Kenyon City Council, October 29, 2026

0:00 It's 5 p.m. I'm sorry. We're going to call a meeting order. It's 5 p.m. This is our City Council special session on October 29, 2026. Let's stand up for the Pledge of Allegiance, please. Pledge of Allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice. Thank you.

0:34 Okay. Can we get a motion to adopt our agenda, please? I'll make a motion to adopt the agenda. I will second it. All in favor? Aye. Motion passes to adopt the agenda. And our business to be discussing possible actions, discussion regarding council salaries and ordinances, etc. I know I've talked with Scott and I know Kim and Mr. Riggs, our city attorney, and there was discussion that if we do this, we have to completely rewrite an ordinance before our next city council meeting.

1:15 For the election. For the election. Well, before the election. And I just think that with that time frame, I think there's going to be too much of a cost for rushing it to get it done. And plus, it's a new council's coming in. And I know you said something earlier here. We're waiting.

1:37 And I agree, it's probably not fair to new council members to come in. Yeah. If it was us sitting here all again, I'd be fine with it. But because you've got new people coming in, it's not very nice. Yeah. Yeah. The reason I asked it if you put on is because obviously I was ill last meeting. I wasn't here.

1:59 You had a discussion about it. There was a motion made to do that. If you're not going to do it, I would say you do a motion to descend in that direction. Because we'd have to do it by state statute with this ordinance. And it would have to be done before next Tuesday to make it effective for the next 12 months or whatever time it's set. So if you're not going to do that, obviously ignore the ordinance there. It's pretty straightforward and simple. But you would just need a simple motion to say, oh, we're sending that directly to the next council that comes in 2027.

2:27 Yeah. Yeah. I'll rescind that. I'll make a motion to rescind the motion for the. Okay. I'll second it. All right. All in favor? Aye. Motion passes to rescind. Okay. Thank you. That clarifies that one. All right. Discussion regarding the grocery store abatement assistance process.

2:53 At our last city council meeting, we did not have a resolution in place to vote on. So this is basically a resolution, more informational resolution that's going to be on our next hearing for our tax abatement. For the grocery store, folks who are not, they'll get one. And that, correct me if I'm wrong, Scott, but that is to do a tax abatement of $40,000 over the next five years to help the grocery store with assistance so it can help survive over the next five years.

3:33 Yeah. Again, I asked that this be put on if you were going to have a meeting like this to have a quick update of where this is at, what's happened. Typically, a project like this with a tax abatement takes a number of months to complete. Many months, maybe four or five months tax increment, typically a little bit longer. You've turned this around extremely quickly. You have, you know, it came before the council.

3:57 You had information in a previous council meeting with the Northland folks providing you the breakdown information, exactly what the mayor said, of a tax abatement of paid twice a year over five years of a total of $40,000. So there'd be payments of $4,000, $4,000 twice a year for five years. This is purely a policy decision for you folks to make. You have the legal authority to do it.

4:22 Again, it's typically a process. It takes a number of months. You go out, you vet this, you review any projects you're looking at that you might do this with, but it's been set up to have a public hearing at your meeting on the 10th. You have to hold a public hearing pursuant to state statute, and then you have to adopt an abatement resolution if you do that. What I have in the packet tonight that I've given Scott and staff to provide you was a copy of the public hearing notice that's already gone out, as well as the resolution you'd have to adopt if you want to do it. Again, totally up to you.

4:51 There's no action to take tonight, other than if you all said you're not doing it, which is your prerogative to do, you could say, well, let's not hold the public hearing. But it has been noticed, and you can wait until this attempt to do that, but it's either you vote for it or you don't vote for it at that point. But I wanted to make sure I could answer any questions, but also, if you needed further information, then some folks could provide more by the meeting on the 10th as well, if you needed it. Didn't include that stuff in the packet.

5:15 That was in your last council packet. Okay. Okay. All right. All right. Okay. Okay. Okay. Fire department appointments. The fire department has hired, interviewed five applicants and hired five home, Owen Craig, Blake Waltman, Blake Mills, Micah Johnson, and Ruben Johnson. They're all excellent candidates, and we're glad to offer them the position to be in the fire department. Motion.

5:44 Option. I'm going to approve it. We need a motion to approve it. Correct. I'll make a motion to approve the hires for the fire department. I'll second it. All in favor? Aye. Aye. Motion passes the hiring hired by the gentleman here who is in the fire department. All right. Discussion regarding business park, electrical services, and transformer, compass, and et cetera.

6:14 We have some individuals here from compass that put together a presentation and willing to answer any questions that you have as a council and so on and so forth. Thank you for coming. I'm Jay Anderson, CEO of the compass. I brought a couple of people with me, our supervisor of engineering, the health market, and our resource planning manager. I put a few slides together to just kind of go through a lot of the discussion I've seen here and talked about just to clarify things and give you some background about what we are, what we do, what we don't do, and how we're kind of assisting right now getting everything going on.

6:56 So we are a joint action agency. That basically is, we're a group that works with other cities. We have 11 members in Minnesota, like the town of Kenyon, Bluebird, Granite Falls, Janesville, Sleepy Eyes, Springfield, Fairfax, Wyndham, and Mount Lake. So those are some of the towns that we are our members. They are a board that govern what I do.

