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MINUTES/PUBLIC SAFETY COMMITTEE
Monday, July 13, 1998 - 4:30 p.m.

Members present: Bakken, Bouley, Martinson.

1. Application for block party:
a) to close 19th Avenue S. from Oak Street to S. 10th St.
on July 22 from 6:00 to 9:00 p.m.
Moved by Bouley and Martinson to approve request. Motion
carried. (comm.only)

2. Request for refund of temporary restaurant license fees by Greater Grand Forks Soccer Club.
A request from Betsy Perkins, Greater Grand Forks Soccer Club, for refund of two temporary restaurant license fees in the amount of $65/ea. for June 5 - 7, was presented. Moved by Bouley and Martinson to approve request. Motion carried. (comm. only)

3. Applications for special alcoholic beverage permits: a) GF Goodribs - July 16 for Health South at 3051 32nd Ave.S.
Julie Frey, mgr. of GF Goodribs, stated they would like per-mit for service off premises at C'Mon Inn for dinner meeting. Moved by Martinson and Bouley to approve application for permit. Motion carried. (comm.only)

b) GF Goodribs - July 21 for First National Bank picnic at Kraft Field
Ms. Frey reported they were anticipating between 800/1,000 people for the event (about half children) and stated there would be a manager working with other staff; this would be in fenced area north of the entrance of Kraft Memorial Field (between Kraft and Apollo). She stated there would be someone from First National at entrance to make sure only invited guests enter. Committee stated they wouldn't want alcoholic beverages leaving premises and don't want minors to have easy access to it. Moved by Bouley and Martinson that we approve application provided that security is approved through Grand Forks police department. Motion carried. (comm.only)

4. Request from Curt D. Johnson Auction Co. to close street during auction on Sunday, August 9, at 1620 9th Avenue North. Applicant was not present. It was noted they would set bar-ricades up in morning and remove when auction is over (by 6:00 p.m.) Capt. Kjelstrom stated they would have no problem with closing area to traffic, have done in the past. Moved by Martin-son and Bouley to approve request. Motion carried.

5. Matter of crossing at 17th Ave. on bikepath at S. 30th St.
John Thompson, traffic eng., reported this matter was referred by Council Member Hafner but hasn't had any contact with him. He stated this item has to do with bikepath crossing signing and additional signing. He stated at present the traffic on the bikepath is stopped and that there is pedestrian crossing sign and pedestrian advance warning sign ahead of the crossing for traffic on 17th Avenue South. He stated that intersection constructed within last 2-3 years as well as bikepath and recommended holding for more information or receive and file.

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Mr. Thompson stated that pedestrians have right of way, but didn't think stop signs would be appropriate; the traffic on the bikepath is required to stop. It was noted that there was a pedestrian accident in that area, but that the accident didn't occur on the bikepath crossing.

Moved by Bouley and Martinson to hold for further information, and also asked for location of where pedestrian accident hap-pened. Motion carried. Held in committee.

6. Matter of closing intersection of DeMers and N. 4th Street. Mr. Thompson reported they had been contacted by both con-tractors, Community and Mortenson on Corporate Center; that the work being done on Corporate Center and First National Bank is encroaching into the street, and they had asked prior to this to take some of the parking lane and moved beyond that now - are into driving lane for southbound traffic on 4th Street. He reported that First National Bank being worked on by Community Contractors and they have put down roll-off containers and they est. 400 loads coming out of that building. He stated he is recommending that they close 4th Street and that appropriate signs be put up and work zone be established for one half block from DeMers to the mid-block, fencing and appropriate pedestrian and vehicle warnings be posted by the contractors and maintained by them so that one-half of that block between 4th and 1st Avenue N. would be closed for 30 days, or would bring back to committee every two meetings so know if maintaining properly and how affecting traffic flow. He stated it is undesirable for N. 4th Street traffic to be closed but no other solution, wouldn't want to affect DeMers Ave. traffic. He stated they would maintain local traffic for the one-half block and the parking ramp. Signs would be installed at 1st Avenue N. - road closed, local traffic only. He stated that both contractors were notified of this meeting, and it's contingent upon them taking the responsibility to put up signs.

