Reflection - City of Minot 2019 Annual Report

REFLECTION 2 0 1 9 A N N U A L R E P O R T STABILIZING

WORKFORCE SAVES MILLIONS Staff focused on employee retention to save tax dollars. The results speak for themselves.

What other strategies did the City of Minot deploy in 2019 to improve the citizen experience, become more efficient, or increase safety? We have the list.

THIS ISN’T GOODBYE IT’S SEE YOU AROUND Key retirements happened in 2019. We highlight those who spent much of their lives serving the City.

STREAMLINING BUSINESS It’s not easy making things faster and easier. Find out how City employees are spending hours now, to save time later.

IT TAKES A VILLAGE When it comes to providing service, not even Mother Nature can stop us.

LEADERSHIP MAYOR SHAUN SIPMA

ALDERMAN JOSH WOLSKY

COUNCIL PRESIDENT MARK JANTZER

ALDERMAN SHANNON STRAIGHT

COUNCIL VICE PRESIDENT LISA OLSON

ALDERMAN PAUL PITNER

ALDERMAN STEPHAN PODRYGULA

CITY DEPARTMENT LEADERSHIP Tom Barry David Lakefield Dan Jonasson John Klug Lance Meyer Kelli Kronschnabel Lisa Jundt Kevin Ternes Kelly Hendershot Rick Feltner John Zakian Janet Anderson Brian Billingsley

City Manager Finance Director Public Works Director Police Chief City Engineer Fire Chief Human Resource Director City Assessor City Attorney Airport Director Disaster Program Director Library Director Community Development Director

Content STRIKING A BALANCE AS POLICE CHIEF

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EMPLOYEE ACCOMPLISHMENTS

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TOP PRIORITY: KEEP ‘EM

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Strategies THAT SUMMARIZE 2019

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STREAMLINING BUSINESS

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FINANCIAL IMPROVEMENTS

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IT TAKES A VILLAGE

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OPERATIONAL ACCOMPLISHMENTS

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ENGAGING THE CITIZENS

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CUSTOMER ENHANCEMENTS

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STRIKING A BALANCE

The City of Minot says goodbye to Chief Olson: Jason Olson has been a part of the City of Minot team for over 30 years. After many years of leadership and service, the former Chief reflects on his career on the force and what brought him to the Magic City.

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aw enforcement has changed dramatically since Jason Olson joined the Minot Police Department more than three decades ago. But Olson’s passion for serving his community has only grown stronger.

As Olson prepares to retire after nearly 32 years, the last eight as police chief, his commitment to Minot and its residents is first and foremost in his mind. It always has been.

“I think we learn from our mistakes, and I’ve made my share of mistakes,” he said. “That’s part of life. You regret those.

I think everyone would go back and do some things differently. But would I do it all over again? Yes.” “Looking back, I’m sure I’ve had a bad day or two, but I’ve always enjoyed my job and found it rewarding,” Olson added. “It’s been a challenge, and it’s always been fulfilling.”

Olson was succeeded by Capt. John Klug, who was named the new Police Chief in mid-January. Klug officially took over the job Feb. 1.

Olson’s influence on the Minot Police Department will continue long after he clears out his office. He’s worked hard to maintain the department’s culture and professionalism, creating a positive work environment that empowers employees to succeed. He credits his predecessors, Jeff Balentine and Dan Draovitch, for building a strong department and setting high expectations of the chief.

“It’s been a good culture here, and I inherited that from Jeff and Dan. I’m just glad I didn’t screw it up,” Olson said, with a laugh. “As long as I’ve been in Minot our department has had a level of respect in the community and a good reputation. Now it’s time for the next person to take over.”

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As long as I’ve been in Minot our department has had a level of respect in the community and a good reputation.

AN UNEXPECTED PATH TO CHIEF OF POLICE

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lson grew up in Williston, and came to Minot State University after graduating high school. He had no intentions of staying.

“I intended to stay at Minot State for one semester to establish a grade 4

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point average in science, then go to Montana State at Bozeman for criminal justice,” he said. “But I never left. It’s funny how little things like that happen.”

He married Lisa, his high school sweetheart, when he was just 18.

Between his junior and senior years at Minot State, Olson applied for a position with the Minot PD. So did about 120 other people, he recalled.

“I wanted to test strictly for the experience of interviewing,” Olson said.

“I had no illusions of being hired at that time. They offered me a job during their second round of hiring. They hired four officers and I was one of them.”

He’s been with the department ever since.

Olson spent nine years as a patrol officer before being promoted to sergeant, and following several years as a field supervisor he became the Crime Prevention Sergeant.

“That was out of my element. I am averse to public speaking, but I purposely took that position because it required me to do a lot of public speaking,” Olson said.

“It improved my ability and confidence to speak in public, so ultimately that was a good experience for me.”

Olson was promoted to lieutenant, and then to captain in 2010. He spent much of his time in internal investigations, grants and policy work before overseeing patrol and investigations. He was named chief of police in 2012.

“Pretty early on in my career, I certainly wanted to go as far as I could, so I was always taking every training opportunity that I could, working hard to advance my career,” Olson said. “It’s all been rewarding, but a lot of the things I do as chief have nothing to do with what inspired me to be a police officer. It’s a totally different work life than that of a street officer.”

THE ‘C-H-E-F’ OF POLICE

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are vastly different than any other position in the department. In addition to overseeing the entire department and determining policy and procedures, Olson said hiring, training, and retaining quality officers has been a constant battle in recent years.

“It’s a challenge to maintain the culture of the department when you have constant turnover,” Olson said, noting that he’s hired 106 officers since becoming chief in 2012. “But even with the turnover, I think our department culture is still very good and our relationship with the community is very positive. I have to give credit to everyone in the department for that.”

The public’s expectations of law enforcement officers are very high, Olson said.

“People want to be treated respectfully. They want to make sure the officer isn’t abusing their power in any way. They want to make sure they aren’t using too much force. They want officers to be well-trained. They want them to respond appropriately at all times,” Olson said. “And then I think, some of these officers are still kids. They’re not perfect, but it’s amazing at how often they are perfect. They do the right thing almost all the time, which is amazing at that age.”

Lisa Olson said she’s appreciated the level of

Olson describes the responsibilities of being police chief as akin to overseeing pots on a hot stove.

lson describes the responsibilities of being police chief as akin to overseeing pots on a hot stove.

“As chief, there are a lot of different dishes cooking on the stove. The other day, I made a list and I stopped at 95 items,” he said. “Some of them are simmering on low and don’t need a lot of attention. Others are boiling up from time to time. That’s just the way it is; there’s constant attention to that stove deciding what the top priority is. It’s the nature of the job.”

The challenges associated with being police chief

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community respect for members of law enforcement and other first responders.

“In public, I’ve always had people who are very appreciative of what Jason does and what the other officers do,” she said. “A lot of people have also thanked me through the years for the role that law enforcement spouses serve, and I think that says a lot about our community.”

THE CHALLENGE OF CHANGE A

s every promotion brought changes to his career, Olson welcomed the skills he learned and the relationships he built at every level on his way to becoming chief.

“Every time you’re promoted, your perspective changes, and that helped me when I became chief,” he said.

While some aspects of police work haven’t changed much, the use of technology and new equipment has completely altered law enforcement since Olson began his career.

“When I started, I carried a paper ticket book, a sidearm, a night stick, and a set of handcuffs. I think that was it,” he said. “The level of training and the level of expectations of an officer have changed dramatically since I started, and that’s made us more professional.”