7:22 They govern all their members do. We are a project-based agency, and we don't come up with one solution and make all our members make the same thing. Our members have choices on what they want, what they don't want, what they need, what they don't. Our primary function is engineering support. We do a little bit of engineering support. We've got a small engineering group that help our towns and are kind of on the ball for them when they need help. We also have a market participant group.

7:50 We are in the daily market buying power and selling power from all our cities all the time. It's the mid-continent independent system operator or the grid for the Midwest. It goes all the way from Canada all the way down to almost the governments. We are at Generation Power Supply Planning. We help parents evolve this. We help each city figure out how they're going to meet their energy needs and capacity needs. You guys have your own gen sets here in town, which are part of the capacity rights that we have.

8:19 We also look for power supply contracts. Those units are great for capacity. They're great for backup. They're expensive to run. So we're looking for cheaper energy. Remember, we're basically providing a couple things in this. The energy is, if you want to compare it to the water energy pipe and the capacity is high, you need both of those to supply power. We also need some transmission ownership.

8:42 We're part of the Brookings line. You guys have participated in that project. That provides a variety of different benefits, but it also is a guarantee to the system to make sure that we support what we're needing for getting power supplies right now. And lastly, there's other things that our members need. We have various consultants that work with our cities. We have a rate consultant that meets with each city. They cycle through each city.

9:06 They go through your rates. They help you sign your rates. They work exclusively with you. I'm not involved very much in that. They are for the cities. And any other things, there's various things our members ask for at different times. We have a GIS person that's helping to support some GIS. So we're basically a support group for all our cities, and each one of our cities has different skill levels, different needs, different population basis, different population of employees. So everybody needs a little bit something different, and we try to be a little bit of everything.

9:41 So let's talk a little bit about what's been going on in Kenyon. So just kind of to give a rundown of it and talk about the original issue. We got a call, or we've met with KMU staff in the Scouse Transmission. There's a couple things going on. One big thing is substation transfer. The lead time on them has, what, doubled or tripled out?

10:10 And the prices have doubled or tripled. Part of this started because of the COVID epidemic. But then on top of it, what we're starting to see is a lot of supply issues. And there's more and more people needing transformers, more and more data farms. You guys have all heard about all that. The need for transformers, generation units, switchgear, all that has skyrocketed. So the lead time's gotten longer, and it continues to be a delay.

10:38 The other thing we wanted to make sure, because of the long lead time, we talked with Kenyon staff. We said, you know, if you have a failure, it's going to be really hard to get a replacement quick, and the cost to operate your generation is very prohibitive, as well as the alternative. You only have so many hours that you can run according to the pollution permit. The one other thing that Kenyon staff was concerned about, Kenyon staff was concerned about, was the business park access.

11:05 The current location of your sub behind the building, as well as where the load is, and the voltage you serve, provides some unique challenges, because you need to run a lot of big wire out there to serve bigger loads, of which you're going to be getting. And lastly, Xcel is planning an upgrade as a 60-line system that runs near you guys, and in the next, I think about 20, 31 is kind of the estimated date. So when they come through, they're going to have a new line, so kind of all lines do, it'd be a good time to go up that second line, have a new substation, bring the power to it.

11:39 Lastly, I just wanted to kind of, you know, the average age of your transformers is 60. They were basically manufactured in the 1960s. I know staff had looked for dates before. We actually got the serial numbers on, and they're tracking down. You know, they're from the 1960s, and it's like a 60-year average age. The next curve I'm going to have Alex come up and talk a little bit about, this is part of the concern, as well as the fact that you're going to be getting more loadings down, which is a great thing.

12:15 It's more revenue. So it's a good thing to have it, but it's also, you've got to make sure that it can serve a certain device. All right. So like David said, we looked up the dates on the ratings on the transformers. So the graph I got in front of you is from IEEE and Doble, roughly both transformer. You know, one's a testing company. That's all the standards, and Doble is actually test transformers, makes test foam.

12:42 So what I have here is basically the age of the transformer by year and the rate of failure that you did. Now, normally, like a substation transformer, they're designed basically the last, they say the service life is 30 years. Now, we consider that low. Because, you know, they tend to last longer, especially older ones that go really well. But you can see that past 30, you can see that the curve will accidentally increases the failure.

13:07 Now, does it mean the transformers are going to fail tomorrow? No, it just means that the rate of failure is going to decrease. Because over time, you're going to have insulation break down inside the transformer at some point, it's going to let go. So right now, the graph only goes up to 60. That's a pretty old transformer. Usually about like 50. So we do yearly updates on these transformers to make sure everything's working good though. Yes.

13:36 We do yearly test. Yes. We do yearly do the oil reports. I know there's been testing done on, I assume that maybe the LTCs have been serviced at some point too. So we do what we can for them and stuff like that. It's a little tap changer. So it's basically, that's a, that's part of that. That's why there's two curves here because the one is for one of the little tap changers, which is higher.

