05-26-2020 Council Packet - Laserfiche WebLink

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MINUTES OF THE ORONO CITY COUNCIL MEETING Monday, May 11, 2020 6:00 o’clock p.m. _____________________________________________________________________________________ Page 17 of 22 City needs; there is no profit margin in recycling for the City. He said the City does the best it can to keep it as low as they can; unfortunately, the City had to take an increase last year. He stated there is a lot of discussion between himself and Chief Farniok about what can and can’t be prosecuted and what is legal. There is a lot of gray area in what has come out in the Executive Orders, and he said City Staff is working through that on a regular basis. It is way beyond the capacity of what the police forces of all of the State of Minnesota can handle. There is a lot of concern about what is going to happen with the Stay-at-Home Order supposedly ending. If that is not the case, there will be another discussion in 2 weeks, if not sooner. He stated Staff has been working with some local businesses in regard to a discussion about expanding potential outdoor seating and things such as that. Staff has had questions, and they are helping work through a process that works for them, trying to keep them going. Orono does not have a large business base, but Staff is available to serve them if they need anything. Printup noted there was a new pizza place in Navarre and suggested Rief welcome them. Rief stated they would try to contact and welcome them. He said he would like to follow up on the communications as far as where the City was, what the City is looking to change and some of the weaknesses identified, and specifically what happened with the miscommunication related to utility billing increases. A couple things identified were redundancy and things not getting communicated from out of the department into Administration, where communications are handled. A number of circumstances happened at the same time which left the City with one Staff member in the Finance Department, and the information did not get relayed. He said it is kind of a team effort, but he would take responsibility for not having the proper process in place. They are trying to formalize a process. They established a new email and calendar, and there will be 4 people monitoring it on a regular basis to ensure that all communications get out in a timely manner and as soon as possible. He indicated one of the challenges is that there are a limited number of people accessing City information online through the notification process and Facebook, and it has been a struggle to grow that. They are trying to figure out a way to do more engagement within the neighborhoods to get the neighborhood leaders to emphasize that if people sign up for the notifications, they will find out about water main breaks, etc. They are trying to figure out a process to develop a system based on streets and neighborhoods rather than just relying on Facebook and email feedback. It seems to be a pretty big undertaking; they are asking for Council support to help with the engagement process. National Night Out was going to be one of the components. Now that it has been moved to October, it gives Staff more time to make sure there is a good process in place to engage Police Officers and get people interested in being a part of getting communications timely through the digital process. He said in the past they have always relied on the newsletters. They are slow and costly; it costs about $2,400 every time one is sent out. A postcard is $1,600-1,800. The City does not have a large budget when it comes to communications/publications; it is about $22,000. The City is limited in terms of newsletters but is working on more online communications. Printup asked if there was an ability to work with the County to include an informational piece from the City when the County sends out their once-a-year proposed tax statements. He noted there is a lot of unused space on the utility postcards and wondered if messages could be written on them as well. Rief said his next challenge is the conversion from paper to digital. The City consistently sends out on utility bills requests for people to sign up for online information. They have realized that residents might think it is a good idea, but they set things on their counter and somehow it ends up in the trash. The challenge is to get residents to sign up for events when it is given on a piece of paper with a link on it. He said they could look into the inserts idea and also may look at changing how the utility bills are done.