Officers are carrying with them much more sophisticated equipment than Olson ever did in his days as a street level officer. Body cameras, sophisticated communication equipment, tasers…none of that existed when he began his career.

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“The amount of digital evidence is night and day, too.

You might go to a scene now and there’s a dozen devices that could potentially have evidence on them,” he said. “To have the training to be able to capture and preserve all that has been a game-changer in how law enforcement approaches a crime scene now.”

Advances in technology have also changed other aspects of police work.

“The chances of being recorded on some kind of device or the chances of having your work file looked at through an open records request have gone way up,” Olson said. “There is definitely more public scrutiny.

I’m not saying that’s a bad thing; it’s just a fact of life in modern law enforcement.”

STRIKING THE BALANCE

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ne of the most challenging aspects of a career in law enforcement is balancing the demands of work with your personal life. Like other first responders, Olson knows all too well the personal sacrifices that must be made.

“I spent about half my career working as a street level officer on patrol. You’re working shift work, holidays, weekends. You have a lot of demands schedule-wise on your family. But I’ve had excellent support from Lisa and my family my whole career,” Olson said. “I can’t say enough about spouses and families. Being in law enforcement isn’t a choice that affects just the individual; it affects the whole family: moms, dads,

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Being in law enforcement isn’t a choice that affects just the individual; it affects the whole family spouses, kids.”

Lisa Olson agrees.

“I think there’s kind of two parts to it. For our family, there were a lot of times that I had a single parent role because of Jason’s shift work.

Part of it was that he was on the SWAT team, too, so he’d get called on holidays, etc.,” she said. “But on the other hand, law enforcement families are a family, too. There’s always a lot of support from the entire group, if someone gets hurt or is involved in a particularly tough case. I’ve appreciated that support.”

Lisa described the 2002 train derailment and anhydrous spill west of Minot as an example of how the duties of a first responder can conflict with personal lives.

“He was immediately called into work,” she said. “We had three young kids, it’s the middle of the night, and people are calling me trying to get answers. I didn’t know any more than they did at that point,” she said. “So I had to make decisions to keep our family safe when Jason was already at work trying to help keep all of us safe.

With someone in law enforcement, your plans can change in a heartbeat, and you have to be able

to cope with it.”

The retiring chief said advice from former police chief Draovitch about maintaining a healthy balance between work and home life has stuck with him.

“He used to say, to do this job you have to build up a shell because you’re around death, or a suicide call, an accident where somebody dies, a horrible child abuse call, or a sexual assault. We’re exposed to that all the time. In order to emotionally exist, you have to build up a shell because if you put yourself out there emotionally on every one of those calls, you won’t last,” Olson said. “But at the same time, he said, when you walk through the door at home, you have to crack that shell and become a human being again so

you don’t lose that relationship with your family. You have to be a different person when you’re at home.”

With young officers working on the streets every day, finding a healthy coping mechanism is vital to their long-term success.

“These young officers are experiencing a lot of the realities and the harshness of real life in a year’s time that most people don’t experience in a lifetime,” Olson said. “We hope they make good choices in how they cope with the job. I think the most common way first responders cope with things is through peer support.”

Olson said he also advises young officers to build friendships outside of the department.

“I think it’s healthier for them. I’ve

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been able to do that, so all my friends aren’t here,” he said. “That way, if I make an unpopular decision at work, I can still go fishing on the weekend with somebody that doesn’t care about it.”

Law enforcement officers are certainly exposed to risks on the job, although Olson said the portrayal of the inherent dangers are often dramatized on television. Still, there are real risks, and every officer has different methods to make sure family members know they’re safe.

“My street level experience was more than 17 years ago, but I did spend 18 years on the SWAT team,” Olson said. “We probably got called out 10 times a year. Every time after the incident was over, you’d make that call home just to say ‘Hey, we’re good. Everybody’s OK.’ ” Despite the strains on family life, after nearly 32 years in law enforcement, Olson reflects fondly on his career.

“I’ve always appreciated working with people that are in public safety.

Most people who go into this profession have a heart to help people.

If you ask our new officers why they wanted to become police officers, they’ll usually say because they want to help people,” Olson said.

“It’s always impressed me that people are willing to do this job even though they are talented enough to do other things that would pay a similar or higher income, but they’ve chosen to serve the public despite the risks and the shift work and everything else that goes with it. It’s been a pleasure to work with all the good people that I’ve gotten to work with. It’s fun to be in a place that’s full of good people with good intentions.”

Lisa said Jason’s law enforcement career has had a positive impact on

their own children.

“I think about how proud all three of our children are of their dad. Growing up with Jason in law enforcement has helped create the kind of people they are today, and I know his career in public service is what impacted our youngest son to become a firefighter,” she said.

“I’m very proud of what Jason has done.

He’s been an excellent police officer and a great chief. I wouldn’t say I’m glad that it’s over, but it will be exciting to see what’s next for him and for us as a family.”

What will the retiring chief miss the most? “That’s easy,” he said. “All the people I’ve worked with.”

What won’t he miss?

“As much as I’ve enjoyed my job, I will not miss the stress,” he said. “I’ve always had a good attitude toward my job, and I like it, but it is a weight of stress. I’m looking forward to having that weight lifted.”

THIS ISN’T ‘GOODBYE’ Other notable staff retirements: Our public employees are our greatest asset and it is always hard to see them leave, whether after a short while or an entire career. These are some other very notable departures from the City of Minot who will surely be missed.

Barb Mcpeak | 32 years Barb retired as the Public Safety Answering Point manager after more than 30 years with the City of Minot’s Police Department. Margaret Haugan, who has been in Central Dispatch for 12 years, was hired as the new PSAP manager.

KEVIN TERNES | 30 years After being with the assessors’ office for more than 30 years, City Assessor Kevin Ternes announced his retirement at the end of February 2020. He will have been the department head for approximately 17 years.

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Chief Olson congratulates Sr. Officer Foley on his promotion to Sergeant in 2019.

IT’S ‘WE’LL SEE YOU AROUND’ LANDI FUNKE | 24 years Landi Funke retired after spending 24 years with the City’s Finance Department.

Landi spent much of her time helping the Finance team and organizing many employee morale initiatives.

Cleo Nicolaisen | 15 years Cleo Nicolaisen retired as the cemetery superintendent in January. Cleo was honored by the Minot American Legion William G. Carroll Post #26 of Minot upon her retirement as superintendent of Rosehill Memorial Park, Minot.

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MOREABOUT OUR PEOPLE ACTIONS THAT IMPROVED OUR WORKFORCE

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A strong workforce is an effective workforce: Our people do a great job, and accomplish great things. it’s important to reflect and recognize the minor and major accomplishments that lead to a better, happier, and more efficient team.

SAFETY

Staff at the City landfill improved an existing building to create a much safer and more efficient work environment. Workers removed an unnecessary corner storage room to increase the usable area, installed LED lighting, replaced the dirt floor with chip seal rock, replaced the walk-in door with a new one acquired from flood buyouts, and secured the insulation that was falling. The project cost about $16,000.

EMPLOYING LEADERS

City Transit Superintendent Brian Horinka was elected president of the Dakota Transit Association Board of Directors. Horinka was also selected to serve on the Statewide Active and Public Transportation Advisory Committee. In his roles, Horinka gives Minot a voice in future changes and projects to address public transportation needs in North Dakota.

