes Chanhassen Public Safety Department. What you would have is...what is called a contract officer/supervisor. The contract officer/supervisor is a position, an employee... Sheriff's department. However, the Carver County Sheriff's Department would allow...our contract supervisor. And that is...Bob Zydowsky and Kerri who would become Carver County employees under this idea. They would continue to work out of Chanhassen and assist with code enforcement, water patrol, and on bike trails like they have... However they would be Carver County employees. They would be insured under the Carver County insurance policy...compensated by the County Sheriff's office. Plus we would then up the contract of, with the sheriff's office to reflect both Bob and Kerri's salary. The contract officer/supervisor would also oversee the deputies that serve Chanhassen and would also, I want everybody to know that the deputies currently are not in need of supervision...and crime prevention officers so.o. So I just want to make it clear that it's not°.. The community service officer and crime prevention specialist would continue to be Chanhassen employees. There's a reason you cannot include CSO's and crime prevention specialists...right now the Carver County Sheriff's Department does not provide animal control and crime prevention education. It's something that...look into because there are other needs throughout the county for animal control or police education. And crime prevention. So based on that scenario we came up with some... That would be a plus. There would be one comprehensive police contract which woul& o. Chanhasser~ would lose it's local community oriented policing.,, lave never seen that. ~ .but there's always the possibility of occurring but we thought we should...Bob and Kerri would become county employees and lose their seniority as Chanhassen employees. Clinton Cop grant funds could be transferred down to the county is my understanding. And it costs less to have Bob and Kerri here. You're looking at 30... And again, we talked about the BCA computer for running criminal...background checks for handguns, solicitor's licensing, liquor licensing would have to be done...One of the other concerns we had was kind of separating crime prevention from the local police. And if she's supervised over by the Carver County's Sheriff's Department, that there would need to be...I think Beth could still call upon Bob or Kerri to volunteer time... With that, that's all the comments I have for Option 3B. Does Council have any questions of Option 3B? Mayor Mancino: On the contract officer/supervisor in that box in the middle. Could that be Bob? If we get to choose or does it have to, I mean that's always a possibility I'm assuming. Todd Gerhardt: Bud did not think that that could work...I don't want to call it union issues or seniority issues but that point he did not think that that could work. Mayor Mancino: But he wasn't sure? 6 Todd Gerhardt: Well one of the other wrinkles is that we'd have to work on. Councilman Engel: But because they would require seniority within their county sheriff organization to move up and take that type of a position as opposed to 10 years of Chanhassen? Todd Gerhardt:...Bob might be overseeing some deputies that have...and so it gets a little controversial... Mayor Mancino: Okay, thank you. Any other questions? Councilwoman Jansen: Madam Mayor, I don't know if now would be a good time for me to maybe introduce some information. I had gone from Mr. Gerhardt's Option 3B and run some numbers realizing that we had Mr. Gerhardt under a rather constraining time situation as far as the information that we were given. And procedurally I don't know how we do this. I know of course you're going to be wanting to take public comment but I wouldn't want to pop these numbers on everyone after they've given comments if they would like to be able to speak to them if they in fact apply to this option. (There was a tape change at this point in the discussion.) Councilwoman Jansen continued: ...director of public safety. The public safety officer. Community services officer. And then the two support services positions in there to come to that $305. I left out of the number for comparison sake since it's not provided in the county and we're saying that it is essential, the crime prevention officer number isn't in there. Since we had been talking about that remaining with the city last Monday in the work session. And then within the departmental figures, so I felt I needed to pull those out were the two support services positions for the building inspectors. So those numbers aren't a part of the calculation on what our total policing is costing us. Then I went to our budget. Mayor Mancino: Our 19997 Councilwoman Jansen: Our 1999 budget. The January 27th version of our budget and pulled out all of the costs that were associated with police administration. The public safety commission had a small amount in there and then the animal control was also noted. So all of those numbers are included under the materials and supplies. I pulled the Sheriff's contract out and as we went through the budget process we were all aware that there was this additional $64,000.00 that was above and beyond even the Sheriffs contract. And I had in my notes that that seemed to be a roll-up of just additional hours that tend to contribute over to the sheriff's contract. So I did include that as a part of our total policing number and correct me if I've made any wrong assumptions Gerhardt, if you would. And then I pulled the capital outlay. So the total other was the $114,641.00. Then to try to figure out the vehicle cost in order to have a like number to the sheriffs number, I took what their formula was that they used within the contract which was of course ~he .hourly 8 hour days .and how many days in a year times our 4 vehicles. So the 4 vehicles being public safety director, the deputy director, public safety officer and community service officer. All four vehicles are then factored into that number for the 16880. Just again trying to come up with comparable expenses that would be shifting over to the total sheriff if we went that direction. That came to a total within our own budget for personnel, other and vehicles $437,244.00. Added to the sheriff's contract of the $487,000.00 comes to a total budget of $924,750.00. So are those numbers clear? Mayor Mancino: So we're understanding the total amount that... Councilwoman Jansen: Yeah. And that was. Mayor Mancino: And you said that includes the public safety director's salary? Councilwoman Jansen: Yes. I left that in there. So then using our current population estimate that we had just received. That as of April 1, 1999 we're going to be at 19,500. ! used the hourly patrol formula from the sheriff's department, which is calculated for a population of 7,000 you need 18 hours daily and then for every additional 1,000 in population beyond that you need 3 hours additionally. So it totals up to 54 hours total if we were to shift everything just over to the Sheriff's department and cover the exact number of hours from their tbrrnula. So by their hourly amount that then brings that total to $822,498.00. So right now our current services are costing us $102,000.00 approximately more than if it were all under the sheriff's department. That was just running raw numbers and there's probably room for gravitation and Todd, ! know you've had a lot of your plate and I started running these and trying to figure out, just based on the hourlys and it is confusing to try to do, to compare some of the hourlys just because there's so many additional things that are in it. Mayor Mancino: So this is $924,750.00. Plus another, but you don't include crime prevention officer. So that would not be..~support services for building. Councilwoman Jansen: Correct. Assuming that everything that was within this departmental budget that was building oriented or yeah. All the building inspectors would shift from this so it didn't apply that at all. Todd Gerhardt: Mayor. Just a couple of comments. Carol Dunsmore and Leslie have just, they probably spend anywhere from 10% to 20% of their time doing police function work. The remaining amount of their time is they're doing building inspections. The majority of their time you know with the occasional background check and memos that they would write fbr Scott Harr. But so I don't know if you can allocate their entire salary over to there. And then under the community service officer position. Mayor Mancino: That's what we do right now in our budget. Todd Gerhardt: Yeah, they may all be included in administration but what we're doing right now is doing our activity budgeting which will really show you where their time is being spent. Councilwoman Jansen: I actually thought that that's what I had used to pull the two of them and put them here versus leaving Elizabeth and Betty under building inspections, realizing that of course Betty does some of the fire back up support but I think within the budget maybe it was creative accounting but it was logged under police administration. Todd Gerhardt: Well 90% of their time is spent doing building inspections. But I'll get a clarification on that for you and...under this scenario also, the county is not geared up yet to take on animal control and are not geared up to take on crime prevention. So you know those things are still going to have to fall underneath our umbrella. Mayor Mancino: And I think that's what's shown here. The crime prevention officer is not included. Todd Gerhardt: She has the community service officer up above. Mayor Mancino: Yeah, she does have that but she doesn't have the crime prevention officer. Todd Gerhardt: Right. Right. Mayor Mancino: That's pulled out. Councilwoman Jansen: And actually, in a follow-up conversation with your presentation to this scenario, we have had just a brief conversation again with the sheriff as to what the commitment could actually be. And in his mind he's very, again having to look at it transitionally, he gets very enthusiastic about the idea of being able to put the CSO function and the crime prevention also into a full service county sheriff department. And I gather that he's very focused himself; as you noted in I believe it was Ashworth's letter, that he's very community policing oriented as far as wanting people on our trails and on the lakes. So he did realize