1990 04 0914ayor Chu/el called the meeting to order at 7:30 p.m.. The meet/rig was ovened
with the Pledge to the Flag.
Pl~s~el~IC~ ~e ~ Pe.I~: Mayor Chniel preee~ted a check to Michele Haas
for the Recycling ~rize.
~ l~~t: ~lwcean Dimler moved, Councilmen 3ohnsc~ seconded to
approw the followi~ Ccr~ent &~mda it.s purs,__mnt to the City ~'s
c. AVV~ Plus and Specificaticr~ a~d Devel~t Cmtract for Trivets Pass
at Near Mountain 4th ~klittcn.
e. Approve Ccaum/tent Selectic~ for Storm Water Dr~ Utility.
g. ~proval of Accounts.
h,
C/ty Council Minutes dated l~__~ch 26, 1990 u ~ on page 24 by
Councilm~n Workn~n to dmnqe the word "theft" to "death".
Plarming Cc~missio~ Minutes dated Marah 21, 1990
Park and Recreation Ccm~Lssi~ Minutes dated March 27, 1990
i. approval of One Day Liquor hicesme, (Imntmsse~ Rotal7, Hay 5, 1990
J. R~esol~m #90-40: ~ of Year End Closings and Transfers.
k. Resolutim #~0-41: 8et Public Heart~ Date for Nodtficaticn No. 10 to the
Redeveloime~t Plan and Tax Increm~t Ffnanci~ Plan.
All voted in favor and the motim carried.
City Council Meetin~ - April 9, 1990
Councilman Johnson: Mr. Mayor, before I get into l(a) and (b) here, I'm
wonclerin~ if there's anyca%e in the audience, if there's people here that wants
to look cm this. Otherwise we can move it to just before Council Presentations
rather than waste all these people's time ~n it. Same thin~ with (b) and (d)
probably. Find out if there's anybody here.
Councilman Workman: I just have a quick point with (b).
Councilwcesn Dimler: What is your concern who's here? Who's here that...
Councilman Johnson: If there' s nobody here interested in iten l(a), I'd prefer
to talk about it later in the a~enda and get to what t/~ese people are here to
hear about.
Mayor (~miel: Is there anyone here interested in item l(a) which is wetland
alteration pequot for filling and alteration of Class A and B wetlands located
on Lake Drive East south of TH 5 and east of Dakota Avenue? See/n~ none, we can
put that cm to the Balance of the agenda Jay.
Councilnmn Johnson: Put that just before Council presentations.
Mayor Chmiel: Okay. Ursula?
Councilwaran Dimler: I suppose in the same regard we can move item l(b) to Just
before my Council presentation.
Mayor C~el: Okay, is there anyone here? There's scme~me here. Okay, would
you like to discuss that?
Councilwcnmn Dimler: I guess I will. MY concerns about this one were that I
guess this is an HRA project. Is that correct? ...had indicated that it was.
Mayor ~el: Yes.
Councilwuran Dtmler: And I guess I wanted to tie this into my questio~s about
the HRA which I'll be discussin~ later. I see this on a conce~t agenda and I
know nothin~ about it. Again, I want to make my point that we don't know the
applicant but I hope you're here to present this, but I saw it in the Minutes
that Jay had a concern about the envi~tal issue which I didn't find
addressed in here. Therefore I wanted to pull it and find out what's goinc3 on.
Also, I guess if this is an liRA project, we're giving t~ somethir~ so I'd like
to know what we're getting in return. I'm not real pleased with the minimal
siding and I think it should confom to the neighborhood and to the standards of
Empak and the Church of the Living Christ.
Don Ashworth: The project does qualify. As it is within the tax increme~t
district, the project does qualify for a special assessment rate. They are
City COUncil Meeting - April 9, 1990
eligible to have their sewer, ~ater, street reduced as singly an ince~tive
program through the Houair~ and Redevel~t Authority. The prs~le to
HRA's ~rit~ pro,ram doss state that the pro~ect n~at meet the ~verall intent
and desire of the City. More specifically it qoes c~ to state the pro~ect n~st
be approved and a~reed to be a favorable pro,eot by the City Council. I ~uld
like to have Elliott address this issue ii I am misstatin~ it in any ~y but as
I see it, the City Council does have the ability to state that they ~ld ~rish
to see the standards increased as a result of any HRA iamdin~ into the pro~ect.
You're tre~t~ into an area that's a little t~r. In other
architectural review po~ers qeneral ly are those that, they can ~ very
sub~ective. However, for you to. turn arotmd and state to the pl~rmir~ DireCtor
that you ~ld like to have him ~ork ~lth this particular ~plicant a~d
potentially brir~ the exterior materials u~ to a level similar to adjacent
property, the office area similar to ~d~acent properties, I think that ~ould be
~dthin the Council's purview to do that.
Council~ Dimler: I ~ueas me of n~ quastic~s is, bss this project been
heard by the HRA?
Ikm ~rth: The }iRA, as it is solely a write~ of the public in~rovements,
that typically is not taken back to them until bsm 9xram throu~ the review
process of the pl_srmlng Cc~ssim and City Council-so no, it has not been
presented to them. Al thou~ the applicant is a~are of the general provisim
that states that a project that is accepted by the City is eli~ble for those
special assessments.
Council~an ~lmler: Okay, I ~uess I'm ~ about proced~ here and
here's the resam ~hy. I ~as told that ~e're ~ible for the HRA projects
and then ~hen the public cc~es back ar~ they say I don't like t__h~_ locks of that
builclin~, they look at ua. I'm sayin~ that if this is c~ the ccrment a~euda and
no pulls it, we've never met the applicant. We've never seen the plana and I'm
~uat real leery about approvin~ scmethin~ and bein~ held ~ible for it when
we don't even see the plans ar~ there's no I~A Minutes to refer back to. Can we
scmeho~ reverse that procedure so the P~A listeus to it first?-
· .
Council~ Boyt: Well it went to the Plannin~ Cc~im.
Council~ Dimler: Right.
Councilnmn Boyt: They did review it.
Councilwoman Dimler: Yeah, that's right.
Councilm Johrs~: The HRA has no real reascm to review this me.
Council~ Dimler: The rely ir~ that I have is frcm the Planning Cc~ssicn
and they've had a public hea~ I assm~. But I never ~ to see the plans or,
you know what I'm sayir~.
Council~ Boyt: ~ell I happen to a~ree ~tth you.
City Council Meetin~- April 9, 1990
Councilwoman Diml er: Thank you.
Council~ SOyt: For what it's worth. I guess I'm surprised to see this on the
Consent Agenda and I think it's worth a good bit of discussion if it's going to
get approved or not approved.
Councilwom~n Dimler: I'd at least like to meet the applicant and see the plan.
Don Ash~orth: I apologize for having it on the oonsent agenda. As it had been
approved by the Planning Commission it appeared as though that it was, well it
is in order in terms of meeting all of your ordinances. At issue is really a
question drawn by the Planning Director in terms of his review of the project in
stating that potentially it could be looked at in terms of in, roving the outside
facia or landscaping, etc. associated with the project itself. The applicants
are here. Potentially you might want to hear what they have to say regard/ng
the project.
Councilwoman Dimler: I guess m~ cc~ern is that if the public reacts to how the
buildin~ looks and that's all they'll react to, then we should have s~me say
into it and I hate to see that it's going to be minimal sta~ rather than,
and it's architecturally functi~nal, that's great but we are concerned shout
looks.
Councilman Johnson: We pass the standards in our ordinance. The mirdaun
standards. We can't say these are our min/m~n standards but you've got to meet
something higher. Whatever higher becomes minimum.
Council~ Dimler: That's correct except if the standard has been set by
Councilmsn Johnson: We have staD_4ards within our ordinance and the subdivision
has it's own standards also.
Councilwoman Dimler: But I guess m~ point is, if we're going to give the~
somsthin~, we can ask for something in return. Isn't that the purpose of...
Councilman Boyt: Yes. That's what we've talked about before.
Mayor C~el: I guess I had one co~cern, being that you ~ulled it too.
cox~ern. Has the Church been notified as to the proposal? Okay.
Don Ashworth: I believe the Church did sign off on the plat. I msan there's
been more than notice. They're been joint...
Paul Krauss: The Church is a party to the plat.
Councilman Johnson: Yeah, because they're doing some exchange of church
property right? So they would be.
Com~ilwoman Dimler: So would they like to address this since they're here?
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
Mayor Chh/el: Maybe what we could do is have Mr. Worthington or the avplioant
indicate or show your proposal as to what you're propo~ing for that Particular
business. Maybe if you coul4 just wind it u~ in maybe a 10 minute period if you
could.
Bob Worthington: Mr. Mayor, merbers of the Council. I'm Bob Worthington
Opus Corporation. We're going to be the c~ntractors for the Ra~ Automated
c~m~any's office/msnufacturing facility w~tch is before you this ~ for
appr~l. We of course apologize for having a matter that we look upon as being
of some ~rtance to the c~ty k/nd of placed on a ~m~sef~t agenda. Also,
because I 9uess it leaves us in a situation where we're not fully p~ to
~mze to make a formal presontation to ~uu this e~~g. Usually whe~ mn item is
on a co~sont agenda, you cz~e. You show u~ to answer 9uesti~us and then you
hopefully get the kind of response that I~u're looking for mhd wi~.
this evening I'm goin~ to kind of have to talk a little hit from m~mory in tezms
of what it is that is being presented here. First o~ all in terms of historical
co~text, the site that we're discussing is next to B~ak and is next to the
Church property that w~s referre~ to earlier. It's been platted for 9uite some
time. It's a part of our Chsn Lskes Business Park a~d as you know, the e~tire
park is eligible for the in~ti~, that'this particular project is r~luest~.
Th. i4~a of trak-off is an interesting ~x~t~ Whon ! think th.
first were e~loy~ ~ ~ Mr. ~H Du~n was tbs 4eveloper for th~ park before
we became involved, the ~tives were primsrily aimsd mt trFln~ to ~
devel~t to occur within the park. So they were kind'of ~c in nature
as opposed to aeath~ic, you know we want hig trees ~ we w~nt ~autiful
l~umcIs~~ and we want aestheticall~ pleasing'buil~. At that time the City
was very interested in havin~ the presence in-terms Of the industrial
marketplace within this park. They w~re~'t necessarily getting-it with the
normal marketing tools so they in part we~t to this ~tive program which of
course attracted l~erican Linen ~d then Opus Corporation into the
and I guess everFthing else is history. This is ~e of the last t,~els within
th. park that is yet to be dev~lop~. That sa~ s~m~thing in terma of th.
design stan~=rds that have been used to ~ate in terms of-evaluatin~ projects
that have been introduced into the park. Frcm a 4esign point of vi~, th.
buildin~ will have a feel similar to our Chart ~.akes Businsss Park which is th.
photograph which I'm passing aroun~ to ~u at this Particular Point in tim~.
The exterior materials that we're going to 'be usin~ on this office/msnu~acturing
building which will be 48,000 aguare feet an~ ~lies in ~ re~r4 to th~
zouing requi~ts in terms of o~rage set~ack mn~-on site parking so we
~ave to really get into a discussion-of that. The ~msic differ~z~ betwe~% this
building and the Chan Lakes Business Park-that I'm'showing to you is that the
Chan Lakes Business Park was an o~fice--sh~wrc~m'bu/ldin~ which meszm that 80% of
the space within that buil~ was going to be for office use ~ the other
would be for msnu~acturing .and industrial use. So the 'chsracter o~ the building
is going to be a little hit differant in terms of you-have more ~ in this
building than you will have on the warehouse distribution portion of the
Robert's Automsted Products builclin~. Also, we're going to be using a material
that is ~ as Fab-Con ~hich we've us~ at o~-~r times within the park
have h~ great success with it and u~ to this point h~ no objection in terms of
the City feeling that this was not a ~uality exterior material that warrsnted to
be used within the park. I don't want to go into the merits of Fab-Cc~ but Fab-
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
Con has been used in a variety of locations in a variety of projects...Trm~nel-
Crow building which is an award winning building but the only thing that I want
to show you is that the n~terial that's going to be used on the Trsnm~l~ow
building is the same material that's going to be used relative to the Robert's
Automated Products Building and as such we don't feel that this is going to be
an inferior material. In terms of minimal standards as it relates to
landscaping, we're open. If indeed you feel that the landscaping should be
enhanced, we're open to discuss that so we can upgrade those. If there is some
introduction of material or s~ne emphasis that you'd want us to place on the
exterior of this building that the building does not show at this time, we're
open to discuss that with the staff. But in terms of standards, Council~
Johnson I think was correct up to this point. There are no design standards
that the City has used for the purpose of evaluating the architectural el~nent
within a building. As such it's left pretty much to the discretion of the the
architect and client to make decisions, which we have done here in terms of the
types of facilities that are going to be constructed within a park. So we think
we have been using those standards very well. We' re going to be desi~ming a
building which is going to be comparable to other buildin~s which are in this
vicinity of the park and don't feel that we want to make any excuses or make any
apologies for what it is that we're introducing here. But the main thing I want
to talk about, beyond the aesthetics of the building, is this is a time of
celebration because we're bringing yet a new business into the City of
Chanhassen. Robert's family is here. I d~n't think that I'll take any more
time because I think you'd want to hear their story as to what they are and why
they selected Chanhassen for their business.
Councilwc~n Dimmer: I guess I'd like to make a c~mm~nt at this point. It
isn't necessary for me. I d~n't oppose your project. I think what I'm saying
here is that we have a procedural thing at the City level here that we need to
take care of. I like the project but I would like to also know if Councilman
Johnson's concerns about the hazardous waste, he asked for s~ne infor~etion. Has
that been addressed?
Robert Worthington: Walter Roberts, who's the President of the cc~%~any will
tell you a little bit about the c~m%~any and then directly respond to Mr.
Johnson' s question.
Walter Roberts: I won't talk nearly as lon~. I just want to tell you a little
bit about our company because we think you should know something more about it.
We're a custom producer of machined precision metal parts. We make frc~ 500
pieces of an item up to several million to a customer's specs. Most of our
business is done statewide. We hope with this ex.~zansion to be able to go
nationwide. Have more people and more equi~m~snt. The cc~any was founded in
1947 by my father. I now have 4 of my kids active in the business. A fifth
who's just out of college looking for a job. They all have to go work for
s~meone else first before they come with me. We have 83 ~loyees. Our average
wa~e is Just over $12.00 an hour plus benefits and shift differentials. We do
work 4-10 hour days. Two shifts. We're non-union. We're movin~ from Edina.
Our place was buil t there, our shop there was built in 1966 by th~n the
Roundhorse Corporation which has since then ohan~ed their name to Opus. They
added on in 1972 and 1977 and we're very proud of our Ed/na facility. I think
City Council Meeting - AI~ril 9, 1990
I would just say as I was sitting there and 2ou were talkin~ about trees and
things. We have a 2 acre lot with 26,000 feet on it. Brick face all the way
around and it's a beauti~ building. We have over 40 trees over 3 inches is
diameter on the property and that was all what we wanted to put on. So we're
very prou~ of it. Edina b-- strict co~es just as you people do and I really
appreciate that because when we're putting this ~uch m~iey into a facility, I
like to know ~h-t it's going to be worth s~wst~ a little more than that 20-30
years clown the road and will be here at least that lon~: So ! Just wanted to
make those ccements and as I say, we do look forward to ccming into than.
Councilwcemn Dimler: Can I Just ask you, does your ~dina facility have a
Fab-Con exterior?
Walter Roberts: No, it's all a Brick face. This was built 26 years ago and at
that time that was the ordinance.
Councilwca~n Dimler:
neighborhood there?
Would you have an objection to u~ to meet
Walter Roberts: That's a big expense item to go to brick face Because you put
u~ a block first and then you put u~ the brick face and it's a big item. I've
sc_-% some very beautiful, we feel that we're a job shop and we have to be a
little careful about just what kind of a face we're putting out to our
custcmers. We can' t lock like we' re roi ling in it and yet we want to put out a
9uality image and that' s what I think we' re doing.
Council~ Dimler: That's our concern.
Walter Roberts: We want a ~uality look~ building. As I say, we're
machinists. That's our business and we want it to look like that's what we're
Council~ Dimler: I hope you understand nu concern. I don't want the public
reacting and blaming the Cx. mcil amd we've never eve~ met you. We had no input
so that's the reason I pulled it.
Councilmsm Workuem: My biggest ccucern was that I didn't have th/s. See kind
of carbon copies on a small scale like tb/s kind of-makes you nervous and that
Councilman Johnson: We had then with our Plan~ Ccrmeission packets whe~ they
se~t us the Planning Ccamission packet.
Council~ Dimler: But some of us couldn't make it to that meetly.
Oouncil~ Johnson: Yeah I know and I didn't save nu drawim;s.
Mayor CYmiel: Thank you very much.
Councilman Johnson: Did you give the ~xmwer to the...
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
Mayor Ch~iel: Oh, Jay has one specific question.
Counoilman Johnson: What chemicals you used and that kind of stuff.
Walter Roberts: I brought my er~3ineer alon~. If I could just quickly. We have
two that are considered hazardous. Two solvents. One a methylene chloride and
the other a solder solvent. We have on site separate stills for each item and
we distil 1 both of them into the ccmg~nents that are in them and I guess I'l 1
let my engineer go through it for you.
Ron Oberg: I 'm Ron Oberg. I'm the engineer for Roberts Aut~tic and I've been
the engineer since 1973. When I came to work there, Roberts Automatic was
generating about 2,500 gallons a year of trichlorethylene waste. We were also
generating 10,000 gallcrm a year of mineral spirits waste. We were also
generating 50 barrels of year of water soluable waste and it's taken me u~ until
last year to reach the point of a zero emitter. We recycle our methylene
chloride in house. I did write a letter and send it to the Council. I don't
know if anybody got a copy of it. Probably lost in transit. Do you have a copy
of it. It's only a real short paragraph.
Councilman Johnson: If you're down at what EPA says is possible and it sounds
like you are.
Rcn Oberg: We' re below that.
Councilman Johnson: Yeah. I mean the zero discharge is what they say is
possible and a lot of people say it's not. You're one of those that have proved
it and one of the people who believe it is possible. Probably the only stuff
that goes out is your sludge from your still.
Rcn Oberg: No, the still bottom is, let me just, methylene chloride from a
degreaser is steam stripped once a week using a steam checklist and I sent a
copy of that. Methylene chloride is returned to the degreaser. This armmants to
about 7 gallons a week. The product is worth $3.75 a gallon and this saves us
$1,365.00 a year. The recovered cutting oil contains less than 100 parts per
million of methylene chloride. We put it right back in our system. The cutting
oil is returned to our oil recovery system and amounts to 40 to 80 gallons a
week, depending on workload and oil recovery is worth $3.00 a gallon so we save
$9,000.00 a year in cutting oil recovered. The second waste we generated is
mineral spirits mixed with cutting oil. We purchased a clear flow separater
which is kind of a molecular seive. It first filters out all the metal fines and
then there's a molecular seive that separates the large molecules which is the
cutting oil from the smaller molecules which is the mineral spirits. The
mineral spirits is then recycled and reused in our small wash buckets next to
the screw machines and the cutting oil goes back into our oil tanks. We also,
when I went to work at Roberts we were generating 50 barrels a year of this
stuff and we're down to about 10 gallons a week now. Basically it's tran]~ oil
or oil that floats on the top of the s%m~s of the C~C screw machines. Right now
we're down to about 10 gallons a week. We skim the tramp oil off the coolant
and the tramp oil then goes into our still and the still runs at 220 degrees and
you know what happens to water and oil when you get it to 220. The water turns
City Council Meeting - A~ril 9, 1990
to vapor and it's lost to the atmos~ and the oil goes back in our system.
