Call this meeting to order. The Natural Resource Conservation Board is an advisory board to the city council.
A board is charged with recommending acquisition of lands for open space and developing a natural resource plan,
which includes environmental policy and guidelines for the maintenance and preservation of blends existing in future open spaces and trail corridors.
One of the board's functions is the whole public meetings and make recommendations to the city council.
For each item, the board will receive reports prepared by city staff provide the opportunity for public response,
conduct board discussions, and make recommendations.
The city council, however, makes all final decisions on these matters.
roll call meet board member Jeanette here or member Panning here board member McKinley
board member Thrushon here board member Philippe chair Raffordy here next we
have approval of the minutes from last February 21st.
I move we approve the minutes
All right, we have a motion in a second. All those in favor. All right, minutes are approved, approval of the agenda for tonight.
Sure, everybody, I have a few things I'd like to add to the agenda this evening.
One, at the last meeting, Board Member Jeanette brought up a grant opportunity for additional staff,
and she's going to send information to Nate, just wondering the process how that went,
because it's kind of a tight timeline.
Second, I understand we have a new board member, Ken Anderson.
That will be joining us next month.
next month. Yeah, just one. Just one. And then four possible adjunct members. And so I'd
like to discuss the onboarding process for new members. And anybody that's interested in the
community, new city council representatives just so they understand what the function of the board
and some of the priorities put together around the board, and lastly to talk about, well, not
lastly, but the accounting for the 3.5 million bond referendum, and I realized that would be
probably at a later meeting, but that would probably be a good time to do that on the next.
And then I found friends of the open space on the city website, and it's so it's still there,
still buried in there, and I would love to promote that again. So those are way more information
than you need it just to add to the agenda. That's very good. All right, we can do that.
Proveal the agenda as amended motion. I'll second that. All right. All those in favor?
All right.
Next we have open form for citizen input. Since we don't have anybody here,
move on to 6.1.
Alright I'll turn it over to Megan here. Thank you. We'll start with
these items and then I know that Nate does have some information about these added
items as a while that we can incorporate into our update later on. I think Nate said
we had the screens working today so hopefully you guys can see. I got the bugs. My visual
today I heard we had some pickups. My first is a brief update on our wetlands sanctuary trail contract that we're trying to get secured.
We've got a couple different proposals from three different consulting companies and one of the main things I want feedback on tonight is regarding the
possibility of some alternative materials and looking into that as part of the feasibility in site 7 for boardwalk.
We've pretty stuck there. We're kind of committed to that same material that we've used previously because that's what's been approved in our bank application.
But as we enter the Southern portion, which is where majority of the trails under these contracts will be constructed.
I'm just curious to get some of your feedback in your initial gut reaction on getting information
about alternative boardwalk materials in the site 7.
We've gone with the timber frame, that more classic boardwalk material, but if we could see
some cost savings with something else, I just, I wasn't around for the conversations during
the original trail project, so I don't know if it's something we looked into then.
I haven't had the time to do the research into that process, but figured I'd get some feedback
from you all tonight. If you don't mind.
How did we arrive on our choice? Is it recorded anywhere
for the site 7 or what that we have? It was a million dollars vote. And would that
wouldn't we because that was cheaper or would that not be enough of any other choices at the time?
I believe from what I've read and it's been a while since I've dug through that original
contract.
It's something it was impacted by the Army Corps and the watershed as part of the banking
process that we needed to go with that boardwalk trail with a timber material.
So as part of permitting through the southern portion we don't have that bank establishment.
So you know very much might be that the watershed still requires a timber trail.
It's something we certainly look into through the permitting process.
But we have a look into that yet if the watershed would have a preference.
No, not at this time. We're hearing from our consultants, I think there might be some cost savings.
If we do have the opportunity to move away from timber.
But if that's something to that we've already decided to use some sort of composite material or some kind of precast material.
There's a couple different proprietary products.
Um, if we were to move forward with anything, we would bring that for further view what those
products were.
Um, but if our gut reaction during the original trails, we wanted timber, you know, that's
something I kind of wanted to know now.
So I don't remember exactly.
I would have to dig back to, um, the minutes and this was in 2014, it's been a while.
Oh, then it's, then it's prior to when I was on the board.
Yeah.
So that's, yeah, okay, I don't remember, I don't remember, I don't remember water shed involvement and that probably wasn't brought to us.
But I know the construction, like the the the footings and the pedestals were meant to be low impact to the, yeah.
So, and I didn't know if the weight of the boards or, you know, I'm sure that has something to do with it, and would was much cheaper in 2014 than it is in 2023.
Because the cost difference between composite and wood now is much less than it was eight years ago or whatever.
It is heavier than timbers, so I don't know if that impacts it, but you're right, if we don't have the requirements from, we do need to make sure that we're very clear on what the regulatory requirements are and what our obligations are that we have to uphold and that we abide by those.
There were any negative impacts of the material that it wouldn't be worth the money saving
to me.
I would rather do it right for the natural loose source unless it was just so expensive.
And then the other side of it is the composite would be more durable.
You know, in terms of like the longevity of it and the weathering, the composite would be more durable.
And if it's a composite material that's made from recycled materials, then that's, you know, that's a consideration.
If it's, you know, using sustainable materials, that's a consideration as well.
to have a great, the boardwalks would be crossing a wet land, so I'm assuming that we really
have to find out from the watershed,
what their requirements might be now. We are going
to have an inspection by the Army Corps this summer, so if we're not in a terrible hurry,
It would be kind of good to know what Army Corps thinks now rather than hit or hit the right, and so yeah, and then the watershed too, and this is all within the Rice Creek Watershed district, so when we have a
We have a blame
Councilperson
Who's on the board on board?
Yep, so we have a good contact
To keep in touch
And Patrick Hughes will be here for our April meeting
So perhaps this is something we can talk about with Patrick Hughes and also with Bouser,
with Ben Meier.
Oh, I'm sorry.
And the other thing would be, no, no, I'll lose my train that thought totally.
The other thing would be, just to be sure, we're putting in trails where we need them
not everywhere. Are we changing the configuration of the trails we had already been shown?
Not significantly. It will depend on our ultimate wetland delineation because we will be
looking for our kind of path of least impact to wetlands going in the upland whenever we can
because less impact to our wetlands and it is also significantly cheaper to put an asphalt trail
and then build the boardwalk.
So the layout we have here is based on some ground true things,
some preliminary delimination in the field,
but nothing formally has been delineated.
So it will depend on the results of that delineation,
which is something our consultant will perform this spring.
Also where we can, I don't want any more S-felt fault
than we have to have.
And so I would like to see before we go ahead,
If you show our committee, like, where the asphalt is going to be, where the wood chips or whatever is going to be gravel, gravel, whatever, whatever it is, you know, and wherever the boardwalks have to be so this image is a little hard to tell because it's a very large picture.
But in general, any of the areas that are in green are going to be that boardwalk material.
So at least phase one that we're looking at constructing in 2023 is a significant amount of boardwalk material versus
traveler asphalt whenever that alternative is.
But it also shows boardwalk going across all of the islands too.
Does that necessarily have to be boardwalk?
No, and that's a little challenging to see with the color scheme on the map.
There are small sections of non-bored walk on any upland.
So essentially anywhere we're constructing an upland, we're looking at having either asphalt or gravel, or just what's happening in color.
Yeah, it does.
So that tan is the upland areas, so that will be, again,
investigated further by the consultant, and probably the only spot there is an opportunity for an asphalt
trail would be in North Oak's West Park. The rest of it, it will be gravel on any of those
uplanders, just like we happened in the larger island to in the north. So that would be great.
Yep, but then that's what all that the consultant to look at all that stuff and I actually went to
our state conference last fall and talked to a few major manufacturers that actually did do composite
And I know what is allowed, but again, we'll have to verify that and I know our consultant
could look at that.
But again, it is like, board member Jeanette said it's very, it's a lot more durable.
