February Task Force Meeting Summary

Date: February 19, 2025

Time: 7:00 PM to 8:45 PM

Location: Edina City Hall – Community Room

Task Force Member Attendance: Jim Nelson, Jasmine Stringer-Moore, Bianca Dawkins, Jonathan Rogers, Elly Doscotch, Pranika Kumar, Jan Stone

Task Force Members Absent: Daisy Khalifa, Fartun Ismail

Staff in Attendance: Thomas Brooks, Zoe Johnson, MJ Lamon, Jessica Connors

Public Members in Attendance: No public members were in attendance

1. Welcome & Introductions

2. Confirm Task Force 2nd Co-Chair – Bianca Dawkins – 5 minutes

Bianca Dawkins was confirmed and congratulated as a co-chair with Daisy Khalifa by the task force.

3. ESAP Update – 5 minutes

Task force members were reminded to complete the Diamond Inclusiveness Assessment (DIA) survey by February 28th. The task force will discuss the results in an upcoming meeting on April 23rd.

4. Meeting Topic(s)

4.1 Staff Presentation – 30 minutes

Jessica Connors – Community Liaison – Joint Community Police Partnership to present on role in the city and the Multicultural Advisory Committee

Jessica Connors provided an overview of the Joint Community Police Partnership between Edina and Hennepin County. Information was provided to the commission about the Community Liaison role, community programming for youth, adults, and mothers, and work of the Multicultural Advisory Committee (MAC) to build trust and get

community input on policy, human rights concerns and offenses in community, and create programming opportunities.

4.2 Staff Presentation – 30 minutes

MJ Lamon – Special Projects and Engagement Manager to present an overview of the City’s current engagement methods and techniques

MJ provided a presentation which included an overview of all (or most) existing engagement efforts in the City of Edina, including types of engagement methods used, engagement values and best practices, IAP2 principles and the public participation spectrum. Information was provided about the different types of boards, commissions, task forces, neighborhood associations, and other engagement groups within Edina.

5. Group Discussion – 20 to 25 minutes

5.1 Rethinking Engagement: What Resonated Most?

5.2 Breaking Barriers: Expanded Participation

5.3 Deepening Our Understanding: What Next?

Task force members requested data related to housing demographics, voter engagement, and Edina’s engagement with the BIPOC business community. Takeaways from the meeting were to find opportunities to expand engagement to students in the high school leveraging clubs and advisory hour, including promoting the commission opportunities, which many students still do not know about and some barriers to participation were discussed.

6. Final Updates & Adjournment

Task force members were advised an experience survey will be sent to all current and former commissioners in March. Task force members will have an opportunity to review the survey and provide feedback before it is sent and will have a meeting dedicated to reviewing the results.

Next Meeting is March 19th at 7:00P at Edina Public Works to discuss Alternative Engagement Methods and Commission Considerations