Agenda - Council Work Session - 02/27/2018

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General Government supply. Metro Cities supports current law authorizing cities to regulate and prohibit the placement of private wells within municipal utility service boundaries and opposes any attempt to remove or alter that authority. Metro Cities supports funding that can be used to cap private wells. 2-N Organized Waste Collection Cities over 1,000 in population are required by law to ensure all residents have solid waste collection available to them. A city can meet the statutory requirement by licensing haulers to operate in an open collection system, authorize city employees to collect waste, or implement organized collection through one or multiple haulers to increase efficiency, reduce truck traffic and control costs to residents. Metro Cities supports current laws that allow cities to work with existing haulers to achieve the benefits of organized collection or investigate the merits of organized collection without the pressure of a rigid timeline and requirement to pass 'an intent to organize' at the beginning of the discussion process. Metro Cities opposes any legislation that would further increase the cost or further complicate the process cities are required to follow to organize waste collection or prohibit cities from implementing, expanding or using organized waste collection. 2-0 Election Administration Cities play a critical role in managing and ensuring the integrity of elections. Any changes made to election laws should not place undue financial or administrative burdens on local governments. Additional costs resulting from election law changes should be the responsibility of the state. Eligible voters in Minnesota may vote by absentee ballot prior to Election Day. Starting 46 days before the election, a voter can request, receive and cast an absentee ballot in one visit to their county or city election offices. As more and more voters choose to vote early with absentee balloting, improvements must be made to increase efficiency of administering absentee balloting before Election Day, reduce the potential for errors and to improve voter experience. Metro Cities supports: • 2016 laws allowing in -person absentee voters to place their ballots in a secure tabulator, and statutory changes to allow this for the duration of absentee voting • Establishing an earlier deadline for ending in -person absentee voting; 2018 Legislative Policies 16