STATEWIDE RECOGNITION

Our personnel are being honored for their accomplishments in our community, but also within the fire service in North Dakota.

• Retired Battalion Chief John Hocking was inducted into the North Dakota Firefighter Hall of Fame.

• Capt. Austin Burns was named the North Dakota training instructor of the year. Burns was the department’s first training captain, and concluded his two-year term in December. Devin Walter was named the department’s new training captain.

TOP DOG BRING IN THE BEST

The Minot Police Department added a canine and handler team that is trained and certified to detect explosives and items related to firearm usage such as guns and spent ammunition casings. The Minot area has never had a canine team with this capability.

An eight-member Workforce Recruitment Task Force was established to study and improve the City’s approach to marketing and hiring employees with emphasis on attracting more and better qualified candidates for City jobs.

WORKFORCE IMPROVEMENTS Workforce retention was a top priority for the city going into 2019. With a turnover rate of around 15%, costing taxpayers nearly $2 million annually, the City set forth with several improvement measures that effectively reduced turnover by half, netting $1.5 million in savings. The City continues to work towards additional retention and recruitment efforts. Read more about this long path in section 2: Strategy.

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STRATEGY

PRIORITY 1: KEEP ‘EM When good people leave, the numbers don’t add up: How City staff and City Council prioritized retention in 2019 to help save over a million dollars annually of taxpayer dollars,

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n recent years, the City of Minot faced a rising employee turnover rate that was negatively impacting not only staff morale and experience levels, but the overall budget as well.

At the end of 2017, the turnover rate was an alarming 14.9 percent, with 17 open positions. Many short-staffed departments were unable to address longterm projects, instead having to crosstrain staff members on the fly simply to keep up with the day-to-day work. Plus, constant turnover meant constant training, and that gets expensive very quickly, especially in the Police Department and Fire Department where each staff member can require approximately $70,000 in training.

City Manager Tom Barry said as part of the preliminary budget process, he gathers input from staff, department heads, and Council members as to their budget priorities.

“One of the priorities that everyone agreed on was to stabilize the workforce by implementing budget strategies focused on improving employee retention and reducing turnover,” Barry said. “So that was one of our main marching orders right at the beginning of the 2019 budget process.”

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Department heads conducted market research and gathered input through an employee survey, and then went to work trying to make significant changes.

“Human Resources Director Lisa Jundt and the entire HR department developed an employee survey to identify what was important to staff members.

We also asked department directors what they thought was important and what would make the biggest impact,” Barry said. “We used all that data to develop some strategies that we thought would make a big difference in retaining staff members.”

THE IMPROVEMENT PLAN

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he comprehensive workforce improvement plan included several major upgrades, including a tuition reimbursement program, increased vacation and sick day accrual rates, added a flexible spending account option, increased vacation rollover, improved the City’s health care contribution, and added the North Dakota Public Employees Retirement System.

“With every one of our pay plans, we do a survey of similar benefits in other municipalities. We’ve always been a little bit short on our benefits,” Jundt said. “When

we were having retention issues, we realized it’s not always the pay that was the problem for us. We thought if we enhance the overall benefit package, that would be a better retention tool for us.”

The City Council approved the changes, which were incorporated into the 2019 budget at a cost of approximately $567,837.

The results have been dramatic.

• End of 2017: Turnover rate 14.8 percent, 17 open positions.

• End of 2018: Turnover rate 12.56 percent, 9 open positions.

• End of 2019: Turnover rate 7.67 percent, 5 open positions.

City staff determined that reducing the turnover rate by just 2 percentage points would create enough turnover-related savings to cover the cost of the improvements. In the first year, the plan paid for itself. But the cumulative reduction in the employee turnover rate in less than two years amounts to a 54 percent reduction, saving more than $2.1 million in turnover-related costs over two years.

“Our vacancy rate is low, which means we’re filling positions more efficiently

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than we were before, and our retention rate is increasing,” Barry said. “The program is working, even better than imagined.”

SAVING MORE THAN JUST MONEY

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educing the turnover rate has benefits other than the financial ones. Full staffs create better morale, increase organizational efficiencies, enhance employee safety, and reduce legal liability.

“Longevity is another measure that we need to be attentive to, especially in public safety positions like the Police and Fire Departments,” Barry said. “As an organization, our institutional knowledge shrinks when we have high turnover rates. That’s changing for the better with the reduced turnover rates we’ve seen in the past two years.”

Barry and Jundt said improving the City’s health care contribution and moving to NDPERS have been major factors in reducing employee turnover.

“Moving into NDPERS has guaranteed a defined benefit when you retire,” Barry said. “The other thing that it did for us in addition to helping retain our own employees is that it put us on the map as far as attracting new employees from within our own state. We couldn’t recruit some people because they didn’t want to leave a position where they were in NDPERS at another North Dakota jurisdiction and come to the City, where we were not part of the system.”

The Council-approved changes didn’t completely cover all costs of employee insurance, but did increase the percentage paid for by the City. A single plan is now fully paid for by the City, while 90 percent of a single plus dependent is covered, and 80 percent of a family plan is now paid for by the City. This aligns more closely with Ward County, the State of North Dakota, and

RESULTS 2017 TURNOVER

14.8%

COST TO TAXPAYERS

$3.9 M

2018 TURNOVER

12.5%

SAVINGS TO TAXPAYERS

$600,000

2019 TURNOVER

7.6%

SAVINGS TO TAXPAYERS

$1.5 M 13

STRATEGY

Minot State University.

“The one thing that we saw through employee exit interviews at the time was that other municipalities paid for the entire insurance cost,” Jundt said. “Family insurance is very expensive, and that was a huge component for us to work toward. I’ve had a lot of employees who have come to us and thanked us and the Council for moving in this direction because it did save them a significant amount of money. It’s been a very positive tool for us.”

The efforts to improve and maintain employee turnover rates will continue.

“Pay wise, I think we’re pretty good. The benefits were the main component that we dealt with by making adjustments to the benefit package,” Jundt said.

“But there’s always ongoing discussions about making improvements.”

FEELING THE HEAT: Experience matters in every department,

but some departments rely on cohesion, leadership, and teamwork more than others. That’s part of the motivation for the emphasis on retaining our people, something we witnessed when firefighters battled a blaze in southwest Minot in 2019.

KNOWING THE INS & OUTS: Public Works staff work together

every year to practice installing flood control stop logs to help stop flood waters. Each year the process has become quicker for staff. Retaining that staff ensures that in the event of a flood, staff can install stop logs quickly and efficiently.

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A YEAR FULL OF

STRATEGIES

A FOCUSED APPROACH: This section highlights how the City of Minot has worked towards big picture goals in 2019.

Whether it was strategies to combat small problems that may manifest into larger ones, or big problems creating enormous challenges

FLOOD PROTECTION - FIVE THINGS TO REMEMBER A SOLUTION TO SEVERAL PROBLEMS The City of Minot, partnering with the Souris River Joint Board along with state and federal partners, made great strides toward permanent flood protection in 2019.

Construction will continue in 2020 on a large storm water pump station near the Broadway Bridge. In 2019, four 500 horsepower pumps were installed at the pump station, which will be one of the largest flood control stations in the state when completed.

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progressed along Phase 2 and Phase 3 throughout 2019.

02 |Work The Wee Links golf course’s impacted holes were reconstructed. The Perkett Ditch Pump Station was completed and tested. Crews replaced utilities in the area of 16th Street SW as part of the project to build flood walls along the north side of the Souris River.

work in several locations, including along phases 1, 03 |Underground 2, and 3 in the City included rerouting and upsizing water mains, sanitary sewer lines, and storm water pipes.