Moved by Martinson and Bouley that we approve closing of North 4th Street, that work zone be established for one-half block from DeMers to mid-block, that fencing and appropriate pedestrian and vehicle warnings be posted and maintained by the contractors, to monitor on 30-day basis, contingent upon filing of the hold harm-less agreement by the contractors. Motion carried. (comm.only)

7. Matter of intersection control on 24th Ave.S. and S. 29th St.
Mr. Thompson reported this item is result of concern over accidents that have occurred at that intersection, and brought before committee by Mardella Mott, Columbia Towers, and concern was verified with review of accident records that indicated 7-8 accidents in last two years, and 5 or 6 two years before that. He reported they have talked with owners of Best Property and adj. properties trying to negotiate some kind of blockage of through traffic on that property, that there are other concerns at that intersection (Gate City Bank has exit to their drive-through, vehicles exit and cross two lanes and get into left turn MINUTES/PUBLIC SAFETY COMMITTEE
July 13, 1998 - Page 3

lane and make U-turn to go back to Columbia Road); and he is recommending putting up a "no U-turn" for westbound traffic at the intersection and also a right turn only out of the Best Property, with two regulatory signs added to see if get com-pliance and reduce number of accidents. He stated other alter-natives or further improvement at that intersection to reduce accidents would be to close median on 24th but not desirable because would close South 29th Street traffic from crossing into the Mall or making left turn. It was noted that Mall access for trucks to Best property and not entrance/exit from Mall, is a private parking lot driveway and is only driveway approach to street, and question raised whether City would have authority to remove access. Mr. Swanson stated he has some concerns about moving access, is shown on PUD plans and at this point to remove access could impact value of property; and also stated not convinced evidence as a hazard, is on private property (property owner runs liability to allow it to continue the way it is). It was noted that suggestion had been made to property owner to close, but opposed; Mr. Swanson stated he would want to do more research. Mr. Thompson stated this has been long term access for the Mall, they took advantage in drawing all that traffic through there, now have developed road to the west of that over to parking lot so splitting traffic but with traffic from the Herald, started getting lot more complaints about that intersec-tion, there's medians on three approaches and one's driveway without median. Mr. Swanson stated he would research, but options are 1) to close access to Best property and that's most vulnerable move, 2) to extend median so no N/S traffic - City has enabled that intersection to develop, if extend median and take out the turn, have better position there; put signal light there, four-way stop and those impact Columbia Road traffic; signage, etc. can research. Bakken stated they need to do something permanent, but suggested right turn only out of the Mall.

After further discussion it was moved by Martinson and Bouley to install "right turn only" sign coming out of the Best parking lot, install "no U-Turn" sign for westbound traffic, that staff continue to research and negotiate with property owners, and further to look at condition of that parking lot. Motion carried.

8. Matter of stop sign at 40th or 47th Ave.S. (and Belmont)
Mr. Thompson reported request came from Council Member Beyer - at Belmont Road at either 40th or 47th Ave.S. but unable to contact her; neither intersection warranted by accident or traffic volume; 47th is one-mile road from 32nd, which is last four-way stop on Belmont making it a candidate location, 40th Avenue is about one-half mile but probably has more cross-traffic on Belmont and closer to meeting 50-50 traffic split warrant for traffic, but not warranted for use of stop-sign, but think recommended for control of speed. He stated they are doing road improvements and asked that they give him time to look at both intersections. Moved by Martinson and Bouley to hold for 2 weeks. Motion carried.

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Bakken asked that when these items brought to committee to bring in intersection diagram and brief explanation of concern. Mr. Thompson asked that these items be referred to him prior to placement on the agenda.

9. Matter of grant agreements for health dept.:
a) Women's Way Cancer Prevention grant agreement - $34,502
for period 07/01/98 - 06/30/99.
Don Shields, Health Dept., reported this is on-going agree-ment, regional grant including Cavalier, Walsh, Grand Forks and Nelson Counties, that $23,000 spent in Grand Forks County. Moved by Martinson and Bouley to approve pending review and approval by the city attorney. Motion carried.

10. Applications for gaming permits:
a) Grand Forks YMCA TaeKwonDo - raffle 9/01/98
b) St. Mary's Knights of Columbus #10837 - bingo 8/29- 12/26/98
It was noted that these applications had been reviewed and approved by the city attorney. Moved by Bouley and Martinson to approve the aps. for permits. Motion carried. (comm.only)

c) Altru (Close Enough to Care) - raffle 9/10/98
Mr. Swanson reported that the Hospital had number of groups recognized as public spirited. It was noted that money from raffle would be sent to community hospital in St. Peter, Mn to help after tornado. Moved by Martinson and Bouley to recognize this group as a public spirited organization eligible to conduct gaming, and to approve the permit. Motion carried. (comm. only)

d) Greater GF Girls & Women's Hockey Assn. - raffle 7/24/98
Mr. Swanson reported that the application is in order, that group has not been recognized as being public spirited and has not met existence requirement which is two years. He stated that they can waive the existence rule and can adopt resolution recognizing them as public-spirited organization and have groups with similar purposes and functions that have been recognized as public-spirited. Mr. Swanson stated they are seeking to use the funds to promote youth hockey and adult hockey programs. He also noted that the two-year existence requirement is to show that the group is a legitimate group, and that this group has formal by-laws and charter.

