polo maplewood city manager chuck all we've heard from a few of you that you are enjoying our new platform it's the mission of the city council and the city staff to keep you our citizens informed about what's happening in our city we hope that this is a good venue in which to do just that today our show begins with a message from minnesota house representative alice housman she's the chair of the state house capital investment committee and they visited maplewood on tuesday october twenty ninth they took part in looking in to maplewood sites that are seeking a portion of the four billion dollars worth of requests that representative houseman's committee received for consideration during the twenty fourteen bodybuilders part of the legislative session then you'll hear from beverly do so she's president chief executive officer of harriet tubman that's a family alliance and tamar camera stark she's a director for youth and family services who are seeking funds for a bond of seven hundred twenty thousand dollars two additional floors to the t space will be used for victims of sex exploitation and trafficking and for homeless you i'm representative alice housman i chair the house capital investment committee that's the group visiting today we have many members here they represent districts all over the state we have both parties represented so it's a good  representation of of the people who will be making the decision we obviously have many many projects around the state we've been to the northwest the northeast the southeast now the metro area and next week we go to southwest central and there will probably be four billion dollars worth of requests we spent a good bit of time in st paul and ramsey county today but of course now we are looking specifically about some two that actually are very near and dear to us that are here in the maplewood area they hurry at tubman center i've been here several times before even before it had been turned over to local government and i should say a word about that if it were still run by a nonprofit or privately we could not do general so they had to work out the ownership issue here first and there had to be a local government that assumed ownership of this so that we  general obligation bonding we are very lucky in all the many ways that we've been able to partner with maple wood as a community and really as a representative of us of a very important city in the state of minnesota together we've worked with their police force we've worked with prosecutors we worked with their hospitals we work in their schools with the children we have this wonderful harriet tubman center east available for community groups and work people want to come in and have meetings and forums here and of course to serve families that are in a great deal of stress whether they want to live with us in a shelter or if they simply want to come in for a whole variety of services so while tamra is probably our most knowledgeable and our senior leader that works with parenting and use in all of the ways the tubman does right here out here at tubman center east we also have our elder care right center so it's a wide spectrum of ages and services to a very particular group of people whom we have bill we believe were victims they have been traumatized from a variety of different things and through we can provide them services that really can change their lives and give them a different future in the schools and in our programs here we support people developing healthy relationships and very practical strategies and tools to do that we have found to that seventy percent of young people will tell of not their friend that they know if they're being victimized so we want to make sure they're equipped young people with resources where would you go who would you call for help if you needed it and we're seeing great results in that so we really by me the young people and what they're sharing with us and have resources and tools to respond to that need we help people learn you know effective communication is one thing but also empathy for one another you know live a life in the shoes of someone that you might think that's very different from yourself and then you start to see how they are we have a lot similar to us we can work together that's definitely one way and also the tools for change whatever way is that we can help get connected to making a difference helping change thinking the message out of our healthy relationships are possible that violence are is behaviors hundred percent preventable and we're all a part and preventing violence in the schools we're there for six weeks in a row one day a week and there's enormous learn to love young people say you know i never knew exactly how to have a healthy relationship before going through some of these activity is a performer of learning and going to have a dialogue putting what we value about ourselves and our communities into action and just having the space and time to create and think about it and think what we  e perspectives can be bought to the table to benefit the long term and prevent violence we know the strong individuals mean strong families and vice versa and the communities are built of a bunch of families that are just like that little work together and feel good together and trust one another take care of one another and learn from one another and i think that that's what we've got going on here we do know and we need everyone to be a part of solving the problem of violence in our community is we're very lucky in all the many ways that we've been able to partner with maplewood as a community with community is just great and supporting and being change after it's being a welcoming environment we even have tutors from the schools that come on site to help educate students so that they're having successful futures doing well in school all right despite all the experiences they've had in the same way that we have a legal services center right here very unique quite quite marvelous right above that the floor above that is a partnership center and that is a space where a whole variety of  agencies and service providers have come together with us to help serve and they're here not only to serve our own clients tubman's clients but anybody in the community that wants to come in and visit with them too so while you might come in here for a computer lab and learn how to do a resume you could also come in and see an attorney or a legal advocate or a nurse or a counselor someone that can hand help you with parenting skills a whole variety of things really a rich a ray of things to help you with what is your barrier in your life or tomlin has a very unique set of legal services that we provide that they're both criminal court family court of course orders for protection harassment orders and we do legal clinics not only for those folks who live with us who are sheltered by us but also for the community at large we have somewhere in the neighborhood of one hundred thirty or one hundred fifty paul bono attorneys that will help beyond the work of the fifteen staff members the legal advocates and the attorneys that we have as our own staff here so the