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1f Approval of MinutesCITY COUNCIL MEETING NOVEMBER 16, 2000 The City Council' convened the meeting at 5:18 p.m. after the EDA meeting completed its business. MEMBERS PRESENT: Nancy Mancino, Mark Senn and Linda Jansen MEMBERS ABSENT: Steve Labatt STAFF PRESENT: Don Ashworth, Scott Botcher, Todd Gerhardt and Bruce DeJong FINANCIAL ADVISORS: Rob Tautges and Dave Mol, HLB Tautges Redpath, Mark Ruff, Ehlers and Associates, Ron Batty, Kennedy and Graven. PUBLIC PRESENT: Craig Peterson, Councilman-Elect, Robert Ayotte, Councilman-Elect, and Eric Sorrona and Melissa Gilman, Chanhassen Villager, and Mark Kroskin CONSIDER RESOLUTION INITIATING THE PROCESS FOR ESTABLISHMENT OF A REDEVELOPMENT PLAN FOR THE CONSTRUCTION OF A MAINTENANCE FACILITY AT LAKE ANN PARK: After discussion, there was a motion to adopt the. resolution passed by the EDA-tO initiate the process. Jansen moved, seconded by Senn, to approve the resolution initiating the process for establishment of a redevelopment plan for the construction of a maintenance facility at Lake Ann Park. All voted in favor and the motion carded. CITY COUNCIL WORK SESSION NOVEMBER 16, 2000 The City Council started the work session for the Tax Increment Financing information. Scott Botcher gave an introduction regarding the process that led us to this evening. The Council started analyzing the debt service back in 1999. We had Ehlers start a debt study and during the course of that study we realized that we had a larger problem with tax increment than anticipated. At that point we asked HLB Tautges Redpath to prepare some regarding the deficit in TIF District #1 at the end of that district's duration. Mr. Dave Mol presented four scenarios. He showed each one of the possible situations that we envision happening. Scenario #1 has the city defease for the maximum grant amount including the amount of grant estimated for each year and qualified debt on this scenario shows a deficit upon decertification of $4,030,000. Scenario #2 envisions releasing an amount of $2.93 million in the year 2001 prior to April 1st to the expenditures equal to the amount of increment to be received in 2001. That would leave a deficit upon decertification of $2,189,000 but that scenario is difficult to do from a cash flow standpoint. It would require selling investments and we are not entirely sure that would be accepted by the State Auditor's Office.- Scenario #3 envisions the City Council Minutes November 16, 2000 grant pool staying open for one more year - that the legislature would extend that program. We would be required to defease an additional amount in 2001 in order t° receive grant proceeds in 2002. This alternative suffers from the same difficulty as Alternative #2 in that it impacts cash flow and there is no guarantee that the grant program will be extended. Scenario #3 would leave us with a deficit upon decertification of $2,341,000. Scenario #4 was presented under the assumption that increment received after April 1, 2001, can be used to fund deficits that existed at April 1, 2001. That requires no additional defeasances but it is likely to be rejected' by the Office of the State Auditor. This option however would leave a deficit upon decertification of $964,000. The question is if we can rely on the commonly understood definition of expend as it relates to governmental accounting. A discussion followed Mr. Mol's presentation regarding the amount of money left in the grant pool and Councilman Senn talked about the option to refinance any debt that remains outstanding at that point in time or at some point after April 1,2001. That was answered in the affirmative that we can refinance that debt--it is general obligation tax increment debt so we always have the option to refinance as a general obligation of the City. Mr. Batty discussed likely responses from the Office of the State Auditor and discussed the penalties for noncompliance. They range from being forced at District Court to repay any monies that are found to be in noncompliance. If no settlement is reached at the County level or in District Court, then the Office of the State Auditor can forward the findings to the Attorney General for possible prosecution. The Attorney General is required to try to mediate any disputes and they also have the ability to determine reasonableness of any possible solutions. If the Attorney General does decide to prosecute, the prosecution goes to tax court and the penalty in tax court is that we would not be allowed to create any new TIF districts in the next five years. Mayor Mancino discussed what would likely happen to the growth and the tax base of the city during the course of that time to mitigate the amount of levy that actually shows up on the individual property taxes. She also discussed other alternative revenue sources. The meeting ended at approximately 8:00 p.m. Prepared by Bruce DeJong, Finance Director CHANHASSEN CITY COUNCIL WORK SESSION NOVEMBER 27, 2000 The work session was called to order at 4:30 to discuss the following 2001 Budget items with staff: IS Department, Fire Department and Capital Projects. COUNCILMEMBERS PRESENT: Mayor Mancino, Councilman Labatt, Councilwoman Jansen, and Mark Senn. Bob Ayotte, Councilman-elect was also present. STAFF PRESENT: Scott Botcher, Roger Knutson, Todd Gerhardt, Kate Aanenson, Bruce DeJong, Matt Saam, Karen Engelhardt, Rick Rice, Mark Littfin, Greg Hayes, John Wolff and retire members of the Chanhassen Volunteer Fire Department. 2001 BUDGET ITEMS Rick Rice discussed the IS Budget. Mayor Mancino questioned when computerized property information would be available for citizen use. Rick explained the timetable for implementation in 2001. Rick also discussed projects remaining for 2000 and the new 2001 projects that were detailed in the handout he presented. Council Member Jansen asked if other staffing options had been investigated before we recommended adding a new desktop IS person. It had been investigated and seemed to be a reasonable option given that hiring consultants is in excess of $100 per hour. Then training is required to get them up to speed on the software used in each department. Council Member Senn asked why the fees for service increase while we were adding a person and it was explained by Mr. Rice. Fire Chief John Wolff presented the operating budget for the Fire Department. He discussed the priority dispatching that they had expected a 10-20% decrease in the number of calls but because of the growth in the city, they only actually experienced a 2% decrease. They have had a good recruiting year and an excellent training class, but they have approximately 15% turnover in the department on an annual basis. They have to hire between 5-7 people each year just to maintain the department at current authorized staff.. He discussed the pension system that there was a study that the Fire Department was working on regarding compensation that was performed by DCA and it showed that they are completive on our total pension. We do have an issue because the State Auditor has determined that the deferred compensation plan is not authorized by state law. The city will have an actuary evaluate alternative financing possibilities for modifying the defined benefit plan for the Fire Relief Association. The Dive Team was discussed. The Fire Department has expanded the number of people on the Dive Team from 2 up to 10. There was a donation received from the Chanhassen Legion of $4,000 for new underwater communications equipment and $15,000 was included in the Capital Improvement Program to purchase other equipment for the Dive Team. Scott Botcher presented the vehicle list sorted by use, and discussed his philosophy regarding vehicle purchases. Scott noted that there is not much money to be made on the sale of any surplus city vehicles because you would sell the worst vehicles. Those are generally reaching near the end of their useful life and have little value. Council Member Senn commented that the policy should be to determine when we purchase vehicles versus when we pay mileage reimbursement. Council Member Senn also asked a question about what cash balances may be available to offset our TIF difficulties and which could mitigate the tax levy increase. Discussion of the budget ended at 6:20 p.m. Mayor Mancino called the work session to discuss the City Council agenda to order at 6:20 p.m. Kate Aanenson passed out a letter staff had received from Robert Boecker asking that his item, Request for Wetland Alteration Permit to Excavate a 100 ft. x 50 ft. pond into a Wetland Area, 610 West 96th Street, be pulled from the agenda. City Council Work Session - November 27, 2000 Consent Aeenda: d. Canvass Recount Election Results. Scott Botcher asked if the City Council members had any questions for Karen Engelhardt regarding this item. There were no questions asked. a. Receive FeasibiliW Reoort and Call for Public Hearing for Tanadoona/Doffwood Street and Utility Imorovements, Project No. 00-01-1. Mayor Mancino stated she was surprised at the large amount of money for assessments. b. Aoprove Eneineering Agreement with Bonestroo Rosene Anderlik & Associates for 2000 and 2001 Bridge Insoections in the City of Chanhassen. - Councilwoman Jansen asked that a "not to exceed" clause be added to the agreement. Ce Arvidson Addition, 6398 Murray Hill Road: Final Plat Aooroval and Aoorove Develooment Contract and Plans & Soecifications, Proiect 00-12. No questions were asked on this item. e. Aooroval of Bills. No questions were asked on this item. fi Aooroval of Minutes. No questions were asked on this item. g. AOorove Renaming Summerfield Addition to Summerfield 2"~ Addition. No questions were asked on this item. h. Aooroval of Lease with Ridgeview for Ambulance Soace at Lake Ann Building. Councilman Senn asked the City Attorney to explain the amount being specified for lease payment in the lease agreement and why Waconia wasn't being asked to help with the cost to upgrade the space in the maintenance building from cold storage to heated space. Scott Botcher stated Ridgeview's stance on providing service to the city and that the ambulance service would not be providing financial assistance. Kate Aanenson stated that staff has been trying to find an existing location to locate the ambulance service closer to the downtown area for some time without success. Mayor Mancino adjourned the work session at 6:30 p.m. Submitted by Scott Botcher City Manager Prepared by Nann Opheim CITY COUNCIL WORK SESSION MINUTES MONDAY, DECEMBER 11, 2000 Mayor Mancino called the work session to order at 5:30 p.m. MEMBERS PRESENT: Mayor Mancino, Council members Jansen, Labatt, Peterson, and Senn. STAFF PRESENT: Scott Botcher, City Manager; Bruce DeJong, Finance Director; Todd Gerhardt, Assistant City Manager; Todd Hoffman, Park & Recreation Director; Teresa Burgess, Public Works Director; Rick Rice, IS Coordinator; John Wolff, Fire Chief OTHERS PRESENT: Len Simich, Southwest Metro Transit; Melissa Gillman, Chanhassen Villager BUCK'S UNPAINTED FURNITURE: Scott Botcher stated that the City Attorney had given an opinion regarding the inclusion of Buck's Unpainted Furniture in the All About Lights development in our TIF District. If they choose to locate in this district, the developer would lose eligibility for the remaining years of assistance that they would otherwise receive. TIF DEFEASANCE: Bruce DeJong discussed the TIF defeasance. The amount will be increased to $4.6 million to maximize the amount of the grant application next year. With the increase in values, increased increment is coming into the district. We raised the estimate of rate compression from $1.8 million to $2.2 million. CAPITAL IMPROVEMENT PROGRAM, 2001-2005: Linda Jansen brought forward the park and trail capital improvement items that were not approved in any of the prior CIP discussions. The following items are to be included (based on the September'8th memo from Todd Hoffman to Scott Botcher regarding the Park & Recreation Commission recommendation): Marsh Glen Trail Connector Skate Park Improvements Recreation Center Illuminated Wall Sign ' Tree Plantings New Park Signs Picnic Tables $68,000 $35,000 $10,000 $5,000 $4,000 $4,000 These items will be paid out of Park Acquisition Fund 410. The Council received an update on the costs for replacing the telephones at City Hall from Rick Rice. Len Simich provided an update on Southwest Metro Transit. John Wolff discussed the Fire Department and the need for more infrared cameras for better visibility at fire scenes. He also stated that he was comfortable with $15,000 for dive equipment. The laptop computers were deferred. The time frame for the 800-megahertz radio system was discussed. The Council discussed whether to move up the timetable for the water treatment plant construction. The Council discussed the overlay program for street improvements with Teresa Burgess. Bruce DeJong Finance Director SPECIAL CHANHASSEN CITY COUNCIL REGULAR MEETING JANUARY 11, 2001 Mayor Jansen called the special City Council meeting to order at 5:35 p.m. The meeting was opened with the Pledge to the Flag. COUNCILMEMBERS PRESENT: Mayor Jansen, Councilman l~abatt, and Councilman Ayotte. Councilman Peterson was present at 6:15 p.m. STAFF PRESENT: Scott Botcher, City Manager and Todd Gerhardt, Assistant City Manager. INTERVIEW ARCHITECT FIRMS FOR THE CONSTRUCTION OF THE NEW LIBRARY Borman Kroos, Vogel Group, Inc. started their presentation at 5:35 p.m. Leonard Parker and Associates, the second group started at 6:40 p.m. and completed their presentation at 7:25 p.m. Meier, Scherer and Rockcastle, Ltd. was the'third group to make a presentation. They completed their presentation at 8:25 p.m. The process used in 'interviewing all three candidates Was for each candidate to give a 30-minute presentation on their credentials and to discuss the dynamic challenges and possibilities for the development of a library for the City of Chanhassen. The City Council began discussion of the architect's presentations at this point giving their pros and cons of each presentation. Mayor Jansen moved, Councilman Peterson seconded that the City Council approve the architectural firm of Meier, Scherer and Rockcastle, Ltd. as the architectural firm for the construction of a new library for the City of Chanhassen. All voted in favor and the motion carried. The special City Council meeting adjourned at 8:55 p.m. Prepared by Todd Gerhardt, Assistant City Manager CHANHASSEN CITY COUNCIL REGULAR MEETING JANUARY 22, 2001 Mayor Jansen called the meeting to order at 6:40 p.m. The meeting was opened with the Pledge to the Flag. COUNCILMEMBERS PRESENT: Mayor Jansen, Councilman Labatt, Councilman Ayotte, and Councilman Peterson. STAFF PRESENT: Scott Botcher, Roger Knutson, Todd Gerhardt and Todd Hoffman Public Present: Name Address Debbie Lloyd Alex Bloomquist (Boy Scout Badge) Jeff Stewart (Boy Scout Badge) Brian & Kyle Kemble (Boy Scout Badge) Uli Sacchet Linda Landsman Steven Berquist 7302 Laredo Drive 960 Lake Susan Drive 8631 Valley View Court 1782 Valley Ridge Trail No. 7053 Highover Court So. 7329 Frontier Trail 7207 Frontier Trail APPROVAL OF AGENDA: Councilman Peterson moved, Councilman Labatt Seconded to approve the agenda as presented. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously. PUBLIC ANNOUNCEMENTS: None. CONSENT AGENDA: Mayor Jansen: May I have a motion for approval of the consent agenda please. Councilman Labatt: Motion to approve and deleting item (c). Mayor Jansen: And a second. Councilman Ayotte: Could we please give an explanation, a succinct explanation of why we're making that so people know. Mayor Jansen: If you'll make the second first please. Councilman Ayotte: I second. Mayor Jansen: We are pulling agenda item l(c), approval of police contract with the Carver County Sheriff's Department because we have substantiated that that was in fact already approved back in November as part of a council motion. So we have a motion and a second. City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 Councilman Labatt moved, Councilman Ayotte seconded to approve the following consent agenda items pursuant to the City Manager's recommendations: b. Resolution #2001-03: Accept Public Utility Improvement, Target Expansion, Project 92-5. e. Approval of Bills. Approval of Minutes: - City Council Work Session Minutes dated January 8, 2001 - City Council Minutes dated January 8, 2001 Receive Commission Minutes: - Planning Commission Minutes dated January 2, 2001 g. Resolution #2001-04: Approve Change Order for Lake Lucy Reservoir. h. Resolution #2001-05: Approve Resolution Designating Those Authorized to Sign City Checks. i. Approve Designation of City Auditors for 2000, 2001, and 2002. Resolution #2001-06: Approve Resolution Amending Procedures for Filling Commission Vacancies. k. Appointment of Randy Herman to the Southwest Metro Transit Commission. 1. Authorize Publication of Notice of Intent to Franchise Cable TV Service. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously. VISITOR PRESENTATIONS: COMMUNITY INVOLVEMENT, MINNETONKA COMMUNITY EDUCATION, DAN KUZLIK (POWER POINT PRESENTATION). Dan Kuzlik: Well good afternoon, or good evening. This is good evening. This is the second time over the last 6 hours I've been in the chambers here. For those of you who didn't know this afternoon Linda and Scott and other staff graciously hosted our mayors and city managers from around our school district to lunch today and so it was a nice chance to get in here and have a nice lunch. Thank you for that. And that's probably a good lead in as to why I'm here. Again, I'm Dan Kuzlik. I'm Executive Director for Education Services for the Minnetonka School District and we're just here to kind of show our face to you. We've got no hidden agenda. We want to talk to you a little bit about how we act with the 10 communities in our school district and if technology cooperates we even have a very brief power point demonstration to demonstrate to you that although you're 1 of 10 communities, you're a unique community and we appreciate that uniqueness. I think your Sergeant Dave Potts said how long will you be and I said welt, if the technology works about 15 minutes. If it doesn't work about 7 minutes with a little dance that I might do so we'll see what happens. Again you're 1 of 10 communities that either serve all or part of and although we are part of the school district, and of course anything legally controls our actions through our school board or elected school board, we also have a 25 member advisory council and if you know anything about community education in the State of Minnesota, it's a very sophisticated system. We are very fortunate to get resources and a number of categorical aids from either local levies or from state resources. And our 25 member council has a representative from each of the 10 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 communities. Here in Chanhassen your representative is Ann Osborn and you may see her face later on in our presentation, if the power point is working, but Ann has been with us for 15 years and for every one of those 15 years of course does represent Chanhassen. She's very, very dedicated. She makes things happen. When we're not serving her commUnity, she lets us know about it and I think over the last 15 years she's probably made every one except for about a handful of meetings, unless she's out of town so she's a very, very dedicated representative to Chanhassen. This afternoon, it's kind of unique. We didn't plan it that way, we said to Ann try to get us on the agenda of the City Council when you get an opportunity, but today at their mayor and city manager session we did talk, one of the agenda items was the joint powers agreement that we have with the 10 communities. That kgreement is 25 years old and it's served us well over 25 years but it probably needs some changing and the reason it needs some changing, it's kind of evolved differently among the different 10 communities we're serving right now. And we made it a point to bring that up as an issue today at the meeting and we've said that when we meet again in March in Deephaven, we're going to re-attend to that particular agreement. And we're going to be talking to everybody and I told Scott and Linda that they'd be getting a formal letter from us just identifying that we're going to be re-looking at that agreement and how we react. Quite honestly for your information, just briefly. I'm not going to get into a lot of detail. One of the things that that agreement calls for was support of a 50 cent per capita support to community education by each of the 10 communities and some of our communities we have a different relationship. Chanhassen is one of them. They nO longer support us at that 50 cent per capita. On the other hand they do come to us for services and we provide for example the lifeguard services at Lake Ann. And we do that on a contract basis and working with Scott and his people in park and rec too. So today we're just here to say hi to answer any questions and again I'm going to see if Ann can get that power point up. Is it yes or no? Okay. And what this power point is going to do again is to give you a little flavor. We're not going to narrate it. You're going to see captions. A flavor of what we do in all of our communities but a 'little bit of the uniqueness of what's happening here in Chanhassen too. A power point presentation was shmvn at this point. Dan Kuzlik: Thank you. When I asked how come the transition from Beethoven to that and she said it gives me the opportunity to say that we'll walk the extra mile for you so. Again, one of the reasons that we're here is to let you know we're very interested in working with the council. With your staff, park and rec and the city staff and if you can see some areas where we can be more productive or where we can assist with you and helping to deliver services, we want to do that. You should also know that we have budgeted this year to do a total community needs assessment with all of the residences in all of the cmnmunities that we serve so if there were some things that maybe we could partner in where maybe you wanted to find out some information or just after we did our needs assessment if you wanted to see what we learned, we'd certainly be happy to share that with you. Mayor Jansen: Yeah, that would be excellent. We actually have talked about doing a community survey ourselves so that would be very good for us to stay in communication with you on. Dan Kuzlik: Great. Well again I said I'd be brief and I promised the sergeant that he'd be on right after me in about 15 minutes so I'll just ask if there are any particular questions or comments and again to give an acknowledgement to Ann here because she's just done a great job of representing Chanhassen. Mayor Jansen: Thank you Ann. We appreciate it. Glad you could be here tonight. Councilmen, any questions? City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 Councilman Ayotte: Because I'm novice and I don't know, maybe I should. District 276. We have Chanhassen population, the student population represents what percent of 276? Dan Kuzlik: We had that number because. Ann Osborne: It used to be 50/50. About half of our city was in one and half was in the other. Councilman Ayotte: No I'm saying, of District 276. Mayor Jansen: Of your 10 communities. Councilman Ayotte: What's the percentage? Scott Botcher: You figure you've got 8,000 students, right? Dan Kuzlik: Yeah, we've got 8,000 students. Councilman Ayotte: Well if you don't know that's fine. Dan Kuzlik: I don't off the top of my head, I'm sorry. But we do serve either all of part of the 10 communities and of course our largest quite honestly is Chanhassen and the City of Minnetonka. We're about half of... less than half the city of Minnetonka. Mayor Jansen: Well thank you very much. Scott Botcher: And you all have been very, very good to work with and...the lifeguards and everything else. Dan Kuzlik: Well we'll keep in contact with staff. Thank you. Mayor Jansen: Thank you. Scott Botcher: Can I sneak in one visitor presentation? Mayor Jansen: Certainly. Scott Botcher: Just because I see these guys in the back. I'm an Eagle Scout. I don't know if anybody knew that and I see those gentlemen sitting in the back and I have many times offered my merit badge counseling. Your son's a Cub Scout, right Todd? My merit badge counseling expertise to some of the Boy Scouts. I guess I'd just like you all to stand up and introduce yourself and I'm glad that you're here. So if that's okay. Mayor Jansen: Thank you for pointing them out, certainly. Scott Botcher: I still have my uniform. It still fits. It does. Councilman Peterson: Your Cub Scout or your Boy Scout? City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 Scott Botcher: Yeah, but I think it's great you guys are here. That's not a Badger jacket is it? Thank you. I just want to make sure. Well thank you for coming. Councilman Ayotte: What troop are you guys from? Boy Scout: 337. Scott Botcher: Alright. I was 331 in Prior Lake. He's like who cares. Thank you. Mayor Jansen: Okay, thank you. LAW ENFORCEMENT AND FIRE DEPARTMENT UPDATE. Mayor Jansen: Welcome Sgt. Potts and deputies. Sgt. Dave Potts: I'll get my introductions done right away so these guys can get back to work. But as I've done in the past bring some of the new deputies in to just meet the council real briefly. And we have 3 out of the 4 that I had hoped to have tonight so I did pretty good. Mayor Jansen: Great. First I'd like to introduce Mike Felt right behind me here. Mike's been a police officer since 1998. Joined our department in April and as you know, towards the end of this last year here we bid shifts and added hours in Chanhassen so we've got a couple extra people and some people that moved onto promotions or other positions. We filled their slots and so I think we have 4 of our newer people working in Chanhassen now. And Mike is just one of the, he was working out in the western part of the County. He was in Chan. Went out to the western. The new people get bounced around a little more than the rest of us. But with the new bid cycle he endedup bidding a shift in Chanhassen here, working what we call the evening power shift. From 5:00 p.m. to 3:00 a.m., have I got that right? Okay. Next to Mike is Scott Tautges. Scott's been an officer since 1996. Worked for both Jordan, Clare City and also with Minnetrista is where we stole him from. We're real happy to have Scott with us now. He was hired back in April and again with the new shift bidding, bid his shift over here in Chanhassen. He works our p.m. shift which is a 4:00 p.m. to 2:00 a.m. shift. And next to him, our gentle giant, and we'd love to have him for back-up in our town now. Dewitt Meyers has been an officer since 1985. Has worked in North and South Dakota. Was hired here in September. He's one of our most recent hires. Kind of fresh off of field training and now working on his own. Works overnight shift or the dog watch here in Chanhassen now and I just want to give you a quick name and a face in case you have to call these fellows or talk to them at some point in time and if you have any questions or other comments for us. Mayor Jansen: Well I would say we look forward to seeing them around town but not on those shifts. Hopefully not. Really appreciate you gentlemen coming tonight. Councilman Ayotte: You did offer us an opportunity to ask a question. I know the Mayor was hoping I wouldn't but I do want to ask, I'm sorry sir I didn't get your last name. Mike Felt: Felt. Councilman Ayotte: Kind of curious. You worked here before. You left and you came back. What would you say is a significant difference from what you saw before to what you see now? I'd be kind of curious. City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 Mike Felt: Well actually I worked in the City of Chanhassen before with the sheriff's office. I did not come back to the sheriff's office. I worked in Chanhassen right after I did my field training program and due to other shift changes I was just moved out to the Watertown area. Then now recently I've come back to work in Chanhassen. Councilman Ayotte: What I'm asking though is have you seen, of a category, do you see more concern or less concern in certain categories or is it about status quo from when you were here before? Sgt. Dave Potts: I may have confused you when I talked about he was here and he left. This is in a matter of a very short number of months. He was, he started out when he was fresh off of field training, he was assigned to Chanhassen because we had that open spot here. And then they moved him over to Watertown because we had a more dire need to fill a spot there and in shift bidding he came back here so it's a very short period of time. Mike Felt: I can answer your question a little bit. I think it's just more of looking at a different focus just to the time of year. Frankly when I was here earlier, you know some of the larger issues that were trying to contend with at the time ,,vas the watering issues. Stuff like that. Now you know I come back and now it's in the middle of the winter...summer again, had some new issues. You know I don't think the overall focus is a good quality law enforcement. I've seen that...from other people in the community at all. Just some of the detail efforts, and that's always going to change on a month to month basis. Mayor Jansen: Thank you. Sgt. Dave Potts: Back to work. Okay, we'll start back at the top and following my memo to the council. On the sheriff's office area call report for December, I just had a couple of comments on that. If you look down at the bottom where it shows the total number of calls over the month it looks like there's a fairly significant jump there. A lot of that has to do with the weather. Traffic accidents. Cars in the ditch. All those sorts of things. Under boat and water it shows 24 complaints and what I found out in looking into that is those were snowmobile complaints, not boat and water complaints. And traffic stops. When we were getting ready for this year we actually started our new schedule December 18th. That added the additional people in Chanhassen that we xvere anticipating coming into this year so ~ve've actually had those extra bodies out there and because of that we've had some were officers, have had more opportunities to get out there and work some of our traffic spots so you might see that there's a pretty high number of traffic stops listed on this month's report and that is one of the main reasons that you see a jump. Also because of the snow and that, there were a lot of cars in the ditch. People locking their keys in their cars was another big jump for us but crime wise, we didn't have any big jumps so when you see that larger number at the bottom of the column there, it's mostly kind of weather related and having some extra people here and working some more traffic. That type of thing. Mayor Jansen: Thanks for pointing that out. Sgt. Dave Potts: I was going to say on the citation report, the only noteworthy thing I would point out there is you see roughly half of the tickets are for winter parking violations. So we've been hitting that hot and heavy as we pretty much do ever5, year. Try to keep the cars off the streets for the plows to be able to clear them real good. Any questions on either of those two? Councihnan Labatt: Yeah, I've got a question regarding to winter traffic, or parking tickets. How many of those go to warrants? You know the residents not paying and eventually they go into warrants. City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 Sgt. Dave Potts: Good question. I couldn't speak real recently. I'm just thinking back to when I was out there writing those tickets and working the street more and seeing the warrants come out. Far and few between would be my top of the head kind of response to that. They're typically taken care of by their fine or whatever. Councilman Labatt: I was just kind of geographically looking at it. They're all kind of you know centrally, there's certain pockets of the city where you seem to be getting more violations. Sgt. Dave Potts: Yeah, I haven't looked at that myself to make a differentiation between one area of the city or another. As far as where most the violations are. Mayor Jansen: Anything else? Councilman Labatt: No. Councilman Ayotte: A couple of questions. Last council meeting we had a gentleman come in from the snowmobile club and I had asked the question of him if he had any, I hate this chair. If he had any meetings with the sheriff's department. And he put the blame on, you know the weather wasn't what it was before. Well now seeing that you have, what is it, 61. 