the significance of that role to this community and spoke to you know definitely needing to make sure that that was covered and that maybe in a more of a transitional type of a scenario being able to speak to that. Todd Gerhardt: Yeah, he said that to me too and his only other concern in that is that they represent the entire county and that his phone will ring off the hook as soon as he starts providing that service to one community. That the other communities would want it. Especially in the animal control section so. Councilwoman Jansen: Exactly. Todd Gerhardt: But no question, if he had a comprehensive system down there, as I said in my presentation, that having just the one contract would be the best of all worlds. You know it is clunky having the system. However they have made it work over the years. Mayor Mancino: Okay, thank you. Councilwoman ,Jansom You're welcome. I just thought it'd be best to have the numbers at least to speak to. 9 Mayor Mancino: I'll open this for a public hearing° Those wishing to address the city council, please come up. State your name and address. Councilman Engel: Mayor Mancino, I'd like to just state for the record before we get started. There's a lot of information out here. Todd's. Linda's. Stuff that I've been getting from the community. What we're going to hear now and I would be in no position whether I was here until midnight to make a decision on this one way or the other tonight. I just want to preface this. I would move to table after we're done and keep continuing this discussion. I do not feel ready to make a decision regardless, one way or the other so before it gets to 8:30 and I've got to go, I just want everyone to know that's how I feel. I would not be ready to vote on this tonight. I want to keep getting input on it. Mayor Mancino: Okay, comments. Bob Ayotte: My name is still Bob Ayotte. Stilk..Cascade Pass. Number one, I'm 37 years old but my father, does anybody know who Mickey Rooney was? But you know who...yeah. The movies that occurred in the late 40's, bear with me Mayor. Mayor Mancino: You're sticking with the subject that we're on, right? Bob Ayotte: It's important. The movies in the late 40's, every movie that Mickey Rooney was in he would say, let's go in the back yard, build the stage and have a show. That's what's happening tonight. I have a few questions. I really appreciate your comments. I saw an organizational chart that went from where a council was doing the castration to a council that was being castrated° Okay? I saw this councilwoman working towards development of a position with empirical data~ I have talked to you on that point. But I saw absolutely no mention, it may have been, but I heard no mention of city staff input on what the requirements are for organization to protect my daughter. Now I'm not asking you~ I'm warning you. Any organizational structure that's intended to protect and service this community better have the input of that staff and better have the input of community. What are the requirements? I've disagreed with this guy. Anita and I have had two or three disagreements. His police force has given me a police ticket to go through a stop sign in my neighborhood, which I'll never forgive you for. But the thing that they do is they define requirements and build specifications. You'd better have the specs for every department. Every department. The number of calls that have to be responded to. The issue with the dogs. Putting the dog in a car and so on. Now I know when I ask this guy how many linear feet he has of sewage lines, he knows. He knows the number of his lift stations. He knows the gallons of water that are pumped. So don't play this game in showing me charts. You'd better have requirements defined before anybody goes. Thank you. Mayor Mancino: Anyone else wishing to address the council and give comments. Bill Bernhjelm: Bill Bemhjelm, 9380 Kiowa Trail. I'm a member of I think still the public safety.commission. ~I still haven't heard if we're having a meeting .on T.hursday night. It's i.n calendar but I haven't heard one way or the other and I think one of the most important comments that I can make is this discussion doesn't belong here. It belongs there. I agree with 10 Mr. Ayotte. Too little information. Too fast. You're talking about making a major change in the leadership of this community in terms of hiring a city manager. 'You're talking about a major change in the way the most important public service that you provide is delivered to the people of this community and you want to do it in a big hurry. You had to do the other thing you did, or at least three of you did, in a big hurry because you were running out of time. Because at the end of the year there was a new council. But to start down the wrong road at this point without having the input of your new city manager, without having the input of your staff and without having the input of the public safety commission that's been in place for many years here and knows, at least some of us know the history of why we have a contract. Why the contract says what it says .and why you know there are minimums put on it and the fact that you raised the question obviously causes the sheriff to raise the price. The sheriff would be a fool not to say sure, I'll be happy to provide that. But don't forget, the sheriff gets his budget from the farmers in the west end of the county. Not from you all. And you'd better be prepared to pay the piper if you want all this extra service because you know they're not going to provide it. And to put a sheriff's employee, a contractor of yours, in charge of supervising the contract makes absolutely no sense at all. And to say you're going to pick his employee, the sheriff's employee that's going to represent you. Well which master does he serve which day? And then you throw in the part about, and we can get rid of him a lot easier than we had to get rid of, then the way it went the last time we got rid of somebody. You're moving way too fast and this is not going 'very well. Mayor Mancino: Please, no clapping. Thank you. Barb Klick: Barb Klick, 7116 Utica Lane. I have some concerns also about the direction that we're taking and I think I'll speak from the angle of a parent. I have two small children and I .reside in this town because I like the amenities and I like the safety issues that are covered for us. Right now under the contract we have excellent response time from our sheriffs and they do a good job of responding to injuries and burglaries in process and crime scenes and PI's and things like that. The system or the model that we have in place now also offers us a community service in terms of not only prevention but identification of some of our juvenile delinquents, our truants, and policing has really changed. It's not just response now. It's really...in trying to prevent some of the issues and some of the damage. And a few weeks ago when my two young children were playing in the front yard and a young gentleman about the age of 13 or 14 sped through on a snowmobile about 30 mph. IfI would have called the sheriff, sure. They would have come out if they were hit and helped with the crime scene and rendered emergency services. That's not what I'm looking for. I'm looking for people who already know those juvenile delinquents. Who know that those are some repetitive problems in our neighborhood and who are already dealing with those people. And I urge you with whatever model you look at, that we can continue some community policing in Chanhassen. This is not a regulatory number but this is a spec or a benchmark you might want to make yourself aware of. In the Midwest area right now they're looking for about 1 police officer for 1,000 residents. And if we're going to 20,000 residents, .that would be a police force of about 20 FTE's. Right now with the contract we have 32 hours a day which is about 5.6 FTE's. In addition to our local policing we've got maybe 10 people at the most. So it's not just about price. It's about public safety and it depends on what we all want to spend and how safe we want to be. I'm not suggesting we need a police force at this time. I don't ,think we could afford it. We're looking at around a million price tag now. We'd be up around 11 two. I am advocating for a model at least that gives us some control over the people who are watching out for our children for the safety of our families. Thank you~ Patsy Bernhjelm: Patsy Bernhjelm, 9380 Kiowa Trail. As I'm sure you're all aware by now, I'm a very concerned citizen also about the public safety department issues that are in front of our city. I guess I would go along with some of the issues that have been raised already tonight. Why you would make these changes with the new city manager apparently coming on board soon. It appears that if the purpose was to get rid of Scott Harr, that's been accomplished. Then why are we further disrupting city hall by changing this department. It's functioned very well with the alignment that is currently in place and it is I think a tremendous tribute to Scott himself that the dynamics that were put in place when he was the public safety director have been what has carried through this department. Carried this department through what must seem to many employees like an impossible situation. I can only imagine what's going on in the minds of these people, these employees as they watch their department being bandied about up at city hall. In the newspaper. In the streets of our city. In the grocery stores. Questions that are being asked. I had asked you, the council at your December 14th meeting, why this would happen. Why any of this had begun? What was the purpose for this? And those questions have never been answered. Yet you told Mr. Smithburg and Mr. Mendez that you would get back to him on the issues that they raised tonight. Well I'm not the only one that has raised these issues. Many people have and I don't know if they just aren't going to be answered° If there's reasons but what is it that's being hidden from the public here. Why aren't these questions being answered'? Is there something that needs to remain hidden from the public? I don't know. It's certainly the impression that's being given to people. I guess at this point I would like to say please, please do the right thing at this point in time and leave the public safety department in tact. I feel it would be foolish