Around 80 people packed into the Forest Lake City Council chamber Jan. 23, most there to discuss the future of local police service, after the Forest Lake Personnel Committee initiated a request for a proposal from the Washington County Sheriff’s Office to contract law enforcement services in Forest Lake.

The Personnel Committee, which is made up of Councilmen Ed Eigner and Michael Freer, City Administrator Aaron Parrish and Assistant City Administrator Dan Undem, initiated the request at its Jan. 18 meeting following a discussion about filling an open position in the Forest Lake Police Department. The request does not mean that the city has initiated steps to discontinue the services of the Forest Lake Police Department, but the stated goal on the city’s website is to evaluate whether county law enforcement service in the city is feasible and what kind of impact the change would have on the city’s budget. During the Jan. 23 City Council meeting, multiple council members stressed that no decisions about the Police Department’s future have been made.

“All we have done is to ask Washington County Sheriff’s (Office) for information,” Mayor Ben Winnick said. “There has currently not been any decisions made regarding Forest Lake working with the Washington County Sheriff’s (Office) for police and public safety services.”

Before the meeting, Winnick told The Forest Lake Times that the proposal could reveal that the city’s current police arrangement is best for the community or that a contract service could be better, or even that some combination of local police and sheriff’s deputies be utilized.

A proposal request letter sent by the city to Sheriff Bill Hutton states that city officials still hear positive feedback from residents about the law enforcement services the sheriff’s department provided to rural Forest Lake residents before the annexation of the township by the city, as well as positive feedback from other communities where the contract law enforcement services are still provided, like Hugo and Scandia. The letter stated that the city’s Personnel Committee was interested in “exploring alternative approaches” to local law enforcement and asked that a proposal from the county include an expected staffing profile and transition and implementation plans for a contract.

News of the committee action spread quickly. During the council’s Jan. 23 meeting, a long open forum session ensued, with most of the resident speakers voicing their opposition to contracting with the sheriff’s office. Some argued that the council should even halt the request process, as they felt it was unnecessary and potentially demoralizing for current Forest Lake officers. Though some of the speakers acknowledged that economies of scale might make law enforcement service cheaper for the city, they argued that the department offers many less tangible benefits that they doubted the county could provide, including community investment and engagement and an undivided focus on Forest Lake. The assembled crowd was raucous at times, applauding most of the speakers after being asked to hold their applause by Winnick and bristling at various council member remarks.

“They make me feel safe,” Kristy Schauls said of Forest Lake’s officers. “I know who they are; I love that they live in this town. They care about our town, and when they’re off duty, they’re still on duty.”

Mark Finnemann suggested that part of some residents’ concerns about the request came from a lack of public engagement. Though the idea of getting a law enforcement contract comparison has come up under previous councils, it has not been discussed at council meetings recently. Freer reminded the council that he had proposed such a comparison during past budget cycles as an alternative to a police layoff. In addition, not all of the council members knew it would be discussed at the Personnel Committee meeting; an agenda for the meeting listed “Police Recruitment” as an agenda item but did not include other specifics.

“I think what you’re seeing here is a group of people who were surprised at something, and they shouldn’t have been surprised at something,” Finnemann said.

One of a couple of residents who didn’t speak against the proposal request was Elvin Norby, who said the city could be well served by a contract with the sheriff’s office that still left the Police Department intact. He said that a mix of services that included the county patrolling some of the more rural parts of Forest Lake while the police focused on the more populous portions of town closer to the heart of the city would allow law enforcement to have a better focus and more localized service.

“I think from the standpoint of economics, we could hire some cheap sheriff’s people to patrol the outskirts, so to speak, and not expect Chief Peterson to send his people out to us in the boonies,” he said.

Councilman Sam Husnik and Councilwoman Mara Bain were also dismayed at the Personnel Committee action; both of them indicated that they had not been told such a discussion would be occurring before the Jan. 18 meeting.

“Shame on me for not asking better questions about committee authority, that a committee of two council members could launch a process that’s this disruptive to the community,” she said. “I won’t make that mistake again.”

Bain added that she thought such a process was premature without more community input and without the city coming up with more certain ideas of the kind of law enforcement standards it would expect from a contracted service.

Husnik was more blunt. He asserted that the Police Department does a great job of serving the city as is and alleged that he and Bain were shut out of the decision-making process on the request, comparing the move to a “backroom deal.”

“It’s the very thing that you guys complained and whined about when the YMCA came to town,” he said of not being involved with the request decision. “Mara and I were not invited to the party.”
Eigner, Freer and Winnick all said that discussions about the county vs. city law enforcement stretch back through previous councils. Eigner said his intent as a Personnel Committee member was not to get the ball rolling on replacing the Police Department but to get the information needed to settle contention over which agency could provide the best service – financially, in regard to staffing levels, and in regard to other areas and special concerns.

“It may well come out that we just stay with what we’ve got because it’s better. I don’t know,” he said. But I know one thing. If you don’t look at it, you’ll never find out the answer. You’re always going to have this contention about ‘I want Washington County.’ ‘I want the old township. ‘I want Forest Lake.’”

Parrish said that many of the questions residents and council members have about specific service areas will be able to be better answered once the sheriff’s office submits a proposal. The city does not know how long the proposal process will take; Parrish said the city might not get a proposal for a couple of months or longer.

“We’re light on specific answers given the fact that we need to go through this process of getting a proposal and then that’s where the more robust public conversation starts on whether or not it makes sense,” he said.

Bain said she wanted a workshop to be set up quickly for the council to discuss its and the public’s law enforcement priorities in more detail, an event Freer said he was open to. As of press time, no date for such a workshop had been announced.

During the meeting, Police Chief Rick Peterson thanked his staff for their professionalism during the process and said he welcomed the proposal as a chance to showcase the department’s strengths.

“It will give us the chance to display our many community partnerships and our efficiencies of adapting to an ever-changing law enforcement environment,” he said.

Both Peterson and Winnick read from prepared statements before the more informal discussion, which are included here.

mayor-statement chief-statement

Here is some of the latest news and opinions around Forest Lake regarding the city’s request for a proposal for contract law enforcement through the Washington County Sheriff’s Office.