complement of services and ways of keeping people safe  not just shelter but we can intervene so that people can be safe in their own home by using the legal system legal services are also wrapped around these young people a week can serve minors who are in need of protection orders themselves and just learning about their rights and how they can access safe housing for the law term they also harassment orders to hero and that really helps protect them from people who've been abusing them i think that this service is among the most unique we have and even in the nation this is a fairly rare occurrence much of this is you know results from the change in the laws now that relate to what who is a minor what happens if you if something has been done to you if you were prostituted and you're underage and you were forced to sell drugs or you were forced to do other horrific things by other people you can be now treated as a victim because that's exactly what you were and instead of being treated as a criminal this sort of community mind change and judicial mind change and for us service  focus it means a whole new way of taking care of young people and young people with their own children so that they can change their lives we think it's going to be much less costly and much better for the young people themselves so i started to beginning solved at the beginning save them make them safe at the beginning and then they can go on to build futures just like the rest of the community and the people we serve they don't want to be a layer of all their people first and they have hopes and dreams and what inspired us hopes and dreams are here twenty four seven they can call us at any time generally if you're unsure about something we're here to answer the questions also find us on facebook twitter the agency and the services so that there's a lot of different ways that you can come into the organization to get help or we hope with some of you to give help we think this is an incredible re of a facility and that someone had a vision for how that could happen and so we've done some work here before but now there is this one additional project that we'd like to finish this year and you can tell we're committed to it because it was in our bill last year so that would be a pretty good indication that we'll continue that this year and i think they're targeting for a particular special needs population here as well but if you tour that it is so well suited for it without a lot of extra work that it just does well so we'll soon see that thanks ls and especially thank you to beverly and on the rise across the country including here in maplewood chief schnell will tell us what we as a community can do to help with awareness and education please join me as we listen to chiefs now oh my name is i'm the new police chief for the city of maplewood i want to talk to you a little bit today about domestic violence each year in the city of maplewood maplewood police officers respond to more than five hundred domestic violence related incidents these incidents run the spectrum from matters of family disputes all the way to utter and complete violence that occurs inside these homes we know that domestic violence is a chronically under reported crime it affects people from all socioeconomic backgrounds and is something that as a community we need to have a high level of concern regarding the reality is that the mass the violence  whether it's occurring in our homes or not has significant impact on our community each year in our country more than five billion dollars is spent on direct costs related to domestic violence including medical care or mental health services that are provided to victims of domestic violence it also has a profound impact on both the victims as well as the witnesses and we know that in many instances domestic violence occurs in homes in the presence of children research shows very clearly that boys who witness domestic violence in their homes are twice as likely to abuse their own partners as they become adults is for these reasons that we feel really strongly that the mess the violence should be a priority for the maplewood police department and really for all members of the community maplewood is well positioned we have a group of cadre of well trained police officers to respond to and address these incidents in working with range of community partners domestic violence advocacy programs such as the tap pub and family alliance and prosecutors from both the maplewood city attorney's office as well as the ramsey county attorney's office are key and critical partners in the response to domestic violence maybe with police department assumes and takes a zero tolerance policy and approach policy to domestic violence it is our goal to work with our partners in advocacy and prosecution to keep victims safe and at the same time hold batter's accountable as a department and as a community we need to do all we can to send the message that domestic violence is not and will not be tolerated all of us can play a role to prevent and stop this very serious and compelling community problem in crime some of the ways that we can all make a difference include if we suspect that someone has been abused we can gently approach and ask them if there is something that they can do to connect them to community resources to keep them safe we can and should encourage and teach the boys in our homes to be more nurturing nurturing and for our daughters and girls in our community to be strong we need to help children develop the knowledge attitudes and beliefs about the importance the critical importance of healthy relationships we must approach domestic violence as a human rights issue by involving men and women of all backgrounds and all ages we need to support and encourage and i would strongly encourage men to become more empowered bystanders to address and confront the abuse of peers we need to also support school and community work places that are safe from all forms of violence and learn about the resources that are readily available to prevent and support victims of these crimes we want people to know that as a police department and as a city we stand ready on a twenty four hour seven day week basis to respond to the needs of domestic violence victims we will do everything we possibly can to ensure that our response is affective and that victims and the respective family members will be safe what is most important is that people call as a community all of us need to be aware that we can make a difference to address this really critical and compelling community problem when we establish that the most of violence has occurred in a home it is the policy of our department to a fact to make an immediate arrest in those cases that has been shown to work that we  do hold bettors accountable becomes critical there are also a variety of resources that are available to help victims who may be considering their options including internet resources overall the safety needs to be taken into consideration because some batters will oftentimes check to make sure what type of resources are being looked at in the internet but the tubman family alliances