That's basically how we operate. The still botts...
Council,mn Johnson: ...still on the me~l~e chloride.
Ron Oberg: We use a stil 1 and the still boils it down to about 80% oil and 20%
methylene chloride. At that point cr~e a week we use steam to heat the product
up to 220. Methylene chloride boils at 104 so now we cmn get rid of about 98%.
At that point we inject live stemu into the base for a couple of hours end at
that point we can clrive the methylene chloride clown to less than 100 parts per
million. Now the oil is cc~letely reuseable in our system ~nd the methylene
chloride goes back in the de, teaser.
Council~ Johnson: And you have no dirt7
Ron Oberg: You're talking about the very sludge bottans of the degreaser?
Counciln~n Johnson: Right.
Ron Oberg: Okay. ~x~ut every 2 years we have to clean out our degreaser and
what we have at that is about 10 gallons and what it is is the metal fines, the
metal oxides frcrn the washed parts. We have to dry that product ~ we put it
in with our mixed chips and it goes back to the metal recyclers.
Councilman Boyt: I have a question of staff. Paul, or samsone. -Let's talk
for a minute about, I see you've got in the Council ~tions of approval,
approve screening of truck loading area. You kncse Ursula, ! think everyb~y's
basic concern is how the building's going to look, a. lot of that has to do with
landscaping. I know these little circles on the diagram are almost-~ngless
in terms of how much tree life actually gets out there and what it covers. So
frcm a staff's point of view, are you convinced,- forget the
requirement, are you convince~ that there's er~ evergreen type trees hare to
screen this?
Paul Krauss: Councilman Boyt, in the reccmnendati~ we had requested sc~e
additional scr~.~.-~ing, particularly around the truck loading area... The area
we're requestin~ is over here and over here. In the schere of th~, I think
those are relatively minor c~ticus that you typically find on projects of
this sort.
Councilman SOyt: Well we've got a lot, there's a lot of existing screening and
sane that they're putting in over by the ~. There's really very little on
the frontnge to Lake Drive.
Paul Krauss: The Lake Drive frontage is a difficult one to work with. Lake
Drive runs considerably below the elevation of the parking lot. Lake Drive I
believe is dropping away as you cane through here so what you're going to be
1 ooking at is a grassy, lande~ hil 1 that' s actual ly itself going to screen
most of the parking lot.
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
Councilman Boyt: Okay. I'd like to see, I don't see a cc~tition in here and I'd
like to see one that says that that 30 inch oak tree, the dripline has to be
screened off throughout construction. Sc~y expansion may take that tree but
until then I'd like to see it alive. So what staff is sayir~ here is that the
landscaping does a more than adequate job of screening that builcling?
Paul Krauss: With modifications as outlined, yes.
Councilman Boyt: Okay. So I would just, I don't know whether we add it to the
plat approval or if we add it to the site plan. Whichever is appropriate, I'd
like to see us add a condition that would require the screening off of the 30
inch oak before any construction activity takes place or grading.
Mayor Chmiel: Ursula, do you have anything else?
Councilwoman Dimler: Is that a cor~lition Bill that you're putting on?
Councilman Boyt: I'd like to.
Councilw~ Dimler: Is there a second to that ccmdition?
Mayor Chniel: For further discussion, I thought you may have scmething else.
If you don't.
Councilwc~anDimler: I'm ready to make a motion if there's a secc~ to that.
Mayor Chniel: We have a motion on the floor. Is there a second?
Councilmen Workman: Second.
C~mmcilwc~anDimler: /~t.
Councilman Johnson: Bill's ~t.
Mayor C~el: To the tree, right.
Councilman Bo~ moved, Counatlman Workn~m s~ an am~ck~nt addin~ a
cc~clition that the drtpline around the 30 inch oak tree be screened off prior to
ar%y c~mtmim or gradi~ m the site. Ali voted in favor and the mot/on
Councilwoman Dimler: I move the preliminary plat and final plat to replat Lot 2
and an outlot of Chan Lakes Business Park 2nd Addition, Robert Worthington
project as amended.
Councilman Workman: Second.
Councilwoman Dimler: And that they work with Paul on the exterior.
Mayor Ch~el: Are you referring to the Planning?
10
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
Council~ran D/ruler: To work with Paul on in~roveme~ts.
Counciln~n Johnson: I have no idea what you mean by that.
Dcm ~rth: You mean the faoia queeticrm that had been brought out in Pau/'s
report. What you're saying is you'd like to have him work with the applicant to
see if the quality that is shown in these diagrams to insure that that in fact
does c~me about as a part of the plan. Is that right?
Counciln~n Boyt: Before we vote on this I would like to take this opporttmity
to Just say, I think it's Bloomington that has a brick or better standard. We
have tried numerous times to get through sc~ething about metal buildings. I
think that we should be encourag/ng and maybe you've got scmething on that but I
think we should definitely be looking at upgrading the standard of the surface
of the buildings.
Mayor Chniel: I think that"s sarethir~ we cma look at as we keep going. I
think on this particnllar pro~e~c right nc~.
Cxnmcilman Boyt: It's not relevant to this project other than that here's an
example of one where we don't have a standard and we can't say to them put brick
onito
Mayor Cl~tel: That's something we can lock at.
Council~ Workman: But this is a matal buildin~.
Councilman Boyt: No, not a metal bu/ldin~ but it's also not a brick
Counoilnan Jdmson: Well I'm not that wild abo~ brick buildir~s. I mean a
brick building is not the best locki~ building.in t_hm world ~/th~r to me.
Where I gre~ up almost everybody was brick. In Alahana everythi~ was brick.
Councilwoman Dimler: I guess before we get into a lca~ discussion. KY point is
just that Paul will work with th~ applicant and s~e what they're willing to do
to cc~vrmfise on it. Maybe it's going to stay th~ sa~e. Maybe we have to
change our ordinance. That's a separate issue.
Mayor Cizniel: Yeah, Paul will basically work with the developer.
(kamctlwr~m m,-ler mo~, Co~ctl~ Workaan seconded to ~ the
Preliminary Plat and F~,ml Plat to replat Lot 3, Block 2, ~ ~
Busit~ea Park 2nd l~Sdition into two Iota and ~ outlot as m~mkd. 111 voted
Councilman Boyt mo~ed, (k~lmsn Wot~ secz~xled to ~ tl~ Site Plan
facility as presented. 111 voted in favor .and the motion carried.
Councilnan Johnson: As we're going here, there's also one other thing that was
implied. Is that we're talking about getting something for the ~ writedo~.
11
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
I personally agreed with Bob that the purpose of the HRA writedown is an
economic incentive to build in the City of Chanhassen. Not something that we're
using for architectural control. A PUD, if sc~ebody comes in and asks for a
PUD, that gives us architectural control and whatever. As lc~g as they meet all
our standards. I just want to make that can~ent.
D. AOC~ FE~SIBIL~ STUDY ~ LAKE ~ WE~T ~ PI~ NO. 90-1,
C~rZ. ~ P~BLIC
Councilman Workman: Only very quickly. Again, nmybe it doesn't have exactly to
do with the roadway on the improvement project other than again, as I mentioned,
maybe Gary remembers that c~ page 2 of the existing cc~d/tians it indicates that
there's single family residential to the south and east of this and it then says
a future land use to the south with high density residential. What perhaps we
can do, we're going to have Red~ Products, is that about a 300,000 square
foot?
Todd Gsrhardt: 388,000.
Councilman Workman: 388,000 square foot industrial use across the street from
residential and I continue to question how or we don't necessarily have anything
like that currently in the City and are we in for some problems with that
situation.
Councilnmn Johnson: That's why we made that multi-family residential.
Councilman Workman: And you indicated to me before that multi-family is less
valuable than single family. I live in multi-family and more people too and
they have the same concerns as the people in single family have. Trucks.
Traffic. Noise. Pollution and everything else and so putting, I don't know what
multi-family in this situation means. Maybe it means apartments and we don't
necessarily care what the people in the apartments think but when you get an
apartment of 3 stories or so, they're looking right into this and are we
foreseeing the ir~ct here as far as all of this. Are they going to be far
enough away that...
Paul Krauss: Are you aware that they withdrew temporarily from the agenda? The
first plan that we saw frankly I had the same kind of concerns but on a much
larger scale architecturally that were raised with the Roberts Autcmatic. You
had a 300 foot lc~g, 50 foot high building. But they since revised their plan
somewhat to n~ke it a little more appealing. Plus, one of the things they did
do is they had a separate office component that was in frant with the Fab-Con
exterior of the warehouse. It was quite attractive. Their site includes a huge
amount of open space. There are 3 pc~ds. 4 ponds. A series of hiking trails.
The building's set well back from an oversized right-of-way so there's a lot of
separation from the future high density. There's also city park property,
actually there's two park property in there that will help give sane open space.
They're certainly a design consideration whenever you have two uses like that
interfacing with one another, you want to be sensitive to that and possibly it
points out an area that our ordinances could one day be beefed up. What I
wanted to mention on the last item is we have passed an amend~ site plan
12
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
ordinance that does prohibit metal Buildings except in the agricultural area and
does require adorned, at least adopts to the concret® block in Fab-Con. You
can't just put t~ a flat panel. But bey(~ that, we ~mn apply our l~x~iscaping
standards and other mechanisms to katifer that type of use frcm~ residential area
but it is a concern. It's a design ccl%sideration that we have to deal with.
Councilmsn Workmsn: This is where that park is s~ed to ~e. This on the
other hand is where the proposed mu/ti-fsmtly to ~e /irectly ac~-oss the road
I don't have a site plan or anything else for ~ or how it's going to...
Paul Krauss: There's also another city o~ed parcel Just to the right o[ where
your pen was. Up on the north side of the road.
Counciln~n Workman: It's just s~reth/ng, I don't w~nt to take uv time on this.
I'd like to move approval. I just want to make sure that we know that we're
h_-a~ng into a rub here that I'm not comfortable with at this point. I don't
have any questiczm for C, ary.
Mayor Chuiel: Alright. You made a motion Tom?
Counciln~n Workman: I /ii nyse approval.
Councilwomen D/after: 8eccz~.
call for a Public ~arin~. Ail voted in favor ~mt the m0eion carried.
VISITiI~5 ~(~5: Nc~e.
Public Present:
Nm Address
Jo~/~n Kovern
Betty Bragg
Esther stel let
~ma St. John
Hazel Johnson
South Shore Senior Center
6320 Stellar Circle
6311 Stellar Circle
1621 West 63rd Street
Paul Krauss: As you're aware, the City Council must act to disperse the Year
XVI Block Orant allocations and we're on a fairly strict timeline set by
Hermepin County. We have $33,664.00 this year ~md there are only a limited
mm~er of activities that are eligible. Han/icapped activities. Senior
activities are mmong the two primary c~es. Anyth~ that would Benefit Iow ~nd
13
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
moderate income families. The City received their request for continued fundin~
of $7,212.00 to South Shore Senior Center. Staff supports the request although
we are aware of their need to relocate this center. In speakin~ to scm~e of
their people tonight, apparently they have secured a new location and would be
expected to relocate into there scmetin~ in the fall. I had an opportunity to
review the Center in conjunction with the senior study task force and was
impressed with the dedication of their staff and the quality of the facilities
that they provide. We're proposing3 that the balance of the funds, the
$26,226.00 be held for senior projects or facilities to be named later. The
reason that we're doing that is, as you're aware we are involved in a senior
needs study and we have found out that there are considerably more seniors in
the comusLity than one would have suspected. Initial data indicates something
on the order of about 1,200 seniors if you use the 55 and over definition.
That's expected to grow by about 500 or 600 in the next few years. Population
is aging in place and apparently there's more seniors who live here than I think
a lot of us would have guessed. We believe that the senior study task force
will produce scme good valid results for you and proposals that would be
legitimate funding programs by scmet~ this s~r. Probably around July.
We've received a lot of support with the senior study task force and the work's
going quite well. That would take up the balance of the Year ](VI fau~d. You
might remember at the last meeting I spoke to you about the possible
reallocation of Year XV funds. We have approximately $17,000.00 available for a
low and moderate income housing rehab program. I checked with Hennepin County
to find out when they last advertised this because they've been telling me that
there have been no applicants. Apparently they haven't advertised it for 2
years which would explain why there's probably no applicants and they're sending
a news release that we can use in the local papers to see if anybody is in fact
eligible and wishes to apply. I should warn you though that the incc~us limits
are very strict and there's a good probability that nobody in Chsnhassen that
would like to use it would be eligible. The $17,000.00 that's in there is
probalby enough to fund two rehab programs. They figure they run about
$10,000.00 apiece. If after having advertised it there is no applicants that
are received, I'd like to ccr~e back to you in mid-May or early June to talk
about reallocation of those funds. We do have the right to reallocate those.
What I'd like to propose doing is to support, use those funds if they become
available, to support the already funded, partially funded program to improve
handicapped access on Lake Susan Park.
Mayor C~el: Thank you Paul. Is there anyone else wishing to address this
subject at this time?
Jo Ann Kovern: I'm Jo Ann Kovern and I am the director of the South Shore
Senior Center and I have with me four women, Betty Bragg, Esther Steller, ~ure
St. John and Hazel Johnson, all residents of Chanhassen. Very active as
volunteers there and I want to thank Paul for his reccm~tion to you and I
hope that you wi l 1 agree with him. Thank you.
Mayor Chmiel: Thank you very much.
Councilnsn Workman: Paul, the other thing I see is I think the staff
reccmm~s~lation, those nunbers add up to the old figure not the new one.
14
City Council Meetin~ - April 9, 1990
Paul Krauss: Okay. Well it would be the diff~ betweon our allocation and
57,212.00 for the South Shore Senior Conter.
Mayor (lxeiel: Is there anyone else? This is as I mentioned a public hearing.
If seeing nor~.
~iz~. All vot~ in favor and the motion aarrled. T~e publia hearing was
closed.
Councilman Johnson: I move approval.
Councilw~ Dimler: ~.
Council~ ~oyt: I've got discussion here.
Mayor Chmiel: It's been moved and seccuded with discussion. Bill?
Councilman Boyt: I would hope that before we allocate the rest of the money,
that we investigate handicap barriers in all our parks. Not Just Lake Ann.
certainly have that the other th~ listed there, gettin~ seniors to than
Elere~tary which for 1,200 sen/ors we clearly have a bi~ger market than we're
servicing now. The other items that you mentioned there, that we now in
allocations when studies are done as to where will we hit the largest need and
that scmethin~ might he a little bit different. What in~s the most people
and where's the widest in, ct on the ec~ty. Sc~ like a boc~le for
instance might have tr~ int~act on the relative shut-in types and I'd like
to see that n~ve ahead very quickly.
Mayor C~el: I think that has bes~ in'the report on ~les.
~ the reallocation of Year XVI Cmmmity Devel~t Block ~r~nt Funds as
follows:
Senior Facility, Service and
pr~qr~s to be specified later
$26,226.00
Oary Warren: Mr. Mayor, this is pretty much a housekeepin~ chore. The Cxn~l
took action in 1988 to actually vacate the sanitary sewer easements that exist
near the Colonial Center and the Pauly property and at that time, for whatever
reason, ~e legal description for the vacation was not accurate u tins pointed
out to us by the County surveyor when it was att~ted to be recorded. We since
City Council Meetin~ - April 9, 1990
that time have located and prepared the accurate descriptions for the old
sanitary sewer easements and those descriptions are included in tonight's packet
for the vacation. The easemeslts themselves are of no use to us at this time
because they cover the old sanitary sewer service which since has been replaced
by our downtown redevelolare~t utilities and we have new easements which have
been dedicated to cover the new utilities so there's no further need for these
old easements.
Mayor Chmiel: Thank you. This is a public hearing as I mentioned. Is there
anyone wishing to address this specific iten.
Coumcil~ Worlm~- moved, Counail~ Ilbal~ secc~cled to close the public
hearing. All voted in favor and the motion carried. The public hea~ was
closed.
Councilwc~m Dimler: I want to ccexmend' Theodore Kem%a of Carver County for
catching this situation. I wonder if we can send him a letter or is that Just
part of his routine job? Anyway, I'm glad there's people like that out there.
Gary Warren: Who actual 1 y reads those legal descriptions right.
Resol~on #90-44: Coun~lman Work.mn mo~d, Coum~lw~an Dimler s~ to
approve Vacation Request No. 88-2 as le~ally described in At~t No. 6 for
~ Secc~ addition. All voted in favor and the motion csrried.
BIDS:
Mayor Chmiel: Gary, would you like to cover those?
Councilman Johnson: Does anybody have any cc~ments on then? Because I was
going to say, I was just going to move staff reccm~endatiorm.
Councilman Boyt: Well I would second that.
Councilwoman Dimler: With discussion.
Mayor Chmiel: Yeah. I guess I just had one specific question Gary in
relationship to that 4 wheel drive similar to what the building inspection
vehicles are. I think with our useage of these trucks, 4 wheel drives are
basically necessary to get in and out but in your cc~ment that you had, page 2,
the vehicle is to be equipped with 4 wheel drive similar to the building
inspection veh/cles and the Director of Public Works vehicle. It's necessary
since it will be called on for off road use on construction sites, erosion
control reccmmaissance/enforcement and survey work. I just wanted to make
people aware that there is the basic need for that.
Gary Warren: I'm ashamed to admit that public works had to pull me out 2 we~
ago when we were chasing the erosion hazards that we were trying to mitigate so
I did learn that 4 wheel drives even have their limits but it certainly does
help us to get into the remote areas which we typically have to deal with.
16
City Council Meeting - A~ril 9, 1990
Council~ Jc~ms~: Once all 4 wheels start spirm/n~ you're in trouble huh?
Mayor C~,iel: Any othsr dis~ussion?
Councilwc~an Dimler: I guess my point is, I see the first $ items an here and
they have to do with a truck and a body and snowplow. Is that all one item
there that we're looking at? Is it for snowplow r~zoval?
~ary Warren: That's correct. Council~ Dimler, we get the snowplows, the
sanders and actually the dun~x are fabricated by cliffere~t suppliers so we bid
them out separately to get competitive prices and not to pay the overhead of the
truck manufacturer himself so that is actually s%~m~zed n~]~e more
conveniently for you on the third pa~e of the staff report where smmmrized d%ml~
truck under actual and show cab ~nd chassis du~x ~nd sander and plow ~d a
win~. That's al 1 ~ne vehicle.
Councilwcnmn D/mler: Okay. MY question with it is, as ! add UP the ~rs
it's approximately $60,000.00 for sx~wplowing ~ I'm wc~dering, didn't we just
get that snowplow, that s~al snowplow that the }~A got us for downto~m? We
haven't had much snow. I'm lookin~ at maybe eontractin~ for snow'removal rather
than investin~ in such extravagant egui~m~t.