The city has scheduled a special work session at 6:30 p.m. Feb. 6 that will include a discussion of the city’s guiding principles while it engages in process of evaluating contract law enforcement. The agenda packet for the meeting is available on the city’s website.

On Jan. 29, Councilwoman Mara Bain wrote a letter to the commissioners of Washington County regarding the contract law enforcement request. In the letter, she discussed the nature in which the request was made and urged the commissioners to listen to public feedback about the request. Her letter is available here.

Local readers began writing letters to the Forest Lake Times last week regarding the issue. These letters can be found in The Times’ Feb. 3 issue and online here.

Mayor Ben Winnick wrote a guest column for The Times regarding the contract law enforcement evaluation process and the reasoning behind the request. His column will be published in the Feb. 9 issue and is available here.

Photos and video by Ryan Howard
A group of protestors that topped out at around 25 people stood in front of Forest Lake City Hall for about an hour Feb. 6 to protest the city’s request for a contract law enforcement proposal from the Washington County Sheriff’s Office.

The Forest Lake City Council scheduled a special work session Feb. 6 to discuss the guiding principles of its evaluation of moving to contract law enforcement services, as well as to discuss the airport overrun cost dispute.

As it was at the council’s Jan. 23 meeting, the council chamber was packed with residents who wanted to speak or hear about the latest developments on the law enforcement issue, which was brought to the spotlight after the city’s Personnel Committee authorized a request for a proposal for contracted services from the Washington County Sheriff’s Office.

Unlike the Jan. 23 meeting, the Feb. 6 meeting was preceded by a protest by about 25 residents, who stood outside the Forest Lake City Center for an hour before the meeting to protest the proposal request. Their conversation was quiet and reserved – including with council members, as both Mara Bain and Michael Freer stopped to speak with them about their concerns – but the message of the protest was more pointed: The protesters reserved room on three signs for the names of Freer, Councilman Ed Eigner (the two councilmen on the Personnel Committee) and Mayor Ben Winnick, alleging that each man “does not support our police.” The protest was a physical manifestation of a sizable online movement to keep the Police Department intact – an online petition to keep the department was at more than 2,200 signatures at press time and a locally based Facebook group called “We love our cops” was close to clearing 1,000 likes.

Inside the council chamber, the pointed criticism continued, with multiple residents urging the council not to consider any action that could result in the disbanding of the Forest Lake Police Department. Among the speakers were Russ Peterson, whose statement questioning the motives behind the request got a standing ovation, and Jennifer Snell, who feared that contracted services would result in longer wait times that residents couldn’t afford.

“I was in a severe accident on (State Highway) 97 about 12 years ago where I got T-boned, and had it not been for the prompt response of the Forest Lake Police Department, administering emergency services at the time, I probably would not be here today,” she said.

On the other side of the issue, Planning Commissioner Eric Langness defended the proposal request, saying that the city was lucky to be able to compare the excellent service provided by both the Police Department and the Sheriff’s Office. He urged council members not to prejudge the wisdom of using contracted services until the sheriff’s office proposal comes back to the city.

“We should be grateful that we have choices, and … during a decision making process like this, I applaud you for looking at all the options,” he said.

The council reviewed a brief document presented by City Administrator Aaron Parrish, who outlined some guidelines on which the city would evaluate a contract law enforcement approach. Parrish acknowledged that though it would be difficult to provide an “apples to apples” comparison for some facets of law enforcement, as the local police have different approaches to public safety in place than sheriff’s deputies do, he said that the comparison would include benchmarks that would look at the two agencies’ patrol coverage, community policing and more. The comparisons would include a look at whether becoming part of a larger law enforcement whole by switching to a sheriff’s office contract could result in better technology use, law enforcement innovation and positioning for future needs at challenges. The city will also examine how the economy of scale might result in cost savings for Forest Lake’s law enforcement budget, taking into account one-time expenses like unemployment benefits that the city would incur with a switch to contract.

Parrish mentioned, and Winnick reiterated as “fundamental,” that the city was planning on keeping the same level or greater of patrol coverage in the city should a switch occur, and Parrish said that should the Police Department be broken up, the city would seek to include current police staff in the ranks of local Sheriff’s Office law enforcement. Winnick added that it was important to him that the local deputies assigned to Forest Lake would be stationed in the city during their duty hours, allowing them to respond to a crime with the same speed as a police officer. A sheriff’s office use or reuse of the current city Police Department will also be part of the upcoming discussion.

Bain wanted to modify the principles to include a more aggressive public notification and input plan, as well as the inclusion of additional services that the city wanted to “meet or exceed” their current levels. She also asked that the council add another principle regarding the importance of local control, but Freer thought this was an attempt to tilt the process against considering contracted service.

“It would seem to me that it’s in our public interest to maintain that local control,” Bain said, adding that law enforcement vision, policy, budget and service standards as some of the items she thought the council would like to maintain control over in any law enforcement system.

“I think you’re making arguments about why we shouldn’t do it rather than trying to make ideas on what the standards would be, looking ahead at the contract,” Freer replied.

Eigner said that Bain had good ideas for important standards but added his belief that many of those issues would be addressed naturally during the proposal process.

“I would think the things you mentioned will be part of that proposal,” he said. “I would hope they would be, and I would be very upset if they’re not.”

Councilman Sam Husnik stressed the importance of city transparency during the process, voicing again his concern that neither he nor Bain knew that the Personnel Committee would be discussing contract law enforcement until after it had approved the proposal request. After further council discussion, members agreed that Bain would meet with Parrish to brainstorm community input questions to be used throughout the process.

The Forest Lake Police Department’s K-9 unit, Ranger, died after assisting local law enforcement with a traffic stop on Feb. 7. His end of watch was listed at 12:38 a.m. Feb. 8. The cause of death for the police dog is still under investigation, but preliminary results suggest that it was cardiac arrest.