14:00 And that's what you guys have. And the one is for the nominal tap changers. And there's a lot of moving mechanical parts in it and stuff like that. So the failure rate of those tends to be higher. So the reason I bring it up, like I said, just to, just to guys give you an idea. It's time. We got to, we got to figure out something. Just part of this transformer. Alex, the version is going to talk to any of them all. Yeah.

14:25 Yeah. I mean, not uncommon to any city. All the transformers all right next to each other. And, you know, one of them lets go and eventually it's a hazard. Now they have uses on the primary that are supposed to go if they have an issue or anything like that. But they're really slow going and stuff. What is the fail rate percentage at 60 years? Oh, it's up there. I can't see the number.

14:47 3.5% right now. So a lot of 100 transformers that are still on level 60, 3.5 out of 60. Yeah. And if you had a spare, or if you did a spare really quick, that would be part of the solution. The problem with these transformers is that it's two-yearly. You're going to have two-yearly. So we have a low percentage of one of our scaling, but it could happen.

15:12 And it's kind of like, you know, I hate to say a convert to this, but it's kind of like a washing machine that we use for our remember off some split surface. You don't know when it's going to happen. The testing is a bit indicator. Typically, when you're doing that testing, you'll see a cellene build up in the glass sample. Yeah, there's a bunch of different types of gases that we look at and we're doing there on that part. But I've also seen transformers before that have an indication as far as far as it can happen.

15:41 The insulation breaks down. Usually, there's some indication that you don't have much time as soon as you see that gas build up. And the testing and all the stuff you guys are doing as well. The other thing is that it's been fairly lightly loaded. And, you know, you say, you sit here and you say, okay, we do this, we do this. 40 years, you go, okay, we're okay.

16:05 50 years, we're okay, we're okay. Or is it all of a sudden 60 years now? We're really in our part of time. And, again, the whole thing is that if you had a spare, you guys have a spare system that you're asking. If you had a spare, that would be partially a different discussion. But also, they've been fairly lightly loaded with the issue to it, but at the same time, if you're giving her any gas more loaded and you say, well, this is good for revenue. Again, it's all good problems that we have.

16:34 We have a new customer coming, we have a lot of coming. But the problem is we have these little page changes. We should look at our backtestments to see if there is any of the gases and stuff in there and how much high it is. If it's something that's more urgent and certain things or not urgent. So that's a little bit about the age of the transform.

17:06 That was one issue. And just to be clear, you know, KMU staff reached out to the original issue was, you know, they needed, we got a consultant engaged with them. You guys approved us to go find it. They hired UCI that you guys are paying for them through us. They have an engineer that's been here. He's looked at the system.

17:29 He's working with Alex to give the information. He needs to design a new substation. And they are getting ready to propose a design. They'll propose a transformers to be ordered. All this has to be approved by me for the planning staff. This is, we have done, we have done, we have not, I have to say, not spend anything on this other than our client and the consultant you guys are paying for it. All of this has to be approved by me for the planning staff.

17:58 So right now it talks about design, it talks about load and that transformer, when I talked to Scott, I said, Billy, there's two things going on. Because they called me and said, well, we want some assistance. The two things are, one, substation situation has to continue to work. We have to continue to make progress and be ready for the future. Two, you get an air custom company, which, again, is a good problem. But it's another thing that needs to be developed, and we'll go into that a little bit here in a second.

18:25 So we are working on it. You have an engineer. He's a very seasoned engineer. They have an officer named Cato. He's out of Montana. We've talked with him. We let him know that this other stuff's going to go on. He's going to assist staff with getting his new customer done, as well as Alex. So we're going to go on there. So on current engagement, what started this whole thing, we had some staff situations, people moved out of positions, or moved out of positions, whatever.

19:01 In early October, him and the staff reached out to me, Josh reached out. He said, okay, we smell. We got the situation. We got a new customer. We love it. There was already a transformer for him. You had already ordered the transformer for the new customer. I think, Josh, that's already good, right? So that transformer has already been ordered for business card. Josh took a customer application form out to him the other day. We couldn't find any that were filled out.

19:26 We had him fill it out. Our engineers are evaluating what they said for load, and we'll be talking to them, make sure that everything's lined up so we know what we have to build up. We made sure to hook up Scott with the rate consultant who recently did a rate study with this. If you guys do approve substation expenditures, you may have to change rates for you, as well as you're going to have new customer content, you'll have new revenue streams. You may have to tweak your rate forecast and look at it and say, okay, are we good?

19:53 Do we need to borrow money? Do we need to raise rates? What do we need to do to deal with this? So we hook them up with that. We have an engineer lined up already. We'll work with them as well. And then we have a corporate council who is specifically legal staff for us. It's very oriented with utilities. You have your own legal council, fully capable on both sides. If they need assistance, we have a person in the office.

20:18 That's what we are. We are an advisory role only. We do not make decisions for you guys. We do not spend your money. You're an advisory role only. We were asked to continue. Moving on to the next slide. So again, we advise only. We assist by aligning the engineering support. As I said, we're working on the continuation designed for the planning of the substation. I have a picture that kind of walks people through that.