4 (Maple Diversion) continues to move forward after Lt. 04 |Phase General Todd Semonite, chief of engineers with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, signed a report in support of the $87.3 million project. The next steps include obtaining congressional authorization for the project, which could lead to partial federal funding. protection in Minot will cost approximately $565 million, 05 |Flood with the basin-wide project estimated to cost more than $1 billion.

The Problem Properties Unit was created and is charged with identifying the City’s most challenging properties and developing an action plan to resolve their issues. The PPU includes staff from various City departments. The PPU will focus on resolving issues involving any building in which illegal activity takes place or that is unsafe and reduces the quality of life for the surrounding neighborhood.

COMMITMENT TO BUYING LOCAL

An eight-member Buy Local Task Force was established, including the Chamber of Commerce, to study and develop buy local solutions in the City’s procurement practices.

The recommendation was approved by the City Council.

FIGHTING FIRE WITH STRATEGY The Minot Fire Department, at a cost of $9,430, conducted operational strategic planning that outlined the department’s objectives and then backed up these goals with realistic, thoroughly researched, quantifiable benchmarks for evaluating results.

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STRATEGY

ON THE CAPITOL

STEPS Left: Mayor Shaun Sipma testifying at the Capitol on behalf of the City of Minot.

Right: A chart showing how the recent changes to the Hub City funding formula will add up for Minot.

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hanks to months of preparation, hours of testimony, and nearly two years of work by city staff and leadership, Minot is set to collect approximately $6 million more in state hub city funding this biennium. Hub cities are cities of 12,000 or more residents that contribute to the employment and quality of life in the Bakken. Minot lands squarely within those boundaries. That was the message City Manager Tom Barry and City leadership sent to state lawmakers. A message that proved fruitful for the Minot community.

“We worked incredibly close with the leaders of those cities as well as lawmakers,” Barry said. “Our goal was to get Minot its fair share.

We made our point to those communities first and they helped carry our message too.”

HUB CITY FUNDING

The impact scoring method approved by the Legislature includes: • Hub city’s percentage of mining, quarrying, oil and gas employment.

• Average of mining, quarrying, oil and gas employment relative to total employment of all industries in each county for all the That good news and account of the fiscal imcounties in the human service region in pact was shared with the full council in June which the hub city is located. of 2019 by City of Mi• Percentage of not special counsel, TWO YEARS IN THE MAKING: establishments enShane Goettle. Goettle Efforts by City leadership to help gaged in mining, informed council that show Minot’s role in the Bakken bequarrying, oil and under a new formula ap- gan in 2017 with a two day Legislative gas relative to total proved by the North Da- Committee meeting hosted and lead establishments of

by City Manager Barry. kota Legislature the new all industries in the conservative estimate county in which the for Minot’s hub city funding is around $14milhub city is located. lion for the 2020-21 biennium, compared to • Percentage of oil production in the human $8.036 million that Minot received for the services region in which the hub city is lo2017-2019 biennium. cated.

• Percentage change in population in last The new method, which was approved as part five years. of House Bill 1066, also known as the Prairie • Percentage change in population in last Dog Bill, is far more permanent than it was befive years for the county in which hub city fore. The new production tax distribution rules is located. take effect July 1.

A pool of $44 million per biennium will be split Goettle said the Legislature based the new tax between the designated hub cities of Willisdistributions on estimates of 1.4 million barton, Dickinson, Minot. The funding amount rels per day at $48.50 per barrel for 2020, and could rise depending on a new impact scoring 1.44 million barrels per day at $48 per barrel method. for 2021. An accomplishment that Barry be-

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lieves will reverberate true positive impacts for Minot for years.

“The whole process was grueling work for us,” Barry recounts.

“But i think we now see the juice was well worth the squeeze.”

Hub city funding adjustments was just one of eight top priorities the City set forth heading into the 2019 legislative session.

City Manager Barry also lead staff into the legislative session with a more focused approach on what needed to happen to

help the City of Minot. Among the rest were: 1. Flood Control Funding 2. Low Interest Revolving Loan Legacy Fund 3. Workforce Shortages and Solutions 4. Property Tax and Budget Control 5. Special Assessment Restrictions 6. Civil asset forfeiture 7. Local Decision Control

EFFORTS THAT MATTER M

MARKET ADJUSTMENTS

inot raised building permit fees that were below market rates. Some fees had not been adjusted in 25 years. The changes reduce the Community Development Department’s dependency on property taxes to fund building inspection services.

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ENGAGING THE PUBLIC

ity departments oversaw an eight-month public education and input process related to expansion of the City Landfill, including creating a focus group and holding several public meetings that resulted in a compromise to reduce the expansion project and begin a formal search for an alternative site.

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BACK TO THE PEOPLE

he Minot Police Department held its second Citizens Academy in more than 10 years.

The academy consisted of a fourpart course and helps citizens better understand and appreciate challenges faced by the Police Department. It also serves to improve community relationships by equipping the attendees with knowledge and building relationships with their public servants.

TOWN HALL SERIES The City of Minot began the Town Hall Series in 2019, a pledge to move City Hall into the neighborhoods across the city to talk about the most pressing issues we’re facing. The first started in February of 2019 with an impassioned Stat of the City delivery by the Mayor. This was when the first pledge to ‘no property tax increase’ manifested, a promise later delivered. In the Spring of 2019, staff recapped some of the results of the 2019 North Dakota Legislature that impacts Minot moving forward. Later in the year, the National Disaster Resilience program was the topic discussed. Affordable Housing projects and the Downtown Gathering Space project dominated much of the conversation. All Town Hall meetings were streamed live on YouTube and can still be watched retrospectively.

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FINANCES

FISCAL DECISIONS MAKE a difference The City of Minot made good on a promise Mayor Sipma made in January of 2019, by reducing its budgeted mill levy for the 2020 budget. In September of 2019, Council approved its budget that reduced the City’s mill levy from129.23 mills, to 121.29. That’s because, in April, the City’s Recreation and Auditorium Department was transferred to Minot Park District, which reduced the City’s levy by nearly 8 mills. This section outlines several other methods the City of Minot worked to improve its systems, processes, or other decisions that will help further improve the financial status for the City and the residents.

STREAMLINING BUSINESS

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ity of Minot employees have already invested countless hours into the new enterprise resource planning software system (ERP) purchased by the City – and there will be plenty more work before the first module of the system goes live in October 2020.

City Finance Director David Lakefield said the current ERP system dates back to the mid-1990s, and although there have been multiple software updates, the system is outdated and difficult to navigate.

The new system, known as the Tyler Munis system from Tyler Technologies, will upgrade multiple aspects of the City’s dayto-day functions, both internal and external. Financial processes, purchasing, accounts receivable, accounts payable, human resources, payroll, utility billing, and other procedures will undergo massive changes.

While the end result will streamline many of the City’s processes, and save countless man hours, the sheer amount of work to make the transition successful

includes thousands of hours by a long list of City employees.

“It’s a huge project. We’re so far behind the curve, so now to get caught up is a big task,” Lakefield said. “It’s going to put a strain on some things in the next couple of years. It’s going to be a big change for some employees, and that’s why we have a Change Management Team to help make the transition as painless as possible.”

