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ARDEN HILLS CITY COUNCIL - AUGUST 27,2001 5 . Mayor Probst stated his expectation that there would be levy limits and local government would be blasted for not monitoring taxes. Councilmember Aplikowski stated the city should protect itself. She noted they could always reduce the levy. She noted people have liked the activities and liked being served. She added this was what they have heard all summer. She stated she felt more comfortable with raising the levy than she might have been. Councilmember Rem stated the newsletter committee meeting would be on Wednesday morning. She noted the front page would deal with the tax levy issue. She added she had several concerns regarding the budget. She stated there needed to be a discussion on several issues including the Day in the Park Budget, staff reorganizations, increases in insurance for staff, and loss of some economic development funds. She noted she was concerned about the staff reorganization. She asked if it could be postponed. She added they needed to give serious consideration that someone should be in the public works position to give them feedback from the people doing the work. She stated they needed someone to pull that information together and put it before council. She noted Mr. Moore had done a fine job on the park side, but public works was a full time job previously. She added the longer this went on they would be hurting themselves. She stated they do not know if the streets and water mains were having problems. She noted they were not able to make decisions without all of the information. Mayor Probst stated they should to stay the course with the staff reorganization. He noted if they had concerns, they needed to get the consultant in and get going on it. . Councilmember Larson concurred with the Mayor on the staff changes, but agreed with Councilmember Rem on pavement management. He stated he did not see how they were going to get to a pavement management project this year. He noted he would rather do what needs to be done to have a good project next year. He added he agreed with Councilmember Rem's observation that having no public works director had made this more difficult. Councilmember Grant concurred with Councilmember Rem's comments on the reorganization and its timing. He stated it was discretionary. He noted it was a sizable sum of money relative to the budgetary needs and the loss of state aid. Councilmember Aplikowski stated she was more concerned with getting something up and running. She noted they were limping along although people were working hard. She added she wished it did not take so long. She stated when they approved this back in February or March it seemed simple. She noted it would take another three months before they received the information and three more months to hire someone. She added it was taking so long, but they had all agreed to it. . Councilmember Aplikowski stated there was a bigger issue there on the Day in the Park. She noted the event as they had known in the past could happen again. She added if they needed to go out every year and solicit funds for extra things, they would have trouble getting volunteers to do that. She stated they would need to look to setting up a volunteer group or have staff do it.