20:46 We want you guys to get the support you need for rate revenue requirements, for the system improvements, as well as transfer some of the knowledge about what the studies show, where you're at with your revenue forecast, your rates, and really kind of give everybody up to speed as to what's going on. Really, this is – we're just doing a simple continuation of what can be used to happen. The plan for the substation had already been talked about. The engineer was hired to do the design.

21:13 We're just coming in and making sure that everybody knows where things are at. And to be there, you need help. The last thing I want to do in my position is to shy away from helping people when they ask. We got asked to provide support. That's why we – the revenue staff we have. Again, you guys do have some low growth. They're under low growth. It's quite averaging. That's got it here.

21:39 So, you know, your revenues will grow by half percent in work. You've got some big customers coming in. So, it's a good thing. It's a good problem to have. Additional load and you need the support. And again, you guys maintain all the authority of the decisions. This is nothing that I do. There's going to be RFPs that you're going to have to up for equipment and services. There's going to be discussions about what to buy.

22:05 This is all in the purview of your elected officials and your appointed efficiencies. So, let's talk a little bit about the big discussion that I see it kind of talked on. And I'll try to walk you through it. We went through this together about 12 times. And I know – I'm going to say this. I had a tough time saying it was 1, 2, 3, 1A, 1B. Again, just my silliness about what I wanted to try to say.

22:36 But we try to say, look, all the ones are really important. They all kind of need to have to have the final. We're very close to the final. Maybe the two can weigh a little bit. So, the first thing that needs to be addressed is this line that runs on some patients like we're out to the service. That needs to be carried or poured in and put in and just fed up. That is what we're going to do with time.

23:04 You will be able to serve it out of your distance as basically. Very helpful in that. If the load is big enough, we're going to have to do something else. But right now, projection we saw initially was it would probably be okay, but we're going to solve it. That's not a problem. So, that line will be poured in and put out to the distance part, and that will be out of the service. That line will also have the second.

23:32 Once it's buried, it's going to allow some other things to be done. The next thing that's most important is we need to start, again, looking at the design of the substation fishing configuration. When we saw the students, they used to ask, we got to all the early ones because we wanted to do this stuff that you're not going to do with the driver. The other thing about it is that if you guys deserve 4,160 volts, transform your power from 69,000 to 4,16.

24:07 That is a lower voltage, it's not 5/5, but there's a lower voltage than what other you can do. By moving to 12,4,7, we can reduce the system loss of the amount of energy that's lost in resistance from the unit. And we also don't need to be as big as wires. We're going to do it in a way that, when you go to do it, you guys have all these transformers all in the city.

24:36 We're doing it in a way that we can continue to serve you and let your staff slowly migrate away from those older transformers or older. And we're not going to be able to be able to do loads out of the business part, not only what's going on now, but what's my policy going on now. So the next thing is, you can do this in mind, and if you guys approve, I think, again, I don't see this recommendation as an important thing. You have a little lead time with the transformers, so the transformers should probably be ordered.

25:12 You already have the transformer for the new customer that's been ordered and delivered. The other transformers would be the 69,000 to 12,47. That would be for a new sub station out in the business park area, if it's approved. And then lastly, we're going to re-utilize this line that we're going to serve that customer, and we're actually going to go back to this side from that new sub and feed this existing side. So we'll put in the Patenow transformer there, or you guys can put in the Patenow transformer there, and it will transform the voltage from 12,47 to 41,60.

25:50 So all the computers are in the power plant. This transformer is about a year, year and a half lead time. Same with this one, switched here, about a year, Alex. Breakers are two years now. So the biggest problem is if something fails, how will you guys cope with having power in the city if you don't have a chance? So that means that, that's kind of the one key thing, and once this is done, you'll see a customer served in the meantime for this line.

26:37 Lastly, once it's well done, there's a visiting sub station transplant, sub station. That 1A line, that's necessary to run our current business that's going out there, or the power we have going through right now, is that sufficient for the time being, or does this 1A have to be put into place? 1A will be what you use to feed that new company right now, the broker system, okay?

27:14 And that's not in ways right now. No. Once that's there, and you guys start getting that sub station built out there, you'll feed them directly right there. This transformer that you bought has the ability, it has a switch on it, and it's moving from 41,60 to 12,47, turning them off. You have to be interviewed and serve you up and turning them off. This is basically kind of the generator step, and can you have already ordered this, you've already got a plan, what they ordered, get this customer served.

27:44 Once this substation is fully operational, we'll basically feed them out of this sub, but we need to feed back where your service call terminated. And we have, it's a lot easier bringing that much power back at 12,47, that's why that 41,60 or 12,47 transfer, so you're going to use it initially, potentially if you have an upload, the feed power out. Otherwise, you'll continue to feed it at 41,60 in the meantime, with that, why are you going to put it on the ground if you're going to serve?

28:16 So, initially, it's circling, then we're going to flip the interstate backwards, and then feed it back to the city after as substation. So, what kind of land we've got going there now, that's providing power out there right now. So, Jay, can you explain to the council, I think there's been some questions, and I think you did a nice job of explaining that the substation is one thing, and getting power out there is another thing. But, initially, I've been getting questions about how did we come up with roughly $750 to $1 million on the initial part.