Moved by Bouley and Martinson to waive the two year existence requirement, recognize the group as being public spirited and eligible to conduct games of chance, and to approve the permit. Motion carried. (comm.only)

11. Matter of purchase of portable radios for police dept.
Capt. Kjelstrom stated that communication is most important thing re. public safety and reported they have problem with portable radios, that he asked for price quotes from several companies, reviewed quotes for 10 portable radios: Stone's Radio
for Visar equipment, $15,263.50; Stan's Radio, $5,410.00 and

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Dakota Communications from P1225 VHF for $9,600; however, equip-ment from Stan's and Dakota Comm. not designed for public safety use; funding would come from grant monies. He asked that they purchase 10 of the Visars.

Martinson stated that with officers away from vehicles and on street they need reliable system for their own safety, and moved to authorize purchase of the 10 Visar radios from Stone's Radio in the amount of $15,263.50; Bouley seconded the motion.

There was some discussion re. whether properly bid, Mr. Swanson stated this is well within excess of bid requirements and only way to waive that is if this is emergency situation or if radios is State bid item. He stated he didn't think this was a sole source bid, however, maybe make determination that given loss of radios, emergency need; if find that number of functional radios available to it and fact that no longer repairable, constitutes emergency situation. Martinson moved that he would make a part of his motion that they declare an emergency to purchase the radios; Bouley seconded the motion. Bouley questioned if they were purchasing the "cadillac"; Capt. Kjelstrom stated his con-cern with others was that they state they are not designed for public safety use. Amendment to motion carried. Upon call for question, motion carried.

12. Information on agreement with County on AFIS (Automatic
Fingerprinting Identification System).
Capt. MacCarthy reported that he had asked Mr. Swanson to review an agreement between the Police Department, County Sheriff's Office and Correctional Center; that the State has a grant and local participation is $15,600 and they are attempting to enter into agreement with those entities on central area for booking prisoners within the County of Grand Forks. The concept of the Correctional Center was that they would charge everyone to book prisoners, have a verbal agreement and Mr. Swanson is drafting a written agreement that they would provide the $15,600 to get this equipment, the County would buy digital booking camera for the Correctional Center and would not be charged for booking prisoners. He stated his calculations based on figures given by the County Jail that if charged for booking prisoners they would greatly exceed the cost of a shared agreement on the AFIS, their original concept was that City would pay to book prisoners and buy about 50% of the $15,600, but better off buying the whole thing and not paying to book prisoners, and they have agreed with that. He stated maintenance agreement, first year under warranty, and after that would be split and County Jail would give usage by each agency and bill out the other entities their share. He stated there are some people County Jail would book with this process that are not part of the agreement and would pay fee and that fee would defer maintenance cost in future years of other participants of the agreement. AFIS system is state-wide project (fingerprints taken electronically) and will go into three state computer (MN, ND and SD) and has ability to determine if people wanted in those three states immediately and also

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registers their fingerprints in the system. He stated they were informing committee of what doing, and Mr. Swanson will be sub-mitting written version of the agreement for approval. Capt. MacCarthy stated there isn't national system but is being cobbled together area by area, that in North Dakota don't have enough volume to stand alone in the State, nor does South Dakota, and better off as satellite of MN, perhaps in 3-4 years there will be national data base; and computer standards are national stand-ards. It was noted this would be in 1999 budget. Information.

13. Application for block party:
a) 14th Ave.S. between South 10th and 11th Streets.
Capt. Kjelstrom stated they had no problem with this. Moved by Bouley and Martinson to approve request on August 21 from 5:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m. Motion carried. (comm. only)

14. Request from Abate of North Dakota, Dist. #4, to hold Toy
run on July 18, 1998.
Leslie Legg, Abate of North Dakota, was present. Capt. Kjelstrom reported they have reviewed and this has been done in the past, approved. Moved by Bouley and Martinson to approve request. Motion carried.

15. Matter of grant agreements for health department:
a) TB Screening Services - $11,482 for period 7/01/98-6/30/99
b) Care Coordination - $24,210 for period 7/01/98-6/30/99 (to coordinate care for children of special needs)
c) HIV/AIDS Testing - $12,000 for period 7/01/98-6/30/99 (Grand Forks regional testing center and do testing and counseling, and is provided free)
d) Ryan White grant agreement - $6,000 for period 7/01/98- 6/30/99 (this agreement provides funding for treatment)
Mr. Shields reported these are four additional grants, all on-going grants that have had for a number of years and total $53,692, and reviewed each of the grants. Moved by Bouley and Martinson to approve grant agreements subject to review and approval of city attorney. Motion carried.

