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CC Minutes 2002 08 26CHANHASSEN CITY COUNCIL REGULAR MEETING AUGUST 26, 2002 Mayor Jansen called the meeting to order at 7:00 p.m. The meeting was opened with the Pledge to the Flag. COUNCILMEMBERS PRESENT: Mayor Jansen, Councilman Boyle, Councilman Ayotte, Councilman Peterson, and Councilman Labatt STAFF PRESENT: Todd Gerhardt, Roger Knutson, Justin Miller, Teresa Burgess, Matt Saam, Bob Generous, Lori Haak, Todd Hoffman, Jason Angell and Bruce DeJong PUBLIC PRESENT FOR ALL ITEMS: Bruce Feik Debbie Lloyd Jerry & Janet Paulsen Brian Link Planning Commission 7302 Laredo Drive 7305 Laredo Drive 17569 George Moran CONSENT AGENDA: Mayor Jansen: All listed under the consent agenda are considered to be routine by the City Council and will be considered as one motion. If there is anyone in the audience that would like to have separate discussion around any of the items that are on the consent agenda, if you could identify those to us at this time, we could certainly do that. Good evening. Debbie Lloyd: Good evening. Debbie Lloyd, 7302 Laredo Drive. Item (e), l(e) was requested by the President of Sunrise Hills Association to be removed from the consent agenda this evening. Mayor Jansen: We will do that, thank you. Anyone else with an item on the consent agenda for separate discussion? Councilman Labatt moved, Councilman Peterson seconded to approve the following consent agenda items pursuant to the City Manager's recommendations: a. Vasserman Ridge, Lundgren Bros. Construction: 1) Approval of Final Plat; 2) Construction Plans & Development Contract b. Resolution #2002-73: Receive Feasibility Study and Call for Public Hearing for Extension of Utilities, Ashling Meadows Second Addition. c. Approve Easement Agreements for Trunk Highway 101 Trail Project No. 97-12-3. d. Approve Consultant Surveying Services Agreement with H.T. P.O., Westwood Professional Services, Sunde Land Surveying, and Otto Associates. City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 f. Approve Contract for Chapel Hill Academy Sanitary Sewer Realignment - Project No. 00-07. g. Approval of preliminary and final plat to subdivide 14.027 acres into one lot and one outlot and approval of a development contract for Halla Maryanne Addition. The site is currently zoned Agricultural Estate District and is located north of Creekwood Drive and west of State Highway 101, Don Halla. h. Approval of Bills. i. Approval of Minutes: - City Council Work Session Minutes dated August 12, 2002 - City Council Minutes dated August 12, 2002 Receive Commission Minutes: - Planning Commission Minutes dated August 6, 2002 j. Approval of Security Agreement for Matrix Development, Hidden Creek Estates. k. Approval of a One Day Beer and Wine License for Edina Realty Foundation. 1. Resolution /12002-74: Approval of Resolution Giving Preliminary Approval to Issue Multi-Family Housing Revenue Bonds. m. Resolution/12002-75: Approve Change Order No. 2, Chanhassen Library. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously with a vote of 5 to 0. VISITOR PRESENTATIONS: Debbie Lloyd: I'm sorry, Debbie Lloyd again. 7302 Laredo Drive. I didn't make that last question of mine very clear. We'd like it removed entirely from the agenda tonight. Mayor Jansen: It is. Debbie Lloyd: Oh, okay. Mayor Jansen: Completely removed. Thank you. Debbie Lloyd: Thank you. Mayor Jansen: Anyone else that would like to make a presentation to the council at this time? LAW ENFORCEMENT UPDATE: Sgt. Dave Potts: Good evening Mayor, council members. From the attachments the Sheriff's Area Report, citation list, the Community Service Officer info and Crime Prevention Specialist info. Any comments or questions regarding those items? Mayor Jansen: Any questions for Sergeant Potts? City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 Councilman Boyle: I have no questions. Sgt. Dave Potts: Okay, I didn't have anything to add on those particular items. Under miscellaneous for this evening, I just wanted to mention for the council's information. The search for a missing woman that happened back on July 26th, you probably heard about it in some media reports in the newspaper, that type of thing. What I'd like to draw your attention to is when an incident like this happens, what are some of the resources we have at our disposal. And this was first reported to us at 9:00 p.m. on Friday, July 26th. A woman that was missing from her home apparently had gone out for a walk, or something like that and due to some medical concerns, a larger scale operation was set into motion in attempting to find her. She was not found until early Sunday afternoon about 1:00 p.m. by family members. But in the process the search efforts in Chanhassen included assistance by family members of the missing woman, of course the sheriff's office participated. Chanhassen, Victoria and Shakopee fire department personnel assisted, as did the Chanhassen and sheriff's office and Shakopee fire department dive teams. The State Patrol helicopter and search and rescue dogs enlisted through aid of the Minnesota DNR. So it just, again highlights when there's a need out there and the call goes out, there is a lot of help that comes to Chanhassen or any other community for that matter through mutual aid and other public assistance that is out there. A successful conclusion. The woman was found alive and was transported to the hospital for further treatment so it ended on a positive note there. Mayor Jansen: Congratulations, and it is very reassuring to know that there are that many organizations working together when we do have an emergency like that so thank you for mentioning everyone that was involved. Sgt. Dave Potts: Thank you. Another item I was going to talk about this evening was the AMBER Alert Program. Councilman Ayotte asked about this particular program last month, that he had heard about. And the AMBER plan was something that was created in the State of Texas after the 1996 abduction and murder of 9 year old Amber Hagerman. Since that time regional and community versions of the AMBER plan have been created around the country. Minnesota is now 1 of 16 states that has adopted the program statewide. There is talk now in fact about using the AMBER plan to create a national network for locating abducted children. In Minnesota the AMBER plan has been put into effect through the combined efforts of the Minnesota Department of Public Safety, Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension, and Division of Emergency Management, along with the Minnesota Broadcasters Association and the Jacob Wetterling Foundation. The AMBER plan is a voluntary partnership between law enforcement and TV and radio broadcasters to send out emergency alerts to the public when a child has been abducted and is believed the child's life is in great danger. These announcements are similar to the emergency weather warnings that you might see on television or hear on the radio when you're out and about. When a missing child is first reported to the police, and the situation fits the established criteria, the agency involved notifies the Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension. The criteria includes a confirmed abduction of course. Somebody under the age of 18 years old. That the child is in great danger, and that there is enough descriptive information about the child, the abductor, the vehicle, that type of thing, that a public alert would perhaps assist in the case. The BCA in turn works with the investigating agency to gather the pertinent information, and then activates the AMBER alert plan through the Minnesota Crime Alert Network and the Emergency Alert System. At that point TV and radio stations are notified and asked to broadcast the alert once every 15 minutes for the first 2 hours, and then once every half hour for the next 3 hours, and then it's at their discretion to continue those announcements beyond that time. But what statistics and studies have shown is that when there is a real emergency in a child abduction case, 3 hours is kind of that window of opportunity where you're looking to have something positive or City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 a lead in the case develop. So with this kind of a plan, hopefully with the public being alerted so quickly, some good, solid immediate leads could come in and a child could in fact be found before any harm comes to that child. But just though being that that's an interesting program and new just coming on line in the State of Minnesota, council might be interested in that one. Comments or questions regarding that? Mayor Jansen: Thank you. Anything for Sergeant Potts on that? Appreciate the report on that. Sgt. Dave Potts: Okay. Two of the crime prevention programs I just wanted to mention for council this evening. First, National Night Out, as you know, was held on August 6th. Coordinated by Beth Hoiseth in crime prevention. Three deputies, including one of our canine deputies, Keith Walgrave and his dog Titan, along with members of the sheriff's mounted posse visited participating neighborhoods during that evening, and this year we had 16 neighborhood groups throughout Chanhassen participate, and some of those would host block parties while others would just have a brief social gathering and a visit by the officer and mounted posse group. And again another nice year for that. Participation was down a little bit this year, but we're looking at trying to do some heavier publicizing for next year and get our numbers back up. We feel that's a real nice program. We like to see people come out for that. Safety Camp. Probably one of our larger crime prevention programs, again coordinated by Crime Prevention. This was the sixth annual safety camp this year for kids entering the third grade. This year we had 81 kids involved in the program, held out at Lake Ann Park, with the objective being to bring children together for a fun day of hands on learning about safety on a variety of topics and interacting with law enforcement officers and fire fighters. The 81 children this year were divided into 6 teams, with a couple of team leaders assigned to each of those teams and we try to provide some of our officers and volunteer personnel to assist as team leaders and as presenters for the safety topics of the day. The day this year started with a bright and loud parade by a sheriff's squad, fire trucks and an ambulance, followed by some introductory comments by Sheriff Bud Olson. The teams for the day then rotated through their safety topics, and we only had a small issue with the weather. Some rain came through and interrupted a couple of our programs for the day, but we got through that. And the day ended with a canine demonstration and graduation ceremony with some comments again by Sheriff Olson and Mayor Jansen as well. So we appreciate the support we get from the city and I know being kind of a partnership thing, that crime prevention is grateful for the sheriff's participation and our ability to provide officers for that program. The topics for Safety Camp this year were fire safety, in-line skating safety, water safety and boating safety. And also a talk on remaining drug free by members of the National Guard who arrived, and left, by helicopter which is always a big treat for the kids to see that come in and take off. And Don Vannah, a motivational speaker and artist, who is also quadriplegic from a motorcycle accident many years ago. Inspired the kids by sharing stories about his struggles, triumphs and just his everyday life. Over coming obstacles and allowing the kids to see special abilities in themselves and demonstrating his own abilities as a mouth artist in drawing some pictures for the kids while he did his talk. Kind of a real eye opener for the kids and a touching moment for everybody. A State Patrol officer instructed the kids on bicycle safety this year and the kids had a chance to go through an obstacle course with their bicycles. So all and all we had a really good day, but we would like to mention that Safety Camp relies heavily on sponsorships and this year's Safety Camp sponsors were General Mills, Target, the Chanhassen American Legion Post 580, Chanhassen Lions Club, and Frankies Restaurant. And we try as much as we can to give them some kudos for their participation because it is a big program and of course like everything else it takes money so I'd like to thank them. And with that, comments, questions from council on those or other activities. City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 Mayor Jansen: Appreciate your mentioning those sponsors on the Safety Camp, and again our kudos to all of you for the effort that you put in on that day and I know I mentioned at the last meeting the amount of interest that you receive, not only in Chanhassen but you've gotten a reputation outside of Chan for an excellent safety camp. Sgt. Dave Potts: We do have participates from the surrounding area, and that's just kind of a solid note that we're out there doing something good so. Mayor Jansen: Which is excellent. And I don't recall if you mentioned to the council your own personal involvement, as well as some of the other officers that in fact you spend the day out, without your uniform working with the kids. Maybe sharing that with the council would be. Sgt. Dave Potts: Exactly. Well it's, I consider it a treat for myself to get all this gear off for a day, but I, as well as some of our other officers do participate as team leaders. We show up in our t-shirts and shorts, just like everybody else. Participate with the kids throughout the day, and they may hear somebody mention something about the officers or, but they're not paying a lot of attention until the end of the day, during their graduation when, in this case the sheriff mentioned did you realize that your team leaders were officers from our department, at which point we walk up wearing our uniforms and the wide eyes and the gasps from the kids who thought they were with normal, regular people and it was just, it's a real positive experience I think for the kids as well as for us so. Mayor Jansen: And having witnessed that reaction, it was really heart warming and I can only think that it makes such a positive impression on those kids for the rest of their lives to have interacted with a normal person who tums out to be a deputy and to know that they would then have a comfort level in approaching an officer. I just think could only be the most positive experience that they could have had at such a young age with law enforcement so. Sgt. Dave Potts: And one of the goals and objectives of the program so. Mayor Jansen: Which is excellent. Any questions or comments for Sergeant Potts? Councilman Labatt: The only one I had, is this, you're looking at reviewing the citation list and by beat, and I'm curious at all the boat and water ones, obviously those are ones that occurred on the lake but, and I don't know if in