Gary Warren: The City did purchase a snowblower ! believe is what you're
referring to via the ~ funds and that was special use equil~ent for helping us
with downt~ removal when we develop our windr~ m~d other areas where it
would n~ke serme for off loading snow. This vehicle is a replacement vehicle
for vehicle 106 which basically served it's time. (kmcering the contracting of
snow re,oval, it's not typically dune. I guess I couldn't say that there'is~'t
a ccmmmity that maybe doesn't do that but the response that's necessary and the
cl~m~u~]s on that service are so in~ort~nt to the community that to rely on a
cantractor who may have other ~ties where he's plowing snow and such, I,
don't believe is a positicm that we would want to cc~ortably be in for that
in%~ortant service.
Councilwcman Dimler: It's just that we, you know that's a heavy ~ture for
the amount of snow we have been having.
~ary Warren: This vehicle is not only used for snowplowing. It does do year
round duties.
Mayor C~v~el: Maybe it might help Council too if you show that you're replacing
an existing vehicle. In, cate what that vehicle is ~nd the amount of mileage
that's on there and the year. That might serve sc~e po/n~ that will answer
questiorm and would alleviate the questioning as we're doing now.
Gary Warren: Again on the smmmry page there ! do show chm~ truck re, lace 106.
Is that kind of w~at you're looking for?
Mayor Cl~el: Yeah. The year of the vehicle and mileage an that vehicle and
how long we've had it.
17
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
Councilwoman Dimler: Just a little bit more information because I don't know
what you have.
Gary Warren: Sure. We can include that the next time.
Councilman Johnson: You can pull it right out of the budget because it's all
back there in the...
Gary Warren: Yeah, it's in the vehicle equilxm~nt sheets in the budget but I'll
surm~rize that.
Don Ashworth: I also had talked to our mechanic on this item because in going
through the budgets in previous years and replacement of a truck, we had been
looking more like into a $35,000.00 category and what I 'ye been seeing is that
generally they hit closer to 40-45 and in talking with Harry we're now going
into a diesel engines and all of the equipmeat. This is after a long study by a
nu~r of cities. There's been a relunctance in switching over from gasoline
over into the diesel but just in terms of the repairs, the total cost for
operating the vehicle, he really felt that this was a better way to go and of
course there is an additional cost associated with the diesel. After that I
felt comfortable that he had in fact done his homework and in fact this was a
good recc~tion. I 9~_,_ess I felt cc~ortable with it.
Councilman Johnson: I have o~e cc~m~ent off of what Ursula was saying. On the
contractor, I saw s~ething unique in Cmaha a few years back that you can just
put in the back of your mind is that they contracted with the local concrete
companies to use, the concrete trucks aren't as busy during the winter. There's
no as much construction going on and they put snowplows on the front of the
concrete trucks and a sander on the back and I mean these things are all 6 wheel
drive trucks and built for doing that kind of work. It gave the concrete truck
drivers some work during the winter. The initial response weren't the concrete
trucks. The initial response were all city trucks and the concrete trucks came
out the next day during normal work hours and did the clean-up work. The edges
and whatever. It seemed kind of a logical thing to do. But that's just
something I observed.
Cotm~ilwcman Dimler: Any way we can save the City some money.
C~ry Warren: How much snow do they get in Omaha? A co%~le inches?
Councilman Johnson: Oh, quite a bit. Oh yeah. The Great Plains, they've
gotten a lot more than we have the last few years.
Gary Warren: Our major thrust is from a time restraint is to get the first
pass. To get everybody opened up and actually the winter months, the clean-up
work. The off loading, the trucking of snow and such actually is good work
because we do that in a non-overtime basis.
Mayor Chmiel: I appreciate the snowplowing that we have done within this
cc~ty. I go to many other conm~mities and believe me, you're driving in
more ruts than you are on streets and I think we do a fantastic job.
18
city Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
m olu im #90-45:
the bids for the fol 1~ equilaamt:
Boyer Ford Tzuak
Midl~ Equi~t
Crysteel Truck Equipmmt
Su~or Ford, Inc.
Thurk Bros. Chevrolet
AI~ Eclui~t and Supply
Midl ar~t ~qui~t
LaHass Manufac~curlng and
Sales, Inc.
Motorola C~cations
V~cl e/~mm~;
1990 r.-8000 Cab and
Chassis
Sander
Henke Plow and Palls Wing
Two 1990 F-250 4x4 Piak%%~
and One 1990 F-150 Pickup
1990 Chevrolet B1500 ~uburban
New Versalift VO-50P1
A~rial D~rl~ (~ Truck)
Boss '~;" Plow
Western 8 1/2' Pro-Plow
'$39,S78.00
$9,897.00
$9,971.00
$37,573.00
$15,385.00
$39,329.00
$2,703. O0
$1,797.00
$3,000.00
For a total ~mmt of $167,462.00 . All voted in favor ami the mot/c~ cmrrt~.
comcilmn Jdmsm moved, ckamctl __w~-- nimlor s~xzl, d to ..ard th. hid for the
62 inch Front Mortared Lasm ~ to l~l Iltst~ Co. frc~ Pl l~mth,
Hiz]z~a in t]~ m~ount of $9,322.90. 'All voted in favor and the motion
Councilman Johnson:
Mayor Cl~niel: Great.
Councilwcman Dimler:
~ (1~ BIDS: 1WI~LIC ~ ~IAR~ ~ IKIIIDII~ ~ 89-23.
Councilman ~: I ' 11 ~e a~r~l.
S~.
I like ~ ~ we'~ ~.
I'd like to ~y I ~~ ~ tda ~t j~. ~ c~
~ ~t ~ ~t s~ ~ ~ ~ $100,000.00 ~t ~ ~~ for ~ 1~
~ ~ s~ r~l clue so I'm ~1 ~.
~cil~ J~~: A lot ~tter ~ ~ ~tial.
19
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
Mayor Chmiel: I appreciate it too.
Gary Warren: Excellent bidding plans and good in, ut I think.
Resol.~ .c~ #90-46: Councilmsn Boyt n~, Councilman Johnson seccnded to ~
the bid for the Public Works Auxiliary Storage Building, Phase II Project No.
89-23B to W.H. Cates construction, Inc. in the mwunt of $76,900.00. all voted
in favor and the motion carried.
A. APPOINtmenTS TO T~E PUBLIC ~ (XN~4ISSIC~.
B. R~C~SI~R POLICE STUDY OC~tXTT~.
Jim Chaffee: I miss my introduction Mr. Mayor but I don't think this issue
needs a whole lot of introduction. I asstm~ we're talking about the item on the
Public Safety Ccmmtission appointments.
Mayor Chniel: We're talking about the appointments to the Public Safety
C~ssion and also reconsider police study ccm~nittee.
Jim Chaffee: Okay. You may remember that we talked about this ~n several
occasions in the past, both in a Council setting and a work session setting.
Again, I don't think it needs a whole lot of introduction because we've gone
over it so many times. I'm just asking I guess for Council d/rection in how we
want to proceed with this. I'll be happy to answer any questions that the
Council may have regarding any of these issues.
Councilwoman Dimler: Okay, Jim I guess I had a question as to, you said that
you were going to fill ~ne of the two remaining vacant slots. Did you get any
more applicants? Did you advertise for more?
Jim Chaffee: We advertised way back in the beginning and didn't receive any
applicants and we advertised once again and I believe it was in conjunction with
Park and Rec. I think they had the sm~e problem we had. It was during the
second advertisement that we did receive the 6 applicants that cmme in and then
we did suhnit those to the Public Safety Ccmxnission on February 8th. At that
time the Public Safety Cxm~nission made the reccmm%endations of the four to the
City Council. I think that's where we stand right now.
Coun¢ilw~,ren Dimler: Okay, so we never recalled Kathy Schroeder or Ken Potts
and asked them to reconsider?
Jim Chaffee: No, we did not do that yet.
Councilwcman Dimler: I guess I still have the same concerns I had before.
Mayor Chmiel: Do you want to indicate those.
Councilwunan Dimler: Too many people that work in Public Safety were passed
forward to us. I'd like to see more of the general public. Different
professions come before us you know so we don't have a Public Safety Cc~mission
2O
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
that's made u~ of mostly Policemen and public safety, s~mehow involved in ~blic
safety.
Mayor (2m~el: I guess I"11 throw a c~m~t in too. I feel that these people
who are either Policems~ or whoever su~it an application. Bein~ a resident
within the ccmmmity I guess I d~n't have that co~cern. Bein~ that we have a
certain amount of people that do apply and we don't get enough applicants, it
presents a problem in itself so in having the...
Council~ Dimler: But we did have Ke~ ~n~ Kathy that did apply.
Jim Chaffee: That was for a totally separate issue.
Council~ Dimler: Yeah hut ! thought maybe they would he interested in the
ccemissi~ if we asked them.
Councilman Bo2t: If I might. When the Public Safety Commission interviewed
these people, the candidates that were referred to the City Council, eaoh
brought a special area of excise which the C~ssicn was goin~ to he ~uite
happy to have. We're not a police review c~ttee where we're going to he
takin~ some kind of disciplinary action or recommending an.v~ like that as
like Minneapolis might have. What we are is a research study grou~ and it
really helps to have people who have the ~uality and kmckgrom~ in the
candidates referred. ~ who has worked full time in a dru~ task force.
A~szing resource they have in all our meets. The gentleman who worked has
been assi~med to the Civil Defense effort. I think we're going to appoint him
as I recall hut again, just a trema~hmm resource and so when the ccm~missi~n
looked at it, at their knowledge of the issues. The fact that they were
residents in the c~zaity an~ their desire to serve. It wasn't that the other
people...
Council~ Dimler: Okay, I don't have any 9ualms about the qualifications of
the people. That isn't n~ point hut I think in the future when you send people
forward to be interviewed, keep that in mind that the2're not all policems~ or
work in public safety as well. There are other 9ualified individuals out there
that ! think are willin~ to serve if we Just open it-u~. And mF other point is,
if we move ahead to the police study c~mittee, n~ point there is that I want to
make sure that the Public Safety Cz~mission does not become the police study
c~ittee. And I say that Because although you indicate that everything is well
right now and everything is haxmonious, we all know that overnight the public
safety issue can flare u~ into a big battle. At that point I'd like to have a
buffer z~ne in it's place that the Public safety ccamission doesn't
automatically becNmr~ the police study c~mitt~ which to me is like whe~ you go
ask a group of surgeons if you need surgery. They're all goin~ to tell you yes
when indeed there may he a medical approach that would be just as good and get
the same results. So I'd like to have that buffer z~ne in there. You did
mention in your report that the police, or the Public Safety c~mission could
hec~me the police stud2 ccmzittee. I do not a~ree with that and I would speak
against that and that we do at sc~e point, when it ~ a hot issue aga/n,
that we get a police study committee.
21
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
Jim Chaffee: And I would tend to go alon~ with that. I would just like to
point out one thing though. That the names that I forwarded to the Public
Safety C~ssion was the entire pack that I had. I didn't pick or choose any
of these names. It was exactly the application that came in that went to the
~m~missicn.
Councilwoman Dialer: Okay. That's all my concerns.Councilman Workman: I guess
I agree with Ursula on the appointments. You're not a police review c~ssion
or you wouldn't he. The Public Safety isn't a police review and I can
appreciate and I can understand why people who are involved in day to day public
safety, fire,hen, police officers, etc. would be interested in doing this. I
don't know that citizens of the cc~ty are best served nonetheless by that
because they do see, police officers do see things a little differently than
what I call a normal person myself and so maybe we can head off the need for a
citizens review or police review cc~mittee by, you know I think one of the most
respected members of the Public Safety C~ssion who just left was Candy
Takkunen and she was just a citizen and I think she put her heart and soul into
it and cared a lot about the issues and she had no background so she's proof
that we can get good citizens without, and I d~n't know. Maybe you're going to
tell me she had a FBI background or s~nething. But you're right. You get a
room ful 1 of like minded people in the same room thinking about something, I
don't know that that serves the citizens of the cc~ty quite properly. The
other minute thing that I had a concern about was if we had a situation Jim
where we did have a police depar~t and you were obviously police chief and we
had a disgruntled officer. That officer could in effect get on the Public
Safety Cc~mnission and cause you all sorts of nightmares. The same thing for
Dale Gregory. A disgruntled fire fighter. Doesn't like the way things are
going could cause Dale Gregory sc~e problems and I don't know that we need to
keep any citizen off any of these cc~n~issi~ because of that potential problem.
But it's I think s~nething we need to look at. We have had a lot of heated
discussions on this Council about where we want that police depar~t situation
to go. If it were stacked with police officers I'd feel I was at a disadvantage
also. That has nothing to do with the personal opinions about any of the people
that have applied because I think they're quality people. But again, I think we
need to have maybe a little more discussion about the direction of the players
on the Public Safety Cc~nission are.
Jim Chaffee: I think we'd certainly welc~ve that too. Any kind of direction.
Councilman Boyt: I think that we can't forget that the City Council, which
currently has no people with a professional public safety background on it,
reviews everything that the cc~mission does. The cc~mission can't cause anybody
grief because they have no power to do anything other than raise issues. And so
it would be different if they had a budget. If they had some sort of direct
supervisory impact but they don't have any of that.
Councilwomen Dialer: They've caused us enough grief in the past though.
Councilman Boyt: I think that when we look at the drawbacks of having the
commission filled with people with professional public safety backgrounds, I
agree in part with what you're saying. I know that they bring a biased to these
things out of their experience. But they're not the final authority and they're
a beck of a good resource.
22
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
Mayor Chr~el: Okay, I would like to have us appoint to the Public Safety
C~mrdssion $ people and is there a motion?
Counciln~n Boyt: Who are the 3 people?
Mayor Chmiel: Well we have to ccme up with the third one.
Councilwaran Dimler: ! move Bill Bernhjelm, Dave ~ and Brian Beniek.
Mayor (2m~el: I would secca~d that. Any discussion?
Councilman Johnson: I think it's really close with me between Jack Talbot with
his juvenile experience which is a big ccrm~ern of mine is the children in town.
You all know my ccemi~t to the children plus his dru~ experience in to~n.
Those are the two thin~s that I would like to pick Jack over Brian personally at
this point even thotuh I'm not goin~ to be disappointed with Brian whatsoever.
I think he would also make an excellent because he's'a fire fighter and police
officer and britts two Points of view there.
Mayor Owniel: I liked the fact that Brian has lived in town for 25 years so
he's got a fairly good handle on what's ha~peEd/~.
Counci lwaren Diml er: He knc,,es the town.
Mayor Ch~iel: He knows the ccmmm/ty.
Councilnmn Johnson: Jack's lived in the area. He went to Chaska High.
Councilwon~n D/rifler: They' re al 1 excel lent candidates but we have to choose.
Councilwce~n llimler moved, Mayor (]~/el seconded to ~q~[nt BiI1 BernhJelm, Dave
Duerer and Brian Beniek to the Public Safety ccemission. All voted in favor ~ud
Mayor Ch~iel: Reconsider that Police study ccemittee.
Councilwamm Dimler: We' ve already discussed that.
Mayor Chu/el: That's already been discussed so therefore we can just...
Councilman Workman: It's off the burner?
Councilwmmn Dimler: Well, unless you want to make a motion. If you feel it's
needed right now but certainly when things get hot again I'd like to see it in
place.
Jim Chaffee: Mr. Mayor, if I may hake a ccm~e~t. Ommcilwonmn Dimler, I th/nk
we have a real workable tool in place in our adhoc Police group meet~ once a
month on the third Monday where myself and Councilm~n Workmen and Council~
Dimler alcr,~ with Sheriff A1 Wallin ~nd Captain Bob Paqelkopf frcm the Sheriff's
Department get together and discuss these issues. I really hope deep ~
inside that just in that alone will prevent any type of controversy from arising
and hopefully that will Be the case. I think it's a good workable work session
if you will.
23
City Council Meeting -April 9, 1990
Councilman Johnson: Whether this is the right time for a polio study c~mittee.
Right now what's being proposed is basically have all of our police
professionals kind of put all the data together and come up with a
recc~tionwithout really any, as you're saying, the c~m~n citizen, the
non-police professional which has a different point of view on everything
involved. I mean that was the point of the police study c~ssion was to have
a blend of both the professional police officer and their point of view with the
taxpayer point of view to look at this issue. I'm not totally sure that the
police study ccmm~ittee is a bad idea at this time. That maybe 2 or 3 years of
study for the group and to get it together and whatever.
Councilwoman Dim/er: I guess I want to make my point again. I don't really
care if we get one now or not. The point is that the Public Safety C~mission
never becomes the police study ccmm~itteewhen it is time to move ahead for the
reason being also that remember that the police study c~nittee, if the Public
Safety Ccmm~issionwouldn't have any input from the sheriff's depar~t. So we
need to have a committee that is well rounded and has lots of citizen input.
Councilman Johnson: Did we not pass a motion a while back to create the police
study commission?
Councilwcman Dim/er: Yes. And it had the stipulation that...
Councilman Johnson: And it was going to be a well rounded group.
Councilwc~mm Dimler: Right.
Councilman Johnson: What happened? Can somebody tell me what happened to that
original? Why we are where we are now.
Jim Chaffee: Prior to that I think the Council direction was to have Sheriff
Wallin and myself get together and do just that same thing.
Councilm~m Johnson: Which didn't happen.
Jim Chaffee: Which did not happen, right. We started seeing the police study
cc~mittee as becoming quite bt~ens~ne and after discussions with Sheriff Wallin
and Chief Deputy Jim Castleberry and myself and Scott Hart, we thou~t we could
streamline things quite readily without actually going through the process of a
police study committee with upwards of 9 me~bers. We Just felt we could serve
the citizens better andstreamline the processwithout going back to square one.
Again, I think the forces are in place to do that.
Councilman Johnson: But will it happen this time?
Jim Chaffee: Yes. It has to. I mean we're looking at changes that are going
on right now that myself and Sheriff Wallin have kccn discussing pertaining to
law enforcement coverage in 1991. We've got to know real soon just what we're
going to be reccmm~m~ling through the contract system in 1991 so we've been
discussing quite regularly what we would recc~ to the Cit Council in very
short order here.
24
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
Councilman Johnson: See that was ~ of m~ other objectives of the police study
cc~ttee was to actually have it happen because you know, all of a sudden
you've got a little deadline of, the cc~mittee's meetin~ on Tuesday. We better
get together and do something since it's M~y afternoon. ~et something for
Mayor C~el: I d~n't w~nt to keep goin~ with this but I think we discussed
this probably enough.
Councilwo~n Dimler: As lcd; as you r~ that.
Mayor C~el: I ckn't know if we need a motion on this? I don't think we do.
Councilnmn Johnson: Right now they're under direction to form a committee so we
need a motion to either get rid of the cc~ttee and go to the Public Safety
Director's idea of doin~ it the way we told then to do it 2 or $ years ago.
However long that was.
Mayor C~m~el: Not too lon~ago. Last year.
Councilm~ Johnson: Well, the Council before also.
Mayor C~el: Okay. Maybe we should have a motion on the floor to indicate
that we no lc~er reccamider the police study cc~ttee.
Councilmen Johnson: why don't we move to suspe~ the police study c~mmission,
fonmtion of the police study ccmmission indefinitely?
Councilwoman Dimler: With the understanding that the Public ~afety Cc~mission
shall never become the Police study cc~ttee.
Councilmen Johnson: Right. Make that a motion as I move we suspend the
fonmtion of a Police Study Ck~ttee and rec~ that we do not have the
Public Safety Cc~mission as the Police Study Cx~mittee, al~ the~ should be
represented on it.
Councilwomen Dimler: Right. And they would.
Mayor C~el: Okay, we have a motion on the floor.
