The Houston City Council met at 6 p.m. on Monday, April 10 at the Houston, Minn., City Hall. In attendance were City Administrator Peterson, Deputy Clerk Hegland, Mayor Olson and Board Members Schutte, Krage, Knutson and Sanden. Following the pledge, the council opened the meeting to a period of public comment. Hearing none, the council moved on to the 12 items of business on the agenda.
First, the council dealt with an issue at the city park, where the process of erecting a memorial in the park has raised the question of moving the park’s horseshoe pit. The council decided to move the flagpole to the southwest corner of the park, allowing the memorial to be built and the horseshoe pits to remain in their current place. Next, the council approved a variance for a large garage to be built at 110 N. Chase Street, and also approved an easement with Houston citizen Marlene Schultz to develop and operate a parking and trail access area for OHV, or off-highway vehicles. Following that, the city approved the naming of Ron Ziegler of CEDA to serve as a meeting facilitator for the new OHV Committee. The facilitator, according to city documents, will “help the community in vetting the different aspects of [the] project,” and will “facilitate the community advisory group meetings – making sure all are heard.”
Next, the city approved the hiring of three summer City Maintenance staff: Leonard Olson, Les Roesner, and Ken Carrier. Olson and Roesner will work three days a week, and Carrier will work two days a week, for a total of 40 hours overall, compared to 35 hours in 2016. The extra five hours will deal with the extra time required to water city flowers. Following that, Houston Police Chief David Breault spoke to the council regarding a resolution approving a joint powers agreement with Minnesota’s Bureau of Criminal Apprehension. The council voted unanimously to approve the resolution and have the city work with the BCA. The council then moved on to authorize a street and utility improvement project for Elm and Stoddard streets. The project will involve street paving as well as the running of water lines on Elm Street from Kilborn Street to Stoddard Street, and the running of sewer lines, drainage, and related infrastructure on Stoddard Street from Elm Street north, serving six to eight new lots. The council agreed that the city needed to undertake these measures to help the city grow and prosper into the future, hoping to bring new homes and families to the currently vacant lots.
The council then considered an insurance claim to repair the roof of the City Community Center, which had been damaged during a wind storm. The city approved the plan to repair the roof at a cost of $6875.00. Administrator Peterson then introduced to the council the standardization of city email policy with the establishment of a city email exchange. This exchange will make sure all city correspondence is contained in the same server, and eliminates the need for council members to use their personal emails. The council approved the measure to create the email exchange through Microsoft, enlisted the help of AcenTek to migrate current city emails over to a new “houstonmn.us” domain. Following that, the council unanimously approved the appointment of Karen Todd as a member of the Tree Board, and Mayor Olson issued a proclamation designating April 22 as Arbor Day.
Finally, the council discussed upcoming meetings, including one about the construction of a new Community Center at 7 p.m. on April 26, and the OHV meeting at 6:30 at the Community Center on May 2. Administrator Peterson mentioned the League of Minnesota Cities annual conference on June 14-16 in Rochester, saying that her previous attendance at the conference has been excellent and urging the other council members to attend. Lastly, the council heard and approved consent items, including previous minutes, financial reports, bill review, and city department reports. The Houston City Council will meet next on Monday, May 8, 2017 at 6 p.m. at Houston City Hall.
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