According to reports from the Forest Lake Police Department and Washington County Sheriff’s Office, the Minnesota State Patrol attempted to conduct a stop on a vehicle for a traffic violation on a state patrol-monitored road. A state patrol car followed the vehicle onto a side road near the intersections of State Highway 97 and U.S. Highway 61, where Forest Lake police assisted on the stop around 11:30 p.m. An occupant of the car (whose name has not yet been released) was allegedly not compliant with officer instructions. Eventually, Ranger was deployed to bring the person into compliance, and an arrest was made.

Shortly after the arrest was made, Ranger had a medical emergency and became unresponsive while in his assigned squad car. Resuscitation was attempted at the University of Minnesota Veterinary Hospital, but the veterinarians there were unable to revive him, and he was declared dead.

Ranger, a German shepherd, was a familiar face to many community members, as he and his handling officer Nick Kent were often part of the department’s community outreach events. In 2013, Kent and Sergeant Mark Richert started the “Run With Ranger” 5K event, which raised money for the Lakes Area Youth Service Bureau and helped familiarize the public with the department’s K-9 program. Ranger was with the department for seven years.

Ranger was the department’s only K-9 service animal. Acquiring a dog to fill the position would require City Council approval.

Currently the department in unsure whether a service to commemorate Ranger will be a public or private event. More details about the traffic stop will be released as they become available. The department is unsure if Ranger’s medical emergency was triggered by something that occurred during the traffic stop; the matter is being investigated.

Photo courtesy of Ed Stec
Forest Lake and Wyoming firefighters responded to a truck fire Jan. 24 on Interstate Highway 35 near the border of the two cities. The fire was called in shortly before 2 p.m., and the response temporarily shut down the freeway. The 26-foot box truck started on fire due to an undetermined mechanical issues, burning up the cab and engine and penetrating slightly into the trailer area. No one was hurt in the fire.

The Forest Lake City Council chamber overflowed again Feb. 13 as the body discussed and approved its contract law enforcement evaluation guiding principles.

The principles were passed more or less as discussed at the council’s Feb. 6 work session. They include tenets on public engagement and weighing the possibility of contracting with the Washington County Sheriff’s Office for law enforcement on the basis of service delivery and budget impact comparisons with the Forest Lake Police Department.

The changes that were made included the addition of more aspects of law enforcement to the list of what will be benchmarked and the addition of a council intention to conduct a statistically valid poll of residents regarding the evaluation once the city receives a proposal from the sheriff’s office (Councilwoman Mara Bain proposed both changes). Learn more about the guidelines in the Feb. 9 story “Council explores contract law enforcement guidelines” or online at ow.ly/6sct3090flG.

The evening was marked by a pre-meeting protest of the Personnel Committee’s contract proposal request to the Sheriff’s Office (with at least 50 protesters, double the number who came to the Feb. 6 work session to protest), as well as the first official councilman attempt to shut down the evaluation process when Sam Husnik moved to abandon the proposal request. The motion failed, 3-2, with Councilmen Ed Eigner and Michael Freer and Mayor Ben Winnick voting against. Once again, the open forum segment of the meeting was filled with residents speaking on the law enforcement topic, with the majority of speakers asking the council to stop the process and keep the Police Department intact.

During the council comments at the end of the meeting, Freer said he was inspired by a conversation with Bain to speak more publicly about the law enforcement evaluation. He encouraged Bain, Husnik and the public not to jump to conclusions about the viability of the contract law enforcement option and asked for an open-minded discussion.

“People can agree to disagree on whether we should have asked for a proposal or not or the process that went into it, but we should have people keeping an open mind as to whether they would consider Washington County or whether they would consider the Forest Lake Police Department,” he said.

“I continue to think the window’s open about that far with you right now,” he added to Bain, holding up two fingers close together, “and it should be much more open than that. Council Member Husnik has said in the paper that he’s not open to it at all, (and) we should all be open-minded on everything.”

The afternoon of Feb. 17, the Wyoming and Lakes Area police departments announced that an 18-year-old Lindstrom man and a 17-year-old Center City girl had been arrested and charged with third-degree murder in connection to the overdose death of an 18-year-old Wyoming man.

According to police, Wyoming police responded to the report of an unresponsive male in his home on the 25000 block of East Comfort Drive in mid-afternoon on Dec. 12, 2016. The man, whose name has not been released, could not be revived, and a subsequent death investigation revealed that fentanyl toxicity was a factor in the man’s death.

According to police, an investigation by Wyoming officers determined that Alexander Menne, 18, of Lindstrom, and the 17-year-old had provided the man with fentanyl pills the day of his death. Fentanyl is a potent pain medication that can result in an overdose death if used recreationally. Under Minnesota statute, a person who is believed to have unintentionally caused the death of another person by giving or selling him or her an illegal schedule I or II drug can be charged with third-degree murder.

According to Wyoming Public Safety Director Paul Hoppe, given the man’s age and the circumstances surrounding his death, officers determined that a death investigation was would need to be done on the day the man was found dead. He said police did not issue any media release about the case until Feb. 17 because they did not want to compromise the investigation.

The investigation is still open, but Hoppe did not say whether police expect more people to be charged in connection with the case.

More information about this case will be posted as it becomes available.

Submitted photo
Wyoming Police Sgt. Lance Beardsley (pictured with Wyoming Director of Public Safety Paul Hoppe, left, and Minnesota State Patrol Col. Matt Langer, right) was honored Feb. 9 at a state patrol ceremony in Vadnais Heights with a life-saving award for a June 22, 2016, incident in which he saved a suicidal man from jumping off the Viking Boulevard bridge into oncoming traffic on Interstate Highway 35. According to police, the man was preparing to jump as Beardsley spoke to him and tried to coax him away from the edge of the bridge. When the man made an attempt to leap off the bridge, Beardsley lunged toward him, grabbed him and prevented him from jumping.

A caravan of Forest Lake Police and other law enforcement squads brought K-9 patrol dog Ranger’s remains back to the City Center Police headquarters the afternoon of Feb. 16. A public memorial service to commemorate Ranger was scheduled from 6 to 8 p.m. Feb. 22 at Century Junior High School (after press time).

