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HomeMy WebLinkAboutCEC Agenda Packet 11.18.24CITY OF FALCON HEIGHTS Community Engagement Commission City Hall 2077 West Larpenteur Avenue AGENDA November 18, 2024 at 6:30 P.M. A.CALL TO ORDER: B. WELCOME: C.ROLL CALL: Karen Cooley-Kistler____ Julie Ebbesen____ Curt Stockford____ Mishy Wang___ Rebecca Leighton____ Denise King____ STAFF PRESENT: Elke Johnson___ COUNCIL LIAISON: Melanie Leehy____ D.APPROVAL OF AGENDA E.INFORMATION/ANNOUNCEMENT F.APPROVAL OF MINUTES: •October 21, 2024 Community Engagement Commission Meeting Minutes G.AGENDA •Unfinished business 1.Human Rights Day 2. Apartment Outreach H. ADJOURNMENT: Next Regular Meeting is on Monday, December 16 at 6:30 PM 1 BLANK PAGE  2 CITY OF FALCON HEIGHTS Community Engagement Commission City Hall 2077 West Larpenteur Avenue MINUTES October 21, 2024 at 6:30 P.M. A.CALL TO ORDER: 6:34 PM B. WELCOME: C.ROLL CALL: Karen Cooley-Kistler__X__ Julie Ebbesen_X___ Curt Stockford_X___ Mishy Wang_X__ Rebecca Leighton__X__ Denise King_X___ STAFF PRESENT: Elke Johnson_X__ COUNCIL LIAISON: Melanie Leehy_X___ D.APPROVAL OF AGENDA •Motion to approve King, second Wang, unanimously approved E.INFORMATION/ANNOUNCEMENT F.APPROVAL OF MINUTES: •September 21, 2024 Community Engagement Commission Meeting Minutes o Motion to approve Leighton, second Ebbesen, unanimously approved G.AGENDA •Unfinished business 1.Human Rights Day a.Amber – Just Deeds & Hennepin County Recorder’s Office, Amy – Ramsey County Examiner of Titles Office b.Johnson reviews the background of Just Deeds partnership and Mapping Prejudice. Based on experience with Mounds View the City of Falcon Heights is planning to take the process of discharging the racial covenants “in-house”. Mapping Prejudice will also be able to attend Human Rights Day at City Hall. c.Stockford asks what type of information property owners need to proceed with removing the racial covenants d.Amber clarifies her role and how she is involved with the program 3 e. Amy is hoping to be here and be able to look properties up from the Ramsey County database. Clarifies the difference between abstract and torrens properties. f. Leehy requests that during Human Rights Day we include a message clarifying the definition of the term “covenant” and what it can be positive or negative. Also include the timing and history of these covenants. There should be a mention that this may not have been the homeowner or builder but the person who developed the land. g. Kistler asks if there is a date at which the covenants are not on deeds. h. Amy not exactly, there are incidents that have deeds or documents that have been developed since covenants have been illegal that still have the language included i. Stockford - How do we draw attention to the event? j. Amber - Kirsten will have a lot of information available and there are a number of videos that are out and available k. King – refer people to Jim Crowe of the North in the newsletter or something for folks to get educated on the topic. l. Leehy would like to discuss the structure of the Human Rights Day event. Will there be a presentation? m. Johnson – answers yes, there will be a presentation from Mapping Prejudice. She expects we will have refreshments and stations for people to get set up with volunteers to start the process of discharging the covenants from their deeds. n. King – can we identify people who have already gone through the process? It might be nice to have some testimonials to let people know how it works. o. Amber – would be helpful to have people pre-register. Also looking into seeing if there are law students who could help prepare documents to speed up the process. Also, look into paralegals. p. Leehy suggests producing a short video for homeowners. q. Stockford would like to discuss in detail the order of the evening i. Concerned about the capacity to complete the work if we also have a presenter ii. Leehy wonders if we can get a video that we can loop on the TV screens iii. King suggests having the presenter around 6, in the middle of the event and at a set time. and still having people sign up to get the process started 1. Wang & Leighton agree if people are interested iv. Stockford suggests a General presentation at X plus a working time. Market it as a two-part meeting v. Amber and Amy would appreciate pre-registration so they can have the paperwork ready for those who have registered vi. Everyone is invited and are able to sign up in advance or attend and learn more about the process and get started to discharge the covenant. 