THE NEXT ELECTRIC UTILITY MEETING IS SET FOR JANUARY 24TH
By Jenny Kirk The Slayton City Council approved four new business items at its Monday, Dec. 18 meeting, including the purchase of equipment for the police department and the fire department.
After a comprehensive discussion, the council approved the purchase of 2024 budgeted police department bodycams and squad car cameras in the total amount of $47,690.48 from Axon Enterprise, with equal payments being made over a five-year plan. City Administrator Josh Malchow said the drafted budget for capital improvement includes $15,000 for body/squad cams and does not affect the levy at all. Malchow added that the last time body cams were purchased was in 2016. Since that time, they’ve been putting money into a new capital improvement fund — $5,000 a year for six years. “If we’ve got $29,000 in there for body cams and we have $15,000 for the squads, we’re only $3,000 off,” councilman Chris Jacobson said. “It’s a lot easier to justify than front loading $50,000.”
Police Chief Jeremy Steinle started out the conversation by explaining the different options. He said the department looked at purchasing a bunch of used cameras from the Murray County Sheriff’s Office but with the police department’s older software, they’d need to upgrade that software in order to run those cameras. Steinle noted that body cameras only had a life span of about 2 ½ years, while squad cams could last five years or more. He also added that it might be time to talk about dropping down to two squad cars instead of three. “I think we’re at a point where it’s not feasible to keep three squad cars for our department anymore,” he said. “We’re trying to stretch them out too far. They get too much maintenance. I think we’d be better served to put less time on our squad cars and rotate them out and only have two of them. It could also save us money as far as outfitting.”
The council voted in favor of the fire department’s radio purchases, a 2024 budgeted item in the amount of $10,500 from the fire equipment fund. Council members also accepted the resignations of three longtime firemen — Andrew Kleven (23 years), Chris Jacobson (21 years) and Dustin Carlson (21 years) in addition to the hiring of two applicants. “First off, I want to thank the firefighters who are retiring for over half a century of service they collectively provided for the city,” Mayor Miron Carney said. The department will now be back to 30 members. The council also approved a ventilation fan in the amount of $6,226 from Heiman Fire Equipment, a budgeted item for 2023, as well as a skid for a total of $4,708.75 from Forestry Suppliers, Inc. The skid will be financed through a $1,100 grant from the Minnesota DNR and by money the fire department has left in their 2023 equipment budget.
While there was no action taken yet, the council had a healthy discussion regarding potential upgrades to the inflow/ infiltration ordinance. Malchow provided the council with the current water and sewer regulations, specifically highlighting 51.33, which was last updated in 2009. He said Ordinance No. 321 basically states that every person owning improved real estate that discharges into the sanitary system shall allow city of Slayton employees to inspect the buildings to confirm that there is no sump pump or other prohibited discharge in the sanitary. Letter F also states that discharge in the sanitary is allowed between certain dates. “What we’re talking about here is basically beefing that up,” Malchow said. “We have a couple of options here, but we need to do something, because No. 1, it’s truly necessary and No. 2, we need to move in a direction of more regulation, inspection and follow through to show the state that we’re not just ignoring the notice of violation for our wastewater stuff.”
City Works Director Weston Mahon weighed in on various aspects of the wastewater system and its complications. He said oftentimes, he’s finding that new tile was put in but that maybe a whole house wasn’t done and that the new tile was just connected to the old clay tile. The expectation is that there is a lot of cross connections. Malchow said this would be more like the gathering of data stage rather than the remedy stage but that eventually, the city will have to act on the data that is collected. That could mean forcing a homeowner into compliance before the sale of a home could take place. Eventually, the council will be presented with an ordinance proposal at a later date.
In unfinished business, the council approved the 2024 department head contracts for Malchow, Steinle and Mahon. Carney said the best way he could sum up the evaluations is that there was nothing that surprised anyone. Malchow, who evaluated the other two, along with Deputy Clerk Jackie Giesen, said all three exceeded expectations. The council also approved the summary for Malchow.
Carney opened up the public hearing for the 2024 final budget. With no public input after a few minutes, he closed the hearing and the council approved the preliminary levy of 9.5%. “The changes that were made for the levy was one, we opened those airport land bids and increased that revenue by quite a bit — that was awesome — and then our police department health insurance, I had budgeted a worst case scenario for a new officer, so the non-HAS family plan, but now we know he’s not married,” Malchow said. “He’s single with no dependents either, so that’s quite a bit of savings.”
Malchow also updated the council on the Lundblad Solar Development, noting that the next hearing is at 7 p.m. on Thursday, Dec. 21 at the Murray County Commissioner’s Room. He stated that Standard Solar submitted a new design but that he didn’t think moving the development 307 feet south would do anything to remedy the concerns the city and others have. Malchow said he feels it goes against their, as well as the county’s, comp plan that identified the area potentially as a future residential, urban growth zone and that it should not be tied up with solar for the next 25-plus years.
Regarding pending items, Malchow addressed the next electric utility meeting scheduled for Jan. 24, 2024, at the Murray County Central auditorium at 6:30pm. He said he and councilman Blake Heronimus talked with Xcel Energy representatives John Marshall and Eric Pauli, who asked if they were interested in having a cooperative type meeting. At this point, it looks as though the city will extend an invitation for Xcel to give a presentation, followed by their own presentation, and then close out the meeting with a panel style forum on stage so audience members could ask their questions. “Both sides would be able to answer in some sort of structured way without rambling on for 25 minutes at a time type of deal, so it doesn’t last forever,” Malchow said. “That way you’re getting that raw answer from both sides. It’s not canned responses.”
The next city council meeting is slated for 6 p.m. on Jan. 2 at city hall.
