1987 02 23 ~EN CITY COUNCIL
REGULAR MEETING
23, 1987
Hamilton called the meeting to order. The meeting was opened with the
Pledge to the Flag.
PRESENT: Councilman Horn, Councilman Geving, Councilman Johnson
ABSENT: Councilman Boyt
ITAFF PRESENT: Don Ashworth, Barbara Dacy, Jo Ann Olsen, Gary Warren and Lori
OF AGENDA: Coucilman Geving moved, Councilman Horn seconded to
approve the agerzla with the following charges and additions: Councilman
Geving wanted to discuss the Randy Herman development. Councilman Johnson
wanted to move consent Agenda item l(b)(1) and l(b)(2) to be discussed with
item 9 on the agenda; to discuss erosion control; and propose a new Ordinance
for controlling demolition disposal in the City. All voted in favor of the
agenda as amended and motion carried.
CONSENT AGENDA: Mayor Hamilton moved, councilman Horn seconded to approve the
consent agenda it~ns pursuant to the City Manager's recommendations:
a.
City council Minutes dated February 9, 1987.
Planning Cc~nission Minutes dated February 11, 1987.
d. Authorize Execution of Oontract for July 4th Band.
e. Establish 1987 Lake Ann Park Entrance Fees.
f. Final Plat Approval, South Lotus Lake 2nd Addition.
h.
Resolution %87-11: Approval of Resolution Proclaiming '~olunteers of
America" Week.
i.
Resolution %87-12: Establish Public Hearing Date for Redevelopment-
TIF Plan.
Ail voted in favor and motion carried.
VISITORS PRESENTATIONS:
PRESENTATION OF 1986 POLICE ACTIVITY REPORT, RICHARD WING.
Mayor Hamilton: Are you going to go through this briefly with us Richard?
Richard Wing: No, I think it's the same format that we've had in the past
done in layman's terms which makes it easier for all of us to read. Unless
there are any questions from the Council, I guess I don't have any pertinent
comments other than the report itself. Two iss.ues that are a little bit
troubling. One, Fire Department improvement. I think it's an issue. I think
the councilman who attended our last meeting heard the problems ar~ it is
going to have to be addressed. The other one would be the outright question
City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
of inspections in the City. Be it building Codes for better crime prevention
or even the Fire Department. I think the City is starting to grow. I think
we have to be on the ground floor of this. I think we've got to get Codes
established and they should be reviewed quite rigidly. One of the our goals
in coming here is to look into crime prevention codes. Unless you have
specific questions, I have nothing else.
Mayor Hamilton: I think part of that will be taken care of when the new
Public Safety Director is hired, in bringing up to Code. ~
Richard Wing: I guess we're looking even beyond what we've done. Regardless
of the type of quality of the home or the cost of the home, the cities are
requiring specific door locks and I don't know if we are. We would like to
know about that. It's just a matter of Fire Codes. It's our understanding
that the Fire Codes in some other cities are very rigid and rigidly enforced
so you literally, your Fire Department expansion becomes unimportant because
everything handles itself. The City of ~dina is one example where they just
run a small crew and they figure if that crew can't handle with what's on that
engine, then to call for help and just let the building go because their Codes
are so enforced and so rigid, they simply don't have fires so they really
recommend that we have a similar pattern. We may, the Commission just doesn't
know that.
Mayor Hamilton: You mentiond recruiting, where is the force at now in both
locations?
Richard Wing: Tne Ordinance allows for two total man power of 40 and we're
down to 32. The West Station which is really the biggest problem, was up to 8
people and we find that we've lost all but 4 now so the West Station is
hurting for man power. This Station is down and particularly during the
daytime hours, which is real common even if you were in Bloomington.
Everybody is hurting during the day. Jim Castleberry was just wringing his
hands towards the end of his tenure here because he didn't know what to do at
this point. Councilman Boyt did ask for a study fairly rapidly on what
motivates a volunteer fireman? One, why?. Secondly, to stay with the City in
longevity. Who does apply? How could we attract more people? Jim
Castleberry had no ideas. Tne Commission has no suggestions. ~ne comment at
the last Commission meeting we suggested that if we quadrupled the fire
departments pay in all respects, would that make a difference and we're not
convinced it would. If we were convinced it would, we would recommend it as a
way to get people involved and stay involved. One comment to the Council, I
would be very careful in the future not to use the word "volunteer fireman".
They are getting very sensitive about that. ~here is too much time for them
going in, they no longer consider themselves as volunteers and I think they
will approach you in the future as a paid representative of the City's Public
Safety Department. I'm speaking from the Commission now, I think the word
volunteer and the good old boys in the good old days has got to be guarded
carefully.
Mayor Hamilton: I would be interested to know, not so much why someone joins
but why they leave. When someone leaves, do we attempt to do any kind of an
exit interview type thing to find out why they are leaving? How many of those
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Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
left were washed out autcmatically?
Wing: We had some that just burned out also. It reaches a point where
activity levels are no longer that much fun, if you will, and the work
overburdening. They just get burned out. We'll get back to the
with some recommendations and see if we can find some trends here. I
that the 10 year vesting is probably beneficial in that now people with
years, they can see 10 years coming up so we know we have them for 10
Tnere was an argument that we should have kept it at 20 but then they
have to keep going for the 20 year. I don't remember the arguments on
I feel real confident with the Sheriff's Department. We're really
with Wallin and Castleberry team down there. T~ey've added patrol
on the weekends. Jim finally is tackling base level services so for our
we're expanding our service dramatically at very little cost to the
so we can't in any way support all of the department. We were pressured
aggressively this past year with the comments and snide digs that we
to have our own department and our comment really was, justify your
because we felt that we were biased ~ we were accused of being
but we consider ourselves intellectually biased because we were
to be biased to study the information.
Hamilton: What I would like to do while Richard is here, so he doesn't
to stay all night, is to combine this with item 1L Would you mind that
? It would take just a couple of additional minutes.
Geving moved, Councilman Horn seconded to move item 11 after item
on the agenda. All voted in favor and motion carried.
ADDITIONAL POLICE SERVICES/PURCHASE OF CSO VEHICLE.
lman Geving: The comment I would like to make Richard is that this is
very excellent report. Usually in tbs week's mail and all through the. week
we have a council meeting we get about 4 inches of paper. It's quite a
of reading and there are very few things that I really save from week to
but this is an item that I save from year to year because I always keep
year's report and do my comparisons like you do here. A couple of
ions I had. In terms of the reco~d that we're trying to obtain with the
firefighters and I see a lot of advertisements on our TV channels arzt it
for, much be a Chanhassen resident. Why is that so?~ We have people
Gary lives in south Minneapolis, Barb Dacy lives north of here and we
live in different places. We're not all residents of Chanhassen. If we
firefighters bad enough it seems to me that we would take them wherever
are available.
Wing: That's the case. Tne Fire Department By-Laws and the Ordinance
state that they have to live or work in the City. We do have one party
lives in Lakeville that is on the Fire Department at this time. He's one
the CSO officers so anybody who works in the City is encouraged to join and
Iim did pursue that this past year.
lman Geving: Let me ask you, would it help if we changed that By-Law to
it open to anybody that could be a firefighter from wherever t~ lived
City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
as long as they attended the required number of meetings and fulfilled all
the other functions of a firefighter, I would see no problem with that.
Richard Wing: I believe so. I think that should be the case. The Department
feels that they want people that can participate and will be available because
they're putting so much time, they don't want to see someone get the same pay
they do but I agree with you. I believe that is intended to exclude people
and I don't know why it would be other than that is the old days and here is
the new days.
Councilman Geving: I'm also thinking of people who might, just for one reason
or another have to move out of the community but live close enough yet, maybe
in Chaska or Jonathan or someplace where they are still available to be a
firefighter but because they don't live in the community would have to give up
their membership in the firefighting team so we might have something there.
Richard Wing: On the March agenda for the Commission, I'll see that the Fire
Department is there to answer that. I think that should be changed.
Councilman Geving: I had some questions, I like the activity report. It
looks like we're gaining on some areas, particularly traffic violations are
way down. We're improving in just about all the areas over the previous year
1985 but I did have a question on burglaries. We had a substantial increase
this last year and I'm wondering if you have determined particular areas
within the community where these burglaries are happening? Where the highest
instances occur? We're up to 44 in 1986 and I'm wondering if that has been
highlighted and pinpointed on somebod~s map and we are patrolling more in
those areas.
Richard Wing: If Jim Castleberry he could be very specific. I'll only say
that on the demographics of all these calls, you take your City Hall and draw
a one mile circle and you've encompassed just about everything. Particularly
neighborhoods who are getting progressively, and as you get closer to the
metropolitan area, the more congested areas, you're going to see conditions
but I can't give you a specific answer. I don't want to quote you anything.
Jim Castleberry could be very specific.
Councilman Geving: I had one other comment Dick. On page 3 of your
conclusions and recommendations, number 7, it says that the 6 officers serving
Chanhassen should be introduced by the Chanhassen News Letter and other public
relation vehicles. I met Julie for the first time this evening here, our
Carver County Deputy, and I am suggesting that this is a very good idea. I
would suggest that we put this in the Chamber Post because that gets a lot of
circulation in the community and I don't what the vehicle is to get this out
but I would encourage the Commission to seek out the Chamber and see if we
can't get a picture of each of the 6 people who serve our community and a
little paragraph on each of them and introduce them to the City of Chanhassen.
Richard Wing: On the March agenda, the Chamber and Mayor will be asking us
for articles. We're going to have a fireman of the month and we're going to
give the deputies interviews.
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City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
Mayor Hamilton: That's something that we've done in ~ past and I think
there has just been so much turnover in the last couple years, we ~ to do
that again. We should probably look, in that March meeting, we can look at
all the things because Waconia Ambulance Service, I think we ~ to
reintroduce those people as well.
Richard Wing: One of the problems is it takes time and it's probably one of
the projects you'll be assigned.
Mayor Hamilton: I know we talked at one of recent meetings about the CSO
vehicle, Richard. We had quite a discussion about whether or not we should
replace it. We had not budgeted for it this year and I guess as I drive
around in the Twin Cities area and see other vehicles on the road, I think
ours looks quite immaculate compared to a lot of them that I do see on the
road so I'm not in favor of purchasing a new vehicle unless it is going to
cost more to keep it on the road than it would to purchase a new one. I don't
think the looks of a vehicle are that important. There are a few rust spots.
That's fine. Nobody is going to fall through the floor but I think we can get
the rest of this year out of it I would think. I'm asking for your comments I
guess.
Richard Wing: ~nat was our position. When the CSO Officer Ellering came to
us earlier in the year, we kind of decided in his favor. Jim Castleberry's
comments was that he was going to try and limp through, that is his quote.
They tell us that Don Ashworth was in favor of purchasing a new vehicle and
the City Manager on a day-to-day basis is in contact with it, it's really his
perogative to say I want a truck and I feel Don is very conservative in his
purchases. He certainly has not been willing to buy us cars to drive around
with to use so when he said he felt a truck was needed, we ths~ got together
with him and discussed it at length. Appearance isn't the issue. It was the
transmission and it went on from there. The shop said this is foolish to
spend money because it is going to cost a large amount of money to put it into
shape and then continual maintenance. It's very high mileage and Don felt
that we have a contract with Chaska and that with the part-time issue of
coming up, that he would have a city vehicle that is capable of doing
that's ~ed. If we go part-time, that vehicle is available to
them. If the County bails out of the part-time which apparently is going to
according to our latest comment from Jim Castleberry, it will force the
Public Safety Director to look at our own part-time people, there is a squad
already in place so he felt that appearancewise, maintenancewise, costwise,
ar~ the long delay in obtaining this vehicle that now is~.~the appropriate time
to move so based on his cc~m%ents, we felt we had to side with his position.
Mayor Hamilton: Okay, so if that's the fact and I will accept that, I think
we should have this vehicle bid as we would any other vehicle and have it
specified out. On here it says a General Motors S-10 pick-up. I~ not sure
we do this in the past Clark but a specific vehicle is not recomm~ed.
have to say what it is we need ar~ let anybody bid on it who wants to. If
they can meet that criteria, then we want their bid.
Wing: The reason that I put that in there, it was probably my fault,
I researched this when this thing first came up a year ago, all of the
City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
other communities that I looked at, Plymouth, Minnetonka and so on, were all
using Chevy S-10's or GMC or Ford Ranger, I don't know pick-ups but that just
happened to be the one that I looked at that was recommended. You're right,
specs will be made and it goes out to bid and it could be Ford but a small
medium sized pick-up is what their intent was. We had a hard time with the
4-wheel drive but considering the weather and the fact that it could be used
as police vehicle, Don felt that he wanted that item for $1,600.00 to remain
in.
Mayor Hamilton: It should be bid. Somebody might bid it at $1,200.00 or
something. Make that an alternate as part of the specifications. Bid it
without 4-wheel drive, bid it with 4-wheel drive.
Richard Wing: That was strictly for your information.
Councilman Horn: How many miles are on the current vehicle?
Richard Wing: Between 130,000 to 150,000. I'm not sure which. It was over
130,000 miles.
Councilman Horn: And what was the cost to repair the transmission?
Richard Wing: $600.00 to $800.00.
Councilman Horn: We have similar vehicles at work that have over 200,000
miles on them but then that's the private sector. The public makes a
difference I guess.
Richard Wing: I won't defend this recommendation. I would urge you to get
together with the City Manager and discuss it with him because he really has
more information and more background. We just see it coming and with his
definition and as he described it and what he felt was reasonable, we didn't
think as a Commission we were in a position to say no because if it happens
this month or in 8 months, we felt with the purchase...
Mayor Hamilton: I know budget items can be accommodated on budget
adjustments ... Clark, any more comment?
Councilman Horn: No, I agree with your original statement that we don't
really need it yet.
Councilman Geving: I would say we should proceed with it only if the existing
vehicle could be used in some other department probaby as a parts vehicle for
maintenance shop or some other area in the park and rec. I don't think we
need a new vehicle although I have seen some very high bills on this
particular van over the last year. I have seen $800.00 several times. I'm
more interested in the second recommendation, that the Commission continue to
recommend the addition of part-time police servies. I'm in favor of this
proposal but I believe that we must wait now until we actually hire a public
safety director. I don't think we should proceed with this until that person
is in place ar~ let him make his own selection of people and equipment this
program but I am in favor of the program.
271'
Council ~ting - February 23, 1987
Wing: Is it appropriate to make a personal comment? With Jim
y as the Chief Deputy, it's still like having our own public safety
.irector and Jim is watching the City very closely. It's also a very quiet
:ime in the City and summertime, being June is when it picks up and by then a
safety director hopefully will be on-staff. I agree with yot% I don't
there is any rush for this. The proposal that Jim has put forward is
April 1st and I guess I~ favoring getting police patrolling the
ty. We would have trouble not defending some exlmansion of some sort. If
Council should elect to wait, it certainly is no crisis but I certainly
be critical at all. As a Commission member, ,I'm comfortable with
We are very strong and we really looked at this in length. I guess I
to give the new public safety director an option to hire his own people
buy his squad. I think the only way to go, in my opinion ar~ the
· vote of the Commission, is to stay with the County as long as' they
sell us part-time deputies and rent us a car but that is going to come to
halt. Jim has made that clear that that will not make it in 1988. The~ve
kaboshed that, if you will, so if we're going to q0. part-time, we will
forced to go into an alternate in 1988. -"
Johnson: I was at the last meeting of the Public Safety Commission
to spend a little time on the car, there's a little bit more than
'ssion from what I gathered set to go on that thing. It's ~n crossing
pretty rough roads, not delivering parts around town or anything. I'm in
of getting a new vehicle from what I heard at that meeting. Also,. the
officers you're talking about, at this point are they not Carver
Deputies at this point that we're considering and that's what We're
to do right now is not hire Chanhassen part-time deputies but Carver
officers on a part-time basis? It's through Jim Castleberry and
the Sheriff's Department as far as who gets assigned as that part-time
.~rson during the periods we ~ them.
Wing: We would pick our deputies. I think the Council would be in
of people the type of King and Douglas personalties that would be the
people. Just double that service again. The car for $3.0~ per
I don't even want to go on record with a co~xment.
Hamilton: Do you think that's not going to be available next year or am
I misunderstanding what you're saying?
Wing: In 1988. Perhaps you're knowledgable on that.
Hamilton: I have no prior knowledge of that.
Richard Wing: Apparently the County, we're buying at a cost that it puts the
in a pressure with other communities. That most likely will not be
feasible.
:ilman Johnson: ~nat was discussed at the meeting. Basically, they don't
want to advertise the bargain we're getting on this part-time and they figure
the end of the year, everybody will be asking for, instead of their regular
~ts and they won't be able to give it to us next year but they've
City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
already offered it and they're not going to pull back their offer. I think we
ought to grab it.
Richard Wing: Instead of paying $14.95, actually it's going to be up to
$36.00 probably with the lawsuit but we're going to be paying $15.00 to $17.00
per hour per patrolman plus $3.00 for the car which is well below the price of
the contract so it's not going to fly. We don't have a chance of it. It's
going to be a tremendous bargain and a real benefit to the City as long as it
lasts.
Councilman Johnson: We can get into the 1987 contract but no way on the 19887
Richard Wing: That's my understanding.
,
Councilman Johnson: I think we should do it while we can.
Mayor Hamilton: I have just one other comment. Just for clarification. On
the bottom of page 2, item 2, there was a comment made and Richard you can
make comment on this if you would but there was a comment made that in 1986
one problem was the Filly's nightclub and the increase in disorderly conduct
was primarily attributed to Filly's. I know Jim was working very closely with
Filly's as I have and one of the things that the owners of Filly's do is to
call every time there is a problem. They're going to stop calling if this
kind of thing keeps getting printed as other bars do in town. I can't believe
that everybody calls everytime there is a problem and I know for a fact that
they do call because they don't want to have problems there. They want to get
them resolved and I don't think that should be held against them. I don't
think it is fair to print that they are a problem when in fact the others
don't call as frequently as they do.
Richard Wing: We looked at the incidents called and we looked at the actual
calls that occurred. What you're saying is undoubtedly true. The Pony
Express would prefer to burn down before they call for help. I don't know
that but we make that assumption. Pauly's calls for help when they need it
but the real pressure was on Filly's. I think they were calling but there
were also a lot of problems and you can't deny the problems. There were so
many calls that the cars literally couldn't keep up. The Fire Department
actually had people stationed up there from 8:00 until 1:00 in the morning
because they knew calls were going to come down. It was just a foregone
conclusion. They have now added additional people or personnel to help handle
the system and so has the popularity is maybe waning or the activity level is
maybe waning but there is much better supervision and the calls simply aren't
occurring, the problems aren't. We liken Filly's to the Dinner Theater. We
had a lot of medical calls at the Dinner Theater because there are a lot of
people there so you anticipate that. I said, and I made it as a general
statement but I think we could justify the statement that they were the cause
of some of these very large increases. It's a fact, Filly's did account for
an 18% increase specifically. We also stated that by the end of this year,
1986, that it really quieted down and it's not the problem.
Mayor Hamilton: They had some adverse publicity like this previously and they
may already not be calling as much as they used to and are handling things
273
City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
more internally then calling for help everytime something happens.
Richard Wing: I guess I would disagree with you that I think they should
start handling it internally and not dumping umpteen calls on the City that
affect our public safety to the point where the public safety director says we
have to have more cars.
Mayor Hamilton: Then we r~--cd to continue working with them and tell them
that.
Richard Wing: And that's what has occurred. I think the problem has stopped.
I'm not familiar with it so I can't relate to Filly's on a personal basis and
perhaps you can. I think you would agree that things have changed and it's not
going to be a probl~ in the future.
Mayor Hamilton: I hope not.
Councilman Geving made a motion at this point in the meeting.
councilman Horn: You're delaying the vehicle for a 1988 budget item?
