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Mounds View City Council February 18, 2022 Special Meeting Page 5 2 City Administrator Zikmund clarified from a previous statement that Ms. Amundson stated she 3 reached out to City staff for help to put the petition together and noted he has no recollection of 4 this. He noted he keeps all emails relating to this, but has no memory of this occurring. He also 5 noted City staff does not work for the residents. Rather, he was an employee and he receives 6 direction from the City Council. He explained City staff provides extreme levels of extraordinary 7 customer service as directed by the Council. 8 9 City Administrator Zikmund provided an overview on Exhibit A. He indicated Mounds View 10 was one of two cities in the State of Minnesota that has a property tax levy cap and it was so 11 severe the City could not hire a new employee. He reported in three or four years, the City would 12 literally be going off a cliff. He noted the City has been deficit spending since the levy cap went 13 in and the choices the Council will have to make would be shutting down the park and rec 14 program, laying off 20% of the Public Works staff or 15% of the Police Department. He stated 15 that would only assist with balancing the budget. 16 17 City Administrator Zikmund reported the City Council has been working with the Charter 18 Commission on solutions to this and it was the Charter Commission that brought this ordinance 19 forward on a 6-3 vote. He noted Exhibit A goes further into the analysis and details the meetings 20 the Charter Commission held. He encouraged residents with further questions regarding this 21 matter to contact him directly. He then turned the meeting over to the City Attorney. 22 23 City Attorney Riggs discussed the memorandum that was included in the packet. He explained 24 the memorandum details what has occurred, what action the Council has taken in the past 14 25 days and noted on Monday the Council received a petition. He reported the simple fact was that 26 nothing has changed since the Council dealt with this matter 14 days ago at a special meeting. 27 He explained the petition was deficient for a number of reasons. He indicated he consulted with 28 the Secretary of State and the election office for Ramsey County. He stated there is a contract in 29 place between the City and the County for election services. He noted the County had expertise 30 in this area. 31 32 City Attorney Riggs reported the County provided correspondence stating the petition was not 33 sufficient. He explained staff did review it as well and a determination was made 14 days ago. 34 He stated at this point in time, nothing has changed. He commented the City has the original 35 petition that was denied as insufficient, a letter that was submitted as of Monday, and no new 36 petition or amended petition was before the Council. He reviewed the options that were before 37 the Council which was to evaluate the original petition that has come in as new or amended. He 38 indicated this was not an option because nothing has changed. He stated another option would 39 be to review this and consider it, some sort of petition as best the Council can in light of the 40 statutory and rule structure in the State of Minnesota. The final option available to the Council 41 was to do nothing. He recommended, as the City Attorney, that the Council proceed forward with 42 adopting a Resolution that affirms the determination as of 14 days ago that the petition was 43 insufficient. This would allow the City Clerk to provide this information to the Petitioners and 44 provide notice of the deficiencies. 45