00:00:03,167 S1: City. Current. Produced by Dakota media access. In-depth discussion with Bismarck and Mandan city officials. Watch on government access channel 602 HD or tune in to radio access 102.5 FM. Always local, always current. 00:00:25,667 S2: And coming up on this edition of City Current. We'll show you the fire department rescue boat that Mandan has on the water right now. We'll talk about retirement from Cooper, from the Mandan Police Department and give you an update on Memorial Highway construction. Thanks for joining us. I'm Tom Gerhardt from Dakota media access, joined by Mandan City Administrator Jim Neubauer. Great to see you again, Jim. 00:00:49,868 S3: Thanks, Tom. It's been a few weeks. 00:00:51,701 S2: It has been a few weeks. 00:00:52,801 S3: We've got 54 degrees out high of 72 today. So enjoying the nice weather while we while we still have it. 00:00:59,167 S2: Oh, gosh. Actually, I was in Mandan last night for my son's football game. Like, that was picture perfect. Fall cool in the morning. Cool at night. Beautiful day. So I got to hold on to these days before snow flies. 00:01:14,200 S3: Right at the old Goldilocks day. Right? That's right. So we enjoy those when they're here. 00:01:18,601 S2: Well, a lot going on at the city commission meeting. We want to start a lot of interesting things in the announcements right last night, including that fire department rescue boat that I mentioned. Will take a look at a couple of photos of that. But I wanted to express appreciation because you guys got some help, uh, getting. 00:01:35,367 S3: Several donations, um, a significant grant from the North Dakota Game and Fish. And we, as Fire Chief Bitz mentioned last night, over the years, we have added, I think he said, over eight miles of shoreline with all of our bays in Mandan. And there's also, obviously the Missouri River that those opportunities for things to go wrong and things to happen along the water have become significantly more important than they have in the past. So again, very grateful to all of the private donations that we've received and also the grants from North Dakota Game and Fish. Folks are busy getting trained on the boat right now while again weather is cooperating very nicely. So again, this boat will be housed down in the fire station two in the Lakewood area. So we're very excited to get this out and operating. 00:02:23,801 S2: Yeah. Cool, cool looking boat. We'll hear a little bit more from Chief Bits later in City Current. Also talking about fire department. Uh, there's an open house coming up that Chief Bits talked about. 00:02:34,767 S3: Absolutely. Um, October is fire prevention month, so we are having the the fire prevention open house at station one downtown on Collins Avenue on October 14th. Next Tuesday night, there will be a parade starting at 630 that usually begins from the up in the Cloverdale area, where Morton County Rural Fire Department is and travels down Sunset and sunset sixth Avenue. Main Street and over to station one. So within station one, all of our full time firefighters, our career firefighters and our part time firefighters will be there with demonstrations on how to handle a hose for kids and try and put fires out. And there's also, um, as always, you know, hot dogs and water and things like that. And several businesses will be down there also entertaining the kids and giving them, you know, fire safety tips. The I think the lines is usually down there checking kids eyes. And there's a couple of other insurance agencies that are helping with ID cards and things like that. So a lot of good activities show up. And also the all important fire truck rides. So if you see the fire trucks rolling around downtown Mandan probably from 7:00 until sometimes it'll go as late as 9:00 with the kids lined up, and that's always a big hit when they get to ride in the fire truck. 00:03:48,000 S2: Who doesn't want to ride in a fire truck or that new fire rescue boat, too? I think. 00:03:52,100 S3: We'll keep that one on the side for now. 00:03:53,601 S2: But we're not. 00:03:54,367 S3: Doing that. I think that will be on display. 00:03:56,167 S2: I'm talking for myself. I got to be able to. Mandan played host 2 to 4 new inductees for the soda music Hall of Fame. And so I know, starting off with the blenders. 00:04:07,667 S3: Yeah. Crazy event held, I think on on the 24th of September at Shrine Park with the blenders and Chuck Suki and Richard Torrance and Skitch Henderson. I believe we're the four inductees. And, you know, it was I think Marlo Anderson called it. We kind of had a music pub crawl. Yeah. So several different things going on in downtown Mandan for that Sunday afternoon, and all kinds of different artists performing in several of the entertainment establishments downtown. So it was I heard it was a very eclectic kind of music going on all. If you weren't into one kind of music. 