Approximately 200 people converged on Century Junior High School the evening of Feb. 22 for the memorial service for Ranger, the Forest Lake Police Department’s K-9 program police dog. Ranger suffered cardiac arrest and died shortly after assisting in a traffic stop late in the evening Feb. 7. Above, Ranger’s handler, police officer Nick Kent, is embraced by his son Liam after Kent’s speech remembering the dog, as the memorial audience applauds.

Law enforcement dogs and their handlers from a variety of Minnesota law enforcement agencies attended the service to pay tribute.

Forest Lake police officers stand at attention as a squad car carrying Ranger’s remains approaches Century.

Ranger’s equipment was on display for viewing.

Residents pay their respects at Ranger’s remains.

Submitted photo
Forest Lake patrol officer Tom Cockburn (pictured here with Police Chief Rick Peterson, left, and Capt. Greg Weiss, right) was honored by the Forest Lake Fire Department with the presentation of an award of distinguished service during the Forest Lake City Council’s Feb. 21 work session for a rescue he made in a house fire last year. On Dec. 19, 2016, just after 8 p.m., Forest Lake emergency personnel received an emergency call of a fire in a home on the 21000 block of Everton Avenue North, on the south side of Clear Lake – the home of Forest Lake Councilman Ed Eigner. According to a police report and the Fire Department, Cockburn was on patrol near Menards and arrived before firefighters did. Knowing from the call that a person may have been trapped in the residence, Cockburn entered the home and saw that it was filled with heavy smoke, later determined to have been caused by a fire on the kitchen stove. In the home, Cockburn located Eigner’s wife, Rozanne, on the second floor, and he carried her out of the residence (she was later treated for non-life-threatening injuries). Police also safely retrieved a dog from the residence, and firefighters contained the fire.

A rift between different factions of Forest Lake city leadership on the contract law enforcement issue has been further outlined this month as both sides react to the public conversation surrounding the city’s payments to a public relations firm to handle the city’s response on the topic.

While critics have claimed that the way the city began working with St. Paul-based Zipko Strategy was an attempt to circumvent government transparency, defenders of the move have insisted that the city’s business with the firm is not out of the ordinary.

PR questions

Public discussion of the issue began Feb. 27, when Forest Lake resident Jeff Gort (who is married to Forest Lake Police Department administrative assistant Lynn Gort) spoke during the open forum at the evening’s Forest Lake City Council meeting. Gort claimed to have spoken with Zipko Strategy owner Mike Zipko about the terms of Zipko Strategy’s deal with the city and asserted that firm was being used to “spin the city’s position toward the removal of the Forest Lake Police Department.” Zipko has been involved with many of the city’s media releases regarding the Personnel Committee’s Jan. 18 request for a proposal from the Washington County Sheriff’s Office for contracted law enforcement. If the proposal is approved, the local Police Department could be dissolved.

“I find it absolutely despicable that you are using my tax dollars to pay a PR firm to forward this agenda and pursue this matter,” Gort said. “It is wasteful and unnecessary.”

A video of Gort’s remarks was shared on local social media pages, most prominently by Councilwoman Mara Bain, who posted it to her official council Facebook page.

City Administrator Aaron Parrish said it is not uncommon for the city to forgo a bid process and work directly with private businesses for services, a fact confirmed by city invoices. In the city’s invoice for January, along with a payment of $2,800 to Zipko Strategy, expenses ran the gamut from $221.81 spent at Staples to $3,068 to Verizon Wireless, along with many other expenditures.

“We (work with businesses) for services all the time as long as we can find ways to allocate it within the existing budget,” Parrish remarked.

Mayor Ben Winnick said he didn’t see any issue with utilizing Zipko’s services. He and Parrish said the purpose of the firm is to help with distributing information and answering questions about the proposal request, not to advocate for or against using the Sheriff’s Office instead of the Police Department.

“Cities use PR firms all the time,” Winnick said. “I don’t think we’re doing anything unusual. I think their biggest purpose is to help calm the public.”

Parrish also noted that Zipko does not have a contract with the city. Instead, the city is operating under a scope of services proposal sent to the city by Zipko. Under the scope of services, Zipko is paid at a rate of $175 per hour for work done related to the contract law enforcement issue. The scope specifies that Zipko’s work for the city will not exceed a price point of $4,375 for January and February and won’t exceed $3,500 for March and April, with any additional work on the topic beyond April to be decided upon after future discussions with the city. In addition to its $2,800 invoice for January, the firm has invoiced the city $1,750 for work completed in February; in all, the invoices record 26 hours performed by Zipko for the city during those months. The invoices and Parrish confirmed that the work done by Zipko has included media outreach and time spent assisting in the creation of city messaging about the request and Winnick’s newspaper column and public statement on the subject.

“We dictate the billings based on how much we choose to utilize the service,” Parrish explained.

Origins

Parrish said that in late 2016, he was told there was some interest from the then-current City Council in the option of contracting for law enforcement.

“This was a topic they might want to explore,” he said, adding that he felt that a PR firm would help the city manage its messages to the media and the public, as he knew the topic of changing law enforcement structure would likely invite a lot of public interest and scrutiny.

When asked which council member or members asked him about the topic, Parrish said he could not recall the exact origin of the discussion. Email records obtained by The Times in a public data request show that Nov. 14, 2016, the Monday after Election Day, Parrish sent an email to Councilman Michael Freer and then-Mayor-elect Winnick to let them know that city staff was going to contact Zipko Strategy about PR services. Parrish told The Times that Assistant City Administrator Dan Undem was aware of Zipko’s work after previously working with the firm in a former position.

“Recognizing that it (a request for a proposal) might come, we did start working with (Zipko) in advance of the Personnel Committee meeting,” Parrish said.

Bain said she doesn’t object to the idea of working with a PR firm to help manage the city’s messaging. The only trouble, she said, is that she doesn’t believe Zipko’s services have objectively presented information to the public.

