Maplewood reports 76% progress on 2024 strategic plan; council accepts report

Maplewood, Minn. — City staff told the Maplewood City Council on March 10 that the 2024 strategic plan reached 76 percent progress on tracked measures, with most initiatives on track and a small share experiencing disruption.

Lois Knutson, Senior Administrative Manager, presented the fourth-quarter report and summarized department-level highlights: hiring and onboarding accomplishments in administration and HR, election administration by the city clerk—s office (including more than 23,000 ballots cast in 2024), communications— multilingual outreach and new QR-based engagement, community development—s nearly $1.9 million in revenue and major multifamily projects, a refreshed payroll and ERP deployment in finance, the fire department exceeding its response-time goal (94% within eight minutes), IT security and body-worn camera hardware refresh work, and police hiring and community-event engagement.

Knuston identified the Purple Line transit project and associated Met Council routing work as a major disruption for one of the plan—s measures. She described next steps including department-level measure revisions and a review of council priorities at the April 23 council retreat.

Following the presentation, Councilmember Lee moved to accept the strategic plan report; the motion was seconded and carried by voice vote with no opposition. City Manager Sable and other councilmembers publicly thanked staff for compiling and presenting the report.

Staff said individual performance measures will be revisited by departments and discussed at the upcoming council retreat, and that staff will return with any recommended adjustments to performance targets or action initiatives.