00:04:46,200 S2: They had. 00:04:46,567 S3: Another walk across the block and there it is for you. So all kinds of different things. 00:04:50,267 S2: You watched the meeting last night. You heard everything from Chuck Suki to Wiz Khalifa. So, uh, Wiz wasn't inducted, but. 00:04:57,467 S3: He was not. 00:04:58,100 S2: There. Put a tie and could be a potential future inductee. Yep. 00:05:02,000 S3: I think what I heard was you had, uh, Brianna Helbing playing in one establishment and across the alley, you had some rap music coming out of the other establishment. And so very, you know, like I said, there's a lot of different things going on and which is always very entertaining and very good for our downtown nightlife. Well, this would have been afternoon if. 00:05:21,667 S2: We took advantage of it. We had a photo of Chuck Suki holding his, uh, induction poster certificate. We had Chuck come over and Justin did a great interview with him and played some of his music, and then we did the same, uh, photo. Richard Torrance's in the middle there, holding up his poster, but we had Richard and Chuck come over and talk about a couple. Great long time North Dakota musicians. It was great to have them on the radio. So if you go to radio access, you can find those shows and really good interviews mixed in with some of their music. 00:05:57,300 S3: So I think Chuck is a is a mandolin, longtime mandolin supporter and Morton County resident. And if I remember right, North Dakota's troubadour. 00:06:06,567 S2: He's the official troubadour of North Dakota. That's right. 00:06:09,167 S3: There we. 00:06:09,501 S2: Go. Yep. 00:06:10,400 S3: Kudos to Chuck, and we're all glad to. He calls Mandan his home. 00:06:14,300 S2: Well, we had a retirement to talk about. I know LeBron James had some people concerned with the social media. I don't know if you saw that, Jim earlier this week, which turned out to be an advertisement for something else. But this has nothing to do with LeBron James or you or me. But Cooper is retiring this week. 00:06:31,701 S3: Absolutely. On Friday at Dayton Park, I believe at 2:00 in the afternoon, we'll have a little ceremony for Cooper is a one of our first. I think he is probably our first canine, um, that joined our force, I think 7 or 8 years ago. And a very generous donation from Bob Cooper, who I think said, hey, we think you need a K-9 on the force and I'll pay for it. And Cooper has been trained and he's he's been an awesome dog to have. I think Josh shear, his sergeant, is his handler now, and he will retire into the home life of just being a dog. And Josh is awful happy to have him. And again, we're very thankful to Bob Cooper and his family for the donation to bring Cooper on board. And he's been great for a lot of our public service things. Cooper is also a working dog. I think Mayor Freilich asks a question about what language does he speak? He did because he was not. He was not giving commands in English. And that is with both of our canines. They the commands are not in English, they are in a different language. So if you're after a bad, a bad actor and they don't say, stop, dog, the dog isn't going to pay attention to you because they will listen to the commands in the language that they have learned. 00:07:47,100 S2: Interesting. And Chief Zeigler, I think, mentioned too, that a replacement will go into the 2027 budget if I heard that right. So there will be another canine down the road. 00:07:55,868 S3: Yep. We have Officer Black with Medved right now and still on the street. And so we'll be a couple of years before we find a replacement for Cooper. And it's not an easy it's don't pull a dog off the street. These are these are very specific for the tasks that they have. And there's a significant amount of training that goes into both the handler and the the animal that is chosen. 00:08:17,167 S2: Another big event taking place in Mandan mid-October, the business pitch challenge. And that's the 15th of October. Doors open at five, you said, and we've got three great finalists. 