and very feudal on my part to ask that Scott Harr be reinstated, but what a great way to begin the healing process. To leave the department the way it is because it has functioned so well. It kind of goes along with the statement, if it isn't broken, don't fix ito But if you do decide to take a look at some other issues, please do take the time necessary. That's a great job on getting the information together Councilwoman Jansen, but there's other costs involved there. There's other functions that our public safety department performs. Thank you. Mayor Mancino: Thank you. Elizabeth Burgett: My name is Elizabeth Burgett. I live at 1193 Harrison Street in Shakopee, Minnesota. I've been on support staff at the public safety department for 5 years. I almost decided not to speak tonight because I was so afraid and I laid awake last night wondering why am I so afraid. I thought well if I'm going to speak the truth, then why should I be afraid? This you know is the United State of America and I should be able to speak freely to people that have been elected to serve me and the other people in Chanhassen. So I know I'm facing the people that have the most power in Chanhassen government at this time, but I choose to believe that you do want to hear the truth and so I'm going to just say a little what's in my heart. I think those who are elected to positions of power in government, as you have been, have the responsibility to put aside personal feol.i.ngs about persons .or issues and consider the welfare of the people they're elected to serve as most important. Councilman Engel asked at last week's work session what has changed since Scott left. I'll give you my answer. I used to work in a department that was 12 remarkable for it's camaraderie, it's sense of purpose, it's dedication to the welfare of the citizens of Chanhassen. This came in great deal from Scott Harr and his sense of what was important. When Scott was our public safety director, state troopers, deputies, the fire chief and other safety and rescue personnel used to stop by his office to discuss and coordinate safety programs, ,emergency responses and emergency management procedures. Since his departure, the department has had no director. The professional camai'aderie between the safety agencies that Scott encouraged is no longer in evidence. We rarely see any of these people any more. If you imagine a public safety department as a great ship having many decks, each representing a different agency. Carver County Sheriff's Department, the fire department, Department of Natural Resources, State Highway Patrol, building inspections, crime prevention education, community oriented police department, then Scott was our captain and our navigator. A ship without a captain to coordinate efforts made by the many departments that keep the ship running is in a dangerous position should a storm threaten. I believe this is what has changed since Scott left. We work in an atmosphere of insecurity. Waiting for the inevitable storm that we all know is coming. A couple of years ago we had a robbery at the Chanhassen Bank and Scott stood shotgun out there and helped coordinate with the Eden Prairie police department on the apprehension of the suspect. It was just things like this. He would, whenever there was a call he wanted to be right there. So I say that we're waiting for the inevitable storm and we're .wondering who will give us direction when it does hit. As for the public safety commission, I ask 'you to consider allowing it to remain a separate entity. It has proven a valuable resource fbr ipast city councils and a place where citizens could go with safety questions and concerns. Many .safety programs that are now in existence can trace their begimfings to recommendations that were made by the public safety commission. Finally, everyone in this room is aware that you ~hold the power here. You can choose to reject everything you've heard and will hear tonight. ]3ut I ask you to consider that the changes that you've already made at city hall and which are not irrevocable, are enough for now. I think if healing is to begin in our city, it has to begin here and it has to begin with you. Thank you. Mayor Mancino: Thank you. Carol Dunsmore: Carol Dunsmore, 730 West 96th Street, Chanhassen. I've been a public safety employee for 11 years January, since January 2nd. I feel like I'm here at my execution. I feel like I'm here at my sentencing. Ever since you forced Scott Harr to resign I have hated to come to work. Absolutely hated it, and I feel I've been a very loyal employee. I loved my job. I just enjoyed coming to work. And I hardly ever called in sick. I've got almost 700 hours of sick time built up. I mean I loved coming here. I loved getting up in the morning and coming here. But since December 9th, I hate to even think about coming here. It's very upsetting. There's no, the morale is so bad in the public safety department and we're losing some dynamite employees because of this, what is going on and it's horrible and we're all looking for work elsewhere. Leah Hawke: Leah Hawke, 7444 Moccasin Trail. You're going to have to forgive me. I'm not very well prepared. I'm actually quite sick, as is my child but I feel strong enough about this issue to be here Xonig~. I'.m a resident _that wants a fiscally sound conncil. I think we pay already too much in taxes, but you know what? I want to be able to walk the streets of Chanhassen and feel safe. I want to go to the library at night with my kids. I want them to be 13 able Io be outside without me having to be there to watch them every minute. I moved from Brooklyn Park to Chanhassen for that specific purpose. The crime rate in Brooklyn Park was outrageous. People are moving here for the services they are getting. They are looking at the statistics. This is a good place to live. We had a good program in Chanhassen and as a resident, not as a Scott Harr groupie that I'm being referred to, although I will tell you ISm proud to be in what I think is a very elite group, my question for this council remains. Why are we going this? What wasn't working? No one's answered that question. I've sat through what I believe to be the only council session on this issue looking at reorganization. That question never came up. There are four important components to strategic planning. I've been through them many times. I'm sure Mr. Engel, working in a corporation has been there too. The first is you identify your objective. Maybe that's in the strategic plan that you sent to my family. I'm not quite sure. That's coming back to you because 1 don't believe in it. Number two. You identity the strengths of the programs that you currently have. I haven't seen that done. I think residents have done more homework to look at the accolades Chanhassen has received for the programs put in place than I've seen this council do in their work session. Does anybody know? Has anybody looked at it? Has anybody said, what's working in Chanhassen? Am I going to get an answer to my question? Mayor Mancino: We're just taking your comment. Thank you Leah. Leah Hawke: When do I get answers to my questions? Are you telling me that as a resident I'm ,not entitled to them? I just want to be clear on the record because I'm going to stop wasting my time 'with this council if that's the casco Are you going to answer questions or not'? Mayor Mancino: Leal'x, you go ahead and make your comments and when we have 'time to give back, we will. Leah Hawke: Okay, so I continue to wait. This will go into month three of waiting for a response to the question of what is not working in Chanhassen. I just want to go on the record with that Mayor. You're refusing again to, okay perfect. So we haven't identified what our strengths are. Okay. That's my observation as a resident. We haven't gone out there and solicited input from the people that have used our services. We haven't looked at what, Linda you're looking at me with that smile. I don't know. Tell me. I haven't seen it in any meeting. Councilwoman Jansen: My jaw just dropped was all. Leah Hawke: Okay. And then what you do after you've identified the strengths is you identify the opportunities for improvement and you do that very carefully so that you don't have employees telling you that they're looking for work° You don't have employees leaving. You look at the way in which you want to go and you do it through attrition or any other means. I've sat here and watched these people essentially told your job might go if we decide to go this route. Your job may go. My question again to this council is Option 3B. Okay, you've got all the costs for that. What about -the .other -options? And if money is so important, why have we spent .about $320,000.00 in settlement costs for employees? When we didn't even know the direction we were going to take. So I look at this process and it's horribly broken. We've not followed a 14 normal strategic planning process so I'm left here standing asking, why are we doing this? There's got to be something else that's driving this. And again, you're not listening to the people · .that have the expertise. With all due respect, you're not law enforcement officials. Residents are going to look to the people that know and in my opinion, that's the members that you put on your public safety commission. You put them there for a reason. To advise you. And my question again to this council is, why aren't you listening? And this is a significant change for Chanhassen. Perhaps this warrants the task force that you believe needs to be established here. Put some residents on a task force. Put them there with law enforcement officials and put them there with council members. This is a huge change for Chanhassen. Some of these options I didn't even know were under consideration. And I really think that similar to the siren issue when people become aware of something, they will react to it. Right now the public's not quite sure what's going on here. They just know that there are changes, potential changes down the street. They aren't thinking how that could impact them and I think we need to give them the facts arid we need to give them the opportunity to give input when they know exactly what you're doing, because they're not educated enough right now about this particular issue to know what's going on. And finally I will say too. I have two small children. And similar to Mr. Ayotte, you'd