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Current Events
- Election Updates: There are 5 council candidates and 2 mayor candidates. Primary election is Aug 13. General election is Nov 5th. Click here for list of local candidates.
- If you or people in your area want to meet and discuss current/future topics related to the city, reach out to me to set up a time to visit. (email, phone call, or in person)
- As you're driving on the river road by Stephens' park, you'll notice construction on the south side of the road. That's the new central water system treatment facility in progress.
- Many of you are familiar with the phrase "rural look and feel" or "rural character." Dayton residents have said this is important to them and I agree. It's even in our mission statement. We've had a couple work sessions on the topic and I believe it'll result in a list of ideas we will be prioritizing for the future. If you have ideas, please let me know.
- The city still has a Parks commission opening. If that interests you contact me or the city.
Work Session (Long Term Plan)
Every year the council and staff go over long term plans for many of the funds. These plans extend out 10 years, but the reality is that anything over 2 years is really just a place marker for anything for items staff even thinks might be needed or wanted and a very very rough guess at the cost. The reality is, much of it is locking down the things for the next year (2025) so we can accommodate those in the upcoming budget talks.
Here was some of the items discussed in the various funds:
Fund 401 (Capital Equipment)
- 2025 - Front End Loader ($320k) for the Maintenance Dept was a fairly significant item. This has been on the plan for a while now and replaces a 20 year old vehicle that's starting to require significant maintenance. Depending on other higher priority items in the budget, this could get pushed out a year.
- 2028 - These very expensive items (2 fire department trucks) add up to about $3.8M. Considering our current levy is about $7.8M that's a huge cost.
Fund 405 (Park Dedication)
- In general this fund seems to have some things in it that needs to be temper with some of our expectations with parks. It shows the fund goes negative in 2028 and stays there for some time.
- The 2 things I pushed for is to perform an analysis on how we allocate money from new development between local parks and regional parks to make sure we're not short-changing either side, and update the park and trail dedication fees so were able to have development fund what it needs to fund.
Fund 406 (Park Capital Replacement)
- 2028 - For now there's 2 items here for Cloquet, playground equipment and structures. My concern (which I've mentioned many times over the last few years) is that staff is always pushing for "maintenance free" things which we pay a significant premium for yet we end up replacing them not long down the road anyway. An example of this is the gazebo there. At that time I was on the Park Commission and didn't like the fact we were paying $40K for it when I knew we could turn it into a community event and have residents build something as good as or better for 25% the cost. The argument that was used to get the current building was the it would be "Maintenance free". Well, here we are looking at replacing it in a few years (not to mention it's starting to rust through).
Fund 408 (Trails)
- 2025 - The only item here was a $900k cost for a trail from Berkshire down to Vinewood. This one has been on the plan for a while but there are significant questions as to whether it's feasible at this time. It would somewhat complete a connection between the area south of Vinewood to the northern trail system.
Fund 410 (Capital Facilities)
- 2028 - This is going to be massive. A new fire station ($20M), city hall ($5M), and public works expansion ($2.5M). $27M total. Let that sink in. Assuming a 30 year bond and 5%, this is roughly $600 per house in Dayton. Clearly we need to let some reality sink in and see where that goes.
Fund 414 (Pavement)
- This plan has a lot of assumptions that I don't believe will pan out. There are a lot of expenditures on 113th (off of 81) which have a lot of issues to resolve. We directed staff to push those out at least a year and see where things are at next year.
Item G (Three Rivers Park District Update - TRPD)
Every year TRPD gives us an overview of what their plans are for the coming year. Not much in the way of news here but if you are interested you can watch the presentation here(click to open)
Item H (Pavement Management Dollars)
Some of the this year's budgeted pavement projects came in under budget and the idea was floated that we pave the parking lot at central park with the excess funds. The decision was to get an estimate of the cost and go from there. If that estimate is excessive we'll likely keep the balance in the fund which will help with next year.
Item I (EDA Enabling Resolution)
Dayton's EDA (Economic Development District) was created back in 1990. Unfortunately, changes to its structure up through 2014 were handled incorrectly. In addition, the bylaws under which they operate were updated and conflicted with that structure.
Much of this was discovered during the handling of the Levee property.
This item was to approve a draft of a resolution to correct the structure problems.
My intent with this resolution was to clean up and correct the previous issues. Unfortunately (and I knew this was coming) another council member decided this was his chance to make significant changes to the EDA (i.e. disband the commission). Had that was our goal, we (or previous leadership) could have done that at any time in the past but chose not to. That led to a lot of rambling on that member's part, which didn't seem to make a lot of sense. As other council members pointed out, the council ultimately has the controlling authority . My guess is there was another motive there.
Regardless, the majority chose to move forward with the draft (minus a few items that seemed to come out of nowhere in it) and the final draft will be voted on in an upcoming meeting.
Item J (Public Purpose Expenditure Policy)
At a previous meeting, there was an agenda item whereby a non profit in the city was asking to have the fees for some permits they were requesting (large assembly, fireworks, police support) be waved. At that time I repeated my belief that these fees will kill these public events since many of these events don't have a lot of funding to begin with. In looking at this, staff decided our policy on expending city funds was out of date and this item was to bring it up to date. Though if you read the policy, it's still as clear as mud and the reason for that is the state statute covering it is just as murky. It's very full of subjective terms and is virtually meaningless. Given we had to have it updated, this was approved 5-0.
Item K (Waving of Fees)
As I mentioned in the previous item, Magnus Veteran's Foundation has asked the city to wave fees for its event. Magnus is a non-profit that provides medical care for veterans outside of the government's VA system. For you veterans out there, I would suggest you check them out even if you're not looking for medical care. They provide a lot of support for veterans AND their families.
During the discussion, this item seemed to be going in the wrong direction as I think the city should be supportive of non-profits and community events. In the end, it did finally get approved 5-0.
Item L (Territorial Water Main Extension)
This item was to approve the engineering and design to extend the water main on Territorial 1500 feet towards Brockton. Even after it's built, the entire cost will be paid for by the local businesses to get that water. It was approved 5-0.
As always, feel free to contact me for your ideas, comments, and suggestions.