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ARDEN HILLS CITY COUNCIL WORK SESSION — DECEMBER 8, 2025 Ms. Springer highlighted some key information from the survey results. Comments included dog parks, a desire for the Lake Johanna trail connection to Tony Schmidt and access to year-round shelters. The top three desired amenities are trails, nature playgrounds and water features. The survey was a success with 874 respondents and there were over 2,700 comments to the open ended survey questions. Ms. Springer said the key takeaways are the strong demand for trail connectivity and safety, the desire for modern amenities and inclusive features, and a desire to maintain the natural character while improving maintenance across the system. Ms. Springer said the public engagement events generated nuanced conversations regarding specific places in the City where residents would like to see improvements. Discussion ensued regarding the survey results and Council was surprised how certain amenities that they thought would be important, barely showed up. Ms. Springer said the steering committee has met three times, so far. She outlined the work the committee has done so far in regards to the community engagement and the findings. The committee will meet for their fourth meeting in early February and they will review the draft plan, including refined recommendations and findings from a prioritization activity that the steering committee will participate in. Ms. Springer highlighted some of the recommendations that will be included in the plan. Specifically the plan will recommend improvements on things like updating the aging boards on the hockey rinks and Perry and Freeway Parks, improvements to the ball field at Perry, improvements to the basketball courts at Sampson and Cummings and replacing tennis/pickleball court at Hazelnut Park. Councilmember Monson said that these specific improvements have not been mentioned or highlighted in the earlier slides. Ms. Springer said they are taking all of the information they have gotten from the survey and from their analysis of the parks, including adding data from the GIS inventory. That will inform the plan outline. Parks and Recreation Manager Skalicky said the presentation earlier outlined results from the community engagement piece, only. This specifically includes engagement plus the information collected during the inventory. This is a summary of everything combined. Ms. Springer said some of the inventory is very detailed and you really have to spend time digging into it. There is a spreadsheet that show the elements that have just been replaced, as well as the elements that are coming to the end of their useful life. These recommendations include everything. Councilmember Holden said the Rotary used to paint the boards on the hockey rinks. She wondered if the boards are rotting or do they just need a new coat of paint.