And then it's just going to last longer for us.
But again, we'll, we can investigate some of that, but I think it is like, we talked about
with now that the, the wood prices are a little bit more comparable, is it cost effective
for us to look at that.
So.
Yep, and really I wanted kind of a gut reaction, like tell me if I'm going the wrong way with that.
So we cut it off now in our consultants know we want timber, don't waste your time.
But if they're able to find us a sustainable material that they'd like us to take a look at,
I can let them know that it's something we'd entertain.
I would be in support of a sustainable, durable material that would also provide minimal impact to the wetlands.
light enough, you know, whatever the requirement is.
Yeah, talking to some of the manufacturers, it seems the difference between now and our first
kind of go around is the piling technology that they set the platforms on has improved a lot.
But getting that new helical piling improved in the wetland is something we need to run through the
watershed because that would be kind of a different construction technique than we did before,
so we would need to make sure that's just as low impact.
I hope thank you for bringing this up.
I remember Nate bringing those options and I love them.
This predates me, whether the original discussion or whether it's wood or not.
So, I'm all for it. Thank you.
Well, I'm sure it was just Cosphohibited.
In 2014, even 100%. Yeah. And we were looking to reduce cost in any avenue. If it was a very small
upcharge to get a more durable material at something, I think we would entertain, but it will
all depend on how that budget comes back. I mean, I look at the decking material. I have
my home versus what I have at the cabin for the dock. I mean, I have often said, why can't we just
have docked because it's so light, I can move sections of that, but, you know, you
don't want to just blow it away either, stop.
In the Cummings flood.
I'm kidding.
And board member Panning, actually, to your point there, one of the manufacturers that I met
with at our, at our, at our trade show that comes to the, to the conference, they have
decking, it's like 15 foot sections and it goes out.
And again, it was so much cheaper.
I was blown away, so to Megan's point,
that's why we kind of want to look at that.
It makes sense.
And if it's lighter, and if you do need to replace the section,
it's easier to do, so we'll definitely look at that.
And then to your point, too, about cost-effective,
it's, we're going to try to put things in the uplands
as much as possible.
And the island and the northern part of the Blaine
and sanctuary is such a cool spot for people to walk and it's just, it's awesome. So I mean, if we
can mimic that to the south, I mean, I don't know why we wouldn't. It's really the nature
center that we lack. I mean, right. That the growing green hearts, I'd use it for belly,
belly, and for frog studies, and for whatever she does out there, we had that discussion when
When we first met her, and we were decrying that we didn't have a building, and we all sort of got
the idea at the same time. But the boardwalk is such a great place to teach. It's not good for everything.
You know, it can't restore your stuff on it, but it was a gave us great opportunity to teach there. So
maybe that same thing will be happening down in the other. Are we going to have any
look out stations or overlooks or anything at all or be planning.
So the proposal at this point that we're working with our consultant on is mostly geared
specifically towards trail development. I don't see why we couldn't have some alternatives
once we see how that budget starts coming back and how that wetland delineation looks.
If we've got available budget for look-out stations, would be on the Upland part, not.
Yeah, and I know there are some Sandhill crane-nesting areas.
And because I've had camera trips out there, and I have lots of pictures of baby cranes.
So if there was an opportunity, yeah, they're adorable.
So if there was an opportunity to put a viewing platform, kind of like we have between the island
and East Lake Park.
I have some suggestions where that might go. Very good. You used get to be there
and see it. I've spent a lot of time in that southern part of what's been putting out cameras
and pulling cameras and there's cool stuff in there. Yeah, if you want to share a map of
different locations, you think would be a good location for cab viewing platform, let me know.
Unfortunately, a lot of that stuff would be in the wetland area, so that's unfortunate, but
either where that little island near North Oak's West Park, the first island at crosses,
of course that's very close to the park, so maybe that's too close.
The wetland or the upland area that's not on the trail would be a fantastic place to put it.
So I don't know if moving that dotted yellow line so that it intersects that island, rather than go straight to the corner of that new development, and then comes down, then that would be one of those two islands down there would be a fantastic place.
Or just a little jog.
Yeah, so that's I guess that was my suggestion was instead of instead of that yellow line going straight diagonal from that first island closest to North Oak's West Park to that corner, did you see where I'm talking about?
I wish I had control of the mouse right now.
It's then angle it a little bit more.
Are we going south or north island?
Go to the island that's further east.
This large one?
Nope.
That one.
Yep. So just angle it that way so that it goes on that little upland area and that other
little upland area directly south of it and then it can hook up with where it already is.
Yep. And that's where we stage our planting right now. So can confirm. That's very that's high.
That's the dryest spot once you get out there. You have to stretch through a lot of wet to get all the way out.
You do. It's finally dry and we stage our plants here when we've been doing restoration with
regrining kind of north of that island. I wouldn't know that I wouldn't know that part of it
either is it better ecologically to stay away from that area with the trail or or not. I
know they've spent a lot of time picking out the trail route. Yeah, but that's a great idea to
yeah. I mean as long as it's an observation you know platform and I don't know you know
I'm sure there's so much tall grass and wetlands in there and I know there's a ton of
cranes in there.
Or members if I could do so this map that you're looking at, we actually just put this
together on at a staff of our GIS director, we actually just, so these are very, we're basically
just connecting uplands and then just connecting points.
So these are, so this isn't from the consultant, this is just how can we connect points
to minimize cost and you know that's what we're in and maximize the upland use within the site.
So some of these uplands that you're seeing on the map may not be high enough to even put
gravel on. So that's again when you when we get to the consultant when they go out there on the ground
and look at that stuff this will get change not I don't I don't want to say significantly but again
We're going to minimize, you know, how much we're in there, but we are going to, there, there will be probably some change just based on what ecological looks like out there, so.
And our timeline right now for that is that either you're in Bay, but probably June meeting, we would have that delineation and some of that preliminary alignment that we can take a look at.
Did we have a consultant suggestion for where the drill should go before?
This data problem and narrowly came from site visits with critical connections and then just with a handheld GPS.
So there wasn't a lot of physical delineation or actual survey that went into it.
It's kind of a best guess that we know this route is kind of dry.
So we'll be refining that further with actual measurements and some surveying and some delineations just to make sure there's not a better route out there.
Because if we're looking at some of these uplands, you know, we might have a better path of least resistance available to us based on what we learned.
I love the fact that it's one trail through.
Because there are some old maps around that have been haunted us.
They were drafts, they were concept plan, concept plans, and in no way I don't think our
community would support like trails all over the place, not good for the resource and at all,
and not in probably very much more expensive to put trails everywhere.
And I just think that really, you know, that really looks like a good concept of the use of the space we have.
We don't know much about, we don't know much about the very, that southern part of our strange shape piece of our open space.
We don't have much information about that. No, I know 119th. She's pointing to.
Yeah. Correct. We do have a grant going right now with the company called Great River
Greening that does restoration work in the southern portion of Blaine Whitland sanctuary, but they
focus more on plant restoration. You know, we haven't done any. We haven't needed to spend
the time or any of that grant money to do any formal investigation or delineation. We focus more
on trying to manage the canary readgrass and then doing restoration work kind of behind that.
And then there was some tree removal involved with that grant as well, so we're managing
some willow and then a lot of books on throughout that area.
We had some interesting birds down there.
Beautiful hawk when we visited one of the walks we took through.
So there's some good habitat there used to be nesting bubble links.
I want down there, a bubble links.
They're a migratory species that is relatively uncommon.
They're not threatened, but they used to be down there,
but they've lost so much habitat when that area was cleared
for sanctuary preserve.
We were the, it was another bird on the corner of Lexington
in the 19th, it was the westernmost sighting of this bird.
I actually lived there all the time.
I wonder, do you remember what I knew of it?
I have to remember what the name was,
but it's gone.
Yeah, so we were out there to see it once with DNR.
So, to Raffady, just so I get straight on what we're doing.