Council~ Dimler: Second.
Councilman Jol~s~n mo~, COuncilw~an Dimler ~ to ~ the
of a Police Stu~y Ck~mittee ~nd reo~m~d that the Public Sdety Ozmtssi~l not
Don Ash~orth: We ha~ received corresI~ce from the Watershed District. This
was hack in December. Right after receivin~ that we received notice that they
were proposing to develop an outline for their workplan and that the City may
wish to hold off on their comment until after that outline had ~,_-n developed.
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
We have since, just in this past 2 weeks, received the proposed outline frc~ the
Watershed District. This deals with the workplan for the Lake Riley Chain of
Lakes Improve~nent Project. We have nothing on the file in terms of response
back to the Watershed District from their early response to us in December.
do not foresee any form of litigation. However, I did bring this item back to
the City Council believing that there should be a letter basically stating that
we concur with their position which is that it may be very difficult, if not
impossible, to obtain a boat access on Lake Lucy.
Mayor Chmiel: Okay. I think it's adviseable for us to have a letter in the
files supporting the Watershed District's position. Even though that a public
access on Lake Lucy may be very difficult to achieve, it's not being guaranteed
by the City of Chanhassen, we should authorize staff to prepare such a letter.
Councilman Johnson: I think the letter should be, rather than being real
general. I should say maybe even make it more general, in that we can't
guarantee a public access meeting the full DNR, the general I~ requirements of
so many parking spots and so much of this and so much of that. It would be
possible to get some limited public access on there quite effectively and cost
effectively but the full access due to, and you know due to wetland issues, etc.
would be extremely expensive and environmentally could be detrimental to the
lake also. When you have to take out a 20 foot swath of cattails 400 feet long
and make that much dredging on that small of a lake. Put a little more guts to
it rather than just a real general letter to where we're not opposed to the
access. The topography and the general nature of the area makes it difficult
for that large of a public DNR access.
Mayor Chmiel: I think maybe we can have staff prepare that. We can also review
that.
Councilman Boyt: I 'm interested in I believe the first meeting in March staff
was directed to draft a letter to the Watershed District about our desire to see
then make some progress and it was in response to their report that was in our
Admin pack of that meeting.
Don Ashworth: I apologize. I dom't recall notes to that effect. My reason for
stating that is that I have been concerned that we haven't had a letter on the
file.
Councilman Boyt: It was a Metropolitan Council report back to the Watershed
District om their lack of progress. And it very specifically pointed out that
(2mnhassen had not done it's job in getting the, it said scmething about
political problems with the...
Councilman Workman: That was more directed at Watershed wasn't it?
Councilman Boyt: Well it was but it implicated us and I remember quite
specifically bringing it up as a Council Presentation in which, as I understood
the Council, there was the directive to draft a response to the Watershed
District and to Met Council. So I'd like to see that done.
Don Ashworth: Yes, and I do have the note to that effect. I took that
direction however as one of that really supported the Watershed District's
26
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
position. They were qu~ti~ the Metro Council's review of their work plan.
I understood the Cotmcil's recc~tion to be one of supporting the watershed
district in their efforts against proposed legislation by Metro Cotw~l.
Mayor Chmiel: I believe that's right.
Councilman Worknan: I th~ it was, maybe I brou~t ~ the fact that that could
very well have been a letter that was directed towards watershed districts in
the entire metro in preparation of that le~/lslation that thsy're look~ to gain
control where watersheds now control.
Don Askmorth: And followin~ that, the Mayor ~nd I did meet in a legislative
meeting with Becky Kelso and BoB Sahr~tz and we brot~t out th/s City's support
of the Watershed District. I don't know if you fecal 1 that.
Mayor Chmiel: Yes.
~ ~rth: It was a m~etin~ in Shakopee and they were very happy to r~ceive
that and so I guess I felt that we had ac~liahed what the Council was l ook/ng
for unless Councilrran Boyt you're...
Councilman Boyt: Wel 1, I'm fecal ling, the mots we ~lk ~ ~s ~ ~re I
~11 ~t ~t I s~fi~lly ~ ~ ~ ~ ~t ~ tell ~ Wat~
~strict t~t ~s is a ve~ ~ive proj~
~i~lity of f~~ ~s ~ ~ ~t~ of a ~er of a ~lli~ ~11~.
~t ~ t~ prell. It ~'t a ~l/ti~l rotter. It
fi~i~. I ~~ if y~ ~ ~~t~ y~'ll f~ it g~ al~ ~t
line. ~
Wate~ ~st~ct or to'~ file, ~ s~ ~t to ~im ~t ~ c~tt~
$8,333.00 ~i~
s~~ ~ir eifo~ to ~trol ~-~t s~~ ~lluti~. I '~'t ~t
p~ of t~t ~er~ bill ~y'~ got.
Don Ash~orth: You could almost Be assured that they will send it to us thotuh.
! mean ! don't know what it w/Il be, $1,000.00. $3,000.00. They will want to
get it.
Councilnan Workman: I would also 'add that there is property for sale on the
lake which the City was looking at it as a csndi~te for this landin~ m%d a
place where I dan't think any of us a~reed the l andin~ should go But these
larger goverrm~mtal a~emcies aren't exactly j~in~ to buy this property to put
an access in.
Council~ Johnson: The II~R's not run~ out to buy that?
Councilman Boyt: No.
Mayor Ch~iel: Not yesterday.
Councilnsn Worknmn: They only want for us to bu~ it ~nd we c~n't hardly afford
it.
Mayor Ch~iel: Okay. I think staff has direction to move along. Let's m~ve
along to item 8(a).
27
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
Paul Krauss: Mr. Mayor, maybe I'll give a brief overview and then Gary can
explain the alternatives. At the March 12th meeting staff was directed to
reassess access options for the Brandt parcel and surroundir~3 areas. As you may
recall, staff originally proposed providin~ a loop street back to Highway 41
from Doqwood Road over the Brandt parcel. We believe that a connection between
Dogwood and Crimson Bay, which was pointed out in the report, was technically
feasible but we did not recc~ that due to previous actions where
alternatives to serve the area were considered. Both the Planning C~ssion
and the City Council asked that that connection be reassessed at which time
staff indicated that we thought it was technically feasible from a gradin~
standpoint based upo~ new gradir~3 information, topo information that we had and
that since the power company put through the power line, that it was reasonable
from a tree loss standpoin~ since the trees had already been removed. Since
that time workin~ with the engineering department, 3 new alternatives were
developed. Thus if you add in the original Crimson Bay/Dogwood connection that
we'd been considerin~, plus the obvious alternative of doin~ nothing, there's 5
alternatives to co~sider. Any of the four potential build alternatives, if you
will, provide a response to the concerns that have been raised regarding the
need to provide an overall access plan for the neighborhood and eliminate the
over length cul-de-sacs while maintaining traffic safety. In reviewing the
alterantives, the Plannin~ Departmsnt has concluded that Alternative B, which
Gary will show you in a minute, is probably the most effective one in providing
all the access requirements for the future that we see for this area while
minimizing; impacts on area parcels. It would however require the dedication of
an easement over the northern 33 feet of the Brandt parcel plus right-of-way
would also be provided for the cul-de-sac, the formal cul-de-sac at some point
in the future for IkmF~ood as had been shown on the original plat. Whsn you look
at alternative B though, it sort of be~s the issue of whether that Crimson Bay/
Do~wood connection should still be msde. It would technically again, be a
fairly easy thing to do. It's not part of Alternative B per se but it is a
question that needs to be resolved. Staff nonrslly reccmm~m~ls preservin~ as
many access options as possible and that clearly is one that we've gone on
record as sayin~ is feasible. On the other hand, it does impact lots on the
Brandt subdivisio~ and does require the procurement of right-of-way from the
Arboretum to become effective. We believe that in general the overall access
alterantives being explored under Alternative B resolve the neighborhood issues
pretty much as we see them. Therefore we're real l y not recc~in~ anything
particularly on that Crimson Bay connection. We're going to defer to your
direction on that matter feeling scm~ewhat comfortable that Alternative B does
the job for us. We've recommended approval with conditi~ that are pointing
towards Alternative B being the selected alternative. We're proposing that
official mapping of all future streets also be procured by the City Council so
we have something on record as properties do develop over the years. That we
can continue to effectuate this response. With that I'd like to defer to Gary
to give you an overview on how those alternatives worked out.
Mayor Chmiel: Have any of the adjacent property owners had a chance to review
this prior to this evening? ~ood. I see some heads nodding.
City Council M~ting - ARril 9, 1990
~ary Warren: A couple of preliminar~ cc~ts ms]~be additic~al to what Paul has
said. When we took a look at th/s itch, I believe this was to be pictured as
s~ to be...~uick overview look at the grades. At the vegetation and
basically try to fit in alternatives that fit with the contours of the land and
would pose as little environmental harm, so to speak, ms possible and still
abate the... It's not to say that there aren't numerous see~%arios that can come
out of this...but we came u~ with basically 3 alternatives here. ~ the other
hand, we did look at it and did look at grades and such and have talked with
MnDot to further define s~ of the issues as far as out on TH 41 and as far as
the TH 5 are c~ncerned. We had talked about the fact that...controlled access
situation for a quarter mile on both TH 41 ~nd TH 5 where MnDot will not allow
access to...TH 41 and TH 5 intersection in the future. We already are
experiencin~ problems there... We did look at utilizin~ existin~ access points
of which there are two north of that location on TH 41. Sort of touch down
points but gives us some crit~a to where this connection might be. What I
have u~ here is Alternative A which is in the packet. Basically it shows cc~in~
off of the north side of Lot 1, a 60 foot right-of-way ~n~ c~n~ng to the
north here at this t~ point. The road could be take~ through the
Arboret~ property as shown here in a number of c~igurati~ns ~z~ c~ed
into that so we'd have some fora of thru traffic ciruclation. The grades that
we're looking at here are approximately 7% grade or lees. The steeper grades
are on the westerly part of the project here. As you get further to the east we
end up with rollin~3 farmland ~r~ such and we're talkin~ about 5% to 7% so a
pretty modest grades for example. Tree removal, up again in this area primarily
but ag~n, as Paul n~tio~, there's utility work that has been done by
Minnesota Valley. Not as big of an issue as when we originally had looked at
this item. Alternative B, a little different twist to the sce~%ario. Basically
again coming off of the north side of the subject property in this area. Now we
show, I think we have a good sense here, connects to Tana~k~mm Drive off of the
Zim~ermsn parcel here and here it's goin~ to be an att&c~t point here. We've
chosen this access point which just meets the ~uarter mile criteria and there's
an existing buildin~ there that would have to be raised. ~ additioual tree
removal perhaps in here. But a~ain, the s~me grade situation. A little bit
different concept for accessin~ thro~ the Arboret~ property. It does meet
the criteria and does provide...
Mayor C~m~el: The State Hi~y De~ug~ent requires that quarter mile setback
frcm major intersections? Is that correct?
Gary Warren: That is tF~ically their criteria, that's correct. This is
Alternative C and the only difference here, major difference is sh~ the road
accessing through a cc~m property line of the two lots... We're looking at
this to provide a more gradual access to aocc~a~odate traffic movements and that
basically cuts down...Alternative B. T~e grades through here are, we cmn get a
7% grade but it comes at some cost. The existing grades are a little steeper
through this area and we would have to tolerate more si~nificant cuts out there
which would result in a little bit wider path of construction so to speak. The
City has entertained conditiorm of this to utilize or waive our subdivision
criteria and go to 10% grade. This is certainly possible but to minimize the
m~nt of cut in that particular area, it would be about 5 feet. This exhibit 4
shows the 7% grades ~nd the 10% versus the existing terrain so that's ~ne way
that the in~act could be minimized. Tree removal with this alternative on the
westerly end is somewhat less than on the other two alternatives because it's in
29
City Council Meetin~ - April 9, 1990
the area where the trees basically...whichshows the tree area ~tirlywell
defined. Just lookin~ at this area inhere, which is a little narrower...
MnDot, current traffic is sum~mrized in the report forTH 5 and TH 41 and Paul
and I have been diligent in working with the Carver County...application which
is cc~ing to rapid co~clusi~nhere...TH 5 will be carrying u~wards of 30,000
vehicles per day in the year 2000 and TH 41 we're up to 10,000 so I think we're
very sympathetic to MnDot's criteria on the quarter mile for the access
restriction and it also makes sense as we look at our developments through
here...
Mayor Chmiel: Thank you. Is there anybody that would like to say sc~nething,
and maybe if we can go on the repetitions as we had from the last time and just
bring out some new points, we'd appreciate that.
Peter Brandt: I 'm Peter Brandt. I 'm not sure who D~nald Brandt is but that's a
name that's on the application. Mr. Mayor and Councilmembers, tonight I would
like to first endorse the plan submitted and second, just very briefly reiterate
some of the items that we brought up last time when we were here on March 12th.
Councilman Boyt: Which plan is that you're endorsin~?
Peter Brandt: I 'd like to endorse the plan submitted April 5th by Paul Krauss,
the plan that endorses Option B as you've already see~ and have discussed very
briefly here. We feel that given the anlount of study that's already been done
on this piece of property over the last 3 years and the reiteration of that
tonight, that this plan should now pass as recc~ed. As it stands, the
easements that are being requested take at least 2 1/2 acres of the 20 acres
being subdivided and we feel that that impacts the land already. This is done
without any real benefit for either of the two properties being created.
However, we' re wil ling to live with this for the future needs of any devel o~m~ent
that might happen in the area. Just to reiterate the points we discussed last
time we were here. We told you how we intended to use the land. Basically for
our residence and our desire that the subdivision be done without the road
easement from Crimson Bay to Dogwood Road across the middle of our property. We
feel that most of those points are met by this plan now and I don't want to beat
a dead horse but now there is an overall plan and it makes sense to us and it
appears to address the 5 major concerns that we had mentioned last time. Again,
we urge you to pass this subdivision, Option B as illustrated and as the
Planning staff recc~. Any questions?
Mayor Chmiel: Thank you.
Kurt Laughinghouse: Mr. Mayor, I'm Kurt Laughinghouse representing Tim Foster,
the owner of the land and we too endorse the 10 point rec~m~ation in Mr.
Krauss' n~a~o except we want to say this. There's a little hit of a conflict
between item 1 and item 7 in that item 1 calls for the roads illustrated in
Exhibit 2 to be met and item 7 calls for a portion of it to be dedicated in the
plat. We feel that that road that runs alon~ the north line of our property is
a road. If a road is put in there, it will be for the future benefit of all
properties concerned and should not be dedicated at this time. We agree with
the mapping process which is designed for such future considerations so we would
prefer that.
3O
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
Counciln~n Boyt: I've got a question about that that it might be helpful to ask
now. Gary, isn't it our normal procedure when we're platting properties to try
to get this land dedicated to the City?
Gary. Warren: Definitely.
Councilnmn Boyt: And so this would be the time to do it?
Gary Warren: That's correct.
Councilmen Work~en: It's only half of it isn't it? 30 feet?
Gary Warren: 30 feet of the 60 foot right-of-way.
Councilm~n Johnson: If no road's built in the future, it'd be just like the
sewer easements we got rid of earlier.
Gary Warren: The City can always choose to vacate it's right-of-ways or
easements, that's correct. -
Councilman Johnson: We must do 4 or 5 of these a 'year that we vacate that we
reserved earlier and ended u~ when the development occurred, didn't need it
anymore.
Mayor C~el: Right. Yes sir.
Nick Dennis: Mr. Mayor, honorable CouncilmemSers, my name is Nick Dennis.
own Lot 5 in Crimson Bay and after having reviewed what we've seen here
t~night, I guess myself and my f~mily are in 'favor of Plan B without the
connection going through to Dogwood. That's my only c~msnt, thsnk you.
Counciln~n Boyt: What about the people in Lot 3? Are they here? It looks to
me like we're going to have the greatest in, act on them.
Counciln~n Johnson: If the Arboretun ever sells that property and develops it
which is the biggest if I've ever heard. I've never heard of m university ever
getting rid of property. Ac~ring it yes. Getting rid of it, no.
Mayor C~,iel: Yes sir. Please state your name and your address.
Ken Daniels: Daniels is the name. I think I've Been here Before and I've
spoken to you before about this situation. What I wondered were some questions
that I wanted to ask. We're talk/rig about the west side of Lot 1, which is the
lot I'm concerned with. We're talk/n~ I gather a 40 feet easement or right-of-
way or what are we talking shout? As I understand there'd be an assessment if
that road was developed.
counoil~n Johnson: That's right.
Ken Daniels: Who would pay that assessment7
Counoil~ Johnson: Benefitting property owner.
31
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
Councilman Boyt: You're it.
Mayor C~el: Gary?
Ken Daniels: That's what I thought.
Gary Warren: The benfitting property owners Mr. Mayor.
Ken Daniels: Now that would be, I don't view that as a help to me from the 550
and I understand you can't look at it that way but I'm having the west end of
that lot carved u~ to the tune of 40 feet plus the setback of 30 feet and then
in addition to that, right now I 'm giving an easement over I think 20 or 30 feet
in addition to Lot 2 to get at the property he wants to go down to. Now I had
that question and then I'm wondering about the north end of that lot which is
1,130 feet. Under Plan B I gather that that would be involved and that would
run approximately 115 feet at present day costs times 1,130 feet. On the other
side 550 times 115. Now maybe 10-15-20 years when and if you go ahead with it,
those costs, I don't think they'll be going down. They'll be going u~. Then I
understand with regard to the east side of that lot, 346 feet. There's a trail
easement. Would there be an assessment cn that?
Council~ Boyt: No.
Ken Daniels: Well what I wanted to make clear is that I don't see any benefits
really to Lot 1 from this. That's the lot I'm speaking of and when you take
away the setback, you're talking about 2 1/2 acres coming off of Lot 1 plus the
assessments. I'm not really in favor of B. I'd really probably be in favor of
C but if you were to map that property, I understand there would not be an
assessment.
Councilman Johnson: It'd be even worse on Lot 1.
Ken Dsniels: Would it?
Mayor Chmiel: Yeah. I think so.
Ken Daniels: It goes down the middle then right?
Councilman Johnson: Between Lot 1 and Lot 2 and also cuts through the edge of
Lot 1. You thinking A maybe?
Ken Daniels: I just saw those a little while ago.
Councilman Johnson: Are you buying Lot 17
Ken Daniels: Yeah.
Councilman Johnson: This would take the little thing in the front and then cut
through the corner of your lot. I don't know where you're planning on putting
your house.
Ken Daniels. That's part of the problom because there is about, really about 2
1/2 acres including setback ccmting off that so I don't view this as an advantage
32
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
and I realize that you can't look at it that way but I tb/nk you're really
putting that Lot 1 at a disadvantage. For Lot 1 to give you an easement over
that, ! think we'd really be in a bad position at a later date.
Councilman Boyt: While you're there I might suguest to you that since this is
being brought on by the sutx~ivision of that property into two lots, that nmybe
you want to look at something between you and Lot 2 to mitigate the loss of
property there.
Ken Daniels: Yeah, but see I was lookin~ at 1 too on the north end. What
happened is you've take~, now I've never understood why you wanted, I wasn't
part of the earlier plan I think which came in 2 years a~o I think that was and
that I think involved the north end of that lot but what you're really doing
under that Plan B is carving u~ three sides of that property. Your east, north
and west. Aren't you?
Councilman Boyt: I don't follo~ the east side.