28:57 Sure. And I know that's the step up, but can you explain that to them? Sure. You do it better than I do. No, in all honesty, we brought Scott and Josh in and talked to them, and we went through a whole bunch of different scenarios and situations. When we talked, we said, look, we think the substation is probably $5, $6 million, right, Alex? The transformer itself is about $1.2 million. That's for that transformer and that stuff.

29:25 It's the other transformer here, probably $300, $400,000. That was part of this discussion about this time, because we weren't sure if we're going to have to do that right away because of the voltage. Given the load that we've heard of, and we're going to validate through that form to Josh that, that would serve if that load is correct. We need to double-check that load.

29:52 We won't have to do that transformer right now. But in all honesty, all this stuff kind of has to happen really quickly, and we want to get that transformer ordered as soon as possible. Let's pretend this substation does fail. You guys have some of this stuff here. We facilitate trying to get this hooked up faster, especially if we've got this interstate system built. We've got that substation transformer available, as well as the transformer to convert to the system built.

30:22 That's where kind of the milling came from, where we've kind of grouped it together, and that is really kind of the piece that we do. Josh also brought up that this current line, where it's going to be positioned, will replace an overhead line that's not in the best shape. So it is a system input. And that's that number six overhead copper that the line you're talking about.

30:50 And will that be enough to power the facility once it opens for now while we have to get something like this? Like they said, it's real about to be double-checked load, and it's right. But it can be served at 4160 per second. Big enough wire that it can do more than the end of that? No, I'm talking about our current number six overhead wire. Is that enough to power to break out while we're looking into?

31:16 100 amp max on it? 70 amp would be added. And I can't remember what the figures were when we were studying it last time. When you've got air conditioning done, it's packed, right? Rope facilities are very unique to them. It's, I was in Michigan, but Josh, I'm going to do a compass. They have a fish machine over there.

31:40 They have a lot of air on this. They use a lot of energy, and it is, everybody has lost a lot of lives. A lot of their energy is just HVAC. Because they have maintained a very specific set of humidity and temperatures. They get their maximum THD out. So we need money set up prior to them opening. And we need to go out for bids.

32:03 And you guys need to find out for sure what it's going to cost. It's a big wire. It's going to be underground board. I grew up in Iowa. I didn't have to worry about rocks. You guys do. So, you know, when they're underground board and they hit a rock, you can't back up, start over, do a different way, dig it out, and go past it. So we don't know exactly. It's going to cross the creek, too, I believe, Josh.

32:27 So that's, you know, it has to go under the creek. So it is going to be somewhat of an expensive run. But the other thing about putting it underground, and another important part, once this is hooked up, it's a more reliable circuit, they'll be able to retire some of the older circuit. It's usually a problem when they have been placed out and changed on that circuit. But it also provides an underground interstate back from the generation plant to the sub.

32:54 It ensures more reliability so that when, if you have a storm, you already have the generators run, hopefully not replacing a wire in the air that feeds the substation. It's underground, very, hopefully in better shape. So we've been here to assist, provide some guidance, line up the right people to work with your staff. We were asked to help by multiple people.

33:20 That's been a role so far. We are not telling you how to spend your money. We are not saying you've got to do this, but we are giving you solutions for what we've been further to the problems, as well as the fact that it's already started talking about getting a new substation. Those transformers are kind of our... Well, thank you. This is very helpful now. Thank you.

33:44 Thanks for explaining that, Jim. Appreciate it. Moving on to general discussion board. Any past projects, future, pending, general issues, communication, or training? Mr. Mayor, may I have the floor, please?

34:09 I have a couple things that I would like to say. First off, what I have to say has been approved by our city attorney, along with Randy previously stating that he had nothing to hide. And he wanted the citizens to know when we held his performance evaluation as an open meeting back on September 21st. It's important information that the public and his family need to be made aware of.

34:35 The issue of the delay in getting service out to the industrial cart is not the reason why Randy's no longer a city of Kenyon employee. The transformer, which we just found out at the last KMU that he had ordered, first off, was not ordered to statute. For something of this size, there should be at least three estimates received, and then presented to the KMU commission, and then the council for final approval before placing an order. Not just ordering on his own, along with no notification that had been done.

35:07 Randy had been placed on an employee performance improvement plan back on January 28th for nine areas that he has admitted twice during city public meetings that he knows he's at fault for and failed to even try to improve on these. I'm going to just name a few being at being to work on time for his set shift and failure to get prior approval for any overtime hours from his supervisor. This is a known process by all employees.

35:36 This item has cost the citizens thousands of dollars by him adjusting his time entry for those days to appear that he was in at seven. Also, him neglecting to report to work on time made for unclear work direction for his direct reports until he arrived. When he was asked if he would like to change his set hours, he refused. I reminded him at that time that this issue is not only affecting him in paying higher rates and taxes, but also his own children that live in town, which didn't seem to concern him enough to make a change.

36:12 He also failed to get prior approval for vacation time off or notifying when he would be out ill. How many of you can get away with that with your employers? He has used our city-owned buildings to store several personal items for years and was told by our previous administrator that things needed to be removed due to our insurance agent's request. Let's just say if a golf cart or some other personal items were to catch fire and destroy the building, who do you think would have to pay to replace it?