Lakefield said the process to replace the aging system began more than 16 months ago, culminating in the selec-

THE MAIN POINT

tion of a vendor in April. Three companies submitted bids, with Tyler chosen to present a two-day demonstration.

The massive project will be completed in four phases: • Phase 1: Financial, scheduled to go live October 2020 • Phase 2: Payroll, scheduled to go live January 2021 • Phase 3: Human resources, scheduled to go live April 2021 • Phase 4: Utility billing, scheduled to go live October 2021 Lakefield and a host of other City employees are currently working with representatives from Tyler to design aspects of each module within the system. Some of the meetings have has been conducted via remote connections, but for the past few weeks, reps from Tyler have been spending three days a week in Minot discussing and designing the different modules.

“Sometimes we may have four or five employees meeting them on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays, but sometimes we’ll have 10 or 12 people at those meetings,” Lakefield said. “The amount of time put in by our employees for this project is amazing, and there is still so much work to do.”

“We have a Change Management Team and we’ve asked for input

The end result will streamline many of the City’s processes, and save countless employee hours

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FINANCES

01 | DATA MORE AVAILABLE T O PUBLIC 02 |ALLOW FOR MORE ONLINE PAYMENTS 03 | IMPROVE ABILITY TO MORE EFFECTIVELY BUDGET from a lot of different folks when we were looking at the requirements of the software,” he added. “So there has been involvement from a number of departments, not just HR, finance, and IT.” Most of the group meeting with Tyler reps is made up of employees from the finance and human resources departments, but there are representatives from a wide variety of other City departments, too. Once that work is completed, actual employee training will begin, which means more staff time will be dedicated to the project.

“There will be folks from just about every department involved in this. Department heads, superintendents, everyone managing a budget…they’re going to be taking part in the training,” Lakefield said.

Lakefield said the plan is to create the 2021 budget using the new system, and that process will begin in the spring of 2020 even though Phase 1 of the system won’t yet be operational.

“Our budget is created over a few months and approved in August and September, so it’s sometimes difficult to project accurate figures over 12 months or even 18 months,” Lakefield said. “We’ll have a lot more real-time and up-to-date data and details available with the new system when we’re going through the budget process.”

City Manager, Tom Barry, said the project has been a long time in the making and has been a major goal of his since joining the city. “ This is a multi year and multi million dollar investment that took considerable time to plan and position into the budget.” Barry recalls. “The the impact to our operation will be incredible.”

The Tyler system will allow employees to create more accurate graphs and charts with current data, which will make City offices more efficient while providing better information to department heads, City Council members, and members of the public. But getting to that point will take countless hours by an untold number of employees over the next two years.

“In the end, we’ll have a better and more modern system that will allow us to do so much more than we can today,” Lakefield said. “But it’s going to be a time-consuming and challenging process to get to the finish line.”

BETTER BUDGET PROCESS

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he City continued reforming its annual budget process to embrace a more collaborative, anticipatory, and proactive approach inclusive of early public input meetings, early development of City Council priorities and principles, public education and involvement, and historical trending of five-year expenditures to justify budget requests. Continuing a multi-year financial correction of Minot’s financial outlook resulted in restoring $13 million per year in revenue

FUNDING FLOOD CONTROL

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he City of Minot obtained $82.5 million from the North Dakota Legislature in 2019 for flood protection work over the next two years. This is the largest appropriations for a water project in the state’s history.

SECURING LOST REVENUE

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he City requested a report from Ward County of delinquencies of payment of taxes for parcels in the Minot city limits for the last three years, and compared this to overall total to be collected going back three years. The collection of back taxes assists the Minot budget in keeping on track, and avoiding additional mill levy increases to make up for what is not being collected. The report found no significant issue with back taxes.

Good news for the rest of the tax paying citizens.

The Water Department also improved its methods to address delinquent accounts, including shutting off water until bills are paid a total of 1,452 times in the first 10 months of 2019. Unpaid utility bills represent lost revenue for the City and can impact water rates for the rest of the community.

40 years of excellence For the 40th consecutive year, the city of minot was awarded the Government Finance Officers Association Certificate of Achievement for Excellence in Financial Reporting. the award recognizes individual governments that succeed in achieving transparency and full disclosure for public finances.

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add it to the mantel Star of the Show: City Engineer Lance Meyer (second from the left) accepted the APWA Project of the Year award for the Downtown Revitalization Project at APWA’s Public Works Expo 2019.

T

he City of Minot’s Downtown Infrastructure Improvements Project was selected as a recipient of the American Public Works Association’s 2019 Public Works Project of the Year Award for infrastructure projects publicly developed, owned, and maintained that promote excellence in construction management and administration.

The downtown project received APWA’s award in the Historical Restoration/Preservation category in the $25 million to $75 million division. The project included the complete reconstruction of 26 square blocks of downtown Minot. The project was built over three construction seasons between 2015-2017. The project was designed by HMjv and constructed by Strata Corporation, Keller Paving & Landscape, and Wagner Construction.

These awards recognize the alliance between the managing agency, the contractor, the consultant, and their cooperative achievements. This is now the fifth award for this project since it was completed.

“We’re honored to have this project recognized by the APWA,” City Engineer Lance Meyer said. “The downtown proj-

ect required constant cooperation and collaboration among a host of local, state, and federal partners, and especially from the local businesses that were affected during construction. We’re pleased with the final results and the revitalization of downtown Minot.”

The APWA Public Works Projects of the Year Awards are presented annually at APWA’s PWX conference. Awards are given in four divisions and five categories.

OTHER AWARDS RECEIVED • NDAPWA best public improvement project • North Dakota Society of Professional Engineers Outstanding Design Award • American Council of Engineering Companies of N.D. Project of the Year • Ready-Mix & Concrete Products Association Gold Award for North Dakota.

THE AWARDS KEEP COMING

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nother major project recently completed was also recognized by the APWA. The Hazard Mitigation Project at the Water Treatment Plant (WTP) was awarded the Project of the Year for the North Dakota APWA chapter. This is the second major award for this project.

North Dakota Ready Mix and Concrete Products Association recognized our Hazard Mitigation Project with the Gold Star Award in January 2018. This award recognizes projects across North Dakota for their excellence in concrete planning, execution, and construction. We cut the ribbon for this project in 2017.

The project consisted of more than 6,000 cubic yards of cast-in-place concrete in various components of the flood mitigation effort around the WTP. The plant is in one of the lowest areas of the community. Now complete, the project protects our most precious resource for our community, the Water Treatment Plant, which supplies water to all of North Central North Dakota.

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OPERATIONS

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IT TAKES A VILLAGE

hat do you do when Mother Nature doesn’t cooperate with your plans?

If you’re employees of the City of Minot Street or Sanitation Departments, you adapt. You go to Plan B. Or Plan C. Or whatever it takes.

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Snow events are extremely busy times for employees in Public Works. In 2019, we found out what happens when there’s a snow event during the City’s annual fall cleanup week. And what we learned is that various departments will band together, as expected, to do whatever needs to be done.

First, let’s go back in time a bit

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he week of Oct. 7-11, 2019, was scheduled to be the City’s fall cleanup week, where residents can place unwanted items on the curb and crews from the Street Department, with some assistance from other departments, will remove the items. Tires, trees, old appliances, old furniture…you name it, they’ll pick it up.