So you have three vendors selected for the RFP
that you'd like to invite to quote, bit on this.
And then you said that you'd have something for the main meeting.
What would that be?
Would that be an actual who you've selected?
Or once you like.
How long when you call off for the RFP?
How long do they have to respond back?
Maybe that's yep.
So we've got some preliminary responses that we're reviewing right now.
So it's a complicated project.
So it's taking longer than we expected.
It had to review that because we're looking at more than just the number that they're giving us.
for what they're going to do. We're looking at all those services that come with and what they're missing.
What we would need to hire on top of that contract and the pros and cons of all of that.
So my current plan is I'm thinking it's going to time out between this meeting and your April meeting.
I'm probably going to need to email out that information to you so that you have a chance to provide
comments prior to bringing it to council. If it times out, we will bring that to your April meeting
After those speakers and have a discussion and dialogue about it, we'll just have to see how
what their council schedules and our delineation timelines, how that phases out.
I don't want to promise that I can bring it to April if we need to get it on an earlier
council.
Can you let us know who those three vendors are?
Yes, yep.
So right now we're working with Stantec.
I've got a quote from WSB and we have a quote from SEH.
So we're looking through engineering firms.
Two of those firms have environmental services in-house, and the third is contracting out
to an independent environmental consultant.
So that's part of the organization.
Yep.
As reviewing those, they submit their whole portfolio of their project team, so we're reviewing
qualifications over just a budgetary number.
Okay, I think we're in support of that, so.
Yeah.
So the original question, the profit, that's on the screen, I think.
Yeah, I think we are.
They have perfect, which is very helpful.
And I will look into that original contract as well,
to see the determination to why we
to go with that timber, and if it's still relevant,
or if we have some options with the watershed.
That'll definitely be part of our review process.
All right.
I go and move on to the six point two of them,
which is a similar conversation.
And we are looking for our new consulting services contract to get a contract for a consultant
on board sometime in April to start monitoring work.
We are still in the development stage, I'm expecting I will get an RFP and your guys' hands
for review early next week.
But before I send out that draft free review, I kind of just wanted to get some preliminary
comments.
So I can make sure we're not only incorporating staff's priorities, but trying to incorporate
your priorities into that request for proposals as well.
So, our previous contract did expire in 2022.
I've talked to a couple different cities that do similar contracts.
Our wetland bank is unique, as you guys know.
So, while nothing's been super comparable,
cities of Bloomington and Woodbury do have environmental services contracts.
So, kind of borrowing a little from stuff that they've sent out recently,
contractors that they work with. We've got a preliminary list right now of I think six different
contractors consultants that we plan to send this RFP2, which includes critical connections
so we've worked with in the past. I've kind of been in contact with a couple other companies
engaging interest. Minnesota native landscapes currently does work for the city of
in that Southern Blaine Wetlands sanctuary.
They're employed by Great River Greening,
who we have quite a large grant
with to do restoration services.
A lot of what we do there is done by volunteers,
but some work in any herbicide treatment
or any large-scale trees is done by a licensed contractor,
which is Minnesota Native Landscapes.
So I've been in contact with them.
Prairie Restoration's Natural Resource Services
have done work in town for very-
There is haways or different city projects, and then static NWSB have internal staff as well. So that's our shortlist at this time.
If any of you have any experience with any other consultants or contractors that you think would be appropriate to send the request for proposal to, just let me know. And we can add that to that list.
We normally use a pool for these kind of services, but we don't have an environmental services pool.
We have a stormwater pool, which is where I've pulled Stanteck and WSB from, and then we have civil engineering pools,
which is a whole different ballgame, so trying to just get the RFP into the hands of as many people to take a look at it, give us their feedback.
So if you guys do, no, or think of any other consultants to send that to, let me know.
kind of our high level components of the RFK to get into tonight.
First and foremost, we're looking at long-term monitoring of our site seven-wet land bank.
We're also looking to loop in the long-term monitoring and maintenance of our EDA bank as well.
We've received all of our credits for that EDA bank, but what is EDA's development authority of the city of Blaine has their own wet land bank.
those credits are not available for sale publicly.
The city of blame retains them for either city of blame projects,
but almost all of them have gone towards development in blame.
Either sold at a premium for the development authority to make money,
or for priority sites, so that it just count to help motivate development.
They manage that. I administer it, so I do paperwork, so I'm not super familiar,
But they have received all their credits,
but we still plan to maintain and monitor that bank
in perpetuity, like we have discussed four sites seven.
So while our obligation to do so is running out,
we still have a plan to continue the high level
of monitoring and maintenance.
So that would be looped in.
So we would have to have one contract
with the two different portions.
I had a question, mate.
Is that EDA bank, south of our land bank?
Yes, that's understanding.
A site seven has our main portion of trail that runs from east
to west and then through the EDA bank,
we will cut that trail south of the site seven.
So we've got site seven, EDA and then that southern portion
that we have a grant covering the restoration floor.
So in whole, once we send out the Snor of P,
we'll have at least two of those portions managed by one,
consultant, and we'll have our third grant on the south side.
So it reduces how many cooks are in the kitchen?
who manages the ADA, what land bank.
Critical connections had a contract with that as well.
That expired quite a bit ago,
and they've been doing the work just on a year-to-year basis,
since.
So, and again, they'll be invited to respond to the RFP
and send in every proposal,
as well if they want to keep doing that work.
Go back to the previous slide, please.
So, the bullet point in there that says
Critical Connections is indicated that if preparing a response
to an RFP is required for consideration,
they will not be applying, is that a requirement for consideration?
Yes, so we'll send out a request for proposals, and then we need to receive a proposal.
So, last we discussed with critical connections.
They indicated, you know, they'd be happy to do the work, but if they need to respond to a request for proposal,
that's not something that they got at the time they would have the capacity to do.
that was less summer, so I don't know, we haven't started the conversation, I have
that sense in RFP out to see if that's changed.
If the workload has changed, if their availability has changed, but we'll be sending that
out with the invitation to certainly send that proposal in.
Because I know they have a very long history working in this very complicated site, also
as professionals in the Wetland Bank, site 7 is an ENRV in exceptional natural resource
value bank and the board of water and soil resources will only accept monitoring and reports
based around these performance standards from a limited number of consultants and I know
critical connections is one of those consultants and I know they've invested a lot of time
and energy and professionalism and expertise into the site.
It is my opinion that if they're willing to continue the work,
that is who I would support because that history in that site is exceedingly important.
Were we able to track down the monitoring reports from the 2022 growing season?
We're working on finalizing that with the core right now.
Who did that work?
So Jason conducted a majority of the work
throughout the 2022 growing season.
And that's what our invoice is for the $45,000.
Dollars had gone towards.
And then moving forward, as I mentioned,
there'll certainly be a historical knowledge
is invaluable.
It's similar to that trail RFP where when we review these,
we look at more than just the number
that's being provided to us, because the number
the cost of somebody less experienced is how much more is that going to cost? It's more than just
the bottom line for a project like this 100%. And that'd be something we'll weigh in for you guys
to comment on just if you're out the process. What term of a contract would you be awarding with your
RFP? Again, if we're going to be on boarding a different vendor, there's going to be a learning curve
What are you suggesting three years, five years, 10 years, when you say long-term monitoring?
We'd recommend probably at a minimum three years, it's what we've discussed about in-house.
And if you guys have feedback, it's been how many years?
Three.
And if you have feedback on if you want that, if you think it's more appropriate for that to be less or more,
I'm happy to take that and incorporate that in how we move forward.
That is a very short timeline when monitoring is highly weather-dependent.
And sometimes we fall behind whether has definitely been a factor in the last few years.
And we are behind on our monitoring schedule and not currently in not, we haven't met
the performance standards and we haven't seen the report from the 2022 growing season.
A short timeline like that doesn't allow for any wiggle room.