Ken Daniels: The east side you're putting in the trail.
Mayor C~el: Right. That would be the trail portion.
Ken Daniels: See the only part you're leaving alone is the south side.
Councilmen Johnson: We're puttin~ in a fictious line on a piece of paper for a
future trail if such trail is appropriate in the future.
Ken Daniels: There a~en't a~ sethamks?
Counciln~n Boyt: No.
Councilman Johnson: No, you just can't build on top of the trail. You wouldn't
be Building that far back on the lot probably anyway. You'd Be...
Ken Daniels: I see a tremendous hardship. I figured it over $200,000.00 in
assessn~ts.
Councilnan Johnson: Actually when they build, you're on a corner, they usually
only take what, is it the shorter of the two? There's some kind of formula
there for corner lots that reduce those assessments considerably.
~ary Warren: The scale is one factor here I think you have to keep in mind.
Residential lot assessments versus here a 2 1/2 acre parcel which puts it in a
little bit different league. Yeah, we do try to recognize that the property or
parcel is getting hit on more than one side for a road, we typically adjust with
one half of the shorter side and they get a credit, for that distance. The
Bottom line in any of the assessments are that the assessment value has to
sustain the test of benefit so that if the property's not increasing in value,
as a minim~ the value of the assessm_~____ts that are Being levied a~tinst the
property then it cannot be susta/ned. So it's not an arbitrary thing that can
be placed u~,~n this that the City decides in the future to actually construct
roads through the easement or the officially mapped areas. At that time the 429
process which requ/res hearing~ and feasibility study and such would be done
33
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
with full knowledge of the abuttir~3 and Benefit%in~ property ownsrs an~ that
whole thing would be studied very thoroughly at that time.
Ken Daniels: But you're not talking about...right-of-way. Pardon me, I should
say an easement being given by Lot 1 over all that area.
Gary Warren: Well right-of-way is an easement. Actually giving of the
easement at this time, as was pointed out earlier, it could be vacated. I think
the thing that the official mapping, where that comes into play here is we're
talking about an area that's more enc~assing than just these two lot areas and
all that that is doing is preserving the City's right to either call the
question and acquire that property for the right-of-way or to allow it to go
under development. In this case, this portion of the subdivision, Lot 1 as we
were discussing, is being asked to give it's share of the right-of-way as that
road would extend to the east. If it were actually built, the rest of the
right-of-way would be required to be dedicated through the rest of the land
there so every property owner along the way, if it were subdivided, would be
responsible to give their 30 feet let's say of that area so you wouldn't have to
pay as an owner of Lot 1 for acquiring their land. So you're being asked in
this case to give your proportionate share of that future roadway.
Ken Daniels: Do you see how it benefits me? I don't.
Councilman Johnson: When sewer comes in in the future, which is when the
property is subdividing this, then you do have a benefit in there if you
subdivide your lot.
Ken Daniels: You may not subdivide...
Councilman Johnson: Maybe. Maybe not. It depends on how they do the
assessment on a per lot assessment.
Ken Daniels: What about the lots to the west? The lmkeshore? They're going to
benefit fr~m the easement over on the west side but that would all be assessed
on mine...
Gary Warren: A~ain, the whole assessment and the reason why it goes through the
statute process here is because it is a unique element of each project. We have
entertained, Bluff Creek Drive is a good exan~le where we have utilized an area
assessment policy instead of a front foot assessment policy to levy the benefit
to properties that may not actually have frontage abutting the roadway
improvement but that actually can be argued that they are receiving benefit. I
don't know if that wou/d be sustainable in this case but it certainly is
something that would be looked at if and when a roadway improvement project were
authorized and petitioned to decide what is the appropriate assessment policy to
follow. And if there are off line benefits, then as in Bluff Creek Drive we
extended the benefits to off line parcels.
Ken Daniels: Then my final question is, are you 'talking about mapping this
property or what with regard to Plan B?
Paul Krauss: What we're talking about doing is taking the right-of-way
easements over the property which is being subdivided now and the ability to do
34
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
that, if we use those in the future, it will save the City the need to acquire
the land at scme point in the future. For those parts of this roadway system
that lie outside of this subdivision, we're recce~enc~n~ official mapping.
There's quite an extensive roadway system that would ultimately be developed in
there and we think the official map is the best and least intrusive way of
dealing with those other parcels.
Ken Daniels: When you're talkin~ about Plan B then you're talkin~ about
right-of-way as drawn?
Paul Krauss: We're talkin~ about the easements being taken off of your future
lot and the lot to your south, yes.
Ken Daniels: As laid out in B. Then we're talking about assessn~nts bein~
assessed to the property by foot I believe.
Council~ Johnson: We're not talking any assessments.
Gary Warren: There wouldn't be any assessr~eaats.
Ken Daniels: If you exercise this?
Gary Warren: If the project is authorized and built, that's correct.
Councilnmn Johnson: If somebody develops that property and asks the City to
build the streets for them and assess it back to the benefitting. If scmebody
builds that and builds the streets themselves, the person who owns the remaining
80 acres builds that property themselves. When the sewer cc{nes in, they put in
the sewers. They put in all the streets as part of their subdivision, you get a
street al on~ your property line for no cost at all the way I see that. O~
course what he would probably do is move it over a few feet where it wasn't
alon~ your property lines so you couldn't utilize it. Then you'd have to pay
him to use the street if you ever sul~vide. We're trying to preserve sc{net~
for the future and the future's a lcn~ ways off in here because we're not seein~
sewer in here until well after the next century starts.
Ken Daniels: Then do you ccmtem~late doin~ mnyth/n~ with re~ard to the west
side now?. I don' t think you do. It' s just an eesem~9__t ri~ht?
Paul Krauss: That conceiveably could be c~nsidered in a ~fferent context. With
Dogwood Road you have an undersized street that doesn't have a turn around.
It's not inconceiveable that at some point in the future the Council may
possibly respond to a request for property o~=~_rs in there to in, rove that
section of it. That could be done without the cceu%ection going back to TH 41.
It's within the realm of possibility at any rate.
Council~ Johnson: Yeah, it's been requested before and feasibility studies
have been done numerous times I think on that particular patch of roadway.
Councilman Workman: Does Plan B suggest that all of Tanad~ Drive as we know
it now would be o~en? Is that what you're saying there?
Mayor C~el: It would have an access to it, yeah.
35
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
Councilman Workman: Connect up with I~ood?
Councilman Boyt: It does now.
Councilman Workman: Yeah, but we've se~n other plans where Tanadoona has been
shut down.
Gary Warren: If I could answer that. There's an option there that Tanadoc~a
could be considered to be closed down if we had that access but then you have
your two long cul-de-sacs again.
Paul Krauss: We would prefer to maintain a loop.
Councilman Workman: By keeping it open?
Councilman Johnson: One thing I see a reason for acquiring easements now is
when you believe that in the future when something else divides that it would be
difficult to obtain those easements. By officially mapping a street through
here and if we move that street 30 feet to the north, and officially map it
through the other 80 acres and not whatsoever, if the remaining 80 acres decides
to subdivide, it'd be to their benefit the subdivision, the road would be
completely within their subdivision which what happens here, as far as I'm
concerned, this 100 acres did the subdividing. Not the 2 lots. It was a two
step subdivision. The 20 subdivided from the 80 and now the 20 is going into
two parts and so we don't really have pull on that other 80. Can we officially
map because this other 80, I think I'm getting into a separate question, but the
other 80 is not even involved in this subdivision. }{ow are we officially
mapping it? It doesn't really matter. We could go out here and officially map
anybody's farm if we decided we wanted to. So what I 'm saying is, I think the
80 acres was getting off because of the whole scenario of how this was done.
They snuck away and I see those roads benefitting the 80 acres. I'd just move
the road 30 feet to the north and officially map the entire 60 foot of the road
within the 80 acre parcel versus within Lot 1.
Councilman Boyt: I'll make a motion to approve Alternative B.
Mayor C~el: Is there a secca%d?
Councilwoman Dimler: What was your motion?
Mayor Chmiel: To approve Alternative B.
Councilman Boyt: Alternative B with staff recc~tio~s.
Councilrmm% Workman: I guess I'd like to have a little more discussion on the
connection that we're talking about here. Certainly on a map it looks like it
should be connected. It's kind of a Teton Lane situation. It sure looks like
that should go through but a separate deal, for some other reason it's not.
Staff isn't necessarily giving us any arguments wfAy we should connect it.
Councilman Johnson: Connect what?
Councilman Workman: Dogwood and Crimson.
36
City Council Meetin~ - April 9, 1990
Counciln~n Johnson: But we're not even reoc~r~ doin~ that.
Councilman Workman: And that's what I'm asking. That was the whole point of why
we were attemptin~ to look at Options before because we had concerns that maybe
that should be co~nected. Have those fallen by the wayside c~letely?
Paul Krauss: Councilman Workman, it's a good question. No, I d~n't think that
they've fallen by the wayside. I think Alternative B achieves the connectio~]s
that we wanted to achieve with the Dogw~ connection and does it in a more
c~r~ive manner than s/a~ly lookin~ at that ¢o~:tion would have d~ne. Now
as I pointed out earlier, if you're goin~ to ask us if add/till cc~%ections
are goin~ to...we're satisfied that it achieves that long tern goal.
Gary Warren: At some time in the future.
Councilman Workman: Is it realistic to think that we're goin~ to be able run a
road through the Arboret~n property?
Councilman Johnson: Nope.
Paul Krauss: Well the Arboretum question is one that we have to face with
either the Dogw~ copnection or with Alternative B. Alternative B can resolve
the northern loop without involving any Arboretum property. The southern
co~r~-~tion to Crimson Bay has to have Arboretum involvensnt one way or the
other, whichever alternative you look at.
Council~ Johnson: If the University ever got in such a financial condition
that they had to raise sc~e mo~ey.
Mayor Ch~iel: They were raising it today. They called me just right before I
1 eft home.
Councilman Johnson: Oh I had the State Patrol call me. Their association.
Councilmsn Workman: There again, I think Bill brou~t u~ the example that clown
in Falcon Heights, isn't the St. Paul c~m~s actually in Falcon Heights? The
St. Paul campus I m~n is surrounded by development and they're planting corn on
it. So I don't think we'll, I'll never see that happen. ~ a ~mp standl~int,
it looks like s~mething, if we can achieve this thing. Heck, I'm not out to
split lots for the kick of it. I mean I indicated that yeah, there's no doubt
the b~yer of Lot 2 has got a whole different lot if that easement's goin~
through there. S~me~ng of a time b~nb and if we c~n accomplish it ~nd the
staff feels confident that we're acccm~li~ s~nething here by essentially
making this a north half and a south half and not really havin~ ~ connect, it
just doesn't look proper and that doesn't necessarily mean anything. But if
we're acc~m~lishing what we think we want to accomplish then I'm not out to
aggitate.
Mayor Chmiel: Tom, I feel that staff feels very uncomfortable with this
proposal and it looks very logical to me as well.
37
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
Councilman Workman: I just wanted to bring it up and make sure I knew where
everybody else was sitting because... I then support alternative B you know.
just want to, I couldn't believe we weren't going to talk about that connection
but you know, if it's a situation that we're going to be serving safely the
properties in the future that is them ain topic of our concern on this topic,
then fine.
Mayor Chmiel: Okay. Any further discussion?
Councilman Johnson: Well, we've only had a motion. We never had a second.
Mayor Chmiel: No, and we'll call for a second. I'll second it if not.
Councilman Johnson: I'd like, based on the discussion I had, I'm not sure if
Ursula and Tc~n were busy and heard my discussion but I'd like sc~ebody to
convince me that it is necessary at this time to take the 30 feet out of Lot 1
versus taking the full 60 frown the remaining 80 acres.
Councilman Boyt: I'll speak to that. I think that the people who would come in
and buy the 20 acres on the other side of this at some point are going to say
why am I doing all 60 feet when these other lots were platted before and you
didn't take anything from them. I think when a lot is platted, if we need
s~ething for City utilities of s~ne sort, we take it. That's when we do it.
Councilman Johnson: So you're assuming that the next plat will be another 10
acre lot cut off of this 80 acre lot adjacent to Lot 1.
Councilman Boyt: I don't know that that's the truth or not. I don't know that
we're ever going to build that road. I'm just saying that now is the time for
Lot 1 to give us that easement and what I would rec~ is that so~ehow or
another that these guys figure out how to adjust that between the two lots. But
that's up to them. If the road needs to go ne%t to Lot 1, then now is the time
to take that easement. Or half of it.
Councilman Johnson: Well what benefit is that to Lot 17
Councilman Boyt: The smme benefit it's going to be to the lot on the other side
of the road.
Mayor Chmiel: So in other words he's saying 30 to 30 rather than 60 to zip.
Councilman Johnson: What's this adjustment to Lot 2 that you're talking about?
Councilman Boyt: That's nothing. Forget that. That's up to them.
Councilman Johnson: I can't see why Lot 2 would give anything to their next
door neighbor at this point except that they're good friends. Nice people.
Councilman Boyt: Well Lot 2 is looking at an option that looks a lot more bleak
to .them. I meanwe could just go ahead and take the initial easement we were
going to take across to Crimson Bay Road. That kills Lot 2 so they've got a
real incentive to see this thing work out in a different direction.
38
City Council Meetin~ - April 9, 1990
Mayor Chniel: Right and I think as it is, ~d I've mentioned before, I think
this is the most feasible way at this particular time. We do have a motion on
the floor and a second, any further cliscussi~n?
Councilwcm~m Dimler: Can we have a repetition of the motion please?
Councilnmn Boyt: The motion was to acoept Alternative B with staff
reccmmendatione.
~l~m Boyt moved, Mayor Clzaiel sec~zled to ~prove the Preli~r~_ry Plat for
Z~ Farm usin~ Mtemative B for the road alhx2amt with the following
1. The City shall officially map the road alitmmmt as illustratst b~ Exhibit
of the Senior En~tneerin~ Technici~ memo dated April 4, 1990.
2. Erosion control shall be Type II.
3. The applicant shall receive and cc~ply with any neeessary permits frcm the
Watershed District and Department of Natural Resources.
ii
e
m
Sm
g
10.
11.
The street name on the plat should be changed to reflect the current street
na~ of Do~ Road.
The applicant shall dedicate to the City a temporary roadway easem~t for
the proposed turn around.
Require dedication of 40 feet alcr~3 the west lot line of Lot 1 ~md 2 to be
combined with the existin~ 20 feet of right-of-way for the full 60 foot
rural street right-of-way but i~roverent of that right-of-way would not be
required until the rest of Dogwood or Lake Drive is improved or until
develotmmt in the area would require in~rovement.
Require dedication of 30 feet of roadway easemsnt alon~ the north lot line
of Lot 1, Block 1.
The applicant shall provide a 20 foot trail easement alon~ the east boundary
of Lots 1 and 2, Block 1, Zi~;i,~;-.n Farm and alon~ the south boundary of Lot
2, Block 1, Zinme~ Farm fr~n the southeast corner of Crimson Bay Road,
Crimson Bay subdivision.
The two approved septic sites on Lot 1 and 2, Block 1, Zinm~nren Farm shall
be staked and preserved.
Any access, including a dock or boardwalk, to Lake Miata frcm Lot 2,
Block 1 would require a wetland permit as would any dr~t/hg or rer~al of
vegetation in the area of the shoreline.
Construction plans and specificati~ for the temporary turn around shall be
sukmitted to the City Engineer for approval. The' turn around shall be built
in accor4_snce to the City's rural road design (7 ton).
39
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
All voted in favor except Councilman Johnson who opposed and the moti~ carried
with a vote of 4 to 1.
Councilman Johnson: My only opposition is item 7. Taking the 30 foot at this
time. I don't think is totally appropriate.
Mayor Chmiel: I think we finally settled something here.
WE~ ALT~ATI(H~ P~T P~R T~E FILLING IN AND SODDI~ O~ ~tN EKI~TIN~ WETLAND
~ AT 80 AND 100 SAND~ fK~K ROAD, STEPfR~ Ff~ AND
Jo Ann Olsen: ...The Planning C~ssion recommended approval of staff's
recon~tions. They added a condition that if the applicants could show that
the wetland didn't exist as far as what we have seen, we tried to put together
some past surveys, that we would work together to cc~e to an agreement to where
the fill should be removed to. Other than that we are recc~ng approval of
the wetland and requiring the applicant to re~ve the fill to the area staff has
proposed in the original edge.
Mayor Chmiel: Okay, thank you Jo Ann.
Councilman Johnson: Can I ask Jo Ann a question?
Mayor Chmiel: Go ahead. I was going to but go ahead.
Councilman Johnson: How were you going to determine, what method are we
recommend/rig to determine where the wetlands used to be? Are we taking soil
borings? Sci 1 samplings or what?
Jo Ann Olsen: What we did, what staff did was to look at old surveys, aerials
that shows the wetland vegetation. We have surveys from when the subdivision
was first developed and which also has aerials which shows the edge of wetland.
What we did with that was to measure that distance from the lake, the water.
The edge of the lake and what we've done is transfer that to the survey to show
a different dimension. Also we've used photographs from the applicant and we
also used the dimensions given by the applicant's contractor as part of the
grading application. Those dimensi~ were 40 feet, 42 to 45 foot depth of fill
that they showed.
Councilman Johnson: The stakes out there that are on the site right now.
Jo Ann Olsen: Those are DNR stakes.
Councilmsn Johnson: Because there seem to be two rows of stakes.
Jo Ann Olsen: That's only to the ordinary high water mark.
Councilman Johnson: That's kind of what I was guessing was the first row was
the ordinary high water mark. Are you saying that we want to, the conclusion at
the end of the Planning CCmmlission wasn't it that we determined, negotiate or
figure out exactly where the edge of the wetland is by some method? S~me other
method than what you've done so far?
40
City Coun¢il Meeting - April 9, 1990
Jo Ann Olsen: They left it that if the applicant could prove to our
satisfaction that the wetland wasn't as far back as what we're s&yin~ it was.
Council~ Johnson: What proof will you accept?
Jo Ann Olsen: Aerials. Soil boring. We can use that. Photos. I'm not
exactly sure what we' 11 take.
Councilman Johnson: I mean interpretation of mn aerim! photograph can be
interpretted a lot of different ways. It takes no expertise to do it.
Mayor Chniel: Yeah, but it's there.
Councilman Johnson: But it' s there.
Jo Ann Olsen: The soil horin~s, ! don't know how well thoss will be also
since...
Councilman Johnson: Was the existin~ wetland soils r~ and more fill put in
or was fill Just placed on top of the soil?
Jo Ann Olsen: I believe it was just fill. I don't know if anything was
removed.
Councilman Johnson: Nothing was removed?
3o Ann Olsen: No, so you can go d~per.
Councilman Johnson: So if you go throu~ the fill, you should hit what we call
a horizon of natural soils. Then that natural soils from a g~otechnical firm
could identify whether that was a wetland soil or it was u-wetland soil by
moduling and whatever there is within the soils. So that could be surveyed in
and soil bor~ mad~ and the e~ of the wetland, the previous ~ of the
wetland determined at a cost. Okay.
Mayor Ctm~el: Is there anyone wi .shir~ to address, please state your nsme ~
address.