.:.
Don Ashworth: I don't think it will run that long. We're having serious
problems with that as far as the transmission, drive train, the vehicle is
literally ready to fall apart. If we pr~ with ordering, it will take a 3
to 4 month period of time just to get a vehicle in so we're dealing with mid
1987 if we proceed right now.
Mayor Hamilton: The transmission, that can't be that expensive to fix a
tran~nission and if that's the biggest probl~.
Don Ashworth: We're looking at $1,200.00 to $1,500.00 for repairs on the
vehicle.
Councilman Geving: My idea though Don is that we maintain the vehicle and
retain it in the fleet. Push it over to maybe the maintenance people, the
maintenance office or even to the Park and Rec. It's a van that we have r._~
for that kind of vehicle with the young people we hire in t?~ park department
to move them around from park to park so I see a use for this type of vehicle
even if w~ have to repair it.
Don Ashworth: There's no question there's a v_~ but the miles that vehicle
has on it, Gary is basically saying that vehicle is shot.
Mayor Hamilton: So you're planning on trashing it totally?
Don Ashworth: I don't think we could sell that for over $100.00.
councilman Geving: ~nat's just my proposal that we move-it. It is an
unbudgeted item for 1987 and that's the reason for my comments as a budget
proposed for next year.
Mayor Hamilton: Is your motion standing?
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City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
Councilman Geving: Yes, I'm going to stay with my motion.
Councilman Horn: I think if we saw some kind of an ROI calculation on this we
might feel dispensed to do s~mething about it but we don't see anything.
Don Ashworth: Let me do that.
Councilman Geving: Okay, give us some facts.
Councilman Geving moved, Mayor Hamilton seconded to move the purchase of a CSO
vehicle to a 1988 budget item and that the Council get statistics on repairs
that have been made and are ~cded to the present CSO vehicle. Also, to
proceed with hiring part-time police services from Carver County with the
understanding that only after the City hires a new Public Safety Director and
he makes his own program choices and the selection of his own personnel. All
voted in favor and motion carried.
PUBLIC HEARING:
REQUEST TO REINSTATE CONDITIONAL USE PERMIT FOR DRIVING RANGE, CR 117 AND
TH 5, JOHN PRYZMUS.
Barbara Dacy: Attachment 91 reflects the applicant's application to have the
Conditional Use Permit for a Golf Driving Range reinstated at the northwest
corner of Galpin Blvd. and TH 5. Council recalls that the Conditional Use
Permit was revoked for violation of the conditions of the original permit in
November, 1985. Later, within the past year, the Council directed the
Attorney to file suit regarding violations of the Nuisance and Zoning
Ordinance regarding the junk, litter and debris on the property. We have
included in your packets a checklist of items regarding your original Permit
approval. ~ne Council has basically two options this evening. One, is to
reinstate the permit. If that is the action the council is to take, it is
recommended that the conditions in the applicant's letter be implemented as
well as any other condition the Council deems appropriate including additional
site plan review and submittal of a revised site plan for Staff's review. ~ne
second option is for the Council to deny the reinstatement request. If that
is the Council's action then the Court action regarding the violations to the
Nuisance and the Zoning Ordinance will proceed to trial. A date has not be~n
set pending action this evening.
Mayor Hamilton called the public hearing to order. Councilman Geving moved,
Councilman Johnson seconded to close public hearing. All voted in favor and
motion carried.
John Pryzmus: I would like you to refer to the letter that I wrote to you.
Basically, we can go through that we can kind of stay with what I'm proposing
now and then you can go ahead. If you read through that letter, basically
everything on the first page has been completed. What was on the second page
is what I've proposed to do with the new site plan and a new grading plan.
Schoell and Madsen have already done the grading plan and the site plan has
already been drawn up and I have a copy of them if you would like to look at
them. If you have any questions about that, you can ask me questions or
10
Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
If you don't we can go to the condition that you I had done wrong.
condition that you had revoked it for and that was that the structure was
sound. Basically, when I came here a couple years ago, the structure of a
eodesic dome is designed so it can't fall down like a lot of your tin or wood
that are out on farms that are falling down after aging. This is a
fiberglass building that is bolted together with steel and the way it is
it can't fall dowru There was never a problem for any accident 'or
like that to happen because of the building. As far as making it
secure, the three glass sliding doors that go in it, being that I wasn't in
· :ss at the time, if you put the three sliding glass doors in, you would
wind up having somebody turn around, throw a rock or throw something through
the windows and then I would have smashed out windows and then there would be
a problem of somebody getting cut if they did go in there_ As far as the
earth moving and the stumps, when I came here 2 years ago, I told the people
that moved all the earth and moved th~ stumps and the trees in the lowland,
not to put them closer than 10 feet to the creek. In fact, I told them to stay
least 30 feet away. When I four~ out when I came here that t~ were too
I hired Jeff Swedlund to go out with his backhoe so he wouldn't get
close with the big machine so he could reach in ar~ make sure and all of that
was pulled 30 or 40 feet away from the creek and it is still there and it's
just stumps. As far as number 4, the removal of chemicals and to refrain from
using chemicals, I never had chemicals out there. The stock pile of silica
sand that the Council thought was chemicals, was not. The canister I got from
Stodola Well Company when they set up the pump and Stodola Well Com~ has
been giving us water for 50 years so there were never any chemicals that would
ever have been a problem. As far as the electrical, the only time there was
any electrical on out there is if Ihn on the site and that is just a temporary
pump. That electrical will not be there other than when I am pumping water
for the tee area. That's the 'first 5 things in the original certified letter
that I got that revoked my permit. Then you go on to ask for $500.00 escrow
and $15,000.00 bond. If we go back to my original letter, I was running my
driving range here for 6 years in Chanhassen. Never was there a problem. The
City never had to come down there and tell me to mow my grass. When the fence
started deteriorating, I removed it. The building eventually deteriorated so
I just removed it and got rid of it, buried it. From my first driving range,
which a lot of the Council members had apprehension in letting me run, never
once did we have a lawsuit or problem. Never was anybody hurt. Going back to
my letter, I employed numerous young people in the community. My new driving
range I won't be doing that. There will still be maybe 4 or 5 young people but
they will be either high school or college and then I will have a full time
manager running it- If we go back to the original 12 things that my permit
said I had to do, if you go through .them, never once did I do anything. You
say there was litter on the premises. Okay, in a letter from Art Partridge,
somebody dumped a cooler. When the City told me that it was out there, I went
and got it. When I bought the land, people had dumped. They could back in
there because there were two driveways. Now I proceeded to put a berm so
nobody can back in there anymore. I did pile dead elm trees that the neighbor
Ted Benson ar~ I pulled out of the creek. We've ~ cleaning up the creek.
His side and my side. We've ~ spending a lot of time and money cleaning up
the creek. We don't want to block the creek. We want to keep it flowing so
people put leaves and grass what have you there ar~ it was referred to "God
only know what is out there" yet the City Inspector went out there before I
11
City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
got a burning permit and there was no garbage. Somebody did dump a mattress
and that smoldered when I lit it so then I put it back out. Even though some
of the statements about different things, I guess I haven't seen where the
Conditional Use Permit should have even been revoked because I never once did
anything that was really bad against it. Now, finally I got the financing. I
closed up my other driving range and I'm ready to open up there and give it my
full attention. Not only would I like to get the driving range reinstated but
then I'll be going back to the Planning Commission for, I have a building out
there for some things, indoor batting and things like that which I'll show the.
whole grading plan and the berming and the trees and it will be totally
screened I think from CR 117. Especially the neighbors to the north won't
even know it once I move all of it. I have about 100 trees left on my old
driving range to move out there yet and I have 6 dead willow trees that I will
be moving into that corner so it should be a beautiful thing for the whole
community and I want to come back next month but if you reinstate this, this
would be the first process for me to go on.
Councilman Johnson: You covered one of my questions is what are you going to
use with that building? I was led to believe that under this permit you can
only have a driving range. You can't have practice batting and whether that
is an allowable conditional use or any kind of use within that district, it
sounds to me like the only way to do it would be to petition to change our
Zoning Ordinance to allow you batting there. Barb,~ help me there.
Barbara Dacy: Yes, that's correct. In fact, we made that known to the
applicant that currently golf driving range is not included or a Conditional
Use and if reinstatement is granted tonight, it's only for the original uses
that were approved in the 1982 permit. If the applicant wishes to build
additional buildings, yes, we would have to initiate a Zoning Ordinance
Amendment and go through the process.
Councilman Johnson: Without that, the building laying out there would become
a contractor's yard?
Barbara Dacy: The building parts would have to be removed unless the
amendment was approved.
Councilman Johnson: Can you remove those building parts someplace else?
John Pryzmus: Most likely. To answer your question, what it could be is
everyone got an Ordinance thing in the mail and I guess in that Zone, I could
build a building and have a farm. I could have a contractor's yard. I could
have any number of the things that are a permitted use without a Conditional
Use but I would prefer to not have a farm or not have a contractor's yard but
to have a recreational thing out there and use the building which would be all
cedar. The whole side and front would be cedar. The grading plan that I had
Schoell and Madsen do, will have a berm 6 feet high to the east so the
building is a low profile building and you wouldn't hardly, you would see the
roof for the first couple years until the trees.
Mayor Hamilton: That's really not even an issue here. If you want to pursue
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Oouncil Meeting - February 23, 1987
that, that's going to back to the Planning Commissior~ That will be something
~ilman Johnson: So, don't get your hopes up. There is a lot of mention
a wetlands. I walked the area this week~ and where is this wetlands?
Hamilton: It was on the northwest corner.
Pryzmus: That was a lot of problem and a lot of controversy with the
;ity Council and if you go back to the letter where Bill Monk and I went out
there and we addressed this two years ago. The first thing on it is that it's
not a wetlands. It was a farm when I bought it. It was a tree farm but Mr.
Lyman, who had originally owned it, had farmed that 18 acres all of his life.
There was never a cattail so I wish the City wouldn't refer to it as wetlands
because it's not. It never was.
Mayor Hamilton: It sure isn't now because it's filled in.
Councilman Johnson: Barb, was that in our Cc~prehensive Plan as a wetland?
Barbara Dacy: It's not a designated wetlands on your map but during Council
review of the site in 1982, there was discussion about keepirg all activities
out of that wet area, which is in the northwest corner of the site. Last
April of 1985, Council members conducted a field visit out to the site with
the City Engineer at that time and that was the major reason:why the
Conditional Use Permit was revoked. If you refer to the resolution, filling
in a wetlands and conducting grading operations within 1~ feet of the creek.
Councilman Johnson: As I understand this, this wetlands would aid in
filtering out any contaminants caused within your property. Your run-off and
stuff from your property. Does it generally go back towards that corner?
What I'm eventually going at John is, would you be willing to reinstate that
wetland?
John Pryzmus: Yes, Schoell and Madsen Engir.~_ring has already done this and
it's in front of the DNR now waiting for tonight and this would all be done,
it would filter just the way it's suppose to with an overflow so nothing ever
would run into the creek. That has b~- through, I don't know the gentleman's
name at the DNR but the site plan, he had no problems with it the way Schoell
and Madsen had designed it.
Barbara Dacy: Staff did not carry out a review yet of that particular grading
plan but would and could report back to the Council if reinstatement is
approved.
Mayor Hamilton: I think that's the only way to go. We're not going to sit
here and look at this tonight.
Councilman Johnson: No, we can't look at it right here. It does indicate
future development of the place that you're saying you want to do it now. It
does show you are looking to reinstate that and that is something very
important that we build that wetland back. Those are my basic comuents.
13
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City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
Councilman Horn: I don't really think I have any questions. I guess I'm a
little concerned that this all started in 1982 and here it is 1987.
Councilman Geving: I'll tell you John, I'm very disappointed. I was the one
person who made the motion to approve this Conditional Use Permit for you in
1982 or 1983. Over four years ago, we started this process. You have
continued to frustrate this Council to the point where we had to take legal
action against you. You did not appear when you were called. You were non-
communicative when you were called. We asked you on a number of occasions to
come before the Council and speak to us. We tried to treat you in a
gentlemanly manner and you avoided us and you ignored us. I can't see how
your past performance is going to improve by granting you a Conditional Use
Permit under a reinstatement at this time. You have caused the taxpayers of
Chanhassen a lot of money. We have chased you for the last four years. We
have attempted to get you in front of us to talk to you. You have avoided us
and I would be very, very anxious to hear from our Attorney whether or not, if
we did reinstate this Conditional Use Permit to you, whether or not we could
collect those damages that we have paid for, the attorney fees and court costs
to date. Secondly, would you be willing to pay those costs?
John Pryzmus: As far as the problems that the City has had with me, a lot of
the times they were unfounded problems like the chemicals and the electrical
so, ser~ an Attorney down. I would pay his fee for something I've done wrong.
I have no problem with that. I always pay my debts or try to. I feel where
comments from the Council, where we're going to have transients living in the
building and things like that, when I'm putting every dime I got into it over
the last 5 years, did you ever once say, oh, I see it's coming along? In the
original Conditional Use I had a day to day agreement with the landowners down
here and at any day that somebody sold the land, I would be gone. I would
have to sell. I would have to move the driving range. As everybody knows,
Chanhassen didn't grow as fast as I had hoped and I wound up having to sell my
land. Now, is when I have to move out. I would have rather moved out there
and had everything going 4 years ago. It would have been a lot better for and
obviously for this City. Although I did build the whole tee area the first
year. I seeded it all. I mowed the ditched out there. I've done a lot of
things that nobody has ever given me any credit for so some of the things that
the City has hounded me on, and I come in front of you and rather than say
it's not a wetlands. You have hounded me that it was. I guess, I would be
willing to share my part of the debt that the City has incurred so far but
let's sit down and talk about our feelings.
Councilman Geving: Do you think it's fair on your part to force the City of
Chanhassen taxpayers to pay for your ignoring our laws and our attempts to do
the right thing with that develolm~ent out there?
John Pryzmus: No, absolutely not. I just said that. I would be willing to
share the burden that I've caused.
Councilman Geving: I want that in the record please. Secondly John, this was
intended as inner use. There were a number of conditions on the Conditional
Use Permit when we gave it to you. I have never yet seen your completed plan.
The City has never yet seen your lighting plan. We have not seen your parking
14
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City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
..
I have not seen a grading plan or reforestation plan. I know you've
a lot of planting out there. I have not seen any of those plans. I have
no idea what you really intend to build and the 3 or 4 times that I personally
stopped, looked at the site, we went out there in 1985 as a Council and
walked over nearly every inch of that property. We saw the debris. We saw
the electrical lines in the water and on the ground. We saw the old ice box
or whatever it was, the cooler. The geodesic dome, which we advised you to
tear down and get rid of. You still haven't done that. We advised you not to
do anything until you got further go ahead from the City Council and yet I was
out there on at least two occasions where you were mounding up dirt. You were
having rubbish hauled in. You got a fire permit from the City. I don't know
how that happened but it did. I saw you make a trench the entire length of
the property along Galpin Blvd.. You inserted some kind of a plastic pipe and
now recently, yesterday I drove by there and I see all kinds of metal. What
is that steel going to be used for and why is that there? You were advised
not to put anything on that property. Then, when I saw the condition of the
wetlands and what you had attempted to do by moving all of that rubbish down
into the bottom land on the north side and destroying that wetland and the
creekbed, that really hurt. I saw a bobcat out there and someone actively
working the land to move that rubbish into the wetland area. Don't tell my
I'm wrong because I saw it. That has got to be cleaned up. We've got to
restore the wetland area. We've got to see your plans. We would like to know
what your longrange plan for that development is. Tonight I hear s~mething
about a batting cage. That's the first time that has ever come up. I have
seen chicken wire out there. I don't have any idea what you're going to do
with that for fencing. John, I don't know what you're planning on doing in
that acreage but I can tell you, Ign not in favor of 'reins .J:.ating your
Conditional Use Permit. ~nis item should back to the Planning Commission and
it should go through the entire process all over again because the day we
closed the gates on you and took you to court, the hallgame started all over
again. Your Conditional Use Permit was pulled. You no longer had a
Conditional Use Permit. As far as I'm concerned, you have to start the entire
process all over again by going back to the Planning Commission and letting us
take a look at it from an entirely new view ar~ see what you're really
intending to do with that property. I know you've spent money out there.
That's not my concern. I want something that's good for the city of C~anhassen
and your past performance tells me that you're going to put a lot of tacky
stuff up there. Your lighting standards are not going to be up to our
standards. Your parking area is not going to be what we consider to be a nice
entrance to the community and until I see an array of plans and specifications
on what you inter~ to do, I don't think we ought to let you do anything on
that property. You can do anything you want. It's your property but legally,
you're not allowed as a permitted use to put a golf driving range there now
and that's what you want to do. My position is that it should go hack to the
Planning Commission and start this entire process all over again ar~ when you
can start working with the City and our staff and not frustrate our Staff and
our Council people, then we'll work with you. That's all I have to say.
Mayor Hamilton: I'm not going to repeat everything Dale just said. Probably
most of that is true John but I guess some of your comments that if you had
just come to the City Council and said this is what I'm doing. Whether you're
having problems getting equipment or financial or whatever, just if you would
15
28O
City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
have let us know what the heck you're doing. But you kept us in the dark and
we've asked to meet with you, as Dale said, we asked to meet with you out on
the site and you didn't show up. If you had shown up and told us what was
going on. If you had told us what the chemical cans were that we found out
there. All we can do is take a guess. We find them there and obviously he's
using chemicals for something and you weren't there to present your case after
having been invited so it's been a frustrating experience for us as I'm sure
it has been for you. I truly believe that you want to make it a nice facility
for the community and for yourself for everyone here to use and I would like
to see you complete the project but I'm not so sure that Dale isn't right that
it should probably go back to the Planning Commission so we can take a look at
your grading plans. Take a look at your whole plan. I think when you first
came to us with your plan, you had kind of a hand sketched plan that we went
along with and that was probably our mistake. We should have required that
you had more specific drawings with more specifications on it. I think now
that that is probably the best thing for yourself and for us to do. I do
believe that you are going to make a nice facility out there but I think you
r-_~c~ to go back and look at more planning.
Councilman Geving moved, Councilman Horn seconded to deny the request to
reinstate the Conditional Use Permit for the Driving Range at the corner of
CR 117 and TH 5. All voted in favor of denial and motion carried.
A~RD OF BIDS:
CHANHASSEN HILLS ~ATERMAIN EXTENSION.
Gary Warren: Chanhassen Hills trunk watermain extension is basically the
third part of our planned expansions of the watermain for the water system for
the City. This was before the Council in late January where we approved plans
and specs. We received bids on the 17th and we had good response again with
12 bidders. The three low bidders were within 2% of each other so we feel we
have some very competitive bids. The low bid is for $343,962.00 which is
about 2% over the engineer's estimate. We feel that based on the uncertainy
of the wetland construction and such that the bid is very responsive. Civil
Structures is the firm, the low bidder. ~hey are the same firm that we
awarded our Powers and Kerber Blvd. watermain extension to recently and in
checking their references personally and from the consulting engineer, we find
again, very favorable response for it. I would therefore recommend that we
award the contract to Civil Structures in the amount of $343,962.00.
Resolution ~87-13: Hamilton moved, Councilman Horn seconded approval of the
award of the bid for the Chanhassen Hills Trunk Watermain extension to Civil
Structure, Inc. in the amount of $343,962.00. All voted in favor and motion
carried.
1987 BOARD OF EQUALIZATION, GENERAL DISCUSSION, SCOTT WINTER.
Mayor Hamilton: Hopefully things will move along as well this year as they
have in the previous years and I think working with yourself and Frank, it has
~ our experience that it's been much better than it has been in the
previous 4 or 5 years so I hope we can continue that type of experience.