So it would be my recommendation to mine too to expand that and it wouldn't be unheard of no
No, no, I think five would be a minimum and ten would be better
Our original contract was four professional services for seven years and I believe that number stem from our original
Perspectives report that said you know best case scenario everything goes right
It's going to take us seven years to get these credits and that's why we framed it that way
So I don't know that seven is the correct number. It just is what we have to definitely better than three
Okay, yes, that leads three in my opinion.
Yes, and I too would like to add on to Kristen's comments
about the restore we had and what's really amazing about our restoration
and the long-term restore, or we have had ever since
restoration started, I know he's worked with other contractors
were along with his work, but he ended the method of restoration in our
fan. So that's, and I talked with the Army Corps and the BWSR and the
DNR and asking about our restores work, about critical connections, and they said,
You do know that's the best.
They each said that of the three agencies I spoke to.
So that holds a lot of weight with me,
and I would go pretty far to make sure that they got a chance
to continue because I have a lot of faith in what they've done for us
in the past. And their integrity, the DNR uses Jason Hussfeth around the state to find rare
plant sites and other jobs that you run into. He ran the native plant society in Minnesota
for quite a few years. Especially, mainly it was in the metro, but we remember for a long time
and went to all the events.
So I just have a long, had admired the work
that critical connections has done.
So not to say that these are not other good people.
And maybe some of them have already worked
on some work here in blame.
So yeah, I just hope we take those things
into consideration.
Critical connections is recognized as being
the leading expert in the field, and we have a very long history with them, and there would be no learning curve.
They're very invested in this site. So, yeah. So, no, thank you for all your feedback. It's good to
hear and take notes and incorporate what we can to move forward in the process. Part of this will include
we're writing into our what our contracts are. Our RFP will look like eventually as annually throughout
that monitoring period, whether it's seven years,
I've brought 10 years written down as what I'm going to shoot for,
is to have two annual updates from that consultant
to the NRCB.
So we'll kind of have that built in
so that they're giving you an update
on how their spring monitoring goes
and an update in the fall on how that growing season has gone.
So we're building that in to make sure
that they're here in this room
and staying in contact with you with their efforts.
What do you look at when you are considering
their X, which is how do you judge that?
We require a system portfolio of their staff and their experience
as one of the biggest things that we weigh into.
If you're looking at a very standard civil engineering project,
you can go by the numbers a lot more
because we know historically there are four different
six different companies that are going to do the job just fine.
When you look at something like this and are more complicated projects,
when it comes to buildings like the ban show that we're looking at or when it comes to
you an environmental services like this, you look a little bit more at that staff and that knowledge
and their ability to perform a job to hire standard. And especially hearing the feedback from you
as well, that's something that will highlight in that review and involve you in as well.
I took a look at Jason House, but that's a report from 2014.
14, and it was amazing, it was amazing detail, and total knowledge of what plants and
plant communities and what the change had been, you know, from the, so comparing, not only
not only inventory, but comparing from the condition, the previous condition.
So I was I was very impressed. So I hope that we are going to see reports like that from other from the other consultants we we look at to see what their work product look like when they report the progress of the restoration definitely.
And I will bring up two, here's our approved 20-23 budget, and when we look at this contract,
we have $75,000 a year for the next five years budgeted.
If we're still facing the difficulties two years from now that we're facing now, getting some of this
fend to respond, I just wanted on your radar.
That is something we might need to bump up this line item when we come to our budget review.
You know, in the past we haven't exceeded that 75,000.
This year going back and forth with consultants, we'll see where we land and then just something to be on your radar that that line item in the future
We might need to take a deeper look at and see if that's getting us where we want to go or if we need to be investing a little more heavily to see their response that we need to see.
Thank you.
Any other discussion or no?
And if anything comes to you in the middle night just email me and let me know because I will incorporate any feedback from you guys into that draft for you.
review.
We'll be seeing that.
All right, it's next we have updates.
Chair, Raffordee, members of the board. First on our updates list on your gender. Here's
the update from the City Council merger discussion on March 6th. They really didn't get to
talk about it barely at all. Like, very, very, about nothing. So at this point, we are going
continue forward. They actually appointed last night to the NRCB board for the next year.
Doddy McKinley, Kristen Jeanette, Sarah Philippe, Mary Jo Trushon, and a new board member Ken Anderson,
who will be joining us next month. And the mayor also appointed Gene Rafferty as the chair.
And we also have three other members that will be invited to be adjunct members at this point.
So those letters should be going out.
So the folks that I just mentioned, you will be receiving a letter from our clerk's office.
Here are the next few days, or by I'm guessing Monday at the latest.
And then those adjunct members will also receive a letter.
If they would so choose to be those adjunct members for this year, and then can will
Come on next month and be sworn in along with the other members that I mentioned so that actually just happened last night. So I wanted to make that
No one in there
And yeah, so at this point, we will continue to operate separately. There may be a joint meeting down the line.
But those members have been basically at large members.
McKinley, Jeanette and Philippe and Mary Jo, you are a ward of three and Ken Anderson is ward two.
So that was a point of last night. So yep. So we'll see where goals there will be a future discussion from the council is what we've been told.
continue discussion on a potential merger or not, so that will be because we know that really
wasn't talked about it at all. They just didn't have time at the workshop. So, questions
on it.
Yeah, I want to ask about the adjunct members. So, why are they adjunct members, why three,
what's the, what's the, we just, we haven't had any adjunct members. So, I don't know, this,
is a new structure. To me, the only adjuncts we've had have been our youth members that we've had
in the past. So are these youth members like we've had in the past? Are they residents?
Or why are they adjunct?
Board member, Jeanette, they basically, the mayor wants to make sure that they are included.
And if they want to be a part of the board, this is a good time for them to learn and get to know
board as an adjunct member because there's seven positions that were appointed for this.
Did they apply?
They did.
Yes.
So they applied just like can Anderson and the three others applied, they selected Ken Anderson
as the new member and then are still going to offer the other three folks adjunct members.
I have three down here.
That's four.
is what I have on my list.
I'll share names because I wrote him down from the council meeting.
I just have three on the council minutes.
Yeah, but no, that's maybe somebody bowed out.
Or they might have been appointed somewhere else.
That could be too so.
But yeah, let's we'll chat about it.
I'm excited to have them.
Bring them on.
Let's let's get the party started here.
Yeah, I get fresh energy and I guess I just so like the board was at 10 when I started and I
I don't understand, you know, I don't remember that ever being a discussion to reduce it.
So it seems like we have empty space and lots of lots of room at the table.
So I just didn't understand why we were having edge-unk members instead of full members.
If we have community members who are interested in being in taking an active role, I would
sure like to welcome them with open arms.
And maybe we should ask the mayor that.
I mean, that'd be something to talk to your,
you'll soon have a new city council wrap.
Yes, to talk to.
You know, and let's, let's ask.
I think it was my understanding that we reduced a number
because we didn't have applicants to fill those positions.
But if we do have a big tent.
Bring it on in.
We had 10 when I started and it was,
we had some great conversations
and I accomplished some great things.
The mayor, the few years ago, just added some people on their original structure, the original structure was seven people.
The original structure, for me, while they changed it in 2005, so seven people, and that's the way it was, but he just added some on.
Okay, because in the description that we talked about last month, it's in the minutes.
That was the original structure from 2005 on was seven people.
No, there's no, from 2000 it was there were more people but then he reduced it to in 2005 match the other board.
Yeah, so it really would be up to the mayor in the city council to decide how many
four members there should be in the value like we're just saying but each district each
Council district has two and then a chair.
That was for every board.
All right.
And to piggyback off of that, with board member panning's addition to onboarding.
Yes, we did.
We do have the binder.
And if somebody actually, we have the binder folder,
But we have the table of content.
So if anybody has their binder.
Oh, I have mine.
I just want to double check.
I just don't know.
So basically we have a folder that it says bored, you know,
the bored binder.
And there's all there is is the table of contents
and the seating chart.