Steve Christenson: Good evening. My name is Steve Christenson. I'm with the
Dorsey and Whitney law firm in Minneapolis. I realize you've been sitting here
for a while tonight so I'll be brief. The Pfankuchs have asked me to c~me here
tonight. What they want from you is an excavation permit or a permit that would
approve the reccmmez~h~tion of the I~R and the Corps of ~gineers which is to
take out any fill that's below the ordinary high water mark. Their position is
that they've been through a lot of adminstrative hassle over this and nmybe
there may have been some mistakes nmde in the past but they feel that 3 layers
of adng_nistrative work on this is enough. That two expert agencies, the
Deparbmmt of Natural Resources and the Army Corps of Engineers rec~ only
going to the ordinary high water mark and that that's where the line should Be
drawn when this is such a gray question. I'd like to give you a little hit of
bac~ound in how this all ~ about. ~e houses were built, one the Frost
house was bu/lt I believe in 1987 ~ the Pfankuah's was built before that. In
1988 they realized that their lawns were lt~y and difficult to mow in the
41
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
backyard so they decided to level them. These are kind of sloping. Well as you
would expect, they slope towards the lake so they hired a contractor who came in
with a little skid loader to push soil from the high part of their yards down
towards the lake and level things out. In addition sc~ne fill was added. Roughly
6, maybe 12 inches. This was just placed directly on top of what was there
before. I think it's important to keep in mind that they weren't trying to do
mnythingwrong when they were doing this. They weren't trying to evade the
City's laws or trying to get by with something. They Just simply didn't realize
that there was anything wrong here. When they were doing this fill, City
employees came out and looked at the site. No mentionwasmade of that there
were the possibility of wetlands there. They asked the contractor to obtain an
excavating permit. He did so and they they approved his continuedwork on the
project.
Councilman Boyt: I might as well tell you right now that you've never turned up
a signed wetland alteration permit.
steve Christenson: That's absolutely correct.
wetlands alteration permit.
We've never asked for a signed
Councilman Boyt: But you're trying to say...
Steve Christenson: That it was a excavation permit.
Councilman Boyt: Your contractor never came into the City to file for a wetland
alteration permit. Your contractor has a lot of experience around lakes. He
knew he needed that. I agree with you. I don't think either property owner set
out to intentionally do this but I think their contractor, if they need to be
upset with someone, that's who they need to be upset with. So I think your
letter to us is very misleading. It may be the way that you've been told the
facts are but I remember sitting here 2 1/2 years ago and listening to it when
it first creme to the Planning C~mission. I can tell you that I don't think
this is worth the paper it's on. So that's the kind of audience you're
addressing down at this end. I don't know about the other four but you might as
well know that I 'm real upset about this.
Steve Christenson: I think that the contractor should have done more clearly
but I think that also under the circumstances, that he had reason not to think
that there were wetlands there. Especially given that city employees were there
and never suggested it to him. The problem with me, the official city of
Chanhassen wetlands map. This is a paper copy of it. I've got a transparency
that I can show you.
Councilman Boyt: Do you have the DNR permit that he received before he started
excavation?
Steve Christenson: No I don' t.
Councilman Boyt: Oh, so did he get one of those?
Steve Christenson: The wetland excavation?
42
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
Councilmen Boyt: If he push_~_ dirt Below the high water mark, that takes a ~
permit and he knew it. I think you're talkin~ to the wror~ grou~.
Mayor C~sniel: Let' s just.
Councilman Boyt: Excuse me. I'll stay quiet.
Mayor (:~niel: Thank you.
Steve Christerm~n: I fully admit that the contractor mede a mistake but to get
back to the wetlands issue. This is a map of the Chsnhasse~ wetlands and you
can see the wetlands...
Councilman Johnson: Major wetlands.
Steve Christermon: The Pfankuchs and the Frosts live here. It's not shaded so
they had reason to think that they were not wetlands. I mean they had no reason
to think that they were wetlands. The City Code specifically points to this map
as Being one thing that you should think of, indeed the main thing you should
think of in determining whether wetlands are present or not. This n~p wouldn't
sucjgest the wetlands were there.
Councilman Johnson: Are you indicating that they checked these maps before they
filled?
Steve Christermon: I ~'t think they did. If they had however, they wouldn't
have had any reason to think there were wetlands in there. I have aerial
photographs that we obtained fr~ the City... Unfortunately I only have two
copies. O~e of the old and one of the new. I think if you look at these, you
can see the Pfankuchs and the Frosts live here but c~m~rin~ even to a nnn-
expert it's simply not clear that these are wetlands... Lastly, we had a
wildlife biologist at the Pfankuch's and the Frost's expense look at these maps.
Come out to look at the adjacent vegetation to try to determine whether there
were wetlands there or not. After lookin~ at the aerial photO, he
concluded that you singly couldn't tell fr~n these aertial photographs clearly
whether there were or were not wetlands. It's singly gray. He pointed to the
official wetlands map as indication that maybe they were not. He cc~%~ared
vegetati6n on adjacent property and again where it was high ground, he concl~
that it was not wetlands and where it was lower ground, couldn't tell but the
most in~ortant thing, soil borings. The ground was frozen and it was ~sible
to determine last week. I guess I 'd like to bring u~ just a c~le more things.
O~e is this question of whether the City is legally estopped based on the City's
going out there, the city employees goin~ out there and kno~ at the time that
this was happening and issuing an excavating permit despite not issuin~ a
wetlands permit. I think that there is good Minnesota case law and I've Just
sent a letter to your lawyer and discussed it with him. Certainly raisin~ a
legal issue whether the City has the authority to force then to take this back
out. A s~ question along that same line is whether the City's ordinance
allows them to force them to take this land out at their own ~e. Last year
the City Council adopted an ordinance ~n~ the City' to do that but I think
your attorney would agree with me that laws do not ordinarily apply
retroactively after the fact. Again, that raises a question whether the City
can do that. What the ~ and the Corps are askin~ the Pfankuchs and the Frosts
43
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
to do is going to be very expensive. It's punishment enough I think and for
that reason I 'm asking you to approve a permit that would be consistent with the
DNR and the Corps' suggestion. If you have any questions, I know the Pfankuchs
and Mr. Frost are here.
Mayor Chmiel: Does anyone have any specific questions of either party? Any
discussion? Tom, do you have any?
Councilman Workman: No, other than that, apparently something was attempted, a
permit was attempted to be gotten from the City but it was never received and
now we have the mess. It doesn't sound like it was specifically the property
owners but the contractor who did it. I have no doubt that they're in a wetland
area.
Councilman Johnson: I have questions of staff I guess. I 'ye heard the
excavation permit was applied for. I've heard from sc~ne people that it wasn't
ever actually granted. Do we assign a number or any kind of system% to
excavation permits that says once it's granted it goes into a file or whatever?
Do we countersign it? All I see is an application that's signed by the
contractor.
Gary Warren: It's specifically assigned a project number. An excavation permit
number. 90-1, 2 in sequence.
Councilman Johnson: Was this one ever assigned such a number?
Gary Warren: I don't know. Jo Ann, do you know?
Jo Ann Olsen: I could find no record of it ever being assigned a number. What
was sent back to the applicant was the application by Barb Dacy the same day
that it had been filled out. While it was being processed was when we became
aware and went back out to the site, that there was wetland.
Councilman Johnson: And the excavation contractor, who took down the little red
flag saying you can't work? Did the City crews go out there and say okay, it's
ready. You can start digging again or did he put in his excavation permit and
go out and continue to work now that he had his application in?
Jo Ann Olsen: I'm not exactly sure who took down the sign.
Councilman Workman: Jay, isn't it really just a matter of whether or not
they're in a wetland or not, which doesn't agree with our ordinance, and whether
or not they had permission to do that?
Councilman Johnson: Well partially if a city employee went out and said you can
continue this operation after their application had been made, whether that was
a city. That would have some impact on me. If there was firm evidence to show
that a building inspector or somebody on the site told the construction guy that
he could continue. If there was some way to prove that. There isn't from what
I can see. It looks to be that an application was applied for but never
granted. That the construction went ahead without a granted permit. That it
was only, and the permit doesn't mention any wetlands other than saying to the
lake. Hopefully we'll modify our permit on excavation permit forms to ask the
44
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
questions specifically and this points out a need for this. Are there wetlands
involved in this?
Mayor Chmiel: I agree.
Cou~il,mn Johnson: So if that's marked off yes or no, they mark off no and
there turns out to be, we've got a real federal case.
Paul Krauss: I could respond to that directly. Unfortunately you have an
ordinance change in the pipeline that does Just that. It's the grading and
mining and excavation ordinance which deals with most sorts of activities as
well as the Moon Valley thing. You'll see that on your next age~la.
Mayor Chmiel: Good.
Councilmsn Boyt: Well, I would move denial of the wetland alteration permit.
Councilman Workman: SedcO.
Jo Ann Olsen: Actually the way we have it worded is approval with the' condition
that they have to remove the fill.
Councilman Boyt: I was looking at the cover.
Bob Pfankuch: My name is Bob Pfankuch. I'm the resident at 100 Sandy Hook and
obviously I'm not an environmental eng~ or landscape engineer or civil
engineer or an attorney. I'm just a property owner that got stuck with a bad
deal to the tune of $7,000.00 so far and a lot of aggravation. I had supplied
some photos to the city planning staff previously taking about the loosestrife
problem and the fact that very little fill had been put-in because the
loosestrife continues to co, ne up through the sod. Obviously I didn't put in 3
feet of fill or whatever it takes to kill loosestrife or to hold it hack for a
while. I did find another photograph which had been put in a family album
k~cause it's a family ev~t. You know we cut down a diseased or broken branch
in a tree and we're putting a swing up. But it also shows, if you look down
towards the lake, that there was mowed grass all the way to the water... On the
other side there were tall weeds which I hsd be~% cutting... Those root messes
of purple loosestrife which I had a lot of on the shore growing about 7 feet
tall, are extr~ely heavy. In fact the ones in the water, they're like a
floating mass. We live on the bad side of the lake so the~ tend to float over
from all the loosestrife on the other side of the lake if we get a store, these
pods do ~ floating over. The other thing, in terms of the ordinaz? high
water mark, the stakes that you asked about, are my stakes. I put those in
between the two ordinary high water mark stakes, that were driven in by th~ ~R.
In lieu of anything else, they said a straight line between these stakes will
indicate the ordinary high water mark. So in putting the stakes in betwee~ the
two... It's like the straight line between two, we think wetlands? We can
assu~e there was a wetland in~twee~. I su~t the photo shows not a very good
wetland. Mowed grass ~nd some clumps of loosestrife. So that combined with the
fact that the City map, the wetlands map and I dnn't know the difference betwee~
a major and minor wetland, would ir~cate to me that certainly I didn't have any
idea it was a wetland. To me a wetland is a swam~. That was not a swsm~.
was cutting grass on it. The other thin~ is that that property layed vacant for
45
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
about a year during the drought season. The people who owned the house before
Sandy and I purchased it and moved out and it was vacant for a year. The lot
was not taken care of. Maybe they preferred natural growth at the water's level
or whatever. I can't answer that. I don't know. I'm sort of like some of the
other homeowners on Lotus Lake. They like to be able to look at the lake, not
at the weeds. And the weeds are a real threat. I received a mailing in 1987,
shortly after we moved in, from the City talking about the threat of purple
loosestrife and how difficult it was to control and that Rodeo was the only
thing that would do it. Non-selective chemical poured into the water I guess
right? If you pour it on the plant, that plant's in the water. It must get in
the water. It didn't seem like a good idea to me. I tried mechanical removal.
I'l 1 tel 1 you, those root masses can break a man's back you know. You just
can't do it. Or at least I couldn't do it. I tried. It seemed logical to me
to smooth it out so I could mow it. In fact, the photos that I supplied earlier
showed that when the loosestrife comes up through now mowable ground, you can
maintain control over if by runnin~ a lawnmower over it every week. But
physically pullin~ those things out is impossible. I think there are also some
pictures of the DNR, at least State owned land which is adjacent to the outlot
that you dealt with previously. There's no question that some of that is
wetland because a lot of it is under water. If you look at that, the
loosestrife is rampant on that piece of property. Absolutely rampant. It's
under no control whatsoever and loosestrife, I guess you know. Wildlife doesn't
like it. It's too thick. It takes over property. It's a horrible weed. It
really is and what I was trying to do was deal with the weeds. Steve and I had
been out there mechanically cutting these thin~s with a thing called a brush
cutter that we went down to Hardware Hank. That's a tou~her job and you cut it
down in the fall and zammo, that stuff is up. When the lake was down, I'll tell
you we had a wetland out there. It was a mud flat that went out about 35 feet.
It took about 3 weeks for the loosestrife to take root and go into bloom...and
it just keeps goin~ up to about 7. I went out and physically pulled it out.
was UP over my ankles in the muck. In a mud bank pul ling these weeds up because
they were the young ones. The big ones you can't get out. Their root ball is
like this, those big mature plants. You just can't deal with it. There's no
loosestrife on my property now. There's a lot of garbage that blows in from
human use of the lake which I now have access to. I can clean up. Before I
couldn't get through the mass of weeds to get to the lakeshore to clean it up.
I sub~t that for whatever, and I don't believe there were wetlands there in the
first place. In any event, the lakeshore looks a hell of a lot nicer now than
it ever did when I moved in. I can maintain them. I've got pictures of
garbage. Everbody' s seen garbage al ong a 1 akeshore.
Counciln~n Johnson: Could I ask a question or two?
Mayor Chmiel: Sure, go ahead Jay.
Councilman Johnson: How far up the lakeshore did the loosestrife grow?
Bob Pfankuch: It was up maybe about, I'm guessing, I don't know. Maybe 4 or 5
feet. From the water's edge at the time and then there were these mssses
floating in the water. Actually were floating. You could push them around.
There were just some little root structure going down to the ground but they
were mostly floating.
46
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
Councilman ~obnson: Oakey P~ey ~. In this picture you show a series of
boards from your dock.
Bob Pfankuch: Yeah, I think inwards. Those were laying ~n the ground. I think
the people because they preferred a natural, I ckaa't know. I never met the~. I
think they preferred natural. Whichever grows grows which is what S~airley
Huskins has on the other side of me. It's not all wetlsnd. It's just natural
cover is what it is and that's what that was. I don't like the natural cover
so I mowed it down.
Councilmsn Johnson: why did you leave the boards there when you mowed it?
Bob Pfankuch: Because there was no grass there. When they lay ~n the ground,
nothing grows under it. I th~nk what happened is the people left the boards ~n
the ground to get access to the dock but the weeds and the tall stuff wou/dn't
grow through then. That was their preference. It wasn't mine.
Councilman Johnson: Did you show this to your biologist?
Bob P~ank~: I don't think
this weekend we were digging
s~mething on here. I mean I
I found it at that time. He was in Thursday and
through pictures saying boy, there's got to
mowed it you know. Now you can see it was mowed.
Councilman Johnson: Well a lot of wetlands can be mowed.
Bob Pfankuch: Well I can't justify the soil underneath the grass. To me it was
a lawn.
Councilmen Johnson: Purple loosestrife only grows in wetlands. If it's not a
wetland, then you're not going to have ~ar~le loesestrife.
Bob Pfsnkuch: Well there wasn't any loosestrife where it was mowed but on the
right side of the dock there's s~rething there. I don't know what that was.
That may wel 1 have been loosestrife.
Council,mn Johnson: You don't have the negatives do you?
Council.~n Johnson: Somewhere? It'd be like me trying to find one of m~ many
piles of negatives.
Bob Pfankuch: I mean you go through these packets of pictures and you don't
keep the pictures tight with the negatives. I' 11 probably have to go thr~h
5,000 or 1,000 or some number to find them. This is a picture taken at the s~me
angle Sunday. It doesn't look a heck of a lot different except you don't have
the little growth along the right side of the dock and the boards aren't laying
down on the ground anymore. There's sod there now. Most of the 45 feet that
we're talking about here with the level out, I guess you'd call it, I think it's
been called an ice ridge or s~mething. Anyway, it's the higher part of the lot
but the lot slopes uR from the lake towards the house. A lot of that was rough
ground. It had brush, bushes in it we didn' t like. It was higher ground than
the rest of the ground. I wanted some flat area for the kids to play on. I told
47
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
the contractor just drag it down. Clean off the brush. Lay in s~ne, what do
you call it, top dressing. I guess it's topsoil and put the sod down. It
actually was sodded almost all the way down to the dock orignally. There was a
narrow path down there and that's what the people _h~__4 for access. They laid the
boards down and walked on the dock. It was not swamp. It was high ground. It
may have been wetlandbut it was dry ground tome.
Mayor Chmiel: Any other questions Jay?
Councilman Johnson: No, not really.
Bob Pfankuch: I guess I'm a little concerned about a couple things also though
Jay. The fact that the Planning staff never brought out the wetlands map you
know. I had no knowledge that such a thing existed. I think that it's possible
that if the wetlands m ap may have been referred toby the existing planning
staff at the time, Barb Dacy who I had talked to about the loosestrife and she
said, I don't know what you can do about it. They probably looked at the
wetlands map when a contractor was hauled in because he didn't have a permit and
said it looks like there's no wetlands there. Let's give him the permit. I'm
guessing. I don't know. We're all guessing about what happened. But anyway,
if you did legally stop and almost forceably stop the contractor from doing the
work andput UP signs, and the next day you didn't go down to see if he was
still working, I mean youknow. Whether they went down and pulled the signs out
or whether you just went down to see if he was doing sc~nething, which I think
would be a reasonable response...so I think there's some share of blame. The
other thing in regards to wetlands, I have a lot of respect for Paul Krauss
having watched his comprehensive zoning presentation. I wasn't real happy with
the presenter and Paul was not the presenter. I'm talking about Channel 20 now.
But immediately after theM arch 21st hearing before the Plannir~3 C~ssion,
there was another wetlands alteration request that came on and Mr. Wildermuth
said I'm a little confused here. We told these people they can't have a wetland
alteration and now we're going to grant one. What's the difference? Even he
was confused and I certainly was confused. But I picked this UP on television.
I didn't hang around to watch that but out of that, let's see my notes here said
that, the City Planner in response to the cc~n~ssioners request as to how does
the City define a wetland. Say a 10 acre location as opposed to a hole made by
a horse. I assune a hoof print. Paul said we know them whenwe see thegn.
Sounds pretty accurate doesn't it? Well I guess I might suggest that they even
know them when they don't see them. Further Paul offered, if it seers like we
fly by the seat of our pants, we do in reference to the replacel~ent of wetlands
by substitution of a wetland on another property. Having no knowledge of the
current mood of Paul Krauss' seat of his pants or the flying status of same,
I find it a little difficult to offer a replace~ent wetland to appease the city
planning staff and the City Council if it so please the Council. We're talking
about a few hundredths of an acre. If you want to prorata contribution rather
than continuing this very expensive and frustrating procedure, I'd be happy to
consider that. The City park somewhere. I think the suggestion was made on the
land of Eckankar. Lake Ann. Thank you.
