09-28-2020 Council Packet - Laserfiche WebLink

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MINUTES OF THE ORONO CITY COUNCIL MEETING Monday, September 14, 2020 6:00 o’clock p.m. _____________________________________________________________________________________ Page 25 of 26 Printup moved, Seals seconded to establish a program and give Dustin Rief the ability to distribute funds according to that program, to approve the agreements and commit the money. VOTE: Ayes 5, Nays 0. 19. REPLACEMENT OF RESCUE EXTRICATION EQUIPMENT Rief said in light of COVID-19 and everything else, the City of Long Lake opened their emergency operations center and Long Lake Fire Chief James Van Eyll has been in charge of it, noting they have monitored his hours and the amount of time he’s taken and determined they can qualify some of his hours as eligible for CARES Act Funding. The proposal from Long Lake Fire is instead of refunding Orono the money, they felt it was a better idea to tackle some of the capital things they need as it’s already funded, noting it’s coming from the Operational Budget rather than the normal Capital stream. James said Ryan Gonzer who is very good with extrication and did a lot of the extrication stuff up at BIR for the past 5-6 years, identified a deficiency at Station No. 1 with some of their extrication equipment. Mr. Gonzer came to James and pointed it out and they looked at how they could get funding to take care of the deficiency. With COVID-19, the CARES Act money will reimburse some of Van Eyll’s salary and said hopefully it would not change so they will wait to purchase these items until they know the funding is available. At the end of the year as they look at their books if they’re below budget, it gets divvied out to the contract Cities. His proposal is to use some of those funds, just under $24,000 for brand new extrication equipment, and they have a bead on some demo equipment that would be slightly used but would save a few dollars. Rief said one caveat that came up was an email from the League of Minnesota Cities stating they are scrutinizing how Cities can actually use the CARES Funding for wages and he would suggest modifying the recommended action on the CARES Act Funding to make sure that it’s still legal closer to the end of the year. As long as it’s still legal at the point of purchase, Rief feels comfortable moving forward with it and so do the other City Administrators. James said they’ve been tracking everything, so anytime he has a meeting directly related to COVID-19 or training, etcetera, it is marked in a spreadsheet and forwarded on to the accounting department. Crosby asked which trucks this would outfit. James said it would take the place of the centurion equipment on Rescue 12. Seals asked if the $23,000-and-change is the part Orono pays or if they’re paying a portion of that. Van Eyll said Orono would be paying a portion. Seals noted she’d be in support of paying it regardless of CARES because she talked to a few fireman and it sounds like these are the battery operated ones rather than the older ones with cables and can be problematic. To her it seems like an inexpensive solution. Crosby noted he got to run carrying the major tools on a head-on collision on Highway 12 and he said it’s not easy in boots and the equipment is heavy.