But I don't see any.
Oh, there's all kinds of information.
I see the table of contents.
What they are.
So, and it may need all of them may need updated.
Yes, and well, yeah, I would see the budget, yeah.
And I think that I see what they are and some will be the same.
But yes, there's definitely some that are going to need updating for sure.
So, I will probably follow up with you board members and that to get that.
And then I just want to see because they might just be named something different,
but they're just not in that folder that I'm seeing.
No, I have to be able to bring that in.
So, I'll probably follow up with you and grab that at some point.
Just because, yeah, because we do have a new member starting and then I can update all those and Sarah
I don't believe ever got one when she started. No, no, she did not. I think you just feel less a member of the board if you don't have
So much
There is and then there's our management plan
Which was that's part of it. That was part of it. That was part of it. That was one of the
Great river greening at a cost of $13,000, which was the most fantastic price when that went out to bid and they did a wonderful excellent job, but then they used so much volunteer
to your input on their projects and such expert people
who are willing to donate.
So that was, I remember the cost, and $13,000,
and then what they gave us was a fantastic management plan.
And we haven't looked at it ourselves for a while.
Data used to religiously keep us looking at the management plan.
So there you go, Jean.
I haven't looked at mine for a while.
I know where it is.
So I think it's important.
There are other things that have been added since
and other ideas like the way we should be managing
like this when Jason found those endangered species.
In the hundreds of species and told us
that it's merely a matter of mowing.
So that should definitely be added to her.
And then the opportunity, there were three wet land pieces
that were left over from development
up in the Northeast, Lexington, Cove, yes. And those pieces can also just be managed by
mowing and properly. And so that I think it would be very worthwhile for us to add that to
our management plan. So yes, we should have a little appendix to our Bible.
So add some new books
to the Bible, would it be, what if we got together to do that, like a small workshop,
a little workshop, you know, to make sure all the history is there, I just think of
the 10 parcels that are listed, there's a story behind each one. And sometimes it's because
a developer wanted to unload it because he couldn't build anything on it. And we're like,
wow, this is, and it has these great plants on it and it's doing great things for our water.
I mean, I think that's valuable history too, especially as we look forward to new parcels that may be coming
available to us. I think that a lot of that preservation of open spaces just as much of a hot button topic as ever before.
So yeah, what would you think of that? Should we throw out some possible dates?
How do we do that, Gene? What do you think?
I mean there's open meeting laws so that's why I'm like looking at you all because you know come on over to my house
But we have to get the material together first
I mean we all grab our binders. I can look through mine of what I would
And I can select the send you the the management plan. I mean it's I have that in the files
It's just a PDF
hopefully it's not too big, just send us an email, but regardless when I update those
binders, I think that's a good time where we can even sit down even if it's after
a meeting to discuss it and just see if there's things that should be added, like that
lockness piece and Megan actually has an update on that coming up here too.
So.
You know, I'd love to see added to that a list of some of the endangered plants that I've
discovered, within blame, some of these rare bird sightings.
I mean, there are things that are, I'm not a birder, but I know people who are, who get
really jazzed hearing these things.
And how cool is it that we have it here in blame that somebody had the foresight to set
that aside, so we don't have it all asphalt some day, right?
Good idea.
I'll get off myself, box down.
No, all great ideas, like, for sure.
testify. Okay.
All right. The next one is the summer program. So I have this bigger.
I usually, you know, I can't figure it
out. Yeah, usually I was able to just click double click on it and it popped up.
But we are partnering again with Wargo Nature Center to do some a couple bird hikes in May and then also growing green hearts.
She's changed it to growing green yoga because she wanted to add the yoga component to it
Just to hopefully spur on more folks to come out
So those those classes are all listed and registration began March 6th for all those classes
So people can register right now. Oh, there we go and I came up a little bigger
So maybe this will show
Little bigger for me
Okay, so that's the top one is the bird hike that we do with the Wargo Nature Center staff, the natural's there.
And then the other classes are with growing green hearts.
So those are all listed. So very reasonably priced.
And that's on purpose. We want to get as many people out there as we can to experience the plain wet land sanctuary.
so exciting and again hopefully we'll just continue and Heidi is just keeps trying to be as creative
as possible to get awesome classes out there so we're excited always partner with her and the
word on a teacher center. She does. She's fantastic. I want to compliment you on the
wreck connect. I grabbed the wrong one but I love this publication and I love that we're going to be
it more, I hope, and the only thing that I hope I see next year is this beautiful job
of birthday, but then I'd love it if you could, like, divide the cover to this back cover
at half and say, May is what land mom, and I'm not asking, I think Sarah was terrified that
I was going to have some kind of a big singing dancing celebration, but that isn't what
had in mind. It was more get out there events that we could involve people with. So that was
fine hope that maybe next year we can, because it's the same thing. Invest in your neighborhood
go back to the earth, make a difference. That was for Liz big for earth month and May is what
And there can be lectures between overlapped.
But I think that went lens to such a great job of lending many things.
And that's a very unique resource and valuable resource that we have here in
Blaine that I think not enough people know enough about.
And I'm a great supporter of Earth Day, not trying to co-opt anything.
I just think that we really have these and yes, we have these resources of blame and it would be and this publication is gorgeous
It's it's beautiful. So I just want to see more of our our stuff as we go along and maybe we're not suggesting enough things
You know, it's a great addition and it marries those two marriage each other very well
and can be added to the page very easily.
So that's just a spacing that are awesome communications team
puts together this awesome Reconnect for us,
and they are great with just,
that's their expertise in their wheelhouse,
so they are very good with adding things on there.
So that's an easy thing to add for sure.
And it's a great idea for sure.
Well, thank you.
And on the Earth they subject real quick we do have Earth they so basically our residents can come on and
basically select the
Park that they want so they just come on to the website it's just
Blaine mn.gov forward slash earth day and we had last year
I think we had 23 different cleanups people signing up for them and they can pick a park pond
So it was, it was, I think that was our highest you've had so far. So people are really, and Walters actually donated $500. So Kudos to them for Earth Day this year, which is awesome.
So then you just come on and you can register your clean up and we provide gloves, bags, a lot of just the essentials to get your clean up going and then.
Our public works staff will come around if there's more than a normal amount of garbage they'll come up and pick it up that following Monday and they would just ask that they type the bag.
So it's been a great program. People are very invested in their parks that they live by and it's really neat to see and we love doing this event every year and it's fantastic.
So, when you click on the link, does it show which parks have been selected?
Like, there's a, in my name hood, London Park, is somebody out there, you know?
Yes, and I got to find how we get to that.
Yes, because our GIS actually added this, or maybe that's, it could be a adoptive park.
I think it's a adoptive park, I think they do.
So, Earth Day, I don't think there's a map, but a adoptive park, there's, it shows a map of which parks have already been adopted.
And then, yes, so that is, but in Earth Earth Day, because it's just a year to year, because we just don't know who's going to, you know, decide to do an events there, you know, it's there's different neighbors that do it.
But a doctor park, our JAS department did put that map together and it's cool so you can click right on there, you can see it's it's color to different color if there's someone that's already adopted it and managing taking care of it for us.
And then is there a way to get in touch with that person, say if I, again,
London Park in my neighborhood, if I were to get it on the site, let me try to find it.
You know, I'll send something out. I will dig around down that I know that it's there. I'll look.
But I'm thinking if there's an orphan park, maybe we can, you know, I'm thinking about what I can do.
I'm not putting something yet another thing on staff, but, you know, through Facebook or whatever.
I'll send something out to the board because it, yeah, it's actually a lot of people.
But what the GS department did with the map.
I mean, it is really neat.
Yeah, you can click and you see the person's name.
Yeah, it's really all, I'll send that out to the board.
In May, we're launching a similar adopt upon program,
which will have a similar map where you can adopt storm water puns,
either in the parks or in your neighborhood.
And yet another opportunity to marry Earth Month and Wetland, it will be a perfect opportunity
to loop in Wetland month.