4 vii. We may require more notaries, we will take as many volunteer attorneys as possible viii. Registration deadline should be November 22. Will need the property address and property owner names. Available spots will be based on the number of available lawyers we have. Amber will need to contact the volunteers and set up training times. r. Cooley-Kistler suggests having warm drinks available 2. Apartment Outreach a. Stockford reviewing notes and reminds the group we are talking about getting in touch with apartment management b. King remembers that we were planning to parse out the list and prioritize who to reach out to. We need to make sure it is clear that we are requesting time from the City Council Members. Need to get feedback from the Council to see what they are ok with as far as time commitments. We cannot have more than two members attend at the same time. c. Stockford also remembers the same. Requests Leehy brings this to the council and can spearhead the discussion with the Council to see what member availability is. d. King reminds the group of the plan. The request to the Council is if they can be available one to two evenings, Saturday per month. e. Leehy – previously there was a discussion of what was happening in the city, if there were questions and provide new resident handbooks and renters resource pages. The handbooks can be left with property managers in order for managers to get new residents’ information. Also, had done ice cream socials at apartments in the evenings f. Cooley-Kistler inquires number of attended g. Leehy – probably 10 but the impact is much greater h. King – ask the council – if they are open to doing this and if they can commit to a weekday evening and possibly a Saturday afternoon i. Leehy – add a time commitment for between 30 minutes and 2 hours depending on the property and event. j. King – Would like to know if council members are interested and available then we can start setting a calendar k. Stockford getting the new resident handbook is very important - Leehy says the distribution of those handbooks would be the Community Engagement Commission’s responsibility. All commission members say they are comfortable with that. l. Johnson suggests adding the topic to the next City Council workshop event on November 6. m. Leehy - next step is to communicate with property management with a here-pronged approach to bring city leadership to the residents, being new resident resources and find out your schedule of events. n. The commission will reconvene in November to work on the schedule and plan communications to the apartment properties. 5 H. ADJOURNMENT: 8:00 PM • Motion to adjourn – King motions, Cooley-Kistler seconds. Next Regular Meeting is on Monday, November 18 at 6:30 PM 6 BLANK PAGE  7 ITEM FOR DISCUSSION City of Falcon Heights, Minnesota __________________________ Item Human Rights Day Description Human Rights Day is observed by the international community every year on December, 10th. It commemorates the day in 1948 the United Nations General Assembly adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Human Rights Day will be held on Tuesday, December 10, 2024, at Falcon Heights City Hall. A time frame still needs to be secured. The theme will be removing racial covenants. On Wednesday, July 13, 2022, the Falcon Heights City Council took action to support the work of the Just Deeds project. As a result, Falcon Heights residents have the opportunity to acknowledge the historical discrimination caused by these covenants and to discharge them from their property records. Because Just Deeds relies on volunteer hours from attorneys and because a great number of homeowners requested that a racial covenant be removed from their property, the process has taken longer than anticipated. The City of Falcon Heights has now determined that City Staff with guidance from the Just Deeds Coalition can assist property owners wishing to remove a racial covenant from their property during Human Rights Day. Staff has been coordinating with Mapping Prejudice, and Just Deeds, who have in turn reached out to the Ramsey County Recorders Office. Mapping Prejudice will be able to present at Human Rights Day. Just Deeds suggested having volunteer attorneys present at the event to assist residents with completing form 40.10.1. Staff mailed letters to all properties identified with a racial covenant. A sign-up was created on the website and 2 attorneys from Campbell-Knutson are able to volunteer at the event. Budget Impact TBD Meeting Date October 21, 2024 Agenda Item Human Rights Day Attachment • Submitted By Elke Johnson, Administrative & Communications Coordinator 8 Attachment(s) N/A Action(s) Requested Continue discussions about this year’s Human Rights Day Event. 9 BLANK PAGE  10 ITEM FOR DISCUSSION City of Falcon Heights, Minnesota __________________________ Item Apartment Outreach Plan Description Based on recent discussions, it has been identified by the Community Engagement Commission there should be more outreach to apartment dwellers to cultivate a sense of belonging in Falcon Heights. CEC has started discussions around an apartment outreach plan. Commissioners have identified that they should write up a script that can be used to reach out to apartment managers and owners. Staff discussed the apartment outreach topic at the recent City Council Workshop on November 6. All of Council is in support of the plan and everyone would be available to attend an event. They suggest planning out for the next quarter and then determine which councilmember can attend. Budget Impact N/A Attachment(s) N/A Action(s) Requested Staff suggest continuing the discussion for apartment outreach plan Meeting Date October 21, 2024 Agenda Item Apartment Outreach Attachment N/A Submitted By Elke Johnson, Administrative & Communications Coordinator 11