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“Director Corner gave credit to all city staff. In the last week, we’d called in all of our officers as well as additional staff for Fire and EMS as we didn’t know what was going to happen. We wanted to make sure the EMS service in Cottage Grove had adequate staffing. We beefed up business patrols with two squads in every mall area and stepped up our presence. It’s a terrible situation, but fortunately our community still supports Public Safety. With the possibility of protesters at Park High School, we were concerned about potential looting and damage to property. Everyone’s glued to their television, citizens are afraid, but our staff did an outstanding job. Residents delivered pizzas and food to officers at Park High School and Target, which was appreciated.

“Mobile Field Force: Cottage Grove has seven officers on the multi-jurisdictional team. Oakdale requested our help, and our seven MFF officers went there to help with de-escalation and crowd control. We’ve watched our MFF officers’ body camera footage. Hats off to our officers, as they had people screaming in their faces yet they remained calm, professional, did their job and also treated everyone with respect and dignity. Last weekend, Saturday and Sunday, we had a city curfew from 8 p.m. to 6 a.m. Our city was quiet. Mayor Pro Team (Save) Dennis rode with me for a few hours while we checked on all the businesses.”

The minutes continue, “Council Member (Justin) Olsen stated it’s been a crazy week and a stressful time for Public Safety, people standing on a line with people who may not appreciate what you’re doing. It’s a calling to be a law enforcement officer, and it’s certainly not an easy job on a regular day.”