“The message that’s been presented by the city is one that’s been supportive of contract services and advocating a city of Forest Lake’s size going to a contract service model,” she said, adding that in her opinion, the language in the Zipko-vetted messaging – specifically the amount of positive attributes ascribed to contract law enforcement – is trying to sway residents to the reasonableness of giving up their Police Department. “It seems to be a crafted message to prepare the public for a decision.”

Messaging

Two of the Zipko emails obtained by The Times contained language that, though it would ultimately not make it into the city’s public messaging about the department, seems to suggest that the original tone of the proposal request may have differed in some ways from the way it was ultimately presented. The first email, dated Dec. 1, 2016, contains a proposal from Zipko to the city for the use of Zipko’s services.

“The City of Forest Lake is planning to contract for law enforcement services from the Washington County Sheriff’s department,” the first paragraph reads. “This is a way for the city to continue to make sure people in Forest Lake are safe and well served yet the decision to make this change required a lot of research and time.”

The second email, dated Dec. 15, 2016, and sent to Zipko from the city, includes a file with “key messaging” points on the contract law enforcement issue. Under the header of “Why is the City interested in pursuing a change in the way it provides law enforcement services?” there are a few different talking points, including discord related to labor negotiations as well as topics brought up after the proposal request process went public in January, like the good law enforcement service sheriff’s offices have provided to neighboring and nearby communities. However, there is also a paragraph that has been struck through, appearing as if it is slated to be removed, that includes a reason for a change that some of the council’s critics have accused members of harboring privately.

“The City Council has lost confidence in the leadership of the Department because it does not respect the Council’s role in setting and establishing policy,” the paragraph reads. “They have lost the trust of the Council and by extension the community. The City Council is not confident that all members of the community will be treated equally.”

Parrish said the language in the Dec. 1 proposal from Zipko regarding the city “planning” to contract for services was an issue of inaccurate wording and added that city staff had never presented the issue to Zipko as one of the city favoring picking one service or the other.

“I think that that’s probably something of a mischaracterization,” he said of the language.

As for the messaging regarding the council losing confidence in Police Department leadership, Parrish said the language was ultimately not used because the opinion did not appear to be held by the majority of council members after he discussed the issue with them.

“Certainly that (language) might have been an individual perspective that was there, but I guess I didn’t feel that that was a talking point that I would work off of. … I thought that that might not have been a consensus among the group,” he said.

Winnick said he didn’t recall that position being brought up in discussions prior to the Jan.18 vote, adding that he and other council members didn’t want to make the proposal request an “us vs. them” issue.

“We’re trying to keep everything on a positive point,” he said.

Transparency

In a statement given to The Times by Sean Gormley, executive director of Law Enforcement Labor Services, which represents Forest Lake police officers and Washington County deputies, Gormley highlighted the language of the Zipko proposal and said it was at odds with previous council claims that no decision had been made about whether or not the city should stay with the Police Department.

“That’s not transparency. That’s deception,” the statement reads in part. “It also makes the evaluation process, and the opportunity for stakeholder feedback and public comment(,) a sham.”

After the Jan. 18 Personnel Committee vote, Bain and Councilman Sam Husnik said they were never informed of any discussion by the council of an imminent request for a contract law enforcement proposal. Husnik said he was out of the loop on Zipko as well until Gort brought it up at the meeting, and he joined Bain in saying that the request should have been discussed in a full council meeting with all of the current members before the Personnel Committee took action.

“There’s been a lot of stuff as far as I’m concerned that’s been hush-hush about this whole thing, and the fact that some of us haven’t been included on this unbelievable,” he said, adding that he found the way the request was handled by the other council members “unethical.” “We’d have lost the debate, but we still should have had some input into that.”

Bain said her open letter to the Washington County Board of Commissioners on the contract law enforcement issue (also published in The Forest Lake Times) was completed on her own, without Zipko assistance. She felt that Zipko providing feedback on Winnick’s piece, which she viewed as a rebuttal to her own, was a questionable use of taxpayer money.

“This is more than just handling workload in a response to media request; this is crafting a response,” she said.

Bain also remarked that though she didn’t have a problem with using a PR firm to help manage workloads, she felt that Zipko’s maintenance of city responses has left residents feeling like they’ve been given a tight-lipped, inauthentic response to their concerns. She said she plans to address the scope of Zipko’s work at an upcoming council meeting if it is not more strictly defined before then (the March 13 meeting was canceled due to a lack of quorum).

“I don’t understand why we need to pay a PR firm to essentially say, ‘We’re not going to talk until we have a proposal back from the sheriff,’” she said, adding that issues surrounding the firm add to her feeling that the contract law enforcement issue has not been handled transparently by the council majority.

“The citizens of Forest Lake were listening very carefully during the budget work,” she said. “There was no discussion around cuts around the police budget.”

Winnick said he believes the complaints about the process have been overblown by a minority of residents.

“There’s been the vocal few that are one side of it,” he said. “People know who to reach out to, obviously, but (I hear) just as many on the other side of the fence, and I’d say 90 percent of the people are in the middle with, ‘Just wait and see.’”

Winnick added that he felt Zipko’s work was useful in countering what he called “fear-mongering” by some who are spreading falsehoods about what could happen if the city decides to contract with the county.

“There are a lot of distortions of the truth out there,” he said. “There are some flat-out lies.”

Among said lies, Winnick said, are the ideas that deputies would be dispatched from Stillwater to handle Forest Lake calls or that response times or staffing levels would drop under a county-run system. He said the maintenance of current staffing standards is a prerequisite of the proposal request and added that deputies assigned to Forest Lake would be stationed in town during their shifts.

“Response times and staffing levels have to be equal to what they are now, and those are factors that are being forgotten by some vocal people who are trying to tell their story,” he said.

As to Bain and Husnik’s questions about the timing of and forewarning about the request, Winnick pointed out that the duo weren’t on the council when the discussion about Zipko began and said the issue of what level of service the city is getting from the Police Department “has been brought up time and time again.”

“What do we pay for police protection in this community? What do we get compared to other communities?” he said. “These are the questions that have been asked.”