your record keeping system if we get a further breakdown of what those are, and whether they're inadequate life jackets or light violations or speeding violations on the lake. Is that possible? Sgt. Dave Potts: I don't know. It's a question that I would have to look into. Councilman Labatt: Okay. Sgt. Dave Potts: I don't know if they're just categorized under that one thing or if there is a way to break that down further. Certainly something I can look into. Yeah, a number of those where you see the county park ones, those are generally the water patrol people coming through. We do have separate park patrol on occasion as time allows, but because water patrol is in and out of the parks as well, they do some of that same stuff as they're coming in and out so it's kind of a combination. Mayor Jansen: Okay. Anything else? City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 Councilman Labatt: No, that was just the boat and water. I'm just curious as to what's happening on the lakes and what's being enforced. Sgt. Dave Potts: i'll look into that. Mayor Jansen: Thank you. Sgt. Dave Potts: Okay, thank you. STEVEN COHOON, 7525 BENT BOW TRAIL: A. PUBLIC HEARING ON VACATION OF DRAINAGE AND UTILITY EASEMENT. Teresa Burgess: Thank you Madam Mayor. The property owner at 7525 Bent Bow Trail has requested vacation of a portion of a drainage and utility easement by the City of Chanhassen. The existing easement, you can see back here on the back of the lot. The property owner's proposing to put in a pool and the pool and retaining wall would encroach upon the easement approximately 40 feet. The vacation of easement would eliminate the encroachment and staff has reviewed the encroachment and is recommending approval of the vacation. If there's any questions, I'd be happy to answer it. Otherwise this evening is a public hearing. Mayor Jansen: Okay, thank you. Any questions for staff at this time? Okay. i don't know that the applicant would care to make any comments on this item prior to our going into the public hearing, i'll certainly give you that option. Otherwise i'll just open this up for the public hearing. Okay. This is a public hearing, if there is anyone in the audience who would like to speak to this agenda item. This is the vacation of the drainage and utility easement at 7225 Bent Bow Trail. You can approach the podium to make comments at this time. Seeing no one, i'll close the public hearing. Bring this back to council. Council, any comments or discussion? If i could have a motion please. Councilman Peterson: Motion to approve. Mayor Jansen: And a second? Councilman Boyle: Second. Resolution #2002-76: Councilman Peterson moved, Councilman Boyle seconded to approve a resolution vacating a portion of the existing drainage and utility easement located on Lot 13, Block 2 of the Meadows at Longacres 2"a Addition as defined in the attached vacation description, subject to the following conditions: 1. Show all existing and proposed contours on the lot survey. 2. No building shall be allowed over the drainage and utility easement. Type iii silt fence as per City Detail Plate No. 5300 must be used along the north side adjacent to the existing trail. 4. Retaining walls over four feet in height must be designed by a registered engineer. City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 5. A fee of $50 is required to record the easement vacation. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously with a vote of 5 to 0. Be REQUEST FOR CONDITIONAL USE PERMIT FOR DEVELOPMENT WITHIN THE BLUFF CREEK OVERLAY DISTRICT; A 20 FOOT VARIANCE FROM THE 40 FOOT SHORELAND PRIMARY ZONE SETBACK; AND A 20 FOOT VARIANCE FROM THE 40 FOOT STANDARD WETLAND SETBACK FOR THE CONSTRUCTION OF A SWIMMING POOL AND RETAINING WALL. Bob Generous: Thank you Madam Mayor, council members. This property is located at the end of Bent Bow Trail. It's adjacent to a large wetland complex that serves as the headwaters for Bluff Creek. There's two parts to this. The conditional use permit is required by code for any development within the Bluff Creek corridor. Because this property's within that zone, we need to bring it through the conditional use permit process. It's fairly straight forward. We don't believe that development within the corridor will negatively impact the creek corridor and so we are recommending approval of the conditional use permit subject to complying with the 40 foot setback requirements, and the applicant providing some natural vegetation on this site. The second part of this is for a variance from the 40 foot setback. This is to facilitate, they have a retaining wall that's going in and then a pool area above that. The variance request is actually for 9 feet from the 40 feet, which would create a 31 foot setback from both the primary zone boundary and the wetland boundary. Both boundaries are the same line in this instance. The applicant has presented some alternatives to staff to help try to mitigate these potential negative impacts, including the reduction of the swimming pool width from 20 feet to 18 feet, and the installation of natural vegetation as a buffer around the trail area. While these improvements, these things would help mitigate it, staff still had difficulty finding positive recommendations for approving this and so we are recommending denial of the variance request. We have created an alternative for council if you decide to approve this, and that's the paper I gave to you. We missed, it's actually a 31 foot setback, not a 9 foot setback so I corrected that language. Just when we copied it we didn't do it, and that the applicant provide the native vegetation as a buffer. I should point out the applicant has proposed an alternative buffer plan which would have landscaping south of the trail on the wetlands side, and staff is recommending that any native plantings that go in be north of the trail to add as a filter for any water running down the hill and across the trail into the wetlands. With that I'd be happy to answer any questions you may have. Mayor Jansen: Any questions for staff at this time? Councilman Ayotte: Yeah I have one. Are we going to hear from Mr. Cohoon first and then we'll have an opportunity to ask questions both sides, or do I ask the questions? Mayor Jansen: Yes, Mr. Cohoon will have an opportunity to address the issue. So you can ask now or after staff. Councilman Ayotte: I'll start and then, what was the motivation? When I read the fact that you introduced a TEP, 15-17 July, in that timeframe. The reason for having that TEP brought in was what? Councilman Peterson: What's a TEP? Mayor Jansen: It's the Technical Evaluation Panel. City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 Lori Haak: There are two processes that are running concurrently with this project. It makes it a little bit tricky to understand. The first, excuse me. Let me back up. At the end of May of 2002 staff met with the applicant and indicated that if the applicant wished to pursue a pool, there were several options available. The first would be the variance process, and the second would be an appeal of the wetland determination made by city staff. So those are the two processes. The applicant chose to go through both processes simultaneously. And so the Technical Evaluation Panel is for the wetland appeal process. And that boundary that staff determined was reaffirmed on that July 15th TEP. So the net affect of that Technical Evaluation Panel is the reaffirmed boundary that was drawn by staff on the 29th of May. Councilman Ayotte: Can I state it to make sure I understand? Lori Haak: Sure. Councilman Ayotte: It's a validation of the wetland delineation. Lori Haak: Correct. Councilman Ayotte: What was the baseline wetland delineation document? Lori Haak: The original wetland delineation was done with the Longacres subdivision. Councilman Ayotte: How long ago? Mayor Jansen: 92? Councilman Ayotte: '92. Lori Haak: Early 90's, correct. Councilman Ayotte: What is the normal period of time for wetland delineation to alter given natural activity? Lori Haak: Typically we require new delineations every 3 years. Councilman Ayotte: Did we have every 3 years a re-establishment of the wetland delineation? Lori Haak: We wouldn't require a new delineation if no development was proposed. In this instance the delineation was changed by the interaction of the trail in the area. As we indicated earlier with the vacation, originally the wetland line had gone up above the trail easement. Councilman Ayotte: And the trail was introduced when? Lori Haak: '94 or '95. Councilman Ayotte: Why didn't we have, as a result of introducing the trail, knowing that the trail, or suspecting that the trail would alter the wetland delineation, why did we not introduce a new benchmark after the introduction of the trail? Lori Haak: The city did not install the trail. The trail was installed by the developer. City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 Councilman Ayotte: Nonetheless, if the developer installed the trail and we were not certain of the delineation, should it be the city's charter to identify what that delineation is irrespective of who installed the trail? Should we have required that developer to stake that delineation? Mayor Jansen: What I heard staff say initially to that question was that unless there's development, you don't just automatically initiate the delineation request. Councilman Ayotte: I heard that part but what I'm asking is if in fact, a trail is a development in my view. In my view, so it seems to me that the benchmark could have occurred back in the '94 timeframe which could have avoided what appears to be a rather lengthy sequence of events for a swimming pool. That you only get to use 3 months out of the year anyways but, it seems tedious is the point I'm making. Lori Haak: The delineation, it's really a judgment call at the staff level about the delineation. If the delineation appears accurate at the time that the trail was put in, a new delineation wouldn't have been done. A delineation wouldn't need to be done after the trail was constructed, and it's possible, haven't really explored it and I wasn't on staff at the time so I can't really speak to it but, it would appear that they would included those wetland impacts with the subdivision when the subdivision was approved. Councilman Ayotte: Okay. At the time that the development, that the area was developed by Lundgren Brothers, the wetland delineation required the developer to do things and for the city to do things. There's a trade-off. In other words, if the developer would not touch wetland areas, there would be a gain by the city and vice versa? Lori Haak: I can't really I guess speak to that. Potentially. Councilman Ayotte: Okay. How many other homeowners in the area have had a comparable experience to what we're talking about today? History wise. Do you have a sense of what that? Lori Haak: As far as other variances granted in the area or? Councilman Ayotte: Do we know, is there any other activity going into this area, into the wetland area? Lori Haak: Not that I'm aware of. Councilman Ayotte: Okay. So this is the only one. This is a unique situation? Lori Haak: Correct. Mayor Jansen: Well and I would want to maybe preface for staff that without the ability to research your question, you're receiving an answer on the spot. Yet given the opportunity to maybe go back and look, you might get. Councilman Ayotte: Well let me ask it again. Do you think there may have been, with all this going on I would think that we would have seen weather or not there was a template or a reference or other events in the neighborhood that would influence the decision making. As a matter of course you would look to see whether or not we've had other, so that's not an unusual question. City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 Lori Haak: No. There was a pool that was installed to the east of the subject property. It met the required setbacks and I'm not. Mayor Jansen: If you're looking for a specific, okay. Teresa Burgess: If I could address that. Councilman Ayotte, there's nothing as major as this pool that we're aware of. There may be some people that have encroached on the wetland but we're not aware of that because it is not to the extent. Councilman Ayotte: Unknown encroachment, okay. How much time do you think and how much cost do you think the city has put forth in dealing with this effort? I mean the cost of the TEP, number of your hours, direct reviews, so on and so forth. Lori Haak: It's difficult to put a number on that. It's been, the initial site visit was December 6th of 2001 when staff had been alerted of material on the trail and we became aware of construction of the retaining wall. Because the applicant has chosen to pursue two parallel lines, it's difficult to determine what is as a result of the variance and what is the result of the. Councilman Ayotte: Would it be safe to say it'd be over 20 man hours? Lori Haak: Yeah. Councilman Ayotte: Less than 100 man hours? Lori Haak: It's difficult to say. Councilman Ayotte: Could it be as much as 100 man hours? Todd Gerhardt: Bob, where are you going with this? Councilman Ayotte: Well what I'm trying to figure out is, we've, it seems to me that the ordinance and the procedure that we've employed, it's been cumbersome for staff, cumbersome for the resident. That's my opinion in reading through this document. That it's been a cumbersome process only because of the fact that it's an involved process, especially when you're dealing with a wetland where the boundaries move. So it's a difficult thing to enforce. Mayor Jansen: And I think you just hit the nail on the head. It's a complicated process where a wetland gets involved, and it does require certain procedures in order to evaluate that and what staff has shared with us is that there were two processes going on at the same time. A typical variance request does not take as long as a wetland delineation and getting a technical evaluation panel pulled together to review that. So that's the complicating factor here. So if we can move on to project questions. Councilman Ayotte: What I'd like to conclude with though is, it seems to me that with all the resources that have been employed to do this, that it's a difficult ordinance to enforce, that as a lessons learned thing, I'm saying from a future standpoint it seems to me that we may want to consider how we can deal with the issue of wetlands. That it's a difficult point, one. Two, my concern is with the cost of asking... Is it a $1,000 bill? Is it a $500 bill or what are we asking him to do in terms of being deliberate in what we're asking for? Do you have a sense of that? 10 City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 Lori Haak: Well that is something the staff is recommending denial of the variances. That's something that staff has added as an alternative for council, and that was suggested by the applicant so staff will be working with the applicant