better be sure that my tax dollars are protecting my children. Because I will look to this council if something happens to them. And if the police don't respond when I have people poking around my house, I will look to this council for an answer why. I'll just check my notes here. Finally, the big question for me as I look at all the numbers and again, I'm not an expert. But I ,want to know what we're paying and what we're getting and I want to know it for each option and I want to know what will be lost before I can appropriately comment on which direction we should go here. And finally, I want to know how much we are spending per person in the city of Chanhassen and I want to know comparable cities, how much are they spending. So we're not looking at, we're looking at it apples to apples. And with that I'll sit down. Mayor Mancino: Thank you. Elizabeth. Elizabeth Burgett: I'm very sorry. I forgot to say something I think is important. There were two letters to the editor last week and the week befbre then. An article about the $566.00 cell phone bill that was attributed to Scott. I was the staff member that was involved with getting in touch with Air Touch Cellular about this. It was totally their mistake. His use that month actually would have been $61.10. They had sent him the wrong phone. They had put him on the wrong program, which was $249.00 a month for 1,000 minutes. They had charged him for two months and I do have all this that I could show you so it really was just a big mistake. They should have sent Scott a digital phone to replace his broken one which when I did speak to Katherine at customer service she said how sorry she was to me and she agreed that she would send us, at no charge to us, a brand new digital phone which she has done. I do have that. She's crediting the account with $249.50. She's giving us 200 free minutes of cell phone time and she's allowing us to keep the other phone so they are trying to make it up to us. But it's just, to me it was just another example of how people are looking for things to pull Scott down. I know he's gone and I accept that now. We don't know why but you had your reasons but I just wanted you to .know that -I.~,hi. rtk ~hi.s one's unfair to charge him with this when no research was done. No one came and asked anyone in the department the reason for this high bill and I easily could have explained it and then he wouldn't have been slighted in the newspaper. 15 Mayor Mancino: Thank you. Dave Dummer: Good evening. I'm Dave Dummer from 8523 Drake Court. I've been in the city for about 24 years now. Over the last 15 years I've got a real intimate knowledge of city hall through some pretty close references. I'm also knowledgeable of public safety having served on it for six years and been it's chair for one year. I'm knowledgeable of the sheriff's department having spent a couple years in a study that we did and brought it to the people at the county of what's happening over there. I'm also quite knowledgeable in the way of finances. I am an MBA. I'm a CMA, etc, etc. I'm a military person for 25 years and I have to call to your attention that your knowledge of what you're discussing is a vacuum. It is terrible that I could sit here, when one person speaks and I could challenge every bit of data you have as being at best incomplete. Please go back and get the data. One place you can get it is the public safety commission. They will help you. They will probably give you 60% to 80% of it, but looking at costs. Trying to say I'm going to replace a public safety director with a patrol officer. That's not .apples and apples. That's apples and oranges. So get your information straight. Bill Bernhjelm :has said it. Bob has said it. You are operating in a vacuum. Get your data down before you decide anything. Thank you. Mayor Mancino: Thank you. :Leslie Michel: Leslie Michel, 2840 Washta Bay Road. I waited for a while to speak up here and !I'm a little nervous but I've also been on the public safety staff for 4 years. I have to correct you Todd. My percentage with law enforcement is a little higher than 5 or 10. I probably spend about 40 to 50% of my time doing law enforcement work with the deputies and everything else Ihat goes on. More than half my day is spent doing law enforcement worko The only thing I'd like to say is that I've lived in Chanhassen for 9 years also and worked in law enforcement for 20 years at different agencies. Having somebody right in Chanhassen and having a city entity is so very important to a community. To focus on individual things such as your crime prevention issues. Your community policing. It's essential. I have also you know pros and cons with going with the county. Sure, you know Bud would snatch up a contract in a heartbeat but we do have the issues also of a full county. Is Chanhassen going to get lost in all that if Bud has to provide services to the whole county? Where does Chanhassen stand in that as to the size of our city? And my children, my animals running at large. We have to realize the focus of the city versus the county and I don't want to see us getting swallowed up in the county. Because you know it's a large county. We set precedence and go with the county on this, you're going to see all the smaller cities out and about that are going to do the same thing and want the same assistance fi.om the deputies and from animal control and all that and then where does that leave Chan? You know we may not be priority number one anymore where we are within our own city and to me that's very important. As a resident and also as an employee here. And to speak for Elizabeth and Carol, it's been very tough on us. And I am one of those employees that you probably will be losing shortly and it's been very tough and that's all I want to say. Thank you. Mayor Mancino: Thank you. 16 Jim Sloss: Jim Sloss, 9360 Kiowa Trail. I am the present Public Safety Commission Chairman. And I will certainly work with the council and staff to come up with the proper recommendation that all of our people here wish to see. It's been a trying time and if the commission is still in, we will certainly try and provide the assistance and make the recommendations that the council will need. Thank you. Mayor Mancino: Thank you. Patsy Bernhjelm: Patsy Bernhjelm, 9380 Kiowa Trail. ! just have a question based on what Councilmember Engel had to say about the hearing getting over because you're leaving at 8:30 and not voting on anything. Does that mean that, and you talked about tabling it. Does that mean that tonight is going to be the only public hearing or it will be tabled for further discussion by public or not? Mayor Mancino: We'll talk about that. Patsy Bemhjelm: Okay. Mayor Mancino: Okay. And rnake a decision. Barb Klick: Barb Klick. Looks like I may be the last speaker. I'd just like to step back and to all this reorganization and it started way befbre I became aware of it. I don't know what's going on. I'm trying to find out as a good citizen. I'm trying to find out information. I'm trying to give feedback. I'm trying to hold elected officials accountable. We all stand on the shoulders of those who have gone before us and that includes our prior elected officials as well as other citizens who have lived here. We had systems that were working. We had a city manager that was here for 22 years. Apparently that wasn't working. Reorg, demoted. We had a public safety director that was here for 12 ½ years. I've seen his HR files. I've heard of you know people hiding behind data privacy. I'd like to know what the issues were. Still no idea what was wrong with that. Reorg. Termination under duress. We had a public safety commission and we have had different conversations. They're in. They're out. They're in. They're out. This is in your strategic plan. Connecting with the community. Getting more voice piece. Apparently now that's not working. I've read recently of a newspaper, who is the official newspaper and they've been reporting the stories that are going on. Apparently they aren't working and we're looking for other vendors. I mean is this common practice? Do we look for new vendors each year? Do vendors solicit to us? I have grave concerns about the reorganization that you're all about and it really needs to be involved with us. Thank you. Wes Dunsmore: Wes Dunsmore, 730 West 96th Street. I do appreciate you guys taking input. I know it's not fun sitting on that end but that's what you get the big bucks for I guess. I don't know the whole issues about this public safety but I know there's a lot of talk here on the money issues and stuff. Wondering what the price is on quality. I'm not out just for the cheap stuff. I know we have to watch the dollars and t really do appreciate tha. t. But we want.quality with it. I don't care, you don't have to put a name into that position but we are looking for quality I think. And I don't know if everybody understands what all the safety. I hear a lot of talk about a little 17 bit of patrolling and some fire you know training and stuff like that. ! think there's a lot that I don't even know behind the scenes that public safety does. There's a lot of issues. They deal with other communities. They have that touch that only you have by being in that position. I know I work for the government for going on 28 years now and the things that you learn by having contact in other departments, other municipalities, it's really an educational thing. You can't put that on a college degree or anything else. It's that human contact that you have and I don't think you can separate public safety and just kind of disperse it. In my opinion, I don't think that works. I have no speech written up but I think as some people here mentioned, the real issues aren't out. And they probably never will be. They're looking for reasons why we're here. As an ex-marine and Viet Nam vet, ! take my freedoms and rights pretty serious. I would like to know some of the reasons. I think I have a right to know. So we can deal with it. Get the cloudiness out of here. I don't know if we'll ever hear that but it sure would be nice. And I guess I do expect and I'll accept nothing less than 100% honesty frown our government officials. If we can't get it there, where do we get it? I thank you for your time. Mayor Mancino: Thank you. Leah Hawke: One more commentu It's from my kids. I promised il would say ito They just had two questions