'What was it? Councilman Labatt: 24. Mayor Jansen: 24. Sgt. Dave Potts: Snowmobile complaints, is that what you're looking at? Councilman Ayotte: Yeah. Sgt. Dave Potts: Yeah, 24 for the month. Councilman Ayotte: 24 for the month and 61 year to date. Mayor Jansen: Those would include the boat and water from previous so. Councilman Ayotte: Well in that number do you see a need, would there be a benefit, and if the answer's no that's fine. Would there be a benefit to interface a little bit more with this club and would they be an asset to deal with in compliance or no? Sgt. Dave Potts: I'm personally not familiar with the club. I haven't had contact with them in my time here. I think they've had contact in the past with the sheriff's office and probably with our recreational patrol people. But not something that I've been involved in and when I heard that they'Were at the last council meeting, I read over the minutes and saw that they were here and heard what they had to say, I thought oh, this is some people that maybe I would like to talk to. So it would be a good thing for us to make contact with them. There was some mention of them assisting us in patrol of something like that. There's a lot of pitfalls in that but there are certainly things that they can do education wise. Councilman Ayotte: Maybe another posse or I don't know but, it seems to me it'd be an opportunity to have some words with them and see if there's a resource there to either. City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 Sgt. Dave Pons: Yeah, exactly. Councilman Labatt: Dave do you do any, these DNR grants for snowmobile enforcement? Does the sheriffs office apply for those grants such as Hennepin County? To hire off duty overtime deputies to patrol the lakes and trails. Sgt. Dave Potts: My guess would be yes because that's almost our entire water patrol budget comes from what we get from the State. So I'm assuming they would probably do that you know similar to the snowmobiles. Councilman Labatt: Can you look into that and see if the sheriffs applied for the 2000-2001 snowmobile grant. And if so, how much was the a~vard and then how the hours broke down. Sgt. Dave Potts: Yeah, I can look into that. I think you're aware that Doug Schmidtke was our recreational services deputy and he's not going to be moving onto the drug task force and Lance Pierce is actually already taken that over so he's getting up to speed and I'I1 see what he can tell me about it. I'll respond to the entire council on that question. Mayor Jansen: Great, thank you. Sgt. Dave Potts: Moving onto the crime prevention, safety education report. This is something that Beth will be giving to me on a bi-monthly basis and I'I1 just be inserting into...and any questions about some of those I may or may not be able to answer. On the work plan, it's I think at this point kind of self explanatory between the memo I attached and the work plan summary itself. The only thing for the new council members who may not have seen the original work plan, what I've given you here in the summary is an abbreviated version of the statements of the focus areas. I can certainly supply you with the full copy of the 2000 work plan, but the summary just gives you like the first sentence of each item and then a summary that I wrote up underneath that. And in a future council work session I'll be looking for input from the council on, for 2001 and at that time you'll get the full 2001 work, or 2000 work plan that you can kind of see where it was and hoxv it came to be. But any questions on that from the council? Councilman Labatt: Yeah just one more on conducting the liquor license compliance checks. And we as a council last year decided to have a second compliance check done. You've got here it will be conducted at the city's expense. I think there are available grants to do that. To cover that cost of doing that second compliance check. Sgt. Dave Potts: Okay. Mayor Jansen: That would probably be staff looking into that. Councilman Labatt: I think it goes to law enforcement agencies so. You know you can apply for all of Carver County and from my understanding in talking to the Director of that's available for thousands and thousands of dollars. Sgt. Dave Potts: You've mentioned a couple of different grants now and that just brought to mind that Paul Schmell was our main grant writer for the sheriffs office and as you know he's gone now to the St. Paul police department and they're utilizing him very well. But we lost that aspect and it hasn't been completely picked up. Bill Bennett still does the grant work for the Safe and Sober program. But City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 otherwise we don't have a specific person isolated or named to kind of be in charge of looking into grants and that kind of a thing. Councilman Labatt: This might be as easy as a simple application. I say grant to use that word loosely. There's available funding that might be just a simple request. Councilman Ayotte: And MADD is also, ifI can dovetail into that, MADD's also test betting some breathalizer applications. I don't know if that dovetails into your comments Steve but again if we can get on, that might 'be something to investigate because it really increases the conviction rate because it's got, from a litigatiOn standpoint, you don't have to deal with what you typically have to deal with with the 48 hour turnaround time and processing a DWI. So I can talk to you off line on that but MADD also has a testbit that ST. Paul Police is taking advantage of. Mike Jordan, their PIO has information and I'd be glad to send that information over to you. Follow-up question back to the traffic violations. I did a cursory review, I think it was 4 or 5 on Highway 5 and 41. That's either because we're not really congested there or that there's more opportunity for traffic violations. Do you believe that there's a correlation between more traffic violation activity and more patrols, or is that not necessarily the case? I'm kind of surprised that Highway 5 and 41 has such' a low number of violations. Councilman Labatt: ...Galpin and Audubon... Scott Botcher: You don't get a chance to pull through it. Councilman Ayotte: I'm just surprised there's such a limited number. Does that surprise anyone at the sheriff's? Mayor Jansen: Well and this is just one report so you're looking at an isolated timeframe as far as the report. Councilman Ayotte: Let me ask the question, can I find out whether or not there is a higher activity on Highway 5 and 41 with respect to traffic violations? Or is it a skewed view? Sgt. Dave Potts: Whether there's more traffic violations on Highway 5 and Highway 41 versus? Councilman Ayotte: Yes. Is that a hot spot in Chanhassen? In terms, of traffic violations. Sgt. Dave Potts: That intersection? Councilman Ayotte: Yes. Sgt. Dave Potts: Okay. When you see a traffic stop listed as Highway 5 and 41, it may or may not have anYthing to do with the intersection itself. That's just the location the officer called when he called in a traffic stop. They may have been speeding quite some distance west of Highway 41 on 5 and they were headed towards 41 and that's where the traffic stop took place so that's the general location the officer gave when he called in his stop. Councilman Ayotte: Thanks. Sgt. Dave Potts: Under the miscellaneous items. I mentioned that the council received crime alerts by e- mail. When we have contact with our Neighborhood Crime Watch groups, or we have an incident as we City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 did back around Thanksgiving and December with thefts out of mailboxes and we notified some of the block captains from our crime watch neighborhoods, we thought the council might find value in receiving those notifications. SO unless any of you have objections that you can talk to me about later, we'll be sending you all those notifications when we contact our neighborhood groups or put out a crime alert to the local businesses or something like that. Mayor Jansen: That would be nice information to be aware of, thank you. Sgt. Dave Potts: Well I know you get calls at home. You know people wondering about one thing or another. I thought it might be some helpful information for you. And I mentioned here Thanksgiving into December we had theft from mailboxes. A press release was picked up by the Chanhassen Villager to kind of let people know that number one, we have had some incidents of this and number t~vo, a couple of things they can do to hopefully not become a victim of that. A couple of those incidents, people were able to gain some bank account information and then do some forgeries on those bank accounts so that's the thing we wanted people to be aware of. The banks may not have been as diligent as they should in checking identification, those kind of things that could have prevented some of this. But to my knowledge the people who's mail was stolen were not held responsible for any financial losses related to this. The bank took the hit and filed a report with us that we're currently investigating a couple of those incidents. And then also I'd like to mention some of the more significant crime activities or that may look like crime activities on paper but there may be more to the story. And I have a couple of those just to mention quickly tonight. In our burglary numbers in Chanhassen, when a person calls in a burglary, that's what goes down on the statistics. It may turn out to be a little different. On January 6th, here about 3:30 in the morning, had a call of somebody trying to break into an occupied dwelling.. Very serious crime in progress when that's put out to our officers. The first officer on the scene was actually confronted by the suspect versus the officer confronting the susPect and this was a person who was high on chemical substances. Clearly not in their right mind. Believing they were in a different town at somebody's house they knew and they were banging on the doors and the windows trying to get in. So it looks very serious. At the time in fact it was a serious call for the officers as the officer wanted to see this person's hands. They were wrapped up with a shirt and when he demanded that the suspect show his hands, he held his hands in a manner as though he were holding a gun and we had what you might term a near officer shooting in that situation. Although the suspect was not armed and he was taken into custody once back-up officers arrived. Another point I'd like to make on this situation is when that first officer arriving was confronted by the suspect, he would not show his hands. He called for back-up and the question comes up from time to time, how much help or assistance do we have in Chanhassen. Well within a very short period of time we had a second Chanhassen squad on the scene. We had two sheriff's office supervisors on the scene. Two Eden Prairie squad cars and twvo Chaska squad cars so when we really need help it comes from all directions. Mayor Jansen: That's impressive. Sgt. Dave Potts: I just wanted to point that out. The last thing I mentioned here is a robbery, and I termed it of sorts. This was 3 young adults out driving around doing some drinking. A dispute arose about who paid for what alcohol and should have paid and who drank it and one of those people was pulled out of the car and his wallet was taken from him. So that was reported to us, and in fact is what we call a strong arm robbery. When somebody takes a wallet, a purse, what have you from another person, so that will go into our statistics as a robbery and investigated and perhaps charged out as such. But I just, those are some of the more interesting aspects of, what the stats don't always tell you. I just though I might point those out. But that's all I have for the council this evening. If you have other questions. 10 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 Mayor Jansen: Well I'm not positive which one of our agendas we have the 2001 work plan on but we certainly look forward to having that discussion with you and going through that information. Sgt. Dave Potts: Yeah, I don't think we have it scheduled but I talked to Scott about it. Scott Botcher: It will be in March. Sgt. Dave Potts: Put it on a work session and come in.. Councilman Peterson: Dave we shut down 5 last week for quite some time late morning. Was that traffic, was that incident weather related or do you recall? Sgt. Dave Potts: An accident at Highway 5 and Audubon. A 70 year old woman rear ended a semi truck I believe is what occurred and there were injuries involved in that so it'was shut down for a period of time. Councilman Peterson: Thanks. Mayor Jansen: Anything else? Thank you.. Appreciate you being here tonight. Then we have the fire department report. Greg Hayes: Yeah my name's Greg Hayes. I'm here on behalf of John Wolff. He spreads out his welcome coining to City Council. For 2001 the big change is me. I was elected Assisted Chief and I'm the only change that we're going to be making in 2001 as elected by the membership in December and I started in January. Mayor Jansen: Congratulations. Greg Hayes: Yes, thank you. It's kind of interesting. A little different. But John wanted me to talk about the fire board real quick. You'll see them come through here at different times. John Wolff's the Fire Chief. I'm the First Assistant. Mark Littfin, who's also the Fire Marshal for the City is the Second Assistant and Dale Gregory is our Battalion Chief so that makes out the chiefs within our organization so you see a lot of us out there. You'll see us in here too. We've got our 2001 goals set and we're working on them currently. They're over at the fire station right now working on some of our goals. And looking at 2000 we ran 717 calls, which is fairly high. It's within the top 3 out of 3 years. I think the 1998, that was our highest and that was due to some storms and that was only about 740 so we're maintaining well above 700. We had 19 mutual aid assists which is one of our higher years. And what a mutual aid assist is is when we go out to another community because they've called for a different, they've got some sort of issue. Fire, weather related, it can be anything. Some of the more notable ones were the hotel fire in Eden Prairie. We've probably been on about $10 million in loss last year alone in fires and none of it was our's. It was all outside so we had a very safe year and helped a lot of people out with some situations in their cities. From fire prevention, we had about 241 contacts with existing business owners. Going out. Talking to them about fire prevention and we had 584 with new construction. Going out on a job site and talking to them about fire prevention. Looking at codes. Not every time is an inspection. It just means we stop in and see how things are going. 2001, we're already way up for calls for the month. We're at 55 and we should be about 20. So for some reason we've seen a giant increase in calls over the first 3 weeks. We don't know what it is. It's not weather related. We're not going out On a lot of extra car crashes. It's kind of a puzzle right now until we can figure out what all the runs are from. 11 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 Mayor Jansen: So you'll be looking at those statistics and making that determination? Greg Hayes: Yep. Mayor Jansen: Okay. Greg Hayes: Yep~ and if we can adjust that through fire and medical dispatch, that's what we want to do. To keep our numbers down because it does provide for burn out when we're running that much for people. A couple of notable instances already within the first 3 weeks. We had crews down in Shakopee on the Murphy's Landing fire for 6 hours. We were provided with coverage from Excelsior for 3 hours and Minnetonka for 3 hours to provide coverage within our own city and we did have a couple calls during those times but we did have people down at Murphy's Landing. And then the call at 5 and Audubon last Friday was a lady who rear ended a semi and it was about 6:30 in the morning and we ended up calling in a helicopter for a transport. It took us about a hour to get her out of the car. She was awake, alert the entire time. And she was awake for the helicopter ride but in 35 years on the fire department, or 35 years the fire department's been in existence, that's the second time we've called for a helicopter so that suggests the seriousness. It shut down the highway for about 2 hours. So that was, if you were traveling east on 5 on Friday morning, that's what that was. Other than that that's the notable points that we had for today unless there's any questions. Mayor Jansen: Okay, any questions councilmen? Councilman Labatt: No. Councihnan Ayotte: Yes. 584 inspections. And when you go out there, what kind of value added ~vould you see in terms of, what did you discover? Have you evaluated that to get some sort of feedback as to what bang you're getting for your buck with respect to inspections. Greg Hayes: What we do when we go out on new construction is we meet with the job supe. We walk through and a lot of times, instead of writing up what they call violations or corrections, what we'll do is we'll meet with the job supe and we'll see what they're doing and a lot of times, at least from the fire side, there's a lot of changes that occur because of something that's come up in the way they've built it. And we've been able to alleviate a lot of questions at the end of saying okay, we had to build it this way and we had to redesign for example our sprinkler system because of this. In a certain area. So what we do is we meet and just talk over the issues. A lot of it from the fire department standpoint is, we want to know what the building is because one of it's most susceptible times is during construction. Like the apartments here... Councilman Ayotte: I understand but I'm saying, do you have anything that would depict impurically the value of your educating them and your avoiding problems down the road. Do you have any way of quantifying that for analysis? Have you come up with anything to. Greg Hayes: We do keep track of how many corrections or suggestions that we write. Other than that, that's as far as it has gone. Councilman Ayotte: Thank you. Mayor Jansen: Thank you Greg. Appreciate you being here tonight. Congratulations again. 12 City Council Meeting- January 22, 2001 AWARD OF BIDS: ROUNDHOUSE PARK PAVILION. Todd Hoffman: Thank you Mayor Jansen, members of the City Council. Tonight we're here to address the award of bid for the Roundhouse Park pavilion renovation. First a little history on Roundhouse Park. It's an 8 acre site located on, directly on Minnewashta Parkway. It's about halfway between Highway 5 and Highway 7. This area was labeled park deficient up until the time this park was acquired. As plats came through the development process, the City looked at acquiring property for approximately a 10 year period of time. The neighborhood was patient and yet they would have pi&erred to have seen this park go in sooner, but in my opinion the site which was eventually acquired right on the parkway with the access to Lake Minnewashta was the best site and well worth waiting for. The overall park plan depicts the 8 acres laid out in a rectangular fashion. The property is split by Minnewashta Parkway. To the east of the parkway is a narrow strip of land which has a public beach, and then a DNR granted fishing pier. This pier was acquired with a $30,000 grant from the Department of Natural Resources. It's a very popular feature of the park and is more regional in nature than neighborhood in nature as far as the park amenities. Then moving across the parkway to the western half or the mainland part of the park, it's really configured in qUadrants separated by a trail. A park loop trail which is very popular for afternoon walks, evening walks and just gaining access to the park area in general. There's a beautiful picnic area with trees that are left over from the original acquisition of the property. And then a play structure which was identified as the top priority during the neighborhood planning process that was undertaken 3 or 4 years ago. We have a large parking area. Large relative in terms of the neighborhood'park and that is to accommodate the beach and then all future amenities within this Site that you would not typically find a park, a parking lot that large in a neighborhood park. There's an open'skating area identified currently. The City floods that open skating area. A pad identified for future hockey at Roundhouse Park. The hockey boards are not there at this time. Moving across the trail from there is a path for a future tennis court. The city currently holds a policy of not developing tennis courts at neighborhood parks. They've very expensive as far as an amenity. But in the case of ROundhouse Park and North Lotus Lake Park, which are two locations isolated by lakes from the mainland of the community, the City has made an exception and has planned for future tennis courts in those areas. North Lotus Lake already has their tennis court. Traditionally you see us building tennis courts in community parks. They're a destination facility. Have a high long term maintenance cost. In the 70's they put these things in neighborhood parks everywhere and ended up taking quite a few of those out or paying high maintenance costs. The neighborhood elected to take out the volleyball court in lieu of and in replacement for that putting a 50 x 50 basketball pad which is in place...tennis court location, and then in the future when the tennis court comes in, that pad would be sacrificed and then you would see basketball standards go up as a part of the tennis court. Another change in how we developed neighborhood parks is that this location has simply an open play field and not a traditional ballpark. What you find when you put in the backstop and the aggregate infield and those type of things in these neighborhood settings, the organized leagues tend to take them and adopt them as their own and schedule practices in neighborhood parks. Something we try to prevent and we try to put those uses into our community park sites. Any neighborhood family gathering or neighborhood gathering can certainly play a game of pick-up ball in that location so it's just left as an open playfield area. And then lastly the round house itself is located in a prominent location near the intersection of Kings Road and Minnewashta Parkway. It was a home on the property. It originally served as a water tower along a railroad and then was moved to this location in approximately 1950. We think the date is 1948. When the park was acquired, land was acquired, in addition to this building there were two homes on the property. A rambler at this location and a farm behind it and then a 2 story home at this location. As a part of the development of the property those other buildings were demolished first through burning the structures with the fire department and then removing the foundations. And at that time the round house was set to be demolished as well. The commission held a 13 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 gathering out at the park. Came back to the council chambers and determined through at that time which was a split vote, that no we should investigate preserving and renovating the round house for a variety of reasons. First, it's a local landmark. It's not a historic structure but it is definitely an identifiable landmark. And I did not pay off Mr. Kuzlik to put that into his presentation. Ann Osborne: .... Lake Minnewashta. I walk by in the morning when I walk my dog and Roundhouse Park, you've got a picture of it. Todd Hoffman: There it is. So how many years have you walked past it?' Ann Osborne: 4 to 5 years but it's been there, I've lived there 28 years and it's been there the whole time. It's something that the whole neighborhood likes to have so, if that will help... Todd Hoffman: And then to turn into what's a park namesake. The park was named Roundhouse Park. But then to turn it into a renovated into a serviceable structure for the warming house in the winter, for the skating features which will be there. The hockey rink in the future and then the open skating area. Currently we put a, what would be a Satellite portable office there. Identical to the one you see here behind the City Hall. They're not very attractive. They're serviceable and the investment for the lease each year is about $2,000 to have that building brought on the site. Has a heater in it. No restrooms. We provide a portable restroom and then we staff that with an attendant for the winter. Staffing costs would be in addition to that $2,000. Councilman Ay0tte: Could you do that again Todd. Restate that portion. I didn't get all ofwhal/you said. Todd Hoffman: Okay. Currently, since the round house is not serviceable we park a Satellite portable office, identical to the one here at City Hall at a cost of about $2,000 for the rental each season. Satellite Corporation delivers that to a site. Provides the stairway. We hook up power to it and then our staff brings in the carpet, the window, protective window coverings and some of the other amenities to the structure. Benches and then we provide the attendant for the winter. So we do that out there today. So if the round house was refurbished then we would put the people inside this building with a furnace and have that act as the warming house. And then in the summer a couple of uses. Neighborhood parks benefit from a focal point. If the neighborhood was to, let's say a single family was to identify that third Saturday in June, they were going to have a family reunion here or a birthday party here, people would congregate or meet at the round house pavilion. They would have access to a key to the structure and they could set up their picnics inside that building and then in the case of inclement weather they could come in off of the picnic grounds and utilize that for shelter. So that would serve as a variety of needs in that arena. And then lastly, as a city we sponsor Summer Discovery Playground which goes out to the neighborhood parks on a weekly basis and those participants in that program which are about 20 or 30 children per week could utilize this building for their crafts, games and then also as a shelter from inclement weather. That's the background to the park. Any questions in that area before I move forward into the more detailed presentation about the renovation itselff Okay. Mayor Jansen: Go ahead, thanks. Todd Hoffman: This evening we have with us Wynne Yelland. Wynne is an architect with Locus Architecture. Wynne will speak and present really an overview of the findings of the preliminary investigation and then some of the work he did in the renovation of the architectural renovation of the project itself. And then we also have Mike Howe here from the Park and Recreation Commission and 14 City Council Meeting- January 22, 2001 Fred Berg's in the audience as