I have a couple other volunteer events that are going to occur in May that I think we can
kind of circle an narrative on as well.
I'll get into a little bit.
Spring is almost here.
We've got a lot going on.
Okay, get rid of that snow.
Yes.
We hope it goes down into the ground.
All right, sure after your next item on our updates is the bad houses with Eagle Scout
to E.J. Jeanette, and I just basically,
board member Jeanette and I've been discussing
where a good spot would be.
We've kind of, I think, settled on somewhere within the island of the Blaine Wetland Sanctuary,
so I just kind of pulled up this map and the aerial of that.
And if you have specific recommendations, we are open to them.
Our main concern is that they're placed so that they are far enough from trees so they're not shaded
because they do need to be in direct sunlight so they heat up and that they are not in the way of the trail.
that will connect from the southern part on the island there also I think it's
important they talked about having two two houses on a pole yes be careful not
to put one house right above another because they go back to back that's better
so they're directly back to back at the top of the pole you know what they do
before they enter their house right no no they're they're the same level back to
We don't want that impacting the house underneath, they're very clean, they don't want their house to be soiled, so they take care of that as they're entering soil.
Yeah, so board member Jeanette, AJ and I will be working on that here very soon as soon as we are able, but I know I believe AJ is working on basically just constructing them.
He is cutting plywood as we say and then the city will provide signs that we will actually be putting on the post
Once the once they're up and completed as an education piece
So people know what they are because not everybody does so
Yep, he is hosting in a couple of work days with his scout troop the first one is on Sunday
So yeah, anything that could make the snow melt faster and the brown saw, we are all in favor of that.
We're all waving the white flag. We're done with winter.
All right, at this point, I'm going to turn it back over to Megan for the April speaker.
We kind of touched on a little bit and then she's got another one.
Yeah, and yeah, we touched on this, oops, I restarted.
We touched on this a little bit earlier, but as of last month, Patrick and Ben had both confirmed,
where available, and it sounds like as a board, we still want to move forward with that, which is
what I wanted to hear today. So Nate and I will follow up with them this week and get that fully
scheduled and confirmed for our April meeting. And like I said, otherwise for April,
we'll be giving another update on those RFPs and receive comments if we're at a point to do so.
Like I said, we're still working on the timing and that might have to occur over email just to keep
process moving, but you guys will be kept in the loop on that.
Okay, this is a public meeting, so we hope the public would know about it and come if
they want to know something about wetlands.
I don't know how to make that happen myself,
but if anybody's watching here tonight, then
to let them know if they want to come to our April meeting, there will be two good speakers
on wetlands, but maybe there would be a way that that's something that could be shared
on social media?
Yep, I would expect we could work with our communications team
to get something shared on social media, saying,
you know, at our regular NRCB meeting,
there'd be a great opportunity to come and get educated
or come and learn something new.
You've seen the reconnect and what they're capable of doing,
and they're wonderful at it.
So I think that's something we can probably work with that
about you, making notes.
Our next item is an update.
last night at Council Workshop, our community standards department brought forward a normal
May discussion to kind of feel at the council. I know that this board had recommended
last year and expressed some interest in having some kind of program and we heard quite
a bit of feedback from residents as well saying, hey, is going to do a normal May. And it kind
of came to the council to late last year to do anything so we're getting ahead of it this year.
And like I said, it came from community standards, I've been involved a little bit just in kind of how other cities are doing it and how it might work best here.
The council did recommend that we move forward with adopting a normal May resolution at our next council meeting, which would allow for residents of plain to participate in normal May.
Typically, once our weed regulation is typically once grass or we'd reach a certain height,
you can't get tagged by our weed inspectors and you have X amount of days to mole.
So if you sign up for no mole, may kind of the intent is that during the month of May,
if we did receive a complaint, we aren't going to follow through with that citation
until later on in June to kind of allow for those spring kind of flowers and that understory to
up and provide a little bit more pollinators for the B population here. So on the slide, I just
have some of the information direct from that council meeting. I was not in attendance last night,
but you know, we chat with our staff today and it seems like we're moving forward. Anyone who does
want to participate will need to register. We're working on what that looks like. And then if you
want to print out your own sign, you can do that. This year we didn't budget any money for the city to buy
So it's something that Council will discuss during our budgeting process.
After we see the interest, we got this here.
If that's something they want to incorporate into a budget next year to grow that program.
So this kind of be our low cost trial run to allow it and see how many people want to participate.
And what that budget would look like to expand the program next year.
So it all kind of moved pretty fast because we need to get that resolution done in April to allow it to be published by May.
So I wanted to at least bring it to you now and let you know that we are moving forward with something there.
And then the city as well.
We've got a couple of our open spaces highlighted.
Lockness is one of them.
Laddy Lake and Hidden Ponds are three that we will not be mowing.
During May.
Though all three of those spaces we know we have some really good variety of plant communities.
So they'd be our best sites to kind of let go.
because that's a trial you're for us too.
I'm on how that's going to look.
And then we do have the site just outside of City Hall,
kind of where people park when we have our events
that site between City Hall and those condos
just do the south or east.
We'll be letting that remain long throughout May.
That one we normally leave a little longer
as well just because of the nature of the site.
We're not programming that as parkland.
And that has a really, if you've driven by in the spring before we have to
what for parking. It's got a pretty nice kind of wild flower native bed through there that we'd like to let
goal as long as we can. And it has the side benefit. We don't our public works doesn't get a lot of their
seasonal staff until June. So they're all for it. Yeah, there's a lot of good reasons. Yeah, they'd
like to leave more spaces. This is our compromise on our trial year. And then hopefully we can kind of
grow the program over the next year. I'm sure you'll give us a report. I'm excited to see our numbers.
Yeah, so we'll be sharing the word communications just on out today or moving forward.
So they're starting to draft plain specific messaging for us to start,
start getting out there and sharing on social media and that different events.
So that was exciting to see some support for that.
Our next one is also me for some more volunteer opportunities.
Nate had some good classes earlier.
One of the things I just got emails today on is more town library.
does some education outreach for wetland month in the month of May, they're one of their librarians
and their staff there, reserves all the display cases throughout the library for different wetland
focus, education materials and kind of marketing. So I'm working with them to get some information
about the bling wetlands sanctuary into one of those display cases at North Town. So we've got some
old information and I've got a jacket down and see if it's still relevant if it needs updates. So you
get an email for me just to review some information before we make a public in those display cases.
So as far as I know those goes live right first May, but I'll let you know when I have confirmation.
Thank you for doing that. Yeah, yeah, to get opportunity. We've partnered with them in the past.
They've done with the watershed at kind of a significant restoration project around the pond.
They're kind of on the east or north side of the parking lot.
and they've been doing buffer restoration and some native planting work.
It's kind of how we got in contact with them.
So hopefully that'll look nice.
We've got some cool wet land coars.
The watershed has that are pretty popular to put on display too.
Well, there's stuff from the interpretive signs too.
So even just displays that would be nice printouts
or displayed with information from the interpretive signs.
board member Jeanette, Rebecca and I have brought print
else to in the past over to the library that they have displayed.
So great idea. Yes, we have done that and remember we used our
plotter and yeah, brought them over there and yeah, they show very well.
And that's a no cost thing to develop but just cost
of printing it, which we can do in-house. What's a great idea?
A few other updates, great river greening. We've
them a bunch of times tonight, but they are managing the grant for us in the Southern Blaine
Wetlands Sanctuary. We have a couple private events that they've been scheduling in there,
and we're working on getting a public event scheduled. Either late May or early June is kind
of a good time frame to do a plant of some milkweed, and then some of our private events are more
knocking back some willows that we're trying to manage and doing some spring overseeding as well.
So I'm just an update there.
Once we do schedule a public event,
that's something I'll share with you guys.
Normally they're on Saturdays.