for the council and that is, are you going to get rid of the fire hydrant full of candy and what happens to the trading cards. Mayor Mancino: Anyone else wishing to contribute to the public hearing, and then we'll close Mona Kerber: Mona Kerber, 500 Chanview~ My husband grew up in this city a~d I've been here for 25-26 years. He's been on the fire department for 25 years. And along with him so have I. And as all the other fire department: wives, I would hope that yo~ would make ~ure the public safety helps to keep them safe as far as the police being able to be there to help them out. I know that Scott Hart was at quite a few fires. At major things. We don't only go to fires but they respond to all the accidents and everything else that happens. The cut finger. The whatever. And not only do the police officers and the fire department people respond to that. So do the wives and the children of those people. And we're concerned fbr their safety. Thank you. Mayor Mancino: We'll close the public hearing and bring this back to council for discussion and comment. Mark, you need to leave at 8:30? Councilman Engel: Roughly, yes. Mayor Mancino: And would you like to give some comment and. Councilman Engel: Sure, I'll kick it off. This just goes, I got writers cramp from writing notes here and just more data. This just goes right to the point where I'm in no position to make a decision on this tonight. If we stayed here until 1:00 in the morning I still wouldn't be. There's too much to think.abo~t. And just :~o get it on the record, t also have .three children. The oldest one is 6 years old so there's nobody in the community that cares more about public safety than I do and I think it's anybody with children cares about that. So I'm going to make this decision 18 with that in the back of my mind if not in the front so. And as everybody else up here on this council has their reasons for why they're concerned about safety, my children's most important for me. Economics, yes. Structure and reporting and long term quality and direction. Those are all the other things I'm thinking about. I've looked at all these options. There are just so many variables right now, I can't pick one that I just flat out. I don't like 3. I don't like 1. I like 1 with 2A and 2B. Or nOt 2B, I don't know yet. But it just needs some more thought. I'm thinking of probably a hybrid is what's going to be the result of all this. I don't know what that hybrid is. It's going to have the best components of what I, personally what I think is the best of each one. I'm just off the top of my head I'm not comfortable with seating all the control of our public safety functions to the county for precisely the reason one of you brought up and that was, you are serving two masters. Who is going to get the short end of the stick on certain days? I don't know. I'd like to talk to some of the people involved in Andover and see how they handle that because they get all theirs from Anoka County. I'd like to hear from some of their staff. Todd, if there's anyway we could do that. Get some feedback. If they ever feel or experience that the Anoka County master outweighs the Andover master, I'd like to see that. For those of you who weren't here last week, Linda put together a terrific page of information. And Andover seems like, I'm not going to say anybody's a perfect fit but they're a pretty darn good one. They've got a lot of the same issues involved with growth that we do. They're a community that was out, away from the city. The suburbs are growing out and stretching to reach them. They're growing along the same rate. They've got roughly the same population. Their demographics are probably fairly similar so I'm going to use them for lack of anybody else as probably my first point of reference, and there are several others as well so there are some models out there that we can look at and make some judgments on. It wouldn't be taking place in a vacuum. All these decisions are going to take a lot of interaction. I think we just started last, actually we've been starting since December when these, when we even first decided to say well do we still need the public safety commission and department. I don't know. We weren't really discussing that back then. Now is when we're discussing that and ! think there will be a lot of discussion over the next week or two or more. And I've got a lot on my mind with this right now. I don't favor any options. I think it's going to be a hybrid and ! don't know what that hybrid is yet. Mayor Mancino: Are you thinking that you would be ready at the next City Council...to make a decision? Are you looking for more input...? Councilman Engel: I'd like to think about everything I've got here. I'd like to talk to some more people. I'd like to get some feedback from Todd on how Andover and Anoka County specifically are dealing with these issues. I'd like to know if Bud Olson is excited to take this on, would it be under the condition or would we establish the condition that they give us an all inclusive contract which we don't have right now. I mean if we're going to go with that type of a contract, we'd need that. So I want to know if that's involved as the cost change. You know I don't know. Do we still have $102,000.00 cost advantage if we put those services in the contract or is that part of the contract? This is all the details we really don't have and we just need to get that out there. Once I've got that, I think we can start flushing out some alternatives. We could start putting some hybrid-models together and saying here's something that looks good m me.. Linda could put something together. Mark could put something together. I'd like to see us all come up with that. Go over it in some work sessions. One work session at least. And debate 19 what we think is a good model~ I like the start but Fmjust not ready to pick one. So I'm ready to move forward by getting a little bit more detail first behind what would be involved in a full contract. I'm still a little uncomfortable with that because we lose total control of our community policing. But I'm not closed to any decision either so I'd like to see it. But I'd like to start skinnying down the options a little bit. We probably are going to expand them first and then start skinnying the list down so I'd like to see some hybrid models put together and discussed. And I think I could do that by next work session. I'd be ready to do that with next work session. Yeah. I'm going to stick around. I usually run through airports. Mayor Mancino: Well let me know. Steve. Councilman Labatt: The first thing is, I. mean we're a week away from interviewing a new city manager. Or applicants. Probably within 30 days from offering a job. 60 days from having a new city manager. Occupying the vacant office upstairs. Why are we discussing this when we are looking 60 days down the road of hiring a new city manager? Why not wait until this person's on board? Let this person get acclimated to working in Chanhassen to the community. Understand our needs as a city and then let this new person, whoever it might be, or she, make some decisions. So I'll throw that out there first. And I'll also, is it even the responsibility of the council to tell the city manager how he has to organize his departments? ...departments and where he puts employees. That's just another question I'll throw out there. Okays well I'm just. I'm just throwing that question out. ls he asking us for input but his final decision is with him or do we have the final say? I don't know where we sit in our responsibilities 'as a council. I heard some very enlightening comments tonight. Too little information. Too fast. New city manager. I ~heard from, emotional pleas from staffas to what the impact on them has been the last two months. So I'll throw those comments out there. And then looking at the options. You know why...ship broken? Why not just leave it as is with Option lo It's worked well for 13 years... Option 3. Linda provided us some facts and some numbers here. And as...point out that in Option 3, under the cost estimate for full police coverage from Carver County it incorporates 54 hours daily but I think that, I don't think it's any fault of Linda's or intent but we would need to, you know obviously there's other costs in here. $17,000.00 for one squad car. So if we're going to increase 36 hours or so. Whatever. 32 hours of police coverage. If we're going to increase the additional police coverage, we're going to have to buy police cars. That's going to be another cost in the contract that we're going to be charged for. And then we also need to look at the supervision. Right now we're paying for...extent of $137,000.00. That incorporates manual costs of...and using the formula here to $137,000.00. We're going to be, we're going to have to adjust that to the tune of probably $75,000.00 by having one of the newly appointed Lieutenants, since Sheriff Olson's going through the board down there, providing supervision up here. So that would be a cost of $75,000.00 by this middle grounding this...chief deputy salary. It might be more. It might be less. So I think there's more cost that we need to look overall with all three options and I would reserve more time for the end for additional comments when they come up... Mayor Mancino:... Audience: Mayor, we can't hear you. 20 Mayor Mancino: Excuse me...to another work session? Councilman Labatt: Yeah. Another work session but let's give it some time here. I mean this is not something we're going to be able to discuss next week with hearing from the residents. Have a chance to digest information. Mayor Mancino:... Councilman Labatt: I'I1 go on the record too like Councilman Engel, I've got three kids under 18 months so they're my first priority. Mayor Mancino: Councilwoman Jansen. Councilwoman Jansen: I guess I want to maybe reply to some of the comments that came out this evening and last Monday night in our work session one of the things that was moved on right at the end of that session was that there would be two of us on this council working as a committee and calling and taking input and getting feedback and basically bringing to the table more information as far as being able to make the decision. I'm looking around and there are many people in this room that I did speak with. I did put the phone calls in and looked for the input. I touched base with staff