Mayor Chmiel: Thanks. Any other questions?
councilman Johnson: I have a c~ment of course. Wetland alteration permits
such as this, this is kind of a comment to the future for staff ideas, a
48
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
condition I'd like to see is that no fertilizer will be used within so many feet
of this area in that part of the function of a wetland between a h~me and a lake
is to act as a nutrient filter to remove some of these fertilizer
before they get to the lake and start to grow in the lake. I'd like to see any
wetland alteration permit similar to this that is ever requested, that we slide
in a distance that we say this is a no fertilizing zone within your yard. We
can't do it to the next door neighbors or anything because they're not
requesting a permit. The other thing is, as I visited this site, I stopped at
your house today. You weren't h~ne and I took the liberty for m~ son and I. We
walked around to the back and real nice little swing you've got there. I wish
had a tree like that. Looking at the site and looking at the aerial
photographs, and I 'm not an aerial photograph interpreter like the EPA has or
like I'm used to but I would believe that what I saw next door as a wetland is a
continuous arc within the arc to this land and across and that the darker area
within the earlier 80's photograph wou/d be a continuation of that little
triangle of wetland vegetation that you saw on the neighborin9 property. This
isn't your house there? This is your next door neighbors house? In this
earlier 80's photograph? Before you house was bu/lt. Okay, that's your next
door neighbor's house. Good. The little corner in this photograph right here
still exists in a virgin area has wetland vegetation and whatever in. It's the
darker lumpy type area here and that continues arot~ the same area that now as
shown in these photographs.
Bob Pfankuch: That's to the north?
Councilman Johnson: Yeah.
Bob Pfankuch: That's the R~R line?
Councilman Johnson: No, no. To the south of you. Then that further goes
around as it's now shown as sod and is sod there. I think staff's
interpretation is probably halfway right but I'd like to know that we're, I'd
like to see if we move approval here and the approval is that we remove the
dirt. I'd like to see that there's an option that the owner can prove a more
scientific method, soil borings, whatever establish where the wetlands is to the
satisfaction of staff.
Councilman Boyt: That's in there.
Councilman Johnson: That is in there?
Mayor Chmiel: As a condition. Number 7.
Councilman Johnson: Okay, I missed that. I was looking at the Plannin~
Ccemission action.
Councilman Boyt: Can we move approval Jay?
Counciln~n Johnson: Yes. I'm sorry.
Mayor Chmiel: Any other discussion? We have a motion and a second.
49
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
Councilman Boyt: We did get that motiom in that way?
Mayor ~el: Yes.
Councilman Workman: As modified?
Councilman Boyt: I don't think we did. I think I move denial of the wetland
alteration permit and they were really moving approval. So I would move
approval of the wetland alteration permit 88-3 with conditions stated by staff.
Councilman Workman: Secc~d.
Councilman Johnson: That motion effectively gets rid of your, you never
formally withdrew the other motion.
Councilwoman Dimler: It was not seconded.
Mayor Chmiel: Yes it was.
Councilman Johnson: This supercedes it and we're not getting...
Mayor Chmiel: Basically what you have to do is withdraw your motion.
Councilman Boyt: Okay.
Councilman Workman: I withdraw my second.
Councilman Boyt: We did that. I'll make the last motion I Just made.
Councilman Workman: Second.
Councilmsn Boyt moved, Councilman Workman secm~ded to approve Wetland Alteration
Permit ~g8-3 with the fol 1 owin~ c~md/tioms:
1. Lot 2, Block 2, Colonial Grove at Lotus Lake 2nd Addition, shall have 45' x
72' x 45' of fill removed measured from the property line adjacent to Lotus
Lake as shown on the final plat. The fill will be removed by June 15, 1990
using the typical cross section provided by the I)NR.
2. Lot 1, Block 2, Colonial Grove at Lotus Lake 2nd Addition, shall have 45' x
78' x 42' of fill r~novedmeasured fr~n the property line adjacent to Lotus
Lake as shown on the final plat. The fill will be removed by June 15, 1990
using the typical cross section provided by the
3. The applicant shall be permitted one boardwalk through the restored wetland
to provide access to the dock.
4. The area of removed fill shall be allowed to restore to a natural state.
5. Any purple loosestrife that returns shall be innately re~nved as
recc~ed by the Fish and Wildlife Service manual, "Spread, Impact and
Control of Purple Loosestrife in North A~erica Wetland".
5O
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
6. Prior to m%y work being dune c~ the site, the applicant shall su~t for
City staff approval a gradin~ and erosion control plan.
m
If the property owners can present proof to the satisfaction of the City
Staff that the wetland did not extend into their properties frcm the lake as
far as they are being required to remove fill, then that should be taken
into account and the amount of fill to be removed should be adjusted
accordingly.
All voted in favor m~t th~ motion carried m~nimously.
*Note: Steve Christenson, Attorney for the Pfankuch's, picked u~ the
photographs submitted by Mr. Bob Pfankuch fr~m the City Council after the item
~ cct~l eted.
This item was tabl ed.
~II~ E~I~.I~T ~ A NO ~ ZC~E ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
HI6~X 101 ;~D WEST 78~H =l~,-.
Councilman Johnson: D/d anybody show UP for item 107
Mayor C~el: No.
Councilmsn Johnson: I didn't know if those property owners involved were going
to b e here or not.
Council~ Dimler: It was pulled.
Councilmsn Johnson: I know it was pulled but at that point nobody was here.
I'm wondering if anybody is here right now. Okay, k,~ause I ~n't recognize any
of the property owners. Met them once.
Mayor Clm~el: I'd r~rC~orge.
Coun¢iln~n Johnson: No, it's not C~orge Nelson. It's the guy that bou~t the
lot. That's the other people that I was concerned might be here.
Mayor Clm~el: You're on.
Jim Cbaff~: ~ you. Mr. Mayor, several Council meetings ago we looked at
this issue of actually the problem that staff felt was a problem of the cars
that are parked for sale along southbound ~ 101 near the intersection of West
78th Street. It was Council's desire for staff to look at it and ccme back with
a proposal. I've been working with the engineering department, specifically
Dave Hero, el in trying to determine what our best course of action would be to
prevent what we feel is a c~ous situation. We have cc~e UP with a
reccm~tion that the City Council, by resolution establish a no parkin~ zone
for that specific area and with that we believe MnDot would then stake out the
property lines and post sig~s for us and we should the~ be able to get a handle
51
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
on the problem.
Councilman Boyt: I'd move approval.
Mayor ChmieL: I'll second it. Any discussion?
Councilman workman: Yes. My onlydiscussionis, and I'm not so much against
this because apparently the owner of the lot doesn't really give a rip.
Mayor Chmiel: The owner of the lot has indicated that he would like some
assistance from the City.
Councilman Johnson: He requested the signs.
Councilman Boyt: Last November.
Councilman Workman: Okay. Well, because really the situation, nobody's shown
me that we have a problem here. We have a perceived problem but nobody's proven
to me that we do have a problen on this corner.
Mayor Chmiel: Tom, maybe I can address that. Probably about 3 weeks, 4 weeks
ago somebody slowed down to really take a look at the car. I was coming off
of TH 5 onto West 78th and...
Councilman Workman: You didn't have your radar patrol on though.
Mayor Chmiel: The lights were off too but anyway, there was darn near an
accident at that intersection.
Councilman Workman: That's everywhere. That's on every corner.
Mayor Chmiel: Yeah, but. It was because I felt that the individual had enough
room to go ahead of me to make or to go through his yeild but he slowed down
specifically and slowed down real slow to maybe about a 5 n%oh and there's
another car cc~ing up from behind me. Maybe he wasn't paying attention but he
was looking at the vehicle that was parked there.
Councilman Workman: Out at Lake Ann Park there's a car parked right now on
somebody's property. That could cause a hazard. On TH 5 in Eden Prairie,
there's about 3 or 4 cars parked by the Paul y's or wherever over there. As you
come through by Mitchell Lake. I mean the situation's everywhere. I'm just
thinking that one of these days we're going to run into somebody that's got a
lot they want cars parked there on.
Mayor Chmiel: Theyhave tohave a license for it n%m~ber one. I don't object to
anybody selling their vehicle if they have one vehicle at a time that they're
selling and it's their own personal vehicle. That's fine.
Councilwoman Dimler: I guess I have a few things too. I had a concern.
think we're doing the right thing for the wrong reason. I can't imagine anybody
thinking that is a parking area and obviously they're using it for a display
area to sell their vehicles. So yes, we're handling it by putting up no parking
signs thinking that's going to take care of it but again, doing the right thing
52
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
for the wron~ reason. I don't want to restrict anybody, especially if
Mr. Peter's doesn't care. But if he wants our assistance, I guess I'll go along
with it.
Counciln~n Boyt: He wrote a letter in November and said I would like the City
to put a no parking sign u~. I'm an~zed that we're talking about this 4 months
later.
Councilnmn Workman: I never saw that letter.
Councilman Boyt: I've got a copy. I'll get it to you.
Councilman Workman: Maybe we should table th/s. I'm just saying, I saw a
letter that said sanething to the effect he was contacted and he said sanething,
well if you guys want to go ahead and do scmething, that's fine by me. I never
saw a letter that he drafted on his own worrying about this and worrying about a
safety problem or worrying about cars. You're not telling me that are you? He
noticed a problem on safety on his lot?
Council~ Boyt: We contacted him and told him.
Councilman Workman: That's what I mean. That's another situation.
Coun¢ilnmn Boyt: He wrote back and said, I would like you to put a no parking
sign and I'll show you a copy but...
Mayor Chmiel: We're not going to put the no parking signs directly on his
property is that correct Jim?
Jim Chaffee: That is right.
Mayor Chmiel: They're going to be on the high,my right-of-way. So that's not
going on privte property. I 'd object to that myself.
Councilman Workman: I'm Just saying, it wasn't sc~ethin~ that disturbed the
owner of property. It was scmeth~ that disturbed me~oers of the Council and
it was directed to the owner of the property where he said I dun't care what you
do because it's not bothering me.
Councilmsn Boyt: That's not what he said. I'm sorry you didn't get a copy of
the letter. I'd be happy to bring it in.
Council~ Worknmn: It's not that big of a deal.
Council~ Boyt: Well driving by it twice a day every day, I'd say it's a real
safety hazard on one of the most 8~ngerous corners we've got ~nd it won't be a
dan~er~ corner 2 years fr~n now but it is right now.
Councilman Workman: And you're entitled to your perception. As am I. We've
proven time and time a~ain that you and I have a different Perception about
safety and all sorts of things so you shouldn't be surprised. At all.
Councilman Boyt: I' 11 always be surprised.
53
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
Don Ashworth: As we are working with the State on this and engineering, m~
guess is it's going to be 60-90 days before actual signs can get up. I mean if
there's any question that the property owner is really against this, m~ guess is
that just with previous State approvals saying we can put up the signs and where
they'll be located and what not will Be at least 60 days.
Resolution ~90-47: Councilnsn Boyt moved, Councilman Johnson s~ a
resolution establishing a no parking zone on sou~ Hi~y 101 on the curve
in the area generally utilized by vehicle parked for sale. All voted in favor
and the motion carried.
ZCI~ (~DINAN~ ~ TO ~ ~ ~3BDIVISICI~ AND Z{IqING (~I)IN~ TO
REQUIRE THE POSTIN~ OF PUBLIC I~TICI~ SI(~S FC~ N~ ~ WITHIN TBE
CITY, FIRST READI~.
Paul Krauss: Mr. Mayor, do you want a report on that? That's basically an
ordinance an~t that accc~plishes what your direction was to us a couple
months ago.
Mayor Ohmiel: Right. That's correct. Any discussion?
Councilman Boyt: I think $100.00 is not enough. The signs are costing $250.00.
They're going to be up for how lc~g?
Mayor Chmiel: Well the sign goes up and down, up and down.
Councilman Boyt: I'm just saying I don't think the life cycle of the sign.
Well what I'd like to have is I'd like to have staff review this so the City in
the long run isn't putting any money into this. The leasing fee for the sign
covers our actual cost.
Mayor Chmiel: I think what we have to do is run it for a period of time to see
and if it's not paying for itself, then we have to do scmething. Any other
discussion?
Counc~lmsn Johnson m~ved, Council~ Dimler seconded to al~pr~ the first
~ of Za~m~ orSinanc~ ~m~r~t to mr~d the Sutxiivision ~nd Z~r~ir~
~ to require the post~ of public informmtion signs for
developments within the City. All voted in favor and the motion carried.
Z(I~~I~~TOA~DEI~II, ~TI~ ~0-56T~I~!{ 20-70
P~ItTAININGTOFi~0(]~I~]~F(]t~ If,~/t~C~OFVt~II~C~S, FI~,~T~I~.
Mayor Chmiel: Item l3 has been removed. Is that correct Paul?
Paul Krauss: Yes.
54
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
Councilman Johnson: Actually Jim has a lot of background on this. I think
everybody's talked to Georgette at ~ne t/me or another.
Gary Warren: l(a)?
Mayor Ct~uiel: No, we're talking l(a).
Councilman Johnson: Okay. Earth to Jay. I didn't put it in order here. This
is what was just mentioned a little while hack. I have a question. How much
additional wetland is being added to the Eckankar proposed wetland that was
already designed and developed prior to this alteration is bein~ caused by this
alteration? How much bigger are we goin~ to make that Eckankar wetland?
Jo Ann Olsen: I'll start and the~ you can clarify things Oary but it seems that
we have close to an acre in excess right now with the design of the Eckankar
wetland. We've been proposin~ to use a portion of that to replace these
wetlands. In addition, the Eckankar wetland still has to go through Planning
Cc~mission and City Council for wetland alteration permit. We don't know how
much leeway we have but at that time if there's ever a need to add to it, we can
look at it at that point. For right now, even with the design as it is, it
looks as if we have almost a whole acre in excess at this time.
Councilman Johnson: In excess of what?
Jo Ann Olsen: Over what we were using it for as far as the other Lake Drive
wetland alteration permit.
Councilman Johnson: Lake Drive?
Jo Ann Olsen: The one by Ros~t. We did the same sort of thing there.
Councilman Boyt: We went thrcnalh about 3 of then didn' t we?
Mayor (2sm[el: Yep.
Jo Ann Olsen: There was wetland there that could not he replaced on site that
we were replacin~ with the storm water wetland on the Eckankar site.
Mayor C[md. el: There was also another wetland right on our intersection of CR 17
and 78th Street.
Councilman Johnson: In that same...directed there. That was actually going to
that property. The water was actual l y going... Okay, now how did this get
calculated? Did we take the existing wetlands and say we're going to expand
this existing wetland there because it is an existing wetland in the Eckankar
property and we're going to expand it by so many acres. That expansion, we take
so many acres out of it for the Rosemount and so many acres of that expansion
over the existing wetland for what we need for the other property and what's
left over is an acre that we have in the bank that the City can run around and
55
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
take a wetland from a different watershed almost. Different sttbwatershed at
least and then take it out of the bank?
Gary Warren: The wetland alteration permit that was done for the Lake Drive
West project dealt with the mitigation of basically 3 wetland areas. And as a
part of that approved permit, sc~ne work was done along Lake Drive but the
majority of it was shown for mitigation to be do~e in the Eckankar po~d at CR 17
and TH 5. The pond as you may recall, we have a parcel in conde~mation, a
friendly conde~ation if that's possible, in that we've been working with
Eckankar for acquiring the property and they are interested in 1 1/2 acres
roughly in the corner to retain as a lot which is workable. But we've gone
through several actually improvements and modifications to that Eckankar pond
with input from Paul Burke and the Eckankar people and as this thing stays open
here on West 78th Street, that we've just worked through several alterations on
it. The ccmT~t that we've been, I don't want to leave the i~ression that
we've been going along banking wetland credits so we can go about
indiscriminantly saying well we're giving you one back so we can take one so to
speak. It Just turns out that with the wetland alteration mitigation that wss
approved on Lake Drive, that we are ending up now with .9 of an acre of
additional wetland that we are achieving out there. In working with Paul Burke,
he sort of, you've got to put some criteria on it and we've had indications frown
him that we are doing more than typically here in trying to keep track of
things. So when we look at these wetlands on Lake Drive East, which total to
about 4.47 acres of mitigation, I guess what we're trying to say is that the
level of the wetlands on Lake Drive East, their ultimate future as far as
development of the ChanHaven Plaza subdivisions I think is probably in question
anyway and that we do have .9 of an acre on the Eckankar po~d proposal as it
stands right now to show that we are trying to acknowledge. That we're not just
indiscriminantly trying to wipe out a wetland. That we are restoring it.
Councilman Johnson: I find it, I don't know how to say it politely but kind of
hocus pocus here in that before, you know I've known about the Eckankar wetland
for a long time and I saw it as serving downtown and whatever and we get all the
way over to this side of the land and we start taking away some wetland. I want
to see that function of that wetland replaced within that watershed. Within the
entire watershed. Both are in the s~watershed. They're both in the Riley
but within the subwatershed, this one goes directly to the Rice Marsh Lake. The
Eckankar goes through Lake Susan and a series of ponds and everything else
before getting to Rice Marsh Lake. My personal opinion is that it's too far
removed. The Rosemount wetlands went directly to Lake Susan through some other
channels and whatever and the Eckankar goes to Lake Susan through some whatever
channels and those are halfway within, they're fairly close. This one they just
don't quite jive. You're taking, the resources are too far away. I don't think
this one little wetland is very much of a functional wetland whatsoever anyway.
It seems to be a pothole that doesn't serve much of a watershed at all. It may
not be serving a functional purpose as a wetland other than breeding mosquitoes
during the sunm~r. So on that case, to say we're really mitigating'our impact
here, I have a hard time swallowing that. That they're too remote and I don't
think, nobody's told me what the impact is other than acreages. The wooded
wetland has some function and those functions are going to ccm~e back so I don't
have a lot of problem, s with the wooded wetland because it should recover. I
hate to see somebody now go way over to the edge of Eden Prairie and do the same
56
City Council Meeting -April 9, 1990
thing because I'll oppose it the next time through. I'm sayin~ I'm goin~ to let
this one go. Extracting m~pound of flesh I guess.
Counciln~LU Boyt: Frc~ al 1 of us.
Councilman Johnson: Frc~ all of you. I'm sorry Bill but I think it's also a
good concept because I don't think we would allow a property o~er to do the
same thin~. We have to hold the City by the smme level.
C~ry Warren: I guess this is an example where the City is following it's own
rules in that maybe in years gone by or in the past public i~roverrent projects
it was taken for granted that maybe we were watching out for wetlands and maybe
wouldn't even have applied for a permit. I don't know but we defin/tely did
call the question on this one t~cause we are sensitive to the fact that we need
to stand to our own test. I think you touched Jay on an in~ortant part here and
that's the level of these wetlands in proportion to the big picture here I think
is important ~d can't be overlooked. The actual usefulness of these particular
wetlands in relation to the water 9uality benefit I think that we were able to
actual ly provide more benefit by working with the Eckankar pond to the
downstresm Rice Marsh Lake area than maybe what these wetlands are goin~ at this
point in time. Also, c~nsidering that their life is probably going to be
limited when development finally catches up with this site so I guess we're
trying to be responsive.
Councilmsn Johnson: Okay, but the truth is, if we did not chan~e these wetlands
one bit, the Eckankar wetland would have stayed the exact same size.
~ary Warren: We could shrink it if you wanted to. That's pretty easily dc~e.
· Paul Krauss: I guess I'll just take the opportunity to briefly throw in n~
pitch on this and the last applicant indicated that I said we were flying by the
seat of our pants on these things.
Mayor C~iel: He quotedyou.
Paul Krauss: He quoted me actually accurately but I pointed out to the Plannin~
C~ssion that you raise s~e very valid points Jay and the only way we can
resolve that c~rehensively is through the storm water n~nagement plan that
we're making efforts toward pursuing at a c~rehensive approach to wetlmnd
preservation with possibility a no net loss program where wetlands are evaluated
as to 9uality and replacements are offered in a reaso~mble manner. Frankly
right now we're doing the best we can slapping these things together and
hopefully we'll be able to approach it more cc~re~ively in the not too
distant future.