00:08:28,767 S3: Yeah, three. I think actually, for grade four. I'm sorry. Yes. Um, as a judge yourself, you'll be judging those four finalists October 15th at Central Station again, downtown Mandan. Doors open at 5:00. The presentations will start at 530. So we have the soda drop by Kimberly and Darren Hurts. This is what they call a dirty soda company with food service operation. We also have Pronto Chaw by Vaughn Diner, Michael Storch and Arnie Streb. Streb. Sorry, I know Arnie, so I apologize for butchering your last name. This is a technology platform connecting small businesses and homeowners with local Pronto Pros to complete seasonal residential commercial chores. Probably one of those where if you need help cleaning up your yard this time of year. This is, I think, an app that you could use. We have Learning Loft Childcare by Tawney and Cameron Chaussee. They are a childcare center and we have Dakota Soda by Samantha Roth, which would be a soda shop with craft sodas, specialty drinks, snacks and branded merchandise. So there you go. There's the advertisement for all four of those entities for the Amanda and Business Pitch Challenge. And if you haven't heard of it before, it's similar to if you've watched Shark Tank businesses will make their pitch. They will be judged by an independent panel of judges for some significant awards and prize money, and also packages that local businesses have provided for them. 00:09:54,501 S2: It's been a while since I've been called in to judge spelling friends. The last thing I did was a rhubarb Festival years ago in Washburn, and I didn't realize how serious rhubarb recipes were in North Dakota. So I'm coming in a little cautiously, realizing these are really serious ideas that. 00:10:11,701 S3: Yeah, they are. And if you look at some of our past business pitch businesses that are in places right now, Kids in Motion is a really great example that they have now built their own building. They're in their third location since they got up and going. And like I said, that is one of our prime examples, along with the folks from Copper Dog Cafe. And they have, I think they were the chamber's small business of the year this year. So these competitions, one, it kind of gives a deadline for folks. I've been thinking about opening up a business, and this provides some of that impetus. There's a lot of coaching that goes into this too. So again, it provides that I want to do this. There's a reward at the end of the day. Let me get my in my business plan my information together. Um, if you are fortunate enough to be one of the lucky winners, there's a substantial cash award which comes in the form of a forgivable loan. So try and help out those new entrepreneurs. But again, several businesses have sprouted up and taken off from this when it was first started several years ago. 00:11:12,567 S2: Looking forward to. 00:11:13,200 S3: It. Yeah, it's going to be a fun evening. So again, we encourage folks to you can go to City of Mandan. Com and register so that we get an idea on how to plan and set up and what kind of beverages and food to order for folks. So again, five 30th October, October 15th. 00:11:29,167 S2: Yeah, we can kind of zip through the construction updates. Uh, a lot of big projects going on or winter's coming around the corner, but let's start with Memorial Highway, I think. Last time we talked, you were hoping there would be three underground crews working, and. 00:11:45,200 S3: I think there are several underground crews working now. Right now, if you've been out there for the Wavy bacon ride, and just to assure folks, the wavy bacon will not be there this winter, um, one way or another, contractor has until November 23rd to complete the phase one of this project. Do you see a lot of underground work going on? I think where do we get three inches of rain again on Saturday night into Sunday? Um, so a lot of pooling of water. We did get, I think 1000ft. I say we which does not include me, mind you, I'm not a concrete person, but 1000ft of concrete was put down last week, and I think curb and gutter was installed on the part of the south side of this project. And looking forward to a lot more of that going down in the upcoming coming weeks. 00:12:31,767 S2: Yeah, it's good to see that color stripe. Yes, on the roadway. 00:12:34,901 S3: Very much so. And again, rest assured, folks at the Wavy Bacon Road traveling service. Well, a lot of people get a lot of comments that people really like. This is kind of fun. I guarantee you, it may not be that fun this winter. 00:12:46,868 S2: Um, see a whole new set of circumstances. 00:12:49,267 S3: Um, unfortunately or fortunately, the wavy bacon will go away and hopefully we have, um, five lanes of concrete down before November 23rd. 00:12:56,467 S2: Water treatment plant, phase three. Work continues. 