Star Tribune reporter Laurie Blake had a very nice article in yesterday’s Star Tribune about Eden Prairie Street Division employee Mike Schmidt. Mike has worked for the City for ten years. He is a bright guy. In addition to his talents in the truck with a plow, which you’ll read about in the story below, [...]
Monthly Archives: December 2007
Safety of CFLs
December 27, 2007 – 8:16 am
I got back into the office today and started to go through my mail, email and voice mail when I read this message in my email box from last week:
Dear Mr. Neal,
I noticed the “Change a light” link on the home page of our city’s website. I love these lights and have installed many in [...]
The Budget is Done
December 20, 2007 – 8:07 am
We’re done. It’s finished. The 2008-2009 City budget was approved by the City Council at its meeting on Tuesday night. At just a few minutes over 4 hours, it was the longest Council meeting of the year, but the City has a budget for the upcoming biennium. Today’s posting is the internal release we posted [...]
A Major Award
December 18, 2007 – 12:45 pm
There’s one thing I know for sure. The city manager always gets more credit and more blame than he or she deserves. When I get more credit than I deserve, I like to share it. When I get more blame than I deserve, I like to repress it. All in all, it works OK.
Last week [...]
Friday Report for December 14, 2007
December 14, 2007 – 1:15 pm
Here’s my Friday Report to the City Council for Friday, December 14, 2007:
Friday Report
1. MLC Legislative Program is Approved - The Municipal Legislative Commission Board of Directors unanimously approved the draft 2008 legislative program at the board meeting in Shoreview yesterday.
2. Joint Meeting with Planning Commission - Our Workshop for Tuesday, Dec. 18 is [...]
Do We Want It, Or Not?
December 13, 2007 – 8:29 am
I get a daily email from Governing magazine that highlights a wide spectrum of government issues from around the United States and the world. I always take a quick glance at the headline links, even if I don’t have much time to read the stories at the moment. If it’s interesting, I’ll come back to [...]
A Very Common Question
December 12, 2007 – 8:43 am
I get many questions about my blog. Besides the standard “Why do you do it?” and “How do you have time to do it?”, the most common question I receive is very much in line with the following question that I got last week:
Mr. Neal,
We recently implemented a “President’s Page” on our Village Website. [...]
Suburban Legend?
December 11, 2007 – 4:07 pm
There was a good article in the Star Tribune business section from last week that is worth a quick read. The article was written by Larry Werner and appeared in the December 4 edition of the paper under the title “Suburban Legend“.
The article describes the fortuitous actions of a young city planner in Edina by [...]
The New 212 is Open
December 7, 2007 – 7:54 am
It’s open today. Well, it’s supposed to be open today. The new portion of The New Highway 212 is supposed to open for traffic today from its current temporary ending spot in Eden Prairie at Dell Road all the way out to the interchange with Highway 41 in Chanhassen. The new highway was planned to [...]
