Sherburne County Sheriff Joel Brott attended Tuesday evening’s Clear Lake City Council meeting to provide the annual report on activity within the city.

Brott reported that there were 521 law enforcement contacts within the city in 2021, which can range from traffic stops to more serious calls such as DUIs or burglaries.

The number of calls was up significantly from 2020, but those numbers were lower across the county due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Once again, Brott noted that there were zero assaults within the city for the third year in a row, and also thefts and criminal damage to property incidents were both down from prior years.

The Sheriff went on to explain his office’s participation in a grant program to provide the Crisis Intervention Co-Responder Initiative, where a mental health professional is trained to respond along with law enforcement to certain calls.  In addition to the Sheriff’s Office, several police departments in the county are participating.

“It’s been a tremendous program for the Sheriff’s Office,” Brott noted, explaining also that the grant cycle will expire after two years. “Once the grant funding expires, we will have to decide if we are going to fund it.”

Brott noted his office is “all-in already” with the program being just several months old and he expects that they will continue the co-responder program well into the future.

Brott also shared several national accreditations that his office has achieved in the last year, including one for the dispatch center, as well as in the jail.

“Our dispatch center is one of the few in the state that has attained the accreditation, which is tied to national standards,” Brott said. “We’re very proud of that and any time we can hold ourselves to these national standards, we are achieving our goal of offering the best services possible to the public.”

Mayor Tim Goenner thanked Brott for his office’s continued service and partnership with the city.

“You guys are around quite a bit and you do a great job,” Goenner said.

Sewer Issue

Residents Kelly and Cole VanderHeyden were present at the meeting to discuss a sewer issue that they had at their residence recently when the main sewer pipe near their neighborhood was getting cleaned, or “jetted.”

According to the couple, pressure that built up inside the pipe during the cleaning process caused water to back up into their home and their toilets to overflow with sewer water.

They were asking the city to reimburse costs of $354 that they incurred to clean up after the issue.

There had been some discussion that the issue could have been caused by a blockage inside their house or a possible issue with their venting. They had companies come out to inspect their venting, as well as their plumbing and no issues were discovered.

Public Works Director Dustin Luhning and City Engineer Keith Yapp both discussed the issue, noting that there can be a variety of factors that can cause a backflow issue.

However, since the timing to the backup coincided with the jetting, the VanderHeyden’s still felt the city should do something to help rectify any similar situations in the future.

After a lengthy discussion, council acted upon the advice of their attorney to not issue reimbursement, as that could set a precedent for future issues. They did pledge, however, to work to notify residents in the future when the jetting is occurring so people can be on the lookout for any issues.  The jetting usually occurs every four years.

In Other Action, the Council:

• Heard from Brott, who also delivered last month’s statistics, including 25 calls for service;

• Decided to continue to investigate the replacement of the radar speed sign for Hwy. 24;

• Passed a resolution to explore financing and other logistics for the maintenance required on the city’s water tower;

• Reminded the public that the Clearwater/Clear Lake Sewer Authority is looking for a member at-large to attend the bi-monthly meetings and help in the decision making process;

• Heard from Goenner that the CLFD will be moving to getting paid hourly for their training rather than a stipend as soon as the fire board approves the change;

• Approved the hiring of a seasonal on-call employee to help with snow plowing duties in case Luhning is unavailable;

• Discussed the tear down and disposal of the city’s nitrate plant. Yapp explained that there is probably little value in the plant other than scarp metal materials since there was only one other plant like it in the entire state of MN and that one may have already been decommissioned;

• Discussed two development projects that may move forward with new phases this summer – both Parkside and Hunter Lake Bluffs.