well from the commission if they would like to speak to the project. In 1999 the City hired Locus Architecture to conduct a preliminary investigation and condition review of the round house. The round house, as a local landmark, had a lot of interest around it. We really just didn't know what exactly we were getting into that night that we said let's save the round house and see if we could renovate it. That report is attached and it brings to light valuable information which Mr. Yelland will speak to. That report estimated that an investment of $61,100 to $86,800 would be required to renovate the round house. Subsequently Locus Architecture was hired to prepare plans and specifications and to conduct biddings for the renovation of the pavilion. The City has received bids on two occasions for this project. The first bid opening was last September ~9th, which resulted in two bids. One of $145,769 and a second of $237,000. We had a third bidder who we thought was the low bid at the time but turned his bid in at the wrong drop off time so his bid was not accepted and not opened. We rejected both of those bids and a second bid opening was scheduled for December 6th of this past year. During the first bidding process several contractors identified possible asbestos and lead based paint concerns in the project. We wanted to make it fair for all bidders and also to identify those concerns for Our information so we hired Angstrom Analytical Inc. to conduct a limited scope asbestos and lead base paint test. Those results identified, the results of that test identified approximately 40 to 50 square feet ofilinoleum in the second floor bathroom containing friable asbestos or the bad asbestos. And generally that asbestos is locked in the mastic. The glue mastic underneath the tile and does not pose a hazard.., identified 5 exterior and 2 interior paint locations which exceed the lead based paint hazard threshold and generally the exterior has a lot of lead based paint on it. The results of those test were incorporated in the second set of bid documents which were distributed for the December opening. While both of those issues are a concern, the outside or exterior lead base paint is a much more significant scope than the asbestos in the tile. The second bid opening resulted in 4 bids. $119,372; $124,800 and $131,000. All which are all right in that, a tight bidding range, and then a bid of $183,060. The low bid of Mcon Construction of Hanover, they were the low bidder. All these bids are approximately 50% over the established project budget of $80,000. However it's my belief that the 3 low bids represent today's prices for completing the work identified in the plan and specifications. In other words, I do not believe a third bidding would yield significant different results. What I do believe happened is that our estimated project costs were estimated low and the extent of our plans and specifications went beyond what was thought would be the necessary work to complete the project back when the estimate was prepared. Obviously at those prices we took a look at attempting to lower the cost of the project to be closer to that $80,000. In conversation with the President of Mcon, the two most costly elements of the structure are the steel and the exterior painting. Beyond that individual line items drop to $3,000 or $4,000. So if you can try to imagine saving money on line items of $3,000 or $4,000, it's not easily done. Wynne and I discussed the merits of limiting the scope of the project in an effort to reduce cost. Wynne detailed those findings in a letter dated to me January 4th. It's in your packet. It's my conclusion that none of these potential changes yield enough savings considering their associated impact, it's negative impacts to the project to be warranted. The one we looked at specifically was instead of powder coating the steel, which is structural steel which would be incorporated in the project just to paint it, that we could save some significant dollars in that area but you're going to pay for those cost savings 15 or 20 years on down the line when that steel starts to rust in those areas and you have to pay for some expensive maintenance at that time. Which if you powder coated the steel you would not have to do. Other alternatives to awarding the project, first and most easily is just to go back 3 or 4, 5 years ago and tear the building down and demolish it. Take it out of the plan and incorporate some other structure onto the site. The second alternative, which we looked at early on in the project, would be to reject all bids and work with a local contractor, something I wanted to do early on, on a time and materials basis to provide a band-aid approach to fixing the round house. Back when we first started looking at this project I was intrigued by the idea of just hiring a local contractor to come in and fix it up. The problem with that, the maximum bidding amount that you could spend without public bidding at that 15 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 time was $25,000. If you invested more than that in a public project you were, public bidding laws apply. Today that's increased to $50,000. I still don't believe we could go work on a time and materials basis and make a significant impact to this project. So again we're back to hiring an architectural firm to come up with plans and specifications and then public bidding, which we've done twice to date. As part of your deliberation I want to update the council on the funding sources for this project. Back when the $80,000 goal was established, $40,000 was allocated from the 1997 park open space and trail referendum. And that was advertised in our referendum brochure and publications. And then a second $40,000 was included in the 2000, year 2000 park and trail acquisition and development capital improvement plan, CIP. At present the referendum neighborhood park improvement budget is carrying a $44,733 deficit. That deficit is due in minor changes to the scope of the other 25 projects were completed underneath that category. And that total budget of those 25 projects was $495,000. It is my recommendation to the city manager that the $44,733 deficit be covered by the park and trail dedication fund, which has a current balance of a million 7. Further it is the recommendation of the Park and Recreation Commission that the City Council utilize park and trail dedication funds to complete the round house project in 2001. And that was again their recommendation from a week ago last Tuesday. Wynne, I think I'll go ahead and let you go over some of the specifics about, the building is very interesting and Mr. Yelland has some details about the structure that he can inform us also. Mayor Jansen: Okay, thank you. Wynne Yelland: Mayor, Council members, city representatives. I was an Eagle Scout too a long time ago. I don't know if that helps but. Scott Botcher: You should have said that when the young men were here. Wynne Yelland: I didn't go over the report in detail in the office today but I'm familiar enough with it that ! think ! can give you some ideas of ~vhy we're excited about the project and why we still think it's a good idea. Of course once we're hired to do something, our job is to advocate for the building so. We did this back in July of 1999 and basically were hired to do a report establishing the status of the building and what it would need to be renovated and also our best guess at that time of what it would cost and the extent of what we'd have to do. There was a certain amount of structural issues that had to be dealt with in terms of tying the building walls to the foundation. And there had also been a huge amount of water damage. Councilman Ayotte: What was that about the water damage? Wynne Yelland: There was a huge amount of water damage. The roof had failed and water was pouring in from the top directly onto the second floor deck and the first floor deck. The floor boards had buckled enough that the door couldn't be opened to gain access to the building and a lot of this linoleum that we're talking about that has asbestos content in it, had started to peel. It hadn't been painted in a long time so the lead based paint on the exterior was peeling. But after cursory investigation with a structural engineer we determined that the building was in relatively stable condition. That the water problems could be stopped. The wood on the inside and outside is extremely high quality. Basically built like an old barrel. A wooden wine barrel with tension rods that encircle the building, basically to keep it from expanding. The boards or stays if you want to call them that on the exterior are old growth, vertical grain redwood. It's not commercially available anymore today. The interior is clad with a sort of a tongue and groove Douglas Fir, not unlike what the front of this podium here. It's also old growth vertical grain, nice material. And the frame, even the framing on the interior is in very good condition and it's nice quality wood so while our office is not by any means experts in the realm of historic preservation, we felt 16 City Council Meeting- January 22, 2001 that the building was a landmark not so much in it's historical significance but it's a very unusual building and we sUmmed up this report. And by the way, at that time my partner Paul Neseth and I, or the 'partner of my firm Locus, and he was working on it. From this point he's much better on the front end of things. He summed it up saying, we believe that the existing structure in Roundhouse Park has substantial value as an architectural element. Both the existing material and the history of the building are irreplaceable. The plan of the building is perfectly suited for the suggested use and would also be conducive to future adaptation. The investment in preservation will surely be worth it. That was before, that was back when it was $80,000. I took the project over ~vhen we moved into the construction document phase, which is basically putting together the plan for construction and there were really four main issues that we were considering as we went through. The cost. Just the cost of the project. But also the cost versus value of the project. We felt that putting a band-aid on the building,' simply fixing what was there and trying to get it operable and up to code, spending the minimum amount of money would not be worth it. It would be better to demolish it at that point because we felt that it still would be a building that wasn't very well lit. Didn't have enough natural light and basically wouldn't be worth the effort. So we did make some changes that probably drove the cost up somewhat but we felt if people were really going to use the building as an ice warming hut, obviously they'll use a trailer but if you're going to get some use out of it from family gatherings, group activities, family reunions, that sort of thing, you're going to have to make the building nice enough to warrant that kind of use. So that was the second issue. The third issue is taking something that's really as it stands right now as an eyesore and turning it into a real asset for the city. And also considering alternate ideas of handling the project. Should the building really be demolished and a new one built in it's place? We felt that that would be even more expensive than fixing what was there and a real loss of the existing building. Transforming it, just demolishing it and putting nothing there, or this band-aid approach. And I think in the end we struck, I think we struck a really good, delicate balance. We made it into a viable destination and something that's worth spending money on. I'm not going to qualify that and say it's worth what was the bid amount. That's not my decision to make. I think we made it a really unique building. Not only unique in the way it stands as it is today but also the additions that we made and I think that's important. I mean this park, as Todd mentioned was named after this building and we felt that it should stay. And thirdly I think we respected the rural and agricultural history of Chanhassen. The history of the local building, or of the round house. I don't think we changed it to the extent where it loses it's sort of original facade as it stands now. And also I think it's going to be a real tribute to the users and park residents of the park if it continues to go forward. I will address the cost issues a little bit. As I mentioned to Todd in that letter that he mentioned to you, there are ways to cut the cost. There were five main ones. We certainly could remove the canopy, which is shown over the door in this area here. I talked with the contractor about that. He thought that would be a way to save anywhere from $2,000 to $4,000. He was not specific and I didn't press him to get any really good detail. We could change the roof structure. What we did in our proposal, the round house now basically it stops right here and there's a flat roof on that structure which has been tarped and roped to prevent more water from coming in. We added approximately 3 feet of space above that and that is essentially glazing which is a greenhouse, polycarbonate kind of material which allows diffused light to come in. Natural light. And then we top it with a conical roof as opposed to the flat one that was there. All of this framing up in here is going to be exposed, visible from underneath. So what we could do is eliminate that 3 feet of space and bring that back down and even go back to the flat roof which would be cheaper. So that's another possibility. There's a paint versus powdercoat issue that Todd mentioned. We specified cedar shingles on this project. An asphalt product could probably be used. I'm not sure how much savings we would gain there because the way that you would have to sheave the building would be somewhat different for the asphalt shingles. 17 City Council Meeting - January 22,2001 Mayor Jansen: Did you have, excuse me for interrupting. Did you have a number attached with the roof2. The change in the roof configuration. Wynne Yelland: I think if we got rid of the clear story, that's probably one sum of money. I'm going to guess $5,000 to $10,000. And if we went from the roof as we designed it to just a very simply flat roof that you could clad on the underside with a flat material like this, and on top with a membrane roof like that, you're probably talking another $5,000 to $10,000 again. Councilman Ayotte: That you would incur with either a membrane or...a'life cycle requirement? Then maintenance requirement. I mean a membrane isn't going to last longer than 7-8 years. Wynne Yelland: What's that? Councihnan Ayotte: A membrane isn't going to last longer than 8 years. Wynne Yelland: It should, yeah. Councilman Ayotte: Unless you do a lot of PM. We could argue that back and forth but you do incur a PM requirement if you take that pitch off, right? Wynne Yelland: I would expect a membrane roof to certainly not last longer than 15. I mean you'd probably get somewhere in the 10 to 15 range out of it. Councilman Ayotte: What's the cost per square foot? Wynne Yelland: I don't know. Councilman Ayotte: Take the 140 number. How many square feet of usable space is that and what's the people load? Wynne Yelland: The occupant load, if I'm remembering correctly, and I'm pulling these numbers off the top of my head so they may be wrong but I think to stay, to not get into the assembly part of the code, I think it was less than 40, ~vhich I think you'd never get that many people in this building anyway. It's about 800 square feet I believe. Councihnan Ayotte: 800 square feet at 140K. Let me do the math quick. That's $110 bucks per square foot. Wynne Yelland: More than that but... Councilman Ayotte: Okay, and what's the construction cost for a building of 800 square feet? Wynne Yelland: Well that's hard to judge too but I'd have to say... I'd have to say in the hundred and a quarter range, 150 range. But you have to factor in the demolition costs of this building as well. COuncilman Ayotte: Welt I understand. Well that's making the supposition that you demo. Wynne Yelland: Right. 18 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 Mayor Jansen: Thank you. Wynne Yelland: And also we could, there's some seal pieces in the proposal that could be'removed and replaced with wood which would be some saVings. I don't think they'd be significant. And I think to a certain extent we did under eStimate the structural steel work that was involved and the steel finishing, although I think in the end we specified a powder coat finish in lieu of the painted finish and that accounts for some of that. And there are other issues as I've outlined here. I think it's important to mention that I contacted the construction means people and the price of construction in the metropolitan area has increased since the, since we were awarded the 'project and so thht's, it's effectively changed what was $80,000 then is about $70,000 now and so there. Councilman Ayotte: Say that again.' Wynne Yelland: What is $80,000 at the time that this project came into our office would be worth about $70,000 now in today's dollars. Councilman Labatt: So it went down? Wynne Yelland: What's that? Councihnan Labatt: Say that again. You're confusing me. Wynne Yelland: Just in the time value of money that construction has, the construction costs more today than it did 2 years ago is what I'm saying. Councilman Labatt: Yeah, okay. Wynne Yelland: And it's risen, I don't have the, well I do have the factor actually. IfI can find it here. The January issue of the Quarterly Means Construction Cost Index contains historical costs. In January of 1998 that index was 124.6. Today it's 136.1 so if you work out that ratio, construction, I stated it backwards but what I was trying to figure out is what would $80,000 then cost now and it's about $88,000. Scott Botcher: You're saying that $80,000, is it 10 or 8? Wynne Yelland: Well if you're working the other way it's a little bit more. But it's $88,000. Scott Botcher: And would now cover what was $80,000 2 years ago? Wynne Yelland: Right. Scott Botcher: So it's 4 grand a year. : Wynne Yelland: Yes, right. Right. And then there was the abatement issue.' The way we had specified the projects when it was gone out to bid the second time was that it would be simply encapsulation. That they would scrape the loose paint off and paint the surfaces of the round house with a new lead encapsulation coat which would have to be maintained every 5 to 6 years. And at the Park and Recreation Commission's meeting I said we had done that as a cost savings measure from the first bid to the second bid and they suggested that they would like to see, if possible, the way that we had specified '19 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 it the firsi time, come back which was stripping all of the lead paint from the exterior and clear sealant. Putting more of a clear seal on that wood. I suggested that to the contractor. He got back to me with a number of $4,000. I think $4,065 which added to his bid amount of$119,372. Made the total project cost with that addition $t23,437. And that's all I have. I can answer any questions. Mayor Jansen: Okay. Any questions at this point councilmen? Councilman Peterson: Based on your comment you said you could cut out some things like the upper window area by a couple feet and lower the lighting obviously. In those recommendations, would you still, from your own perspective, do that building or would you tear it down? Knowing that you've got to have'an inviting environment as you talked about earlier too. Wynne Yelland: One of the commissioners from an earlier board meeting suggested trying to mimic that affect with artificial lighting. With lighting. Electrical lighting, and I think that would partially go to me saying maybe I would consider that but I think that would make me a lot less, I think it would make the building a lot less interesting as a renovation and it's still, you're still spending a significant amount of money and I think the end result might not be worth it and might not be a good investment. Councihnan Peterson: Good, thanks. Councihnan Ayotte: I see members from the parks and rec committee here and I'm really interested, the kids need some place, a warm up place. What is the capacity, I'm from Canada but I don't know hockey. Mayor Jansen: If we, if you wouldn't mind, if we're through with this gentleman. Councihnan Ayotte: Okay. Oh so we are going to be able to talk to the parks and rec? Mayor Jansen: Yes. If we could finish this part up first. Councilman Ayotte: Okay. With respect to the cost per square foot, replacement costs would be typically what? Pure replacement cost. To replicate what you've got. Wynne Yelland: Oh you mean to build this building again? Councihnan Ayotte: Yeah. Wynne Yelland: It's not possible. Not utilizing the materials that are in there now. Councilman Ayotte: Okay. To replicate the square footage to have a look alike for a warm, a place for the kids tO warm up, what would be the cost per square foot? Wynne Yelland: Well without bathrooms you could do it very cheaply probably. I don't know, $80 a Square foot. $100 a square foot. It really depends on the kind of, you can build something that will last 20 years and it will cost you $50 or $60 to do it. And you know if the economic climate continues to go a little bit slower, you might even get it cheaper than that. Whereas if you built something that's permanent, I don't know how much more permanent it's going to be. Councilman Ayotte: Let's take the cost per square foot to renovate this. You said it'd be about $140 a square foot. 20 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 Wynne Yelland: Yes. Councilman Ayotte: What could you build for $140 a square foot? What kind of capacity could you get then? Wynne Yelland: Well again without a rest room you could build a very solid, nice looking building. Our office could do it. But you're not going to replicate the historical value. Councilman Ayotte: I understand that. I know you're robbing the historical portion of it. Wynne Yelland: Right. Councilman Ayotte: What's the distance of that facility from the ice? Wynne Yelland: Todd would be able to answer that better than I. Todd Hoffman: 50 feet. Councilman Ayotte: That's pretty close, okay. Now the lead base paint that's chipping on the outside, is that a hazard if it's not taken care. of?.' The building's padlocked so it's not a hazard but. Wynne Yelland: If nothing were to be done with it and we just left it? Councilman Ayotte: Yes. Is there a hazard there?. Wynne Yelland: Yes. I mean if you want to get to the specific, one piece of that building flakes off, hits the ground and a child picks it up, or anybody picks it up and puts it in their mouth, it's a hazard. Councilman Ayotte: So there's an environmental concern if we don't address it? Wynne Yelland: Well yes, absolutely. Councihnan Ayotte: So as stewards we've got to address it. Mayor Jansen: One way or the other. Councihnan Ayotte: One way or the other, yeah. Mayor Jansen: Is that all 'for your questions? Councilman Ayotte: Thank you. Mayor Jansen: Councilman Labatt, anything at this point? Councilman Labatt: Maybe I missed it in the reading, are you going to keep the rest rooms? Todd Hoffman: Portable .... 21 City Council Meeting - JanUary 22, 2001 Mayor Jansen: Not in the buildingsl Todd Hoffman: ...buildings but those will be taken out. Councilman Labatt: Okay. Wynne Yelland: They were on the second floor and the first floor and the second floor is to be entirely removed. Councilman Labatt: So this is going to just be one open space. There will be no floor. Wynne Yelland: Right, exactly. Correct. Well there will be a floor at ground level. There's a full basement belo~v it as well. Councilman Labatt: Right. But there's going to be no second level? Wynne Yelland: Right. And we did, we briefly looked at an accessible bathroom as a possibility in there but it was going to take 40% of the floor area so we eliminated that. Councihnan Labatt: Okay. No, the next one's for Todd so. Mayor Jansen: Okay. Mine too. Thank you very much. Wynne Yelland: Thank you. Mayor Jansen: Todd, realizing that you have a council that did not sit in on this project and it of course had numerous discussions and reviews. Could you take us back a little bit through the neighborhood process and how we reached the point of designating with the neighbors, and the level of involvement around this building and their desire to have this maintained. Todd Hoffman: Sure. We go back to my preliminary comments. When the land was acquired with the Harstad development, the community had, and the neighborhood specifically, had a very rewarding experience ahead of them. They get to plan their neighborhood park. And so neighborhood meetings were called on behalf of the Park and Recreation Commission and the City Council and we brought together a group of interested residents who would like to sit down and talk about not only the future design of their park, the elements that would be included, but then also the timing for the improvements, the initial improvements going into the park. I looked through the files today and there were 3 of them from the start of the acquisition and there was no fewer than 6 neighborhood meetings that were identified in the analysis, or in that review. So we started with the groups and they assembled and talked about the master plan process. Once the master plan process was developed, they started identifying, worked with the commission to make recommendations to the City Council about capital investments through the park and trail acquisition and development. To go into the park. Their number one priority was the play area, or this children's play area in the center. And the first phase of that children's play area has now been put in place by a company called Miracle Recreation working with the neighborhood. The neighborhood volunteered to get more bang for their buck. They came out and they installed it and then there's also enough space left in that area for the second phase of playground equipment which will be purchased at a future time. The second priority identified through that neighborhood meeting process was the renovation of the round house. And for the reasons that we've talked about tonight. And one of those is because it's not, it's a landmark but it's in a state of disrepair and it's not something that you 22 City Council Meeting- January 22, 2001 would be very proud of. I think you could still tell people to get directions to your house, to go to the round house and turn left or right or go straight, but when they got there they would ask you what the devil is that building that sits out there and is in such a bad state of disrepair. Because of those neighborhood meetings the referendum promise was made that this would be included. Funding would be included in the referendum for the renovation of the round house and the $40,000 mark was identified. The referendum was passed. We started into the formal process.., it became evident that the $40,000 wasn't going to get the job done and so again we held a meeting. We sent, and I apologize, I was going to make copies of all this Correspondence for council this afternoon but our copier is broken so it took me about 8 minutes to run a single copy over in engineering. We held anothei' meeting and just spelled it out plain and white. Black and white to the neighborhood that the cost of this project has risen significantly. Please come speak to the Park and Recreation Commission and express your feelings about whether or not you want to see the round house renovated. And again the neighbors responded, and not with 100% support. And as I mentioned or alluded to in my report, there has never up until this last vote been 100% support on the Park and Recreation Commission to move forward with the project. All the votes were split and I think the initial vote to save it was the most decisive amongst all of them since that time. There's been more and more ownership put into the building and the votes have come closer. There are people that are in this neighborhood that, I believe generally because of the state of disrepair of the building, that they would simply like it to go away. And so there are letters on file in that regard. But again they responded, we'd like to save the round house. Commission made that recommendation to the City Council at that time to increase the budget. The $40,000 was doubled to $80,000 based on the report from Locus and we moved forward into the bidding. And I truly believe tonight it would just be a formality if it was not for the case that we are at $120 some thousand dollars now and the cost of the project have again increased. So that's some history. The neighborhood has been involved. Neighborhood mailings and the neighborhood response and input has been there and they are waiting for the City to complete the project. Mayor Jansen: You called offa number 1 and number 2 priority. Did they go beyond that as far as the other amenities in the park and listing priorities? And did we give them a timeframe on what those other renovations would be? Todd Hoffman: No. We are unable to give timeframes simply because of the public process that we need to work through. They did identify, and ifI can take a moment I'll find those. Mayor Jansen: I guess where I'm going with my question, while Todd's looking for that. Part of what I looked at was the CIP to see when the additional amenities in this park are scheduled to be built and they're not in the next 5 year plans. So I guess as far as how far out we're projecting before we get back to this park, it's a significant expenditure that I'm not quite sure that neighborhood is going to understand that we put a significant investment in this building and sometime after 5 years they'll get Phase II of the play area and whatever the other priorities are that they listed. That was part of what I was looking into today. Councilman Ayotte: When is the ice rink, if this is for the ice rink for a warm up for the kids, when's the ice rink coming in? Mayor Jansen: With the hockey boards? Todd Hoffman: The ice there is flooded currently every year but the hockey boards are not programmed in the 5 year CIP. And if I can comment on why that timeframe is out there so far, the initial investments put into this park are significant. And so for acquisition, initial development, grading, parking lot, the 23 City Council Meeting- January 22, 2001 beach area, and so the timeline was accelerated. The budget process was accelerated to get them up and running and now in fairness to the other sites throughout the community, you need to slow them down and back them off for a few years. You get them up and running and then you need to back off and go do some projects elsewhere in the city in all fairness before you come back out to this neighborhood. The investments made in this park far outweigh the park acquisition and development dollars that will ever be acquired from this neighborhood and so that's something that we .need to acknowledge. In response to the Mayor's questions, the outcomes of the round house meeting which there was oh a dozen or so people in attendance, outcomes were to investigate the playground, ages 5 to 12 was a top priority followed by the exterior renovation of the round house. If funds are still available, improve the interior of the round house, and again that speaks to the appearance of the structure. Second, is additional caution signs at the crosswalk at Kings Road. Third, ability to clear the sidewalk along Kings Road. So they wanted some maintenance in the Kings Road area. Four is the necessity to install a fence along the Kings Road sidewalk adjacent to the pond, near the homes. Right at this location for safety. The idea of a half court basketball pad within the park, which was subsequently moved forward due to it's economy. For a very reasonable amount of money you can get that project done. We were doing neighborhood basketball pads in other parks and so it was moved up. And then the neighborhood installation of the playground. If they could pull that off, they wanted to do that which in fact they did. So those were the priorities identified. Mayor Jansen: So I'm curious, they had the exterior noted as the number 2 priority. The interior as number 3 priority. That indicates to me that maybe they weren't looking at the utility of it as high a priority as the aesthetics of it? Todd Hoffman: Correct. Mayor Jansen: Go ahead. Councihnan Ayotte: Did they, you said a dozen people? Todd Hoffman: Yes. Councilman Ayotte: How many people in this community? In this part of the community. What's the population? Todd Hoffman: 200 or 300 homes. 