00:13:00,667 S3: Yeah, a lot of Short Creek going on, which is basically concrete being shot up on the walls to form the outside of this structure and looking forward to its completion. But that's one if you're driving by on Collins Avenue, it's about on a daily basis, you can see progress being made. And like I said, very significant 2 million gallon water is of worth to replace the existing 2 million gallon one that we have now. So again, um, good projects going on. We also have the at the water treatment facility, a water treatment plant optimization phase three. I call it probably 333 at the water plant, but again, the lime silo conduit and the concrete site work is being done next to the railroad spur out there. So lots of work going on in town, including the, uh, the what we call the Monte Drive water line replacement project by Lewis and Clark School. 00:13:53,167 S2: I think the last time I saw it was a lot of scaffolding, a. 00:13:55,968 S3: Lot of scaffolding. So work on again, work on the water reservoir has been going really quick. And when this work is done and this reservoir is put into service, the old reservoir will be taken down and all the country will be removed, which. 00:14:12,801 S2: Is next year. 00:14:13,767 S3: Yes, we're looking at probably 2027 or 2026. Interesting. When we were building the new location, it's kind of like we're building reservoirs on top of old reservoirs, but there was some footings and things that were found from the old reservoir. And what we will do when we take down our older reservoirs, we'll pull everything out of there their soul. That in hopefully 100 years, when when all of us are not around, they won't be going. Why didn't they take these things out of here? Back when we will remove all remnants of the old were completely. And also we will pull back the wall on on that intersection that, you know, it's we'll pull it back so there's better sight distance on the the intersection of Collins and Division. 00:14:58,367 S2: And in 2024 and 2025 reconstruction those projects. 00:15:03,567 S3: Uh, continuing on, um, finally, on some of those up in the Illustrator Drive area by Grace King School. And we're also, again, the Monte Drive Waterline project continues, and we're getting close to starting to button a lot of those things up as we go now to. 00:15:18,667 S2: A lot of work that's been done in the last few months, to say the least. 00:15:21,968 S3: Yes. And there will be, you know, it happens every year, this time of year when we're on to October, when we don't know when the weather is going. 00:15:29,167 S2: To. 00:15:29,667 S3: Significantly change. So there's a lot of folks that are very busy right now. 00:15:34,267 S2: I also wanted to remind folks the Art alley ribbon cutting, uh, I guess you're calling it a ribbon cutting is coming up that's really taking shape and showing us some photos last time. 00:15:44,767 S3: Yeah. October 22nd. Um, 5:15 p.m.. We'll do a ribbon cutting in the alley. And if you haven't been through there between kind of behind the, um, butcher block area, um, starring bank, behind, uh, Vickie's sports bar and big six cigars. If you can avoid those driving through that alley, that'd be great. But if you want to take a walk through, please do so, because the artists continue to work and get this project wrapped up. And I say, if you haven't been back there, look, there's some pretty cool stuff going on back there. 00:16:17,367 S2: Just a sample here, but we talked about a few of them last show and really, really great artwork. That's a really nice addition. 00:16:24,167 S3: It is. And it's amazing how many people are coming downtown and walking through the alley and taking a look at. 00:16:30,467 S2: That whole idea. Right. Get the. 00:16:32,167 S3: Idea? Get them downtown. Yeah. Looking this again is one of those projects. It's spawned by a public gathering we had at Central Station a couple of years ago. Talked about, you know, an entertainment district. And also, you know, what we can do. We've got an alley here. How do we make it special? How do we make it a place where people want to come? So this is step one in that process. And the artists, you know, my hat's off to them. They are doing just fantastic work. 00:16:57,667 S2: And you and I can really appreciate good art work. Right? Yeah. 00:17:01,100 S3: Um, much, much more complicated than our stick people. Yes. That we draw and we don't even do those very well. So hats off to those folks. They do a great job. 00:17:10,100 S2: Uh, moving on to the regular agenda, you have a new vice president for the city commission. 00:17:14,501 S3: Yeah. Commissioner Rohrer made a decision that he is currently the vice president of the board. He is indicated that he is not going to run for another term in next June. So he thought it would be good to move out of that vice president spot and put Commissioner Hasan into that vice president spot. So that went off without a hitch. And, you know, as the vice chair of the board, you get to, um, run the meetings when the president of the board is is not in town or things like that. So Commissioner Hasan will be doing a very good job as that comes up. 00:17:50,167 S2: There's a couple other things. Uh, the long term financial planning was adopted last night. Just tell us a little bit about that. It's looking. 