16
285
Council ~ting - February 23~ 1987
Scott Winter: Thank you for that confidence. I don't have really t66 much t6
say. In regards to it again,' I think the evening will run pretty much as it
in the last couple of meetirgs. People come in, give us their parcels or
A brief description of why they feel the evaluation or classification
is wrong. Getting a phone number or somewhere where we can contact them and
' on from there rather than trying to dwell into their specifics with
them at that time. I think it has worked very well for us ar~ that way we can
back to them. The other thing I've got at this time is-if you have any
comments or anything as far as areas in the City you would like me to review
the Board of Review.
Mayor Hamilton: I would like to have you clarify for the Council maybe now or
tell us what you can about the increased assessed valuation of the commercial
I understand that the State mandated an across the board increase
and that the County is also increasing that. That's what I've heard.
Scott Winter: What happened was a State increase across the board countywide.
What happened is on the commercial properties, there were not enough sales in
any one general area to warrant a statistical study for that area so the State
put the entire county into the hat and did a statistical study on the entire
county ar~ w~ came up short countywide looking at the sales.
Mayor Hamilton: How do you mean ~ came up short?
Scott Winter: The sales ratio for the County then was 65%. They wanted us to
increase it more. They wanted us over 85%. They wanted to go to over 2~%
increase but through discussion with them, we got somewhere down to 15% in
regards to that but they are saying that based on surrour~irg areas ar~ that,
our sales for our county were too low compared to the surrounding areas.
Frank did go down to the State after we got the State Board of Actions and
right now we've set up a meeting to say how we disagree with it. Went down
there and brought in ratios from Chanhass~ and here in Chaska from 1984 and
1985 to show that those ratios were very good because I think there were only
like 9 or 12 sales countywide is what they used for this study to get the 15%.
I say, if we put these other sales into these in years and--it brought that
ratio up quite a bit but they disregard those 5 years. We also brought in
some sales that were after that, such as we had the one sale here in
Chanhasseru Commercial sales are just starting to show about 92% or so on
that one and again, they disregarded it saying it's not in the sales study
period. That's what happened. We did come in with what we thought was
equitable information showing the realistic justification. You're all aware
of the increases I had put on the TH 5 commercial and certain commercial
properties in Chanhassen. We showed them that. I forget what the percentages
were of increase that I placed on commercial properties in the city of
Chanhassen already. Again, it didn't help. ~ne State went ahead with their
mandate and said that countywide that it be increased.
Mayor Hamilton: I would guess that's one area where we're going to have a lot
of people here is the commercial district, Perhaps more than the residential
this time so I just think the Council ~s to be aware of that and probably
whatever information you could supply to us for that evenirg or just for our
general information about the commercial district would be helpful to us.
17
City Council Meeting 22 February 23~ 1987
Councilman Horn: It would really be helpful if someone from the State were
here to explain their criteria in doing this.
Scott Winter: Again, they go tooth and nail with their sales ratio study.
They won't do a statistical study unless they have 6 sales in a jurisdiction.
If they don't have them in that jursidiction, again, then they try to group
them in a geographical area that they can and the nearest geographical area
they could do was Carver County overall. That's why you have sales from
Watertown, Young America, Cologne and sales in there. When the study in
fact, one of them was very low, sales in one of the small cities, have forfeit
backed to the seller too so the person well overpaid on it and it influenced
the ratio. The forfeiture didn't happen until after just recently so that was
something we had no...
Mayor Hamilton: Could you maybe give us your thoughts or perhaps even the
State's and I think you and I talked about this previously about if a parcel
of property that let's say was appraised at $100,000.00 and due to
improvements and expansion of whatever the case may be, you feel the appraised
value should now be $500,000.00 or something. A significant increase so if
you're looking at a 300%-400% increase in the tax that they are going to have
to pay. My position has always been and I guess I ask this question every
year is why can't that be graduated over the next 2 or 3 years so a person has
an opportunity to budget for his tax increase rather than all of a sudden
being hit in a one year period of time with a 300% to 400% increase in the tax
dollars that they have to pay?
Scott Winter: Again, it just comes down to State Law. As far as that for
tax purposes, the assessor has to appraise at market value and market value
will be established January 2nd. If that market value has increased that
January 2nd, there is nothing in the law that allows for or that says there
will be a graduated increase. Again, they go back on the basis of if you have
that 500,000.00 in that one and right next door you have the exact same
building that's been standing there for 4 years and you say he's going to pay
one-third the taxes of the guy right next door, even though they have the
exact same building, that's why they say no. They will appraise at market
value.
Mayor Hamilton: I guess I get the same answer every year and that's not
adequate.
Scott Winter: It does put a tremendous burden on especially your commercial
type properties in that way. We do try to, and depending upon what type of
property it is, if it is feasible to run it into a program because are three
approaches are market value. Your cost approach is what it costs to build it.
Your market approach is what it would sell in the market. The income approach
and again, for those, if we have something like that where it is a truly an
income producing thing. Not industrial or something like but truly an income
producing, we will try to look at how that income approach to value will
reflect and sometimes it will take a one year benefit. Not tremendously in
regards to what you would say but it somewhat of a benefit for them using it
for one year anyways. It only works in on your true income parts. Motels,
things like that. They are working in that type of a public service.
18
283
Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
Hamilton: I still think it's unfair to those people-and it really h~rts
town that's growing like Chanhassen where we're trying to encourage people
to upgrade their property. When they do they get hammered really bad on taxes
so they come back and say why should I bother? It takes all the incentive out
anyone trying to improve their property. If it was spread out over a
of time so they could budget for it so you can gradually get to that
if would make it a whole lot easier and would certainly encourage more
It would make the whole process easier.
Scott Winter: There again, the State's attitude on it and the discussion I've
with them is it comes back to, whenever you talk to the State they always
talk about legislature. They come back to the market val~ The appraiser
has the responsibility to appraise at market value and classify. If they want
to reduce taxes, the Council can, for their jurisdictions reduce their tax
and levies and that's the State's stat~am-~nt on that.
Mayor Hamilton: Th~n the County can raise it or the State can raise it.
Scott Winter: We're talking as far as your levy too, you could set up a
special taxing district for that. Again, like you've got your urban type levy
for the urban properties compared to rural. Something like that is what
really matters. Again, it is a small portion of the tax bills that you are
giving up there again. It's not like a real tremendous aid either.
Councilman Horn: Would an option be for us as a Council to reverse that
internal basis or do we have to listen just to the people who come to the
-n~cting?
Scott Winter: No, you've always got, you're talking about the Board of Review
right? At the Board of Review, you've got the option to deal with general
plats of property also. The County did it last year countywide. A portion
of industrial went down 3%. Last year with those vacant lands in the TH 5
Corridor, we did it in regards to them so it is a possibi!.i_ty to do. Again,
you get into the same situation that the State got into now. If you reduce
everything by 5%, you could be reducing someone that's at 70% down to 65%.
Really reducing the taxes the same as the State when they put 15% on, they
gave one that's already at 1~0% at 115%. Ones that are. at 80% now are at 95%.
There again, whenever you are dealing with classes or groups you've always got
that problem where someone's going to get a better rating or worse than the
other ones too.
Councilman Geving: I have not heard a great deal about the tax statements
that I've talked to my neighbors with, generally were down this year. They
are in pretty good shape for single family homes. I have heard from the
commercial people and it would be very difficult to be a new property owner in
the commercial district of Chanhassen to try ar~] make a go of it right now. I
wouldn't want to own a business in the downtown area ar~ get hit with 15% to
20% increase. I talked to a couple that said they don't know if they're going
to make it. They really don't whether they can afford to pay the taxes this
year and stay in business. We're a developing community and most of our
businesses, commercial are new. As a result, these people are just trying to
get their feet on the floor and build their business up. ~hey've had a
19
City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
tremendous amount of money that they have had to borrow~ I think what we're
seeing here is very unreasonable. Now you indicated here that the property
owner could suk~tit an appraisal of the property for his abatsment process.
Scott Winter: Before a property can come in and under the recommendation, as
far as assessors, if we felt such is a 15% that we were very close to market
on certain properties that the 15% was just exorbitant for this certain
property. All the paperwork goes to the County, they come through our office,
they apply for abatement. What that is, there are three really major classes
for abatements. The first one being that the person's homestead was missed
which for a commercial property wouldn't apply. ~ne second one is where there
is a physical problem with the property such as if we had it listed at 80
acres and there were only 40. The third one is unjust appraisal to the
property and that's where they would fall. Before I said, with these State
increases they could come in and apply for this abatement to the assessor and
say that 15% or 10% or whatever it was, was exorbitant for the property. We
would at that time make an appraisal of it and look at it and make a
determination of it yes or no. The State says no longer will they go along
with it because initially an assessor makes a determination, either approves
or denies it, then it goes to the County Board. The County Board can approve
or deny it. If they approve it, then it goes onto the State. The State still
has the final say.
Councilman Geving: So your statement here is not true.
Scott Winter: What?
Councilman Geving: Your statement here really doesn't mean a darn thing.
That even though they can get their own appraisal on it, it's not going to fly
with the State.
Scott Winter: If they had an appraisal and the appraisal showed that the 15%
was exorbitant, then the State will believe it. If they just came in and said
it was exorbitant ar~ we sent it to the State saying we feel exorbitant, we
don't think that's right.
Councilman Geving: Have any these local property owners and commercial
property owners contacted you yet?
Scott Winter: A couple have.
Councilman Geving: The Chanhassen Inn? Prairie House?
Scott Winter: ~ne Prairie House. The restaurant has and the motel has.
Councilman Geving: Have you advised them?
Scott Winter: Right, I have advised them as far as the steps that would have
to do. We are with all of them. And the directive came out from the State,
like I said before, some of these I felt with the TH 5 commercial that I did a
fairly good job down there and when this came on one of the big things we went
down to the State saying that Chanhassen should be excluded. If you look at
20
28?
City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
the values and the increases without new construction that was placed on
Chanhassen, they had a tremendous amount of increases already. Again, the
State just ignored but now with this new directive that they came out with in
January.
Councilman Johnson: To me it seems very unjust. C~vious statement there. I
would like to see us pursue with the State what you started as far as saying
this is not applicable to Chanhassen. We have so much new business in this
town that they are assessed at 100% or near 1~% almost entirely in this town.
Scott Winter: One thing the State does do and I'll make a comment here, the
State really frowns on it if a local jurisdiction gets involved with their
appraisal process. It's one of those you don't want to erupt the beehive down
there because if you do, you can get in trouble and the best thing is how we
try to tune the assessors off, because what they do is look at is if the City
of Chanhassen comes down and they start' listening to it, what about the
call of Hennepin County? Dakota County? They don't want to start
those people in there so they exclude pretty much all local
jurisdictions from being involved in it.
Johnson: What basis do they exclude us fr~n being involved in it?
~ilman Horn: Why are w~ a Board of Adjustments and Appeals then?
Hamilton: We ask that question every year.
Scott Winter: We do make the adjustments that we can and last year I thought
when things were suh~it~ that we had a pretty good tax situation est~_hlished
they went along. Again, the process that we went through with going down
there as the County, try to appeal this thing to them and get them to reason
with facts that we had from these other years. We thought we could persuade
them but it didn't work out. For the current year now we have gone through
tried to do a reappraisal of all the commercial properties, the C-l's,
they aligned up after 15% and at this point I'll say that there are some
with our reappraisal that went down for the 1987 assessment taxes
in 1988. There are some properties that are going up yet because of
the value that being established for the land value of the downtown area. I
feel some of those were grossly undervalued just in their lar~ portion of them
so again, we are doing some reappraisals for the 1987. We should have a
good established value base and start it all over again.
Johnson: I would like Staff to review, beyond what Scott says, if
there is any other legal or other action that the City can initiate to see
this injustice rectified somehow or another. We can't figure it out right
We don't have enough data.
Mayor Hamilton: What we can do and have done in the past is to go from here
to the County, we follow the property and the property owner to the County.
send an appeal to the County on their behalf and then they can go to the
and the County goes to the State on the behalf of the City so that's
about as far as it goes.
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City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
Scott Winter: Again, for the taxes levied this year again, the only process
we've got left now is the abatement process and tax court of appeals and both
of tP~_m are going to have to have an appraisal of the property done for both
processes. Rather than paying the fees for Court and all that, if they it
done and it does show that we're over valued, we have an established policy
and it's listed in your Minutes there that we will take a look at that and
probably adjust to the abatement process. Again, because of what the State
has mandated, we almost have to have an appraisal.
Mayor Hamilton: I just have one other question, on farm lands. Pretty much
across the State farm properties continue to drop in value. What are we
looking at in Chanhassen this year as far as land values?
Scott Winter: For market in the land, I think we're looking at probably
staying the same. For the Green Acres value, it will be continually dropping
under that portion but the market portion of the value we haven't seen a drop
in value based on investment potential and things like that with properties
right now.
Mayor Hamilton: Green Acres is going down?
Scott Winter: Yes, Green Acres will continue going down. I believe the
figure was 15% and that will be on land and outbuildings both.
Councilman Horn: At the risk of offending the State, I suggest that we invite
Schmitz and Kelso to our meeting.
Mayor Hamilton: That's a good idea.
Councilman Geving: What date have we selected for the Board?
Scott Winter: That' s what I 'm here for.
Councilman Geving: We haven't really talked about it. We don't have a
recommendation.
Mayor Hamilton: What date would be good for you?
Scott Winter: First of all, it's ~-~cn discussed at the County that we hold it
during the day.
Mayor Hamilton: I beg your pardon.
Councilman Geving: W~ all have to work during the day.
Mayor Hamilton: So do the property owners.
Councilman Geving: No, that isn't fair to do that during the day. It might
be nice for you guys.
Scott Winter: But again, they've got the appeal through letter form and the
letter we deal with the same way as we do with people coming in person so a
22
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City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
person really has the same option open to the~.
Mayor Hamilton: I think what we've done in the past .few years is to m~_t in
about the 2r~ week of May.
Scott Winter: May llth and that is what was my primary objective. The week
after would be my secondary one so whatever would best fit the Council's
agendas. Do you want to set a time limit too? Sometimes that gets
people here at the beginning and if somebody doesn't come at 9:~0 and there's
only two people that we're down to. Sometimes it's nice if you set it at
7:30 to 8:30 then at least almost all people are here by that 8:30 or 9:00.
I think last year we did. I think it was from like 7:30 to 9:00 or something
and that way we tried to. _
Don Ashworth: I don' t think wa' ve even set one.
Councilman Johnson: One year we had to sign in.
Mayor Hamilton: We do that every year.. I think we'll just leave it at a 7:30
meeting. That's worked well in the past.
Scott Winter: If you don't have any other general areas beside the commercial
and that.
Councilman Geving: I think that's going to be the hot spot this year.
Scott Winter: We'll probably see some residential again in some areas. I
think the established tax base and that are working.
Mayor Hamilton moved, Councilman Geving seconded to set May 11, 1987 at 7:30
p~. as the date and time for the Board of Equalization meeting in the Council
Chambers. Ail voted in favor and motion carried.
DISCUSSION OF DRAINAGE P~, SUNSET VII~/ADDITION.
Mayor Hamilton: Before you get started Gary I've got a couple of comments
that I want to make. I guess I was a little surprised to see this on our
agenda without having the feasibility study complete unless this is a
feasibility study sitting here with some costs associated with it. Looking
back at what we did in September or October, I think we b-~. ~pproved the
feasibility study. We asked that Eden Prairie be included in the process,
which I didn't see anything about them. I just felt that what I was seeing
here was more or less a rehash of what we had already approved 5 months ago.
Personally I felt we just aren't moving ahead here and I was wondering why.
Gary Warren: Mr. Mayor I think we are moving ahead. Some of this is maybe
groundwork in getting me up to s~ on the project which I feel I can
apologize for that. We have had several meetings with the homeowners to the
point where we feel we have some solutions now that are agreeable to the
residents which has been a big motivator as far as the project is concerned.
The feasibility report itself was very brief and basically came up with the
alternate that we formed our basis arour~ here which is the drainage ditch
23
29C
City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
area and the piping. I guess I apologize for not including the other two
pages. We are at a point here which I think has been unclear earlier on, from
what I've been able to gather from the various Minutes, as to exactly what
extent the Council is willing to go with the project here. We do have some
firmed up alternatives and costs associated with these alternatives. I have
had an opportunity to talk with the City of ~den Prairie and the with Water-
shed District to get an understanding of the participation but what I've found
in the Minutes earlier were that these were going to be longshots at best and
until we have a firmed up plan that we're willing to take Council action on,
it's very difficult to get these people nailed down to what they are willing
to respond to. So that's why at this point, while I have had preliminary
discussions with them and still feel that it's going to be a long-shot for
their involvement, it's proper to approach them with an approved plan in hand.
Mayor Hamilton: Okay, do you just want to go ahead and give us an overview of
the project itself?
Gary Warren: Yes, if I could. Briefly, to bring you up to speed, we have an
area which is the South Lotus Lake area that as a result of activity on South
Lotus Lake last year, we took to heart the concerns of the local neighbors
here, which we have five residents involved, as far as drainage problems that
have existed in the area since 1977 when the sanitary sewer, which crosses all
the properties, was constructed. It's a very difficult drainage area, low
area, and we have seen over the years with the area to the northeast, with
~den Prairie developing, that we have received run-off from that area which
continues to grow as is typical with any development. What may have been in
the past an acceptable situation for drainage coming off the 18 inch culvert
under TH 101, we now have an overflow of surface water that continues to
infiltrate the majority of the property owners in this area. The Council's
interest at the time this was reviewed was to see if we couldn't work with the
local residents to come up with an acceptable solution in that regard. Bill
Engelhardt has been involved since the preliminary investigations and has
actually prepared the report that you have in front of you on the alternates.
I guess I would like Bill to review the three alternates that we have details
on for you tonight.
Bill Engelhardt: I take to heart your concerns about rehashing and
readdressing old problems and certainly that's the case because this one has
been around for quite a while. What we four~, I believe through the direction
of the Council on this project, was to work with the property owners in
addition to trying to solve the drainage problem that was originally proposed.
The original proposal was a pipe and a ditch portion and work with the
property owners to solve their individual problems. We met with all four and
five property owners on numerous occasions to get a clear understanding of
what their concerns were. The basic problem was that we had a low area, as
Gary said, where the sanitary sewer went in. The property owners were
interested in getting that area filled. Along with that, the drainage coming
down from ~den Prairie. We looked at the plans from Eden Prairie subdivi-
sions. We looked at the drainage areas. Computed the run-off and went back
and looked at an option to build a ponding area on the east side of TH 101 to
take the pressue off of this side and that was not feasible because of the
amount of area it would take on that side and also because a new house is
24
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Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
constructed at an elevation that would cause problems. So, in working
all of the property owners to try and arrive at a mutual agreement where
felt they would be satisfied ar~ get what they were concerned about,
it resovled once and for all, that is why the three options were
99% of the problems caused by this run-off coming through that
be taken directly down to the lake at the present time, it just spreads
over the property of the Arseth's and the Horr's. The only solution to
is to rip-rap up to the existing culvert ar~ then pipe it through kind of
knob and then discharge it by a swale. In talking ar~ meeting with Mr. Horr
this problem, I met 'with him 2 or 3 times to review all of the
Another concern was to bring the drainage from the culvert under-
the driveway that is coming south along TH 101 and get that into our
area. Initially it was planned to bring rip-rap or a ditch up that
This is a modification to that original thought because to do that, you
,ld be virtually destroying all of the trees along that side. Some of it is
some of them are trees which we would be doing a great amount of damage
in there and it would be very difficult to put any kind of a pipe or a ditch.
solution we arrived at, which as it turns out is probably the least
· , is to put a bituminous berm aloft3 his driveway to keep the water on
side of the ditch and keep it flowing down to the pipe in the ponding
The Arseth property, after meeting with Mr. Arseth a couple of times,
concern is again the ponding on the property. Mr. Segner is concerned
the ponding on his property. They're both concerned with the drainage
to flow across their property to an existing swale down along the
property line. Mr. Melby is concerned about the drainage coming
his property and again,, continuing that drainage through to have
drainage. This solution, we call it Plan A, is to put in the pipe,
a swale down to the lake and then grade individual drainage swales
the property lines so each property would act independently. Those
~rties then, to a limit, fill in their own property as desired. ~nat
lld have to be reviewed by the City prior to any filling. We wouldn't want
to go in and fill 6 to 8 feet, I'm being facetious but they could fill 1
1/2 to 2 feet and solve their own problem. This solves the problem of
blocking the drainage to the Arseth's and the Arseth's blocking the
lng to the Segner's and so oru It's also tt~ least expensive of the
ects. The total project cost for the pipe, the ditch and the bituminous
is about $20,000.00. That includes some restoration of the tree area for Mr.
and I'll get into that a little bit and then to cut into a swale and
restore is about $1,500.00. The second alternate, I'll go through it real
is again doing the major portion of the pipe work but instead of
installing the swales on the property line, just fill in the entire property.