200 homes. Councihnan Ayotte: 200 homes so you've got 12 versus 300. That sounds like a small representation for, am I being? Mayor Jansen: No. Any other question? Councilman Ayotte: Yeah but I'm not going to. Mayor Jansen: Craig. Councilman Peterson: As a percent, excluding this building, if you had a blank check to build out the rest of the park, just using ballpark. No pun intended. What would it run? Todd Hoffman: About another quarter million dollars. Something in that nature. 24 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 Councilman Peterson: So the house is a proportionately large amount of the finishing off of the park? Todd Hoffman: To give you an idea of the hockey arena and the lights and those improvements that go along with that would be roughly equal to this investment. Probably a little less. Somewhere in the area. CoUncilman Ayotte: The hockey what? Todd Hoffman: The hockey arena and the lights. Scott Botcher;. It's going to have lights? Todd Hoffman: And the asphalt that would go into that would be about $100,000. Scott Botcher: We're going to light a hockey rink at a neighborhood park? Todd Hoffman: Yes. Otherwise you would never build a hockey rink in a neighborhood park. Mayor Jansen: Any other questions? The other, I'm sorry. Didn't mean to interrupt. The other point that you and I spoke about today was the cost of the pavilion in North Lotus Lake Park'and if I'm remembering you shared with me a $30,000 cost? Todd Hoffman: Yeah. $25,000 for the structure, yep. About $30,000 for the whole project. Mayor Jansen: Okay. And not to put you on the spot. We didn't talk about the square footage of that structure. Do you know offhand what the square feet? Todd Hoffman: They have about the same. Same diameter to the round house. Mayor Jansen: Okay, the 800. Todd Hoffman: Yeah. It's a concrete pad with a metal frame structure and a wood roof over the top so it's an open air 'shelter. Mayor Jansen: Okay. Todd Hoffman: Those were installed as a part of the referendum at Meadow Green Park, North Lotus Lake Park, Rice Marsh Lake Park and then Power Hill Park. Four structures went in. Mayor Jansen: Okay. So not nearly the equivalent of this building but I was just trying to get a feel for what we've put in in other neighborhood parks as a pavilion. Councilman Ayotte: And when they drink beer there you can see them. Mayor Jansen: Yeah. Wynne Yelland: Can I say something to that? Actually I did a quick calculation and it's not 800 square feet. I've never done this before so, I made that calculation so I apologize. It's only 450 square feet so 25 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 the cost per square foot is more like $275 a square foot. Now there's a basement associated with that, which we usually don't calculate as part of the overall square fOotage so. Mayor Jansen: Okay. Scott Botcher: So is that basement part of the 400 or no? Wynne Yelland: No. Scott Botcher: Okay. That's two libraries. Mayor Jansen: I was going to say, and the library's costing a square foot of 157. Sorry. Todd Hoffman: If you think about the renovation of this structure, when you get right down to it there's, it's like any remodeling job. It's going to cost you more than building new. We will have, all that will be remaining is the foundation and the wood round shell. Everything else is tom off the structure and replaced. So there are significant costs associated. Councilman Ayotte: And we do have an environmental hazard. Todd Hoffman: Yeah you have that to deal with as well. Scott Botcher: Well, let's understand. We don't have that statement from the State or the PCA. 'We have it froTM the architect. Potential, that's correct. Todd Hoffman: We have a study from Angstrom Analytical which points out specifically that we have lead base and that's it a hazard. Lead base paint which is a hazard on the exterior of the structure. Scott Botcher: I guess my biggest question, and my questions are sort of for these two gentlemen more than anything else is that, and I've shared my thoughts with the council and they can certainly do whatever is in their best interest but you just start running the numbers on this thing and the costs have, since it initially went to referendum, have more than tripled. And then we're doing the library and we see the cost per square foot of that and you just, and the library is hopefully going to finished far nicer than the inside of that's Todd proposing. Just with the finish work that's going to go into a library. But you know I've run this so many different ways. If you just look at it as a utility as a warming house, at $2,000 a year, that's 60 years. If you knock off25 grand and say we're going to build a pavilion like at North Lotus Lake, Bob's right about what he said in providing utility and if you've ever been up to that neighborhood park, it gets used quite a bit. It's family oriented. Picnics. All that sort of stuff. It's a very nice project. You knock off25 grand, you're still down to 50 year payback on the warming house side of things and that's a long time for a building like this. And I guess my two cents worth is, and Linda was sort of going down that road, if we had to say to the neighborhood, and I think Bob's comment about what was the representative sample that Todd met with, the City's going to say here's $80,000. Is this the choice that the neighbors would make? And certainly that's up, I mean there's a lot of nice things in this park. This is going to be a really nice neighborhood park compared to some of the other neighborhood parks we have, but at some point when the costs start tripling, and Linda knows me well enough that, Bruce and I probably more than, well Todd does' too, we start getting really, really nervous ,,,,,hen numbers start floating and not that it's wonderful but as I read through the report from the architect, I see a lot of warm and fuzzy words, which just drive me up the wall. It's, and you've said many times, it's an interesting project. And it's noteworthy and historical value. All these non-quantifiable sort of 26 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 things and if you're going to strip it down to nothing but the wooden shell, if you want to save the wooden shell or move the thing. I mean it's not even original to the site. That's the goofy part. If it was a historic stop for the trains and they got water there. I've had one of those. Fine. But that's not even what this is. It's a lot of money. I mean it just really is and I'm thinking, if I'm in the neighborhood and the city's going to spend $125,000, I might very well fine, it will clean up the outside. Do the best you can on it but put it towards something that to me has far more utility to the kids and the families in the neighborhood and that's, maybe that's where I'm coming from. BeCause I don't think there's any way in · God's green earth we're spending this kind of money on the other neighborhood parks we have in the community. We simply can't afford it. And that's a decision obviously you all have to make but, I just think that, I just think you really need to think about it. Does every, does a neighborhood park need a warming house? Now if we're going to put a hockey rink there, the answer's probably yes but does it need it now? We don't even know if the hockey rink's ever going to go there. We have all sorts of plans upstairs that show all sorts of different things. But maybe we just, maybe hockey rinks go the way of tennis courts some day. Maybe there's a big sheet built at Minnetonka West. Maybe, there's all sorts of things that could happen. 125 grand's a lot of money. Mayor Jansen: Thank you. And I don't want to dismiss the value that the parks and rec commission is putting into having tried to look at preserving this building, and we certainly have done the diligence in trying to make sure that if there was something here that we should be protecting, that we do protect it. That is what we're going to hear. If you would like to have the commissioners come up to the microphone and we can certainly do that just so they have an opportunity to speak to this. But I think as a council again from Scott's comments, I'm hesitant to put the neighborhood's value so high on this particular building when in fact there are other amenities that could be better utilized within this park. And to proceed and make that decision without their full knowledge of how much we're'about to spend on this building, I don't know that they would go down that path with us knowing what the cost of a pavilion would be. On top of that we could get them the hockey boards. We could get them the second phase of the play area. You know do we give them those options and opportunities maybe as we start making our comments, you know think of speaking to that a little bit. Are we needing to put this back to the neighborhood because the project has gone up 50% in cost from when they were looking at it last. Councilman Ayotte: Actually 200%. If you go. Mayor Jansen: If you go clear back to the 40. They did weigh in on the 80. Well a dozen of them did but. Councilman Ayotte: I personally would like to, Madam Mayor, the parks and rec commission's been sitting there and I think we ought to give them the opportunity to. Mayor Jansen: Yes. If you'd like to take a couple of moments to speak to the recommendation that you forwarded to us, and maybe the potential of what we might be able to do to engage the neighborhood at this point. State your name and address for the record please Mr. Berg. Fred Berg: Yes, I'm Fred Berg. I live at 6910 Chaparral Lane. I've been on a roller coaster ride in the back of the room tonight. Listening to all the, what seemed to me to be logical presentations from Todd and the architect and I'm thinking no, what I've got to say is much more esoteric and it isn't logical. And I said no, I've got a passion for what I wanted to say and I'm going to say it. Then I'm listening to Mr. Botcher with his logic, which by the way I didn't do very well in in college so excuse me if I'm not logical all the time. And I'm thinking to myself no, why don't I just sit here. I think maybe I don't have anything to say to you because I don't know that I have anything to add in terms of what some people are 27 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 looking for in value with this building. I've taught at the high school in Chaska for 24 years. I've been a teacher for 27. I teach history. I understand, I think I'm beginning to understand as I get older especially the value of history and what it means to us and what it means to us in terms of our roots. What it means to us in terms of our past and what it means to us in terms of who we are. And I sat dutifully this afternoon and wrote down a whole bunch of notes that I wanted to be sure that I was going to say and I'm not going to because again I don't know that what I can add is that important, what you would feel is that important towards'your decision. Your ultimate decision. It's important to me. It's important to me that we maintain some of what has made Chanhassen special. I was born and raised in Minneapolis and as I grew Up, watched more and more buildings being torn down. I've watched Hiawatha Avenue be ' destroyed so that 25 years later they could build a light rail system and I watched the homes in the beautiful area along there disappear because it was economically a wise thing to do. It hurts me, it bothers me to see that same kind of thing potentially being done here in Chanhassen. We have very precious little left in terms of the history of this community that sets us apart from Eden Prairie. My daughter tonight said tell them we don't want to become Eden Prairie. I said Kara I can't say that. That's, we're not going to throw stones at another town. Well I just did. I wish I had something of substance to say that could change your mind. We've been down this road before. My passion is preserving what we have that makes us, helps make us unique. If we tear down the building, if we raze the building, it will be done. The community wilt soon forget that it was ever there. It will still be Roundhouse Park and people will say how come. Well there used to be a building there. It's not there anymore but so be it. We will have saved the money, the city some money and that's a good thing. As a taxpayer I can certainly appreciate that and I can certainly appreciate the quandary that you're in when it comes to balancing esoteric or historical versus saving the dollar. But I think that's unfortunate. I think it's unfortunate number one that you have to be in that position, but you are. And I think it's unfortunate that if you decide to raze the building or demolish the building, that it will be gone forever. We can't get it back. We can't get back our history. For the sake of our economy and I think that's a very unfortunate thing. Mayor Jansen: One of the things that I learned here tonight that I didn't realize until I heard it said here tonight was that this building isn't originally from this property. That it was actually relocated to it. So I had gone through the same mental exercises that the commission has as far as if there's historical value here, how do you put a value amount on that. But I've also gone down another option and I'd throw this out to you, since you've spent more time on this project than I have. As far as the neighborhood, their number 2 priority was the exterior of the building. If in fact there is a lesser expensive way to just simply make sure that the building doesn't collapse, and as I drove past Bandimere Park and saw the silo sitting, I think it's a silo. That's just indicating the history of that property, and I think what we did in order to make it safe to leave it there was just took the ladder up so kids couldn't be crawling up it and getting themselves hurt. Is there a way to maintain the exterior integrity of the building, lock it up. Have it be a landmark xvithout putting what now we've already spent $20,000 on the project so actually we're looking at $145,000. $150,000 as we continue down this project. Is it worth it for that landmark sake? Fred Berg: My answer to you is the one that I never let my kids at school give and that's I have no idea. I don't know. Standing here before you now quite honestly, anything to keep the building up is better than knocking it down. I would love to deal with you and work on some sort of compromise, if that's at all possible. Mayor Jansen: To explore options. Fred Berg: Yeah. It's not spend $125,000 or light the dynamite tomorrow. I think cahner heads and sensible heads and prevail perhaps and look at least, be willing to explore some sort of compromise. My 28 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 first concern is the historical nature of the building. Because it's not exactly located where it was originally or because it's location doesn't have significant historical value doesn't detract from the historical value of the building itself. Lots of buildings have been moved. There was a wonderful little school house in Chanhassen one day that the people in Chaska decided they wanted to have so they took it and now they're holding it up as an example of the first school house in the area. It's our's but who knows that? Mayor Jansen: Interesting. Councilman Labatt: Can we get it back? Fred Berg: I've contemplated ways to do that but I'm not so sure they're all legal. Scott Botcher: Is moving it again an option? Fred Berg: You're asking someone who doesn't know the logistics of that. Scott Botcher: And I don't either. I'm just... Fred Berg: I think in terms of preserving the building I would. Scott Botcher: That would be a better option for you than taking it down. Fred Berg: Speaking for me, yes.. But I represent absolutely no point of view other than my own. Scott Botcher: But your own, and that's fine. Mayor Jansen: Understood. I've put you on the spot for your opinion Mr. Berg. Fred Berg: I'm also here to give it. Mayor Jansen: Does anyone else have questions for Fred while he's here? Councilman Labatt: No. I've just got some for Todd. Mayor Jansen: Okay, thanks. Ann Osborne: When you get done with that, are you going to hear a neighborhood person talk? Mayor Janseni Actually this isn't a public hearing and I think we probably have sPent almost an hour on this particular subject and we may keep moving it on. Not to say we're going to. Ann Osborne: ...neighborhood I guess is all I was going to say. Mayor Jansen: That's I think maybe where we end up going. Mike. Mike Howe: I'm Michael Howe, 2169 Stone Creek Drive. Mayor, Council members. I'll be brief. I'm batting clean-up here. There's not a lot really to say. I thought I would summarize briefly what the rest of the park commission thought about this and how we arrived at this decision. About the round house. 29 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 Before I begin, this is my first presentation before the council in a long time. Certainly the first before the new council and one of the things that struck me about the park commission, and I've been on it now for over 6 years, I think we're very good with our money. We don't make recommendations like this unless there's'a deep seeded reason why we think we should definitely do it. We've always been that way. That always impressed me and I don't think you'll see us making a lot of wild we need this, we need that because we realize that funding is going to dry up some day and we have to bevery careful 'with what we have. Keep our cuPboard dry so to speak but the round house we thought was a definite landmark. The way it's built. The materials were very unique. I'll Say those words again. For many people I've spoke with it's really their first noticeable landmark in Chanhassen outside of downtown and ! think that means a lot. It's the re-use of the structure. We've heard a lot tonight about a warming house. Sure, a warming house is a great idea and I think this would be used for that but I think in the summer there are many more activities that might fit in this type of structure. Picnics, Dynamo's, a lot of things you could do. If you built it I think you'd find that out. As far as the neighborhood, yes. This is a neighborhood park but I think the commission looks at this more as a, as Todd mentioned, a regional park. It's got a beautiful beach. If you've been there. Very large parking lot. When I'm there in the summer, I find a lot of the people at the beach certainly I don't think are from the neighborhood. A lot of people do drive there from other parts of Chanhassen, or even outside of Chanhassen. So I think that's something to consider. And I know it's a lot °fmoney but again I don't think the commission takes these decisions lightly and we had a unanimous recommendation in what has been sometimes stormy sessions about the round house to get me up here to talk about it so that's really all I had. Any questions? Mayor Jansen: Go ahead. Councilman Ayotte: In talking to the community by, what was your sense. I heard 12 residents. What was your sense outside of the immediate neighborhood and can you give me an idea of the feedback you got? Mike Howe: Well frankly I think, if ! remember back to those days when this neighborhood was just going in, it's quite common you don't see a lot of turnout. I think we sent out a lot of letters to folks that live there and apprised them of what we're going to discuss and it's probably immaterial to them as far as what they're going to pick in their playground or their park. It was new at the time. I don't know even if all the houses were completed 3 or 4 years ago when this was done. I think it's important but again the commission is looking at this more as this is something that everybody in Chanhassen would use. Sure, the neighborhood would be important to solicit their opinions and what goes into it but I think we're looking at this in a bigger picture than just the neighborhood. Councilman Ayotte: Thanks Mike. Mayor Jansen: Thank you Commissioner Howe. Appreciate it. What I would share, piggy backing on your questions since we were just all out knocking on doors through a couple of months. In speaking to neighbors over in this area, they didn't appreciate the aesthetics of this building but their primary questions to me were when are we going to get the rest of the park facilities? So hence my hesitation to now go to the CIP and realize that they're out beyond 5. Now that was just from the people that I spoke with and I can't say that I've got a representative sampling or anything but that's where part of my reaction is coming to wanting to make sure we're attuned to the neighborhood if this is going to be changing. Let's bring it back for council comments and see if we can reach some sort of agreement on how to move forward with the project. If someone would like to begin. 30 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 Councilman Labatt: I've got a couple questions first. When we built the warming house at Bluff Creek, what was that as far as cost? Todd Hoffman: $225,000. Councilman Ayotte: Say again? Todd Hoffman: $225,000. Councilman Labatt: Okay. And was that all' was that a combination between the school and city or all of the city expense of that building? Todd Hoffman: All city expense. Mayor Jansen: And that's brick and lavatories and correct? It's a lot different than what we're talking about with the shelter. Councilman Labatt: And I can't recall, in the CIP if the warming house at City. Center Park is in the next 5 years? Todd Hoffman: Yes. Councilman Labatt: And what are we slating for that? Todd Hoffman: I believe it's $225,000 or $250,000. Councilman Labatt: So that will be similar to what we have at Bluff Creek. Todd Hoffinan: Correct. Councilman Labatt: Okay. Todd Hoffman: With an exterior covered shelter. Interior warming house, bathrooms and concessions. With a look of construction similar to the recreation center or city hall. Councilman Labatt: Okay. Do you recall what it cost to remove the depot back downtown? Todd Gerhardt: $10,000. Councilman Labatt: And do you have any idea what it would cost to raze the building and granted with the asbestos and lead base paint before moving it? Any estimate at all? Todd Hoffman: I don't have an exact estimate. I can tell you we could do it and just have landfill costs but with the asbestos there and the lead base paint it becomes more complex and so $10,000 to $20,000. Councilman Ayotte: I bet you it'd be more. $85.00 a square foot for a demo. Councilman Labatt: Yeah. Okay. Well I'11. 