36:42 The insurance is not going to cover it, so it would end up being you and I. His recent personal use of the city bucket truck is against our employee policy as well as our insurance coverage. How many of us have had to pay big money recently to have our dead trees taken down? I have sat in several meetings where there has been extreme insubordination, from pounding his fist on the table to shouting and using profanity towards our city administrator. One meeting was so bad that our law enforcement received a call to respond.

37:12 Since day one, he has refused to accept the changes that the city council and the KMU commission had approved. These are the five agreements between KMU and the city that were approved many years ago, but had not been followed by the last administrator. Randy has said multiple times that he would not report to Scott. He would only answer to the commissioners, even though the agreement clearly states who his supervisor is to be. His kids have asked what happened in the last two years, causing him to no longer like his job or not sleep well.

37:45 Well, this would be the reason. One man's refusal to accept changes in the workplace. After being allowed by the previous administrator, who did not like confrontation, and now having one who cares about his position and how the city is run, felt in his terms as being micromanaged and would not comply to the change. Scott was hired to handle two very important issues, along with everything else necessary to run a city. The merger and repairing the fracture between the KMU and Public Works employees.

38:15 Trust me when I say many hours have been spent working through personnel issues between all the in-person meetings and phone calls due to the drama that started this time two years ago due to three employees and has been continually a problem until just this month. Now you can see both departments working on jobs together and running things like they should have always been, a City of Kenyon team. Looking back now, maybe the previous mayor and our interim administrator at that time were right in wanting to let all three go at that time, but I had not agreed.

38:48 Randy was not told he had to sign the separation agreement or he would be terminated. He was presented with the agreement and it was explained that if he chose to not sign it, the next action was that it would go to the entire council who would then hear the personnel committee's reasons for recommending releasing him from his duties and would then vote on it. If council majority were yes, then he would be let go immediately and his benefits would immediately end.

39:16 We offered him to remain on paid leave until his scheduled surgery and his benefits continued through December. I certainly hope you all can now understand that we had valid reasons for the difficult decision that we had to make. Let us as a council move past this and be able to focus on what is important, getting our city back in order. And to the anonymous blogger who thinks Kenyon is some kind of 17th century Salem and is afraid to reveal themselves, please stop causing our community to be in an unnecessary uproar. That's all I have.

39:50 Thank you. Eric, can I respond on that? We're not doing any comments at this meeting. He used me under the bus, so I'm just wondering if I can respond or not. So, we're now opening up to special council meeting. Okay, if you let her talk, or you won't let me. Fine.

40:11 Pretty cowardly to do it in a meeting like this. Thank you. 100%. When else am I supposed to do it? Where is she? Why is the Vienna up there? What happened there? You can ask her. Okay. I'm just going to say this. We're going to stay on topic of the meeting. It's a special meeting that we set aside for five topics.

40:37 No, yeah. And so, I... And that guy over there, he's a public, he's a micro-manager, he's working on the corner, that's why I said some of these things. And nobody listens to me on it. We can only get court so much. You, I don't believe anything you say. Thank you, Randy. I appreciate that. All those points, a lot of them, but none of them had to do it. When a guy kicks you out of meetings many times, because you bring it, you open your, you say your opinion, then that is a micro-manager. And you can just cut him off.

41:05 And he lies through his teeth. Maybe we should hear from one of the KMU commissioners that you state that those are the only ones that you were going to respond to. Please, let's move on to the topics at hand. Do we have any other general discussions that we need to discuss right now? Yeah. So, I'm not going to get into a fight with anybody or have anything like that. I just want things to get resolved.

41:33 I think that in a small town like this, and I think, Scott, when you started, I came into your office and I had a discussion with you. And so, not to pick on, you know, the whole town, but I just said, hey, you have to handle things delicately here, right? Remember this discussion? I don't remember all the points, but I remember you was talking. And so, that being said, I don't know that necessarily the management skills are not there, but there's definitely, and we, you know, we can, I'm not here to argue about it, argue about it, but obviously there's issues. Because all these people here, they're angry.

42:12 So, I just think there's a problem with the communication. And you can argue that and you can argue that, but it's not necessarily whether you're communicating with people. It's how you're communicating with them, right? So, what I did, because I just, I don't really know how to handle this, and I only have a couple months left here. So, I did meet with the league. It's something we can put on the next agenda.

42:37 But they're going to, if it approves, they're going to get somebody down here. They're going to go over the roles and responsibilities. It's not going to solve everything, but it'll be a place to start. I just think this is, you need a third party to come in here. And, I mean, maybe, you know, maybe there needs to be leadership training. Maybe there needs to be training on what our roles are, what our responsibilities are. Because, I mean, we can argue and say, you know, you're doing this perfect job, and I'm not saying that you're doing a terrible job.

43:08 But there's clearly communication that is bad, clearly. I mean, it's just like, we can't deny that. So, I'm not saying you're not communicating, but maybe it's not, you know, I just said, be careful. You're in a big town of Norwegians. I live with Norwegians in my home. I love them. But too much change too fast and too abrasive is not going to work here. And so, that's just, you know, how I feel.