This was requested or asked to be looked at by the property' owners. We had
two meeting where all the property owners sat down and discussed all the
solutions. This Plan would move the 899 contour back up to the property line.
would have positive drainage across all the lots and that would about a
6/10% grade which requires about 3,000 yards of fill to be trucked in. It is
very difficult area to bring the fill iD. We have no access. The third
which we call Plan C, that particular cost is about $32,000.00. The
third alternate Plan C, the pipe work again, the rip-rap, the berm along the
Horr driveway but utilizing some of the material on the property. There is
area in this area that could be moved back ar~ would generate about 1,000
of the 3,000 yards of material that would be required. This would have
25
City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
a 1% grade and all the properties would have positive drainage to the lake.
Meeting with the property owners on all three of these alternates, they felt
that the first alternate, Plan A, which again is the least expensive. This is
one reason it was brought back to the Council in this form is that there are
additions and modifications here that came out of the meetings with the
property owners to try and recognize their concerns. Tne ditch and the rip-
rap area under construction, a portion of it is on the Tesler property and
that is colored or hash-marked in red in this area. Tne Tesler property
unfortunately gets involved in this because the 18 inch pipe comes underneath
TH 101, discharges on their property and runs through a small swale and then
it continues on and runs so on down to this area. They don't have a drainage
problem in this area. They are carrying more damage to the tree areas than
the other properties. The Horr's do have some damage to trees and they do
have some damage where the pipe is going in. Mr. Tesler gets drawn into it as
the nature of the property lines and how they line up with the existing
drainage pattern. We've met with Mr. Tesler twice on the site. In fact, one
time we brought Mr. Gene Ernst of Ernst and Associates, the landscape
architect out with us to discuss his concerns about the tree damage. ~ne type
of trees that were in there to make sure that what we were doing would be
something positive for Mr. Tesler. At that time, we had estimated that there
would be about 20 trees that would have to removed and that was estimating
from about a 1 inch to a 2 1/2 inch to 4 inch size. Mr. Ernst suggested a
plan for reforesting the area to accommodate the screening. Mr. Testler felt
that with the construction that would take place that his screening to TH 101
and to the south to the Horr property would be removed. The suggestion was to
plant 20 trees along the border of the rip-rap swale and then use dogwood
bushes or something to cover the base of the trees. It's been king of a long
process here and I realize that the Council has worked on it for many years
too but we feel that we have something that all the property owners seem to be
agreeable with. Without agreement from all the property owners, this project
virtually can't be built. Everybody has to agree that what we're doing is the
right thing to do. They have to provide access easements. It's just a very
difficult area to get into and work. I have a couple of clear films that
review the costs that you have in front of you. Tnis may be more for the
benefit of the property owners. Total construction cost for Plan A was
$20,140.00. Tnat included the rip-rap area, the pipe area, the ditch
restoration along the property line and a bituminous berm along the driveway.
The lot regrading of the swales down the property lines and the restoration
was $1,500.00 for the total construction cost for Plan A was $21,640.00. Plan
B, $20,140.00 still stands but the regrading of the lots would require fill
material to be trucked in. The total construction cost for Plan B then is
$32,140.00. Plan C, again $20,140.00 but because we are utilizing some
existing fill on the site, the cost for the fill goes down and that cost is
$30,140.00. These plans that are prepared are essentially construction plans.
They are grading plans. They are planned to be taken and constructed. We
felt that the Council should have an opportunity to listen to the property
owners and their concerns on which plan they thought was best and make a
selection on that basis.
Mayor Hamilton: Tnan I would like to hear from the property owners that are
here. The Horrs are here and perhaps you want to be the first.
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Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
Horr: I wasn't here at the last meeting when the tentative agreement was
swale. I called Gary up and told him then that I didn't like the swales.
the properties sit now, ar~ I think you left out one huge thing, what's
· missed here is it runs down the driveway. It stays in the ditch pretty
'ood because I put it up there myself. You're going to put a bigger berm here
right past the house, right in this here, it jumps out and it goes
across mine and into Wes' lot. Fr(m~ the City of Chanhassen, I would
about 30% of the water goes just like this and the other 70% comes through
This has to be extended all the way and hook up here. If not, we're
half the problem again. I thought that was all understood that this
going to continue all the way down.
Engelhardt: I totally agree with you Ron.
Horr: Then you left that out when gave your presentation.
Engelhardt: That' s the intent of it.
Horr: I%n sorry, okay. This has to go all the way down. because it jumps
here where my garage is. It jumps right out here and goes right
down into Wes' property. It has to connect all the way down. That's
thing. I have a dead ditch that goes approximately like so. The three
families drain into that ditcl~ It goes halfway down approximately in this
stops, because this is always dry. It stops right about here. ~nat's
why I don't like the idea of a swale. I've ~n maintaining this stupid
, with f~iropractor's bills to prove it, for 10 years now. It's dead.
It's absolutely useless. It just draws s~me water off of the other three
)roperties. It used to do a good job. The last 2 or 3 years it doesn't do
job but just seep iD. The water is seeping in. It stops approximately
and then the seepage goes or~ I wasn't here when we agreed to these
swales. I have taken care of a swale for 10 years now. I don't wish, if I
could, don't want to take care of any more swales. I think Plan C and/or B is
the much better plan. In fact, I think C is the better plan. My personal,
and I haven't talked to my neighbors, I think we ~ fill in there. I think
we need grading in there. I ask the Council arid I ask you Mr. Mayor, the last
3 or 4 meetings, the last 3 meetings, this problem everybody agrees happened
in 1977. It's 1987. 9 1/2 years ago. We've been fighting this, all of us.
At this point in time when we're so close, I'm amazed at Lou Tesler's letter,
he's not here. Oh, you are here, good. I'm amazed at his letter. He states,
"a major portion of this requires work on his property." 95.9% of all of this
is on my property. There's a dog run that he has that's on my property here.
This here, I'm going to lose probably 15 to 20 I would say, I measured it off
the other day, I'm going to lose about 30 feet on my property right here. The
list of demands he made is, I don't know. ..
Mayor Hamilton: I understand what you're saying.
Ron Horr: The whole thing, 90% is my property. I'm losing property.
Councilman Geving: What are you going to lose? We're going to improve your
property. We're improving your property. You're not going to lose any.
27
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City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
Ron Horr: Yes.
Councilman Geving: Where are you going to lose some? How are you going to
lose some? Let me understand your statement.
Ron Horr: By jumping this ditch and who is going to mow on this side. It's a
trivial point.
Councilman Geving: I've walked on there. I know what you're talking about.
I think it's going to be a great improv~nent.
Ron Horr: I think it's going to be a greatly improved area too. I really do.
I just want to implore the Mayor and Council, please this time don't let the
bottom line be money. Take into consideration Joyce and myself and our
neighbors. Take into consideration Joyce and myself when the County came out
and devalued our house. Take into consideration three contractors. My house
was buckling. They wouldn't touch it and my lawyer had to coerce, what's his
name? The guy who did the construction?
Mayor Hamilton: It doesn't matter.
Ron Horr: It doesn't matter. He almost had to coerce him to come out and do
the job. One contractor said, "oh my God". The second contractor said, "boy,
you've got a problem". The third contractor said, '%hove". It's funny now.
We can look back and laugh. There were such cracks, such bangs in that house.
My wife said this is the last night I'm staying in this house. The next day
she went to her sisters. I had gone away for a week. All of these problems.
All the phone calls. All the bickering between neighbors. We used to have a
nice friendly area. Please don't let, please don't let the bottom line be
money on this. Let's do it and let's take into consideration what we've been
through. What I've been through personally. What my neighbors have been
through and as everyone knows and everyone agrees, yes, that was a problem
when they put the sewer and water in. Everyone agrees yes, there is a big
majority of water coming over from ~den Prairie. I don't want to make the
Council and Mayor upset but the point is, why wasn't all this stopped. Please
don't make it the bottom line.
Mayor Hamilton: Let me ask you a question Ron. When did you buy your home
there? When did you purchase that home?
Ron Horr: 1975.
Mayor Hamilton: And the project was done in 1976. When you purchased your
home, how has the drainage on the road changed, the top part on TH 101 since
you purchased your home? Has it changed any?
Ron Horr: Ccming down the driveway?
Mayor Hamilton: Cc~ing down the driveway, right.
Ron Horr: Last year didn't seem too bad.
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Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
Mayor Hamilton: The City didn't do any constructioru What I~ driving at is
the water coming down from TH 101 which really caused the damage to your home
wasn't anything that the City did having to do with the sewer pipe
construction right?
Ron Horr: It was the City's contractors and I understand you fired one of
them, that caved in and it created a blockage. It created a dam ~ all the
water that was coming down hit the dam and went into my house. A couple of my
neighbors were over there helping we squeege that night, all night from the
sewer and water project. That's where it originated. That's what originated
the problem. Please gentlemen, I implore you, don't make money, have
compasion. Think back 10 years.
Wes Arseth: I'm quite pleased myself with what the City is trying to do. It
seems to be probably about the best way of trying to solve ~ problem. I
really have no problem with it. With the swales, Plan A. ~me only thing that
I would be concerned about would be the swale going down the property lines.
three trees and they are large trees so that's the only thing I have.
other thing, a possibility if the $1,500.00 for the swales, we could
possibly eliminate one of them like in the middle of the three. I don't
really see any reason for having three swales down the property. I don't
think it will make much difference as far as the water direction. I think
you're solving most of the problem with the drain pipe.
John Segner: Wes and I were talking and we're willing to take the chance on
eliminating that one swale going down the middle of our property lines. If it
would be necessary...we're willing take a chance for a year or so and see how
the water runs off. As far as tt~ way Ron was saying over there in that
ditch, with Plan A that ditch would be closed and he could fill that in and he
could cut his grass right down to the lake with no problem at all.
Ron }{orr: That would be a first wouldn't it John?
John Segner: Like I said, the water from the natural rains, either drains on
Melby side or Wes' side. It's got a natural flow either way and with that
other drain tile going through the sewer line, that should eliminate a lot of
your under the ground water. '
Mayor Hamilton: Jack's not here. Mr. Tesler?
Lou Tesler: I have nothing to say really.
Councilman Johnson: It seems like we're going to put a lot of water down
through that proposed ditch on the north side.
Mayor Hamilton: There's already a lot of water going through there. We're
just going to channelize it.
Councilman Johnson: That's true. We're going to channelize it better. Where
are we standing on erosion and erosion control? Any thoughts to an erosion
barrier as part of building this ditch to catch erosion as it goes down?
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City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
Gary Warren: As I point out in the report, we would take stringent erosion
control measures that we would enforce in any development. One of the
benefits in establishing the pondirg area, the entrance area to the pipe is to
try and allow for some modest amount of settlement of any sediment that's
coming in there so there would be some, not a major impact but a little bit of
settling improvement to that. ~ne erosion control with bales and filer fence,
etc. would be, especially if it would go to the overall grading plans like
Option C, it would be an major part of the improvements out there to make sure
that we're not aggravating the lake situation.
Councilman Johnson: My point was not actually at construction but after
construction for any sediment that got into the 100 foot pipe there and then
went into the ditch and on down towards Lotus Lake. In other words, what
sediment comes under TH 101, traverses down, goes through that little ponding
area, which doesn't appear to much of a ponding area, and then heads down that
new ditch, after the grass is re-established, are we looking to help protect
our lake any? Here we run it across a large lawn area and stuff should filter
it out pretty good. Do we have as decent a filtering in this proposed ditch?
I'm watching out for starting to get a little delta belt down in Lotus Lake or
is there a delta now?
Ron Horr: There is a little delta now. A little one but there's one there.
Gary Warren: To answer your question directly, there wouldn't be anything
extra done. We would be rip-rapping the channel from the outflow of the pipe
to the lake and normal vegetation and such, that's a positive impact as far as
allowing the water to tumble and lose some of it's sediment enroute. The only
way we could replace, if you want to look at it, the positive effect of
allowing the water to spill out onto the neighbors property, would be to
provide a similar area and that wouldn't be possible.
Councilman Johnson: I think you've done a pretty good job here.
Councilman Geving: This project has changed a lot since 1977 when we put in
the sanitary sewer line and I believe that what we're attempting to correct
tonight goes well beyond the original damage that could have been done by the
sewer line. I'm willing to accept that. We've agreed on that before with
the homeowners except now we bring in a new party.. Mr. Tesler is tb~ new
party in this whole circle of events here. This was never mentioned back in
September when we discussed this and kind of agreed on where this thing was
going. I believe Mr. Tesler is being reasonable though in his letter. It's
unfortunate that a lot of this water is being piped under the road from the
~den Prairie side and I'm only concerned about the trees that will have to be
replaced. Could you tell me Gary what kind of trees we're talking about here
that are going to be destroyed. The 20 trees. Are they shurbs?
Gary Warren: There's sugar maple for the most part.
Bill Engelhardt: Box elder and a variety of underbrush.
Councilman Geving: I don't know of a whole lot of really good trees in that
area though. You're requesting that be put back as 12 foot pine trees.
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Council Meeting - February 23, 19B7
asking for quite a bit Mr. Tesler. Those are 4 inch trees. That's
'oing to cost us a little money to put those in ar~ we're taking out scrub
Tesler: I don't know what the cost involved is.
lman Geving: You know what a 4 or 5 inch, 12 foot high norway pine
cost us to put in there and there's a dozen that you're requesting.
, we can get on with that. I think your request is reasonable.
I'm not excited about that. The-construction on the east side of the Horr
was an expansion of the project as far as I'm concerned. The
swale that was included in here probably as an extension of the
ect that was never really agreed to because the water had ~ going down
roadway for an awful long time before.
Horr: But it jumps in the~le of the driveway.
~ilman Geving: I know that but it's not caused by the original project in
That water has ~ going there for 1~ years.
}{orr: No, it's not.
lman Geving: It's been going there for an awful long time. I looked at
project with the Mayor in 198~ and we were there on your property talking
you at the time. My review of this situation is that I can not see how
can possibly regrade any of these lots under Plan B~ Plan B would be a
mess. We would be trying to regrade 3,MBM cubic yards of dirt down
I know that we'll never do it timely. We would never be able to put
It back and restore it in a manner that would be acceptable to the homeowners.
think we ought to just forget about that. We'll be there all summer. As
as Plan C is concerned, regrading the lots to a 1% slope, the same
How are we going to get in there with trucks hauling 3,0B0 cubic
Is of dirt into that area if we don't have an access point? So I think
's totally unacceptable. I don't know how we could do it. We would mess
that area. If we get a wet spring or wet summer, we would have trucks
down there all summer long. I think the only plan is Plan A. I think
e~gineers have done a good job in putting this together for us as
ternatives. I do agree with the plans that we talked about here in trying
do this with City people. The reason I say that is at least we have some
~trol over our own peopl~ This is a sensitive area. We want to do it
:ight. I don't want to mess up Wes' trees down there if we can avoid it. We
to put this in as good as we can and put it back the way that it is now.
.y the Tesler area. If we have to destroy some of those trees, we
Iht to put it back and restore that so I believe Plan A is the only feasible
to go. It happens to be the cheapest plan but it's to me, the best plan.
far as the swale is concerned, I think we ought to put swales on every one
these lots. The homeowners that live there now. They move on someday and
will say, why did they do that? Why does my water drain across
y elses land? Let's put all the swales in just as the plan indicates
and do it right and go with Plan A. That's all my comments.
Horn: I would agree. I think we should go with Plan A.
31
298
City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
Mayor Hamilton: I agree for the same reasons that Dale just mentioned. Plan A
is best. I just can't imagine going in there and trying to grade that
property. We would need to have a grader in there and that grader would get
stuck because that property is low anyway. If it happened to be a wet spring,
we would probably have to wait until winter to get it out again so Plan A
seems to solve the problem for everybody. The engineers are satisfied with it
and the property owners are satisfied with it, I certainly think it's going to
solve the problem. I also agree with Dale that we should put all the swales
in. I'm not saying that Segner and Arseth's idea isn't a good one to perhaps
eliminate one but I would hate to eliminate one and then suddenly have a
problem again where it wasn't quite adequate so I guess I would rather put
them all in now and make sure that we get the problem corrected once and for
all. Hopefully everybody will be happy and everything will drain into the
lake as it should. I would like to see Eden Prairie participate in this
project financially somehow. The water that drains across the northern
portion of Mr. Horr's property is 99% from Eden Prairie. I think that they
should be more than willing to participate somewhat. If they can't put a pond
in on their side with some type of a dapple to reduce the amount of flow from
their side, then let them participate financially and us in creating the rip-
rap across the Horr property to slow it down so we can have it filtered. I
think that's only fair on their part and bill them for the dang thing. I'm
sure that they're reasonable and they would probably participate. I know we
talked about this years ago because I know I brought it up when they started
putting in a larger pipe underneath that road. I was concerned at that time
because I had already been on the Horr's property and saw what the problem was
with the water going across Tesler's and onto to the Horr's property and we
failed to talk to Eden Prairie at that time to get them to do anything with
that drainage area because they should have ponded it at that time. There
were no homes being built on the Kerber's property and the land was available
to put some type of pond with a dappler to slow the drainage down and I guess
I'm not convinced that they couldn't still put enough of a ponding area in
there. It doesn't have to hold a lot because the only time you really get a
lot is when you have an extremely heavy rain.
Gary Warren: We did look at that because there is a 'lot right at the inlet to
that 18 inch pipe that hasn't ~n built on yet but basically it's a buildable
lot and the thing would have to be replatted I guess if it were to be used
that way. It would get some retainage but it's unfortunate, like you say,
that this isn't earlier in the develo~nent process over there.
Mayor Hamilton: I would make it a condition of this that they work with Eden
Prairie to make sure that they participate in this whole project. It could
either be financially or maybe they want to have some of their people help
build this whole thing. Then also, be sure, as Mr. Horr mentioned, the water
from the top of the road that cuts across his property, that that is continued
so it meets up with the other drainage swale and doesn't flow down. That will
just mess the whole thing up if we don't do that. It's going to drain across
the property and defeat the whole purpose of putting the swales in across the
property so make sure that that water gets channeled to the north also. Other
than that, those are my comments.
Wes Arseth: What would be the timeframe on this?
32
Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
Hamilton: I would suspect as soon as w~ can get in there.
lman Geving: I thought the engineer said April.
Warren: We're looking to as soon as things dry out where we can get in
ar~ get things going.
Hamilton: If we don't get a lot of snow between now and April, we can
et in there. We want to get it done so you can get your garden in as early
possible. It's dry down there now probably.
Horr: It's dry there now.
