2022 Vol 16, Issue 4 July Gem Lake News

Home

Gem Lake News Page 4 of 6 City News Recycling by the Number An impressive 91.66% of Gem Lake residents participated in curb-side recycling last year. A total of 28.3 tons of materials were picked up in 2021. This material broke down as follows: • 16.7 tons of newspaper • 3.6 tons of glass • 1.1 tons of cans (aluminum and steel) • 4.0 tons of OCC and mixed paper (cardboard) • 1.0 tons of plastic • .02 tons of scrap steel • 1.7 tons of residue (items that cannot be recycled) Your participation in Gem Lake’s recycling is greatly appreciated. Of course, our numbers will continue to be good if our vendor actually picks up our recycling. Due to driver shortages, we have had major and ongoing problems. We are in daily contact with our vendor. You are going to be receiving a letter shortly or have already received a letter explaining the situation in more detail. Charitable Gambling Donations Made The Gem Lake City Council voted to donate $1000 to the White Bear Lake Emergency Food Shelf to help fund their summer lunch program for kids. This donation was approved at the June 21 Council Meeting and was done as a result of charitable gambling receipts the city received. License Required for Rental Properties in City If you are renting out your property in Gem Lake, you need a rental license. If you own rental property but are not currently renting it, you still need to fill out a rental license application to keep the City updated. The application process is easy. Fill out the form located on our website, which can be found under “Permits” or contact Melissa Lawrence, City Clerk, pay a license fee (if you are actively renting), and go through a brief inspection of the property by our code enforcement officer. We check for things like smoke detectors. Call 651-747-2790 to find out more. Free Notary Services Residents of Gem Lake and White Bear Township can get notary services at Heritage Hall for no charge. The service is available only during normal business hours for our city hall—which is Monday to Thursday from 7:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Non-residents can utilize this service for a fee of $5.00 per document certified. Two Positions Opening on the Gem Lake City Council There will be two positions up for election on the Gem Lake City Council. The terms of Council Members Jim Lindner and Len Cacioppo will expire at the end of 2022. Council member terms run four years. If you are interested in running for election, you must file with the County between August 2-16 and pay a fee of $2. You can file either at Heritage Hall or at the county. You must be at least 21, be a current resident and be eligible to vote. For more information, see the Ramsey County website under the election section. License Required for Dogs in City Dog license tags issued in 2021 expired on May 31 of this year. Any dog over 6 months in age is required to be licensed by the City of Gem Lake. A reminder letter and application was sent out April 28 to all Gem Lake residents. If you have misplaced the application, it can be found on the Gem Lake website, under “Permits.” The application has a space for information on up to three dogs. Proof of rabies vaccination must be supplied, along with the application. The fee per dog is $10. At a recent city council meeting, it was voted and approved to have dog licenses run on a calendar year schedule. With that change, all dog licenses issued for the 2022 cycle, will be good through December 31, 2023. The fee will remain the same for this one-time period. After that, all dog licenses will run January 1- December 31. The dog license tags you will get this year, were created before this change and will show an expiration of 5-31-2022. Don’t worry, they will be good until the end of the 2023. Call 651-747-2790 with any questions.