under the applicant's proposal and we've provided, staff has provided options and alternatives as far as vegetation that should be used within the Bluff Creek Overlay District, and those sorts of things, so that would be something that would be discussed and arrived at with the applicant. Councilman Ayotte: But we don't know if it's a $100 issue or a $1,000 issue? Mayor Jansen: It's something that the applicant in fact has offered to do, and staff is in fact then working with them on it. It was again in the give and take that's occurred on this project, it was one of the things that the applicant has offered to the city. Councilman Ayotte: No, I understand. Mayor Jansen: Were we to grant the variance as a give and take. Councilman Ayotte: I'll hold that question for Mr. Cohoon. Mayor Jansen: Okay. Councilman Ayotte: Okay, thank you. Mayor Jansen: Appreciate that. Any other questions for staff at this time? Okay. If the applicant would like to come forward and make a presentation to the council, I'm just going to ask that we keep that limited if possible to a 5 minute timeframe in that we do have the minutes from the Planning Commission meeting, and have had an opportunity to review that so any new information certainly share with us at this time. Welcome. Steven Cohoon: Thank you. My name is Steven Cohoon, 7525 Bent Bow Trail. Good to be here. Mayor Jansen: Good evening. Steven Cohoon: I'm going to try very hard to move as quickly as possible. That's my presentation so you can follow along and hopefully it will go very quickly. I have back-up if there are questions so this is a summary of the situation, but it is very complicated, as you've all noted already, and there is some new information that's been developed since the Planning Commission meeting, so we need to cover some new information. So, I've tried to organize this as effectively as possible. Basically I want to cover overall context, the background, some staff, the staff recommendations and conditions, some alternative conditions and a quick summary. I'm going to move quickly so don't be afraid to jump in, stop me if you have a question or I leave something out. Three related issues, we've already dealt with two of them. Thank you very much. The third one, the variance for the retaining wall, pool fence and pool apron, and of course relevant to all three is the wetland delineation, and we started to talk about how difficult it is, but first maybe you can share the objectives that we have. We obviously want to meet legal requirements as well as the intent of our wetland conservation code, and provide reasonable use of homeowner property. So, I had quite an education. I'll keep my education for you very short but I'd like to cover what is defined as a wetland. How the current delineation was defined. Some relevant data. A very quick summary of applicable city codes and there will be a summary, and the current situation of the site. Okay. Wetlands. It's defined in the U.S. Army Corps of 11 City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 Engineers Wetland Delineation Manual. It's also described in city ordinance 20-1, and summarized in the city publication, Revenge of the Green Pond Scum, which is in my background material if you want to refer to it, but basically all three say three criteria must be met simultaneously. Have wetland vegetation, have wetland soil, and you have water at the surface or saturation within 12 inches of the surface for 5 percent of the growing season, or about 8 days here in Chanhassen. Now we've had several site visits. Five site visits. In addition to that I've done daily monitoring of check sites established in April for the past 120 days. Those check sites are located relative to the proposed site of the retaining wall and pool. D is closest to 31 feet. C is the next furthest out. B at 50 feet. Check site A at 110. Again I have detailed data in the background if you need it. A summary of all the data.., is that within 110 feet of the retaining wall, nobody has yet detected the ground saturation within 12 inches of the surface at any time. In other words, the current delineation is based upon secondary factors that indicate at some point in time there was water somewhere. We have found occasional ground saturation within 12 inches of the surface beyond the 110 feet, and the headwaters of Bluff Creek, there is some surface water at about 120 feet. So, the process that we've had with the delineation has resulted in a conservative delineation that provides adequate protection for a wetland and/or water quality. We're very satisfied with that. Okay, so that's wetlands, and where we are relative to delineation. I'd like to move on to the city codes and talk about some things that have gone on. This is new material. It's not in the staff report. Was not presented at the Planning Commission. Basically in looking at applicable codes we have specific, distinct definitions for principle structures, accessory structures and landscaping materials. Basically it provides a very specific and separate, distinct usage. And it's important to know that there are distinctions because there's been a change in the applicable code. Section 20-406, Wetland Buffer Strips and Setbacks is a key part of the discussion tonight. Basically for this type of wetland, there's typically a 40 foot setback with a 10 foot buffer. As Bob was pointed out, the buffer and the setback are coincident. There essentially is no buffer in this case, due to the installation of the path. Supplement A of the City's code was effective until May, 2001, and specified the 40 foot setback to be applied to principle structures. No reference to accessory structures, so just city code distinguishes between principle structures in May, accessory structures were added in Supplement 14. This supplement was published in January, 2002. January of this year. It added accessory structures, and the current interpretation includes basically anything man made because the code identifies is going to be interpreted the word structure dominates, predominates the word accessory and principle essentially are how it should be removed to, for clarification. I have definition of structures also in the background, but it's basically anything man made. Some additional city codes. Section 20-904. Pool is defined as an accessory structure. Section 20-1183. Landscaping materials includes retaining walls, no permit required for those less than 4 feet high. So we have additional point of confusion whether or not the pool is initially included in a principle setback, principle structure setback. Also point of confusion whether the retaining wall was a structure or landscaping material, until clarified by the city attorney here 2 weeks ago. Teresa Burgess: IfI could clarify real quickly though. Even though a permit is not required for a retaining wall, it does require an easement encroachment agreement and this retaining wall is in the easement which is what we did prior to this item. Mayor Jansen: Thank you. Steven Cohoon: Yes. That's correct. So, the summary of what I discovered in the codes and I'd like you to hold with you is that the wetland setbacks have been revised since we purchased the property and built the home, and re-published since our project was initiated, and we've got conflicting definitions and requirements for structures, for wetland setbacks for accessory structures including pools and landscape materials. In our current proposal with the vacation of 12 City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 the easement, as you just approved, complies with ordinance in effect when the home was built and with those published when the project was initiated. So our current situation. As we just reviewed, there's no buffer strip. Only requirements under Section 20-406 is a 40 foot setback from the wetland's edge. Therefore under 20-406 we could landscape to the edge of the wetland. This is an average of 20 feet south of the path across 200 feet of path distance. About 4,000 square feet could be legally landscaped, which is today natural vegetation. The retaining wall by surveyor measurement is 33 ½ feet from the wetland boundary, and over 100 feet from the measured water saturation. I have a graphic here, to give you a feeling again for the situation then. We have conservation easements for the wetland. We have tree preservation easements. We have the path easements, and then we have the proposed site. These are disturbed areas that have been, due to access to the site, these areas are disturbed. I'll come back to that. Then of course this is the section I just talked about that potentially could be landscaped. Any questions about this? Councilman Ayotte: Okay. Point to me where, under paragraph 4. Correction. Under 3 where we would revegetate. Where you would revegetate. Steven Cohoon: The disturbed areas, this area is disturbed. These areas have been disturbed by access, and when we're done actually this whole section here will be one way or another because access to either remove the wall or complete the project will require disturbing this whole slope. So as the condition's written, it would essentially revegetate most of the rest of the back yard. I'll come back to description of that in a second. So moving on to the staff's recommendations and conditions. We talked about conditional use permit. You've approved that, thank you. We agree the wetland delineation will adequately protect our wetland habitat and water supply. We agree with the vacation of drainage easement previously approved. We are a little confused about condition 2 of the vacation of the drainage easement. We certainly intend to build in the vacated portion, so condition 2 is confusing to us. Stating, wasn't clear whether that's the vacated portion or the remaining portion where the drainage easement applies. Mayor Jansen: Staff, can you clarify that? Teresa Burgess: I guess I'm confused by the question. You're asking can you build in the vacated part of the easement? Steven Cohoon: Yeah, that's. Teresa Burgess: Once it is vacated it's no longer an easement and you can build in that. Steven Cohoon: Then condition 2 just states what's law. What's in city ordinance already. Teresa Burgess: Right, and that would still apply to the remaining portion of the easement. Steven Cohoon: Yes, that would be obvious. We don't agree with the new condition in the conditional use permit for revegetation. That's not supported by 20-406. Goes well beyond, in fact 20-406 only makes native vegetation optional in the buffer strip. This is all outside the wetland. The buffer strip and primarily outside the 40 foot setback. What the staff position, there's no hardship. Hardship has been created. The lot size and shape dictates where we can put the pool. Position of the path dictates using a retaining wall to provide clearance or observe the easement for the path plowing, and of course we have confusing and conflicting requirements among.., relevant ordinances. A little more detail on the condition. Like I said, 20-406 says no vegetation requirements. The proposed condition was native vegetation, and frankly this was not 13 City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 part of the proposal that we submitted initially, and this was not discussed with us so we were very surprised when we saw the staff report. Disturbed areas are a minimum of 28 feet from the wetland boundary. Majority are outside a 40 foot setback, and they represent approximately 50 percent remaining usable backyard. We think it represents an undue hardship to use of our property. Alternatively though, the section south of the path. It talks about 4 here. We propose to leave that in native condition. It's an average of 20 feet wide, 200 long. Over 4,000 feet, and frankly it deals with the major feature that affects wetland quality which is the path itself. As there's over 3,000 square feet of hard surface represented in the path on the property, and it has the major impact on wetland quality. So we've maintained that. Refrain from any future landscaping south of the path, and we offer to plant native trees as well to enhance the habitat. Summarize then our basis for the variance. At the time of house construction, 20-406 called for a 40 foot setback for principle structures only. At the time of construction it was sited as close to the street as permissible for side setbacks. There's a figure in the back-up material as well as in the staff report. The slope of the back yard precludes the pool siting in closer proximity to the house. The path location or related easement requires a retaining wall for the maintenance of path. At initiation of a retaining wall we called the building department. They advised no permit required under 4 feet so we initiated the project thinking we would follow up with a permit for the pool. Obviously we were in error at the time because of the easement. The drainage and utility easement. At the time of the staff review in November we were only provided Supplement 8, so again we didn't realize the application to all structures. So we started the project believing we were in conformance with applicable codes. And we were also looking at similar sites around the neighborhood at the time of the project initiation. We viewed two neighboring pools. Both are closer than 40 feet to surface water and cattail vegetation. There's actually two wetland sites in the pool that is on the property to the east of us, and wetland to the east of them is very close. It's within 15 feet of their fence, which of course is a structure under the current interpretation of 20- 406. We viewed 19 neighboring homes where the property is adjacent to wetlands. 