and I will say now thank you to the staff members who have been extremely professional. Spent the time with me on the phone. Giving me input and one of the things that 1 did express at that time was that I am certainly sensitive to what has been going on within the department. Mr. Labatt and I did go through an orientation program. We were introduced to all the diff~rent functions and personnel and had a wonderful exposure to this department and how it is structured. What makes it work. The significant parts of it that in fact everyone speaks to as having make it work. And I acknowledge those things. And hopefully those are the things that yes, we can both bring to the whole decision making process. In the course of speaking with people this week, and meaning staff as well as a couple of the commission representatives, I heard more than once get this done. The morale is low. We are hurting. There's a feeling of when is the next shoe going to drop. We don't know what's happening. You know it was make it stop. So it's a little difficult to then sit here and hear additional comments about how can you make that decision now. You want us, and myself: I speak as an individual here. You want us to be sensitive to what's going on within the city and making sure that you know safety is covered. That we're doing all the right things. And I'm hearing from internally, we need direction. We need to get this done. We need to get on with our lives. And we need to get down to business. Now if we do our diligence and that is what we're charged with. And yes, I started from you know presenting some numbers here because if we're doing this for the right reason, yes. Quality is an issue. It is a major issue and making sure that we have the right service. I'm not hearing anyone say anything negative about our share of deputies but no one has said, some of those deputies have been with Chanhassen for 10 years. And we're one of the high bid positions within the deputy ranks. We're getting high seniority deputies. And any time I have, myself have had to call and use their services before I was familiar with the <,i-ty, -I ~lidn't distinguish between our officers and the Carver County deputy office. But I can tell you that it was, they were deputies that showed up you know for every call ever placed from our home. They were exceptional professionals and it didn't matter for how 21 minor. These were not emergencies and the deputies were there in wonderful response time. So to think that we're making a decision in a vacuum when we've all sat here and the faces have become familiar after what, 60 days? I think we have all, whether we admit it publicly or not, we have spent a tremendous amount of time thinking about this. Asking questions, ls it lair for us to be calling the employees and asking them some of those questions? I don't know. ! mean they're going through a lot right now. We've now called them. Gotten input. But to research this, we have to look beyond. We look for other county sheriff contracts so that we could do comparisons. Is another community our size properly covered by a Carver County sheriff's contract? And so I mean yes, we are doing our homework. We're bringing in the numbers. If you bring the numbers in you have to say, are we getting quality services at a cost effective price or we're not doing our jobs. I mean that is our job and yes we have to look for the safety. I don't want to carry on too much at length but I know I did my goals as to in the end what are we trying to accomplish. And ! could speak to that now but I mean I'd be taking. Bob Ayott~: ...I want to know what the response time for a police officer in... Mayor Mancino: Excuse me Bob. Please. This is not, 'the public hearing is closed. If you can just wait please for her. She has the floor° Thank you. Councilwoman Jansen: If there's a problem with response time, it's not been brought to this council's attention. Bob Ayotte: I didn't say there was. I'll talk to you after..~ Mayor Mancino: Or you can at least wait until we're done and we open it up~ 'Thank you. Councilwoman Jansen: And again, looking at what is working. If we're going to change anything, and this was looking at all of the options that were presented to us by Mr. Gerhardt, 1 through 3B. And looking at those long term. Long term. Long term planning. We need a unified focus, community policing service. The most cost effective means of providing quality public safety service to the community. The resulting organization needs to provide for visibility and accessibility to the community. Connectedness and interdepartmental cooperation and communication between all public safety service organizations. That is what we are so renowned for. Is that we integrate all of these services into a well tuned working machine. The Carver County Sheriff's department. Chanhassen fire fighters. Minnesota State troopers. Paramedic services from two different communities. Southwest Metro Drug Task Force and then you've go the Department of Natural Resources Conservation Officers. So I mean, and I also noted etc. I know I've got MADD that I need to account for and there's you know probably several others. But communities manage to coordinate those things. We need to just make sure that we've got that mechanism in place or maintain it as any changes were to happen. Continued support for community policing. The bicycle patrol, water patrol. Continued support for crime prevention .programs. The local control and identity. That is a major issue that going back even through the 80's-comes up i.n a.l-l-of.the .reports is .that a major concern was whether or not -we would be able to maintain the local control. Monitoring and reporting of successes and deficiencies. We need to be sure that we have a mechanism in place that's tracking where we are and what's happening~ 22 Reporting back. Suggesting if we've got problems, then how do we address them. Whether that's you know the liaison commission or you know I guess it was called a police liaison commission at one point. And get the significant players involved so that there's open communication. And those were all things that in the process of doing my research on the background of where this department's been in Chanhassen, came out as significant issues. That I think we've all Paid time thinking about. I mean it does. It gets down to are our streets safe? Is our community well covered? But how do we best do that? Because the initial plan didn't have a splintered department to where the one internally continued to grow and we held the patrol hours fiat. And the patrol hours have been fiat for 5 years and I realize that there's been the significance of our having you know the internal hours, but you know where are we shorting and if it is under one umbrella, is that being better addressed in totality? And in the conversation with Sheriff Olson, he understands the significance of the coverage that we need. The community orientation that we need. And he is prepared to step up and put into a transitional plan what this community needs. It's like Andover said to me, they are the biggest community within Anoka County. And they are significant to the sheriff's department so the sheriff's department bends over backwards to make sure that Andover's happy because they don't want to lose that contract. It's a completely perspective so then are we asking of the sheriff's department what we need? And what I'm heating is they will put our emblem and serving Chanhassen on the sides of the cars. They'll provide the patrol hours that we need. Those are all things that Andover spoke to as well that were important. And we need to make it visible to the community. I went back through a year and a half worth of quarterly newsletters and we make stand out our logo and our Chanhassen city employees very nicely. But we need to say to the community call the sheriff's department. They're there. We need to show them. Your know a flier to the community with the phone number for the sheriff's department. I floored a few people who said well I only know to call 911. Well call the non-emergency number for the sheriff's department, 361-1231. I mean but do we get that information out there? I mean they're significantly in our ,community and I'm, I guess what I'm reacting to is I heard here tonight that we're not answering .the questions. We're not saying how we're doing it or why we're doing it. And I have welcomed the phone calls. I have spent hours speaking with anyone who has approached me and said, come on. You know we'd like some feedback. If what you're saying is are we going to get our answers to the letters in the Villager, I don't know if that's a communication tool. I don't take it that way. I don't pick up the phone and call the authors so if I'm offending someone by not doing that, then I apologize. But I would better be able to communicate from a phone call and I don't know that anyone has ever refused to take a phone call but I certainly haven't. And I certainly approach the employees and said now's the time. Now is the time to say you know what it is that we need to be addressing. Inform us. Let us know what the key issues are and again thank you. They did. Councilman Engel: I'd like to state just before I take off. I know I don't have to remind Councilman Senn of this but there's a complete record of the minutes for everything said in the council meeting so I would invite you please, if you continue making comments. Speak directly into that microphone so that the minutes are clear because it gives us a chance to review all this over .the v~ecO~.end. T.hursday when we get our packet for next week. And if-the deputy would be so kind as to give me a 3 minute head start out of the parking lot and clear 494, I'd appreciate it. 23 Mayor Mancino: Councilwoman Jansen, would you like to see this move forward to the next work session? Maybe Roger, can we just stop this and forward to the next work session and continue this discussion? Roger Knutson: Yes. Mayor Mancino: Okay, thank you. Roger Knutson: You can table this item to...time you think is appropriate. Mayor Mancino: Thank you. Councilwoman Jansen: I obviously want everyone to be able to gather the information and I thought that's what we were doing. So if Councilman Engel needs more time, I think mine isn't short the process but I do think that, and again if the employees feel differently then they need to you