matter. On Aug. 23, the area around Campbell Street was blocked off and neighborhoods were evacuated for more than three hours until the St. Paul Bomb Squad collected the device. A man driving noticed the suspicious device on the side of the road and called police.

The home where Bleyle was residing was the site of three search warrants last year.

'There were three search warrants served at 803 Kinnickinnic Street, two of those involving drugs and the other one as a result of that bomb,' said Michaels. 'So, I've started the process for a nuisance property at 803 Kinnickinnic St.'

The major crimes take significant time to investigate, the chief said.

'What you're looking at here is a lot more things you have to do a lot of investigation on. When you look at the difference between the traffic stops from '19 to '20, there was almost 1,000 less traffic stops, but if you look at the amount of cases that are being investigated, the crimes are starting to be more major,' Michaels said. 'My investigator is also the School Resource Officer, so the investigations are being done by the officers up to the point where they can complete it and then it goes on to the investigator. So, the number of crimes is going down, but the level of the crime is starting to go up where it's taking more manpower and resources to investigate these.'

He said the burglaryarson took about 300 hours of investigation, and the bomb call was between 150200 hours.

Downtown Bar Complaints Michaels said there still are a significant amount of fights occurring after bars close downtown. The city restricted bar hours late last year and early this year in an effort to curb the problems. Public Health rules also restricted occupancy. Those restrictions are over, and the fighting problem still exists.

Council member Dar Hintz asked, 'What is happening on the weekends in the bars downtown as far as…'

Before she finished, Michaels said, 'Fights. Lots of fights. Even with Minnesota opening up 50 percent, there's been lots of fights. This weekend we had a decent one, and when I say decent, I mean involving people with significant injury. I believe two weekends ago we had a fairly large one and that involved six or seven people and injuries that required hospitalization.

'Are people being over served, or is it that people are just crazy right now?' Asked Hintz.

'I think it's a little bit of both,' said Michaels.

The chief said he talked to one bar owner who promised to do a better job of keeping an eye on the situation.