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Minnesota Statewide Public Works Mutual Aid Agreement Quick Facts • There is no membership or other fixed cost to participate in this agreement. • This is a Joint Powers Agreement that specifically allows a requesting party to select the resources that best meets the needs of a given situation. • Only governmental units as defined by Minnesota Statues, Section 471.59, subd. 1 are eligible to participate (cities, counties, towns, others). • A requesting party may individually call upon any other participating party for mutual aid. There is no requirement to make requests through a particular party. • The Joint Powers Agreement should not be interpreted as being limited to only being able to request assistance to address major catastrophic situations. Instead, parties can request assistance for many reasons including routine circumstances such as training efforts, maintenance operations, and back-up support service. • The decision when to request assistance or to provide assistance is left entirely to the discretion of the requesting or sending party . • For liability reasons, management of a mutual aid situation is under the control of the requesting party. • The sending party has discretion whether to provide personnel or equipment and can recall such assistance at any time. • Hennepin County Emergency Management ("HCEM") has volunteered to serve as the administrative coordinator of the pact. They have the largest EM staff of any County EM Department in the State. • There is no grace period for costs, so if mutual aid is requested the cost clock can start as soon as resources roll. That said, the agreement says that "charges may be levied", so it is optional whether the sending party will bill for providing assistance. The reason that it is written this way is that traditionally local communities provided each other in -kind services without charge. However, in some situations a party may determine it is necessary to recover its costs due to the scope of the assistance provided. That said, any joint training effort is exempt from billing. • Each Party shall be responsible for its own personnel and equipment and for injuries or death to its personnel or damage to its equipment. Responding personnel shall be deemed to be performing their regular duties for each respective sending party for purposes of workers' compensation. If you have any questions, please contact Mark Ray at mark. ray@crystal mn.gov