know counter what they said to me this week. But I got the sense that this, if there's going to be a change, then they need completion. They need to start the healing process is what they're saying to me. I mean that's what [ heard. That's what I was told. Mayor Mancino: Councilman Senn. Councilman Senn: Well hearing what i think is probably the consensus at this point to put this to another work session, I think I'll be very brief. Plus I don't want to be repetitive. Many of the .steps which Councilperson Jansen traced also traced I think, I can't speak as to what each and every city council person has done in terms of their due diligence but I think the majority of the ~:onncil has taken this issue very seriously as it relates to due diligence. Weave, you know .everything from contact other cities to see how other cities are doing it to getting data and information that's available to us and organizations to spending several occasions meeting with and talking with the sheriff. Sheriff department and staff. The...last weeks efforts of, especially in terms of the contacts and calls that we asked her to make a week ago and feedback t¥om that. I think that personally there's enough information there to proceed with basically discussion and decisions that we need to make. I too think that, and a lot of the comments I've been getting is let's get it done with. And I'm trying to get it done with and move on potentially we aren't quite to that point and it's another week to do that which I'm hearing a few people say, then so be it but let's move on and get it done. Councilman Labatt: I think one comment here as far as, Linda referred to having a mechanism in place. I think we had a mechanism in place with the public safety director. He saw to it that our needs as a community were being met in the case of the contract. And...Option 1. And during my campaign this past fall, not once did I hear somebody...did I hear lower my taxes by removing the public safety department... There's a lot of other little programs out there that Chan Public Safety does that the Carver County Sheriff does not do...programs that many of us are aware of. Cr. ime~prev~ntion. Things that Scott and Beth havE.done. Sometimes i.t's just the little things that, stick with what you have so... 24 Mayor Mancino: Thank you. I'll give just a few of my comments. And mine are mostly ditto from everyone else's as far as getting, tabling this till Monday. But a few of the things that I've heard, and I want to go back to another area in public safety that we have gotten as a council a lot of input from, not at tonight or a month ago but has been inspections. And that has been from the Chamber of Commerce. A lot of the members there when we have gone to a meeting and they spoke to the entire council in September and we broke Up into different tables and they had lots of concerns about inspections. In fact they faxed to us in the inspections, this is from their concerns to us. Are the members of the council and the city staff aware of the increased cost of doing business in Chanhassen due to the manner in which city inspectors pass judgment? Comment. These increased costs are passed onto business owners and tenants which puts them at a competitive disadvantage to those doing businesses in other communities. It also discourages the business community investing and serving those who live here. Construction is over inspected compared to neighboring cities. Little or no judgment is used to whether altematives proposals meet the intent of the code. Rather builders are required to meet the strictest interpretation of code. They also say, do we discourage business by harassing them with new construction and alternation cost required by building inspections, and that is in all due respect to the inspections department. Not to say anything about that, but to let you know that we are getting feedback and we have been for the last year from other community members that have been concerned with some of the way the public safety department and what's going on in there. And again, they have called. They have voiced concerns and wanted us to look in that area and 'whether inspections should be kept under public safety or whether it should be moved to community development. And the philosophy that they have passed on to council members is, ,wouldn't it be more user friendly under community development and it is also that way in most other cities. So they did want us to look at that and have brought that up to the council again · many times and ! know that that hasn't been talked about in the last couple of months. We still, we need to listen to those other members of the community. So that is something that I think we also need to talk about when we... (There was a tape change at this point in the discussion.) Mayor Mancino: That's Tuesday, excuse me. On the 17th. Thank you. What is the 16th? Roger Knutson: Presidents Day. Mayor Mancino: Thank you very much. Then I do, I would like to spend some time going over not only the numbers but the quality of services compared to the numbers that Linda handed out tonight and look at that and understand it. And also the goals that you have written down. That was.just a wonderful presentation. So with that can we. Councilman Labatt: I'd like to make just one more comment. Mayor Mancino: Sure. Councilman Labatt: ...inspections. I was curious about inspections too and in fact I had two inspectors out at my house today doing my basement and my deck, neither of which passed I will 25 proudly admit. But it brings up a point. I mean with why it didn't pass you know. And it was right from building code. The same code that every city goes off of and the glass railing I had my deck did not have the tempered glass logo on there which is required by building code. Now I've got to go back. Get a hold of the contractor to find out for sure that it was tempered glass and building code. There's a reason for that is number one, safety. If the glass breaks, it breaks into little itty bitty pieces. Not big shards and hurt someone. And is it a hassle for me? Not really. I don't really mind. ! mean you know, sure. The inspectors have to come back out. It's probably more of a hassle for them. But I also have some comment cards here that I got from the inspections department. And here's one here from, am I allowed to say the names here? Who they're from? Mayor Mancino: You don't need to, do you? 1 mean just to give the comment. Councilman Labatt: Well...say names on who's commenting. Roger Knutson: I don't know what you're reading so I can't. Councilman Labatt: Well comment cards. Roger Knutson: ...it falls under the government data privacy act° Councilman Labatt: Okay. Here's one from Eden Trace Company° Are there any areas we need to improve? I've had a very good working relationship with the building department and appreciate their quick. ~ .of my plan reviews and inspections. My experience with city employees has been pleasant and very professional. Special thanks to Steve Kirchman and Bob Reid. Another one here from a guy name Bob. Excellent service overall. I think we need tcJ take a look at these here. Try to maintain a 24 hour to 48 horn' lead for inspections° And comments I've heard when Linda referred to it the day her and I rode along with the inspectors before we were sworn in. Every inspection I went to, 'the building sup or the developer said we need more inspectors. We can't wait 48 hours to get inspectors in because there's development so, in such high demand here. Another one here, the inspectors always appeared on time. You know a lot of inspection times for a lead time and...so there's all kinds of comments here that, as long as the comments are being made about the inspectors and the ones that you led to. Refer to were negative in context. I got very positive ones too that I thought. Mayor Mancino: Well, and I wasn't trying to do a tit for tat thing with inspections° Councilman Labatt: I know you weren't. Mayor Mancino: I'm just saying that. Councilman Labatt: I mean I got the supporting documents to say it 26 Mayor Mancino: So that's why we always hear both sides of issues. So may I have a motion please? I mean I think we're done. I think we want to make sure that Councilman Engel is with us and we're discussing this and coming to conclusion. Councilwoman Jansen: I guess if we just again emphasize, if this is being tabled for input, please call. If yoU've got new information that you want to share. If you've got questions about what we know or don't know. If you've got information, you know share and call. Councilman Labatt: Can we, before we make a motion, can we re-open the public hearing to take comments tonight when things are fresh in people's minds? Can we do that? Re-open the public hearing? Mayor Mancino: Sure. Roger Knutson: Tuesday, it's not a regular council ineeting. It's a work session. Todd Gerhardt: So no decisions can be made. Mayor Mancino: No. No...was asking tonight. Sure, we can take a few more comments. We'll take a few more comments tonight and then that will be it. Public hearing. ~ob Ayotte: Thank you very much Mayor. I appreciate that. Clarification. I am not disagreeing :with the fact that possibly Carver County would be an excellent opportunity. What I am disagreeing over is the fact that the council has not sought out the expertise to build specification. Scope of work. Congress, or councilman. You may be a congressman one of these days Senn but right now Councilman Senn. The point is that you need to push it through but we do not want euthanasia. We need to have the scope understood. What is the specification? How many acres of lakes do we have? How many linear miles of road do we have to patrol? Has that data, that empirical data been collected from people like this to say okay. Now what are the law enforcement issues associated with it? In addition I believe there is a faint going on. A rouse. Because you're talking about public safety when in fact the organizational charts that Mr. Gerhardt presented was for an entire city organization. So let's see specification. The · requirements list for everything. Not simply public safety. Then the appearance of rouse won't be there. Then we'll know that there is sincerity in looking at an organizational structure that will support us as a community. So I would ask that you would consider that. And I would ask that you look at the