“We drop everything to help,” said Street Superintendent Kevin Braaten. “Generally we’re manning the rear-loading trucks, we have three or four pickups with two-man crews picking up appliances, and we have a crew that runs a front-end

RACING MOTHER NATURE: Sanitation crews pulled longer days and worked ahead of schedule during the Fall Cleanup week, collecting any items they saw on the boulevards. It was a break from the usual system, but this wasn’t your usual Cleanup Week.

OPERATIONS

loader and uses a roll-off container to take care of bigger stuff like couches. We have some help from other departments, but our crews do most of the heavy lifting.”

Oct. 11-12 was also the fall household hazardous waste and E-waste collection at Public Works, where City sanitation customers can bring unwanted items like used oil, old paints and stains, propane tanks, and computer parts to the Public Works building. For users, the HHW and E-waste collection is simple: Drive into the Public Works building, open your vehicle doors, watch the crews unload your items, and drive out the door. It’s a bit more complicated for the crews, who separate and sort the items and help make sure they’re disposed of properly.

“Since we were doing the household hazardous waste event that week, too, that meant we had to move our equipment outside and clean up our shop area,” Braaten said. “That keeps us busy, too.”

Yes, the fall 2019 collection week was shaping up to be a busy week.

And then it snowed.

“October is supposed to be when you start thinking you need to clean up the garage or the yard a little bit to get ready for winter,” said Sanitation Superintendent Josh Kraft. “October is not supposed to be ‘Bring on winter!’ ” The week began normally. On Monday and Tuesday, the Street Department crews handled the cleanup week collection as usual. The Sanitation Department drivers did their normal garbage collection routes on Monday and Tuesday, then pitched in to help with the cleanup week duties.

The normalcy didn’t last long.

On Wednesday, with a forecast of snow on the way, things changed. Time for Plan B. “We lost the Street Department on Wednesday because with talk of snow coming, they had to get their equipment ready,” said Kraft. “It was a pretty obvious situation and snow had to be a priority for them. People were

asking what would happen to the fall clean-up, and we told them that it might take us a little longer, but we would finish the job.”

“Josh understands that our snow removal duties come first, and then when we were done, we’d come back to help with the clean-up week,” Braaten said. “But we had to have our personnel focused on snow removal.”

With Street Department crews work-

Yes, the fall 2019

ing to make sure their equipment was prepared for snow removal, the Sanitation Department crews continued with clean-up week duties.

DOUBLE DUTY

S

anitation crews worked into the late afternoon on Wednesday. On Thursday and Friday, those crews finished their regular garbage collection routes as quickly as possible, then turned their attention to collecting clean-up week items.

collection week

“They worked past 6:30 p.m. on both Thursday, and Friday,” Kraft said. “It was all hands on deck.”

a busy week.

Those extra hands came from a lot of different departments, including employees from the landfill, water department, the cemetery staff, waste water workers, and the water treatment plant.

was shaping up to be

And then it

snowed

“Anyone who had extra people pitched in the best they could,”

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OPERATIONS

Kraft said. “It takes a team to do this, from cemetery to street to the water department. It was really good to see everyone come together.”

Meanwhile, Street Department crews were preparing for and dealing with an early dose of snow. Thankfully, the storm didn’t dump as much snow as earlier predicted. Still, what did fall had to be moved.

up anything left over. After Friday, most of the snow had been moved to the curb, and in some locations in Minot, street sweepers were dispatched to continue

“We might have to have fall clean-up in July just to make sure the weather is good.”

In retrospect, Kraft and Braaten aren’t surprised things went as smoothly as they did, despite the massive curveball from Mother Nature.

“extra people pitched in Anyone who had

their annual fall work.

By the end of Saturday, the household hazardous waste collection event was also completed, as scheduled.

By the end of Friday, the vast majority of the fall clean-up items had been picked up, although Street Department crews did work on the following Monday to pick

It all made for a strange week.

“This is the first time something like this has happened. In the end, everything worked out fine, but it’s something I’d rather not have happen again,” Kraft said.

“

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“A lot of the snow in the middle of the streets melted pretty quickly, but we had to move the rest of it off to the side of the street,” Braaten said. “We worked hard to get all our blades equipped with snow gates, but we would have run the blades without the gates if necessary because there wasn’t that much snow.”

“Josh and I were in constant communication. He knew what I needed to do and I gave him personnel when it was possible,” Braaten said. “It was frustrating, but everyone handled it well. I think our superintendents are all on the same page.

We have a great team at Public Works.”

OPERATIONS

MARRYING SERVICES

POLICING PAPERLESS

The City actively led and studied the efficiency of merging the City’s Recreation Department with the Minot Parks Department, which was completed in April 2019.

The Police Department implemented new $70,000 Brazos ticketing software that eliminates the use of paper tickets, increasing efficiency both for the officers in the field and by eliminating the need for data entry by records department staff

OPERATING AT

A HIGH LEVEL STRIVING TO WORK HARDER & SMARTER: Much of 2019 went into tasks that made our services better and easier for our staff and the community. This section will continue to highlight those efforts.

GOING WITH THE FLOW

The Water Department performed sewer main televising on more than 59,188 feet of sewer line through October. Using cameras to examine sewer pipes helps prevent sewer back-ups and identifies any potential repairs. The department cleaned 25.7 miles of sewer pipe through October, helping to prevent sewer back-ups in homes and businesses, and checked 369 gate valves through October, which helps crews find valves that need repairs or replacement.

A NEW WAY TO AUCTION The City disposed of five pieces of equipment using the GovDeals online auction, netting the City $31,751 in revenue, more than five times the amount the City would have normally re-

ceived by disposing of the equipment at local auction.

TAKING CONTROL OF OUR GHOSTS The City successfully asserted operational control for both downtown parking structures, instituted cleaning and repair of both ramps, updated infrastructure, mitigated poor construction work, preserved both structures with protective measures, and moved to legally hold the developer accountable. The property maintenance staff created a maintenance program for the structures to ensure equipment is efficiently maintained rather than replaced. These changes improved the workings of the control gates, the ticket system, and the structure’s fire suppression system. All while making the structures safer and more inviting to the public.

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OPERATIONS

SCALING OPERATIONS FOR A BUSY LANDFILL

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he City landfill completed an expansion of its inert site by removing an unnecessary leachate pond, regrading perimeter drainage and building a new access road.

The project added 213,000 cubic yards of space to the existing inert disposal site, and was done with existing staff and equipment.

Just how busy was the landfill this past year? Here’s our data:l

51,000 | SCALE TICKETS PRODUCED 55,000 | TONS OF MUNICIPAL SOLID WASTE 20,500 | TONS OF INERT WASTE

2,200 | TONS OF COMPOST 2,400 | TONS OF TREES 340 | BULK ITEMS COLLECTED

A project to install the final cover on Cell 2 at the City landfill began in May, with the final portion of the project to be completed in 2020. The project utilized existing staff and equipment, and completion will ensure permit compliance as set forth by the North Dakota Department of Environmental Quality.

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POUNDING THE PAVEMENT

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he Engineering Department completed the City’s largest budgeted street maintenance program in history, at a cost of $4.72 million. The department has been utilizing pavement condition data to prioritize maintenance projects, thereby optimizing all dollars allocated to the project. This use of data is an example of how the City, across all departments, is starting to make operational and organizational decisions. By collecting and monitoring more (and the right) data, the City will be more effective with its services. The PCI index also shows the City’s street conditions rate as Satisfactory.