Warren: There are two things that we should make note of. The starting
is contingent on getting the various waivers ar~ releases from all of the
and also being able to get the easement from Mr. Tesler. We haven't
a real detail estimate but we did put in $2,50~.00 for reforestation if
want to call it that for up there ar~ I think the current plan could be
$8,000.00 to $10,000.00 so that definitely does impact our cost estimate.
ilman Geving: What do you mean $8,00~.00 to
Gary Warren: For the additional treeing.
Councilman Geving: Wait a minute. Mr. Tesler was very reasonable in his
letter. He said he didn't want anything other than replacing those 12 trees
and a few shrubs. What I read in his letter is that he would be reasonable
with us in this respect. Is that true Mr. Tesler?
Lou Tesler: I'll be happy to talk with you. When we get into construction
I'll show you what I really would like to see.
Mayor Hamilton: We need to do it before that so we know exactly what we're
going to do. If we're takirg out a few trees, I'm sure that we have a few
trees in our tree farm that we could plant back in that would be about the
same size. To have low shrubs, it seems like you're asking for more than
what's there now. You've got some scrub brush stuff in there now. It cuts
out your low visibility but if we had to go in there and put in a bunch of
something that would be low bushes, I think we're getting into something
that's not there now and it proably wouldn't be fair I don't think.
Councilman Geving: One of the things that we agreed upon with the Arseths,
Segners, Melbys ar~ Horrs, you weren't there that evening, was that all the
easements would be granted for this project so that we could proceed. We pay
for no easements. Everybody understood that. This new problem that surfaced
tonight Mr. Tesler, I believe you'll be reasonable with us. We've set aside
a budgeted item of $2,500.~0 to replace pine trees that you talked about in
here and whatever few shrubs. We don't want to go over that budget item and
that's where we' re coming frcm. I hope you don't hold us up on this project.
Lou Tesler: I certainly won't intentionally but what I want to be sure is
obviously you understand that the project, the work will require considerable
33
City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
work on my property and no benefit including a pond which in fact can be an
atrocious sight at times. What I want to do is hide that thing.
Councilman Geving: Let me say this though. I believe this improvement
project will greatly enhance your property. I really believe that what is
there now with the water that's coming down there is making your property less
sellable. What we're attempting to do is correct that.
Lou Tesler: It's not affecting my property whatsoever. It's affecting my
neighbor's property. I have no drainage problem on my land. I think Mr.
Warren verified that.
Councilman Geving: I just hope that you don't hold up this improvement
project.
Lou Tesler: I don't know how we can resolve it. What are you asking?
Mayor Hamilton: I think what we need to do, rather than sit here and argue it
is to have Gary meet with Mr. Tesler and see if it can be worked out and if
it's unreasonable then they'll have to come back. Then we have no problems
with the easements and whatever is required for us to get on there to do the
work? Okay, good. Gary will be giving you a call to move ahead with the
project. Get your signatures. ~nanks all of you for coming.
Mayor Hamilton moved, Councilman Horn seconded to move ahead with the Sunset
View Addition, Lots 10-14 Drainage Plan using Plan A as outlined by the City
Engineer. All voted in favor and motion carried.
WAIVER OF CONDITIONAL USE PERMIT REQUEST, WESTSIDE BAPTIST CHURCH, BRIAN PIKE.
Jo Ann Olsen: The applicant is currently in the Minnetonka West Jr. High.
They must find a temporary location facility for locating their church. They
found space in an industrial office park and that is not zoned to permit
churches. We also have a temporary use section in the Ordinance which we
found that Conditional Uses run with the land. Essentially Staff has found
to properly intrepret the Ordinance, we must have an Ordinance amendment
and even if we do, we would not be able to recommend allowing a church...
Should the Council wish to go with the temporary use, it should help the
process.
Mayor Hamilton: I understand that but I sure have a problem with that. I
can't believe that there isn't some way we can accommodate this and just make
it a temporary use. Whether it's a non-conforming use. I don't care how we
structure it or how we word the contract or any agreement we may draw up with
Pike and the church, I just can't believe that we can't do this and allow them
to use someplace in the industrial until such time as they have found quarters
elsewhere where they are allowed. Tney're planning on building a church, or
talking about it, in the R-IA District. This is one of the things that
frustrates me so dang much about government law and government zoning
ordinances and all that. It almost gives you no room for leeway and it is
very frustrating.
34
Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
Geving: It's frustrating because we make the rules ar~ we should
able to bend the rules when the need is there. Here is an emergency
situatioru These people are being thrown out of their present facility. They
want a temporary Conditional Use Permit for no more than a year in an
industrial area and we have to be reasonable people. I think that's why we're
elected. To be reasonable and to accommodate situations like this. What if
their church already existed ar~ burned down and they had to move into a
temporary quarters in an industrial complex? It would be no different and
we're not going to wait two months until it gets through the planning process
and the entire government structure so this gets approved. I too am very
frustrated about how the wheels of government and we create these rules
ourselves Tom. We ought to be able to accommodate a church or any other
emergency situatioru I'm all in favor of waiving whatever is necessary to
allow the Westside Baptist C~urch to utilize those quarters for the next 12
months.
Councilman Johnson: I tend to disagree with our Attorney. Not that I'm an
Attorney but we've passed a City Ordinance ams our City Attorney got to look
over the City Ordinance and should have told us at that time that our City
Ordinance wasn't legal. He had a shot at it. We passed the OrdinarE~e ar~ as
far as I understand, this Ordinance is the law of the City until somebody
challenges it and the Court kicks it out. Th~ Westside Baptist Church folks
are not going to challenge the Ordinance because it does what they want it to
do. I think we're doing exactly what our Ordinanc~ says we can do ar~ I hope
our City Attorney won't challenge our own City.
Mayor Hamil ton: Then he won' t have a job.
Councilman Johnson: We passed the Ordinance. It's the law until it's
challenged ar~ found illegal in Court so as far as I~n concerned we should
pass this based on our present City, published is our newspaper last week, our
Zoning Ordinance. We got the provisions in there in that section that's
quoted.
Councilman Horn: I wish the Attorney were here tonight. Are we violating any
precedent in this thing? Are w~ setting precedent?
Jo Ann Olsen: Applicable to the new Ordinance, you have to conform with the
Christmas tree sales. You don't have to challenge the Ordinance.
Councilman Horn: To dowhat?
Jo Ann Olsen: You do have the power which way to go.
Barbara Dacy: Based on an emergency situation, make a statement of fact as to
why.
Jo Ann Olsen: We are pointing out that we really don't have a section for...
Councilman Horn: But we can use our perogative if we think it's an ~nergenc~
35
City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
Councilman Geving: I'm going to modify my motion to indicate that the reason
for the waiver of the petition for this permit for the Westside Baptist Church
is based upon an emergency situation and that because of this emergency we are
waiving the normal Conditional Use process.
Mayor Hamilton: I'll amend my second.
Councilman Johnson: I don't believe it's even necessary because we are
permitted under a Conditional Use Permit.
Councilman Geving: Yes, but I'm just trying to strengthen why we're doing it
so in the future we' 11 have no precedence.
Mayor Hamilton: Non-precedent setting.
Councilman Johnson: What you're doing with your motion is admitting that our
Section 4 of Article 6, Supplemental Regulations, is not there. I would say
we want a motion tlhat we would like to do a temporary conditional use per
Section 4, Article 6 rather than trying to by-pass our Ordinance for an
s~nergency.
Councilman Geving: I think it is an ~mergency and that's the way I stand.
Councilman Geving moved, Mayor Hamilton seconded to approve the waiver of the
Conditional Use Permit for the Westside Baptist Church to utilize the office
space in the Industrial Park for the next 12 months based on an emergency
situation. Ail voted in favor and motion carried.
CONDITIONAL USE PERMIT REQUEST FOR A LANDSCAPE CONTRACTOR'S YARD/WHOLESALE
NURSERY, MERLE VOLK/GARDENEER.
Jo Ann Olsen: Tne applicantion is for a landscape contractor's yard. The
site is located on the northwest corner of Galpin Blvd. and CR 18. Currently
there are two other contractor yards on the site. Merle Volk and R & W
Sanitation. Again, the City Attorney has interpretted the Ordinance that you
must review this as a separate use. The site is in the northeast corner of
the site and it will have access from CR 117. There is an existing barn that
will be removed and there will be some storage bins for storage. They will be
extending the berm to further screen the parking, the trucks and equipment.
There will be separate plantings to the east to further screen the site from
CR 117. Carver County has reviewed the site plan and has not felt the
increase in traffic will be detrimental enough to warrant additional access
improvements. The Ordinance requires that you can not have more than two
contractor yards within one mile and this contractor's yard, again would have
to be considered separate so then it would be within one mile of another
contractor's yard. Therefore, it would require a variance to the Ordinance.
Staff is concerned, about the possibility of cleaning up the site by adding
additional berms and storage area. Tne Planning Commission recommended
approval with the following conditions:
36
Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
.
e
.
.
~nat hours of operation shall be from 7:30 aan. to 5:30 pan., Mor~ay
through Saturday. Work on Sur~tays or Holidays is not permitted.
That all truck traffic that leaves the site must be southbound on CR
117 and all truck traffic entering the site must be northbound on CR
117.
Outdoor lighting and speakers are not permitted.
Berming and landscaping shall be provided as shown on the site plan
and that any expansion of the operation shall require a Conditional
Use Permit.
Hamilton: Gardeneer people or Merle Volk's representative have any
additionalcomments?
A1 Michals: I have no further comments. I represent Mr. Merle Volk ar~
Gardeneer. I think Staff did an excellent job in preparing the report. They
did an outstanding job in presenting it to the Planning Commission. I think
her comments this evening covered everything we could cover. I would be happy
to answer any questions you might have.
Councilman Horn: It looks to me like th~ hours of operation don't totally
match with some of the others although it looks like they match the excavating
use, is that correct?
Jo Ann Olsen: The hours that are set here are the hours that are set with the
conditions of a contractor's yard.
Councilman Horn: But according to this map that we have, the hours for the
sanitation company start at 6:~0 aa. whid~ apparently is earlier than what
our contractor's yard allows.
Jo Ann Olsen: That was the old Ordinance.
Councilman Horn: There will be 13 extra trucks in this operation which be has
a total of 23 down there now so there would be an additional 137
Mayor Hamilton: It's probably not the number of trucks that's significant.
It's the number of trips. Don't they say 40? Isn't that what was in the
report?
Jo Ann Olsen: When I did the total of the number of vehicles and trucks that
were being used for...
Councilman Horn: How would we enforce Planning Commission recommendation
number 2?
Jo Ann Olsen: We have the applicant's guarantee. They can further explain
but they prefer using that route using TH 41 with the signal light at TH 5.
Otherwise, traffic to get onto TH 5 from CR 117 during rush hour...
~ 37
City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
Mayor Hamilton: I understar~ that and I think the other council members
understand that but Clark is saying, how do you enforce number 2? It would
seem to me to be a worthless condition to put on there because we're not going
to have a deputy sheriff's car sitting down there outside the entrance to that
site day and night making sur the nobody comes from the north down CR 17.
It's one of those things when you put a condition on there and then all of a
sudden a neighbor comes in and says we have cars coming down so all of a
sudden we do have to put a sheriff's car out there. It's something we can't
enforce. You can't enforce it I don't care what you do.
A1 Michals: I think as a realistic matter, we've agreed to do that and I
think we have probably two reasons for it. The neighbors on the traffic
issue. The primary issue is really a safety factor. We feel that because of
the signalization on TH 41 and TH 5, it just. makes it that much easier to move
on TH 41 and also the through stop sign on TH 41 as it comes out on CR 18. I
think trying to get those trucks through on CR 117 into TH 5 in the morning
and back in the evening, it's just too much of a traffic problem. We've
agreed with the Planning Commission. We've agreed with the neighbors. This
is the traffic circulation pattern that we will do and I think you're just
going to have to rely on our integrity that we are going to do it. We jus
don't want any accidents at that intersection.
Mayor Hamilton: I'm not questioning that you're not going to do. I merely
saying that the condition itself doesn't have any teeth because we can't
enforce it.
A1 Michals: If we tell our employees that we can't do it this way, just let
us try and handle it.
Mayor Hamilton: Tnat's fine withme.
Councilman Horn: I did notice too that apparently these hours were changed
because in the original report on page 3 at the bottom paragraph it says that
they will start at 6:00 a~m. to 5:30 pJ~.. Was that modified to meet the
contractor's yard Ordinance?
Councilman Johnson: You're looking at a different one. This wasn't for the
Gardeneer.
Councilman Horn: It says, if Gardeneer locates at the proposed site, there
will be a total of 40 vehicles...
Jo Ann Olsen: ~nat was a mistake. It should have been 7:30.
Councilman Horn: Do we have any limit about how many of these we can put on
one site? Theoretically we could just keep adding and adding.
Jo Ann Olsen: Theoretically, if it's an accepted use for that area, we have
to allow it.
Councilman Horn: I remember our intent when we did this was to allow somebody
to put a business in but I guess I never envisioned putting two or three
38
Council Meeting - February 23~ 1987
[nesses all in the same site.
Mayor Hamilton: They're supposed to be a mile apart. ~nat's what the
Ordinance calls for. Since the Ordinance calls for them to be a mile apart we
~ a variance
ilman Geving: I think the significant thing there is that this is a 32
acre site. It's a fairly good size piece of property. I%n familiar with
a 32 acre site and I think it could easily handle that kind of traffic. I
really don't have any problem with the proposal. I do believe that there are
areas in the City such as this, Merle Volk site and others, where Gardeneer,
which is being relocated from West Jr. High is somewhat appropriate. We have
to find locations for this kind of activity in our community. We had a little
bit of problem with Gardeneer up there. I think that was straighten out. No
further problems that I'm aware of. It has a good traffic pattern. I've had
just a comment or two about the thoughts about starting times. I know that in
the summer a lot of these Gardeneer type operations like to get going fairly
early to get their crews ar~fl stuff moving and I'm not surpirsed that t~
would want to start at 7:00 a~u. for example. Are we prohibited to start at
7:30 because they're in the contractor's yard end of it?
Jo Ann Olsen: They would have to get another variance to the Ordinance.
Councilman Geving: I guess my own personal feeling is that I would be in
favor of starting at 7:00 a~u. but that's a small issue. I'm more concerned
about granting the variance arz] approving of th~ business. I did see a
comment though that I want to relate to the rest of the Cbuncil. I believe
it's in our packet here. It came from Gary WarreD, His comments to the
Planning Commission. I don't know why you wrote this Gary but maybe you can
enlighten us. It should be noted that in the future the wholesale nursery
would propose to become retail center. Do you have information of that? Why
did you say that this could possibly be a retail center or are you
speculating?
Gary Warren: I was pointing out in that paragraph that there was some
sensitivity here that if there are some further changes to the site such as a
retail center, which obviously would bring more traffic that we would have to
take a closer look the~ for the requirements for turn lanes or other things
as far as CR 117. I have no privledged information about a retail center, no.
Councilman Geving: So you only brought that out to indicate to us that is a
concern. I would only comment that this is a wholesale nursery activity and
it will r~m~ain such, isn't that true?
Councilman Johnson: I visited the site several times this weekend and I was
appalled. I really was. The site has trash all over it. There is trash
outside of the berms. There is storage outside of the storage area. ~here is
equil~uent stored outside of the storage area. There is equipment stored
outside of the berms. ~here are junk cars which are in the woods there.
Mayor Hamilton: Does this have to do with Gardeneer or tt~ yards that are
there currently?
39
City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
Councilman Johnson: This has to do with both because they have to move all of
this material. We have to start enforcing Conditional Use Permits. We just
did on John Pryzmus and I think we're going to have to do this for Mr. Volk
also. When he starts moving this equipment back into the bermed area because
obviously he doesn't have room to store his equipment now so he's storing it
out where he's not authorized to store it. When he moves it back in behind
the berms and builds the berms that are suppose to be there, there's not going
to be room for Gardeneer in there anymore and somebody's going to have to park
outside it looks like. Until somebody proves to me that he can put everything
back into there, there's no conforming use of the same property right now.
Why put more into it? It's an eye-sore to the City. They have not complied
with the Conditional Use. We have not enforced our Conditional Use Permit on
them and that's a problem with the City and we need to go out ar~ enforce
that. I think the Gardeneer does deserve but I think we have to start
enforcing all of the conditions. I would like to add another condition on
this Planning Commission's conditions. Tnat Volk's compliance with all the
conditions of his permit. Cleans the area up. Gets the trollers, the ditch
box, the old underground tanks that are lying out alongside CR 18, all the
equipment on the east side outside the berms, all the junk cars that you Mr.
Mayor asked him to remove in 1984 and he said the junk man's on the way. I
think we ought to give him 30 days and if not, then start revoking the permits
for the site. I actually believe this should be one permit as a construction
yard with this three different operations and I'm not sure exactly where the
Attorney is coming from that the exact same property utilizing the same
parking spots and everything. They've designated this parking spot and that.
You know they're going to share the employee parking lot and everything. This
is not just one conditional use and one contractor's area. I would like to
stick it all under one permit if I could but I'm not sure if we can do that.
I'm shocked that we're coming in and saying let's put some more people into an
area that's been operated badly for three years now. Unfortunately, we've
done nothing about it so we can't really complain until right now. I was
shocked. He was supposed to put trees on this berm. It took me three trips
to see the trees because the weeds are taller than the trees. Let's get
serious. I pile of trash between the berms. It's just one thing after
the other. I think we just revoked one permit tonight. We didn't revoke it
tonight but we didn't reinstate it and I think this is a worse problem than
the Pryzmus problem in some respects. That's where I'm coming from on this.
I do not think that we're going to create more problems by putting another use
in an area where we already have a problem. As far as giving variances, I'm
going to stand by exactly what I did two weeks ago and you're going to have to
prove the five points in the Ordinance in order to get a variance. We have an
Ordinance. It tells us we have to five points and some of those are hardship.
One of the points is a hardship. There has to be a specific hardship created
by the land and not created by the person. I don't believe we can show a
hardship on Volk's problem. Gardeneer, he does have a hardship. It is going
to be tough to prove that we can allow a variance without being arbitrary and
totally throwing out this Ordinance that we just passed. Just got published.
This is it's first week and we start not going by it. ~nose are my comments.
I'm pretty much against it because of past history in the area.
40
Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
Hamilton: My comments are that I certainly disagree with Jay's
This' request for a Conditional Use Permit for Gardeneer has nothing
to do with the other two Conditional Use Permits that are there. It would
y be a disservice to the Garde~-c~r Corporation to tell them they can't
in there because another Conditional Use is not going by his rules. I just
to ask Roger Schmidt is here, do you have anything you would like to say
'er?
..
er Schmidt: All I can say is I don't know where Jay was when this first
up. I think the Council recognizes that they are dealing with a man that
necessarily pay much attention to regulations. I have not seen
that Jay has brought out. I don't go down CR 18 that often but I
my thinking is I would have to agree that this is something that Mr.
is a businessman. Obviously he's leasing the property to someb~ else
~o if he isn't abiding by the Conditional Uses that are on there now, I would
think it would be ridiculous to let him profit by having someone else come on
until he's shown that he can abide by them. My comment about the
going iD. The only thing IR concern with is the added traffic on
road. You're putting something next door that's going to have another 13
so trucks and I'm not happy about that at all because they have enough
trips on that road right now as far as I'm concerned now. Cbviously the
is built to take ~ traffic. The road isn't doing what it's meant to do
I first moved out there but I guess times have changed quite a bit. With
41 made CR 117 much less of a traveled road but I have to ask the question
is how many uses do you have on one piece of property? I sat in on a
Commission when they were looking at Conditional Uses or contractor's
and I guess I assumed that they were talking about one yard per location
now all of a sudden we're putting 2 or 3 ar~ that wasn't the way I
it when the contractor's yard was talked about. The only other
the Garde ~r~cr people too is how much noise is going to be going on down
during the daytime as far as a lot of equipment moving trees arour&] and
Is like this.
