Tuesday, July 19 is the all-city Columbia Heights Community Picnic at Murzyn Hall/Huset Park.  This will be from 6:00 – 8:00 pm.  Free food and displays/demonstrations from different city offices.  Come meet your community leaders, staff, and enjoy food with your neighbors!  Some parts of the event will be inside Murzyn Hall (air conditioned) so you can get some relief from the heat.

Conferences and seminars are important  for several reasons.  These help me to stay out of a rut of doing things the same every time, because ‘we have always done it that way’.  It encourages networking, helping me to see what other cities are doing that is working.  It promotes new ideas, those ideas can either be embraced, or rejected, new is not always better.  It promotes discussion, discussion is always good to help develop thoughts on why we are doing something and getting input from several people to help make a final decision.

For those reasons, and more, I took notes at this conference and shared them with my fellow council members and staff.  As a courtesy to the residents, I am posting them on this website.  There are several comments within the notes.  Take them or leave them.  I do appreciate the chance to go to events like this and wanted to make sure residents can get some feedback on what goes on at events like this.  There are 7 pages of notes and comments so enjoy!

Donna Schmitt

The keynote speaker was David Horsager, author of the Trust Edge.  (Excellent speaker!)  Overall trust in government is at 29% (Pew Research 2011).  That is a sad note when everything, quality of business, employees, customers is based on trust.  As government, we have lost the trust of our customers (local citizens).  We need to gain that trust back.

With the loss of trust comes an unrest, a sense of loss, and loss in overall respect.  As elected officials, it is our duty to rebuild that trust.  What was lost takes time to rebuild.  Any mistake may take years to regain the trust of local citizens.

Keep me accountable.  I do not have all the answers and I am not all knowing.  I can not accurately predict the future.  Mistakes will be made and have been made in the past.  But I will do my best to serve this community and help earn your trust as my term continues.

Even though I think 29% trust in government is appalling, a year ago it was sitting at 22%.  Some strides have been made.  There needs to be much more.  I don’t think we will ever get back to what people felt in the Kennedy/Johnson years, 68%, but as regular citizens become more involved in local government we will see a change.

I need your input, your suggestions, your insight when decisions need to be made at the council level. I need feedback to make sure that I stay focused.

If you have questions or comments, feel free to contact me at:  donna.schmitt.citycouncil@gmail.com

Thank you for your patience and thank you for your support.  See you around town!

Donna Schmitt, Columbia Heights City Council

At the city council meeting on June 13, we were asked to adopt a resolution to show the continuation of our support for the Anoka County Hazard Mitigation Plan.  The only problem was that the city neglected to get me a copy of the plan to look over before the meeting.  I asked that it be tabled until our next meeting on June 27.  It was unanimously voted on to table this.

I do have a copy now and I am looking it over.  But I would also encourage you to do the same.  After the meeting, I was able to find that this is readily available by going to the Anoka County Website and there you can download it and look at it for yourself.

Take the time and look it over.  The County will be revising and updating this in 2012.  This needs to be done before November 2012 to be approved by FEMA,  We need many people to look at this and not just county and city officials.  We need to come up with something that is workable, reasonable, and acceptable to protect the safety of our families, homes, and businesses in Columbia Heights.

Some of the properties that the city owns have been off the tax rolls for over 15 years.  That means that the city is not getting any income from those properties but it also means that the county isn’t getting any income either.  While there isn’t any money coming in there still is money going out since those properties need to be maintained throughout the summer, mowing, removing trash and removing any dead trees or brush.

I guess we can say that a few of the properties bring in some money because they are used as community gardens.  One of those gardens brings in a large number of fresh vegetables for our local SACA food shelf which is a blessing for those in need.

My opinion is that the city needs to start selling properties.  Even if it would be selling properties to groups such as Habitat it would be better to have a taxable income than a money sucking property.

Even if that property would be an empty lot, sold to an individual or developer, it could potentially have been bringing in at least taxable income equal to what we are spending in a summer on lawn service.

Hopefully you were able to share stories and thank a vet for their service this weekend.  Or maybe you just visited a widow and talked about her family and their service to their country.

The VFW had a list of 37 Comrades and Sisters who had died over this past year.  Our prayers go out to those families.  I know the Schmitt family was missing our patriarch, Bob Schmitt, a man that served in World War II and the Korean War but last year he lost the battle to cancer.

Thank you to those who read this and served our country, here and overseas.  We would not be here without your service.  Thank you.

It needs to be clarified that this is an optional service.  You do not have to pay for this cart if you choose not to use it. You can still continue to purchase the approved bags at your local garden stores or just compost your yard waste.  Another option is that you can use your own designated container to dispose of these items.  You just need to make sure that you do not overfill and make the container too heavy to empty.

The city will continue to only pick-up yard waste between April and November as they do now.  Kevin Hanson stated that if you do not want to store the container over the winter it can be picked up by Veola to be returned in the spring.

Voice your opinion and let your leaders know your opinion.

http://bringtheshuttlehome.rallycongress.com/

Police came and took care of some of the problems. Jeff also talked with the Police Chief and they have tried to come to some agreement as to appropriate changes for any auctions in the future. If those changes aren’t enough, maybe it is time they hire a police officer to help guide traffic or possibly it would be time to move it to a new location.

I see nothing wrong with making money and selling a product that people could use.  But it is also important to show courtesy to the neighbors and respectful of laws.

With all of the tickets that were passed out over the past couple of months for jaywalkers, I am curious how many tickets were passed out at this auction?

The “Hear Every Voice” forgot that an important part of this discussion should include public transportation and the only voices that should make the decisions about public transportation should be those that don’t use it.