OPERATIONS

Setting a standard

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he Engineering Department completed the first update since 2013 of the City’s Standard Specifications and Details for Construction. These provide contractors, developers, engineers, and the public in general with information regarding the requirements for infrastructure construction within the City of Minot. This updated many City standards to more closely follow NDDOT standards.

The City Council adopted updates to the 2018 International Code Council set of codes (six different codes in total). They also adopted the new 2018 International Existing Building Code. It keeps Minot’s

codes in line with other cities and counties in the state and provides clarity for contractors.

Fire up the upgrades

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he Minot Fire Department went live in January with Emergency Reporting, a new software system that not only manages all records within the different disciplines but also provides for maintenance, asset management, and training.

With a budget impact of $10,521, this will help today’s administrators and public officials with data that captures all of the daily activities conducted by local government — including fire, EMS, police, zoning, and public works.

Fire Station 3, located near the Minot International Airport, was remodeled to

address multiple issues, including code compliance, space, and aging building issues. The $1.1 million project also provides an improved living space for firefighters and will greatly extend the life of the building. The cost was split between the City (50%), the Federal Aviation Administration (45%), and the state of North Dakota (5%).

For Transit, the two-way radio systems in the buses were upgraded, at a cost to the City of only $1,139. This will improve the communications and safety of the transit system by eliminating the shared use of radio frequency and lost radio transmissions due to four other departments using the same frequency.

City’s PCI Index: A complete assessment of the City’s streets produced some favorable data, and aided in helping the Engineering Department prioritize maintenance and construction projects. Overall, the City’s Pavment Condition Index is in satisfactory condition. The full index, including a street to street ranking is available on the Engineering Department’s page on the City’s website.

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OPERATIONS

SAFETY FIRST

The Minot International Airport improved its safety programs through several methods in 2019.

1. A Certified Airport: For the third year in a row, the Minot International Airport passed its certification with no discrepancies. The Certification Inspection is an important validation that the airport is in compliance with all of the regulatory and safety responsibilities.

This ensures that the airport remains eligible for federal funding, and verifies that City staff is operating at the highest possible standards.

2. Prepared for the Unthinkable: Every three years, the Minot International Airport is required to perform a full-scale emergency drill which simulates a real world aviation-related disaster. Emergency response agencies from the City of Minot, Ward County, and Homeland Security all participate to ensure readiness. This exercise gave

the teams an opportunity to face the types of challenges they are likely to encounter in the event of a real disaster..

3. Fighting Mother Nature: Federal funds were allocated to improve the safety of the airport and the traveling public by reducing wildlife habitat on the 1,600 acres of airport property. In addition, planning how storm water runoff from the airport is managed is critical to the City’s overall flood control project. The new terminal increased the amount of impervious surfaces dramatically with more parking lots, taxiways, and commercial aircraft parking ramps. The additional runoff of storm water needs to be managed in a way that does not create an inviting wildlife habitat which is dangerous for aviation.

4. Doing Due Diligence: MOT staff members, with the City of Minot and Fire Department inspectors, made detailed inspections of 27 hangars located on airport property. To ensure compliance with building code, fire safety, and their airport leases.

ADDITIONAL HIGHLIGHTS

The City instituted nearly two dozen ordinance changes to update and improve city policy and operations. These changes resulted in clarified operations, modernized policy-making, business-friendly improvements, and liability mitigation.

Security was increased at the Public Works building by adding 26 cameras, both inside and outside the building. The building has frequently been the target of vandals, and the new $30,000 system will help improve security for break-ins as well as day-to-day operations. New, more efficient LED lighting was also installed at the Public Works complex.

Council adopted a new Capital Improvement Plan in 2019, a document that lays out the top capital projects based on an objective scoring system. 800 hours of work went into creating the detailed document. The engineering department compiled the data, with major input from other City departments. Projects are scored using written criteria that is now formalized and standardized.

There are several advantages to the new method of creating the capital improvement plan.

Departments all use the same process for each project.

Each department’s projects are combined into a single spreadsheet and rankings are created based on project scores.

A summary spreadsheet is used to collect data from all departments.

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CUSTOMERS

OUR TOP FOCUS IS YOU CUSTOMERS: The City of Minot is a service-based organization.

Our purpose is to serve the citizens and the surrounding community. Everything we do is to better serve you, the public. This section highlights a few ways we are working to do that.

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ENGAGEM CUSTOMERS

Citizens know best: The Listen. Speak. Act. Community Engagement Strategy recognizes the importance of public input in nearly every decision that is made for the City. It will standardize practices the City has already been deploying to better engage you.

I

mproving communication with members of the community has been a priority for Minot Mayor Shaun Sipma since he was elected in 2018.

Now, he and other City of Minot officials have a new tool to help them do just that.

Public Information Officer Derek Hackett introduced a comprehensive community engagement strategy to the City Council in late 2019. Hackett said work on the “Listen. Speak. Act” engagement strategy began about 19 months ago, and involved studying more than a dozen examples of community engagement strategies. The City took bits and pieces of those examples and combined that into its own strategy.

“Part of this is setting expectations for ourselves, but also setting expectations for the community. The “Listen. Speak.

Act.” strategy is a direct reflection of how we expect the community to participate,” Hackett said. “We want to give them the proper opportunities to listen to us, to speak to us, and to act with us.”

SET THE EXPECTATIONS

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ertainly, one goal of the strategy is to provide as much information as possible to the community, whether it’s the expected impacts of a

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major construction project or a press release detailing holiday hours at the City Landfill.

“But a big piece of this is more than just making sure people are informed. It’s also about helping people understand what decisions are being made and more importantly, why they are being made,” Sipma said. “We want to make sure the community is educated about City of Minot issues, and that in turn will help us get community buy in. We’ve had a lot of new people move to Minot who may not have the background knowledge of what’s going on here, so getting information in front of people is very important.”

ABOUT THE PLAN LISTEN: The City will give

the opportunity for the public to get information.

SPEAK: The City will provide the public chances to provide feedback.

ACT: The City will provide the public opportunities to get involved.

Hackett said the strategy is designed to assist members of City departments in interacting with the public. City employees on the strategic engagement team included City Manager Tom Barry, Executive Secretary Tami Stroklund, City Clerk Kelly Matalka, and Library Director Janet Anderson. A focus group of private citizens also contributed to the creation of the strategy, including Gregory Boster of Minot Air Force Base, Lorena Starkey, Jonah Lantto, Mark Lyman, Minot Public School Supt. Mark Vollmer, Preston Phillips of the Young Professionals, Shannon Krueger, and City Council member Stephan Podrygula.

“As our processes evolve, we want to have a very uniform delivery system for information so the public can have expectations of what we’re going to provide,” Sipma said. “Department heads and elected officials are often involved in community outreach for major projects, and we want to ensure that the process is consistent for everyone.”

WHAT’S NEXT?

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ackett said now that the strategy is completed and has been adopted by the City Council, he plans to host training workshops for members of City departments to assist in implementing the strategy.

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CUSTOMERS

“Many of our departments already do a lot of community engagement. We wanted to make sure we could standardize a lot of the things we do, and to make sure everyone is moving in the same direction,” Hackett said.

ONE TO ONE CONTACT

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he mayor said while social media provides an opportunity for community members to comment on local issues, direct contact with the City is a much more efficient method of communicating.

“I think the message is that we need the community to engage, more than just commenting on social media. Social media is one outlet, but it’s vital that community members reach out directly to City staff and elected leaders to address issues as quickly and efficiently as possible,” he said.

