City of Eden Prairie Blogs

Today Assistant Chief Scott Taylor attended the Spring Grant Awards ceremony hosted by the Eden Prairie Foundation.  The foundation is a non-profit group that raises money to support various groups in our city. 

Over the years the Foundation has issued grants totaling more that $100,000 to the Fire Department.  The grants have been for such items as our first Thermal Imaging Camera, defibrillators and a joint effort with the EP Lions and Ep Moms Club for a Safety Awareness Trailer to name just a few.

This Spring we applied for a received a $5,000 grant for radios to enable our CERT members to communicate with our command and control structure during an emergency.  Scott Taylor’s role as one of my Assistant Chiefs is to oversee the CERT program.  The grant will fund radios, a vital communications tool that will serve our CERT members well when they are called into action to support emergency response during a disaster situation.  We believe that having a thriving CERT program is another valuable tool available within our Public Safety strategy in the event of a wide-scale emergency.

 We are fortunate to have such great support in our community for our initiatives.  Without the support of groups like the Eden Prairie Foundation our operations would not be as robust as they are today.  Thank you to the members and supporters of the Eden Prairie Foundation and to the other community groups that tirelessly raise money to support the high quality of life we enjoy in this outstanding community!

Last Wednesday I went to court. The 3rd Division of the 4th District Court, to be exact. It’s at the Rdigedale Service Center in Minnetonka adjacent to Ridgedale Mall. For the record, I was not, and am not, in any trouble. No, I went to court to observe the a typical day in the life of our City Prosecutor Ms. Jennifer Inz.

This was Eden Prairie City Court day at Ridgedale. It is the day that people charged with crimes by our Police Department come into Court to get adjudicated. There were people there with lawyers, but most of them came alone to represent themselves.

Ms. Inz started the morning with 97 cases to resolve that day. I observed her until Noon. By that time I’m guessing that she had resolved more than 30 of them. Most of the crimes on her docket that day were traffic crimes. There was the guy that was caught doing 97 mph in a 60 mph zone. He pleaded not guilty because there was another car exactly like his in the exact same location at 2:00 am in the morning doing 97 in a 60. There was a student charged with assault. There was a guy charged with his 6th DUI. There were lots of DUI defendents. Most of them pleading guilty. There was a lady who shoplifted some sunglasses and ended up paying a $300 fine. Another that took some water softner salt. And another that took some watches and jewelry.

Ms. Inz is talking to defendents, listening to the judge and fending off pesky defense attorneys all at the same time. She is interuppeted constantly by defense attorneys asking some version of the question: ” Hey Jennifer, what are the chances of………” She fielded questions from defendents about why they could not get public defenders and why they could not resolve their cases today and why they could not get out of their punishment. She even fielded questions from defense attorneys looking for Minnetonka City Court and Mound City Court cases.

I learned alot. I know what a C-WOP is: Continuance without a plea. That just means you get to/have to take another day off and come back to the Court to resolve your issue. It was unbelievable to me the amount of paper in the Court. We spend a fair amount of time in city government reducing our use of paper files. In the court system paper files and paper everything is everywhere. That made an impression on me.

Another impression I came away with was how much volume is moving through our Court system. The docket for the day was overflowing, and so was the docket for the next day, and so on. I’m not sure what the answer to that problem is, but I hope someone is thinking about it.

I’ve been thinking about going to observe City Court for a long time now. I could never really fit it into my schedule. But am I ever glad that I went. It was interesting and educational to see it close up. Now I will have to go again on a Wednesday afternoon to see City jury trials. That’ll be interesting too.

No real blog action from me this week as it has been a crazy one.  Earlier this week we were up early, 0400 hrs on Wednesday to kick-off our Women’s Fire Service Expo.  Firefighter/Administrative Assistant Kim hanlon has been the driving force behind this program.  The idea is to have a one day program for women interested in exploring becoming a firefighter.  The morning media blitz has resulted in good interest.

Next up was our bid opening for a replacement ladder truck.  After that was an all afternoon training session on some new radios that will allow our Fire command staff to communicate more easily with our mutual aid partners when we go to another city or have other fire departments come here to help battle large scale fires and other emergencies.

My hope is for a safe and enjoyable holiday weekend for everybody.  A good chance to recharge the “batteries” and get back at it next week.

I took the opportunity this week to sit down and talk with two of the City’s Recreation Division staff members, Beth Degree and Nicole Weedman, about a program they run together called Girls on the Run.

There are two things I’ve always liked about this program. First, I like the catchy program title. Kind of provocative. It makes you want to find out more about the program. And second, I like the way this program integrates physical fitness with other important life lessons for young girls.

As the father of three boys, I know nothing about parenting young girls - except that I think it must be more difficult than parenting young boys. Beth and Nicole, as young women themselves, know the challenges that young face and teach the girls strategies for addressing many of those challenges in this program through the discipline (and fun) of physical fitness.

That’s enough from me. I’ll let the Beth and Nicole explain the rest. The photos are from the program ending race that took place last weekend. Enjoy Girls on the Run.