Councilman Boyt: As lon~ as you're brin~ this up, I thought that if we gave
him the impression that we don't know what a wetland is, we misled him because I
think, at least in the 3 years I 'ye been here, I 'ye seen sc~e very caref~
investigati~ns of whether s~mething is a wetland. Our staf~ and Fish and
Wildlife and we base those on facts. Not on seat of the pant guesses.
Paul Krauss: What was being paraphrased there was, we do not have a
comprehensive wetlands map. If somebody ccmes in and says can you tell me if-
57
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
there's a wetland on my property, the general answer is well maybe but we'd
really have to go out there because here's a wetland set of criteria. If we're
out there we can tell you definitively or we can call Paul Burke or somebody of
his to do that. But we do not have a ccmpre~ive map so homeowners are at
s~ething of a disadvantage. If they try to follow-up, they can't do it very
effectively.
Councilman Boyt: Well given the number of wetlands in Chanhassen, I'd say your
chances of having a map that has them all on it are pretty remote.
Council~ Johnson: Have you talked to the mosquito control? You guys are
going to get a letter from the Mosquito Control District. They claim they have
every mosquito breeding site in eastern Carver County on that. The number was
astounding. I happened to be here when it came in so I got mine a little early
and you guys are going to get yours. I 'd check with them. They may have some,
because where mosquitoes breed are wetlands with the exception of forests.
Council~ Boyt: That's not necessarily true.
Councilman Johnson: Well tires and sandboxes and everything else but in
general.
Councilman Workman: I ' d move approval of this.
Councilman Johnson: Yeah. Actually I'll move approval since I yanked it.
Councilman Workman: I' 11 second it.
Council~ Johnson moved, Council~ Workman seconded to approve Wetland
Alteration Permit for fill~ a~ alteration of Class A and B wetlands located
on Lake Drive East, south of Highway 5 and east of Dakota Avenue as recommended
by the City ~r. All voted in favor and the motion carried.
OOUNCIL P~E~]~'ATIf~S: ~ JET SKI (X~4PLAINT,
Councilman Johnson: I believe last year we said we were going to look at this
and nothing really happened. Georgette came in on a Visitor's Presentation and
we were going to follow up and there hasn't been a lot of follow-up yet. This
is really a tough issue in that it's going to be probably be handled by federal
regulations and stuff like that before we would be able to much about it. The
movement in a clockwise manner or counter clockwise manner around Lotus Lake may
be part of her problom. Part of her problem is that jet skis like to run in
tight circles at her property and then jump their own wakes. If we could
construe the counter clockwise requirement being that when you're, of course
that's only if you're going over 15 m~h too and I don't know how fast a jet ski
goes when they're doing these little circles. I would assume if you're doing
tight circles, you're probably well under 15 m~h. So that doesn't even count.
I don't know how to help her on this thin~.
Mayor Chmiel: Maybe Jim can.
Jim Chaffee: Well Mr. Mayor in the interest of time, I think the City Manager
had a, at lesat for the moment a pretty good suggestion and that's tabling this
58
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
until such time as the LMCD cc~es up with some kind of finalization ~n their
guidelines. I just noticed in a co%~le, several of the weekly papers that they
did have a public hearing, I think it was ~n Saturday regarding this very issue.
They're cern%lng out with s~me real stringent restrictions and again, I don't know
what the public hearing, what happened at the public hearing but at least for
the moment I 'd like to suggest that.
Mayor C~,iel: I think that's probably s~metl~ that we have to do. We need to
look at other than the fact that the State of New Ham~shire did ban them
completely. I don't expect that's going3 to take place.
Coun¢iln~n Johnson: Didn't we have a serious injury last year on Lake Riley
with a Jet ski?
Jim Chaffee: Yes. I believe it was when one of the individuals was impaled.
Councilman Johnson: He was impaled on a dock post. Tried to jtm~ the dock and
didn't make it or s~mething.
Jim Chaffee: Right.
Councilmen Johnson: Major stupid move.
Councilman Boyt: I would think that, this is about a life vest. Don't you
already have to have those on any water vehicle? Any water vessel?
Jim Chaffee: Again, the ~ indicated that you did not. That was one of their
suggestions to the legislature this year is to mandate the wearin~ of lifevests
when you're operating these jet skis and they said the legislature wouldn't even
look at it so I'm just assunin~ fr~m wSat she told me, that it is not a
requirement at this time.
Councilman Boyt: Is Hennepin County at 85 decibel limit? Is that wh~ that's in
there or is that a State limit?
Jim Chaffee: Wel 1 that again I d~n' t know.
Anita told me was what they were looking at.
their limit 79 so it could be a LMCD limit.
limit. I 'm not sure about that.
That was what the gal fr~m the I~R,
The LMCD now is looking to ~ske
It could be nmnufacturers P(~
Council~mn Boyt: Do the deputies have the authority to stop hazardous operation
on our lakes?
Jim Chaffee: Yes they do.
Council~ Boyt: So if they deem this tight circle sort of thing as hazardous,
they could stop that?
Jim Chaffee: Yes they can.
Council~ Boyt: One of the things in your comments about ~eorgette r~mfnds me
that we have so many ordinances, T~m will love this, that people don't know what
they are. If you look at Section 6-48, it sa~s that nobody can operate a
59
City Counci 1 Meeting - Apri 1 9, 1990
motorized vehicle within 100 feet of any shoreline without ~merging straight in
and straight out. Well clearly your observation of this jet ski, the guy must
have been illegal.
Councilman Workman: The key is enforcement.
Councilman Boyt: But I'm saying, we've got it here and I would venture that if
we polled people, nobody knows it.
Councilman Johnson: That also says or slow, no wake operation which again.
Councilman Boyt: Well that rules these guys out.
Councilman Johnson: Right. So you can troll the shoreline for fishing but you
can't watesk± the shoreline.
Councilman Boyt: Like so many other things, we have a control mechanism in our
ordinances. We just don' t know about it.
Council~ Johnson: We need to post that.
Mayor Chmiel: Well that'd be the only thing you could do. But how are you
going to enforce it without something concrete to grab onto?
Don Ashworth: Well we can put as part of the attendant being there making sure
that things such as the no wake and the circular movement is on that flyer. I
personally think that it was from this last year but I'll double check and make
sure that it is on there.
Councilman Boyt: Isn't there a sign posted right by the boat launch that has
al 1 those on it al ready?
Don Ashworth: I know it has as far as the r~al of the weeds but I'm not sure
about...
Councilman Boyt: I think there are two signs there. One for the Eurasian water
milfoil and the other one for the regulations on that particular lake because
it's a little unusual that you'd have a lake where you can only go counter
clockwise.
Mayor Chmiel' I know I went out there last year when they were having s~ne
problems when I got a call frc~a Georgette and we did quiet it after I talked to
them but the following week it was right back to where it was. They weren't
people from the cc~ty at all. They were people from Minneapolis and
Excelsior and Minnetc~ka. But anyway, I think that we probably should go by
what the manager's comnents are to see what the LMCD is going to do. Carrying
out their extensive study regarding water jet skis. Can we somehow enforce that
counter clockwise?
Jim Chaffee: I've got a meeting with Gary Bankston from the Sheriff's
Department on Wednesday and he will be the water patrol supervisor this year.
And last year they were real responsive to all of our requests and I think last
year we had fewer complaints than we have in the 3 years I've been here.
60
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
Councilman Boyt: Well the lake was different when they were there and when they
were gone. And they were there quite often.
Mayor Chmiel: Okay. I don't think we'll nc~ a motio~ on this. Just to
proceed with it.
Councilman Workman: So what are Just going to wait and see?
Mayor C~el: Well yeah. As Jim has indicated, he's going to talk with the new
individual who's going to be on there...and try to curtail the problems that are
existin~.
Counciln~n Johnson: Have Jim continue on and kee~ focused on this one.
Jim Chaffee: I'm sure Georgette will make sure we keep focused. Thank you.
Mayor Chmiel: I have-a letter from the Chaska Boy's Basketball prc~ram which
I presented some ~ifts to the players and this is from De~s Welder the coach.
He said Mayor Chmiel and the City of Charihassen. On behalf of the Chaska Boy's
Basketball team coaching staff I want to say a special thanks for your kind and
warm comments at our Study welcome home and also very appreciated. Thank you
for the tickets to the Chan Dinner Theater to see the play Dsn~ Yankees. We
enjoyed the d/nner and the play was delightful. It was an enjoyable night and
we thank you for that wonder~ul gesture on your part. Thanks again. Sincerely,
Dennis Welder.
Councilman Boyt: How did we fund that?
Mayor Ch~iel: We funded it mostly fr~m the Dirm~r Theater.
Councilman Boyt: That' s marvelous.
Mayor C~el: Yes, and we are sending a thank you letter to them. Or has it
already gone?
Don As~rth: It's already gone.
Mayor Cf~iel: Good. I have another letter here from our fair Governor talking
about last year's Minnesota Clean Rivers Project. Initiated statewide program
called the Mayor's challenge in an effort to clean ~ waterways in and around
our states and comzunities. Over 240 mayors indicated an interest in organ/zin~
clean-up efforts for their c~munity and 56 cities actually participated. Hard
work by these dedicated leaders really paid off. Nearly 400 to~s of debris was
removed from 287 miles of shoreline through mn effort that involved 13,868
volunteer hours. That's a lot of hours. This year we wanted to increase our
efforts to include many more Minnesotans who are interested in making their
con,unity a cleaner, healthier and more aesthetically pleasing place to live.
What he is asking is that if we would like to participate in this. We have a
card to send in and I think on our Earth Day would be as good a time as ~ny to
incorporate some of this in addition to what we have, if we haven't already done
so. So with that I would like you to take a look.
61
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
Councilman Johnson: I think that would be a good idea to talk to the Scouts or
whatever about...
Mayor Chmiel: Yeah. See who we can get. The Boy Scouts or Cub Scouts or Girl
Scouts.
Don Ashworth: Todd Hoffman is working on this right now.
Mayor Chmiel: I think he is and that's why I said that but I think we should
indicate that and send that in. Ursula, HRA?
Councilwoman Dimler: Alright. I've got our Minutes here that have been
approved and I guess after reading through them I can see that it was, we were
talking past each other. It was real confusion here. It has to do with setting
up the meeting, the joint meeting of the HRA and the Council. It was always my
understanding that the purpose would be to get to meet with them to discuss HRA
control and accountability. I was real surprised whenwe came to the meeting
that that was not on the agenda. I can remember distinctly saying if and when
we make a motion that the Council becc~ne the HRA, does that require a public
hearing. I was told that it did not but that the HRAmenbers would have to
resign to provide openings. But I said can the public be present if they want
·
s~ne input. I was told that they could come. There were many members from the
public here that wanted to address both the HRA and the Council and they're not
given the opportunity. I guess my question is, when was that agenda set and who
set it and if it was set before Thursday, why were we not given copies? Target
was never mentioned as a topic and yet that was what most of the agenda was
about. I didn't object to talking about the legislative, having an update on
the legislative proposals but I really was surprised that the whole meeting then
was taken up by the Target proposal. We never got to the real issue and I 'd
just like to know how and when we can accomplish that because there are people
in the public that did want to address their concerns and were not given the
opportunity and I said to Don, they may have been mad before but now they're
irrate. And I do appreciate Den's letter tome and I gave you all a copy
explaining that there was this misunderstanding and that letter will go out to
those people that did attend but were not given an opportunity to speak.
Mayor chmiel: I'd like to probably address some of that. Some of the plan
amendments and things that we're going to do I thinkwith theHRA is sc~nething
that's going to be looked at probably sometime yet this month. Somewhere arot~
4-23. I would also like to have those citizens input as I felt they wanted to
discuss and of course the reason that they really didn't have that opportunity
as you well know there was another meeting right in the Council chambers at 7:30
and by the time we finisb__~t_ it was 25 minutes to 8:00 and I didn't want to delay
the other meeting anymore.
Councilwoman Dimler: I understand that but Target was never part of the
proposal. I'm just saying we took up a lot of time that we could have let the
public address us.
Mayor Chmiel: Right, I think what I'd like to do is to, and I think we know
most, because I got a few calls too. I did inform them that we would let them
know as to when we're going to do it and I think you can do the s~m~e thing. You
62
City Council Meeting - A~ril 9, 1990
probably got the same calls and talked to the sm~e people that I did. But I
think we should have some kind of a...
Councilw=~n Dimler: And I would like to say that we should make sure it's a
joint meeting. Not a Council meeting because we want the HRA members to hear
this public input as well and so addressing it ~n April 23rd isn't going to do
it because that's a Council meeting.
Mayor C~el: Yeah, we already addressed it as you r~ with the ~ except
Whitehill was not there at that particular meeting. So we did want to have the
other meeting with him being there. SO I think that's something we can look at.
Councilwoman Dimler: So we should set another date for that type of a meeting.
Councilman Workman: Well Don we talked about mid-May potentially?
Mayor Chmiel: No, I think we should probably, well it could be mid-May too.
Don Ashworth: I think staff would be ready.. What I'd like to do is make sure
we get s~mething in the newspaper and again I apologize. If I would have had
any idea that we did have people here that the Minutes show. I guess I was
speaking at one level about what the meeting was currently c~ u~ and I
really felt Ursula's questions dealt with when are we going to have a meeting
for the citizens and I didn't tie that we were talking about the sm~s n--_cting.
Anyway, I would think that we would be in a position to do that somewhere
between May 1st and May 15th. What I wou/d suggest is that even during this
next week.
Mayor C~m~el: Let's say between May 1st and May llth.
INn Ashworth: May llth? That I poll City Council as well as HRA members.
with Don. Select a date s~mewhere in that whole process ~nd then put out a
meeting notice for that particular date.
Meet
Mayor Chmiel: Yep. I think that would be good.
Councilwoman Dimler: That's satisfactory to me.
Todd Gerhardt: Included in your packet was for discussion BRA directed staff to
solicit ideas from the Council regarding the replacement of the existing
fountain that sits in the courtyard in the new wing. While we're usin~ those
monies allocated to look at doing something else around City Hall or in City
Hall or somewhere in the downtown area. Jerry Bailey from Arteka who was
recommended to us by the architects who constructed or designed the new addition
of the City Hall, reccranended Jerry highly and that Jerry has done these things
in the past throughout the Twin City area and included in the packet were s~me
of the individuals he's worked with. In residences and businesses and
throughout the Twin Cities. This is the re~dering that Jerry had recked or
suggested...
63
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
Councilman Johnson: Is there a reason why we're considering this? Replacing
the fountain. What's wrong with the fountain?
Councilman Boyt: Fountain? Come on.
Mayor Chmiel: I like the sound.
Councilman Boyt: The fountain is a joke.
Councilman Johnson: Why do we want to spend some more money on a different
joke?
Councilwoman Diml er: I agree.
Councilman Boyt: Wel 1 that' s a good point.
councilman Johnson: I mean it's there. It's a joke. Let's lau~3h at it and not
spend a~y money.
Mayor C~el: I mede a proposal last time. I've got a 8 foot, probably 9 foot
Benjamin Ficus at hcme that I'm willing to donate to the City to put in that
specific location.
Councilman Workman: To be blunt, it appears to me the St. Pauli Girl doing
something someone would do in an outhouse and sounds like that too. It's
aesthetically not, what we should put there I don't know but go look at it.
Councilwoman Dimler: It's not that bad.
Mayor Chmtel: They have another way of eliminating3.
councilman Workman: Oh you bet but I'm just saying, it's like a $15,000.00 car
with a 15 cent squeak. It's got this little, something's wrong with it.
councilman Johnson: What kind of money are we talking Todd?
Mayor Chmiel: $4,600.00.
councilman Johnson: So we've got a $4,600.00 squeak.
Councilman Boyt: Well I can tell you that I will vote against that particular
design. I think it' s, if anything it' s not a step forward.
Councilwcemn Dimler: No, I don't like it either.
Councilman Workman: Do you have a St. Pauli Girl?
Todd Gerhardt: Well we don't have to go with this. This is just an idea that
Jerry had come up with and it sort of stands...and tried to spin off of the
Maple leaf logo that the City has. tie did his best efforts but I'm sure if you
wanted to give your suggestions to Jerry, he could come up with something
64
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
else...that represents the City and would be an attractive to anyone who would
c~ne in and look at that area.
Mayor Chmiel: I think that area is a very neat area really the way it is. I
think it blends in with the greens that are there.
Councilw~nmn Dimler: Right but you don't like the statute?
Councilman Boyt: There's another potential city clock tower cc~tng and-anytime
we have what will be probably about 15 people deciding something, I would almost
be more comfortable sayin~ to one person somewhere, let's all pick one person
and say alright, you do it. Then whatever they do is fine because we aren't
going to like it. No matter what goes in there, there's going to somebody out
of that group of 15 that says that thing's crazy.
Councilwcmmn Dimler: Another concern I had is why spend the money, ntm~0er one.
I'm sure we have other things that we could spend that mc~ey for. And also, why
d~n't we ask the groups in town such as the VFW or the Rotary or someone. Maybe
they want to make a dmmation. Maybe they can c~ne up with s~ething.
Councilman Workman: This is HRA funding isa' t it Todd?
Todd ~erhardt: Xes.
Councilwc~an Dimler: Does the n~ney have to be spent or do we lose it? Is that
it? Use it or lose it type of situation?
Mayor Chmiel: No. It's just that the dollars are there.
Councilnmn Workman: We don't need anything. We could put ping pon~ tables' in
there.
Mayor C~el: It's just to put a little culture into our City Hall.
Don Ash~orth: Actually this structure is very basic and the only area that you
have that b~-- a real identity is that courtyard area. By putting that little
thing that we've got out there, just doesn't match everything else that's there.
Maybe this isn't the ticket but the Council should cc~sider some architectural
something in there. Scm~ething that's unique to this city. I don't know what it
might be. They started out with the maple leaf.
Counciluumman Dimler: Let's put a statute of our first mayor.
Don Ashworth: That might be appropriate.
Councilman Boyt: Why don't we go to the people at the Arboretum and have then
rec~ s~mething. They'd probably do it for free. The Arboretum is in
Chanhassen.
Counciln~n Workman: I didn't know that they were in the sculpture or art
business.
65
City Council Meeting - April 9, 1990
Councilman Johnson: You can sculpture with plants. Isn't Lotus C~rden Shop
trying to put together a city garden club? This could be their indoor project.
Councilman Workman: Who?
Councilman Johnson: Lotus Lawn and Garden. Whatever they' re cal 1 ed. He' s
trying to put together a Chanhassen C~arden Club who will do the ¢.;ardening in
various areas around the City. Putting in flowers and whatever. I would think
that this would be a nice place that they would put sc~e of their efforts in
versus some kind of...it changes all the time.
Todd Gerhardt: We could do that but to emphasize...
Councilman Johnson: I'll tell you where you could $4,600.00 a lot better than
something to emphasize some flowers.
Mayor Chmiel: I guess you know where we're co,ting from. I don't know if we need
any more discussion.
Councilw~m~n Diml er moved, Counci lm~n Johnson sec~ed to adjourn the meeting.
All voted in favor and the motio~ carried. The meetir~ was adjourned at 11:15
p.m..
Suhnitted by Don Ashworth
City Manager
Prepared by Nann Opheim
66