Zipko, he said, is simply being utilized so that those issues and others surrounding the proposal request can be portrayed fairly.

“I think that’s what they’re doing,” he said.

Mike Zipko and Council Member Ed Eigner did not return a phone message from The Forest Lake Times seeking comment. Freer responded to a request for comment from The Times, but due to scheduling issues he was unavailable for comment before press time.

Next month, Sheriff Bill Hutton will end a 34-year career in law enforcement in Washington County.

The Stillwater resident is stepping down midway through his third term as sheriff to be the executive director of the Minnesota Sheriffs’ Association. His last day with the county is April 30, and he’ll start the new job May 1.

“In law-enforcement years, I’m old,” said Hutton, 57, who said he didn’t plan to run for a fourth term. “Then I was approached by the sheriffs’ association. … I had to make a decision, albeit a very difficult one. I would’ve liked to complete my term.”

Hutton began his law enforcement career in 1983 as a part-time officer with the Oakdale Police Department, where he worked through 2006. During his time there, Hutton served in positions from patrol to investigations, working his way up to captain.

He was elected sheriff in 2006, and re-elected in 2010 and 2014. His current term expires at the end of 2018.

In his new position, Hutton hopes his experience as a sheriff will benefit others. He’ll replace outgoing Executive Director James Franklin, who is retiring after 14 years on the job.

The Minnesota Sheriffs’ Association was formed in 1885 with an educational purpose and is the oldest law enforcement association in the state, Franklin said. Today the St. Paul-based nonprofit provides training to more than 6,000 people a year, helps develop public safety policies and best practices, and supports sheriffs in other ways. All 87 Minnesota counties are members.

“The current executive director has done a phenomenal job,” Hutton said of Franklin, adding that he has relied on Franklin over the years. “I hope I can do that for others as well, where they can call me and hopefully I can either help them through my knowledge or get them to the right people.”

Franklin plans to stick around as a contractor for several months to ensure a smooth transition, but he’s confident in Hutton’s ability.

“He is well-respected in Greater Minnesota among the Greater Minnesota sheriffs,” Franklin said. “He is highly qualified and has all the skills of a metro sheriff, so he understands those issues.”

Plus, Hutton has the “wherewithal” and “tenacity” to make necessary changes and support good public safety policy, Franklin said.

Although Hutton looks forward to the new position, he’ll miss the Washington County Sheriff’s Office and the people in it.

“The citizens of this county need to be proud of this sheriff’s office and the officers that work here,” he said. “They do unbelievable work day in and day out.”

That gives Hutton confidence that he’ll leave the department in capable hands. He’s recommending Chief Deputy Dan Starry to replace him as sheriff for the rest of the term, and on March 14, the County Board approved his appointment.

Starry has been chief deputy for the past six years, has played an active role in running the department and “really understands what it takes to be a sheriff,” Hutton said.

“If you like what’s happening the sheriff’s office now, Dan is behind most it anyhow,” Hutton told a county commissioner.

In January, the Forest Lake Personnel Committee sent Hutton and the Sheriff’s Office a letter requesting a proposal for performing contract law enforcement services in the city. City Administrator Aaron Parrish and Mayor Ben Winnick said that to their knowledge, Hutton leaving his position will likely have little to no effect on the status of the proposal or the time in which the city receives it.

“Based on my feedback from both Sheriff Hutton and the county administrator, I don’t anticipate we will have any delay in the transition,” Parrish said.

Winnick said he hadn’t spoken to the Sheriff’s Office about the transition but said he didn’t anticipate a long delay in the process.

Ultimately, the County Board chose a replacement to serve through 2018. According to Washington County Administrator Molly O’Rourke, state law doesn’t provide the possibility of a special election to replace an outgoing sheriff.

“We are really sad to be losing Bill,” O’Rourke said. “He has been an excellent sheriff to work with and very collaborative. We are going to miss his leadership.”

But she said Hutton also built up a group of capable leaders within the sheriff’s office.

“He leaves us in good hands,” she said.

– Ryan Howard contributed to this report.

The Forest Lake Police Department was called to Karl’s Korner BP gas station (1107 Hwy. 97) at approximately 10:15 p.m. March 16 following reports of an armed robbery.  According to a police issued press release, a white male, described as 5’-7” tall, medium build, wearing a dark sweatshirt, blue jeans, gloves, sunglasses, and a black ski mask, displayed a black handgun to the gas station employee.

The suspect may have had a vehicle waiting from him in the area, northwest of the business. The whereabouts of the suspect are unknown at this time.

The Forest Lake Police Department received assistance from the Washington County Sheriff’s Office, Chisago County Sheriff’s Office, Wyoming Police Department, and the Minnesota State Patrol.  A Code Red was sent to a one-mile radius of the business to alert residents of potential danger.  The Code Red was cancelled at 12:45am when officers deemed the area to be safe.

Anyone with any further information should contact the Forest Lake Police Department at 651-439-9381.

Several notable local court cases reached their sentencing stages in early 2017, including those of multiple acts of violence, a man found sleeping in the Forest Lake Wal-Mart parking lot with drugs and a gun, and the campaign sign dispute involving the Forest Lake mayor’s wife.

Stabbing

In one of multiple older cases that reached the sentencing stage this year, Kyle John Duraine, 25, of Forest Lake (a separate recent criminal complaint lists him as having a Columbus address), was sentenced to probation and a $50 fine Jan. 4 for a third-degree assault case stemming from a Nov. 4, 2014, incident that occurred outside the Marcus Theater in Oakdale. According to court records, Duraine was getting a ride to Oakdale from an acquaintance when he began arguing with another person in the back seat of the acquaintance’s car. When the acquaintance grew irritated at their argument, he reportedly stopped the car at the theater and asked the two bickering passengers to exit the vehicle, at which point Duraine stabbed him in the back and arm with a knife he’d purchased earlier in the day. The victim was treated at a local emergency room and reportedly required surgery. A warrant for Duraine’s arrest related to this case is currently active.