13 of the 19 exhibit landscaping structures, retaining walls, fences, steps, play structures, walks within 40 feet of the wetland. So it's consistent with established practices in the majority of the neighboring homes. So moving on quickly here. I've used more than 5 minutes and I apologize for that. We have a very conservative delineation that provides for over 100 feet to the nearest detection of water saturation. We propose to maintain a 20 foot average substitute buffer beyond the requirements of Section 20-406, which will also act to mitigate the impact of the public path. We reduced the size of the pool so the pool itself by surveyor measurements will be outside the 40 foot setback. We've upgraded the pool cover to eliminate overflow. The new man made features, the retaining wall and the edge of pool apron are less than 10 percent of the surface area of the path, are further removed from the wetland. We believe therefore that again in terms of protection for the wetland, the path is the largest concern. And we have proposed to improve the habitat with the addition of trees. In terms of the second objective I stated beginning of the discussion, reasonable use of homeowner property. The project complies with and exceeds ordinance in force at the time of the property purchase and home construction. It complies with and exceeds ordinances published and made available at the time of project initiation and is consistent with established practices in neighboring homes. So, we'd ask you to consider and respectfully request approval of our variance to construction our pool, retaining wall and fence. Mayor Jansen: Okay, thank you. Steven Cohoon: Thank you. Mayor Jansen: Any questions for the applicant? Councilman Ayotte: It didn't state the depth of the pool. 14 City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 Mayor Jansen: You're joking, correct? Councilman Ayotte: Yeah, I'm joking. Steven Cohoon: Do you want to cover some of the background? Councilman Ayotte: You did say that you were in disagreement with what the staff wrote up on the alternate motion, and I didn't quite understand what point you were referring to. Mayor Jansen: If I could, I was going to direct that question to staff so that we can have them clarify the alternative vegetation. I think that will be the most helpful for us Mr. Cohoon. Thank you. Staff, whichever one of you would like to approach that question. I'm gathering the difference between the two vegetation areas that we're talking about is that the applicant had proposed their vegetation on the south side of the path, and the replacement and addition of the native vegetation is on the north side. Bob Generous: Yeah, that's partially it. I think that Steven's concern is that we're looking at requiring revegetation all the way up the hill because all of that area would be impacted with the construction activity. The machines coming down the hill, and we're really looking at one of his proposals for adding the buffer strip, which was on the north side of the trail. His plans show a nice example on the west side and the east side of his properties, there's existing native vegetation and we were looking at something that would connect to that but just adjacent to the trail area so that we would have this small corridor of more natural plantings rather than mowed lawn all the way down to the trail easement itself. Councilman Ayotte: That's paragraph 2 on top of page 4? Bob Generous: Yes that's. Mayor Jansen: Correct. For the conditional use permit. Bob Generous: Both for the conditional use and for the variance. Mayor Jansen: Condition 3 under the variance as well. Councilman Ayotte: It applies to both, that north/south and along the trail? Bob Generous: Pardon me? No, it's just along the trail that we're looking for the native revegetation. Councilman Ayotte: Just along the trail, okay. Bob Generous: And that's what we've worked with the applicant to come up with a final plan, but his original suggestion and we're working with that. Mayor Jansen: Okay. So possibly the confusion is how far into his property you're wanting to extend that revegetation. Do you have a distance in mind as you had looked at those original plans that, or where the vegetation is currently? So we could maybe more clearly find. Bob Generous: About 10 feet wide we believe that we're looking at that area. 15 City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 Mayor Jansen: Okay. Mr. Cohoon, can we maybe establish, is that more in line with what you would be willing to accept as far as that condition? That it's not impacting the full breadth of your property up the hill but. Steven Cohoon: That's much more reasonable, but the point I'm trying to make also is that the, if the concern is for the quality of the wetland, we need to address the impact of the path. And we're offering to address the impact of the path by leaving the whole 20 feet, 200 feet long south of the path in native format. We think that's more than adequate and reasonable. Frankly we're trying to imagine what it would look like, but we don't want, frankly don't want the look of the native vegetation going into a sodded area. We think that it would not be very attractive. And the way the trail divides it is very natural format today. Mayor Jansen: Okay, thank you. Lori Haak: If I might add a concern of staff is the maintenance of the trail and the affects of that trail maintenance on any vegetation that would be planted. It's not staff's intent that trees would be planted near the trail so that the roots could damage the trail in any way. In addition, the normal maintenance practices along trails include mowing and things of that nature so part of staff's concern about landscaping south of the trail would be those concerns. Mayor Jansen: Okay, thank you. And that would also be part of my question on the north side of the trail. Don't we have an easement for the trail? What distance is that? Is it 5 feet? Is it 10 feet where they're actually mowing? Okay, so typically isn't that native vegetation, is that what we're talking about is that buffer now for the trail would be 10 feet of native vegetation. It wouldn't be sodded by the homeowner right up to the trail. Steven Cohoon: It can be. Under 20-406 we can sod up to the wetland boundary. In fact we have sodded up to the edge of the trail and in fact a couple of my neighbors have... Mayor Jansen: Okay. So I guess that's what I'm asking staff. At this point if we have a trail easement that impacts the 10 feet on the north side of the trail, can't we already require that that have the native vegetation? Councilman Labatt: No. You're another 10 feet from center. Center of the trail. Mayor Jansen: But the segment that the city mows. Steven Cohoon: The easement provides that we can't obstruct 10 feet from the center line. It doesn't require that we cannot sod... Mayor Jansen: Okay, is that, that's correct staff? Okay, that's what I'm asking. Councilman Labatt: Bottom line is, right now with the new delineation if the Cohoon's want to, they could sod from the trail south out to the wetland. New wetland delineation, correct? Lori Haak: Well the confusion is that the ordinance does require a 0 to 20 foot buffer with a 10 foot minimum average. In this case because the trail, at that point I wasn't certain the distance between the actual delineation and edge of the trail. We had not had that surveyed yet so the discussion of staff and what was indicated in the Planning Commission report was prior to that TEP on site, so I didn't know precisely how far it was from the edge of the trail. So we weren't 16 City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 certain if the wetland went all the way to the edge of the trail, or somewhere inbetween and what maintenance would do. It's a long way of saying that there is area there that could be used as buffer. Councilman Labatt: Well let's just look at the drawing here. I mean the way I read this here, on the new survey dated 7/31, from the edge of the retaining wall to the pre-posted trail, you're looking at 34.8 feet of distance. Where the new delineation is noted. Councilman Boyle: But the issue is not south of the trail is it? Councilman Labatt: Well no, I'm just trying to figure, what I'm trying to point out here is, if he wanted to, he could now re-sod up to that new wetland. Correct? Lori Haak: With the current. Councilman Labatt: With the current delineation he could. Mayor Jansen: On the south side. Councilman Labatt: Okay if he wanted to. So, what he's saying, I'm willing to leave that native. Why wouldn't we just say great? That's the new buffer. Mayor Jansen: And we can do that. Councilman Labatt: Well, we're sitting here wasting all this time, my goodness. You know let's not. Mayor Jansen: I'm trying to make sure that we're clear on the condition that staff has in the report compared to what the applicant is asking for and we can go forward now because I think we've established what the difference is between the two. And that was the misunderstanding. Todd Gerhardt: Lori, you were going to add a comment? Lori Haak: Yeah, the only thing that I would add is that, the proposal that was reviewed by staff is what was in front of staff at the time. That was the proposed buffer that the applicant had proposed. This is something new that staff has not had a chance to review so I'd just like to make that clarification. Mayor Jansen: Okay, thank you. I'm going to go ahead and bring this back to council at this point if there are any additional questions for staff, certainly pose them at this time. Otherwise looking for comments so we can move ahead on the agenda. Councilman Ayotte: This is so convoluted, I don't have any more questions for staff. This is so convoluted however, in terms of being able to make a motion that's clear based on all the factors. I'm having difficulty with that. I thought I had paragraph 2 and 3 knocked down pat. Now I'm having a little bit of difficulty. Then we're providing clarification to point 4 then. That no vegetation shall be planted within a public trail easement. That's the point that you're bringing up Steve, right? Councilman Labatt: Well yeah. They are entitled to plant south of the trail if they want to. Correct Lori? 17 City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 Lori Haak: Outside of the easement, yes. Councilman Labatt: Outside of the easement, they can. Lori Haak: Correct. Councilman Labatt: So. Councilman Ayotte: So how would we rework paragraph 4? Councilman Labatt: I think what we do is, if you're asking me, and it's strictly myself. Mayor Jansen: 4 is also still talking about not within the public trail easement. Councilman Ayotte: Yeah, that's what. Mayor Jansen: Which is what Lori was trying to explain. Councilman Labatt: And that's 10 feet from center, right? Lori Haak: Correct. Councilman Labatt: Okay. Mayor Jansen: So I don't think that in fact inhibits the homeowner in what he's saying he would like to do as far as the native vegetation on that side. Councilman Boyle: Well it does because on north of the trail he's saying he would like to sod up to the trail. Am I not correct? Mayor Jansen: So that would be paragraph 3. Steven Cohoon: That's not a violation of the code. Councilman Ayotte: But that's what you want. Mayor Jansen: That's paragraph 3. Lori Haak: It's the second sentence in paragraph 4. The last sentence would have to be changed if council goes that direction. To all planting shall be installed south of the trail. Councilman Ayotte: And I think that would fix it if we just use south of the trail. Steven Cohoon: ... condition something like maintain current vegetation.., and native vegetation south of the path. Councilman Labatt: So you're willing to just let the area south of the trail be as it is right now? Steven Cohoon: That's right. 18 City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 Councilman Labatt: Provided up on the north of the trail you can sod up to the trail. Steven Cohoon: Correct. Councilman Labatt: And then re-sod all your disturbed areas with sod. Steven Cohoon: Yep, correct. Mayor Jansen: Council, any further discussion? Councilman Labatt: So it's just a matter of, on the TEP panel survey, there's a distance of 34.8 feet. Am I reading that right? From the wall to the closest point to where the wetland is. Or the trail or whatever. Lori Haak: I believe it says 33. Councilman Labatt: There's a 33.5, and then to the right of that is 34.8. Lori Haak: Correct. Councilman Labatt: So coming up with the 9 foot setback, where's that number coming from? Lori Haak: When I used the scale on this drawing, that's what I came up with on the southwest comer of the retaining wall. Councilman Labatt: Okay. Wouldn't he need a 6 ½ foot variance at that point then? Give him 33 ½. Bob Generous: If it's 33 ½, yes. Lori Haak: Right, but I came up with the 31 foot. The southwest comer which would be a 9 foot variance which is what is in the staff report. Mayor Jansen: So the staff report includes what you think is the maximum needed. And I don't know that we need to. Councilman Boyle: I have one area of confusion. Just real quick. Mayor Jansen: Okay, go ahead. Councilman Boyle: Supplement 14, approved in May of 2001. Published in January of 2002 added accessory structure and current interpretation, etc, etc. Supposedly this was added after the project was initiated, is that correct? Bob Generous: No. It was codified afterwards. It was approved and published prior to that with council's approval of the amendment. Councilman Boyle: It was published prior to January? Bob Generous: Yes, but we didn't codified it so we didn't have the new inserts printed up until January. 19 City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 Councilman Boyle: Okay. Councilman Ayotte: It wasn't available to the public per se, although it was in. Bob Generous: Well the ordinance was available, however it wasn't inserted into the code under a format that everyone's used to looking at. Councilman Boyle: So the applicant had no way to know this, is that correct? And possibly should have been grandfathered? Bob Generous: Well it was published. We noticed, as part of our public hearing process. Councilman Boyle: Well why didn't staff tell him of this then? Mayor Jansen: Okay, tell you what. I'm going to bring this back and call for a motion if I could please. I think we're very close and we're just hammering through some of the details of what's been a very complicated, long, drawn out process and I think we can simplify this by moving forward. Steve, you were taking some notes. Did you make an adjustment? Councilman Labatt: Yeah. I made a couple of them. I just have one more question on, and I promise my last one. On paragraph 2, all disturbed areas shall be revegetated. That paragraph. Have we addressed that issue completely to Mr. Cohoon? Steven Cohoon: I've... current native vegetation will be maintained south of the path and no future landscaping south of the path. Councilman Ayotte: No, that's paragraph 4. He's talking about paragraph 2 right now. Mayor Jansen: It's actually paragraph 2 under the conditional use permit. They're identical. Councilman Ayotte: Oh, I'm sorry. Mayor Jansen: So whatever you do to actually 3 you should do to 2. Councilman Labatt: Right. Well I'm just going to make those the same so I'm going to change them. Mayor Jansen: That'd be good. Councilman Labatt: Okay, so I would. I'll try to wing this here. I would approve, or move that we approve a conditional use permit 2002-3 subject to the following conditions. Number 1 stays the same. Number 2, that all areas north of the trail shall be resodded and the areas south of the trail shall be left in their present state. Mayor Jansen: Okay, do I have a second? Councilman Peterson: Second. Mayor Jansen: Okay. Any questions on the motion? Okay. 20 City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 Councilman Labatt moved, Councilman Peterson seconded that the City Council approves Conditional Use Permit #2002-3 to allow construction within the secondary zone of the Bluff Creek Overlay District in a PUD-R District for a swimming pool and retaining wall, subject to the following conditions: 1. The swimming pool and retaining wall shall maintain a 9 foot setback from the wetland. All areas north of the trail may be resodded and the areas south of the trail shall be left in their present natural state. All voted in favor, except Mayor Jansen who opposed, and the motion carried with a vote of 4to 1. Mayor Jansen: If I could have the next motion please. Councilman Labatt: Okay. I move that we approve Variance #2002-7 for a 9 foot variance from the 40 foot Bluff Creek Overlay District Primary Zone and a 9 foot variance from the 40 foot wetland setback for the construction of a swimming pool, retaining wall subject to the following conditions. And the new as amended one. Number 1 is a 31 foot setback instead of a 9. 