We're trying to do a B count last fall
and into this spring too, but with the drought,
we aren't seeing flowers in the Southern portion.
We've so much reconnected grass, but it's really competitive.
So we've had to pull out on a couple different B
oriented events there.
So we're kind of reorienting how we're going to program
and want different events, and I feel more successful this year there.
It would be fun to run, run, if anybody wanted to set it up, I'm afraid I don't have time to set it up myself, but I don't find out if there are any rusty patch.
because they should be in blame, and our ACD has conducted a, might be finished with the round of grants we had,
for putting in pollinator gardens on the route of where the rusty patch has been identified.
So, you know, about there could be interested in that, if it would be fun to do it.
It was definitely our goal, it was to try and key in some of the work they were doing with
some of, there's a lot of available grant funds out there for Rusty Patch, just with the
drought that we have had, we don't have the habitat where our grant covers to do the
B population tracking that we were kind of hoping to do.
So we're continuing on restoration, so hopefully in the next year to we see that and we're
able to program something like that, is it's a perfect spot to get some research done.
Cool.
That's very cool.
I know, sort of real...
Related, yet unrelated note. We still have the opportunity to seek sponsorship for our interpretive
science. I believe we have, is it one or is it two that, oh, there's three now. I feel like
it is an opportunity for the new Rusty Bumblebee to sponsor a sign that has information about
pollinators. All that would be great. I mean, I don't know where they're at as a brand new business
and blame, but if that's, I feel like that's an ask that is just waiting to happen.
Do they have a, do they have a, do they have a mascot?
Yeah, they do.
They've got a logo that's, yeah, that's true.
How about beats?
Yeah, really.
Do you have a tip chart just set out for tips that are patrots, patrots that contribute towards
an interpretive sign?
Yes.
So, you have the, you know, what would go on this line for the rest of the people will be
could close to it in their business while they raise money for it?
Well, I was thinking we have the signs that we have existing signs that don't have sponsors yet.
So, and we do talk about pollinators on those existing signs.
Our economic development specialists should have a contact for them.
I know she was working with them throughout their opening process.
So I can talk to her tomorrow and see if she's able to provide me someone to get into contact
and see if that's something they'd be interested in discussing.
How do you feel?
Yeah, if I need to go over there and
that might be more effective than me sending an email to you.
I actually haven't been there yet.
All right, and then my last volunteer update
is I'm working with ACDI just at Carri Taylor the other day
about getting some garlic mustard poles on our calendar.
We had some good luck last year with a couple different volunteer groups,
scouting groups.
And I know ACD has indicated they've lately had a lot of really good turnout for garlic
mustard poles.
It's family-friendly, it's not challenging to tell what garlic mustard is and we have
a lot of it in our open spaces.
So we're working on getting a couple of vents and like the second, third weekend in May on
our calendar and getting kind of some advertising out for that kind of on top of Earth Day
some specific polls there because it's a problem and many of our open spaces,
pioneer park is a pretty hard, at the moment, is when we're looking at
highlighting. It's in the web and thanks for joining me. I missed the volunteer
supervisor training for great river greening again this year and but they said if
we had eight people they would do a training in-blane and they could do it
Zoom or they could do it here, but I just feel like there's enough people who would like
to get involved, and sometimes that's hard. They don't have enough of the volunteer
supervisors that have been trained to go out and monitor a garlic mustard poll. I don't
know, it's something, if we had a friends of playing open space, that could be something
and we'd sponsor to contact that on time.
We ourselves cannot run the road.
That's a nonprofit organization that we have to be separate from our board.
Yeah.
I don't know about that.
Does nobody think she'll be right there?
We'll talk after that.
It isn't written anywhere.
Maybe not.
My next update is just quick regarding Pioneer Park, because in February the board did recommend that
Councilor Yves at the item, so I just, Nate and I wanted to let you know that Jerome, to bring that to the March 6 workshop.
So, if any member of Councilor Quest to be placed at our future workshop, we will let you guys know when that is and what we're preparing for that.
But that's our update right now, and we made, I believe, has an update on some a true removal project that is currently going on in Pioneer Park.
I just started this week.
Yes, so last week, we sent out that letter that was attached in your second to your agenda.
I'll just pull it up here.
So, this was sent to all the residents surrounding the park, about the tree management that
that's being done.
So, basically 30 feet on each side of the trail of any dead fall disease trees, they're
basically, our public work staff is going in there.
They started last Thursday and then got pulled off because of snow and also on Friday.
And I know they're back at it this week.
We haven't received any phone calls or anything from residents that receive the letters,
so I think to understand it's kind of, we're managing the park and, you know, keeping up on it
or trying to keep up on it.
So obviously, our largest park, so yeah, so that's just, the public work staff puts up signs
and stuff, but it's just during their work hours of 70m to 3pm, but just want to let the
board know on that, but that should definitely help that out.
And then they're also going to be adding wood chips to all the wood chip trails in there, too,
because I know they were starting to, I know the last time we were out there when we went
and visited, it was in need of some sprucing up or adding some wood chips.
So those will be added if not, probably not, as they take down some of the dead trees,
but they're going to pile up a pile of wood chips and then spread it once.
the snow leaves.
So.
No.
Yes.
When.
Yep.
So just want to bring that to the board's attention.
That just kind of came up very recently, too.
Basically, in between, since our last meeting.
And then some of the additional items that were that was brought up by board
member panning.
I did add those on there.
And I do have.
Um, I do have the spreadsheet that, uh, what we spent, um, the actual last expending,
and if I can make this better,
it's not show up like this before.
I'm just not shown.
Why is that, uh, what happened to the interest?
Hang on, I get it.
Okay.
So this document, I'm just gonna have to start like this, we're gonna have to go down on
the lights that doing have.
Um, so the original bond.
This was signed up.
There we go.
So the original bond referendum was $3.5 million.
So basically, these are all the different parcels that were purchased.
And the last one was purchased back in 2009.
So I'd probably just not even been here a year.
But yeah, so these are the difference.
And I can send this out to the board.
If you guys want this, I can send this out along with that adoptive park information.
all send the C. guys have a copy, but this is basically the different parcels that were purchased
and let me go down a little bit. It actually exceeds the 3.5. It actually was almost closer to
3.8 and that's I know there was some interest in there, but that's where they had just what.
Yes. So I'll send this out just so you guys have it for your records as well.
What was the lakes? Did you have the information on the first purchase, the lakes development?
That was the Oaks of Anna and then I think just east of it was say seven yep, so that
but the Oaks of Anna was part of
the site seven
200 acres or so
What's now are fed and bank but that purchase was connected to the Oaks
to the one you're calling leaks development. Those two purchases were together.
Yeah, and that looks like it was like 70 acres.
And when you're saying connected, do you mean they were just bought at the same time because
the size and deal. Okay, but because the spaces are not connected, but it was, it
It was one of the developers of the lakes approached us to sell us the wetland piece, but then Jim Peterson being the Sharpie that he was told us to ask him for the eight acres of oak forest at the same time, and that would be about what he should have offered us for the, you know, that should have, that gave us more value, which he felt we needed.
So yes, and it was so nice to hear this gentleman say, I wanted to save that for my best houses
But maybe everybody should have it. So it was amazing was you know, it was an amazing moment for our committee, and that was our first purchase. So
So site 7 was our first purchase, sir, and we didn't know what we had until Jason came along and told us it was
What the potential was? Yes, what it was. We knew we had open space. That's, that's as bright as we were.
So this was a bond reformer referendum many years ago, 2000, 2000, it's a 23 years ago.
Do you think we should talk to Council about a new bond referendum for identifying other spaces?
It seems as though that there is still concern that pockets of open space be preserved or are we really ready to say that's it with 10 open space properties.
Maybe we are.
It would be a good question to bring before the council.
I'm sorry I was way too self involved with small children to even remember how it happens.
What, how did you get this initial referendum going?
I know this is, you had the support of City Council in the mayor and the City Manager.