Sobraske: During the day the crews are out working. They go out in the
· and they ccme back in the afternoon so during the day there's nothing.
er Schmidt: I would like to see the Conditional Use include the traffic
· south instead of the north. You say you have no way of enforcing it.
If I notice a lot of Gardeneer trucks going north, I would certainly like to
something to come back to Council and say hey, you guys they're not doing
they're supposed to be doing or what they said they would. That's the
thing I can think of. I think Volk should prove that he is able to abide
a Conditional Use before he be pemitted to expand.
Hamilton: I know Roger that tt~ configuration of the property out there
changed considerably since you first built your home and the
intensification of the use of the land to the west of you has increased. I'm
going to say this to be any kind of a threat or anything else to you.
It's just merely an informational thing if I were you I would much rather have
type of use across the street from me than an industrial use and you
ze that Merle has considered asking Chaska to be annexed to them, which
me bristol just at the thought of it but that is a real possibility and
41
City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
there is that chance that you could have an industrial park across the street
from you which would really make me angry if I were you and I think this is a
heck of a lot better alternative to me personally for your benefit and for the
city's than to have something like that occur. I'll tell you right now if
that's ever suggested, I'll fight it to my last breath. I'm not going to
allow that land to be annexed to Chaska if there is anything I have to say
about it. I think this use, although it's certainly different from what was
there when you first bought your Property and there is more traffic and
intensification is more, I guess I would hope that by having Gardeneer going
in there, which seems to me to. be a very well run operation, I think that will
help to clean up the rest of the mess that's there and it will give us a
little more leverage to go in and .talk to Merle and force him to clean up and
abide by his Conditional Use Permit. Because now we'll have some leverage, we
can go to Merle and say if you don't clean up on your other Conditional Uses
Gardeneer is going to lose theirs too so Gardeneer is going to go back to
Merle and say let's get this act cleaned up here because I would just as soon
stay here and I want to run my business out here. He doesn't want to be
moving every other year. It's too expensive for him to do that so I think
you'll see an overall improvement in the property really through this action.
Roger Schmidt: Tom, don't you think you have just as much leverage right now
if Gardeneer wants to move in there? Get that cleaned up?
Mayor Hamilton: But one doesn't have anything to do with the other. I don't
think it's right to penalize Gardeneer for going in there for something that
Merle is not doing or something that we're not enforcing Merle to do. ~hat's
not Gardeneer's problem. That's our problem and Merle's problem and we'll
take care of that.
Roger Schmidt: Well, I ' ve heard that before.
Mayor Hamilton: When you heard that before we said that if you see a problem
there, come and tell us. I'm not going to drive out there every week and
drive through the property nor does the Staff have time to drive out there.
We do rely on the neighborhood areas to tell us if there are some violations
occurring, let us know about it so we can go out there and inspect and then
put the pressure on them and force them to abide by the laws. We rely on you
and you're right there across the street and you see these things more
frequently than we do so we need your help I guess is what I'm saying to try
to enforce all of these regulations.
Roger Schmidt: Tnis is what we're paying some of you people for I think. Not
you but some of the City people is to just check and make sure that people are
doing things properly. Like Jay said, some of there things are pretty obvious
and I would think that...
Councilman Johnson: I talked with Jo Ann about this this morning and the City
is looking for putting these Conditional Uses on a computer and having a
tickler file and a few other things where on a routine basis they are
inspected in the future. This is something that the City is improving it's
enforcement capabilities but the neighbors are driving by much more often. If
42
1!
City~ouncil Meeting - February 23, 1987
they do see it, it does help us. We would be going out once a year or
something.
Roger Schmidt: I have mentioned some things in the past, not too long ago.
It just seems tome that youhavemore leverage now than you will have later
on and as was mentioned before, Mr. Volk is not necessarily been over
enthusiastic about cc~plying with regulations.
Councilman Horn: Has Staff reviewed the property?
Jo Ann Olsen: Inspected the site? ~'
Councilman Horn: Yes. Do you find violations of the existing permit? Did we
read about that? I didn't read about that2
Jo Ann Olsen: That is something we will foliow through as a separate issue.
Merle Volk's Conditional Use Permit.
Councilman Horn: What seems to beat issue here is do we assignadditional
use permits to a given business or do we assign them to a piece of property?
I think what I'm hearing is they are assigned to a specificbusiness. Is that
the way you interpret it?
Jo Ann Olsen: Technically a Conditional Use Permit goes with the land but
Merle Volk has one portion of the land and R & W Sanitation has another
portion of the land.
Councilman Horn: So it doesn't have to be with a plat?
Mayor Hamilton: Even if Garde_r~r leases that lar~ from Merle, he now has
control of that piece of land and he is requesting a Conditional Use Permit
for that piece of land so it really does't have anything to do with Merle.
We're dealing with Gardeneer strictly I believe if I ur~erstand real estate
correctly but he now has a bundle of rights for that piece of property by
leasing it. Once he leases it, Merle has given up those rights. Gardeneer
now has them and he can come to us and request a Conditional Use Permit so we
are dealing strictly with Gardeneer as far as the conditional use Clark as I
understand it.
Barbara Dacy: To further clarify, it's for a wholesale nursery contractor's
yard. It's Gardeneer Inc. or XYZ Landscaping Company, the use is the factor.
Any use has to conform to the site.
Mayor Hamilton: Yes. All I'm saying is the Conditional Use Permit goes with
the land and Gardeneer, in this instance, has control of that piece of lar~ so
if a conditional use is going with the land, it is going to Gardeneer.
Councilman Geving: What's throwing the application is this is the first time
we're ever had two uses and now the third use on the same property and we've
got to deal with that and I think we're clarifying it tonight. It wasn't
clear in my mind even as to whether or not we had three uses or one owner with
several different activities going on on his property. I agree that these are
43
City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
all separate and we are dealing only with Gardeneer tonight. If we've got a
problem with Merle cleaning up the other areas, then that's a different
probl~.
Councilman Johnson: The application is in the name of Merle Volk, not
Gardeneer.
Mayor Hamilton: I think that should be changed.
Barbara Dacy: We're acting on the recommendation of the City Attorney. We
sent the application over to him. Tnis is how the Staff advised the applicant
to proceed. We can under separate motion of the Council, investigate the
violations of Mr. Volk. ~ne City Attorney advised us that the Council has to
grant a variance for the condition of having more than one contractor's yard
within one mile of each other and that is the way we had proceeded with the
appl icat ion.
Mayor Hamilton: Was the question asked of counsel whether or not the lease of
the land to Gardeneer and the Conditional Use Permit went with the land? I
think that seems to be the question. Maybe Mr. Michals can, in all his wisdom,
tell us if that is true or not.
A1 Michals: It was my understanding, we followed the Staff recommendation,
what was going to happen. It's really Gardeneer's application and Gardeneer's
lease of that land. All the benefits and rights will run with Gardeneer. All
Volk will have is the basic property that is subject to the lease that
Gardeneer is under too.
Councilman Johnson: In the lease, is specific pieces of land called out in
the lease saying Gardeneer has exclusive rights, exclusive use, exclusive
responsibilities for these sections of the land.
A1 Michals: That's the way I'm planning on drawing the lease.
Councilman Johnson: The lease isn't drawn yet?
A1 Michals: I'll be drawing that up on behalf of Gardeneer.
Barbara Dacy: The Conditional Use Permit will also be based on the legal
description of the land on which it is specifically.
Mayor Hamilton: Right and I think that should say Gardeneer and not Volk.
A1 Michals: We'll move to amend the application for Gardeneer Inc..
Mayor Hamilton: I think that would clarify it a great deal for us.
A1 Michals: We just followed Staff recommendation but we'll take it in the
name of Gardeneer Inc. and ask that the application be amended according to
legally suhnitt~ application.
44
City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
Barbara Dacy: We will also get clarification from the Attorney's office. We
typically bring back the Conditional Use Permits for your review on the
Consent Agenda.
Roger Schmidt: I didn't hear what Barbara said earlier but that would put two
different people with contractor's yards within a mile of each other. In your
regulations, that' s not possible.
Councilman Geving: We w~uld have a variance.
A1 Michals: Let's get into the technical aspect of that prgblem. That same
matter was submitted to the Planning Commission and we discussed that at quite
some length. It is my understanding that your Ordinance was just published
and I don't want to get into the technical matter but as long as it has come
up, that Ordinance does not become effective until 3~ days after publication.
That's the question that I have. As a consequ~, I don't know whether you
have an Ordinance.
Councilman Horn: We obviously need some legal clarification.
Councilman Johnson: I would remind Council of one thing. We now are
considering variances on two points I guess. The one is the one mile. I forget
what the other point was that one of the variances was for.
Councilman Horn: There's only a single variance.
Councilman Johnson: I thought somebody mentioned.
Councilman Horn: That w~uld be if w~ modified the time.
Councilman Johnson: Yes, modifying tt~ time would be the second variance.
Counci~ Horn: But they didn't ask for it.
Councilman Johnson: They didn't ask for it so no use in modifying it. Okay,
we have five conditions. All five must be met in order to grant a variance by
our new Ordinance published last week and now in force and they are the
literal enforcement the variance would cause, ur~ue hardship and practical
difficulty. That's pretty close for Gardeneer. That the hardship is caused
by a special condition or circumstance peculiar to the land and structures
involved which are not characteristic or applicable to other land or
structures within the same district. ~he third thing that has to be is, the
granting of a variance is necessary for preservation and enjoyment of
substantial property rights. I can not find that Merle Volk has substantial
enjoyment of his property rights right now and Garde ~r~r has no property
rights right now.
Mayor Hamilton: His right is to lease his land.
Councilman Johnson: He has no lease as of yet.
Mayor Hamilton: One of his rights is to lease his land I'm saying.
45
14
City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
Councilman Johnson: Okay, you're saying one of his rights is to lease his
land. If we don't allow him to lease his land, that we are taking away one 'of
his property rights? Okay.
Councilman Geving: He has the right to benefit from the use of his land. We
can' t deny that right.
Councilman Johnson: Tnat's right and be is benefitting from the use of the
land at the present time from the exact same use. He's trying to cram another
tenant in and in two weeks he'll be trying to cram another tenant in.
Mayor Hamilton: That's speculation.
A1 Michals: There's 30 acres.
Councilman Johnson: Tnat's exactly right. You have 138 acres that we start
putting in these same things. The last thing that we have to decide is that
the variance would not be injurous or adversely affect the health, safety or
welfare of residents of the City or neighboring property and will keep in the
spirit and intent of the Ordinance. I don't know if we meet all of those
five. I didn't realize we were talking a variance at this point. I guess we
are.
A1 Michals: Mr. Mayor I just have one other comment. I've been sitting here
since about 8:00 listening to some of the comments of members of this Council
have been making. Primarily the need to encourage business activities within
this community. Here you have Gardeneer who I suspect has been an excellent
citizen of this community. They maintain their activity at West Jr. High
School. They are now displaced. The location that was anticipated was at the
yolk property. We've complied with all the requests of the neighbors and
stipulations of the Planning Commission. With all due respect to your City
Attorney, we camehere to the Planning Commission and was approved unanimously
by the Planning Commission. Ms. Dacy just shows me the Ordinance that you
adopted by the first publication. ~nat becomes a legal issue. ~ne Ordinance
becomes effective on the 19th day of February. If we had come to the meeting
last Monday, you wouldn't have had an Ordinance. We're trying to be a good
citizen. We're trying to do whatever we can. Now, all these comments on
Merle Volk. You have all the sanctions that are available. Volk has ~cn
here for 10 years and with all due respect to you Mr. Mayor, there is a letter
on the table inasfar as annexing some of his property to the City of Chaska.
It was going to come before this council but Volk is out of town. I urge you
and respectfully request, all of the comments Mr. Johnson that you have made,
that they be directed to Volk when be comes before this body early in April.
I've asked your Staff to continue this matter. I don't know if it's going to
be a formal hearing or whether it's going to be a presentation on the
annexation issue and then raise those questions but give Mr. yolk the
opportunity to respond. Don't be critical of Gardeneer. They're just here
trying to come into the City and to maintain their activity in the City in
accordance to what I thought was the Ordinance at the time the application was
in effect. All we say is give us the permit as your Planning Commission
recc~ended.
46
k
City Oouncil ~ting - February 23, 1987
Councilman Johnson: Mr. Michals, I tend to agree with you that you applied.
Everything has been done under the old Ordinance and I personally like to say
there is no variance under the old Ordinance ar~ under the old Ordinance we
don't have a problem. I think everything started urger the old Ordinance and
legally, without a variance, I think we can approve this under the old
Ordinance. That' s my personal opinion.
A1 Michals: And I know how you feel. I sat on the Council for 4 years during
a lot more activity than you've ~ exposed to ar~ you're going to get a lot
more in the next 3 to 4 years.
Mayor Hamilton moved, Councilman Geving seconded to approve the Conditional
Use ~emit ~87-1 for a landscape contractor's 'yard ar~ wholesale nursery and
the variance for the one mile if it is deemed that the City is currently
operating under the new Ordinance with the following conditions:
.
The hours of operation shall be from 7:30 a~n. to 5:30 p.m., Monday
through Saturday a~ work on Sundays or holidays is not permitted.
.
All truck traffic leaving the site must be southbour~ on County Road
117 and truck traffic entering the site must be northbound on County
Road 117.
3. Outdoor lighting and speakers are not pemitted.
.
Berming and landscaping shall be provided as shown on the site plan
dated January 22, 1987.
So
Any expansion of the operation shall require a conditional use
permit.
All voted in favor and motion carried.
Councilman Johnson: I don't know if we need a motion to have Staff
investigate my alleged violations of the existing Conditional Use Pemit ar~
report back to us.
Mayor Hamilton: I think they've already been noted and I guess the thing I
would like to do to include with that is to look at those Conditional Use
Permits and to see to whom they were issued. I know that's Merle's son-in-law
I think that runs the garbage operation. I would like to find out if the
company is leasing land from Merle so we're consistent in all these things. I
certainly need to know who w~ need to go after.
councilman Johnson: They are putting their equipment together according to
this site plan. R & W and Merle Volk.
Mayor Hamilton: Right, one of the contracting or garbage but we can have more
than one person. The grading I think is Merle's. I think the garbage is his
son-in-laws.
47
City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
Councilman Johnson: The Conditional Use Permits were done separately at the
same meeting of the Council.
Mayor Hamilton: What I'm saying is I want to know how that whole situation
lays.
CONSENT AGENDA:
B. FINAL PLAT APPROVAL, CHANHASSEN VISTA 2ND ADDITION.
Barbara Dacy: On the final plat, there was a change to Lots 7 through 10 at
the end of Acorn Drive. Tne cul-de-sac configuration was changed due to storm
water ar~ grading considerations. Staff felt that because the lot areas in
this particular area are being maintained as well as the lot width, we did not
recommend to the Council that it go back through preliminary plat process. So
we recommend approval of the final plat subject to submission of a letter of
credit.
Mayor Hamilton: A letter of credit to accom~plish what? The grading?
Barbara Dacy: Securing the cost of the improvements for that particular
addition.
Councilman Johnson: I hate to say this but probably the accuracy of the Staff
Report, as she says there is a rearrangement of Lots 7 through 10. .However,
Lot 1 seems to have lost 3,000 square feet. Lots 2, 3 and 4 have been
changed also. Outlot A has also been changed from 15 feet down to 10 feet so
our park trail has decreased by 5 feet. Whether that's significant or not is
up to the Park and Recreation Commission and that has not ~c.n brought before
them.
Barbara Dacy: That is true that Outlot A has decreased by 5 feet. Staff felt
that the 10 feet would be adequate for a woodchip trail. It was not intended
that that particular access be improved plus the additional 10 feet on the
other side of the outlot, we felt in essence the City was gaining 30 feet
through t_hat area. ~%ere will be, during final plat process, adjustments of
lot lengths. The same number of lots are there and yes, lot areas varied
throughout the plat but Staff did not feel that it was a significant enough
change to go back to the preliminary plat review. Should the Council feel
that is so, then t_hat is their perogative to go back to the Planning
Co~mission and do the process over.
Councilman Johnson: What's happened here is we had a nice large lot and a
nice wide lot right next to our Outlot so the park trail had a lot of room.
They had 100 foot wide lot and they had 130 foot wide lot on either side.
We've still got the 130. We don't have the 100 anymore. We're down to an 80
footer. This puts the house another 10 feet closer to the park trail making
it less desirable. However, I'm getting nit-picky here I guess, there's not
much you can do and still keep that many lots. I've measured all these lots.
They are all 80 foot at the setback. There is nothing really to do to build
that back up. On this particular one, I'm sorry but we lose 5 feet of trail.
48
Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
I fight for trails whenever I can.
,id Siegel: That's an error. On the final plat there will be 15 feet.
Pearson: It showed a 10 foot distance when in actuality, there should
15 feet.
Johnson: I just scaled it off and it is 15 feet. Pardon me.
an error so if we are to approve this we need to modify that it
.ndicate that that outlot at 15 feet.
Mayor Hamilton: Where did you say it was ir~icated on here someplace where it
says 15 feet?
Paul Pearson: On sl~t 3 of the final plat in the upper left hand corner
the reference tables and under identification, if you look in tbs outlot there
is a 15.6 designation.
Hamilton: So it is indicated on there as the correct amount?
Councilman Johnson: But on the drawirg it was accidentally written in wrong.
Mayor Hamilton: Does that answer your question on that?
Councilman Johnson: For number 1, those are my two main comments that when I
lose 3,000 feet off. a lot, I would like to __"~c that too.
Mayor Hamilton: Are you satisfied with both of them now then?
Councilman Johnson: No. Don't you want to take them one at a time? No,
two' s the big one.
Mayor Hamilton moved, Councilman Geving seconded approval of the final plat,
Chanhassen Vista 2nd Addition. All voted in favor ar~ motion carried.
CONSENT AGW~DA:
2. APPROVAL OF PLANS AND SPf~2FICATIONS, CHANHASS~ VISTA 2ND ADDITION.
Gary Warren: With the clarification that I addressed in the memo, the 2nd
Addition now is basically the Phase 1 of the original 2nd Addition. Once we
got that cleared up things went a little bit better. This is tb~ utility
improvements for the 2nd Addition. The site grading has already been
accomplished and this would be for construction of the watermain and storm
sewer and sanitary sewer in this area.
Mayor Hamilton: Maybe we can have Jay ask his question rather than going
through this.
Councilman Johnson: Quite simply we have seen another-ignoring our City going
on here. We've had constant trouble and we will continue having it. I have
erosion control problems in this area and I do not plan on seeing any more
49
18
City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
disturbance in this area until what was promised to the Watershed District to
be seeded by November 1st is done to where the erosion controls are put up.
Where the Watershed District gets the actual same plans that the City Council
gets to review instead of ones that don't show the same amount of grading
where they know what they're up against. I've been extremely upset, once I
got to talking to the Watershed District today and found out that they were
given a different set of plans than we were. They are almost a month earlier
and they did not show the clear cutting of the trees so the WAtershed District
did not ask for erosion control which if they had known about the clear-
cutting it would have been different. We're cutting now and grading land on
the side of the slope and their plans, which they showed me today, did not
show any of that grading on the side of the slopes so their erosion control
measures weren't there. I'm getting kind of into the next thing too but until
I see the erosion control, which we'll talk about in a minute on b, I'm
against going any further on this.
Mayor Hamilton: Do you want to ask a specific question so perhaps Gary can
respond to it?
Councilman Johnson: I just want to add a condition to the approval. I guess
it's almost there but before anything starts, I want number 2 of the condition
of approval totally checked out and added to the conditions of approval that
the Watershed District provides a new grading permit. That the one issued
last Fall should be null and void because it was under bogus plans.