31 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 Todd Gerhardt: It was $12,000 for the railroad depot if we decided to remove the lead paint off that. And that was 4 years ago. Councilman Labatt: And that ~vas $12,0007 Yeah, and that's kind of the same size building? Two levels versus one level? Todd Gerhardt: ...about the same. But Todd's right. It's probably, that was 4 years ago so it's probably up to the 15 to 18. Councilman Labatt: Well I guess I'll make my comments first. I kind of, you know, frankly I agree with Mr. Berg and Mr. Howe. There's, how do you put a price on historical value. You know yeah, it was not original in this location but it's been there. It's a significant landmark on the western side of the city. So I'm hesitant to say destroy the building and get rid of it. I think Mayor you brought up a point that frankly we should look at further as far as you know, what would it take just to do the exterior of the building. Clean it up. Clean up that site. Keep it as a landmark but then yet is it possible to build a couple of the pavilions in that park to provide the shelter. And not finishing off the inside of this building and look at that option versus completing this building completely. You know it is a $123,400, it's a lot of money but I'm not in favor of destroying it so I think we should get it, come up with some option to keep it there and hang onto it. Mayor Jansen: And what's your opinion about going back to the neighborhood? Councilman Labatt: Well I think the neighborhood's fine but I think Mr. Howe brings up a valid point that you know, I mean what are you going to consider the neighborhood? Just the people down Kings Road. Mayor Jansen: No. No, that area. Councilman Labatt: There are people up on Stratford Road that use that park and down on Red Cedar Point that use it and heck, I've driven from where I live out to the park to use the beach. Mayor Jansen: I would think of that whole side near that area as being the people that really need to be engaged in some sort of conversation. Councihnan Labatt: Yep. Yeah, I'd be in favor of that, yeah. Mayor Jansen: Okay. Thank you. Councilmen? Councilman Peterson: Todd, what's going to be the ceiling height inside when it gets refurbed? Todd Hoffman: Full two stories and then with the look up into the roof so the second story would come out. Just a third story to the full two story building. Councilman Peterson: Have we thought about the heating costs of that? I mean you're talking a small building, 400 feet but it's a lot of height to be heating for a warming house. Todd Hoffinan: Yeah the warming house, you would have a ceiling fan up in that area. It's open for a month and a half time period. Short period of time. Operation costs are going to be there but I don't, we heat the current buildings with electric. We heat the other buildings with gas heat... 32 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 .' Councilman Peterson: Okay. Todd Hoffman: Timely question considering...with our heating bills. Councilman Peterson: Yeah. You know I don't like dismissing historical values of any structure. As noted tonight we don't have a lot of them in Chanhassen. However, placing a price on it this evening is really what I'm struggling with. We've got a 400 square foot building,, which is a pretty darn small building, with a pretty high price tag to it that for what in all probability, and ifI had to prognosticate it would be used not for much more use than just the warming house. I can't fathom somebody going into that building in the summertime. Even if we do raise the roof and put skylights, it's just going to be a genuinely darker building and not very open building, which usually when you perceive yourself going to a park you don't go inside an enclosed structure to be entertained. So I really do see the value of usage will be a relatively short period of time for a small number of people. So then you're really bringing it down, you're saving it because it's a unique landmark but we're placing a pretty high price tag on that and I guess on the surface I think that the residents would be better served to finish out the park with items that have a greater utility value and I think to the point of, you know I would like to really place the question that there's a chance that the house may be torn down and we're struggling with that. We need so,ne community feedback, but give them a point blank statement saying that we have a decision to make. Either to spend a lot more money than we had hoped, or we're going to tear it down to hopefully get more than 12 people there to see if we can get an assessment of really what some of their values are. But the cost per square foot is just, it just seems like an awful lot of money for me to do it without really having a community that really wants it. Mayor Jansen: And any comment on just preserving the exterior in order to have it be a landmark depending on the dollar amount that would be attached to that? Councilman Peterson: Just from past experience, the cost of the outside is going to be pretty substantial so then you're really placing a value just on a round building that doesn't have any more value historically than being a round building that was moved onto the site. So I wouldn't be for that on the surface at least. Mayor Jansen: Okay, thank you. Councilman Ayotte: I'd like tO arrest the degradation. But to include ventilation on the inside to counter any further degradation on the inside. I'd like to get a cost impact on that. I'd like to know if there is an environmental issue. Not just, and I'm not down playing the fact that you're an architect and you may not know but there is, we have as stewards a need to determine if there is an environmental issue and I'd like to know that. I think the mayor's point about making sure the neighborhood is aware of the implication, has to be brought up to the surface. And Commissioner Howe brings up a very, very key point that regionally it has to be addressed and I'm thinking because it's a Chanhassen landmark, that we ought to also address it from the total city survey. And get some reaction frOm that standpoint in terms of it being a city landmark. And then revisit it. Mayor Jansen: Okay. That's an interesting point. And at this point the total city survey conceivably we think we can get one done this year but it probably would not be until sometime during, towards the end of second quarter. Councilman Ayotte: And that's why I'm saying, let's stop the degradation and then at that point get it. 33 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 Mayor Jansen: Got it. Okay. I too have a great deal of difficulty walking away from this building. I see the significance. I read all the warm, fuzzy language that's in the report from the engineer that went out and looked at it and I like those things. I mean there's character to the building. It is the landmark for the park. I realize that to the neighbors there's some significance to this building and that it would behoove us to do what we can. At the $125,000 price point I look at how much more we can benefit these residents, and I just want to make sure that if this building isn't going to have the utility for the - neighbors, that we don't tear it down until we figure out if there's something we can do to preserve it as a landmark and I'm agreeing with what Craig just observed. I listened to Cammissioner Howe talk about the summer use, and in the summer months I'm not going to be drawn to go inside an enclosed building unless there's a storm or something going on so I understand the ratiOnale of the summer use. However, I don't know how much that's actually going to be used compared to an open shelter area. So I'm wanting to strike a balance here someplace and again I appreciate all of the discussion that happened at the Park and Rec Commission level. It certainly brings it to our attention that we're dealing with an issue that we need to be sensitive to as far as a historic landmark structure. I don't think I'm hearing anyone here wanting to bulldoze it tomorrow or burn it down for firewood. But I do think we do have things that xve need to look into and I guess in trying to pull together maybe everyone's comments, as far as giving staff direction, maybe xve do need, we need to direct staff or the commission to look into just the exterior cost of preserving this as a landmark. One step. I realize in the course of that we've got the environmental issue that will definitely be addressed depending on what measure we do take. And we realize we need to deal with that. And on the neighborhood and maybe as I'm thinking neighborhood, I'm visualizing that whole side of the lake that would be using this and that's not the same definition maybe as the half mile radius on a neighborhood park but I'm thinking of that whole segment of the community that would conceivably use this park and find utility in it. Somehow we need to engage those people in this discussion and in the options and alternatives and I liked Craig's comment about if you just give them the txvo alternatives, you may get them coming in in droves at the thought of our tearing it down. And if they are going to come in and we're going to get them at either end of this discussion, if we're then prepared, staff and commission, to be able to talk about the cost of potentially just preserving the exterior, I think council needs to see those numbers maybe before we go back and have any discussion with the neighbors to Craig's point that that might be the most significant part of this number. But I think that's what I'm hearing councilmembers say. If someone wants to maybe come up with a motion. Councihnan Ayotte: Councilman Labatt wants to think of a motion for that. Mayor Jansen: A motion. Councilman Labatt: I'I1 motion that we. Mayor Jansen: Table. Councilman Labatt: Well I don't know whether to table or put this back to the Park and Rec Commission for further study and to. Mayor Jansen: I think we might want to hear that exterior number before that starts getting batted around. Before it goes back out. Maybe part of your motion that staff gets back to us with the exterior renovation. Councilman Labatt: Okay. So motion is to table it for staff to look at, come up with a number for the exterior refurbishment of the building. Just leave it at that for now. 34 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 Mayor Jansen: Okay. Do I have a second? Councilman Peterson:' I'd second. Councilman Labatt moved, Councilman Peterson seconded that the City Council table action on the award of bids for the Roundhouse Park Pavilion and direct staff to. prepare numbers for the exterior renovation of the building. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously. Mayor Jansen: Todd, are you clear on the direction? Todd Hoffman: ' Yes. We'll bring that number back at the next City Council meeting and that way if you then want to move forward with a neighborhood meeting you can do that in the last meeting in February. Almost the exact wording of Councilman Peterson was in the last public notice to all residents from Highway 7 to Highway 5 and we had actually less response at that time than the initial planning meeting of 12 and again, so I hope we'll get the response that, I think we're getting down to where it's either now or never so. And I think the council can recognize that the exterior cost is going to be the majority of the $124,000. There's very little interior work here and so it's going to be a high number. Mayor Jansen: That's why my thought is for us to see the number in case it isn't even one we want thrown out. That it might just be the two options. Councilman Peterson: I think it'd be interesting to see that notification. If you could e-mail it to us or send it to us. Because that may preclude us from going out. Todd Hoffman: Okay. COUNCIL PRESENTATIONS: HOUSEKEEPING ITEMS, MAYOR JANSEN. Mayor Jansen: I just put together, because we had somewhat of a short agenda tonight. It went a little longer than I anticipated. I have this short little list and we can get as far as we can tonight, but I wanted to make sure that we're keeping everybody in the loop on what we're working on currently and projecting into the next couple of months so that at least everyone knows what's, if you would, on the radar screen.' One of the discussions that we've had off and on and we've started to change some of the work session philosophy already as to how we're handling those meetings. I'm going to start right off with the agenda item 1. The whole work session philosophy. When, for what and where? Currently we're starting at 5:30, preceding the council meetings and of course standard procedure to date has been to discuss the agenda. At this point what I would like to propose is that instead of going over the agenda at length prior to the meeting, if we turn that into our work session items that we're discussing as far as any of the conceptual or policy issues, review issues. Similar to what we did this evening with staff presenting us with the Bluff Creek Watershed. There will be longer meetings that may need to fall on the inbetween weeks because they will take longer. Meetings with the commissioners. Our interviews of the commissioners. Similar to what we're doing currently with the interviews for the council position. That those are occurring off council weeks where we need a bigger chunk of time. There is just a thought as Scott and I were doing a little bit of brainstorming as to whether or not we can conceivably get our work done in just that hour and a half, or hour before the council. If we started at 7:00 with our public hearings instead of 6:30, and I believe Planning Commission starts at 7:00, correct? I believe Parks and Rec typically starts at 7:00. 35 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 Scott Botcher: Everybody else does. Mayor Jansen: It would allow public to get home from work and a little bit more time to be able to get here as far as our public hearing times. So I think it would be instead of thinking of it as an inconvenience, it would be more conveniencing them. And over the last 2 years we have gotten comments from public that they would like to see our meetings be more convenient to them and that that half hour would make a difference. So those are some of the thoughts that I'd like to maybe hear us talk about as far as our work sessions and how we handle those. I saw some head nods to the possibly moving our public hearing out to 7:00 instead of 6:30? Councilman Peterson: Steve, what's your thought on that? It's probably going to affect you more than anybody else going to work at 10:00. Councilman Labatt: No, because actually April 1st I'll be going back to day shif~ so it really doesn't have a bearing and I have a working understanding at work that if we're into a discussion item that is leaning past my 10:00 departure so I can get to work by 10:30, and I have to be late for work, ifI can just excuse myself and make a quick phone call. I can get one of my partners to cover for me so I'm fine with 7:00 actually. I mean I've gotten far too many complaints about the fact that people have a hard time getting home from work, from their jobs whether they're downtown or as close as Eden Prairie with the way traffic's been, and get to the meeting here at 6:30 so they can, when one of their items that they're concerned about is on the agenda right away and they miss it. So no, 7:00 is fine with me. 7:00 is fine. The off week only if necessary. That's kind of Mark Engel hours. Mark Engel meetings. I like those. If it's necessary we have them, let's have them but if it's just here to discuss a 5 minute, 10 minute topic, you know. Not only is it burdensome on the council to come in just for a short, quick meeting but the staff. I mean I'd rather stay late or come in early some Monday's and have less meetings. Butjust devote more time to them. If staff's going to be here anyways and we can start at 4:30 if we have to. No longer discussing the agenda. I love that. I never agreed with that. Getting into the discussions about the items. The consent agenda questions can be asked like we've always done but other than that, I'm not in favor of any talking. And 5:30 preceding council meetings. Does that just mean a work session, right? Mayor Jansen: Right. That's just yeah. On our regular council meetings. And then because everyone's really coming directly from work, I kno~v there's maybe been some discussion about the fact that we do end up eating during that 5:30 meeting but ! think that's only fair with everyone coming from work who's on the council needing to be able to have dinner. Councihnan Labatt: Either that or get Bob's wife to make us dinner and cater to us. Councilman Ayotte: I don't think she could feed you. I've seen you eat. Councilman Labatt: And let's see, conceptual policy review issues. What did you mean by that? Mayor Jansen: That that's what we're trying to keep the work sessions to. We're not diving into more detail but we're actually doing, well like this evening with the Bluff Creek plan. Councilman Labatt: Yeah. Yeah, I thought that was very beneficial, you know so. Okay, those were my two cents worth. Mayor Jansen: Thank you. And one of the things that Steve said Scott and I also brought up as far as the cutting back the number of meetings that we're actually committing staff to, is the preparation time that 36 City Council Meeting- January 22, 2001 they end up going to. When we're meeting every single week, it's a huge amount of staff time and that was one of our discussions about Cutting back the number. Councilman' Labatt: Staff has families. We have families. I mean it's you know. Scott Botcher: And it takes away from doing a lot of other stuff. I mean we spend Wednesday screwing around getting reports written. Reviewed and sent back to the department heads so they can put them and get the packets put together. You burn up a lot of time doing that. Mayor Jansen: I think economically it makes better sense with staff and we can just hopefully be more efficient in the council meetings as far as what we can get done during our regular meetings. Councilman Ayotte: Is there anything that we can do, may I ask some questions? Mayor Jansen: Sure. Councilman Ayotte: Is there anything we can do to shore up Scott's work load and our work load to instead of getting the detail that we get, to get executive summaries in lieu of some of that detail in the formulation of staff recommendations. Rather than. Scott Botcher: Well frankly Bob, I mean I've never had a council that I guess wanted, I don't know if they do or not, but got. We'll say that. Received as much detail as this council has. Not this council but this, my employer has, let's try that. Because in the past my experience has been far more along the executive summary route. Where my councils in Wisconsin and such would receive you know a brief memo that would delineate the recommendations and that was it. Frankly though at the same time I've never had an employer who needed verbatim minutes. Councihnan Ayotte: You never what? Scott Botcher: We have verbatim minutes here which is a, I mean ask that fine lady back there how much that costs us to do. I mean there's just, Linda and I have talked about a lot of procedural things that have gone on here. Some for a long time. Some for not so long time, that I think we can do better and if the council's willing to try that, that is a good thing to consider because it does improve our efficiencies. It helps keep the council up here you know instead of delving into Some of the other stuff and you know the ~ninute thing is sort of separate but you know, Roger's also available tonight. I asked him to give his input on what his other clients do. That may be beneficial to us and jump in whenever you want but. My guess is ~nost of your clients don't take verbatim minutes. Roger Knutson: That's partially correct. Not most, none of them except Chanhassen. Councilman Peterson: Can you be more specific. Roger Knutson: You're the only city I know, and again I don't know the cities of the first class that have verbatim minutes and that's for 850 cities and we represent 15 of them. Councihnan Labatt: How long has Chan been keeping verbatim minutes? Roger Knutson: They were doing it when I arrived so I can't answer that. 37 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 Councilman Labatt: When was that? Roger Knutson: Mid 80's. 'Councilman Labatt: Obviously there must have been a reason for it way back when. Roger Knutson: Presumably. I don't know what it was. Councilman Ayotte: Do we tape everything? Scott Botcher: Sure. It's tape recorded and as soon as Todd can convince the cable company to come run the cable from underneath the bush inside the building, we'll be going live at the same time. So yeah, we have a verbatim electronic record. Councilman Ayotte: So we have a verbatim electronic record but if that can be categorized. Mayor Jansen: It's not kept for that long though. It's not a permanent record. I think maybe we can have that verbatim minute discussion at some point. In fact as you've brought it up, and one of the things maybe to think about is do we need verbatim Park and Recreation Commission minutes. You know is there a way to step back from it maybe a little more slowly. You know I think we're hearing public wants access. Public wants availability of information. I don't know if now's the time to cut back the verbatim minutes maybe on Planning Commission and ourselves, but maybe we start stepping back on, I think of Park and Rec. Scott Botcher: The only rationale is that for all the stuff that we all say up here, the stuff that's important is the motion. And so you can have a summary of it and you know what, the motion is what you all do. Frankly the verbatim minute thing is almost more so people can read what individual people said so they can call them about it, which is not without value but as we go live and as we start doing other things, and you talk about streamlining, maybe that's something you look at but I would tend to agree that it's a discussion for another time. Because I don't think there's one, they're just different choices. Councilman Ayotte: But definitely we have to do something about the structure of the material that we receive. And I'd be interested in hearing from you Roger on what the other cities do with respect to preparatory packages provided to councils and commissions. Is it the 17 pounds of stuff or do they do executive summaries or what do they do? Roger Knutson: It varies all over the waterfront on that. I do represent some other cities that have just as much if not more material that goes to the council, and I have some that it's lightweight reading. What many cities do is they'll have an executive, really an executive summary on the front page that says staff recommends you to say the following. Your proposed motion. Here's what it's about and so for a lot of routine things you can read the whole thing or you can just read the executive summary and it may be adequate for you. Mayor Jansen: And maybe what we do is request that we end up with an example of what the executive summary would be compared to one of the staff reports. Maybe on an issue Scott where you would feel comfortable asking or directing, since you've been involved with doing just an executive summaries, and i don't want to put staff to extra work on an issue but if maybe you had a template or you could use one of the issues as an example for an executive summary. 38 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 Scott Botcher: I think the whole issue of minutes and the packet can be held sort of together in terms of staff council communications. I can bring you a'template from other cities that have nothing, no issues that you've ever considered but you can see sort of the basic synopsis of what was trying to be done. But frankly I remember the Planning Commission minutes in Delafield and we had as much going on as you did. They could easily be 1 to 2 pages. That's what they were. They were summaries. Frankly we didn't care what individual members had to prophetize about. We wanted to know what the basics. What was the basic discussion and what was the motion. And this community's been raised on 15 years of having like a court reporter here and this is not court. So your... Roger Knutson: Rather than redoing the whole report for the City Council, they'll have a cover sheet over 'it and say, summarize it in two sentences and say the Planning Commission recommended approval. The staff recommends approval with the following changes and it saves staff work and it's less to read. Scott Botcher: We can take that on some other time. Mayor Jansen: Yeah, that's an interesting perspective though because we do end up generating brand new reports with very little changed and it could all just be summarized on the one sheet. Okay, thanks for mentioning that. Appreciate that. And so Bob, how are you on the other points as far as not discussing the agenda item during the work session. I'm just trying to make sure we've got some agreement here on these items. So that our work sessions go to. Councilman Ayotte: Yeah I think, well let me ask, what I did today. Like I was ignorant on some stuff. Some stuff. I was ignorant on a number of points so I wrote e-mails out. If that is acceptable then I have no proble~n because if I have a question on something, I want to make sure that I'm correct and going back to your no surprises down here. Scott Botcher: That's another reason. Mayor Jansen: That's absolutely the best way to handle it is to get all those questions into staff because then if they need to do preparation before the meeting to discuss it, then they're able to do that. And that's part of why I wrote on here, especially with the consent agenda questions, if those are handled ahead of time then we don't have to pull things off the agenda and have lengthy discussions during the meeting. Nope, that's exactly the way to handle it. Okay. Councilman Peterson: Maybe just not 35 at the time, or my server goes down at work because of Bob's e-mails but you know. Mayor Jansen: And you're okay with the off week work sessions then when necessary? And we'll be able to talk about what those issues are. And then how are you with moving the meeting starting time to 7:00? For the public hearings. Councilman Ayotte: I always get indigestion with the dinner because you never give me enough time to eat for crying out loud so I think that will work. Councilman Labatt: We're still going to keep the 5:30. Mayor Jansen: To start the work session. Councilman Labatt: So that will give us an hour and a half. 39 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 Scott Botcher: We need the time. Councilman Labatt: Yeah, okay. Okay. Scott Botcher: Now just to confirm then, and Roger's confirmed this. Our next, it sounds like everyone likes this idea. Our next meeting though will start at the regular time because we have to change it by resolution. That will be on your consent agenda next time and then the meeting hence you can start at 7:00. Mayor Jansen: Very good, thank you. Scott Botcher: So everyone's kosher. Councilman Peterson: You know if we don't discuss the agenda at the work session, that's going to be more questions to you guys, staff during the week. You know Thursday, Friday and Monday is going to be potentially 5 different people asking you the same question. Scott Botcher: Except that generally what happens is that 5 different people don't have the same question and what we've found, or what ! have found prior to the first of the year is that we spent the work session not answering questions but doing debate preparation for council members on different sides of the issue. We weren't answering questions and we were just all sort of sitting there and then, we were playing games with each other and I'd just as soon keep it broad based. Let's talk about an issue for an hour and a half. Tonight we would have put another issue on there after Kate because 45 minutes for her and 45 for something else. We could use the hour and a half because we've got some issues to deal with. But in terms of the prep time, we would expect that the newer council members would have more questions than the more experienced council members. That's just the nature of the beast. And especially with e-mails anymore, it's really easy to answer. I mean if somebody asks the question, I try to ship it out to everybody and so like when Bob's questions came in and the responses, I tried to have everybody get a copy of it and sometimes that will answer the question that Steve for example may not have gotten around to asking yet. So I'd rather do that because it's far more productive than screwing around in the work session. Councihnan Peterson: Okay, so noted. I haven't got a problem with 7:00. The negative of that means it's going later for people too. You've got equal number of people that would have preferred to start them earlier and not go til midnight so there's, I struggled with that in the Planning Commission is that, can we start earlier? We couldn't because some of our members couldn't come earlier but those meetings would historically run til 11:00 and that's late. Mayor Jansen: It's a really good point because the other facet of the discussion that Scott and I had is that we have begun, or we were at least over the last 2 years conducting extensive public hearings at the council level even if it wasn't a public hearing on the agenda. So I would like to be more disciplined ourselves in keeping the public hearing comments with the Planning Commission, and I do think we will have to again give proper notification to our residents because they're used to being able to public hearing in both places and it may be on our meeting notifications that we'd better draw that point out. That if there are new points that need to be brought up to council, you know we certainly don't want to completely shut off the input but we may be able to pull back our discussion a bit. But I appreciate your noting the fact that they could go long. 40 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 Councilman Ayotte: Maybe there's a way of limiting it even more so with, I know a lot of times I ask many, many, many, many, many questions and maybe we need to figure out how to. Mayor Jansen: We need to stay out of the detail also helps. Scott Botcher: I know councils that limit the amount of time a council person can question. Not many, but they do and to me I've never seen it be an issue and frankly I don't think you'Ve gotten to that extent at all and you're going to have a lot of questions and that's okay. But that is an option that. Councilman Ayotte: You mean that you want to self govern?. Scott Botcher: And some councils say, we used to have a drop dead time in Delafield. If it got to be a certain time, the meeting's over. And they knew it and most of the public knew it more importantly so if theY're waiting for a decision, you don't have this parade. Everyone in the neighborhood won't come up and speak because they'd like the council to make a decision so you know. Supply and demand. Mayor Jansen: I think if we clearly communicate it will work. We can do this. CoUncilman Peterson: We can just hook up a 12 volt buzzer to them like the CliffClavin buzzer. Mayor Jansen: Okay, onto the council meeting procedures. We've now already after what, our second or third meeting started to fall into this routine and this is more probably for Steve and myself. Habits that we'll be breaking. I would like to see us go to the order of discussion being simply volunteer versus my actually calling upon individual council people and the order that you will then discuss an issue in. And that was the previous structure. I would just as soon that everyone make your comments when you're comfortable doing so. If everybody hesitates at the same time, we're drawing straws and that's me. I'll start calling but. Councilman Peterson: We started doing that in the Planning Commission for about the last 2 ½-3 years and really at Roger' s recommendation. That's one of the Robert's Rules of Order stuff and you will get hesitation down time. People are processing and I really don't want to go first, so you'll get that but I still, I haven't, I never moved away from that because I think it's still a better way to go ahead. Mayor Jansen: Good. Okay, and did you find that the different members do alternate then on issues? Councihnan Peterson: Yeah, because they know that I will call on them or I would have called on them if they wouldn't have brought it up so, it is a smoother way to do it. Roger Knutson: This was the only city I know of that has used this method of going around and asking in order. What do you want to say? Councilman Labatt: We're a very unique city... Roger Knutson: ...you can make your own decision. Just one thing I've observed over the years, when you do that, if I'm a council member and I really have nothing to say about the subject, when the Mayor turns to me and says what have you got to say, I don't want to look like a dummy so I'll say something. I'll feel compelled to talk because I was asked to talk. 41 City Council Meeting- January 22, 2001 Mayor Jansen: Okay. So I may not never even necessarily turn to everyone and if you don't have anything to say, then you won't feel the pressure but. Councihnan Ayotte: Well that's what happened to me tonight because you kept, I felt that you were prodding me. Otherwise I wouldn't... Mayor Jansen: I just Won't look at you at all. And then we will need a motion to adjourn. Councilman Peterson: Who's benefit is that, your's or his? Mayor Jansen: We will need a motion to adjouTM at the end of the meetings, which we have not traditionally been doing so if we could follow. Councilman Labatt: So all of those meetings are still in process then? Mayor Jansen: Yes. Councilman Labatt: Woxv. Roger Knutson: Just so you know under Robert's, you don't need a motion to adjourn. Mayor Jansen: Okay. Scott Botcher: But you want one for the record. Roger Knutson: You can have one and most cities do. You don't have to have one. What Robert's says is the presiding officer, they don't talk about mayors, but the mayor essentially says is there any other business to come before us and before anyone can open their mouths, slams the gavel down. Scott Botcher: We'll take a motion to adjourn. Mayor Jansen: We'll formalize and do a motion. And then it is not necessary to read the consent agenda once we've approved it so you may have noticed I cut that out tonight so we didn't do that. Saving a little time there. The one thing that procedurally has always seemed a little bit awkward is if someone is going to abstain from a vote, if you also acknowledge your abstaining from the discussion, correct Roger? If we're not, if there's a reason why we're not going to vote, then you can't affect a discussion, correct? Roger Knutson: You've got various, but the recommended procedure is if you're not going to vote because you're going to abstain because of a conflict of interest, you should not sit here as a council member and discuss it as a council member. If you want to say at the beginning of the issue, I'm going to abstain because this involves whatever the issue is, you can of course go down into the audience and speak as a member of the, as a citizen on the subject. But you shouldn't be speaking as a council member on it. Mayor Jansen: In one 0f our, I was actually at a seminar. It was the newly elected officials 2 years ago as a matter of fact. They xvere suggesting that if you were going to abstain, you should leave the council bench so that it's just that much more obvious that you have not participated in the discussion. 