Improving communications can also help the City better track reoccurring issues, such as vehicles consistently speeding through a certain neighborhood or street maintenance concerns.

“This strategy can help us decipher between a singular complaint and a much broader issue,” Sipma said. “The more direct information we have from the community, the better we can make prudent decisions on how the city is managed. That will help us solve issue, both large and small, in an efficient manner.”

The plan was designed to help department heads and other City employees by creating a standardized process to help determine when and how to best communicate with individual residents or groups. That could be as simple as a one-on-one meeting with a resident, or it might mean coordinating a meeting with an entire neighborhood to discuss flood control, for example.

“When we hold those types of public meetings, it’s an opportunity to have an open discussion, and we want community members to feel empowered to attend those and ask questions,” Sipma said. “Having a well-informed community helps us make better decisions for our future.”

The entire Community Engagement Plan LISTEN. SPEAK. ACT. can be found on the city’s website.

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CUSTOMERS

CITIZENS FIRST

Marking achievements for our public: 2019 was a robust year for our City staff. As every year, we focused on improving the quality of service for the public we serve. This section outlines some of those projects.

Calls for service

EXPANDING COMMUNICATION

The public relied a great deal on our services throughout 2019, most notably our Public Safety services. Responding to the needs of residents is an important aspect and responsibilities of a successful municipal government.

Minot Police Department | 41,426 calls-for-service Minot Fire Department | 3,626 calls-for-service Minot Water Department | 7,987 Calls-for-service Through Dec. 11, the Minot Police Department was on pace to respond to 41,426 calls-for-service in 2019. The 41,426 CFS would be an increase of 308 calls from 2018 or three quarters of one percent increase from the 2018 total of 41,113 CFS. The Minot Fire Department responded to 3,626 calls for service in 2019, including 2,604 emergency medical service calls and 1,022 fire calls.

The Water Department responded to 7,987 calls for service through October of 2019, addressing the needs of residents, contractors, and plumbers.

The City increased its public information output through several operational changes in 2019.

The Public Information Office spearheaded development of a community engagement strategy designed to assist department heads and other City employees in successfully interacting with members of the community.

The City enhanced its communication methods in several ways, including Council Chambers upgrades and ADA accessibility, live streaming all meetings, creating a City YouTube channel, and pushing expanded content through public access channels, a bimonthly mayoral newspaper column, and proactive social media campaigns.

Starting in August 2019, the City doubled the number of electronic City Newsletter issues it produces; the newsletter is now published twice a month. That change has improved the readership and subscriptions of the City of Minot newsletter.

IT’S FOR THE KIDS

The Minot Public Library Board eliminated fines for children with overdue materials. As of December, there has been no substantial negative repercussions of this change. IN FACT, THE LIBRARY HAS SEEN AN INCREASE IN CARD HOLDERS SINCE THE CHANGE WAS ANNOUNCED.

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CUSTOMERS

WETTING THE WHISTLE MAKING BETTER ROUTES IMPROVEMENT PROJECTS The City continued to improve the community’s water supply system in 2019 with several major projects.

The City of Minot met all guidelines under the EPA’s Safe Water Drinking Act with no violations, ensuring the health and safety of residents, visitors, and surrounding communities who depend on quality drinking water.

The 1.5 million gallon water tower on North Hill was completed, replacing a deteriorating 500,000 gallon tank, increasing capacity to provide fewer pressure fluctuations, and creating more reserve for times of peak demands.

The completed 2 million gallon Sundre booster pump station and reservoir pumping facility delivers water from the Sundre well field to the Minot Water Treatment Plant, providing an alternate route to help clear the way for construction of vital flood control projects and replacing an aging and fragile transmission line.

The Engineering Department completed a Safe Routes to School project around Washington Elementary School to increase pedestrian safety and promote walking to school, at a cost of $223,000. Promoting walkability and safety around schools is a continued priority for the City.

The City’s transit buses received an upgraded RouteMatch Automatic Voice Announcement System. The new digital system cost the City $4,760 and keeps Minot in compliance with federal rules regarding passenger announcements.

INSURANCE DISCOUNTS The City maintained its Class 8 designation through the National Flood Insurance Program’s Community Rating System, which provides the community with a 10 percent discount on flood insurance premiums.

Several construction projects were completed in 2019 or are under way.

Work continues on a $26 million expansion of the Minot Water Treatment plant that will boost the plant’s production to meet growing City demands and requirements for the Northwest Area Water Supply project. The new facility is expected to be operational in 2020.

The North Dakota Department of Transportation project to four-lane the U.S. Highway 83 bypass continued in 2019.

The project created four-lanes on the 83 Bypass between Fourth Avenue Northwest and north Broadway, and included construction of an additional bridge over Fourth Avenue Northwest. The $15.9 million project was funded completely by state oil impact funds. The final work will be wrapped up in 2020.

A maintenance project on Broadway battled wet weather in 2019, which delayed some aspects of the project that replaced deteriorating concrete panels.

The project is scheduled to be completed in 2020.

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CUSTOMERS

The Minot Public Library continues to play a key role in the educational and social development of our community.

ENHANCING LIBRARY ACTIVITIES

In 2019, the Minot Public Library staff located, inventoried, cataloged and organized more than 60 donated games. Anyone with a library card can now check out board games, continuing to fulfill the Library’s vision of being responsive to the diverse needs of the community.

The Friends of the Minot Public Library donated $8,000 to fund a variety of marketing avenues to better inform the community of the Library’s services.

The Minot Public Library staff attended more than 20 events to promote library services, and launched the “Book Bike,” which was donated by Val’s Cyclery with help from the Friends of the Minot Public Library and allows people to take free books and learn about library programs.

MPL also started placing “pop-up library boxes” around town that contain free books with information about the Library.

Teen Librarian Pam Carswell worked to bring adaptive gaming to Minot, and Children’s Librarian Paulette Nelson brought together a Community Literacy Committee.

DEVELOPING EASIER PROCESSES

Staff in the Planning Department implemented new procedures for Development Review Team (DRT) meetings, including providing written minutes to customers and recording all meetings for record-keeping purposes. This helps staff provide accurate information to our customers and helps our customers submit successful applications on development projects.

The City of Minot’s assessors’ office created an online environment on the Minot City Assessor’s website to help those applying for various exemptions or property tax credits. This streamlines the process for property owners and eliminates the filing, sorting, and stamping of forms received in the office.

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CUSTOMERS

DUSTING OFF THE LANDFILL The landfill staff installed permanent signs at various locations along the landfill roadway, creating a much more professional appearance and directing customers to proper disposal areas. Landfill staff used salvaged posts, and the City’s traffic department made the signs.

A project to reduce dust on the landfill road was completed at a cost of $16,800. Two applications of magnesium and calcium chloride were done on more than a mile of road.

During peak times, more than 225 trucks travel this road every day. The project enhanced safety for customers and landfill employees, and also freed up a landfill employee who previously was assigned to spray water on the road to help reduce dust

OUT & ABOUT Multiple City departments participated in community engagement opportunities, including Minot’s first ever Public Works Day in May. This was an opportunity to show the community what Public Works is all about.

One lucky student even won a trip to school in the classiest rig, our sanitation truck.

Staff also participated in a Touch-a-Truck event at Roosevelt Elementary School. These events allow the public the opportunity to see equipment up closet and gather information from City personnel.

PUBLIC WORKS DAY: Public Works opened its doors in May for an open house. Families had a chance to jump in the cab of their favorite truck and kids signed their name on a snow plow.

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