2 stays the same. 3 will be changed to what I just said number 2. The area north of the trail can be resodded. The present state area south of trail will remain in it's current form. And number 4 will be that no vegetation shall be planted within the public easement, right and then all plantings be installed south of the public trail. South of the trail. Mayor Jansen: Okay, and a second please. Councilman Boyle: Second. Councilman Labatt moved, Councilman Boyle seconded that the City Council approves Variance #2002-7 for a 9 foot variance from the 40 foot Bluff Creek Overlay District Primary Zone setback and a 9 foot variance from the 40 foot wetland setback for the construction of a swimming pool and retaining wall, subject to the following conditions: 1. The swimming pool and retaining wall shall maintain a 31 foot setback from the wetland. The width of the swimming pool shall be limited to 18 feet and the width of the swimming pool apron shall be limited to 26 feet. All areas north of the trail may be resodded and the areas south of the trail shall be left in their present natural state. No vegetation shall be planted within the public trail easement. All plantings shall be installed south of the public trail. All voted in favor, except Mayor Jansen who opposed, and the motion carried with a vote of 4to 1. Mayor Jansen: And I will clarify why I'm in fact voting no. I certainly understand and I did speak with the applicant. I understand all the extenuating circumstances, and in fact on these wetland setbacks I do on principle stand fast with wanting to protect these buffer areas. It is a much larger development. There are other issues and requests that do come before us and we 21 City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 have seen a couple in this area. So I wish you well with your project and appreciate all the time and effort that staff has put in. That yourselves have put in. I know you did a great deal of research yourselves, and we certainly appreciate that. When our residents dig in and probably learn more detail than you cared to learn, but we do appreciate it and I by no means am trying to make an example of your project but it is one that on principle with these wetland setbacks that I appreciate that it's been passed but I had to vote no. But thank you. Appreciate your coming this evening and staying with the process with us. Steven Cohoon: Thank you. PUBLIC HEARING: REQUEST FOR VACATION OF A DRAINAGE AND UTILITY EASEMENT LOCATED ON LOT 2, BLOCK 1, KOLBINGER ADDITION, 7530 FRONTIER TRAIL, CHARLES STINSON. Teresa Burgess: Thank you Madam Mayor. Put north up, because I always think of north as being up. The property owner at 7530 Frontier Trail has requested vacation of an existing drainage and utility easement that runs east/west through the center of the property. This easement was platted with the original property. The property is currently vacate and the property owner desires to build on this lot. Staff has researched the need for the easement and finds no reason to retain the easement and therefore recommending approval of the vacation and the resolution for vacation. If there's any questions I'd be happy to answer it. Tonight is a public hearing. Mayor Jansen: Okay, thank you. Any questions for staff? For a change. I only had one and that was how the service was being provided to the lot that looks landlocked behind this, and I was assured that it's already currently receiving service so that isn't an issue. So with that, I think this one's an obvious. IfI could have a motion please. Councilman Peterson: Motion to approve. Mayor Jansen: And a second? Councilman Ayotte: Second. Councilman Peterson moved, Councilman Ayotte seconded that the City Council approve a resolution vacating the existing drainage and utility easement located on Lot 2, Block 1 of the Kolbinger Addition plat as defined in the attached vacation description, subject to the following conditions: The vacation description shall be revised to exclude the existing 10 foot front yard and 5 foot rear yard easements. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously with a vote of 5 to 0. Mayor Jansen: Moving on. Oh you know, I didn't open it to the public hearing, did I? Can I still open the public hearing Mr. Attorney? Roger Knutson: Absolutely. 22 City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 Mayor Jansen: Thank you. If there is anyone who cares to comment on this item, you are welcome to come forward to the podium still and do so at this time. I apologize for jumping ahead on this one. It just seemed so obvious. Jerry Paulsen: Jerry Paulsen, 7305 Laredo Drive. Mayor Jansen: Good evening. Jerry Paulsen: This is, I think you're going to get this as two parts of this issue. One is the vacation of the easement, and the next part is the construction of the house on the slope that is, exceeds the code as far as the shoreland requirements are concerned. I think that's the next step that's coming down the road. Mayor Jansen: Okay, thank you. Teresa Burgess: I can address that Madam Mayor, very quickly. This is a lot of record. The city is required to allow them to build on the lot. By vacating the easement it allows more flexibility in addressing the restrictions of the lot and since we do not have a reason for retaining the easement, it really is the city's responsibility to vacate this excess easement and allow the property owner to develop his property in the best manner available. Mayor Jansen: Okay, thank you. Mr. Knutson, do I need to call for a vote now. I'm going to close the public hearing. Do I need to call for a vote again? Roger Knutson: I think it would be a good idea. Mayor Jansen: Thank you. Councilman Peterson: Motion to approve. Mayor Jansen: And a second? Councilman Ayotte: Second. Resolution #2002-77: Councilman Peterson moved, Councilman Ayotte seconded that the City Council approve a resolution vacating the existing drainage and utility easement located on Lot 2, Block 1 of the Kolbinger Addition plat as defined in the attached vacation description, subject to the following conditions: The vacation description shall be revised to exclude the existing 10 foot front yard and 5 foot rear yard easements. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously with a vote of 5 to 0. Mayor Jansen: I apologize for my slip up. 23 City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 PUBLIC HEARING: REQUEST FOR A VACATION OF A DRAINAGE AND UTILITY EASEMENT LOCATED ON LOT 1, BLOCK 1, TRIPLE CROWN ESTATES, 820 PREAKNESS LANE, KEITH SCHERBING. Public Present: Name Address Keith Scherbing Mike Korth 820 Preakness Lane 6971 Nez Perce Lane Teresa Burgess: Thank you Madam Mayor. If we can zoom in a little closer on this one, it's on the back of the lot. The property owner at 820 Preakness Lane has requested vacation of an existing portion of drainage and utility easement, the 20 foot on the back lot. The property owner has an existing structure that is in this area that is encroaching on the easement. Vacation of the easement will eliminate that encroachment and therefore eliminate the need for an encroachment agreement. Staff has reviewed the easement and finds no compelling reason for retaining it and is therefore recommending vacation of the easement. If there's any questions I'd be happy to answer them, otherwise this is a public hearing also. Mayor Jansen: Thank you. Any questions for staff at this time? Councilman Boyle: Thanks for the reminder. Mayor Jansen: Okay, no questions for staff. This is a public hearing. If there is anyone present that would like to speak to this agenda item, please come forward at this time. Seeing no one, oops, sorry. Mike Korth: Mike Korth, 6971 Nez Perce. I guess I was just wondering, could you explain to me, does, this does not increase his lot size correct? Teresa Burgess: No it does not. What it is, is his existing lot size has, his existing lot has an easement over the top that was dedicated at the time of plat. It's a 20 foot easement. 20 foot easements are usually taken either when we have extremely deep utilities or when we need to construct a drainage swale. Neither of those conditions exist on this lot and if the property owner was to request an encroachment agreement, we would have allowed it. This is a cleaner method of allowing that existing structure to stay in place. To vacate the easement instead of requiring him to sign an encroachment agreement for the structure itself. Mike Korth: Can you tell me what the setback is for a side lot? Teresa Burgess: Planning would be able to answer that. Bob Generous: It's 10 feet. Mike Korth: How far is that shed from the side? I mean we're just going back here is what you're addressing. My assumption is because that's only 3 feet, 2 or 3 feet from the side lot, that that's going to have to be moved in. 24 City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 Teresa Burgess: If he does get this approved, he will be applying for a variance to the side lot or the back lot setback, and he will no longer need the encroachment agreement. He will still need a variance or he will have to relocate it to meet the back lot setback. Mike Korth: Okay. Mayor Jansen: Any other questions? Mike Korth: No. Mayor Jansen: Okay, thank you. Anyone else that would like to ask questions on this particular item. Okay, thank you. Now I'll close the public hearing and bring this back to council. Council, any questions? Discussion. If I could have a motion please. Councilman Peterson: Motion to approve. Councilman Boyle: Second. Resolution #2002-78: Councilman Peterson moved, Councilman Boyle seconded that the City Council approves a resolution vacating a portion of the existing drainage and utility easement located on Lot 1, Block 1 of the Triple Crown Estates plat as defined in the attached vacation description, subject to the following conditions: Limit the width of the easement vacation to 15 feet which would leave a five foot wide easement as current code requires. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously with a vote of 5 to 0. PUBLIC HEARING: APPROVE FEASIBILITY STUDY FOR INSTALLATION OF A SIDEWALK ADJACENT TO LAKE SUSAN HILLS DRIVE, PROJECT No. PW-191D. Public Present: Name Address Mike Auer Chris Deschneau Martha Newell Tina Schreur Stacey Johnson Terri Berg JeffYeager Debbie & Steven Fuhrman Wendie & Rick Ulku Jason Johnson Paul Larson Kris & John Sanders Jeff & Kristy Cook 910 Lake Susan Drive 901 Lake Susan Drive 9090 Lake Susan Drive 921 Lake Susan Drive 930 Lake Susan Drive 8616 Chanhassen Hills Drive South 1120 1031 1020 1071 1061 1100 8750 Lake Susan Drive Lake Susan Drive Lake Susan Drive Lake Susan Drive Lake Susan Drive Lake Susan Drive Lake Susan Court Teresa Burgess: Thank you Madam Mayor. The City of Chanhassen received a petition from property owners requesting installation of sidewalk. Or not installation, consideration of 25 City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 sidewalk on Lake Susan Drive. The sidewalk would have been placed on the north side of the drive, and the shaded area indicates the lots that it would have crossed. The city prepared a feasibility study over the summer months and included a cost estimate in the feasibility study, and assessment roll for the area. An improvement of this type would be assessed under the city's practices 100 percent to the adjoining property owners. The attached is a map, and the council has this in their packet as well. Of the area that would have been assessed for this sidewalk, had it been installed. Staff then sent out a copy of the draft feasibility study to the public specifically those properties proposed to be assessed. The City received back several comments and also a petition. The majority of the people that commented did object to the project for both cost reasons and also for concerns about a trail or a sidewalk in their front yard. Staff is then recommending that the feasibility study be adopted with the revised recommendation of denial. Staff will continue to work with residents in the neighborhood to address the safety concerns that originally raised the sidewalk issue. I do know that there are property owners that are still interested in pursuing a sidewalk. We will meet with the neighborhood in a couple of months as we go into the winter months we do a lot of those neighborhood meetings, and we'll discuss what the neighborhood wants to do. If they want to continue to pursue this as an alternative, however we are recommending denial of the current feasibility study and to look at it as an alternative at a future. We would revise the existing feasibility study at that time. If there's any questions I'd be happy to answer it. It is a public hearing. I would like to stress for everyone in the audience, the council has received all of the e-mails as well as the petition that was sent, and also received a summary of the voice mails that were received so if you have sent in an e-mail, the council has seen that. Mayor Jansen: Yes, thank you. Council, any questions for staff? Councilman Ayotte: Teresa, I'm sure this will have to go to Public Safety, but has there been consideration options, avenues considered other than the sidewalk to deal with the public safety concerns? And I would suspect time line wise that there's a certain sense of urgency because of school and so on. Teresa Burgess: Property owners have been made aware of Project Leadfoot. That would be one option. Specifically they're looking to address the availability of a safe area for their children, and also a safe walking space. The original request was a sidewalk to address that. We have lost the ability to get that installed yet this year. If we had had approval tonight, and authorization to prepare plans, we might have gotten it installed before snowfall, but doubtful. So we're into next year. Councilman Ayotte: What I'm asking, are there other options beside a sidewalk that have been percolated up to the people that know? I mean the residents can say what about this, what about that but has there been staff assessment as to what the options might be, other than a sidewalk? Teresa Burgess: This is a typical subdivision in the city of Chanhassen. It was developed with the intention that people would use the street as their mode of transportation to walk in, and we're seeing in a lot of those neighborhoods where they have busier traffic that they don't want to do that. They would prefer a sidewalk, but at the same time because of the way the development was laid out, and because people have gotten used to that expanse of green in front of their house, they're concerned about, first of all the cost because it is assessed back to them, and also the loss of area. It's a common concern. We struggle with it in many neighborhoods. In fact it's probably the root of the majority of our speed complaints. Councilman Ayotte: So we don't have an option at this point is what you're saying? 