43:35 I, you know, shared that with you. So, I just think if we can get this, put it on the agenda, and if the council would vote on it to have them come in, it doesn't, they don't pick anybody apart. They don't do anything. They just talk to everybody, try to be a third party and help us kind of get back on our feet. And whatever they do, you know, however you move forward with that, I'm not going to be here. I don't know if, you know, she said she could maybe get here in December, but then it would be like this council that would be meeting with her.

44:02 And I don't know if we should move that till, you know, January, even February, till the other council gets in here. So, it is free. It is free. It's free. It comes with us having insurance. So, it's just a step. I mean, I don't know that it'll solve everything, but, you know, I mean, clearly there's problems. So, we've got to start somewhere to fix those problems because we need to focus on communication and all that stuff before we can do anything, no matter what you do in the future.

44:36 You have to start somewhere. Thank you, Mary. Yeah. And comments will be opened up at our next city council meeting. So, if you want to come and speak at that time, Randy, you're more than welcome because I'd also like to hear comments from the residents of the city on the grocery store and what they feel about the taxpayer as well. Yeah, you have a public hearing for that.

45:00 So, yeah, you would have that. Yeah. So, comments will be opened up then, and you can make your comments at that time. All right, we have anything, other general discussion, any updates on some of the projects? Well, that was on there because you've had some data practices requests and questions about some of your pending matters.

45:35 One was obviously the business part that you've talked about in some capacity. The other was obviously coming up with the grocery store and the abatement there. The third one was the Kenyon crossings, which you've approved a tax increment district for. That's gone through a process of over, I don't know, two, two and a half, three years of getting to where it is right now. So, I can certainly update you with that, but that's why Scott had put this on here to say, we've had questions if you want to update, because I certainly will try to. Scott can, other staff can.

46:04 I don't know if that's necessary or not. Obviously, those are all under contract now for Kenyon crossings. They've signed things. There was a deed grant that was applied two years ago and a year ago that has been awarded, and you've approved all those documents from deed. You've approved the tax increment district. You've approved the contract for private development, and they have, my understanding, started asbestos removal on the project, have not started the project itself, which will be a demo and a rebuild entirely. That will come at some other time once building permits are done.

46:39 So, it's an approved project. So, it's an approved project. Okay. Actually, one update, I would actually, so I'd like to know what was on the pharma complex. Can we get her just a brief update on that? I know there's a lot of mention that people are wondering what's going on. Parking is the biggest issue that I see, but just a quick update, please.

47:14 That's what I thought I just did, but that's what I did. Yeah, okay. It is. I'm sorry. It's fine. Give me the details on it. Yeah. Your engineer has been reviewing, as have I, the plat's been approved for that. It's a replay of that project to reconfigure the lot lines that are out there. The parking under our city code, you are, it is parked properly.

47:42 It is, does meet the city code. So, if they wanted, you know, approval for some type of different parking, you'd have to do, you know, something with that. But you have approved the parking to this point in time. That's been approved. But that would also be ultimately up to the people who own the property. Yeah, they propose, and they make a proposal, and you deal with it, and you see how it fits with the code, and if there's adjustments that have to be made, you can't dictate to them what kind of parking they have to do.

48:08 Well, no, because I think we already dealt with it. You already dealt with it. Yeah, you already dealt with it. And I mean, I guess if you're saying, can they build a ramp, or they can do stuff like that, you'd never get a project there. I mean, that's not possible. I mean, it's not reality. For the dollars you're talking, and the demo they're doing, and what they've got, and what they can cash flow, that's at least what they've said. So, but yeah, no, that's a good question. It is.

48:30 I don't, you know, you have... It's going slow, because we talked to him, and the EDA meeting, we were discussing it, but they got the own bank, and they just said, it's just, yeah, there's issues with just... Investors. Yes. Dollars. Yes. Cash flow in a project like that is difficult, yes. It's taking longer than what we wanted, but they do have to have the demolition done. I think they have a time, they have a time frame.

48:54 They do, because they won't qualify for the deed grant if they go beyond a certain point. So, that is starting, like I said, they're desiring to go forward with that. Actual construction, I don't know, that's up to... At least we need to get rid of the eyesore, so at least get done for sure. Yeah. So, that is under contract. Yeah. So, no, to the mayor's point, yeah, there are... You've dealt with a number of these issues already. They've gone, and it is the culmination of a probably two-and-a-half-year project that's going on here.

49:25 You went through applications and tried to assist the developer with deed money from the state. That didn't get approved. It did get approved this year. So, it got to the point where the project made sense to the state as well to put money into it. So, that's what you got. Yeah. Thank you. Sorry about the confusion. I've got a lot of... No, that's all right. That's all right. All right.

49:49 Do we have anything else with any of our other departments or anything? Well, we didn't have a commissioner that wanted to speak. Excuse me? We did have a commissioner that was going to... Oh, yeah. And then I got a couple other things after that, so... Okay. Doug, did you want to speak on the KMU? You're up, Doug.