inside experts. There's nothing wrong with taking the analytical skills of your engineer force to help build a specification for public safety. It will work. But then you take, you had to bring in the expertise like this gentleman over here was talking about to take a look at not only the fiscal issues but the other tasks that have to be accomplished. You don't know your requirements as yet. I don't know then. I'm not suggesting I do. All I'm saying is I would ask that you research that. And I also would like a point of clarification. Mr. Gerhardt, did you in fact ask the council to change the organizational structure of the city? It's either yes, no-or t don't know. T-hose are three answers. Mayor Mancino said to Councilman Labatt, I thought, that you had requested that the organization of the city change. Is that true or not true? 27 Todd Gerhardt: What was asked was that at the beginning of the year that we would look at. Bob Ayotte: Todd, could you get closer to the mic? Todd Gerhardt: At the beginning of the year we were asked to look at the reorganization of city hall. Not just perSonnel but also the commissions and we also were asked to look at the public safety director's position° Bob Ayotte: Who asked and why? Todd Gerhardt: Mayor, do you want me to answer these questions? Mayor Mancino: Sure. Todd Gerhardt: Okay. It was the directive of the City Council to research these items. Bob Ayotte: I didn't hear you. Todd Gerhardt: It was from the City Council. Bob Ayotte: Okay. And why? What was the rationale for asking for organizational change? Was there something not operating properly? Todd Gerhardt: No. When you see the amount of change over that we've seen here, you want to take a look at your entire structure. Bob Ayotte: The amount of change overo What change over are you referring to? Todd Gerhardt: With the vacancy of the public safety director position. Looking at replacing the city manager position. Bob Ayotte: That's a fair response. I understand. So because of the organizational change, or the changes in personnel it would make sense to look at the organization? Todd Gerhardt: Correct. Bob Ayotte: Okay. But please, I ask again, please build your spec first. Identify the requirements and gain some of the expertise that are out in the community to help you out. Thank you. Mayor Mancino: Thank you. Anyone else and then we're closing the public hearing. Barb Klick.'..Barb KlJ~k ~aia..Am I correct to assume that fight now we still have a public safety commission in existence? 28 Todd Gerhardt: We do have a public safety commission. However, we do not have a public safety director to assist in taking information back to the public safety commission so until such time as. Barb Klick: Okay, but aren't you acting at, aren't you acting in that role? You or Mr. Ashworth? Who's the lynchpin between the public safety commission if they're in existence and the Council? Todd Gerhardt: The code calls for a public safety director to coordinator the public safety commission. Barb Klick: Right. But we don't have one right now so who is assuming the responsibilities? Would that be Bob Z? Would that be you? And what I'm getting at is, we have a system in place. That's what I was trying to appeal to you before. I mean we have built this with our fore fathers about a system that has been working and I've'not heard anyone say let's involve the public safety commission for input about this reorg. This is the biggest thing that has involved public safety in the 12 years since I've lived here. Why would we not use this expertise that we have in place to give input to how we want the city to look like? So if that commission is still in place, I think this should be with the input of the public safety commission. I can't believe how ,we would work around them or without them. I'd be very dismayed if that community input was .not sought. Thank you. Mayor Mancino: Thank you. Okay, public hearing is closed on this. Go ahead if you want to get up one last time. Leah Hawke: Well I just have a question and that is, there's been a lot of information here and I work with numbers every day in a brokerage firm. but I've not made sense of these yet and I would like an opportunity, as I'm sure a lot of people in this room would, to look through the information that's been handed out today so that we could make comment again. Mayor Mancino: Sure. We'll have that available. Up at the front desk. Leah Hawke: ... Mayor Mancino: Come back up. Come back up. 'Leah Hawke: I'm confused. I'm always coming out of these meetings confused so I just want to clarify. You're going to have a work session and. Mayor Mancino: They're going to continue this hearing, this discussion at a work session. Leah Hawke: Right, but the work session rules of procedure don't allow for public comment. Ri.g-hr? So you'ore goi.ng to continue it but we kind of have to sit back with any information that we might want to share at that meeting or others, because I'm sure there will be others coming 29 out as this gets known. All I'm asking is there going to be an opportunity for input on the different options? This is the first time I've seen some of these options. Mayor Mancino: And part of that can, or most of that can be done with, if you want to call councilmembers and give them your input, etc. You can do that. You can send it to us. E-mail it to us with questions and concerns. Leah Hawke: So there's no more public comment after tonight on the reorganization? Can I just. Mayor Mancino: No, not unless the council decides to go to another council meeting. Leah Hawke: Okay. Mayor Mancino: Okay? Thank you. Public hearing is closed. We'll go onto our next agenda item. Thank you. I suppose we do have to make the motion to table this to keep going. Councilman Senn: What are we talking about doing? Tabling this meeting or action or whatever to the work session? Mayor Mancino: Continuing it at the work session on Monday night. Councilman Senn: So continuation of this meeting basically to Tuesday night. Roger Knutson: If you want to be able to take action on Tuesday night. Councilwoman Jansen: On this item. Councilman Senn: What's the proper way that you do that? Roger Knutson: You table this item to Tuesday night and direct the Acting City Manager to post this as a regular city council meeting for this item. If you want to take action. Councilman Senn: Okay. So moved. Mayor Mancino: Is there a second? Councilwoman Jansen: I'll second. Councilman Senn moved, Councilwoman Jansen seconded to table action on the Organizational Issues until Tuesday, February 16, 1999 at which time action will be taken. All voted in favor and the motion carried. Mayor Mancino: Okay. So it will be on next Tuesday night, February 17th work session at, what time do we start? 30 Roger Knutson: Mayor Mancino: Patsy, yes. Patsy Bernhjelm: Mayor Mancino: Roger Knutson: Mayor Mancino: Kate Aanenson: It's the 16th isn't it? Mayor Mancino: February 16th or is it 17th? Councilman Senn: Whatever Tuesday is. Mayor Mancino: Tuesday. Whatever Tuesday is. 17th. It's the 16th. Okay. Tuesday on the l 6th. Jan Lash: ...at the next city council meeting... Mayor Mancino: We may do it at the work session, depending on whether. Jan Lash: And you can take action and call for a vote at a work session? Mayor Mancino: That's exactly, yes. Jan Lash: Roger? Roger Ka~utson: Yes. It will be listed as a regular city council meeting for this agenda item. Jan Lash: And then you take action on it? Councilwoman Jansen: Todd, can you still get it advertised in the Villager? Are you doing the work session things in the Villager? Todd Gerhardt: I don't believe. Dean just walked out. I don't believe he, I don't think he can get the ad in in time tomorrow. It doesn't have to be in the paper. It doesn't have to be in the paper. No Roger just said it didn't have to be. ..~.Tuesday night for people to come... Can we open that up Roger is we continue it? We can open it up if we want to. It's your decision. You can do it either way. Okay. It will be our decision to do it that night. My decision if we want to open it up and usually .I open it -up to comments. But it would be helpful again to get e-mails or questions that you have. So again let me make this very clear. Next Tuesday night we are going to continue this conversation on organization issues. We're going to do it as a council and we 31 will ~probably do it in a work session style. How we've been here. How we were before. And at that work session, the continuation of that meeting, yes I will probably allow for some public comment. But please come with different comments. New comments than tonight. ! mean that would be helpful because obviously, will we be able to get minutes before the work session? Nann? Nann? You're the hot person on the seat. Will we be able to get, thank you. So there will be minutes. Councilman Labatt: Mayor? Mayor Mancino: Yes. Councilman Labatt: Maybe it might behoove us to invite the Sheriff to hear his comments. Maybe even relook at Mark's motion to continue...look at making a decision such as this, going to Option 3, maybe we could have the chance to talk to him. Councilwoman Jansen: Just informationally, we had pursued that with him for this evening but because of,the things on his agenda, that was not a possibility so we were able to at least get comment :before there was going to be any conversation going down this line. But just FYI. Just FYI. Councilman Senn: Well those of you who haven't, contact him° Go talk to him. That's what we did. Couescilman Labatt: But I think the public would like to hear what he has to say. Mayor'Mancino: That's not a bad idea° Why don't we see if he can rnake it. Okay. Jan Lash: Mayor, are you thinking of inviting the public safety board? Mayor Mancino: Most of them I think are here tonight. Jan Lash:... Jim Sloss:...sort of the way things are going so. Mayor Mancino: Okay, thank you. Next item on the agenda. Is everybody ready? Understood? Councilwoman Jansen: Can we take like a 5 minute please recess? Mayor Mancino: Sure. Councilwoman Jansen: Sure. Mayor Mancino: Leah, what's still your question? 32 Leah Hawke: No, that's fine. I'm...what we can and can't do and council... Mayor Mancino: Well Roger is here, if you have a question. Leah Hawke: Well I know Roger is here but I maybe want to do my own research. Mayor Mancino: Okay. You're welcome to ask him. We're going to take a 5 minute break. 33