26 City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 Teresa Burgess: At this point we really don't have an option. We will meet with the neighborhood at a later date and see if they have any recommendations that we can address. I think a lot of those we do with a brainstorming session and open house and allow people to come in and percolate some of those ideas up for us and they live with it day to day. There are some things that we can do, but I hate to toss out solutions until I really understand what the problem is. Councilman Ayotte: So we could safely say that for the time being, for this season, for the fall, we couldn't put a sidewalk in anyways. Even if we said put one in, we wouldn't have the ability to do that at this point, one. Two, we can schedule during this period of time something I hope beyond simply a brainstorming session where we could bring in public safety and other entities to see what realistic options might exist. Teresa Burgess: If there's interest in the neighborhood, we really need that neighborhood involvement. It's pointless for the city staff to go forward without them. Councilman Ayotte: Oh I understand. Teresa Burgess: We could certainly get a sidewalk in, but it would require approval and authorization yet tonight for us to really have that happen. And I would be uncomfortable doing that based on the number of negative responses we received from the public. We really should be aiming for next construction season if we're going to do something. It is possible for us to do some of the low tech things that we could do yet this year, but at the same time we need to evaluate what really works for this neighborhood and if that's adequate for the neighborhood, what they're looking for. To go out there and do some of these things without really exploring it would a waste of time and resources. Councilman Ayotte: Has there been anything done with respect to analyzing how many children in the area? The issue with congestion in that portion of the street. Has there been anything done along that line? So we can quantify how big of a safety issue it is. Teresa Burgess: We have not done that. We usually don't count children. It's more of a neighborhood support issue. If the neighborhood wants it, it doesn't matter if there's only one child or if there's 40. It really is important that the property owners make that decision and they need to feel it's an important issue. As long as we have not had safety concerns that are raised by this city. In this case we have done speed counts. Traffic is moving according to the speed limit. They are well within what would be considered normal traffic patterns. We don't have a specific issue. We haven't had accidents that are, we haven't had any tragedies in this neighborhood, which hopefully will not occur. So there's nothing here to trigger the city to come in and force a project. Councilman Ayotte: No, I'm not saying force. I'm just asking whether or not there's been. Teresa Burgess: This is something the neighborhood really needs to decide and at this point they are requesting that it be denied based on the input that we've received to date. Councilman Ayotte: Okay, thank you. Mayor Jansen: Thank you. And you did mention that you have recommended the Project Leadfoot in this area. That is one vehicle that we have used as a community to help in some of these neighborhood situations with the traffic and the speeding, so what I'm hearing staff say is 27 City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 there are other options and alternatives to explore. They're not going to force the situation. It needs to be an open public discussion with all of the neighborhoods to come up with what in fact those options and alternatives can be. Before I open this to public hearing, obviously realizing we have a lot of folks here to speak to this. As Teresa mentioned, we have copies of all of the e- mails. I'm sure everyone has gone through the e-mails in our packets. Typically what we're looking for this evening is if you have any additional information to share with us, please do. If someone before you has well stated exactly what it is you want to get up and state, please rely on that person for having expressed and our having heard those points. So I would say that with the overwhelming pressure that we have at this point, and the polls from that neighborhood and the landowners to not do this sidewalk, we are going to be taking staff's recommendation and hopefully everyone will be able to come together and maybe come up with some of these other options and alternatives. So with that said I will open this up to the public hearing and anyone who wants to address the council on this issue, if you step forward to the podium. I need you to just state your name and address for the record. Thank you. Mike Auer: I'm Mike Auer, 910 Lake Susan Drive. Mayor Jansen: Good evening. Mike Auer: I've lived on this street for 12 years. I'm against the sidewalk, but I would like to recommend that, if you notice that Lake Susan Drive is kind of a shortcut or a comer between 101 and Lyman Boulevard, and some people choose to cut that comer with our street. And I disagree with the studies you say you've done about the speeding. I see people speed on this street almost every day. I think overall our streets are pretty quiet, but there's this idea that Lake Susan Drive is, has two uncontrolled intersections at it, and I'm suggesting maybe stop signs at those intersections. And possibly more signage. I think that would do a lot to alleviate the speeding and might give us a comfort level with walking on a street that we don't have today. Mayor Jansen: Okay, thank you. Mike Auer: Thank you. Mayor Jansen: Anyone else with comments to add? Tina Schreur: I'm Tina Schreur at 921 Lake Susan Drive. Mayor Jansen: You can pull that down, there you go. Tina Schreur: I'm against the sidewalk as well, and I'm for putting up additional stop signs. And also I don't know what it requires to reduce the speed in our neighborhood because I do believe that 30 miles an hour, when you're driving 30 miles an hour down our street does seem fairly fast. I think it could be reduced to 20. And also maybe a sign that people are aware that there is Children at Play. I've seen many neighborhoods with signs that say Children at Play. I think there's other, these options are to be much more, are to be way discovered before putting in a sidewalk in people's front yards. There's much more options out there besides doing that. I'm willing to pay for all the signs, whatever we need to do but I just, I truly believe that not everything has been brought out to the open to figure out how we can resolve it. Mayor Jansen: Certainly, thank you. And again I think as staff mentioned, the sidewalk was explored at this point due to a petition from the neighborhood to take a look at the sidewalk. It certainly wasn't something that the city instigated so, you know we reacted to the public request 28 City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 at that point and we've done the feasibility study but obviously now there are some other options as staff had said, that we can further explore and especially if what we're looking for are some of the answers to some of the safety issues. And that Project Leadfoot has been successful in numerous of the neighborhoods that have implemented that so that's at least a starting point. But just, you know there are obviously things that can still be worked through as far as options. You had a comment Teresa? Teresa Burgess: Madam Mayor, I've heard a couple people ask about stop signs. I just wanted to address that real quick. We, as the city of Chanhassen, are required to follow what's known as the Minnesota Manual of Uniform Traffic Control Devices. We do not install the traffic signage that does not meet that criteria, and we can certainly look at those intersections through Lake Susan, but if they do not meet the criteria outlined in that manual, we will not put up traffic signage. The other thing is the request for reduced speed limits. Those are done through the State of Minnesota. The DOT is the only one with authority to do that. We recently requested two speed studies. One was in, on Oxbow Bend, which has significantly tighter curves than Lake Susan, but is very similar in make-up, and that was denied. They have indicated that 30 miles an hour is appropriate there. And they have, I spoke at length with Ed Brown from the Department of Transportation and he stated that unless there is a condition such as a school or a park that indicates an alternatives, they do not support lowering a speed limit in a standard neighborhood. The other issue was Children at Play signs. That type of signage. Those are no longer recommended. It used to be a standard thing to do. Nationally there has been no indication that they provide any safety for children, and there's actually some concern that that type of signage provides a false sense of security. Parents then let down their guard and let children play closer to the road than they normally would, and so there is a movement to not install that type of signage. Chanhassen no longer installs Children at Play signs, unless it's adjacent to a park area or something that someone would be unaware if they did not live in the neighborhood. Mayor Jansen: Okay, thank you. Go ahead and approach the podium. Thank you. Martha Newell: Hello. Martha Newell, 900 Lake Susan Drive. I again am opposed, as my neighbors for the sidewalk, though I think there are alternative measures to be taken that we as a neighborhood, I think should get together at some point here in the near future. Myself with a 3 year old, I see the need for added safety and protection. Though one thought that comes to mind. I've been a resident in Chanhassen for just over a year now, and I too was saying well I haven't seen a speed limit sign on our road, not even knowing that there was a speed limit sign on each end of the roads, and it's mirroring each of the comers of Lake Susan Drive so, again it took me a year to recognize that there even was a speed limit sign of 30, which I, you know I think again is excessive. I would say that 20 to 25 is more in line with our needs of safety. So perhaps a request or moving the existing speed limit signs closer into Lake Susan Drive, as opposed to the outside edges may give a little bit of impact and awareness to people coming onto our street. Mayor Jansen: Okay, thank you. John Sanders: Hi. John Sanders, 1100 Lake Susan Drive. I was all for the sidewalk, and I guess I'm disappointed that so many neighbors are against it. I guess my question to the board is, when my wife first started going around the neighborhood for signatures to see who was interested in a study for this, she got more than 50 percent of the houses as required. And now all of a sudden so many people are against it. I've got to think that it's because of the cost. And I guess my question is, has it been discussed or is there anything saying how many years it would be assessed over. If it's assessed over 5 years, that would come to $30 a month, and maybe if people realized that, it might help them think along different lines. Is that a question you can answer? 29 City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 Mayor Jansen: Teresa, what's been proposed? Teresa Burgess: Staff typically recommends an assessment of $2,000 or more be spread out 8 to 10 years. That is a council decision. We typically bring those to you at the time of final assessment roll. If this project was being recommended we would be talking about that tonight... to pay off the principle either in whole or in part. And at 8 years it does come out under, just under $30 per month. The other option that property owners should keep in mind is what was proposed. Because we don't like to go up from assessment rolls, what we've proposed was a concrete sidewalk. This is conceptual and we took into account all of the things that would potentially need to be done. Going back and looking at putting the trail in an alternative location or going with asphalt instead of concrete may lower the cost of the project significantly. We also assumed that the driveways would be inadequate to support the sidewalk and that we would need to put in sidewalk across each of the driveways assuming that they would not be in good enough condition for us to cross. That typically is not the case. However we need to assume it for initial costing of the project, which could again lower the cost, although not significantly because that's a small amount. So we can work with neighborhoods. If cost is the issue, we didn't just hear cost was too high though. We also heard people didn't want a sidewalk. And that's why I'm recommending that we meet with the neighborhood and talk. It is common for these projects to be killed the first time they come through with a petition. That doesn't mean that we don't end up doing them. It just means that we need to meet with the neighborhood a couple of times and then re-evaluate what we want to do. In this case we had a petition asking specifically for sidewalk and we evaluated that issue and unfortunately it is not going to go under this petition. That doesn't mean we won't do something. Mayor Jansen: But now at least you have a basis for some of those discussions to maybe tweak it a little bit as you're saying, to make it maybe more palatable for the adjoining property owners and for those that would be assessed so potentially the project isn't 100 percent dead. But hopefully all the neighbors can get together and figure out, which of all of these alternatives are appealing to the majority of the residents so appreciate your efforts in having organized the initial petition to bring this at least to the neighborhood attention to maybe help organize the project. That's a positive. John Sanders: ...my wife. Mayor Jansen: Well, her efforts are appreciated and maybe look at that as a positive. You've started the discussions and now it's just a matter of staying with it and coming up with the right solution. This was just one alternative and maybe some of the research that was needed to be done in order to proceed with some sort of a project. John Sanders: I just wanted to make sure all the neighbors realized that. That's not a definite cost in one year's time. That if it's over 8 or 10 years, then we reduce the cost by using blacktop instead of cement, or whatever and it down to $12 a month, isn't that worth our children's safety for $12 a month or whatever. Something to look into at least. Mayor Jansen: Sure, thank you. Paul Larson: I'm Paul Larson, 1061 Lake Susan Drive. Mayor Jansen: Good evening. Paul Larson: This is Caitlin. 