Assault

Austin Joseph Harris, 23, of Forest Lake, was sentenced to probation and a $50 fine Jan. 18 for his conviction for domestic assault by strangulation. According to court records, the case stems back to Oct. 4, 2015, when Harris allegedly got into an altercation with a woman he lived with in their home on the 200 block of Third Avenue Southwest. The argument reportedly escalated to the point that Harris grabbed the woman and threw her to the ground, causing her to temporarily black out and ultimately causing a concussion. According to court records, Harris then held a pillow over her face, restricting her breathing for a time before getting off of her and leaving the home.

Drugs

Christopher Lawrence Marble, 34, of Scandia, was sentenced to probation, 59 days in jail to be served in the Sentence to Serve program and a fine Jan. 11 after being convicted for third-degree drug possession. According to court records, Marble was approached by Forest Lake officers May 22, 2016, after a caller reported seeing him slumped over the wheel of his vehicle in the Forest Lake Wal-Mart parking lot.

When officers checked on the man, they found that he appeared to have trouble balancing and that he seemed to be under the influence of a controlled substance. Marble was disoriented and originally thought he was at the Stillwater Wal-Mart before being told he was at the Forest Lake location. During a pat search of Marble, officers reportedly found 4.7 grams of a substance consistent with methamphetamine and semiautomatic handgun that Marble did not have a permit to carry. The gun reportedly was loaded and had a round in the chamber.

Signs

The theft case regarding Rimma Faina Winnick, 42, of Forest Lake, was continued for dismissal Jan. 10. A continuance for dismissal means that the charge will be dismissed after a period of time if the defendant follows the terms of the continuance agreement.

Winnick was cited for misdemeanor theft in October 2016 by the Washington County Sheriff’s Office, which investigated the case instead of the Forest Lake Police Department to avoid the appearance of a conflict of interest. On Oct. 10, according to a police report, a Forest Lake officer saw Winnick and her parked vehicle near the Holiday gas station on U.S. Highway 61, near where a campaign sign that read “Winnick voted to lay off police” had been placed; the police had been notified earlier by the sign’s owner that several of his other signs had gone missing. The officer reportedly saw that when the vehicle drove away, the sign was gone, and when the officer saw the vehicle parked at the city center later that day, he reportedly saw multiple signs in the back seat (a sheriff’s office search warrant recovered three signs). When he spoke to The Forest Lake Times, Winnick’s attorney maintained that Winnick had picked up the signs because they were illegally posted in government rights of way and that she was dropping off the signs at the city center. Since the signs were posted illegally, he argued, she could not be charged with theft.

Under the terms of the continuance, Winnick must complete six months of unsupervised probation (including no contact with the signs’ owner) and pay a fine and restitution.

The following are other recent Washington County court cases related to the Forest Lake area:

• Sean Lloyd Fairbanks, 41, of no permanent address, was sentenced Dec. 7, 2016, for second-degree burglary related to a case investigated by the Forest Lake Police Department. According to a criminal complaint, Fairbanks broke into the Forest Lake St. Croix Cleaners location on Aug. 26, 2014, and took $711 in cash. To break in, it appeared he smashed a window using a pair of underwear with a rock in it. Police submitted blood on the sign and underwear for testing, and the blood reportedly was a DNA match for Fairbanks.
• Nicholas Robert Ecker, 30, of Stacy, was sentenced Dec. 7, 2016, for DWI.
• Cody Melvin Clark, 22, of Stockholm, South Dakota, was sentenced Dec. 28, 2016, for a fifth-degree drug crime related to a case investigated by the Forest Lake Police Department.
• Nicole Jean Brady, 44, of Forest Lake, was charged Dec. 14, 2016, with a fifth-degree drug crime.
• Jesse James Hehn, 37, of Maplewood, was sentenced Dec. 29, 2016, for a fifth-degree drug crime related to a case investigated by the Forest Lake Police Department.
• Adam Mark Kolodziej, 33, of White Bear Lake, was sentenced Dec. 30, 2016, for receiving stolen property related to a case investigated by the Forest Lake Police Department.
• Kyle John Duraine, 25, of Columbus, was sentenced Jan. 4 for a fifth-degree drug crime.
• Dylan Christopher Busse, 22, of Forest Lake, was charged Jan. 5 with malicious punishment of a child under 4 years of age.
• Justin Mitchel Scanlon, 29, of Forest Lake, was sentenced Jan. 9 for fleeing in a motor vehicle and DWI.
• Richard Robert Wemyess, 36, of Forest Lake, was sentenced Jan. 9 for violating his predatory offender registration requirements.
• Ira Latrell Toles, 30, of Forest Lake, was sentenced Jan. 11 for fourth-degree assault.
• Matthew John Hendren, 33, of Forest Lake, was charged Jan. 11 with a second-degree drug crime.
• Scott Michael Niemi, 34, of Duluth, was charged Jan. 13 with a fifth-degree drug crime and giving law enforcement a false name related to a case investigated by the Forest Lake Police Department.
• Emily Raylene Schoen, 21, of Brooklyn Park, was charged Jan. 18 with a fifth-degree drug crime related to a case investigated by the Forest Lake Police Department.
• Joseph Daniel Meyer, 37, of New Richmond, Wisconsin, was sentenced Jan. 19 for fifth-degree drug possession.
• Teddy Alan Korf, 54, of Pine City, was charged Jan. 20 with a fifth-degree drug crime related to a case investigated by the Forest Lake Police Department.
• Dirk Anthony Hummel, 66, of Forest Lake, was sentenced Jan. 25 for a fifth-degree drug crime.
• Cynthia Lorraine Caulley, 46, of Dresser, Wisconsin, was charged Jan. 27 with theft related to a case investigated by the Forest Lake Police Department.
• Chase Aaron Peterson, 23, of Forest Lake, was sentenced Jan. 30 for a fifth-degree drug crime.
• Rachel Grace Oman, 30, of Burnsville, was charged Jan. 31 with a fifth-degree drug crime related to a case investigated by the Forest Lake Police Department.

The owner of Flawless Massage in Forest Lake has been charged with two counts of prostitution after being arrested last week following an undercover operation of the Forest Lake Police Department.