Gary Warren: I guess Jay, if I'm reading it right, our third condition
basically addresses any update. The Watershed District just received the
February 19th revised plans from the engineer and contingent on Bob Obermeyer
and Bart addressing those, we would incorporate that into the application this
time. That was provided in the original Watershed submittal t_hat was done
with the original 1st Addition.
Mayor Hamilton: Should that be included in condition 3 then that the
Watershed District and Bart Engineering agree with the erosion controls?
Should we spell that out specifically?
Gary Warren: We could. I guess that's what I'm stating. Watershed
District's response, he will address those itsms.
Councilman Johnson: Instead of saying all conditions issued, I just want to
put that we're not operating under last Fall's Watershed District in this
area. We put in a new request for a Watershed District for mass grading south
of the this area. We need to pull this area into the Watershed District
because I believe item 9 discusses the next grading to be done and that's the
permit that's been asked for. What I'm saying is the permit for this area is
not valid. I can't say it's not valid. The Watershed District has to say
that and they may be. I want a new Watershed District permit.
Gary Warren: Jay, we would incorporate the current review when we receive the
Watershed condition's into this approval. It does hit at the heart of the
erosion control plan which is the next item as you're saying because strictly
looking at it, and that's why I didn't address the erosion control in this
50
Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
was strictly the installation of the utilities ar~ fro~ that star~int,
my minor exce~fcions here, does meet the City's standards.
Johnson: Yes, it meets the City's s~rds but I don't want
'round broken until we get the erosion controls and a new permit from the
District.
Hamilton: 3 says the developer comply with all conditions issued by the
District or the DNR should be add based on current plans or any
plans? Would that satisfy you?
Johnson: Yes, that would satisfy me.
Mayor Hamilton: The most current plan is February 4th I believe.
Councilman Johnson: Actually Bart Engineering has a more updated plan than we
do.
Gary Warren: Revision D of the erosion control plan.
Councilman Johnson: Bart has Revision E.
Gary Warren: Maybe Mc~.xx~bs would care to address what the latest version is.
Mayor Hamilton: Maybe you can tell us what the latest one is so we can use
it? Is it changing daily?
Paul Pearson: In regards to the revisions of the plans, the plan which was
submitted to the Watershed was Revision F. Gary does have a copy of that
revision. What that revision does show is the proposed 3rd and 4th Additions
within the Phase 2 grading area. As far as the grading construction within
the Phase 2 area, it is the same. The plan does show future 3rd ar~ 4th
Addition lar~L I guess I have to apologize that the Council didn't have that
in their packet. The 3rd Addition plat or proposed plan was in submission to
the City ar~ submission to the Watershed. In that timeframe, plans to develop
the future 3rd Addition, which is this 35 lots in the Phase 2 area identified
on your plan.
Mayor Hamilton: Actually, what I'm asking right now so we can get onto the
next it~ is Revision E is the latest one that you're using?
Paul Pearson: Correct.
Mayor Hamilton: Okay, so we can say in item 3 that the developer complies
with all conditions issued by the Watershed. District and/or the DNR based on
the plat that is included in the February 23, 1987 packet k~o~ as Revision E.
Is that specific enough?
Councilman Johnson: Revision E of the erosion control plan.
Councilman Geving: On the same item Mr. Mayor, I would like to comment on
item 15. I have not seen that formal agreement between Enterprise Properties
51
City Council Meeting - February 23~ 1987
and Triple Crown but I think that it is very important that that agreement be
made and in our hands before this project proceeds. ~nis is a very important
agreement because it involves a lot of money that both these parties have to
put up before we can be assured that they are going to handle the watershed
probl~n. Are you aware of what is going on there Gary?
Gary W~rren: I think the developer can.
David Siegel: An agreement was reached with them and the work was done last
Fall. It's been paid in full and the work is totally completed.
Councilman Geving: And is that agreement on file with the City? I have not
seen that.
David Siegel: I'm not sure.
Councilman Geving: I would like to make sure that that agreement is in our
file.
David Siegel: Okay, but the work is completed and paid in full.
Gary Warren: I haven't seen anything in our file.
Councilman Geving moved, Councilman Horn seconded to approve the plans and
specifications, Chanhassen Vista 2nd Addition as amended. All voted in favor
and motion carried.
APPROVAL OF FINAL GRADING AND EROSION CONTROL PLANS, CHANHASSEN VISTA 2ND, 3RD
AND 4TH ADDITIONS.
Gary Warren: Basically, in September the Council was given the early version
of the erosion control plan and final grading plan to allow the developer to
proceed with the 1st Addition and Phase 1 of the 2nd Addition. What we have
before us right now is the final version of the final grading and erosion
control plan for basically mass grading of the rest of the site on the north
side of the pond which at this point we're calling the 3rd and 4th Additions.
They used to be Phase 2. I commented in the packet here that I would present
an exhibit here which I do have which has the benefit of my field review of
the site and concerns that I have as far as the erosion control plan. I also,
for the Council's consideration, pointed out the phasing clause of the
development agreement with the developer. In light of the fact that the 1st
Addition street work is not completed at this point and in light of the fact
that only the site grading has been done on Phase 1 and as our development
contract provides council discretion, we have a choice of restricting the
development of future phases until we have some security as far as the
completion of the previous phases. With that preliminary introduction, if it
pleases you I will go through the erosion control plan as I see it and what we
would need on it.
Mayor Hamilton: Okay.
52
Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
Warren: There are several sensitive areas out here and in reviewing s~ne
the original comments from the Watershed District as far as they were
..oncerned, I have incorporated their input into the project here. In light of
we're dealing with, my preference in the erosion control, if we're
at all or insecure about the Type 1 control, that we go to Type 2
;ith the haybales and in certain cases that we actually double up and use both
them. The area along Kerber Blvd., there is going to be gradirg along
Blvd. in this area here. The consulting engineer provided for some
at intervals which is consistent with Watershed District. My site
· I am going to be requesting that we extent that a couple hur~red feet
either side to make sure that we're covering that drainage area. That
be along here on Kerber. In addition, that the silt fence and the
be also installed where the grading is being done along this ridge
line area. That was not originally proposed. I went over the drainage area,
'ain a difficult area. There is s~me current haybales and diking that has
installed out there. I guess we would want to continue with that and see
that we maintain the haybales in the drainage area here. A very sensitive
is where the storm sewer is proposed to pack down the outlot into the
storm sewer. Currently the contractor has a silt fence. He doesn't
it extended as far as I show here. The silt fence is not buried in the
soil as we require by our standards. It is laid on top and the dirt is just
on top of it so there is no secure plat where the details show to put
into the ground 24 inches so basically it's not going to be doing that much
'ood for us so that ~s to be installed properly and extended. As well as,
to the grades there, we would want bales and then after construction, this
area up here, we would want to use wood fiber blanket to expedite the re-
establishment of vegetatior~ With connection to storm sewer here, which
.y will provide for an inlet to the storm sewer to intercept some of
the surface drainage, it's also going to be a very challenging area for
erosion control arzt we would want to see silt fence and haybales along that
whole are during constructioru Moving up to the north side, the watermain and
storm sewer, basically storm sewer will be installed. Again, we have some
challenges with st~cp slopes here and we would want to see s(x~e baling dikes
installed across the side slopes amd as the engineer was showing, some bales
across the outlet of the storm sewer. Again, after construction to
immediately use the wood fiber blanket to gain the restoration of the
vegetatioru The cul-de-sac area here, we have a watermain to pick up there.
There are a couple of exposed basins or areas that are used for set basins so
this area is very exposed at this time. There is some baling up in this area
that is part of that improvement. We would want to see that whole exposed
area both silt fenced ar~ haybaled. Again, the circles on the map here
basically are the catch basin inlets arxt once they are constructed we would
want to see that we have bales installed around those inlets to pick up the
sediment into catch basins during construction. Along the north side there is
a modest swale that is being proposed as part of this wetland improvement
here. In looking at the south earlier, there is a low area there and to be
careful about it we should be going both with the haybales and the silt fence
and extending it to wrap a little bit around the east here because of the drop
off here into the wetland area. Coming back along the south side of the site,
the Watershed District recommended the installation of erosion control
measures all the way from Lot 1 to Lot 1L There were a few gaps in the
engineer's proposal here. Because they are a little bit higher on the site
53
City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
but I guess to be conservative, we would want to see again, bales and silt
fence all the way along this area. When the storm sewer is installed, that
both the inlets and the outlets be baled and as the consultant has
recommended, that the wood fiber blankets be used in this very sensitive slope
area in the southwest corner. I guess that's basically the plan that I think
would be appropriate for what w~ need out there to be insured on the site.
Councilman Johnson: My main concern here is that we have asked the developer
in our conditions previously that all areas in what used to Phase 1 be
restored prior to any operations in what used to be Phase 2 here. The
developer has gone outside of the bounds, well outside of the bounds. He has
completed rough grading of Contestoga Court almost all the way up to Sierra
Trail at this time. ~hat is totally completed as far as rough grading as they
worked out on those Lots 1 through 5 there. It's also almost all the way down
to Frontier Trail. I went out and walked this Friday night and I couldn't
believe that we went well beyond what our last permit was for so we have a
permit violation here from our last year's grading permit. Last September's
grading permit. Before they're supposed to touch this, they needed not only
to get final plat from us and our approval, they need to restore Phase 1 and
restore 1st Addition. 1st Addition is a shambles for erosion control. There
are a bunch of places in there. I saw the Watershed District's requirements
today for Phase 1 and a lot of those have not been even begun. There is
supposed to be a 2 foot rock dike with a 4 to 1 slope at both entrances to
Santa Vera Street. That was never constructed. There is supposed to be
erosion control around all the storm sewer inlets in that area. ~'nat has
never been done. Again on the south side, the erosion control breaks at the
point where Barney used to have his road going through. The erosion control
is broken down in several points. There are several places up there where
we're going to have a real problem because this erosion control apparently is
not put in correctly either. I'm not totally sure on that but it looks like
they basically threw some dirt over on top of the flap instead of burying it 2
feet down. The previous conditions I think we have to hold by. Nothing in
Phase 2, and I think our City Attorney should become involved as to what the
repercussions are for the violation of the permit that we did issue. We can
not let people go around and do any darn thing they please in our City when we
specifically tell them not to do something. When I tell my kid not to do
something and he does something, he gets punished. I think that should work
with adults too. I see no reason to do any of the action in item 9 at this
time. We should just totally table this until the City Attorney tells us what
we should do about the violations of our last permit and I see no reason to
believe, he hasn't followed erosion control that we've asked for. He's cut
off ditches that aren't supposed to be there. Now he wants to completely
strip the entire 90 lots out here and leave this open for an undetermined
length of time. If he does like he's done in the past, we'll see no seeding.
No restoration. ~ney had plenty of time to seed and restore the areas on the
Phase 1. Instead they chose to go and start working on, I should say 1st
Addition. They could have done restoration there. They did one small
blanket. That was it. Instead of doing that they want to go ahead and get
what's now called the 2nd Addition and go on to the 3rd Addition which they
weren't supposed to do. I think it's time to put our foot down and stop
being abused in this city. Stop allowing our contractor's to do any darn
thing they please. It's another thing where I brought in an actual erosion
54
City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
control plans that were sutxnitted to us and compared them with Bob
Obermeyer's. Bob pulled out a totally different set that was dated in August
rather than September. He was more than a little surprised to find that his
Board had acted upon erroneous plans. The erosion control that was put up
there, if you look at your drawings that we have, the erosion control starting
up here at this cul-de-sac on the northeast corner was never installed. You
come to the next erosion control that was supposed to have ~ installed last
Fall, everything in Phase 1 is exactly the same as it was except for they are
adding more trees to be cut than what they told us last Fall was going to be
the cutting of the trees. ~nis is what we approved last Fall. ~he erosion
control that is shown as the haybales, two strips of haybales along that sewer
outlet is what Gary referred to as being instead of Type 2 they improperly
installed Type 1 at that point. Then the erosion control next to Kerber Blvd.
was never installed. JUst repeated, repeated, repeated, they're not doing
what they're telling us they are going to do. As far as trees...
Mayor Hamilton: Before you get into trees, I would like to ask Bill or Gary
if they can respond to any of this. I know Bill worked on this ar~ have you
been out to inspect the trees?
Gary Warren: I think that based on my observations out there as I tried to
point as I went through the plan here, I have some concerns as to the care
with what's ~ done out there to this point. There is no question that
there are some deficiencies in the erosion control. The measures that need to
be taken, I can't attest to whether the contractor's been cooperative or not
to our suggestions on improvements or correcting measures out there. Maybe
Bill can address that as far as the 1st Addition is concerned. I know there
has been some difficulty apparently in that regard. I think the plan here, if
properly installed and that's partly our responsibility to stay on top of the
contractor's, I think is a workable erosion control plan. I can't speak for
Bob Obermeyer but I think we've incorporated his original concerns about the
site into this plan and any modifications Bob will have I think will be fine
tuning.
Bill Engelhardt: I guess when we reviewed the plan we looked at the erosion
control for just the grading and not the utilities. The storm sewer and the
restoration that Gary is recommending when the utilities go in, this plan
tonight is going to work out well. As far as I know, I went out and looked at
the erosion control last Fall and when I was looking at it they had the
erosion control barrier up. I know that the engir~-~_r was concerned about the
limits of the tree cutting and we made them mark on a plan and they actually
staked it out in the field and those trees were cur- If more trees were cut I
don't know but as far as I was concerned they were willing to deal with the
erosion control.
Mayor Hamilton: What about on the south push?
Bill Engelhardt: The 1st Addition? I really can't speak to it because it was
really right in the middle of things there and that one was just about done
when they were starting this one up. I think the biggest concern I had or I
have now is that nothing is done down south and you're going to open up
55
City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
another area and I think you have to be very careful. I can't comment on the
south part.
Mayor Hamilton: I guess I like Jay's comments and until the developer
conforms to the conditions that were established in the 1st Addition, there
is no need to even consider any further. Until he cleans up what is happening
in the 1st Addition. Until he puts the controls in the 2nd, 3rd and 4th that
we see them in front of us, I see no reason to even consider anything.
Councilman Geving: We should proceed on an each addition separately.
Complete one addition. Do it up good. Finish it. Finish the grading and
then go to the 2ndAddition, 3rd or 4th or if he wants to mix and match I
don't care. One addition at a time.
Mayor Hamilton: Even if he wants to do more than one but just so heconforms
to what the conditions...
Councilman Geving: Right, and not a mass grading. I think what he wants to
get in there and do a whole mass grading of the entire north side and then
leave it sit for six months.
Councilman Horn: I think that's fine as long as he does all the erosion
control measures in place but what we're hearing is they're not.
Councilman Johnson: I'll disagree with that on all the erosion control.
These are temporary things. The market falls out and we have all this graded
and it sits for a year, those erosion controls will be dead in a year. These
are temporary erosion control measures and as far as the trees, if you look at
your plats that you have in front of you. On Bighorn Drive and the inter-
section of Frontier Drive, you'll see a section of trees on, I'm looking at
last years so it's Lots 11 and 12 here, what I've got in yellow right here, it
shows an area where they weren't going to cut the trees down and it shows an
area where they are going to cut the trees down. Here's what you all approved
last year. No cutting of trees in either of those lots was approved last
year. ~nose trees are gone. There is none on that side of the street. I
walked it. We've already lost all those trees and now they're coming back and
saying, we want to cut them down. They've already cut them down.
David Siegel: First of all, in terms of the 30 lots on the south side of the
pond, we tried to complete all of the improvements by the end of the
construction season. We ran into a lot of delays in September due to the rain
and then we were hit in November with the sudden cold snap and the frost set
in. We couldn't get the curb and gutter in. We couldn't get the wear course
street in and also, our subcontractor for the soil erosion, Evenson's, they
said it would just be throwing money out the window seeding after the ground
is frozen and that they had shut down their operations until Spring. As soon
as they begin their operations this spring, that area will be seeded, the
areas that they aren't homesites on because the area is being rapidly built
out. I think right now there are over half the lots are built and I would say
by spring probably a majority of the lots will be built out. Almost all of
them are sold at this time and that's the reason that we are going ahead with
putting in the improvements on the 30 lots on the north side and grading the
56
City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
remaining 6L The reason we have to grade all 61 lots at one time is because
the earth work has to balance out. The cut and the fill and the only way that
can bedone in that whole section is the whole area has to be graded at once
~se dirt has to be moved from one section near Kerber over to another area
in the 4thAddition and there is no way we can grade it in sections. We would
love to do it in sections but in this project, we did the 30 lots. We could
section that off but the remainirg lots, when the~re graded, they have to be
graded all together. Otherwise it means trucking dirt in or trucking dirt
out and that just becomes exorbitanting expensive and that isn't the way
grading contracts work.
Councilman Johnson: Or you can stockpile dirt. It's not quite black and
white.
David Siegel: Well, our engir~cr would have to address that. I'm not sure on
the details of that. In terms of we did meet the soil erosion control
measures that were stated to us for the 1st Addition grading on the north side
and we'll be happy to work with the City and Gary and the rest of the staff on
instituting the measures for the sanitary and storm sewer and the erosion
control on these 3rd and 4th Additions. We have no problom with that.
Mayor Hamilton: What can be done now, for instance Jay has said that there
several violations on the 1st Addition that could cause a problem this spring.
How can they be correct now so we aren't going to have a problem come spring?
I can't believe there is that much frost on the ground right now where you
couldn't acommplish some of those things that you didn't do ~so we know your
project is going to be up to snuff this spring.
Siegel: I think our engineer Paul Pearson can answer some of those
ions.
Paul Pearson: In the 1st Addition, my recollection of some of the points that
were made. First of all, on Santa Vera the rock dike which the Watershed had
advocated. What that would attempt to do is any erosion coming off the
street, the rock dike would filter it preventing it from going to the east on
Santa Vera Drive onto the existing new roadway. When we had met with City
Staff out in the field, the decision was made together that instead of a rock
dike we would install a siltation fence which would prevent any traffic,
because we were supposed to use Kerber Blvd., that any traffic using Santa
Vera entrance onto the site would be a deterrant them for traffic in that
area. The silt fenoe was installed. As of this date traffic is traveling
through that area. There is a depression in that area because the curb and
gutter and the bituminous hasn't ~_n installed to date. There is about a 6
inch depression. To my knowledge there is not any erosion control leaving the
site. It is wintertime and when spring does c(~me though there is that
possibility, with the depression that will act as a sedimentation pond. I
think one of the reasons that the siltaton fence is also gone was because of
the snowplowing of the area and the City wants to keep that open and maintain
that area for the traffic to allow them to go out onto Kerber Blvd. from the
neighborhood. Maybe I'm wrong on that. That's the case of the rock dike on
Santa Vera Drive. On Kerber Blvd. there is a low point. The water can not
get onto the street there. There are catch basins in that are to pick up the
57
City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
drainage. We have rock over the top of it with filter fabric over the catch
basins so no dirt can get into the storm sewer. There were haybales along the
roadway.
Councilman Johnson: Excuse me. Where is this that you have this?
Paul Pearson: Santa Vera and Kerber Blvd., the intersection. There are two
catch basins installed in that area. There is a siltation filter fabric over
the top of the catch basins which rock over the top of it so storm water is
filtered then and can not go into the storm sewer. As David mentioned before,
the ground was frozen last fall so we were not able to get the seeding and
mulching completed. As he stated, if we would have seeded and mulched, it
would have been blown away. We couldn't properly anchor it into the soil.
Any other questions about the 1st Addition?
Councilman Johnson: You can't seed and mulch but you could go and work on
Phase 1 and Phase 2 or the north side.
Mayor Hamilton: Without a permit is that right?
Councilman Johnson: There was a draining permit for Phase 1 and that was
started in October. So you were through grading on the 1st Addition. You
finished your grading on 1st Addition in October now and you moved your
equipment down Kerber Blvd. and already have it down there for the pond and
then you brought your construction trailer down there and you forgot from
October until it frosted, you forgot about the south addition because you were
busy building the new addition. You had no grading going on the south side.