It took, I took a lot of effort in order to get the political to get this moving, but are we ready to say?
It started with quite a public interest in an open space plan.
Yeah, I mean, I've been here for Gold Golly, you know, 34 years, so just hopefully,
how blame has changed is astounding. And I think I've just had lunch this past week,
the last week with a coworker who's only lived in, blamed for five years. And she's like,
I can't believe how fast it's changing and it's like, you mean nothing.
Where your house sits used to be open land at one time.
I wish we had more money too.
It took some real foresight back in 2000 to say, let's invest in this.
Or this would all be drained and paved.
And so it was a really, it came from the 2020 planning committee.
This was our recommendation to the city council was to establish an open space.
Along with all the other work we had, you know, the big folder of work, our main recommendation
to the city council was that we believe we should have an open space plan for the city
trails. And we were told we were really shot down. We told that they wanted 70,000 people
in Blaine and it would be no room for open space at that point.
Well look what we've had. So yeah, so the committee kept on knowing we just called ourselves
open space 2000 and we marched in the parade with a handmade sign and there was just so much
support along the way yeah we need this we need this and it was really the
people of blame who convinced the council that we needed one needed open
space. Well there's now there's 70,000 people and you gotta believe that there's
a lot of those 70,000 people that still enjoy and care about open space and
And there is the 2040 comp plan, which has some action items and goals for natural resource
management and sustainability, which we need to make some progress on because we're not right now
here. So perhaps there is an opportunity. I mean, if I'm hoping council and mayor are hearing
from more people than just us, that sustainability and open space matters in our community.
Because that's, and maybe when the, I don't know when the, you know, I don't know how accountable
we are to the 2040 count plan. But when that's reviewed, I've reviewed it and there's,
I mean, there's things that I think we as a board could be working on and providing recommendations,
But there are things that are outside of our purview, but would be within the purview of a sustainability board or commission, which is one of the reasons I recommended that when we started talking about the merger.
We've got bigger issues than just open space.
If when we think about long-term planning, because if we want to keep this community great, we're going to need to.
It's even more important now than it was 20 years ago that we protect and preserve.
I would love for a free support 23 years in the future
to look back and say, well,
wow, they were on the ball, you know.
Wait, wait, you know, back in 2000 and in 2024,
because by the time we get any action going.
You know, again, every 25 years, there should be a renewal. You take a look at what you have and take assessment of where we've been and where we need to be. And what do we need to act on now? I'm fired up.
I think we should do. I'd bring it back to our next meeting. We'll see what we can start.
And I think we should talk to our council reps. We should talk to our neighbors.
Well, in order for the city to bond money like that, it has to be put to a vote of the people.
So they'd have to approve it and they'd have to go to a vote.
You do need the support of the council.
Yeah.
If I may, the board can always make a recommendation that staff bring the topic and let council
know that the board would like the council to discuss this.
So the work can always make a recommendation that the council should discuss the idea of having some sort of bonding platform for acquisition of more open space.
And we can bring the idea to the next workshop and get feedback or an initial response.
Great idea.
I mean, I'm looking at this list of properties that were purchased.
And I think it's some of these if I remember going back to the history.
Some of that helped the developers of that area.
because they wanted to develop a portion of it,
but then they had this small plant,
which as if you just want to sell houses
or sell a business park,
or you don't see the value in it,
but it is so very valuable for our groundwater
and species, bird animal, plant species.
maybe just changing also the way we look at management of large spaces. They don't have to be
manicured. Maybe that's part of what the new vision might be. Because I think it needs
to be more than just open space acquisition. It's a bigger issue than that. So do we want to
So it has an item for our next meeting.
Maybe for our workshop.
Or a workshop.
I don't know.
Gene, you're a leader.
We need a workshop for eight.
I'll have to figure out why we're going to do this.
We've had the enlist our staff people to help us have an hour before meeting.
I could do that, sure.
I would that go.
How would we do something like that?
We would just pulse up the meeting starts at 6.30 and set it seven. Yeah, I can do that. That's
And the first one that have to be reminded is me to get here 6.30
Each do some I need to do some homework. I need to read the 2040 plan because it's on the website. It's on the website
right
Is there any more trouble we could make here?
board chair raffer to members of the board. Yes, because we still have the friends of the open space, which
thanks for bringing that to my attention board member panning, because we don't know actually how it even got put up there, because the information soul
outdated and wrong. Not wrong, it's been completed or, you know, you had two and a half years
team in there, and Daddy is the chair. So if there's something you guys want to put in there
instead, please provide content. I'd be, we'd be happy to put different content in it. That's
that's still relevant if it's, because basically it's said in there, they were in the process of
preparing or preparing and trying to make an open stream management plan so if there's
no that wasn't it we were trying to make a nonprofit support group okay so if there's
something different we want to put on that page I know board member panning put that out to the
board so you guys can look at that and if there is and we can exchange emails that's fine
I mean, it doesn't need to be a sit down,
but if there's certain things people want on that page
instead, that's, you know, accurate.
Because the meeting time was 730.
I mean, we don't mean it's 730.
So I mean, I don't know how old that was.
I was kind of shocked.
But yes, we were trying to start a foundation.
We ourselves were not allowed to.
We were discussing how we would do it.
And we had some interested people, most of whom died.
So it really went away, the concept is great, Springbrook has fantastic foundation, the Nature
Center, and they are great funderators, they're great volunteers, and that's what we're
a place like our open spaces can really use the volunteer support and money raising.
And when I first started on the sport that we were talking about friends of open spaces and that's
and you folks told me, well we can't really run it here as long as we're on the board.
But if we graduate from the board, that would be.
Where does that, I cannot find anything that says the foundation.
It's a nonprofit.
Why does the state of Minnesota, you'd have to set it up?
Find anything on it.
Malcolm, Malcolm, what's his name?
So this would be a legal opinion.
So if I ask for like our environmental framework
from a legal thing, I had a bunch of papers,
which if I could follow up on that, I'll see if I can find them.
But yes, it's a legal foundation, non-profit type of thing,
And Springbrook has one, Melcom, talk to me later.
Yeah, I'll cool you in on what it was.
OK.
Yes, so if you guys want to add anything to it,
we actually turned it off at this point
because the information is so wrong.
So you'll see.
I can't find it.
Right.
So that's on purpose.
But again, it's in that email that Carolyn sent out.
So please take a look at that.
There's some different information we want to put on there.
things we want to add to that we can turn it back in. Basically just hit with a
page, but we can. Yeah, so, but yes, no, I was like, I didn't even know that was
there. And then when I read it, I'm like, that's not all right. That's wrong. You know,
it was just I was actually kind of laughing. So that is all we have. And on the
grant, we did not do anything. We don't have the capacity to do anything with it at
point we just we do not have the staff time and resources that is a shame that that opportunity
pass by because I know I had sent it to council and the mayor and the city manager and I
got replies from anti when I got replies from that was that we're enthusiastic and we'll look into
this and it's disappointing that that couldn't happen somebody has to do the work because the
thing is that that was for a position for somebody to do this kind of work so this is a chicken in the
kind of problem where we need somebody to do the work but we don't have that person but we
need to apply for a grant to get that person but there's nobody to do the applying. So I don't
know how to solve that but that is Nick's that is I think a huge gap in our city staff is that
we need more good people and we need people that are knowledgeable and experienced and passionate
about these issues for long-term sustainability and just a couple who are doing lots of other things.
There's only so much anyone person can do.
So I'm disappointed.
We know that you guys are stretched off often.
Every time you do reports on how many things are going on in the city,
I just, I don't know how few of you there are doing all this.
Oh, my work.
And you have great enthusiasm and help for us.
We want there to be more for you, so that that's right.
We just need to clone you.
That is all the trouble we have at this time.
That is all we have on the agenda, unless the board has anything else.
Is there anything else?
Motion to adjourn.
OK.
I move.
I'll second.
All those things.
Hi.
All right.