30 City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 Mayor Jansen: Hi Caitlin. Paul Larson: This is my child. Mayor Jansen: Who needs a sidewalk. Paul Larson: I'm, you know, I'm still for the sidewalk but there's also a lot of things that we need to do. Now I was going to mention those signs for 30 miles an hour. 30 miles an hour is the speed limit. It is definitely by all means not a recommendation that you need to drive 30 miles an hour. So what I'm urging is that we do something this year. My child's life is worth more than anything in the world. Okay, if it takes I mean, I stand out on my driveway. If I see somebody driving too fast, I very well let them know that it's too fast, and I'm sure a lot of people in the audience have seen me out there and/or have heard from me. I'm very vocal in the neighborhood and by the chuckles you understand. So what I need to do is urge that we do something. This is my child. IfI lose my child, there's no cost. Mayor Jansen: And perhaps you can help with coordination of the Project Leadfoot. That is a cooperation between the neighborhood and the city where we've involved in some of the speed studies, and you're involved in some of the, you know putting up signs in order to get drivers attention and it really. Paul Larson: I've got a post hole digger. I can put up the signs myself if need be. Mayor Jansen: Great. Please, they're a little simpler than that. Paul Larson: The other thing is. Councilman Labatt: Call Gopher State first before. Just call before you dig right? Paul Larson: The other thing is, I would like to urge that the Project Leadfoot and even the neighborhood meeting that we get that moving forward. I mean school's coming up and Lake Susan Drive is a short cut, like everybody says, for the high school. We have lots of teenagers who have their drivers license and they don't understand. In fact I've stopped several teenagers that don't understand the cost of a child's life. It's the most important thing and that's the most important thing that everybody has right here as far as I'm concerned. So we need to get it moving forward this year. That's it. Thank you. Mayor Jansen: Thank you. We'll make sure that the public safety people get a hold of you as far as establishing maybe the contact on the Project Leadfoot. Councilman Boyle: Did you say you're going to coordinate this, I mean this is obviously a neighborhood situation. It's no longer really a council situation. Teresa Burgess: No. In meeting with the neighborhood will require some desire from the neighborhood. We will certainly work with the people that actually initiated the original petition to see if they're interested in continuing forward. Councilman Boyle: But they shouldn't wait for you. They really need to initiate a meeting, do they not? Mayor Jansen: Well with Project Leadfoot, they in fact can proceed with that. 31 City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 Teresa Burgess: Project Leadfoot is a different process. Mayor Jansen: Yep. Teresa Burgess: Meeting with the neighborhood, we can do that at any time. I would recommend that we wait. I know there's always that, let's get to it right away because it's important but I would recommend we wait at least a couple weeks, just because we're doing this process and it's good to give everybody a few weeks to kind of cool down, and then we can talk about this with a cool head and what do we want to do to address this. Do we want to pursue a sidewalk? What are the issues that people don't want the sidewalk? And we can talk about it not from a, the council approved it, the council denied it standpoint, or it's a bad idea, good idea, but really from a standpoint of, okay this is a dead project. But let's talk about, do we want a sidewalk as a clean, separate project. And also, this petition, just because we're not approving a project tonight, is not a failure. I want to stress that for the neighborhood and for people that are considering doing these petitions. They initiated discussion. You have gotten your neighborhood together. They have talked to each other not just one but several times as they've gone through this process. They signed the original petition. They talked about it with each other. Do we want this? They talked about the feasibility study. We had people talking over the back of their fences, and there was a petition drive to object to this sidewalk. Not necessarily a sidewalk but this sidewalk, and that's a good thing. We've now initiated that conversation. We now have a starting point to go forward from, and so I don't want anybody that worked on this petition to feel like they've failed. They have started people thinking and talking about the safety issues and gotten them involved just by coming down here tonight, taking the time to e-mail the council. A lot of people don't do that and so you've started the conversation so it's a good starting point and I am certainly available. Matt Saam has left for the night but he is here also and he would be available if I'm not the evening that we want to set up a meeting, and either of us would be happy to meet with you and talk about some options that you have for your area and addressing your safety concerns, and what we can do from our end to help you to address those concerns. Mayor Jansen: And so as they're getting organized, and obviously we have a few people that I think will jump in and maybe act as coordinators we'll hope, they can contact you as far as getting a follow-up meeting set up with you in the next couple of weeks to continue to have these discussions, as well as pursuing the Project Leadfoot through the public safety department. Teresa Burgess: Right, and we really do need at least a week to set up those meetings so we can get notices out for people. We find this time of year, as we're coming into the school season, people need a week, week and a half to really get things on their calendar so we're really out that far even if we were to decide tonight we're going to have a meeting. We're still 2 or 3 weeks out before we could hold one because we need to talk about where and when and then get notices out to people so that they make sure that they get it on their calendar. Mayor Jansen: Okay, great. Anyone else? Councilman Ayotte: I got a quick question that might influence the public comments. Mayor Jansen: Okay, we've got one question for Councilman Ayotte and then we'll continue the public hearing. 32 City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 Councilman Ayotte: Is there a reason why we couldn't defer a decision on this and table it until more fact finding is done with respect to public safety options and possibly other sidewalk options? Mayor Jansen: We can always come back to this if this ends up being the option, but I'm hearing pretty overwhelmingly, this is going to be a different project when it comes before us again. Teresa Burgess: It's cleaner to close this feasibility study and open another one. We'll probably have the same project number and it will be A, B, C, but it's not uncommon, if you go back and look at our files, to find multiple feasibility studies. Mayor Jansen: Okay, thank you. Anyone else who would like to comment on this project, please come forward. Chris Deschneau: Good evening. My name is Chris Deschneau. I'm from 901 Lake Susan Drive. I have been in the neighborhood for only about 2 months now so I wasn't even a part of the area when it was the original study was set up. The original petition and I've even, some of the mailings that I've seen, even the petition that I signed against a sidewalk earlier in July, my name and all the records from myself and my wife are not even listed there so I just want to make sure that for the record that I am not. Mayor Jansen: You're on the record. Chris Deschneau: ... any of that so, and I was just, another quick question for, I don't know if it's for one of the staff members at all about, like if anyone in the neighborhood wanted to contact the State or the Department of Transportation about any of this, like how these studies are conducted, would we want to talk to you or do we just call the State or how do we want to... Teresa Burgess: There's a couple of places you can get information on speed studies. I have a brochure in my office if you want it. You can either call and I'll mail it out or you can stop in and pick it up and then we'll explain it to you and go through it with you and answer any questions. The other alternative, if you go to the city web site, there is a hot link from the engineering web site that's, as you go through the options, that goes to the MnDot web site and will give you the same brochure that I have in my office so it's up to you which way you want to go. The city web site is www.ci.chanhassen.mn.us. There's a lot of very good information, both on the city web site and on the MnDot web site, and if you missed that, feel free to give me a call tomorrow and I will give it to you again. Or if you want me to just mail out the brochure, I'd be happy to. I do have a limited number of them in print, so I do encourage people that access to the web to use it. Chris Deschneau: Thank you very much. Mayor Jansen: You're welcome, thank you. Anyone else who would like to comment on this project? Okay. I'm going to close the public hearing and thank all of you for taking time out from your evening to come in and talk to us about this project. To those of you who circulated the first petition as well as the second petition, we thank you for getting involved. I think one of the most encouraging things is seeing neighborhoods come together. Whether it's around something that you're opposed to, or that you're supporting, it's amazing how neighborhoods can pull together and actually get things accomplished so we hope that you keep these lines of communication open over the next couple weeks, over the next couple of months as we work out what options may be available to us. And I do encourage you to jump in and implement that Project Leadfoot. Getting a hold of our Public Safety Department and seeing if that's something 33 City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 that can have some immediate results for you. I think you are the type of a neighborhood and a situation that they would very readily apply that project to. But thank you for taking your time here this evening. I'll bring this back to council. Council, any comments or I will call for a motion. Councilman Ayotte: I'm going to make a comment. There are other things that can happen in a neighborhood and I think as Teresa also always does, is pretty accurate in her depiction of what we cannot do and what we can do. But for those individuals that are in the audience, for those individuals at home, e-mail your council. Give us your thoughts. Don't just use Department of Transportation as a source. I personally am not going for the sidewalk for other reasons, but I do know that ingress and egress to your neighborhood is extremely important so start communicating more with us to look for options for some of the things that you suggest. Let's identify the requirement and let the experts like Burgess and others come up with the solutions. So you can get involved and it can happen quickly. It can happen quickly so please understand that. This councilman wants to hear from you. Thank you. Mayor Jansen: If I could have a motion please. Councilman Boyle: I'd make a motion that we deny the request for the Lake Susan Drive sidewalk. Mayor Jansen: And we are accepting the feasibility report, or we receiving the feasibility report, correct? Teresa Burgess: You are adopting the feasibility report. Councilman Boyle: We are adopting, okay. And adopting the feasibility report. Mayor Jansen: Okay. And a second please. Councilman Ayotte: I second that. Resolution #2002-79: Councilman Boyle moved, Councilman Ayotte seconded that the City Council adopt the feasibility study and deny the request for the Lake Susan Drive sidewalk. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously with a vote of 5 to 0. Mayor Jansen: And the motion carries to deny the project, and all we have done is accepted the feasibility report so again, thank you for being here this evening and sorry it did get a little bit long on you with the other item that was on the agenda. Appreciate your involvement. PUBLIC HEARING: SUPPLEMENTAL ASSESSMENT HEARING FOR MSA IMPROVEMENT PROJECT No. 01-08 (PARK NICOLLET PROPERTY). Teresa Burgess: I'm sorry. I'm just trying to mop up from the last item. As council remembers, in June of 2002 the City awarded a contract for public improvements to Lake Drive East, Lake Drive, Audubon Road north of Lake Drive, Coulter Boulevard from Audubon Road to the Pillsbury property line, Saddlebrook Curve and Steller Court was eliminated from that project. The improvements included repair of failed areas, replacement of broken curb and gutter, milling of existing asphalt and installation of new asphalt. That project is currently underway and on July 8 of 2002 we adopted an assessment roll for the project. At that time the American Legion property had split into two lots and we adjusted their assessment during that July 8th hearing to 50 34 City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 percent of the assessment that was originally proposed for the lot with the remaining 50 percent to be applied to the new lot that had been created. Tonight's assessment hearing is for that new lot only, and it is a public hearing. There is only one property that is on the assessment roll, and that is Lot 1, Block 1, Park Nicollet First Addition. So if there's any questions from the council, I'd be happy to answer those. Otherwise I'll move out of the way. Mayor Jansen: Thank you. Any questions for staff at this time? This is a public hearing so I will open this for any comments from anyone in the audience on this agenda item. Seeing no one, I'll close the public hearing and bring this back to council. Just Teresa so we're clear, the amount of the assessment hasn't changed from what we reviewed originally. It's just being split between the two lots. Teresa Burgess: Correct. We took the assessment that was originally proposed and divided it into two equal amounts to go onto the two new lots. Mayor Jansen: Okay, thank you. Any questions or comments? IfI could have a motion please. Councilman Boyle: I do have one quick question. The Legion still says they're against it, right? Based on this letter. Teresa Burgess: The Legion has contested the assessment. There is a copy of their contention in the file. That is their legal right. They do have the right to go to District Court if they feel that the council's action is inappropriate if you adopt it tonight. It is in keeping with the assessment practice and also in keeping with what was done on the remainder of the project. And I would like to add for the council to understand, and for the public also, if this split had occurred prior to the original feasibility study, and at that time we would have added that parcel, it would have been assessed the same amount as everybody else instead of having a split assessment between the two parcels. Mayor Jansen: So it's actually less than it would have been from what you just said, correct? Teresa Burgess: Correct. If they had split 2 months earlier they would have received full assessment on both parcels. Mayor Jansen: Whereas now it's 50/50 of one assessment. Teresa Burgess: Correct. Mayor Jansen: Okay. Teresa Burgess: And that was based on advice of legal counsel that this was the appropriate way to handle it at this time. Councilman Boyle: Okay. Mayor Jansen: Thank you for clarifying that. Council, if I could have a motion please. Todd Gerhardt: Did we get public comment? Teresa Burgess: This is a public hearing. 