50:13 Oh, okay. Sorry. You don't have to speak if you don't want to. I think maybe we should hold it off until... I don't know what KMU has to say. All right, babe. It sounds good to me. I think we should wait. I agree. Okay. Thank you. All right. And that way, you're deferring any public comment to the next meeting like you normally would do. So, I think that makes sense.

50:36 Yeah. Okay. I agree. Yeah. Scott, you said you had a comment? Yeah, just under pending matters, just a couple things to bring a council up to speed on. We did put the public works posting up to replace the vacancy we have at public works. That went up on Monday. And at the same time, we put up a superintendent operations manager for KMU. That was posted on Monday also.

51:04 We've received one candidate so far on the KMU side of things. And the posting will be up for... We posted for two weeks. And we posted it for both of them were posted for two weeks. So, I just wanted to bring you up to speed there. Those are to try to fill some gaps that we have right now. And to get a little assistance with public works and with the KMU.

51:30 I think that's all I have, Mr. Mayor. All right. Thank you. Well, all you didn't have left is a motion to adjourn the meeting. Well, I do have one thing. Oh, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I thought we were going to be at the end. So, if you would, Mr. Mayor, I just put together a couple of things here. I think we all understand kind of what's been going on here recently and things have been said and so on and so forth.

51:54 Yeah. You're calling. That's why we're all here. Okay. Thank you. So, all I wanted to do with this conversation that I came in front of the council at the Industrial Park was to bring the council up to speed on what I was recently informed of. I was provided with a lot of information in a short amount of time. I was being brought up to speed very quickly with people from Compass and other things that I wasn't up to speed on.

52:24 I recently now have been added to that, so I get the updates and all that type of stuff. So, my apologies if I came to the council possibly with information that maybe I didn't fully understand 100%. There's been a lot of things that have been said about me out there that are put out there that I believe are extremely false. I'm trying to do my job, and I was asked to do it to the best of life.

52:57 Continue, please. Now I'm being attacked personally and publicly because I was trying to move the city of Kenyon ahead. I don't claim to be perfect, but I am trying to do the best I can. Because this meeting was supposed to discuss the special meetings. And we've already gone through everything on the agenda.

53:24 I am ready to adjourn the meeting. If there's any comments that we've made, what's happening in town, revolving gossip or anything else, we will discuss it at that time. This was a special meeting to cover a few topics. So, there's nothing else to be said. I do want to say one more thing. I actually love that there's people here tonight because normally, like for years, you know, I've been up here and I'm leaving now.

53:55 And for years, like, you know, I would see things, you know, this is just completely up the subject, but I would see people, you know, online and they would be, you know, have something to say. And I would say, hey, my comment would be like, why don't you come to a meeting, you know, and come tell us what you think. And, you know, although we might be going through some tragedies right now, maybe in the future before things become like this, I think more people from the community should come to meetings, be involved.

54:20 And, you know, because it doesn't help to post stuff or you can maybe come in and tell, like, a council member. People do that all the time at the store and that's okay. And I usually just tell them, I'm like, we'll come to a meeting, say what you want to say. So besides everything that's going on, I think it's good that all the people are here. And I think you should keep doing it because then people will know more what you want to do. And, you know, we'll get more input or the people that are coming in will have more input. And, you know, it's, I'm glad you're here now, but, you know, we're here because everyone's angry, there's tragedy.

54:49 Well, maybe in the future, you know, and it's, and I know it's boring, you know, like some of them are just boring and it's like numbers, but, you know, maybe in the future, just be more involved and that would be helpful too. So I'm glad you're all here and participating today. So that's all I want to say. Could I make one suggestion, Mayor and Council? You have a, this is a great idea. I mean, we talked about this before.

55:15 I think it's a great idea to do something like that. You also have had for almost 28 years, I think it is. And you had it before that as well. It basically, a rules of procedure and decorum for the council, for meetings, for citizens at meetings. Might not be a bad idea to repost that, put it in the agenda packet for next meeting when you're approving something like this. Everybody sees what the process is.

55:39 And if you guys want to just pick one up, I mean, and this is not like, but it's just like a beginning step and then you can keep adding on to it. It is free. It's the League of Minnesota Cities. If you guys don't know what that is, they're like the big organization that helps cities. And, and they kind of can give you whatever, she's just going to come down here. She's a mediator. That's basically what she is. And so you guys can, I'll just leave that at the end.

56:03 I'll leave it up here and people can grab one if they want. So I don't know if I have enough. I think I have like 20 of them. Yeah. Is there anything else? No, I didn't know. No, it was just a suggestion. All right. Putting that thing in the next house meeting would be a good thing. No, I think it'd be a great idea. Everybody can see it. You've had that in place. You followed it.

56:25 It follows your rules of procedure. It's what's there and when you actually have an audience that would, it helps to have it. Yeah. It's, I mean, it's great that we have an audience. I wish this was more often. It is. I wish it was started two years ago. All right. Do we have a motion to adjourn the meeting? I will make a motion to adjourn. I'll second it. All in favor?

56:47 Aye. Meeting adjourned at 5.56 p.m. There it is.