According to police and other city reports, Wei Lu, 53, of St. Paul, allegedly offered sexual acts to an undercover police officer during a session at the massage parlor, located at 808 Broadway Ave. W. She was arrested March 20.

The Forest Lake City Council will be discussing the revocation of the parlor’s massage license at tonight’s meeting. The other massage therapist at the location has not been charged with a crime but would need to find employment elsewhere before she could continue practicing. More information will be posted as it becomes available.

The Minnesota State Patrol is investigating a fatal motorcycle crash that occurred the afternoon of March 28 on southbound Interstate Highway 35 near the intersection with State Highway 97.

The name of the person in the crash has not yet been released, but the State Patrol confirmed in media reports that the driver was fatally injured. The southbound highway has been closed until further notice.

Official details have not yet been released, but according to details emerging from witness reports, the driver of the motorcycle appeared to be traveling at a high rate of speed and may have been pursued by law enforcement before the crash occurred shortly after 2 p.m. The Times will post more information as it becomes available.

Around 70 people gathered the evening March 27 on the edge of U.S. Highway 61, at the entrance to the Forest Lake City Center parking lot, to protest the city’s request for a proposal for contract law enforcement from the Washington County Sheriff’s Office. During the subsequent City Council meeting inside the center, well over 100 people attended, with many, some angrily, asking the council to halt the process and stick with the Forest Lake Police Department (one resident, Ron Schaffer, encouraged the council to continue the request process). Nothing related to the request was on the council’s agenda, and the council did not comment on the issue.

Court proceedings continue for a man accused of having sex with a 13-year-old Forest Lake girl.

Nicholas Scott Nehring, 33, of Forest Lake, had his first appearance Jan. 20 for charges of third-degree criminal sexual conduct and distributing electronic communication relating to sexual conduct to a child. His criminal complaint was amended Feb. 22, and his next hearing is scheduled for May 24, according to the Minnesota court website.

According to court records, on Nov. 11, 2016, Forest Lake police were notified that the parents of a 13-year-old city resident had found pornography on the girl’s phone, including nude photos she had sent of herself to an adult and nude photos sent by the adult to her. Investigators allegedly identified one of the offending phone numbers with Nehring and found associated with that phone number conversations about sex, a photo of male genitals, a man wearing a clown costume (later allegedly identified as Nehring) and a man matching Nehring’s description. The text messages between the girl and the man reportedly became more explicit as they went on.

On Jan. 19 of this year, officers executed a search warrant on Nehring’s home in the 21100 block of Clydesdale Curve South, allegedly recovering his phone, other electronics, underwear that matched underwear in photos on the girl’s phone, and the clown costume from the photo in her phone.

Court records state that police learned in interviews with involved parties that the two met over social media in the summer of 2016 and began communicating via social media and text message.

The girl allegedly told Nehring that she was 13 during their first conversations, but their sexual communication continued after that. In the fall, the two allegedly met at an undisclosed park in the city and engaged in sexual contact, including intercourse.

Theft tools

A pair of Blaine brothers were recently charged with possession of burglary or theft tools after Forest Lake police allegedly caught them engaged in a theft tactic called “ticket switching” at the local Wal-Mart.

The brothers were charged following a Feb. 28 police call in which a Wal-Mart employee told a dispatcher she believed the two were engaged in shoplifting. When officers arrived, they allegedly found a small knife, tape “sticky squares,” cardboard tags with bar codes and other tools. An employee told police he’d seen the brothers cutting into packaging throughout the store and meeting another woman, who was allegedly found later with drugs on her person. Based on the alleged observed activity and the recovered items, police believed the men were involved in “ticket switching,” which involves switching the bar codes between expensive and inexpensive items and then buying expensive items for a low price.

The following are other recent Washington County court cases related to the Forest Lake area:

• Kara Ann Kinkel, 28, of Bovey, was sentenced Feb. 2 for a fifth-degree drug crime related to a case investigated by the Forest Lake Police Department.
• Damian Thomas Lauth, 31, of Stacy, was sentenced Feb. 6 for a fifth-degree drug crime.
• David Michael Cline, 47, of St. Paul, was charged Feb. 13 with theft, check forgery and mail theft related to a case investigated by the Forest Lake Police Department.
• Nicholas William Kiecker, 28, of Columbus, was charged Feb. 14 with a fifth-degree drug crime and DWI.
• John Emanuel Jensen, 37, of no permanent address, was charged Feb. 14 with a fifth-degree drug crime and giving law enforcement a false name.
• Adam Ray Gibson, 28, of Star Prairie, Wisconsin, was charged Feb. 14 with a fifth-degree drug crime related to a case investigated by the Forest Lake Police Department.
• Brittany Ann Vacko, 27, of Forest Lake, was sentenced Feb. 15 for issuing a dishonored check.

The Chisago County Sheriff’s Office and the Wyoming Police Department arrested a LaSueur man March 29 after he fled deputies on Interstate Highway 35.

According to the sheriff’s office, around 6:50 p.m., a deputy initiated a traffic stop on a northbound vehicle with a missing front license plate on 35 just south of the Wyoming exit. The vehicle, allegedly driven by Cole Earl Thompson, 37, fled from the squad car and exited onto East Viking Boulevard, where he was pursued by Chisago County and Wyoming Police officers.

Thompson allegedly drove east on the road until running into a dead end at the Polaris plant, at which point he made a U turn and fled back toward the interstate, managing to make it back onto 35. He reportedly continued to be pursued north on the road until his vehicle was stopped by stop sticks north of North Branch, near the Coca-Cola bottling plant. He was then arrested for fleeing peace officers. The chase took about 20 minutes overall.

Thompson allegedly threw items from his vehicle during the chase. Officers recovered several items they believe to be narcotics (they are currently being tested at the Bureau of Criminal Apprehension).

According to a social media post by the Wyoming Police Department, officers also arrested a second man later in Wyoming who allegedly was attempting to recover some of the narcotics thrown from the vehicle for himself. More information will be posted on the incident as it becomes available.