16. Matter of mosquito control.
Bouley reported she see "Skeeter Meter" in paper and how do they get to that point. Mr. Shields stated the 150 count was set by Mosquito Control Comm. (Council Members Beyer and Glassheim, Ann Sande, Dexter Perkins, technical reps. from their department) and program expanded adulticiding, etc., that mosquito has fly-pattern of about 5-6 miles so they go that distance outside of town and provide lots of larviciding in areas that are tradi-tionally wet, and there are time when that program overwhelmed, that mosquito eggs can live 4-5 years, so have situation with abundance of rain and lot of areas that are wet, and mosquitos hatch in areas where not larvicided because can't treat entire area, and they do ground spraying. He stated that the group felt there needed to be some way of monitoring when did ground spraying, that there were people on group and in community that felt that there should be no ground spraying and didn't want any

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chemicals in the environ-ment, also some of group wanted ground spraying twice weekly or as much as possible, and 150 number is a balance between those two groups. He stated that they found over time is that when the average in those mosquito traps (5 in town and collected on a daily basis except for weekends) and when average gets to be about 150 that the complaints from residents went up markedly, and that was picked as nuisance level. He stated that this morning they were at 136 and will probably go over 150 tomorrow and would be doing ground spraying. He reported that group meets periodi-cally, met in May and towards end of July, meeting called by Beyer and look at various facets including the number 150 and whether re-evaluated. He stated there are people on both sides of that equation, some want and some don't. He stated traps not accurate but good indicator of level of mosquito activity (used nationally) and when looked at indicators, felt traps best indicator. Info. only.

17. Matter of change in general penalty provision in City Code.
Mr. Swanson reported that there is general penalty provision in the City Code, that if don't have specified penalty the municipal court will have jurisdiction of imposing a fine of up to $500 per offense and/or 30 days in jail. He stated that in last legislative session they changed that $500 to $1,000 limit, and was done in part to accommodate some EPA requirements on fines and also to make consistence on fines of third DUI; Grand Forks has never changed it's general penalty provision to follow State law since last legislative session and suggested they introduce an ordinance changing penalty section from $500 to $1,000 to be consistent with State law. He stated it doesn't come into play lot because most offenses have specified fine. He reported this is coming as a result of a meeting with newly elected court judge, Judge Eslinger. Committee asked that he bring this back at the next meeting.

18. Matter of hazardous materials.
Bakken asked Chief Aulich if there are ways of getting grants for hazardous material handling, and would like that looked into; and asked if there is inventory of hazardous materials in town, whether complete and up-to-date and if they can handle that.

19. Matter of signage at various locations.
Bakken stated that at 13th Avenue South and Chestnut and Walnut there appears that there may be extra stop signs that they don't need, also at 15th and Walnut, and 9th and Reeves; and would like John Thompson to look into that.

20. Matter of computer systems for squad cars.
Bakken stated that every time they want to check on some-thing they have to call in through switchboard for the officers to get information, can't punch up and get their own info. Chief Packett stated they are in process of researching with other cities who are in process of doing MDC and probably by fall should have idea what State is going to do with their state-wide
system and what type of equipment being purchased to buy into

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that, have budgeted $99,000 for the last couple years for initial purchase, total cost about $250,000.

21. Matter of South Jr. High School
Bouley asked if have an arson problem in this town now, whether because of the vacant buildings. Chief Aulich reported that the city has had very minor arson problem and since flood with a lot of vacant buildings, it has become more acute, and possibly that it is largely juveniles. He stated they are concerned but don't have anything approaching an arson epidemic, but cause for concern; that police department has been patrolling areas more closely and when building occupied it is more secure; that there are lot of unsecured buildings, lot of vacant buildings. He also reported there will be a report made on fire at South Jr. and they will be provided a copy. Bakken stated that officers will be doing accident investigation reports in more detail and thinks that's an excellent idea.

22. Matter of enforcement.
Bakken stated that he thinks they need to do something more on enforcement, leave up to their judgment, target certain areas at certain times, etc. but do have some trouble areas for people running through signs/lights, speeding getting out of hand. Chief Packett reported they have asked Capt. Kjelstrom to develop list of selective sites where do enforcement, and do news media and highly publicize where they're at and let people know they're out there; and also researching a local wagon that has a screen on it for radar enforcement, where put wagon in neighborhood and it flashes speed on the screen as they come through, National Guard has that and they've put in request for that. Capt. Kjelstrom stated they started selective enforcement today. It was noted that have put in grant request for laser radar machine to target high traffic areas, regular radar won't pick up high density traffic areas. Info.

Moved by Martinson and Bouley to adjourn; meeting adjourned at 6:05 p.m.

Alice Fontaine
City Clerk
Dated: 7/15/98.