in a variety of national domestic violence hotline resources are available to victims and members of our community as is your police department maplewood police department is available on a twenty four seven basis to the respond to the needs of victims and their family members who are experiencing domestic violence a city and as a police department along with our partners in advocacy and prosecution we stand ready to do anything and everything we can to keep victim safe and whole batteries accountable thank you chief  that's very sobering information and when you think about the problems of domestic violence right here in maplewood something that we as a community need to continue to be aware of and educate everyone regarding those issues for our last segment we'll see the house capital investment committees second visit to a site here in maple what they say made a october twenty ninth they visited the metro public safety training setter i think everybody knows are hopeful you know that's located on the vacant property just west of the five in one twenty intersection the city of maple woods requesting the state to provide us one point eight million dollars as bonding  for this year's session the training center is going to be used by maplewood open aylmore st paul and numerous other fire departments and our east metro regional area up to twenty four different departments will be there you'll hear from chief our fire chief he just going to explain the value of the training facility to our community and the entire region join me as we hear what the chief has to say  didn't come from what came from a training committee made up of a lot of different communities st paul was actively involved in all this was going to look as well as lake elmo and other other communities that were actively involved in it making sure that happened and you can see that there are a lot of them are represented here today and we do that the other big portion of it i think that's really important for dinner standards that we have this whole great area like i mentioned on the bus for expansion at some point in time this is there needs changes in our job changes which is always happening we have the opportunity to make those changes here and provide the kind of training facility of the east metro public safety training center and they have a some surprises for us apparently today we don't know what they are yet and there are many departments who are supporting this and they're apparently going to be there in large numbers today with their fire rigs for the state to have an interest in something like that they have to demonstrate to us that it has a broad support and so this is not just one cities but this is a variety of cities working together and we'd like that we like the idea that that cities out here have combined and are sharing a particular facility twenty four communities that are going to be training on this site and you can see right there is i way it's just amazing access this is a former man that site and they don't hear basically and piles right back here we come back here and  weeks i just really i just really have a deep love for this project and you know we all especially hate to say of especially after september eleventh i mean not that we don't value folks to the press every day before that but it's a great local area for us and all the departments locally here in the metropolitan area to be able to train obviously especially for north st paul mayport oakdale just because of the location of this for the three communities and then also for other departments in the area we're able to work together and that's becoming more and more of our opportunity as we're all working in training together and sharing resources and equipment amongst all communities so the last time we were here they in fact took us up on the cherry picker and so wouldn't many of us rode up in the air and had  great thrill which is not something we normally get to do i'm told they have a few other surprises for us we're not going to go up in the cherry picker but there may be some other things down the firefighters are throwing out there you know ladder just another  example of the type of training that could be done here when we have the talent rather than having off an area ladder they can practice retelling over the side of a building which is a lot more realistic than having it out in mid air like they're doing here so it's a great local area for us for and all the departments locally here in the metropolitan area to be able to train obviously especially for nor st paul made just because of the location of this for the three communities and then also for other departments in the area it's a close  ose opportunity for i'm going to train we're able to work together and that's becoming more and more of our opportunities we're all working in training together and sharing our resources and equipment amongst all communities very important site for us that's a piece of property that's been here for quite some time and not only the cleanup of the property but the redevelopment of the property for the public safety enterprise bad he just hits a valve and it shuts a fire off so it's a very but yeah they're spraying water out standing there what on a regular car fare for the state to have an interest in something like that they have to demonstrate to us that it has a broad and to provide that kind of training facility and so i want to thank all the departments that came here today and i don't know everybody got your name on the back i guess you could turn around but there's too many to the number but there are everyone here is played an active role in essence has been really great for us and i do have to mention two other names in as kind of the senior group that's been with us and that's like joanna chief tim bucky to me i saw him a minute ago there he is there and i know stu glacier from from stillwater wasn't going to be able to be here today but he's been an active part of that and again we just kind of this side of it but what you will be seeing here when it's all said and done is all of those folks who actually helped put this together and designed it and as we mentioned earlier we are so happy and excited to have century colleges a partner with us to help develop some of the training into some of our needs here we've had a lot of other partnerships who's worked at three am has been on site they want to be an active player with us to do their testing that they can do at this site with a lot of their different types of tapes and as well as public safety is a high priority of ours in the bonding bill we have higher education and wastewater infrastructure and transportation but public safety is is certainly always ranked high so i think the projects that we're looking at from maple exciting for the entire east metro for our training needs we hope that you're enjoying our new format and we welcome any suggestions on things that you may want us to bring to you our viewers if you have suggestion she's our director of communications her information is scrolling on the screen we'll see you next time and tell then drive safely and enjoy this no in cold winter