35 City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 Councilman Labatt: Move that we approve the supplemental assessment roll for City Project 01- 08. Mayor Jansen: And a second please. Councilman Peterson: Second. Resolution #2002-80: Councilman Labatt, Councilman Peterson seconded that the City Council approve Supplemental Assessment Roll for City Project No. 01-08. All voted in favor, except Councilman Boyle who opposed, and the motion carried with a vote of 4 to 1. APPEAL PLANNING COMMISSION DECISION REGARDING A REQUEST FOR A SETBACK VARIANCE FOR THE RECONSTRUCTION OF A DETACHED GARAGE ON A LOT OF RECORD ZONED RESIDENTIAL SINGLE FAMILY AND LOCATED AT 6681 HORSESHOE CURVE, JEFF & JUDY KVILHAUG. Jason Angell: Thank you Madam Mayor. The request is for a 16 foot variance from the front yard setback, and a 5 foot variance from the side yard setback, and also to allow for a 29 percent hard cover surface. I have put up a location map here for you. Northeast comer of Lotus Lake Estates on Horseshoe Curve, and then also I'll just put up some quick drawings so you can see what is currently existing and what is proposed out there. As you can see the current location of the garage and then the proposal is actually to shift the garage on the south side of the property, and also deeper in on the property. The applicant and the architect are here and have some new information they would like to present. They have promised to keep it brief, and also I'll answer any questions you may have. Planning Commission is recommending approval on this item, and with that I'll give it back to you. Mayor Jansen: Thank you. Appreciate that. And as was just mentioned, the Planning Commission did approve this but not by enough votes so it is coming to us with a recommendation for approval. Good evening, how are you this evening? Brian Nowak: Good evening. Mayor Jansen: If you could state your name and address for the record please. Brian Nowak: Yeah, I'm Brian Nowak, 1735 Perkins Lane. I'm the architect for the applicant. Judy Kvilhaug: And I am Judy Kvilhaug, 6681 Horseshoe Curve and I'm the resident. Mayor Jansen: Good evening. Brian Nowak: We just wanted to go over a couple things quickly. The major hardships in the project are the topography. There's an 11 foot drop from the street to the house. There's an irregular shaped lot and there's only a 50 foot current width, which was the original lot that came into effect before the zoning came into effect. Currently the zoning is based on a 90 foot width, and part of the reason we're presenting is we felt that if we had maybe described this little stronger to the Planning Commission, they might have understood some of the reasons for the siting of the garage. When we looked at the house we looked at aesthetic concerns and safety concerns. And a streetscape. An opportunity to create something nice on Horseshoe Curve. Horseshoe Curve is an older lake neighborhood that was once was a lot of cabins. Has many garages right on the street so we were conscience of that. And what happens in a 50 foot lot, if 36 City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 we were to center the building or the garage on the house, it has dramatic effect for the Kvilhaug's and I've got two pictures I'd like to show very quickly. This particular drawing is what we're proposing to do that shows the garage. It's taken from a view just off the street looking at the house and the house adjacent to it, and there is a large oak tree in about that location. If we were to move the house towards the center, this is the same picture and you can see it virtually obscures the house behind the garage. And there's a couple of concerns there. Besides the aesthetics, safety concerns. Judy being able to see her kids playing up on the street area. Concern of having some section of usable front yard and centering the garage eliminates that. And the last item really is that there's an opportunity because the adjacent garage on the right side is on the opposite side, we create a nice green space and a view, a peak out onto Lotus Lake. Those are our reasons. Thank you. Mayor Jansen: Okay. Thank you. Any questions for the applicant? Okay, thank you. Appreciate it. I'll bring this back to council and as has been noted by staff and why the Planning Commission recommended this was that it does reduce the non-conformity on the side and the front yard setbacks as well as reducing the hard surface coverage percent. So though it is still a variance request, it's not uncommon for there to be a staff recommendation, as well as Planning Commission for the reduction of this non-conformity on the property. So with that I'll bring it back to council, if there's any discussion. Otherwise I'll call for a motion please. Councilman Peterson: Motion to approve. Mayor Jansen: And a second? Councilman Boyle: Second. Councilman Peterson moved, Councilman Boyle seconded that the City Council approves Variance #02-10 for a 16 foot variance from the 30 foot front yard setback, a 5 foot variance to the 10 foot side yard setback, and to allow the hardcover surface to cover 3,256 (29%) of the property for the construction of a detached garage including a home addition, with the following conditions: The applicant will submit a survey that shows the elevation at the edge of bituminous and a drainage swale between the garage and the residence. 2. A building permit must be obtained before beginning any construction. 3. Contact the building department for demolition permit requirements. 4. The setback must be measured from the eave to the property lines. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously with a vote of 5 to 0. COUNCIL PRESENTATIONS: Mayor Jansen: Are there any council presentations this evening? Councilman Peterson: The only question that I've got is talking about Lotus Lake. I know Minnetonka has put a no wake zone. We've had this discussion before. Todd's ears kind of perked up but he's not listening so. 37 City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 Mayor Jansen: Todd, this would be a good one for you to be listening to please, thank you. Councilman Peterson: No wake zone on Lotus Lake, or the other lakes. I mean we've got some of the highest water levels in years right now. I know it's the proverbial hard to enforce, but at least saying that we have it and letting the newspaper advertise it. Are we at a value to that? I've gotten one call. I don't know whether you guys have gotten. Councilman Boyle: I'm surprised we haven't heard more. Mayor Jansen: No, I haven't gotten any phone calls. Councilman Peterson: From what I've heard, it's the worst it's ever been. Mayor Jansen: It absolutely is. We have docks that are floating. But Lotus Lake, the last time this occurred, there were no wake signs that were put up at the public access. Todd Gerhardt: And they didn't last more than a day. I think we can do a PR article in the newspaper. Get something on our web site. There's a lot of residents that have visited our home page, and try to get the word out. But enforcement is the biggest issue and after Labor Day weekend, traffic on the lakes will probably go down with the exception of the weekends. Dave's not here. It would have been a good question to ask Dave. What water patrol is doing on enforcement of that. Councilman Peterson: Well we don't have it right now, active so they're not enforcing it, right? Todd Gerhardt: Well they can. It's an ordinance on the book. Councilman Peterson: But we have to declare a no wake zone and we haven't done that as my understanding. Todd Gerhardt: I don't think you have to declare it. Councilman Peterson: Well somebody in staff has to declare it. I'm not saying us. Todd Gerhardt: Yeah, it's whenever you go over the 100 year high water mark and there's a marker over on the east side of Lotus Lake. Lori goes out and verifies it so we can declare that and talk to Dave about enforcing it. If he happens to be on the lake that weekend. Councilman Boyle: I know it's difficult to enforce but I was on Lake Minnetonka Saturday and I have to admit when it said no wake, boy those boats, they were slowing down. And there's not a lot of enforcement going on either but they slowed down just from the sign. Todd Gerhardt: Yeah, I noticed there was Channel 5 had on their newscast, told everybody what the rules were and try to live by them. Mayor Jansen: Okay, why don't we go ahead and have Lori take a look at that and maybe contact the Villager as far as anything that they've considered possibly running. I believe a year ago when we were dealing with this issue, they did run an article, and it might just get people's attention. Enough to pay attention to it. Though the water levels are going down. Who knows how quickly though they'll go down. 38 City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 Todd Gerhardt: On Lotus it doesn't drain as fast as some of the other lakes. Mayor Jansen: Yeah. So why don't you go ahead and take a look at that. Thank you for bringing that up. Anything else? ADMINISTRATIVE PRESENTATIONS. Todd Gerhardt: Just to keep the council up to date on Boyer. We have a meeting tomorrow at 10:30 with the Watershed District, Water and Soil Conservation District, DNR and city staff and city attorney, and we'll be coming back with you on just a recommendations on how to handle that situation. The final plat was on for tonight, but due to the issues that went on there, staff pulled it off but we are up against that 60 day window and we need to take action before we exceed that 60 days so we want to place those conditions on that property. We don't want to miss out on that opportunity. But we definitely can make them put it back to it's original state at least and there will be more conditions probably after we look at it. Roger, did you want to make any comments on that issue at all? Roger Knutson: No. We're taking it very, very seriously as you would expect and we'll be meeting with all of the agencies so we can speak with one voice and remedy the situation as best you can after something as horrible has happened. Councilman Peterson: Was it arrogance or ignorance? Roger Knutson: Arrogance. Mayor Jansen: Pursue it strenuously. Thank you for as quickly as you did react and putting the stop work on when you did find that so. Councilman Labatt: How did staff become alerted to it? Todd Gerhardt: I think it was a call from the neighbor is what I was told. Mayor Jansen: You'd almost have to assume. It doesn't hurt to be aware of what's going on around you. Okay. Todd Gerhardt: Right. Another item, you will be seeing a site plan on the land next to Applebee's. You have a purchase agreement with a party on that and they are following through with that purchase agreement and will be making submittal to the City by the end of August for two restaurants... I did put a memo in your bin upstairs from Barry Pettit, the architect on the library project weighing out some concerns on the delay due to weather and trying to coordinate some of the poor soils that are on the site so, just wanted to give you the heads up. It's kind of a wait and see, depending on what kind of fall we have. We continue to push the contractor to move ahead and make accommodations too so. Thank you for approving the Change Order. That will help in that process and moving that along. Get that utility work, complete the footings on the north end of the building. If you look out there, there's no footings on the north end, and that's to accommodate for the poor soils in that area so. And I will be scheduling another meeting with the council to talk about the coffee shop in the library sometime in September. Mayor Jansen: Okay. And maybe while you're mentioning the library, I don't think it would hurt to mention that during our work session this evening we did have Commissioner Siegfried join us and the question was posed by Councilman Labatt as to what exactly is going on with 39 City Council Meeting - August 26, 2002 some of these conversations that we're reading about in the Villager from our residents about whether the County is fully going to be funding and supporting the library once it's open. And based upon that conversation, the council and the, hopefully the County Board, will have some conversations about what the intent is and how we move forward with that project. Our part is obviously done once we have the building complete. We are concerned that they do their part and properly open it and fund it so we'll be having those conversations and appreciated Councilman Labatt bringing that up this evening. Todd Gerhardt: And that's another one of the concerns I have with the coffee shop. If we're not fully going to have operational of the library, that will affect the potential revenue that would come into that coffee shop so that's one of the concerns I have as we go down that lane. Mayor Jansen: Okay, very good. Anything else? Todd Gerhardt: No, that's it. Councilman Boyle: Todd, any update or anything new on the bowling alley? Todd Gerhardt: Nothing to date. We have a slight mold problem in the building as some of the roof leaks. We have a mold situation. We have gone in there with some bleach and tried to disinfect an area. As to potential buyers, we continue to talk to people. We do have another meeting, not set up yet but other potential retail users and if I run out of options here in the next couple of months, I may bring the EDA back to talk about other potential solutions to redeveloping the site. Councilman Boyle: Good. Mayor Jansen: Very good. Any other questions? IfI could have a motion to adjourn please. Councilman Boyle moved, Councilman Ayotte seconded to adjourn the City Council meeting. All voted in favor and the motion carried. The meeting was adjourned at 9:05 p.m. Submitted by Todd Gerhardt City Manager Prepared by Nann Opheim 40