00:17:58,300 S3: For kind of. 00:17:58,868 S2: A. 00:17:59,601 S3: Kind of an accumulation again. You've seen some of these things on the agenda over the last couple of months. It's an accumulation of work that was started last January with the city Commission and our finance director, assistant finance director, and all of our departments putting together some long range projections and some plans so that one of those things that happens when you have new mayors and new commissioners, where are we going in the future? And here's what, you know. Part of that is adopting some of those priorities that have been worked on over the last 9 or 10 months. So again, one of those next steps that comes along and says it's not that those plans can't change. We all know that. But we we need a sense of where we're going and how are we planning out items for the future. So we're not just hopping from area to area to area. There's there's a plan. It has significant thought and and input into that plan. And so this is again part of that finalization of wrapping those things up. 00:18:54,167 S2: Some engineering agreements were accepted last night, including one with apex for a master lift station, another with more engineering. 00:19:03,167 S3: Yeah, it kind of goes in in line with your long range financial plan. What projects do you need to work through and what are the priorities? The master lift station is one of those, and also the Street Improvement District project that are part of these engineering agreements. We did a request for qualifications for engineering firms to propose to do the work and group of internal folks scored those proposals and then came to consensus on what do we who do we think best will perform on these projects. And so, you know, for the public stake, we don't go on hand to pick right engineering firms to do projects. There are some that have specialized areas that will may be better suited to do different work. In this case, they would. Several engineering firms had made proposals. Internal scoring came up. And here's who we are recommending that move forward on these projects. So again, projects for the master lift station and the master lift station really is where 75% of our wastewater stream comes to a head and then is moved out to the wastewater treatment plant. So a very significant piece of our infrastructure in town. 00:20:09,701 S2: That is 75%. That's no joke. Yep. Also heard about, uh, considering an RFP, a request for proposal for Fire Station three. So again, this is not committing to a new fire station last night, but just trying to gather more information to be able to make that decision down. 00:20:26,868 S3: It kind of goes along with another item on our on our consent agenda was that we were we had applied for what they call a safer grant, which helps fund police officers and firefighters. We were applied for six firefighter positions, and we were recently made aware of that. We were awarded funds to help pay for those firefighters for the first three years, and then after that, they're on your own. But another way to get our current what we call career firefighters and get staffed up for station one and station two, and then looking forward to the next step would be, all right, we're we also know that we have a need in the northwest part of town. Um, let's start with an architectural firm that we'll look at is we have a location up on old Red trail that we think is. 00:21:11,367 S2: There's a map we have just to give people an idea, uh, in that black box on old Red Trail and Hillside Road. You own some land? 00:21:18,868 S3: Yep. There's some land up there. It's right next to our reservoir that most people may not know. There's another water reservoir up there, but it is one of those that is underground. There's also a communication tower on that site, so we're looking at that as the potential home for a new, um, fire station three. Um, but included in the request for architectural services is part of that will be is this still remain as the best location for new station because you're not only planning it for today, you're looking at what are the next ten, 20, 30 years going to look like for a station. 