You had all the grading going on and you moved all your equipment over, you
could have seeded at that time. You had a whole month to see and you didn't
seed is all I'm saying. You just told me you were through grading in October
and you moved it over.
David Siegel: I didn't say when in October. Mid-October and then the
subcontractor was notified. There were storm pipes running through some of
the lots and generally you do not see utility contractors because it was torn
all up.
Councilman Horn: Now I've heard two different reasons why we shouldn't seed.
One is the frost was here and the other one is the utilities not being done.
Which is it?
Paul Pearson: As far as the seeding and mulching, it wasn't completed.
Aitkens, I know he was notified. That wasn't part of my responsibility. The
owner was notifying the seed and mulch person to do that work and it froze
during that time period and he just couldn't do it. There was a period of
time where it could have been seeded and mulched but it just didn't work out.
The ground froze.
Councilman Horn: So what? You can seed in snow and it will grow the next
year.
58
2ity Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
Paul Pearson: As far as placing the seed, that's possible right but the
mulching and when it does rain and there is run-off in the spring, the straw
that is placed ar~ is anchored with a disk. In other words, the straw then is
poked down into the ground so the seed, when the winds blow, the water runs,
the seed will stay in place more or less.
lman Johnson: One of the conditions of your Watershed District permit,
which is an attachment on here, was that the seeding and restoration will be
by November 1st. We didn't have the frost before November 1st. You knew
what the permit conditions were and you didn't live up to it.
Paul Pearson: We didn't ignore then Jay.
Councilman Johnson: I didn't say you ignored them. I said you didn't live up
to tbsm. There are two different things. Ignoring them and not doing th~n.
Paul Pearson: I can't argue that it wasn't completed. In the 2nd Addition,
the erosion control devices were installed but as Bill mentioned, we did
review them with the City. If the silt fence is right now hanging in the air,
I'm not aware of it. That can be corrected ar~ I guess Bill, correct me if
I'm wrong, every request that we've had in the 1st Addition or the 2r~
Addition relating to erosion control, the owner has complied with it to my
knowledg~ I think what I'm saying is the owner has made every attempt to
satisfy the conditions of the permit. The weather conditions did not allow us
to complete all of the seeding and mulching last fall but it is intended to be
cc~pleted.
Councilman Geving: What about the destruction of those trees in that area that
Jay eluded to?
Paul Pearson: Lots 10 and 11, that's on the intersection of Frontier Trail
and Bighorn Drive.
Councilman Geving: Why did you have to take those out? We've got neighbors
that will be watching the trees all the time that you guys are in this project
and all I can tell you is be very careful.
Paul Pearson: On our grading plan we did show an area of trees that were not
to be removed. Now Jay said there isn't any trees in that area but unless
somebody's ~_~n in there and cut them down, there are trees that are standing
in that area.
Councilman Geving: ~hat lot are you talking about?
Councilman Johnson: Show me the standing trees.
Paul Pearson: In this area. Right now there are some trees standing in this
Councilman Geving: ~at are the lot numbers.
Paul Pearson: Lot 11 and 12 of Block 2.
59
City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
Councilman Horn: But he was talking about north of Bighorn.
Paul Pearson: I misunderstood. I thought it was south of Bighorn.
Councilman Johnson: No, I'm talking south of Bighorn.
just submitted.
Here's the plans he
Councilman Geving: Now, are those trees in that yellow section gone Jay?
Councilman Johnson: I don't remember any trees along the south side of
Bighorn when I walked that. If there are they are little scrubby things but
even his plans show they are going to be removed even though they weren't
going to he removed before. All of a sudden we've got new tree removals. I
think we can solve this whole thing just by tabling this until Phase 1, now
it's called 1st and 2nd Addition are restored. When you've done what we were
told that you were going to do, then we'll consider going onto the next item
and I would like to move to table this if we can until the City Engineer is
satisfied that all the requirements of the develo~ent contract and the
Watershed District, that the proper erosion controls are installed, the
restoration is complete before we start opening up and I'd also like to have
the City Attorney look into the violations of the last permit.
Councilman Horn: I would also like to state that I would have liked to have
seen that report and that recommendation in the Staff Report. I think we have
to watch what's going on out there.
Mrs. Kubitz made a statement regarding drainage problems. It was not audible
on the tape.
Councilman Johnson: The City corrected a problem that was caused on the north
sideby grading not being exactly like what they had said they were going to
be. The City Staff came out and fixed it.
Mrs. Loebel: The area that you are talking about with the trees, that's right
over where Frontier Trail ends isn't it Jay?
Councilman Johnson: No, it's further down.
Mayor Hamilton: Where it's going to end.
Mrs. Loebel: Not where it ends now. Because my husband and I were up in that
area today where Frontier Trail now ends and there is not a tree in sight.
Councilman Geving: You've got to go a little bit farther north.
Mrs. Loebel: Well, there are a lot of trees down near Kerber too because Bill
noticed that. He said they are just clear-cutting.
Mayor Hamilton: There weren't any trees there previously where Frontier ends
now.
60
Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
:ilman Johnson moved, Councilman Horn seconded to table approval of the
final grading and erosion control plans for Chanhassen Vista 2nd, 3rd ar~ 4th
lition until the City Ergi~cr states that all the conditions for the 1st
2nd Addition have been completed and to have the City Attorney look into
~tions of the last permit issued. All voted in favor of tablirg the item
motion carried.
)INTMENTS TO THE ~ITY CENTER TASK FORCE.
Hamilton recommended that the following people be appointed to the
ty (~enter Task Force. Jim Bohn from the HRA, Dave Headla from the
,lanning Commission, Jim Mady from Park and Rec Commission, Bill Boyt from the
, Bob Robinett, Pat Swenson, Joe Kasper, Vicky Sawochka, Scott
~onsen and Bill Kirkvold. There are 18 members and that the Mayor be a
of the commission in a non-voting capacity and as Chairman. ~ne only
the Mayor would have a vote would be to break a ti~ Curt Robinson was
at the meeting and the Mayor stated that he was more than welcome to
an active participate at the meetings if be wanted. Mayor Hamilton stated
that he just chose people from their applications ar~ thought he was getting a
'ood mix of young and old, ar~ new and old in the commn~ity.
Mayor Hamilton moved, Councilman Geving seconded to appoint the following
to the Community Center Task Force: Jim Bohn, Dave Headla, Jim Mady,
Boyt, BOb Robinett, Pat Swenson, Joe Kasper, Vicky Sawochka, Scott
Simons~ and Bill Kirkvold, to begin work as soon as possible. All voted in
favor and motion carried.
ADMINISTRATIVE CHARGES, CONS~ION FUNDS.
Don Ashworth: This chart was adoped by the City Council 28 years ago and
basically it should be updated to include the additional work that the Staff
does. You're in the process right now and so I brought this back to City
Council so it could be incorporated into your proposals.
Mayor Hamilton: You're suggesting.
Councilman Johnson: No reduction to $188~888.88.
Councilman Geving: Basically you're going from 2% to 5%?
Don Ashworth: It changes. Going from 8 to $188,888.88 at 5%. Previously
that range when from 3% to 5%. Somewhere between $188,888.88 and
$1,888,888.88 would be 4% and over $1,888,888.88 at 3%.
R~solution ~87-14: Mayor Hamilton moved, Councilman Geving seconded to adopt
the schedule for the City administering construction activity as presented by
the City Manager. Ail voted in favor and motion carried.
61
City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
APPROVAL OF ACCOUNTS: Councilman Geving moved, Councilman Horn seconded to
approve the Accounts Payable dated February 23, 1987 for check numbers 027966
through 027980 in the amount of $40,486.08; check numbers 030617 through
030664 in the amount of $717,045.33; check numbers 027876 through 027964 in
the amount of $195,408.12 for a total of 137 checks in the amount of
$912,453.45. All voted in favor and motion carried.
COUNCIL PRESENTATIONS:
Councilman Geving: Just a quick comment. I was alerted to Randy Herman's
development by people out on the north end of the City. They've ~n watching
this Lot 1 for some time Gary and there are some conditions that we placed on
that Lot 1 just as you come into the development on the left harzt side. I
would like to have the Staff review the conditions that we placed on that and
also look at the site. Take a trip out to the site and see the large mounds
of dirt that they have hauled in there with the intent apparently of pushing
it into the swampy area and cc~pletely inundating what I call a wetland area.
Gary Warren: Is that off the Church road up there?
Councilman Geving: It's off Sandpiper.
GaryWarren: Because we just stopped somebody else.
Councilman Geving: It just looks like they're getting ready to make the move
to push all that dirt into the swamp area. It's just perched there.
Mayor Hamilton: That's one of their conditions that they can't touch t_hat
swamp.
Barbara Dacy: You required that that lot come in for a variance I believe.
Councilman Geving: They've got a mound up there of 15 feet of dirt just ready
to pitch right down and dump into that so I would like to have you look at
that.
councilman Johnson: I went and drove the City, Pheasant Run and components
Engineering and the new huge house on Galpin and a bunch of other places and
erosion control has really broken down. Components didn't even bother to
bury the flap. They didn't even push any dirt on top of it plus they dug a 2
foot wide hole underneath it to let the water out so you know. Then they have
dirt pouring over the top of it at one place. Components is a total joke.
I've already talked to Gary a little bit and he said Terry is going to be
headed out here as soon as he gets a chance and we need a review before the
spring rains come. We need to review all of the existing erosion controls.
This particular house on Galpin. It's one house but they've completely
stripped the land all the way down the side of the driveway and did no seeding
or anything or any kind of erosion controls and that's going to run right down
the ditch there.
62
'81
City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
Mayor Hamilton: Is this the Stellar Addition up there?
Councilman Johnson: No, this is off of Galpin and Lyman, just up the road a
little ways. I~n sorry. Audubon ar~ Lymaru It's a great big, huge house
they're building up there. (IR 117 and Lyman. It's up a little ways from
Lyman. I went up there to see what they're doing. It's a fantastic house ar~
then they haven't even started the 30 by 30 sunroom the guys told me.
Basically I wanted to make sure that we get out there and get this in hand
before we have what we had last spring. ~ne potential is there. Gary was
just giving BRW a hard time I guess on Triple CrowD. They've got some
problems in that creek.
Gary Warren: As Jay stated, I instructed Terry just today, based on my visit
here to Triple Crown and Chan Vista to all of our sites that have erosion
control measures or are required to have it and get back to me and we will get
back to the contractors in any deficiencies that w~ see with notices for them
to improve those correcting them prior to the snows or rains, whatever we're
going to get so I'm very concerned also.
Councilman Johnson: The other one was demolition disposal. The State of
Minnesota has rules on demolition disposal for very large disposal sites. One
of the things, we don't have rules here in the City. It should be some place
in our Ordinances where they can be located. The basic law rules for MPCA
rules say that you have to be more than 300 feet away from a stream. 600 feet
away from a pond. Outside of a park. 2 feet above the water table. A bunch
of basics like this. Almost all of those were not done in the Chan Vista
disposal site. If we had that Ordinance on the books we could have done that.
I would like Staff to look into reviewing. I've given Barb way back last fall
or summer the MPCA guidelines and what would be applicable for the City in
that.
REVI~ TH 212 RESOLUTION.
Barbara Dacy: I did want to go through items 1 and 2 ar~ wanted to ask that
Councilman Johnson help me on the third item. Item 1 is your authorization
to expend $30,000.00 in the 1988-1989 budget years regarding Chanhassen's
contribution to help pay for the Environmental Impact Statement. All effected
agencies are almost to the point of the final draft ready to sign regarding
who is responsible for each share. Basically the counties and tt~ cities are
paying $150,000.00 total. MnDot and Met Council will be responsible for the
remaining costs of the EIS. It might be $325,000.00. It might be $350,000.00
or it might be a little less as well as commission to do reviewing the
location of the study report which helps the construction process along.
Chaska has authorized their share. Eden Prairie has authorized their share.
The two counties are expected to take action on this iten~ I can go through
these items one by one.
Councilman Johnson: Gne night we're talking $150,000.00 for the five groups
or 50%. So if it's $200,000.00 we only spend $100,000.00 of it. I just want
to make sure that if somehow they come in under budget, which on an EIS
never happens hardly but if they came in under budget that we got the benefit
of coming in under budget. We're not going to spend any more than $30,000.00
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City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
but if they come in over budget...
Mayor Hamilton: Can you tell me what real benefit Chanhassen is going to gain
fr~m having TH 2127
Barbara Dacy: The major benefit is, first of all it provides a vital function
in relieving the traffic on TH 5. If you remember from the Benshoof traffic
study, that even with TH 212 Corridor, TH 5 is going to be at capacity by the
year 2010. Just based on conservative growth estimates for Chanhassen.
Second of all it does provide improvement to the existing southwest alignment
because it is a major connector to the southwest part of the State. Farmer
and market truck traffic that comes from the southwestern part of the State.
Basically, those two general reasons are cited.
Mayor Hamilton: Is that assuming that TH 5 will be at capacity in the year
2010 if it's not upgraded before then?
Barbara Dacy: It's saying that essentially TH 5 should be up to 6 or 8 lanes
but prediction is based on having four lanes by 1992. It's scary and the
trunk highway counts are even more scary.
Mayor Hamilton: What would happen to the process if we withdrew? If we said
we don't want to participate.
Barbara Dacy: There would never be a TH 212.
Mayor Hamilton: There's never going to be TH 212 an~ay.
Barbara Dacy: If any one of the communities right now says we're not
interested at this point, you might as well not even consider it for the next
3 to 5 year period, if ever.
Councilman Horn: We might as well close our doors because development will
stop. Everything will stop.
Councilman Geving: I don't believe that because there are always going to be
people buying property.
Mayor Hamilton: Tney keep saying they're going to do it and every years
they've been going to do and there are still no funds.
Barbara Dacy: The EIS is the key. Since I was appointed to that
Transportation Advisory Committee, that is so enlightening because what we do
now is going to affect what happens 10 years from now. It literally takes 6
to 8 years to get a project through MnDot and the EIS is the first step. It
takes 3 years for it right there. If we don't do it now, then it's going to
be pushed off.
Councilman Johnson: Tne main truck traffic coming into town into our
industrial parks and stuff is probably a lot of what will be relieved off of
TH 5. TH 5 can be more of the person traffic. While I don't like TH 212
cutting through and dissecting, as I call it, our town, I think it's a
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Ci%y Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
necessary evil that is going to occur and we need to control how it oocurs.
We'll be in a lot worse trouble if we don't go ahead ar~ map this and get the
mapping out and the EIS, as long as t~ say it's going to be a perm~ EIS
and the MnDot will continue to update it free once it's done, then every so
many years you've got to update it. They've agreed that t~ will ad
infinitum update it.
Mayor Hamilton: The thing I'm concerned about is we're going to contribute
now to the EIS, which has never ~n done before. Then when it comes time to
buy the right-of-way, MnDot's going to say well, the cities buy half of it or
something then we'll go ahead so we'll probably do that_ Them they'll say, if
you pay two-thirds of the road then w~'ll construct the thing.
Councilman Horn: Kind of like Lake Ann Interceptor.
Don Ashworth: You're talking about years from now. We made a commitment to
TH 212. One of the ways we've gotten support, Eden Prairie, Chaska for our TH
5 improvements is by settling the buying program. We really believe TH 5 is
going to happeD, We're putting our group back together to make sure that it
continues that process. At this point to start saying that we're going to
start separating issues and support TH 5 and not support TH 212, I think we're
really going to be shooting ourselves in the foot.
Councilman Geving: It's a continuation of something we started 10 years ago.
I was involved 10 years ago and I don't think we can let this go. I think we
have to make this investment.
Mayor Hamilton: The thing we really can't do is let TH 5 go. If we say the
heck with TH 212, we're going to put all our marbles into TH ~ That to me is
more...
councilman Johnson: Unfortunately we' re on our own then.
councilman Horn: That's right.
councilman Johnson: When we do that, forget aid from Carver County. They
want TH 212. We want TH 5.
Councilman Geving: It' s tough. I hate to spend $30,000.00.
councilman Johnson: That's really cheap.
councilman Geving moved, Mayor Hamilton seconded to authorize the $30,000.00
to be expended over the next two year timeframe 1988/1989 budget for
Chanhassen's contribution to the Environmental Impact Statement. All voted in
favor and motion carried.
Barbara []ac-y: The second item is the resolution that this establishes the
City's recognition of the need that we r._~ to initiate the official map
process and establish proposed deadline of September L Why there is a
deadline is that each of the communities is establishing one so we can show
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City Council Meeting - February 23, 1987
proof to Met Council and MnDot that we are committed.
Resolution #87-15: Mayor Hamilton moved, Councilman Horn seconded to approve
the resolution establishing the offical map process. All voted in favor and
motion carried.
Barbara Dacy: The last item, I hand delivered the paper yesterday. Clark or
Jay, I think I'm going to ask for your help on this. The committee from the
Coalition asked that each of the councils review and determine whether or not
the Council would like to send it out to their respective Chamber of commerce
business community and/or a designated person that would be kind of the TH 212
representative. Take a leadership role as far as informing the general part
of this.
Councilman Johnson: Do we want the 4 page version that is supposed to be just
coming out?
Barbara Dacy: I don't have it yet. I think we're going to get it.
Councilman Johnson: One problem I had with this, after just reading the first
page, the first thing they do is walk up, slap the guy around a little bit and
then ask for his help.
Councilman Horn: Tnat's the idea.
Councilman Johnson: It doesn't work too well. The wording is just too rough
to start with. I think we walk up and we give a good swift kick. I tend to
like to after we're all through somebody says maybe my pocket's been picked or
something rather than, if they shut off right away. I guess it's a little
late to start on this but they have their points pretty good but I think we
need to reorganize it a little bit to where you lead up to punching it out.
Councilman Horn: The meeting you missed, this was beefed up.
Councilman Johnson: You mean punch him harder?
Councilman Horn: Yes. The feeling was that it was too blaisee and nothing
was happening in all these years and we needed to put some punch in it to get
people' s attention.
Mayor Hamilton: So do we need to adopt this?
Councilman Horn: I think what we need to do, to say as a City that we agree
that this is what we want to distribute to the rest of the community as our
position.
Mayor Hamilton: It sure looked good to me.
Councilman Geving: I thought it read good.
Councilman Johnson: I would like to see the 4 page version.
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Council Meeting - February 9.3, 1987
ilman Horn moved, Mayor Hamilton seconded to approve tb~ position paper
from the Southwest Corridor Transportation Coalition to distribute to the
of Commerce and other businesses within the city. All voted in favor
motion carried.
PUBLIC SAFETY DIOR DESIGNATION PROCESS.
Mayor Hamilton: You have a memo in front of you from Don reviewing the
process that he would like to follow. Does anyone have any problems?
Don Ashworth: The question was how does the Council wish to be involved with
this? Remember last time the Mayor and I had reviewed the candidates and
brought back basically the individual selected.
Councilman Geving: I think we ought to see the last couple people. I like
the process but I think it ought to come to the Council and I would like to
see a timeframe on this.
Don Ashworth: You would like to see the Council interview?
Councilman Geving: Not interview. I~n not talking about the interview. I
just want to ~, when you get down to the last couple, I would like to see
it.
Mayor Hamilton: We should narrow it down to two and then bring the two before
the Council. Is that acceptable to everybody?
Councilman Geving: Yes. How about timing though? I wish we could do it
tomorrow. How many applications did you get?
Don Ashworth: The rec(mamandations will be for our first meeting in March.
I know one of my top candidates is gone through the last week of the month. I
may have to take that in and bring it in verbally on the 2nd.
Councilman Geving moved, Councilman Horn seconded to adjourn the meeting. All
voted in favor and motion carried. The meeting was adjourned at 12:~ a~..
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