42 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 Roger Knutson: That's fine and just, I don't think it's always necessary. For example, if you have Something on the consent agenda. It's a routine matter but for whatever reason you feel you have a conflict and it's going to take 10 seconds, I personally think it's more disruptive in that situation to get up, go down there and come back rather than just abstaining. On the other hand, if it's a major land use file in front of you and it's going to take some period of time to discuss, it's not routine by any means, then yes. I think that's appropriate to get up and say i have a conflict of interest because I own the property. Or I'm selling the property or whatever you're doing, and then sit down there and everyone knows that you're not a council member on this issue. Mayor Jansen: Okay. Councilman Labatt: So 'do you need to state your reason for abstaining? Roger Knutson: I would advise, there's no law that says you have to but it makes a difference. If you abstain because of a legal conflict of interest, and we can discuss what that is sometime, but if it's not just that you're uncomfortable. It's your neighbor and you don't want to annoy your neighbor, but if it's a legal conflict of interest, that reduces the size of the council, assuming there were 5 council members, from 5 to 4 and that can affect the simple majority vote. So it's like you only have 4 members but if you abstain just because you know I'm uncomfortable with this or I know the people involved, something that is not a legal conflict, it does not reduce the size of the counciI. So in some situations it's important to know why you're abstaining. It could be, you don't have to get into the details. You could say I'm abstaining because I'm uncomfortable. That would tell me this not a legal conflict but something else, you're just uncomfortable. Or I'm abstaining because I have a financial interest and if you tell us that, then I know it reduces the size of the council and how to count votes. . Councilman Labatt: Okay. The mayor, if I may, I had a similar question on voting. Can I interject? Mayor Jansen: Sure, sure. Councilman Labatt: In years past every once in a while you'll be, there will be 5 of us up here and you only hear 4 votes. One person won't vote yes or no. Just remain silent. How is that vote recorded, if you can explain that. Roger Knutson: Under the rules you used to have, up until I think the first of the year, it was clear that silence was a vote in the affirmative. So if you were silent, you are deemed to vote yes. Now you no' longer have that and what I would really prefer rather than having that, and I can read Robert's that says that's still the case. Silence is an affirmative vote. Silence might be you didn't, you were doodling or whatever it was and you didn't catch it. I mean I would prefer rather than having to ferret out what your intention is, if you'd just stated what your intention is, which could be simply I'm not voting. Register me as a no vote. Not voting. Or register me as yes or no or abstaining or whatever it is. Some cities get around this issue by having a roll call vote on every single thing they do. Mayor Jansen: And I guess if I don't hear someone verbally commit to their vote, there's nothing wrong with my asking and getting them to clarify, and I think that's one of the differences Steve that we can operate under. Councilman Labatt: Yeah. Yeah, I think that was always confusing. 43 City Council Meeting- January 22, 2001 Roger Knutson: I think the person taking, you know writing up the minutes, when they come across that there must be sometimes listening to the tape what happened. How was it registered? And we've had some interesting times on that issue. MaYor Jansen: That's a good point Steve. I'll just make sure. Councilman Labatt: So I just want to, you kmow. Enough said. We know what we're going to do for the next 2 years so. Mayor Jansen: Got it. Okay. And then I wrote no surprises. More in thinking of ourselves with staff. You know again, if we've got issues on something that's coming up on the agenda, get that infotxnation to staff. If it's something you really feel like you've got to cull it out in the meeting, I hate to see things come up and catch those folks off guard. So more just out of respect that again, you know no surprises. They don't need to be caught off guard with the microphone and same with us. I think they try to avoid surprising us with things in the course of the meeting so I just think that mutual respect. And then anything else on that or we'll move onto Roger's presentation on the open meeting law. Councilman Labatt: Are we, you know Scott you had mentioned the drop dead time. Scott Botcher: Just think about it. Councilman Ayotte: Say that again. Mayor Jansen: A drop dead time for when we end the meetings. Scott Botcher: Yeah, it really depends on, it was rarely used because frankly they were so efficient at running their show that rai'ely did they get to it but at the time where you get such a hot issue that the place is packed and you know we do the agenda, the mayor had to call me up and say why is all this stuff on the agenda? We've got big enough issues. I'm sorry, it's, xve've got to do it. Those things will happen at a certain time, the meeting was just done. By the joint agreement of the councilmembers. Mayor Jansen: And I think I'm remembering from again the same procedures that Roger's recalling, we're not operating necessarily under right now. I believe it said midnight. Scott Botcher: And you can simply do that as an agreement amongst yourself to do policy. I mean you don't need 5 pages of written stuff to do that. Mayor Jansen: But I know we continued past it when we were still trying to work something out. Scott Botcher: Then you always have that, and it's hard to say no, I'm tired. I'm not thinking clearly because you want to do something for the citizens but sometimes it's in everyone's best interest to say you know, we're cooked. Because that will happen. Roger Knutson: Just one more thought on streamlining. As your consent agenda, and we tried this, two thoughts on it. In one community I work in, they rountinely after they go through the consent agenda and say, does the council member want anything removed. Then they ask, are there any other candidates from the council to put on the consent agenda. Councilman Labatt: You mean are there any items on the. 44 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 Roger Knutson: On the regular agenda. Councilman Labatt: The regular that you could have on consent. Roger Knutson: Yeah, and for whatever reason the staff'might have put it on the regular agenda and you can just say this is a no brainer. You know whatever. Let's just move this and say I would like to put items 6, 7 and if anyone on the council objects to it going on the consent agenda, it does not. But if everyone's in agreement, yeah we don't need a presentation on that. Theft it goes on the consent agenda. Councilman Labatt: Okay. Roger Knutson: And like some cities, like I believe the practice here is almost no land use matters go on the consent agenda, and maybe there's a good reason for that. Because it can be difficult issues. But some of them are truly routine, or at least I think they are, where say the staff recommended approval and the Planning Commission recommended approval, and there was no interest in the community on the issue. A lot of those go on in some communities rather than having a full presentation on it. A small matter that no one's really interested in. Mayor Jansen: Okay. Thank you for mentioning that. Appreciate it. OPEN MEETING LAW DISCUSSION, ROGER KNUTSON, CITY ATTORNEY. Roger Knutson: Open meeting law? Mayor Jansen: Please. Roger Knutson: I started out with an hour and a half. Now I'm down to 3 minutes so. ' Councilman Labatt: 2 ½. Roger Knutson: 2 ½, quick. Mayor Jansen: And this is more so we don't unintentionally, committing a violation. It's not to suggest that anyone would be doing anything intentional. Just some of the little things that we can slip up on. Roger Knutson: I'll squeeze as much as I can in 2 minutes now. First, what does the open meeting law cover? It covers a quorum of the council. That means when 3 of you are together, 3 of you are together and 1 of the 3 following 3 things happen. 3 of you together and you make a decision concerning city business, you discuss city business or you obtain information on city business. If any of those 3 things occur when 3 of you are together, that is a meeting of the City Council and unless it's properly called, there's a violation of the open meeting law. Where inadvertently councils get into trouble, and I've seen this many times is you, one of you gets a call. I'd like you to come to our neighborhood meeting at the school. We're going to discuss this issue and you say, love to be there. You show up. You don't know that that same person has called everyone on the council. And so you walk in the room and say on look at,. everyone's here. Isn't that interesting. To discuss potholes or whatever the issue is. 2 of you should turn around and walk out. Councilman Labatt: 2 or 3? 45 City Council Meeting- January 22, 2001 Mayor Jansen: Only 2 can stay. Roger Knutson: Only 2 can stay, excuse me. 3 should get out, and ifI were one of you i wouldn't want to be the one violating the meeting laws so I'd be the first one to hit the door. And you just explain to people, you know we can't do this. Whether it's at someone's home or whether it's a community room or whatever it is to discuss business. 3 together to discuss city related issue, you've got a problem unless it's a properly called meeting. Calling meetings is very simple. All it takes is a posted notice on your main bulletin board. That takes care of it. We also recommend, although'it's not required, that you call the newspaper just to give them a head's up on it as well. So if for example you think you may be going someplace xvhere other council members are going, could be in attendance for one of these things to discuss something to get information, all you have to do is let folks know in advance and Scott and Karen can take care of the proper noticing and you're taken care of. Councilman Peterson: How far in advance? Roger Knutson: 3 days in advance. Mayor Jansen: 3 working days, correct? Roger Knutson: 3 days. Just days. Calendar days. Mayor Jansen: Just 3 calendar days. Not even necessarily business. Roger Knutson: There are few exceptions to the open meeting law and what I'd really like to do is not tell you what they are. But I will though. The reason I would like not to tell what they are is, don't, I'll give you this one piece of advice. Don't close a meeting unless you call me. There's potential problems every time you try to close a meeting and you've got to do it just right and you've got to make sure it's done appropriately. People have thought they were doing it properly and they didn't. And they've been sued and they've lost. Things like someone, in my 2 minutes I can't tell you too many stories but a county board was in litigation and the chairman of the county board talked to their litigation attorney and said we need to decide something about this piece of litigation. So the county board chair called the county board meeting, closed the meeting. Violation. The attorney wasn't there. And the court said if you're going to have attorney/client privilege, you're going to discuss litigation, you can't close the meeting unless the attorney is there and a very large county around here got burned for a violation of the open meeting law. That is it, just a little bit on the open meeting law. Scott Botcher: Generally when we've done closed sessions we call Roger even to approve tlie verbiage on the agenda so Minnesota is very, very strict and. Mayor Jansen: And then also the multiple, what's the term for it? Roger Knutson: Serial meetings. Mayor Jansen: Serial. Roger Knutson: Let me just briefly talk about that. There is another area where we have frankly one line of discussion in one case and everyone knows it's true, it says you can't have serial meetings to violate the open meeting law. Let's just briefly tell you what that means. That means Councilmember A for, 46 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 and this can happen many ways. E-mail is the easiest way. I mean I'm amazed. I imagine it happens instantaneously. I don't know how e-mail works but Councilmember A calls Councilmember B and says hey, we have this item on the agenda. How do you feel about it and the two of you talk and B says something and then Councilmember A calls Councilmember C and says, you know I talked to Councilmember Bi B feels this way. How do you feel C? A serial meeting because the 3 of you, you've shared your views. Discussed it just like you were in a meeting in the same room together only you did it sequentially. That's a violation. So what I always tell peoPle, it's almost going to be impossible someday on e-mails because I know I'm sitting there and I get a lot of them and it pops up on my screen and I reply instantaneously sometimes when I happen to be on the screen find then someone else pops up and then you respond and all of a sudden you're, you know. So just be very careful. Councilman'Labatt: So when Scott, when we get forward to the council mailbox where it says council, for all of us, one e-mail to discuSs something or inform us of something, that is not. Roger Knutson: No. Scott Botcher: And that's why what you get is you know a question and a response. It's not, and frankly I don't often get, I don't know ifI ever remember really getting them, where I got an e-mail like from you saying, Scott I'm going to vote in favor of item 2 on the agenda and I forward that. I mean that's not, that would be a violation. But if it's like how many dogs did we pick up in the, that's factual. That's different. Mayor Jansen: You're not expressing an opinion. Roger Knutson: Well and what, 3 council members have not shared their collective ideas. You might have told the rest of the council what A feels but B and C have not joined in the discussion so you know what the 3 of you say. You can send e-mails just as you can send faxes or anything else. It's just a means of transmitting information. It doesn't matter what the medium is. The best way to think of it is, it doesn't matter whether it's an e-mail or a fax or a phone call or in person, the idea is 3 of you are communicating to each other about how you're thinking about something. Mayor Jansen: And if 2 people meet with a staff person, neither one of those 2 council people can then call up another one to then share any of the opinions or discussion from having met with the staff person. Roger Knutson: Sometimes I've gotten calls, not this year, from previous years from council members asking me about something, and I had the discussion. Then someone else will call me on the council and ask me about the same subject. I will never say you know I just got a call from A about this. I don't want to be part of inadvertently causing a problem. Councilman Labatt: How about, let's just say that with the February Festival coming up. Councilman Ayotte: The what? Councilman Labatt: With the February Festival on Lake Ann. I know I got a call from one of the Park and Rec guys to help out. You know do whatever. Mayor Jansen: We'll probably all be there. 47 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 Councilman Labatt: So let's say we're all there. Okay, but we're not sitting around some fish hole with our jig sticks fishing for crappies. But we're all there. Councihnan Peterson: Be assured of that. Roger Knutson: You can all be there. You can all go fishing together, but you just don't want to talk about city business. Councilman Labatt: So it's any item related to the city. Roger Knutson: Talk about those darn Vikings or something. Councilman Labatt: The Vikings, the Wild or whatever. Roger Knutson: Whatever. Councilman Peterson: Curling. We can talk about curling. Councilman Labatt: Teach you all how to curl. Mayor Jansen: Craig, did you have a question. Councilman Peterson: No, more of a statement I guess and a requestfrom all of us and the new person. Talking about when we get the phone calls from groups or whatever that if we do go, I think it'd be prudent for us to send an e-mail that we're going so we know who is going. Where we're going. And it may be appropriate that another person go so we have'2 people there. I mean it goes back to, I think that's just reasonable because many times we're, you know all of a sudden one person can be speaking for the whole council or what is presumed to be the whole council's opinion whenever we open our mouths, it can be construed negatively so I think I can certainly do that and I think if you all agree, let's just make a pact that we inform everybody when we're going out and going in the public. Mayor Jansen: And actually under one of the items in here I have Calendar review as an item under council presentations. That we actually speak to those be it before or be it after. C0uncihnan Labatt: Craig, I think that's a great idea. We tried it 2 years the last 2 years and it didn't work. We got road blocked but I strongly support you on that. Thank you. Mayor Jansen: Okay, thank you. So then onto point 4? The council orientation program, we all got the notice from Scott that he's pulled that together for February 28th from noon to 4:30. That should be a real interesting time for everybody... Councilman Peterson: Do you want lunch or no? Scott Botcher: I run both ways. To me it's like no, you're going to be too busy to eat but I just want you to know that coming in. Grab something on the way in Mayor Jansen: Good mention. 48 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 Scott Botcher: Or if you're riding I the fire truck, snow plow truck, have them drive you through Wendy's or something. Councilman Labatt: ...I want to go with the inspectors on the snowplow. Scott Botcher: Do whatever you want. You have 50 minutes with each one of them. Councilman Labatt: 157 Scott Botcher: 5-0. Councilman Peterson: Can we get a helicopter before the 28th? Scott Botcher: No, but we have an alumincraft boat out in the fire department. - Mayor Jansen: Okay. Scott and I have started to kick around this planning for the City Council retreat. Depending on how quickly we get position number 5 filled. Obviously we want to wait for that person. Looking at getting a facilitator. Having it be a team building and really talking tO that person about how much we can manage to accomplish, be it in an afternoon or whatever we can set aside and that was one of my questions for all of you as we're trying to pull this together. Can we do a halfa day on a Saturday or otherwise we're looking at maybe to do a long evening? And my thought and one of the suggestions that I've heard the facilitators give for any sort of a retreat like this is do it when you don't have the pressure of coming from work or needing to go tO work. If you can get offsite so you're clear in your head of everything, and especially for Scott because ~he'd probably be backing upstairs all the time. If you can get off site so you can really focus on what it is you're trying to accomplish. Councihnan Ayotte: I don't feel comfortable in saying it should be a Saturday, half day or evening without, I don't think we should train to a time line. I think we should train to a standard so based on what we're trying to accomplish, first I think we have to emphasize that. And then figure out how long it's going to take rather than saying...4 hours, you don't know. Mayor Jansen: It's relatively standard and we'll work it out with a facilitatOr that if we can block out a half a day on a Saturday, I don't think you're going to get all of us committing to a full weekend or full day. We need to get at least some motion, and I understand what you're saying. Councihnan Ayotte: Why don't we do this then. First of all it should be a Saturday. You know to do it during the week is just nuts. But I really would like, you know team building and visioning, boy that's really. Mayor Jansen: You don't like this warm fuzzy stuff. So don't worry about it. We'll take care of it. Councihnan Ayotte: Well I'm just saying that it'd be nice if we could kind of provide definition of what. Mayor Jansen: We will. Scott Botcher: 'And we're going to have to get...potential moderators. Councilman Ayotte: I have a hard time opening up to people, you know what I mean? 49 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 Councilman Labatt: You did a lot of...enough to get elected. Mayor Jansen: So we've got one okay with the Saturday. Scott Botcher: ...we're worried about a round house that's 3 times over budget and we haven't gotten to the good stuff yet. Councilman Labatt: What if we, and I don't know what Craig and Bob what your availability during the week but, frankly I mean I'd rather do it on a weekday. During the day when Scott's working. Councilman Ayotte: ! don't have a problem with that either as long as we're not doing it in the evening. Councihnan Labatt: No, I'd like to do it between 8:00 and 4:30. Councilman Ayotte: Can you do that? Councilman Peterson: I'd prefer not to take a vacation day so, but that's just personal preference. Scott Botcher: Linda we'll just have to talk to some moderator. Councilman Peterson: I'd rather give Scott a half day of vacation then me take one. Scott Botcher: We'll just have to see what happens Linda. Councihnan Labatt: Well I get one weekend offa month so we're all king of. Councilman Peterson: Cml you think of 3 better people to spend it with? Councilman Labatt: Yeah, my wife and 3 kids. Councilman Peterson: Bring them with. CoUncihnan Labatt: Well let's discuss this more. Mayor Jansen: Well what's your Saturday off we're taking in February? Councilman Labatt: It's already taken actually for a hockey tournament with my kids in Bloomington. It' s March 3 rd. Mayor Jansen: Okay, we'll work on it and get back to you. So, but you know we're kicking that around and Scott's looking into some different options for us there. Also looking as far as the planning the community survey. Again, we don't need to get into detail right now. Decision Resources has done the original survey for the community back for the park and trail referendum. Scott's going to have some conversations with the gentleman who had done that. He's contacted Chaska. Chaskajust had one done for their community. Decision Resources has been involved in really the majority of the metropolitan surveys that are done so it gives you a good set of input based upon the other municipalities. And then at some point we do, and I wrote this on here Scott, if we can get the '97. Scott Botcher: ... 5O City Council Meeting- January 22, 2001 Mayor Jansen: We'll get the '97 survey to everyone so at least you can get a feel for the questions that were asked then and we do want to make sure it's an instrument that we can use to years after the fact and get some continuity of information that we're collecting so we can see if we're in fact making progress or not. CoUncilman Ayotte: I would ask that there be at least a cursory call made to Bud Olson who's got his survey that he's been working on. I don't know if you're aware of that. 'I talked to him today. Mayor Jansen: Yes, they've been working with staff and he's had that on the radar screen. Councilman Ayotte: Well maybe we can fold that in or not, but at least. Mayor Jansen: I think we need to keep some of these things separate but we do want to document... Councilman Ayotte: That's cool but I'm just saying... Just to coordinate. Mayor Jansen: Item 7, I didn't bring a copy of these with me but the League of Minnesota Cities conference crone out to us if you recall in some of the correspondence packets. And I would highly, highly recommend that conference to everyone. There's one for newly elected and there's one for re- elected. Councihnan Labatt: Seasoned veterans you mean? Mayor Jansen: Yes. Councihnan Labatt: Okay. Mayor Jansen: This seasoned veteran, one term. I am planning on attending the one for re-elected. If you can't find your form, if you contact Karen Engelhardt, I'm sure she can probably get her hands on it for you. Scott Botcher: It's also on the web. All the forms are on the web. Councilman Labatt: Where is it at? Is it locally? Scott Botcher: I don't know this year. Mayor Jansen: Yeah, I've forgotten. Councilman Labatt: One year it was in Rochester. Scott Botcher: It's been in Rochester. They've been in St. Cloud. They've done them. Mayor Jansen: They have different sites but there's usually one within the metro area. And that's where I wrote down the 16th and 17th is whichever one is metro. Scott Botcher: Immc.org. 51 City Council 'Meeting - January 22, 2001 Councilman Labatt: Okay. Todd Gerhardt: To piggy back on what you're saying. Then you're going to be getting' a monthly newsletter for LMMC. 'I signed you up for a monthly bulletin of the Minnesota City activities so it's coming electronically to you by e-mail. So when you see that, I signed you up for that. Councilman Labatt: Thank you. Mayor Jansen: Great.. Then the next couple items, I'm just wanting to make you aware of some of the other groups that I'm currently attending. Now the first one is the Southwest Transit Commission. That's a monthly meeting on the fourth Thursday of every month. What we have not been very good at is my actually reporting back so that you get the information from that meeting. So I'm going to ask Karen to add on the first meeting of every month a reporting item on there so I can at least give you the highlights of what we're covering. It's never anything real earth shattering. Councilman Ayotte: During the working session there? Mayor Jansen: Probably during the council meeting. So at least you've got that input. I listed some of the documentation and it's just an awful lot of documentation as far as trying to do any reporting or Xeroxing of things back to the council. The community leaders group is a little bit less formal. They meet every 2 months I think has been the standard. The next one is on February 2nd. I noted the location and the time. That group is really hosted by District 112 and it's an effort to keep the school district coordinated with Chaska, ourselves, Victoria. There's nothing formal about it. It's just the group coming together, the Mayor and the staff people and Scott attends and just doing an informal reporting of what we all have going on. Currently the big issue has been transportation and all of the road projects that are going to be occurring so the most formal thing you're going to see happen is our trying to come out with a coordinated map and schedule of all of the road projects that are going to be going on this summer and really making everybody's lives difficult. So that's the first formal effort I've really seen come together with this group. Councilman Peterson: Roger, that being said, if we're reviewing city business with other people, having 3 or 4 council members there, is there an issue? Mayor Jansen: It's a rather, I don't know that the City would want more than currently the way it was, I was attending as a council person and the Mayor representative was there so I think maximum, otherwise you're overwhelming the group with too many representatives from one city. Roger Knutson: Same rules would apply though. If you had a quorum of this council there discussing city business, you want to publish it, post the notices of a city meeting. Scott Botcher: You guys will have enough meetings to go to. You don't have to worry about it. I mean frankly I wouldn't. Mayor Jansen: And that's why I guess I'm saying, this one's pretty informal. There really isn't a lot going on as far as action being taken other than that transportation information. But of course, you know if somebody wants to e-mail me and say that you want to attend this meeting, I can make sure that we don't end up xvith 3 people there if the second person wants to come along. The Minnetonka you heard mentioned here tonight. They've only now, I think they said was the third time. They've just started 52 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 trying to do the same scenario within their communities so it's brand new. That group seemed to only be the mayor representatives. There weren't council people. I think it was mayors. Scott Botcher: And city managers. Mayor Jansen: City managers and then the school district representative was how they structured that one so far. But again i Can make sure that I'm reporting back what's actually being discussed and how it's affecting us but this was a pretty informal again exchange of information. I had volunteered to serve on two of the District 112's planning forums this summer and it's an effort that started clear back last January. From those two planning forums they formed a long range steering committee and I had volunteered then tO go onto the long range steering committee so we're now down to fairly limited meetings on those issues currently and we're taking the final vision and mission statement to the school board end of this week. But that was more the residents that I threw my name in there. That was one of those notices that had come through in our correspondence package. If you watch the correspondence package, we get a lot of those notifications on meetings. Staff and I attended the affordable workshop on Friday and that was something that had in fact been in that correspondence package so you do get a lot of good information in there. We're almost at 10:00, should I jump to the library information? Scott Botcher: I would. Mayor Jansen: I'll stop at 10:00. Councilman Labatt: Okay, but you're going to remain the Southwest Transit Commission representative, right? Mayor Jansen: Yep, if everyone's okay with that. Councihnan Labatt: Yeah, that's fine. Scott Botcher: And 11 you can pick up in 2 weeks and that will be more lengthy anyway. Mayor Jansen: Yeah, it will be. Scott Botcher: And 14 is in your packet. Met Council Mayor's Report is what I gave out at the work session, that's 14(b) sort of. 15 is strategic plan. You have that. I gave it to you tonight. I have to run the old task plan I can run for you and I'll just, maybe even I'I1 do it electronically because I think it's on that spread sheet format. Do it that way and then those are those 3 things but yeah, do you want to do the library thing? I gave her the dates that you'd like exhausted. She said I can't sit still that long and I said we should hang together. I'm going to call her in the morning and give her the. Councilman Ayotte: At some point I'll e-mail you Scott or the Mayor and we can have a development strategy, I think that's really key at one point. I'm not sure what we're doing with that. Mayor Jansen: It just needs to be a discussion. We haven't even gotten there yet. I put the last. Councilman Ayotte: Okay, just as a thing to hit. Mayor Jansen: Yep. I put the last 17 on are just to have them on your radar screen. They're out there. 