00:21:52,467 S2: So and an update on the wastewater treatment plan. 00:21:57,267 S3: Yeah, we had we talked about this several times. And it's a we have a master plan that it was done by an engineering firm for the wastewater treatment plant. Again, where that master lift station sends 75% of our waste, is 25 years old and has wastewater, is really caustic. And it really it degrades the equipment that is used to treat it and things like that. So, um, we have a master plan update that has been presented to the commission. And part of this is we're looking at a potential new treatment system out there in a very spendy one. So what we want to do is say, let's have another firm come in and do what we call a peer review. Let's look at what has been proposed. If it's proposed and within kind of dollar wise, it makes sense on what these things cost. You know, let's just have another set of eyes and also another set of that other set of eyes we'll be looking at. Is that the right technology, um, treating wastewater over the past 20, 30 years, significant changes. And so what's being proposed and again, is a matter of going, is this the right solution or might there be something else? It might be less costly or there might be better treatment provided in the future. So again, having a second set of eyes to look over what's been proposed to date, I think makes some sense on a project of this magnitude and. 00:23:16,267 S2: Finally under resolutions and ordinances. The 2026 city budget right was accepted. 00:23:24,000 S3: Yeah. So we you know, if we walk back into our preliminary budget proposal was made in early August and we had the budget hearing three weeks ago where the public can come in and make comments, and we received, I think, one written question and we answered that question for that individual. We have not received any other feedback on the budget. So last so we did that last meeting and then this meeting was the adoption of the final final budget for 2026. So that's done. And we'll we'll that was sent over to the county by Gregor finance director last night. And they have what they need to do to start their work. 00:24:02,367 S2: And then a couple of months off and start all over again. 00:24:04,567 S3: A couple months and and that is it. Budget season really never. 00:24:08,567 S2: Never. 00:24:08,801 S3: Ends. It is a continuous and there's always new things that come up. So um, but it's a matter of, you know, for the for the public out there. We're looking at I think at the end of the day, the overall property valuation increase is about 3.5%. Our budgetary increase, I think after we said it was 2.3%, I think at the last meeting, after some finalization from the county on the on the library budget numbers, I think we're at 2.2%. So when we hear 3% budget cap, we are well within that 3%. We've we've met the the conditions at the Legislative Assembly set out for us. And not to say that that won't be challenging in the future, but we were able to do it this year. And like I said, as our goal is to make sure that we're using our resources as responsibly and efficiently as we can. 00:25:02,300 S2: We just went through a lot of topics like. 00:25:04,367 S3: Yes, it. 00:25:04,667 S2: Was. 00:25:05,667 S3: Very much so. A lot of things on the agenda, um, you know, we we from a staffing standpoint, we appreciate all of our commissioner's commissioners time in working through those budgetary issues, not only for the last month and a half, but for all of our planning sessions and working sessions that we had started last January. So again, big lift by all of our commissioners, big lift by all of our departments. And kudos to all of them for putting in the time and the effort and presenting a needs based budget, not necessarily just a well, we would like to have this and we would like to have that. We kind of whittled a lot of those things down to here's what is needed. 00:25:41,367 S2: Well, if you didn't get to see the City Commission meeting live last night, make sure you download our Dakota media access app and you can watch whenever you want from wherever you are. We also have our radio access app that you can download and listen to all the great local music and local music producers. And if you have a smart TV, if you have Roku or Fire Stick, you can download cable Cast and find the meetings at home and watch from the comfort of your living room. So, Jim, until next time, thanks to all of you for joining us on City Current. 00:26:15,367 S3: Thank you. 00:26:15,667 S1: Tom, for more information on what was discussed in this episode of City Current, visit city of Mandan. Com or call (700) 166-7321 five. If you have any suggestions, comments or issues you would like addressed in Future City Current episodes, contact us at info at Free TV. This program airs on Government Access channel two and 602 in HD or on Radio Access 102.5 FM. It's also available as a podcast on radio access and as a video viewing link at free TV. Thanks for tuning in to this edition of City Current.