53 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 Councilman Ayotte: Alright, library. Mayor Jansen: Library. Initial discussions with the architecture firm, trying to come up with some public hearing dates so that we can get this rolling. This was trying to work around Barry Scherer's schedule as well. Looking at the initial public hearing date of February 8th, is a Thursday at 7:00 p.m. The reason Scott was catching up with Melissa was so that we can already maybe start to get some of the discussion and at least some notification out there that this will be occurring. And if she gets something in this Thursday it will give 2 weeks in a row to give it attention. We'll make sure that we get it to the Friends of the Library so they know what's going on but we can start sprehding the word. Councihnan Labatt: Can we put the date on our calendars? Scott Botcher: Yes, will do. Mayor Jansen: February 8th, 7:00 p.m. Scott Botcher: And we're planning on about 3 hours. Mayor Jansen: In this room. And part of the discussion that Barry was bringing up was that our presence can have a tendency to limit some people's discussion as far as the public because now if they really want to be able to express what they think about the building, if one of us or some of us are sitting in the background, they may have a tendency to hold back and maybe not feel as if, or comfortable. It's more · of. Scott Botcher: I think the bigger issue is that you all are going to have so many whacks at this thing. More whacks than you want that this process at the outset is really to garner input from the public as to what's happening. You're going to get that. You're going to get that both in terms of the renderings that are put together. You're going to get that in terms of representation from, and Linda can talk about this, the building committee structure but from that Building Committee structure. Frankly if it was me, and as many meetings as you guys go to, I govern up here again. Do I need to really physically be here to hear the input? COuncilman Labatt: But this is a public...to solicit. For Scherer and his group to solicit input. Scott Botcher: Yeah, and frankly I don't think staff. I'm not planning on staff being there unless they need somebody for clerical support because it's truly for the consultant that we've hired to go to the public and say okay, now it's time. Mayor Jansen: It's like what we did with the task force and it then turned into the two public hearings where it was the public talking xvith the consultant and the consultant trying to give them the big vision and draw out from them their comments. And they're planning on having someone there to be able to keep notes so that they're able to give us the feedback from the public so it won't be as if we're missing anything. Councilman Ayotte: I think it's a good idea not to but we are...consultant stipulate the ground rule that that's the intent so they don't, Linda and I... Scott Botcher: We already had the discussion of ground rules. 54 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 Councilman Ayotte: Good, good. Mayor Jansen: Yeah, okay. Conversation was around having 3 of these public hearings and trying to stagger the nights or the days that they're having them to allow for people's schedules. If you can't make it on the Thursday night, we then talked about a March l0th, which is a Saturday. And they're coming in 'and starting at 9:00 a.m. on that Saturday and hosting the same sort of draw from the public, their input. At that point they would have had the results from the prior meeting to be able to move on to a more advance discussion. 9:00 to noon, March 10th is a Saturday. Councilman Ayotte: Are you going to haVe them in different locations? Mayor Jansen: No, we discussed just this room. Councilman Ayotte: Okay. Scott Botcher: Sort of the center of the community. 'Community gathering place. Mayor Jansen: Then if they need to use the power point or the slides, they've got all the. The third meeting then would be March 27th, Which is a Tuesday. So we've got a Thursday, a Saturday and a Tuesday. And a Tuesday night would be 7:00 p.m. Again probably 3 hours. A Thursday, a Saturday and then Tuesday night. Councilman Ayotte: Okay. Mayor Jansen: We then talked about the council receiving the update of all that information directly from the consultant coming into our April 9th council meeting. April 9th council meeting to present their findings as this moves forward. Now the piece I didn't tie into this at the beginning, and we talked about it over the course of I think as we were reviewing with the architects the building committees, or a building committee. So at least there is a group that is able to steer this at the policy level. Again, not getting down so much into the detail. You know we're not doing the mechanicals of the building or really getting into the functionality. There's Certainly going to be opportunities for being-able to express those opinions and ask those questions, but this group more so to be able to steer more at that policy level. And what Barry was suggesting was a staff representative being Scott, City Council representative being myself, the Library Director so Melissa Burchone would be able to bring the. Scott Botcher: County. Mayor Jansen: Thank you.. The County perspective and the library board and the county commission are both very comfortable with Melissa as their representative so she does manage to meet both of their needs. Rather than actually having a library board member on there. And then the possibility then of, well giving friends the opportunity to come forward with a friend's representative and then a citizen at large. And again, go ahead. Scott Botcher: I'm sorry, who's not affiliated with friends or anybody is our goal. Just Joe Schmoe or Jane Schmoe. Mayor Jansen: Did I get them all? So 5. So you've got 5 people and again, all those 5 people are doing is ~naking sure that the project's proceeding as we've perceived it's going to. If there's issues that we need to involve council in as far as any discussion, we can certainly raise those issues as we go along but 55 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 I don't really anticipate there being anything until we get to that April 9th. Once the public is really weighed in. · Scott Botcher: And in a project of this scope, the building committee frankly may meet more often than the council. On a regular basis my expectation in a project of this nature, the building committee may set a regular time. Like building a church. Once a week. Once every 2 weeks we either gather or we conference. Conference call sort of deal and say where are we? ...whatever. It is, I mean we're not doing the drawings obviously but it's more micro level than the council, but not, we're not the consultants and that's a good filter for the council to have. It allows us to'drive it without you guys being burdened with it because it's going to be a full time job in 2 years plus. And at the same time allows you all to focus on again the bigger picture stuff and I think that's what you want to do. Mayor Jansen: Yeah, and initially as part of the whole public hearing process we didn't have that group potentially meeting until after that first input meeting. So we've only blocked out one period of time in which to say, okay. You're going in the first direction once they at least get some initial things on paper. Scott Botcher: But that group will set their regular meeting schedule when they form... Mayor Jansen: Did I miss anything from the library discussion? Scott Botcher: No. Mayor Jansen: More so wanting to bring it here. Scott Botcher: Get the word out. Mayor Jansen: Let you knoxv that we can move fotwvard on this kind of a timeframe. Councihnan Labatt: When is it slated to dig the hole? Scott Botcher: Well we're going to bid in January. Mayor Jansen: We should get a copy of that work plan that you had e-mailed me. Scott Botcher: I can e-mail it to everybody. Mayor Jansen: Yeah. It's got the month. It doesn't have what we just went over here. This is what they had up on that board that you couldn't read from here. As far as the design time, the documents. The negotiations and so forth so we'll make sure a copy of that goes out to the council. Any questions on the library? Okay. Everybody look at the last page though because on here your city council appointment process. You're trying to get me to adjourn, right? Councilman Labatt: She's into my travel time. Mayor Jansen: I just noted everybody that the dates that we had talked about the last time as far as the last date to submit applications being Wednesday the 24th. We get the copies of the app's the 25th. We're in here on Monday the 29th at 5:30 to review the applications and determine our interview schedule. Which we talked about doing on that Monday, February 5th. I tried to work backwards. That if we're 56 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 .. going to try to stop at 10:00 p.m., to get 4 interviews.in with them being about an hour a piece, we'd be starting at 5:00. Scott Botcher: The boarder question is, you have more applicants than that. You don't have to answer this but think about it. Do you want on the 29th to then cut down whatever the pool ends up being, into 4? Mayor Jansen: That's where I was going yeah, with this. Either you end up adding another night or increasing the amount of time or do we. Scott Botcher: I'll shut up now. Mayor Jansen: That's okay. We're tracking the same. Councilman Peterson: I think we can answer that question when we see the applicants background. Scott Botcher: I haven't looked at a single one. Councilman Peterson: If we've got 3 ex-governors and a senator versus somebody who's been. Scott Botcher: Those people aren't allowed, right? Councihnan Peterson: Yeah they're out. Councihnan Ayotte: Have you gotten any applications yet? Scott Botcher: I think we have 8. Councihnan Ayotte: You've got 8 already? Scott Botcher: I believe. It was 8 in or 8 people have taken out the paperwork. Mayor Jansen: I was aware of 2 on Thursday who had submitted and 8 who had picked them up. Councilman Labatt: We should make them put some money up like, you know we all paid money for a campaign. Mayor Jansen: Yeah 5 bucks. Put in your $5.00 filing fee. Scott Botcher: Expectation is that you'll have more than 4. Mayor Jansen: And then I just, I tried to work through how the time might break out. Just so we all have a feel going into this whole interview procedure in case somebody wants to get feedback. I just put this down for discussion sake. We give the applicant 5 minutes up front to do an introduction. I don't know if that's too fast for some folks. Scott then had provided us the four conceptual categories. If you care to explore those 4 categories, if we just looked at allocating 10 minutes per category, with 4 of us asking questions, it's like 2 plus minutes a question per category. Councilman Peterson: My sense is I don't think we're going to get, all four of us aren't necessarily asking questions. You know one or two people can take the lead and then the others would just augment 57 City Council Meeting - January 22, 2001 from there but. I think an hour is fine. How it flows, I've never been a proponent of an overly structured interviexv but I think an hour is reasonable and then we can kind of play it by ear from there. Mayor Jansen: We can kind of give a feel. Councilman Labatt: Are we going to eat? I'm just trying to think of 5:00 p.m. I mean we tried to say we're going to feed the council, maybe we should hit a drive thru on the way before we get in. Mayor Jansen: Good point. Eat ahead of time. ~ Councilman Peterson: So we're eating at 4:30? That's a little bit early for me personally. Councilman Labatt: Well, try 3:30 in the morning for your dinner. Mayor Jansen: You're going to eat at the 5 minute break, right? Inhale. Scott Botcher: And just for what it's worth. I don't expect any staff members to be present because it's not really a staff function so. Mayor Jansen: Okay. Thanks for mentioning that. Scott Botcher: On the 29th, the interviews. Mayor Jansen: We might need someone for staging purposes though, because I think. Scott Botcher: Either that or we can. Councihnan Labatt: Put'a sign out there. Scott Botcher: One person instead of a whole team, you could sort of, yeah. We'll figure something out. Mayor Jansen: Because we'll do the green room thing again like you did with the library~ Scott Botcher: We'll figure something out. Mayor Jansen: Okay. Yeah, let's talk about it. Councilman Labatt: The green room or the padded room? Mayor Jansen: The padded room. Anything else? Motion to adjourn. Councilman Labatt moved, Councilman Ayotte seconded to adjourn the meeting. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously. The City Council meeting was adjourned at 10:10 p.m. Submitted by Scott Botcher City Manager Prepared by Nann Opheim 58 CHANHASSEN CITY COUNCIL WORK SESSION JANUARY 29, 2001 Mayor Jansen called the work session to order at 5:30 p.m. COUNCIL MEMBERS PRESENT: Mayor Jansen, Councilman Peterson, Councilman Ayotte and Councilman Labatt STAFF PRESENT: None PUBLIC PRESENT: Melissa Gilman (Chanhassen Villager), Debra Kind(Applicant), Thomas Furlong(Applicant). DISCUSS PROCESS FOR FILLING VACANCY ON THE CITY COUNCIL. Mayor Jansen began the discussion with a review of the number of applications received for the position. She stated that with twenty-three applications 30 minute screening interviews would require the council to conduct twelve hours of interviews. This would require three evenings of seven to eight interviews each. Cutting the interview time to twenty minutes would be eight hours or fifteen-minute interviews would require six hours of interviews. She then asked for comments from the council on the process everyone would be the most comfo~rtable proceeding with. Mayor Jansen also added that she had contacted Roger Knutson (City Attorney) about Councilman Ayotte's pending complaint against him by one of the applicants (Mr. Senn). The city has been advised that there is no legal restriction against Councilman Ayotte's_ participation in all of the appointment discussions including his ability to participate in the interview proceedings with that applicant. Councilman Peterson thought that the council could eliminate candidates based upon the applications rather then interview all of the candidates. He suggested examples of criteria to eliminate candidates as length of residency in Chanhassen (3 yrs or less eliminate), eliminate previous elected officials and/or commissioners. His preference was to not interview all of the candidates. Councilman Ayotte thought the council could restrict the number of candidates to be interviewed. However he voiced a concern that since the council had not advised the public that they might do a "paper cut", the applicants might not be prepared for that action. He voiced an interest in the 10- 15 minute interviews as a way to explore the candidates' community interests and concerns. Councilman Labatt expressed concern with the time commitment involved with interviewing all of the candidates. That many evenings committed to interviewing would be a burden. He was concerned that he had not received copies of 23 applications which it was later determined that he had in fact received all of the applications. City Council Work Session - January 29, 2001 Mayor Jansen stated that she had come prepared to discuss interviewing all of the applicants. Unlike a private company, these were applications for a public service position. She felt it was only fair that everyone have an opportunity to meet with the council to discuss his or her interests. However, she acknowledged the concern of the other council members about the lengthy time commitment of interviewing all 23 candidates. She stated that she would not be opposed to compromising on a reduced number of candidates for the screening interview with a lengthier hour interview for the final candidates. A discussion about the pros and cons of eliminating candidates ensued. The council decided that everyone should list their top 10 to 12 candidates based upon the criteria contained in the city managers' memo dated January 17, 2001. Financial Acumen; Organizational Participation/Management; Public Interaction/Communication; and Planning/Land Use/Development. However, after presentation of his list of candidates, Councilman Peterson noted that he had used Public Service Record, Volunteerism and Outside Activities as his selection criteria.. Mayor Jansen tabulated everyone's lists and posted on the white board the names of seven candidates that had received 3-4 votes each from the council: Jim Andrews, Gayle Degler, Roderick Franks, Thomas Furlong, Mark Kroskin, Mike Mason and Kathleen Peck. Councilman Peterson stated that he was okay just interviewing the seven candidates. Mayor Jansen asked if she should list the next five candidates that had received two votes each. The council consensus was to just interview the top seven vote getters. Council discussed having staff schedule 30 minute interviews with the candidates for Monday, February 5th from 5:30 to 9:00 p.m. The first interview to begin at 6:00 p.m. Following the completion of those interviews, council will determine the short list of candidates for a second interview. Tuesday, February 6th, 7:00 p.m. - (TBD) was set as the date for second interviews to determine the final selection. These will be one-hour interviews with 3 -4 candidates. The final tabulation of candidates and votes is attached for the public record. Councilman Labatt briefly reviewed and submitted to Mayor Jansen some information that he had received in response to his inquiry about compliance checks done by the Carver County Sheriff s Office in Chanhassen in 2000. The material contains an application that is time sensitive and could not be held until the next council meeting. Mayor Jansen suggested the information be reviewed with staff and placed on a future council agenda for review if found to be necessary. Mayor Jansen adjourned the work session meeting at 7:10 p.m. Submitted by Prepared by Linda Jansen, Mayor. CCAppt. Minutes Criteria: Jansen Anderson Asplin Flyrm Franks Furlong Johnson Kroskin Lloyd Peck Peterson X × Franks X Kroskin X Labatt X Mendez Mason X Degler X Berquist Kind McAllister Andrews X Senn X X X X Ayotte X X X X X Boyle Hepperlz *Business Finance Technology *Public Service Volunteerism/Outside Activities 9 10 9 11 CHANHASSEN PLANNING COMMISSION REGULAR MEETING JANUARY 16, 2001 Chairman Burton called the meeting to order at 7:05 p.m. MEMBERS PRESENT: Matt Burton, LuAnn Sidney, Deb Kind, Uli Sacchct, Alison Blackowiak, and Ladd Conrad STAFF PRESENT: Kate Aanenson, Community Development Director; Julie Hoium, Planner I; Bob Generous, Senior Planner; and Matt Saam, Project Engineer REQUEST TO REZONE PROPERTY FROM RR, RURAL RESIDENTIAL TO RSF, SINGLE FAMILY RESIDENTIAL FOR PROPERTY LOCATED AT 1916 CRESTVIEW CIRCLE, TORY WALTON. Julie Hoium presented the staff report on this item. Burton: Thank you. Any questions for staff?. Sacchet: Yeah Mr. Chair. What I'm struggling with, besides the subdivision potentially, two lots which I really don't think is really realistic considering the grade and everything, is the access point. It seems like the logical access point, and the way the neighborhood is built would be from Crestview Circle. And that would have the least environmental impact also. Now that would require an easement and that would go over the land of the current owner? Hoium: To the north, that is correct. Sacchet: To the north? Has that been explored? Hoium: Well we could recommend that but we couldn't require that as it would possibly be a taking if this land was sold. And the rezoning is a stipulation of this land being sold to another party. We can recommend it. Sacchet: But we can't require it. Hoium: But we can't require. Whether it was rezoned or if it got a variance. Sacchet: Okay, thank you. Burton: Any other questions for staff?. Okay. This is not, well I don't think there will be many comments. Anybody in the audience, well first of all. Do you guys want comments? Let's just see, does anybody here want to comment on this? Okay. So we won't open it for a public hearing. Do you guys have comments on it then? Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 Sacchet: Yeah Mr. Chair. I have been thinking about this a little bit and I really don't like the idea of potential subdivision of that place. It doesn't make sense. The topography is relatively steep. There is an old creek on one side and there's wetland on the other side. I think it'd be very hard to reasonably, or should I say environmentally sensitive to put one house there. And to do that it would need access from Creswiew Circle and not from Galpin because if you do it from Galpin you have to go across the ravine basically. So I'm a little bit in a quandary because if we could require that the access is from CresWiew Circle, I would be inclined to rezone it to single family residential. Make it consistent with all the other aspects. But in the absence of having foundation to ask that the access is from Crestview and have some assurance that that's going to go that way, I start wondering again whether- it's better to leave it rural because the possibility to have some animals on that property to me is less threatening than the possibility of having access from Galpin and having a potential subdivision. That's my comment. Burton: Okay, thank you. Any other comments? Kind: Mr. Chair, I'm wondering if the applicant's here and can address where they are planning on accessing the site from. Applicant #1: There is no plan as to where the site's going to be accessed at this point. Applicant #2: The builder who is, has purchased the lot is planning to build one home on it, if that makes a difference at all. His plan is one single family home. Applicant #1: His single family home. Sacchet: But you wouldn't know where the access will be? Applicant #2: Not exactly, no. Kind: Well with that Mr. Chair I'I1 add just to my comments. I'm convinced that the topography limits this to one home and I'm comfortable rezoning it since it is guided for low density residential and our comp plan is consistent with that. I live on a one acre lot that technically could be subdivided and there's just no way it could be done because of the topography so I can relate to this particular lot and so I would agree with the staff report. Burton: Anybody else comment? Sidney: Well I guess I'd just like to add very thorough staff report. All my questions were answered, thank you. Burton: Yep, I agree. And I would just add that I agree with Deb. I'm convinced that with the change that's not practical to build more than one home on this lot so I agree with the planning department's recommendation. So if there's not any more comments, does somebody want to make a motion? Sidney: I'll make a motion. I make a motion that the Planning Commission recommends approval of the rezoning #2000-3 of Mr. Walton's property located at 1916 CresWiew Circle from Rural Residential, RR to Residential Single Family, RSF. Kind: I'll second that. Planning Commission Meeting- January 16, 2001 Sidney moved, Kind seconded that the Planning Commission recommends approval of the rezoning #2000-3 of Mr. Walton's property located at 1916 Crestview Circle from Rural Residential, RR to Residential Single Family, RSF. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously. REZONING REQUEST FROM A-2, AGRICULTURAL ESTATE TO PUD, PLANNED UNIT DEVELOPMENT, A LAND USE PLAN AMENDMENT FROM LOW DENSITY TO MEDIUM DENSITY RESIDENTIAL AND COMMERCIAL OFFICE TO MEDIUM DENSITY AND OFFICE INDUSTRIAL TO COMMERCIAL AND PRELIMINARY PLAT SUBDMSION OF 120.93 ACRES, WETLAND ALTERATION PERMIT, CONDITIONAL USE PERMIT FOR DEVELOPMENT WITHIN THE BLUFF CREEK OVERLAY DISTRICT AND RECOMMENDATION AND REVIEW OF THE ENVIRONMENTAL ASSESSMENT WORKSHEET FOR A MIXED HOUSING DEVELOPMENT (383 UNITS} CONSISTING OF CLUB HOMES, MANOR HOMES, COACH HOMES, VILLAGE HOMES AND RENTAL TOWNHOMES ON 89.5 ACRES AND 2.9 ACRES OF COMMERCIAL USES AND ON PROPERTY ZONED A2, AGRICULTURAL ESTATE AND LOCATED ON THE NORTHEAST CORNER OF HWY. 5 AND HWY. 41, ARBORETUM VILLAGE, PULTE HOMES. Public Present: Name Address Kevin Farrell James Haugen Dennis R. Griswold Mark Guenther Dan Cook Tom & Kay Faust Bill Coffinan Tom Furlong Linda Bergan Pat J. Connolly Leah Hawke Steven Berquist Karen Weathers Jerry and Jan Paulsen Deb Lloyd Dan Shoemaker Mel Kurvers Anne Ryan Mike Zumwinkle 7336 Fawn Hill Road 7800 Bavaria Road, Victoria Pulte Homes Pulte Homes Pemtom 541 Mission Hills Drive 600 West 78th Street 1841 Ringneck Drive 3241 Tanadoona Drive 2008 Grand Avenue, St. Paul 7444 Moccasin Trail 7207 Frontier Trail 7235 Hazeltine Blvd. 7305 Laredo Drive 7302 Laredo Drive 7380 Kurvers Point Road 7240 Kurvers Point Road 2595 Southern Court 7250 Hillsdale Court Kate Aanenson and Matt Saam presented the staff report on this item. Burton: Questions for staff. Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 Blackowiak: Mr. Chair, I just have one, I think a simple one. Page 34, site plan review, condition 2(b). Talking about the dedication of the north wetland trail alignment. Do you have a preference or what is the difference betxveen the public outlot or easement route for that dedication? Aanenson: I believe the applicant does as far as extraction. Certainly they're willing to build the trail. I think the park commission wanted everything on the other side of the trail as dedication. But I think the applicant's position would be that they'd want to be compensated because it's beyond the normal trail easement. So standard language would be, you can ask the applicant about that. Standard language would be a trail easement which is 20 feet wide. And that's going to follow the sewer line predominantly. We're meeting with that and now trying to preserve the trees. Meeting with the developer, or excuse me the engineer that's proposing the sewer. Trying to resolve the tree losses. Uli's walked up in that area. There's some tree losses as you get closer to the McAllister property that we're trying to, maybe you might have a double easement with the sewer and then the trail. Trying to preserve tree loss in that area. Blackowiak: Okay, so did you have a preference? Aanenson: What I'm saying is, this may be something Roger's going to have to clarify. The CiD, Attorney as far as the legality of that. Blackowiak: Okay, thank you. Burton: Uli. Sacchet: Yeah I've got a lot of questions and tonight we need to answer them because we owe these people a decision. First of all, just to start where you left off Kate. There's definition of the primary zone of the Bluff Creek. I didn't really fully understand. Can you explain that a little bit? Aanenson: Sure. We're going through this area right here. That map that I gave you...out the overlay on this so it's not, the alignment is not the engineer's alignment. Sacchet: Correct. Aanenson: The alignment I'm sho~ving you that follows through here is the 984 contour. It's just in this area. Otherwise everything else through here where it appears that it falls out, the primary zone there but it indeed follows this 984 contour right here... Sacchet: So basically what you're confirming is that none of these duplexes reaches into the primary zone. Is that what you're saying? Aanenson: Correct. What I want to make clear is the city's sewer and water project will be in the primary zone. Sacchet: Yeah, that's unfortunate. Aanenson: That's what we're trying to minimize. Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 Sacchet: Okay, but you answered my question. None of the duplexes in the primary zone. That's important to me. Now there was some shifting around going on with some of the village homes on the southeast corner. That from a 4 unit, that became a 6 unit. Aanenson: Correct. Sacchet: What's the rationale behind it because it does certainly hit a lot more trees there? Aanenson: Yes. They took out those units to open up that area for the toflot and that's where they placed them. Sacchet: So it wasa trade off'?. Aanenson: Yes. Sacchet: There was a request for more space for recreation. Aanenson: Visibility into that space I guess I'd qualify that. Sacchet: So do we owe them that extra two things even though they cut into the trees quite a bit? Aanenson: That's that fine line of they're paying full park and trail fees and as far as the responsibility the PUD provides some open space with park dedication. That's what they were Wrestling with. They're paying full park and trail fees but yet under the PUD they're trying to balance what are the needs for being responsible to say. Sacchet: It has to be fair to them, I understand. Aanenson: Right, exactly and I did pass out for you, because they shared it with the park commission, I pasSed that out for you tonight what the other project, similar type projects have been required for totlot- open space. And that would be Walnut Grove, Mission Hills. You can kind of give a comparison. Certainly this has more acreage and again we try to relate it back to demographics. If it was going to be younger people it'd probably be down in that area so that's what they struggled with. Trying to find that line of meeting the needs under the PUD but not going beyond what they have the authority to do. Sacchet: Now you mentioned that the applicant would be held to his full park and rec fee. How do we justify when they do all these trails and open spaces? I mean to me I'm wondering whether protecting a couple more trees would be worth it and I also seem to recall that in the comprehensive plan there's a statement that we try to minimize fees. So it looks like in this case you're actually hitting them pretty hard, aren't we? Aanenson: Well I think when they first came in my recollection was you wanted to see some continuity between the different projects. I think something certainly you can look at and the park commission looked at too, that you have the ease to go between them. If some people walking can stay within the complex. If they want to walk up to the bus. That was one of the other loose ends. I did pass that out to you. We're looking at Southwest Metro providing a shelter closer to the wetland on the south side of that frontage road. Just a slip in lane with a shelter. Providing access with a sidewalks on that side, either internal paths to get you up to that so it's a trade off. Could you eliminate some of those and still have convenience of walking the streets? Certainly. I think that's something. Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 Sacchet: Well I'm not necessarily trying to eliminate some of these amenities. What I'm trying to eliminate is these extra 2 units that were added and encroach onto the trees. And I think it might be more appropriate to decrease the fees a little bit for that. But moving on, the McAllister property. So the issue we have there is that we have this 300 foot setback requirement based on the ordinance for petting farms. We're saying that at this point we want to address that and possibly alter that at our next meeting? Aanenson: In looking at the interim use, correct. Right. Sacchet: Because my concern is that if we approve this PUD, we basically declare the petting farm non- conforming use. Aanenson: If the council approves it with this... Sacchet: If the council approves it. Aanenson: Right. Sacchet: Because if nothing is done about it that could potentially be a death sentence what they're undertaking which is, I don't think will be fair because we just approved to let that petting farm exist. Aanenson: Right. Sacchet: Okay. So you're confident that we can put that into a way that it's not hurtful. Aanenson: Correct. Sacchet: Alright. Now with the density transfer we clarified'that the density transfer from the west side of 41 is added up to the north side of the frontage street. Aanenson: Correct. Sacchet: And on the south side we add in the density credit for the street. Aanenson: Correct. Sacchet: And we do not add any affordable housing bonus anywhere? Aanenson: No. Sacchet: Okay. Now do you know how much that affordable housing bonus could potentially be? Would be requested or. Aanenson: We have it in the ordinance. We haven't to my knowledge haven't applied it at any project. Maybe Ladd knows. Been there quite a while but the density bonus for affordability. Sacchet: One place where I saw it said it can be up to 25%. Is that correct? Aanenson: Correct. Planning Commission Meeting- January 16, 2001 Sacchet: Okay. So we're actually pretty clear about the density here. About the designation, what will be included in the preservation easements. You mentioned that it will be more specific. It would include Outlot E and F, the forested area north of the McAllister property, the stand of trees on the south side, west from the NURP pond, and would it make sense to possibly also include some of those trees that we declared special interest for. I think there's about a half dozen of those trees. Aanenson: Right. Those are the significant stands. Certainly any tree that's a significant portion, 30 plus inches, we try to save certainly. We know there are some that are oui there 60. Jill's looked at it. Again we met with the engineers running to the north side because there's also significant trees as you cross through this area here. I know there's this 60 inch oak in this area. We've spoken to the developer. We've looked at overlay with the grading plan. As a general policy before our project, again before they're given the order to proceed we walk every project to check the erosion control and the tree fencing so they're on notice that anything significant that we can work to massage grading and they're willing to look at that. So we're going to walk the site, as we always do and try to save those individual trees. Sacchet: See my concern is particularly with that stand of trees on the southern side because I've seen this project three times and each time that stand has shrunk. Aanenson: You're talking about this one? Sacchet: Yes. Aanenson: Correct. Sacchet: Each time, I mean each time it's smaller and there's always some reason that, I mean there's some justification to it. But that's why I think it's very important that we very clearly define what that is because it seems to be melting away. Aanenson: Yeah, I agree. Sacchet: Alright. Yeah I think that's my questions for right now. Burton: Okay, thanks. Any other questions? Sidney: Yes Mr. Chair. One quick question. We're talking a lot about housing obviously but we do have a com~nercial component in this PUD. And I'm wondering if there's a discussion about that that I missed or where that is because I'm thinking back to the Gateway development. You know in our Arboretum Business Park where we looked at the commercial component and defined what we wanted in terms of the uses at that... Aanenson: It is in the staff report. If you go to page 9, the PUD standards. We talked about under permitted uses. It's on page 9. Neighborhood style as far as pitched roof, orientation and we listed there the types of uses. No drive thru windows. We don't want fast food. This is a neighborhood oriented retail. We also said no use shall exceed 5,000 square feet. We suspect there may be a gas station or convenience or something of that size. If someone wanted to put in office, daycare. Again those would be appropriate but we tried to look at this, the scale and the appropriateness to the neighborhood. Then also under the design standards on page 10, we talked about this. It's still under the curtain wall as far as acceptable materials. We didn't want a standing seam siding curtain wall but the standards are in there Planning Commission Meeting- January 16, 2001 too. So with the adoption o£this, you have the design standards in place. It's an outlot. It will have to come back and plat it but first they'll have to come back to you with a site plan because it would require a site plan review so you'd review it at that time. Sidney: Okay. I guess I just thought maybe that would have been a separate section in the staff report. Aanenson: It's all wrapped into the design standards and again we adopted all those with this so when they come in, this will be what we'll measure that against. Those standards. Burton: Any other questions? Kind: I've got a question. But they're much less now after Uli went. Speaking of design standards, residential. On page 10 of the staff report. Kate you briefly mentioned something and I didn't catch it. Something about we'll accept shakes as an acceptable material on all buildings now and then what were you saying about brick? Aanenson: Oh, we did put a percentage of brick and there's some ambiguity with that because we said vinyl and brick. That just to make sure that we quantify it. We're approving the design that they represented here and they'll be included in the packet but just for clarity purposes, if we put that percentage in so as that moves through the process we want to put a percentage in so we're held to that. Kind: Okay. I think that makes sense. And then, how about shingles? My concern the last time we gathered was I don't xvant fiat shingles that ripple in the summer time. I want this to have a quality look about it. Did you find anything out about that? Aanenson: Yes. What ~ve did is pulled a couple other projects and got their standards. Actually it would be a similar to what we did at Lake Susan which is the Class A which is the fiberglass asphalt shingle again. What you're looking at is wind resistant, fire resistant so they don't ripple. But what we required there was the 230 pound per square and that's what they said is their standard too so if you want to be specific and put that in as a condition, that'd be appropriate too. Kind: That's 230 pound? Aanenson: Right. Per square inch. Kind: It's tike a weight. And then is it fiberglass/asphalt combination thing? Aanenson: Right. And the specific one that we looked at for the apartment was, it has a called out brand, XT25, Certainteed and in reviewing it with the developer, that's the same one that they would use SO. Kind: Okay. I don't know if we need to get that specific but kind of the gist that we want that or better. Aanenson: Exactly. Kind: Good deal. I just need a note here. Just a minute, I've got more questions. On page 12 of the staff report, we mentioned Outlot F and I just want to make sure I heard you correctly when you were going over this earlier that all the outlots and the treed areas and things will be part of Phase I. Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 Aanenson: As far as dedication with the conservation easement so there's no slippage factor, yes. Those will be required with the final plat. It may be phased. The first one that comes through we record it as dedication of a conservation easement. Kind: Good. And then the only other questions I have were related to things that were brought up in the public hearing last time around and that you did not include in your memo and I was hoping that you could speak to them. The first one being, what's your point of view about the western gateway? Aanenson: I did meet with Peter Olin. You may not be able to see this bdt they're in, the Arboretum's in the process of doing a large upgrade. They've got some significant money to do a new interpretative center and then a big crystal greenhouse. And I wanted him to review this project and then also he wanted to share with me what they're looking at as far as their plan. And as far as the gateway treatment, if you can see what they're looking at. This would be Highway 5. This is the two comers that they own. They talked about possibly doing some sort of fountain. We talked about that too as far as the, if you remember when this first came in everybody was spending a lot of time designing what that intersection could be and we were kind of losing track of the design of the rest of the project. I'm confident that the developer will be willing to do the kind of treatment we'd like there. We talked, I know you have talked about water and we got into the discussion of when Bill Morrish looked at this. We specified different types of trees at intersections. Maples, oaks, kind of signature intersections instead of trying to make something artificial. Make it more natural and if you wanted to put a condition in to that effect, I'm confident they'd come back with a landscaping plan that would reflect what the Arboretum's doing and kind of compliment that. But the actual entrance to the city is not at this point. It's further south on 82nd and then actually further west on Highway 5 but I think if we want to try to mirror what they're doing on those two intersections. This again is kind of in their plans as they go through their upgrading of their project so I'm confident if you want to put something in that they'd be willing to do that as part of their landscaping. It does drop off which is what we talked about when we talked about the water component. If you look at the topography in this comer here. This wetland is dropping off pretty quickly. This is dropping off pretty quickly. This is 5 and 41. These are the two other intersections from the Arboretum. This is dropping off pretty quickly. So we talk about height and what we can do. But if you want to leave that in. If they want to come back with something to show you to work through the process, I think that'd be appropriate. But we were getting so hung up on that. Kind: And then one of the other things that was brought up at the public hearing was taxes. Could you speak to that relative to multi family? Aanenson: Well I think I'd still stand by my original, what we put in the original concept as far as tax capacity. Looking at the commercial versus residential and as far as if this was low density residential, some industrial... Kind: As far as the tax benefit for the city are you talking about it being a wash? Aanenson: Well yeah. As far as yeah. As far as what you would get as far as taxes generated. Would there be more if it's all single family? No. Kind: And how about putting stress on the city services, that sort of thing as far as tax burden goes? Aanenson: It's hard to gauge exactly. You know if somebody was to come in with low density. Until somebody comes in with a project but if they were to maximize it, it'd probably be equal number of school aged children based on you have a higher ratio of single family per household. Where this has Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 more product, you have less children. The other would have less product but more children so they'd probably pretty much equal out. Kind: Good. And then the final thing that was I think one of the more fun questions brought up by the public hearing was, what about the turkeys? Aanenson: Well that's the purpose of the Bluff Creek Overlay district. That was one of the main criteria that we put in place. Not only the water movement but the study also contemplated the creature movement and that was the reason for the preservation of the corridor to a'llow for the deer movement and the migrations and all the other little creatures. Was to provide that opportunity. That's why we felt from the very beginning so strongly about preserving that property to provide that habitat area and as they move through this larger wetland...moving down, going underneath Highway 5. Continuing along down the corridor to get to the Minnesota River. Kind: That's all I have for now. Burton: Questions? Conrad: Yeah one. Matt, tell me what Grade C and D really means in terms of traffic. Saam: Well I thought you might ask that so I pulled out my traffic manual and give me just a moment. As I said, level of sen, ices range from A to F. They do include E. Not to be confused with the education grade scales. I'll just read from, right from here. Level C, as I said is in the middle. Stable operation. Longer cues at signals result in average travel speeds of about 50% of free flow speed. Motorist will experience appreciable tension. D. Approaching unstable flow. Average travel speeds down to 40% of free flow speed. Delays at intersection may become extension. There are twvo other levels below D and those are both unstable flow. Longer delay times. If there is an accident, the intersections will be shut down. So as I said, these are mid-grade levels of service. They're not the best. Sure we'd like that A-B every~vhere in town but when you're that close to Highway 41, Highway 5, some overfloxv traffic is going to spill over to the adjoining intersections. Conrad: So explain it to me on West 78th Street as it intersects to 41. What, is that a C or D or do we know what that is? Saam: Yeah I do. Let me just pull out the EAW. The EAW took a look at three different scenarios. The existing one in 2000. For Highway 41 and 78th Street, of course it's not applicable. It isn't built yet. They took a look at 5 years out, 2005 with no build. So in other words this project not going. That would be a level, they've estimated it would be a level of service of C. At 2005 if this project goes they estimate it will go down one level to D. That's the only change in the three intersections. Highway 5 and 41 and Highway 5 and Century Boulevard both will not change. They're not dependent on this project. Conrad: So what do you expect with a level D service at that intersection? What literally could we expect during rush hour? Saam: Sure. During rush hour, motorists who are backed up from 5, from the intersection of 5 and 41 may be waiting to go east or west on 5. They may back up and cause a longer delay for those motorists coming from West 78th who would be turning south on 41. I don't think there'd be much delay of any 10 Planning Commission Meeting- January 16, 2001 kind for those motorists turning right or going north on 41. I don't see that as being an issue so it would only be those going south in my estimation. Conrad: So when you start at a level D, where do you go from there? Saam: You go to a traffic signal is what. Conrad: That is the next level? Saam: Yeah. And as I said, if that intersection would become a four way, then that's something we would definitely want to look at but right now, neither us or MnDot who are putting together plans for West 78th Street, have programmed a signal at that intersection. Conrad: Thanks. Burton: Other questions? Alison? No? Sacchet: I have one more question. It specifies that we need to make the totlots be accommodating for 40 children. Where does that come from? Aanenson: That was the park and rec commission's recommendation. Sacchet: Do you know what their rationale is or what they're thinking behind it is? Aanenson: I couldn't speak to that. Sacchet: And the three totlots and 40 kids, that 120 kids. That's quite a lot. Okay. Burton: I guess that was a question I had also. Maybe I'm just missing it but where is it specified what a totlot is actually going to be? Or do we know? Aanenson: Tile developer may be able to speak to that as far as what he represented to the park commission. The components. I believe in the site plan they've identified some of the components. A basketball court. Open play field area. That sort of thing. Burton: Yeah I guess, just from the drawings, the site plan. Okay. Any other questions for staff?. Well this is not a public hearing but I think what we'll do is allow the developer a short period of time. Maybe up to 5-10 minutes to discuss, if the developer would like to and then we'll open up some time for the public also to make comments and, but try to limit it so we're not all here all night long because as I said, this is not actually technically a public hearing so I'll let the developer come forward if you would. If you want to make comments and take a few questions perhaps. Could you state your name and address please? Dennis Griswold: Thank you Mr. Chairman. Dennis Griswold, the Director of Land for Pulte Home. There were a lot of questions and comments so I won't remember all them but I would like to just say that I appreciate the interaction that we have had with staff and the commission and the parks commission through this process. Sometimes it's a long, difficult process. Sometimes it's a real rewarding process and I think this is very rewarding in this particular case. The comments that we had made in terms of site plan revisions that staff had made I think were very thorough. There were just a 11 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 couple minor comments that I wanted to elaborate on and then think there were several questions that you had brought up that you may want to restate. The comment, the various site plan changes. The one change that wasn't hit was that we did change the phasing line in this area and in this area. Maybe I can give you sort of a reduced plan. It won't read as well as that but it should show it I should think. The idea is to, if that can zoom in. There we go. The idea was to get the phasing adjusted so that the recreation facilities will all be in Phase I. There was a question, the timing of those so that would coincide with Phase I. The other point is that within the village home area and the coach home area we did add considerable guest parking so we are meeting the code requirement for off street guest parking. There would be of course on street parking on the public street in addition to that. The definition of a totlot. Right now it's defined as a 50 foot square on the plan and I guess further definition is what we would want to do is work with staff when we get to the point of actually picking out equipment and exact details for those. We are in agreement that the south portion of the site is going to be a younger aged group. I believe 3 to 5 is the range and then the older kids would be north of 78th Street. So we are willing to work very closely with staff in that regard. The comment about, and the request that park and rec made in dealing with the access into the public green space through here, which caused the 4 units to be relocated in this, those 2 areas. It was felt, as I understand, and I'm not in agreement with it but I went along with the request. It was felt that the 70 feet approximate width of the open space between buildings, which is over the width of a normal street right-of-way, was not adequate for the paths to connect into the green space so we widened those to over 100 feet in both locations and relocated the units down by the treed area. So that was in response to Park and Rec. I would like to clarify one point relative to our position on the northerly path and what is actually the easement and what is outlot. Our preference and our proposal is to provide the 20 foot path easement that would roughly align with the sewer easement but would be centered on the pathway. That would not necessarily include all the land from the path to the wetland. It would include the path and a few feet on both sides of it. Our position is that we're more than happy to have the public trail through the property but beyond that function we xvoutd like to have that be association land that would be maintained by the association and would not be for full public use beyond that 20 foot area. That also includes the wooded slope that extends up from the wetland up to this area. Again that is an area that we would like to maintain as a very nice natural buffer. Part of the overlay district. We don't feel that the public needs to have full access to that and so we'd like it maintained as part of the association space and remain natural under the conservation easement. Our proposal is also that the wetlands would be under public easement so that if there is need for maintenance or whatever in that area, that would be possible. With that, if there are other specifics. I know I'm, there were a lot of questions asked. I'd be happy to respond to those questions. Also Mark Guenther, our construction manager is here if you would like to see the respective detail of the revised village plan. We do have that in perspective. Burton: Any questions for the applicant? Alison. Blackowiak: Mr. Chair, I just have one quick question. You said that the wetland would be under public easement. Could you explain that to me. Where exactly you mean. Do you mean by the sewer lines or what do you? Dennis Griswold: Essentially the delineated wetlands on site which would be from the delineation line out to the north which I guess may be on this one you can see better. The kind of blue line area is roughly where the delineation line is. Blackowiak: So explain to me then, so the trail itself. There would be a 20 foot easement over the trail. So assuming an 8 foot trail. You can go 6 feet on each side of the trail and that's technically where the 12 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 trail easement is. Then there would be an area between the trail easement and the delineation of the wetland, is that correct? Dennis Griswold: Yes. That's association land. Blackowiak: So that's association. So why would the city want to take responsibility for the wetland if we can't technically get there? Aanenson: Well there is a buffer there. Let me just add a little bit more tS try to clarify this issue. Meeting today with the engineer on this site, the trail easement's going to be 20 feet. In order to preserve the trees and Jill and Lori, the Forester and Water Resource Specialist have looked at this and what's going to happen is the trail has to be upland. You can't put the trail in a wetland, or you do a wetland alteration permit. We tried to get the sewer into the wetland but when they do the sewer project they compact and we put the easement over it with the manhole so they can get in and do their maintenance. Under this project, just to be clear, the trail is represented in an upland area to meet the 20 foot trail easement but in reviewing it, this trail is probably going to move. This is the representation of the public.., because there's going to be areas where actually we're going to have a double easement. Where we're trying to save trees that we're going to bump out. The manholes will be in the upland area but the sewer will be right through the wetland in order to preserve some trees. We're working on that right now so I don't want anybody to get hung up at this point that that's the exactly representation of the trail but a condition is that there will be a public trail and half of the 20 foot easement. His concern is that upland area, what happens and I think there's some concern with the petting farm. I haven't spoken to you about this but I'm anticipating that this may be your question. People walking through that to get up to the petting farm or somebody up in the areas. If it's not under, if it's a public ownership. The wetlands are always dedicated as far as, as a general rule, on the other side they're not but I believe the city has a maintenance anyways to go in there but, that. I just want to make sure that that's not the exact, made up of the exact location of the trail. Blackowiak: Well I was just worried about having the public expense of maintaining wetlands if you technically can't get to them. Aanenson: The buffer is their responsibility. He has to maintain that wetland buffer and it's still their responsibility, concern of the homeowners association. Blackowiak: What kind of maintenance then would potentially be in the wetlands itself?. Because that's what he was talking about. This wetlands would be in the public easement in case of maintenance. What would. Aanenson: That's standard that the city does though. If it's filled with silt, whatever. You have a heavy runoff, sediment, then we go in there periodically. Blackowiak: So it's something, it's not that the city's being asked to incur any additional expenses? Aanenson: No, it's a standard. Right. You want the control if there's an issue going down there. We don't have to contact 50 owners to get permission to clean out the silt problem. That's generally how they like to do it. Blackowiak: Great. 13 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 Dennis Griswold: If I could expand on just one point. There's a differentiation between what I'm thinking of as a public access easement and what I'm thinking of as a public maintenance easement. We are used to, and very happy to grant essentially a blanket public maintenance easement over the association area so if a sewer line that happens to be coming up from the main up into the public right-of- way, or storm sewer pipe or you name it happens, the public needs to get there for the maintenance to deal with that but it's not the general public to just be strolling out in that yard and that's what I'm talking about. Blackowiak: Okay. Sacchet: I have a few questions for the applicant too. You mentioned that you had the elevation changes in the village homes and I have a specific question there. On the ends of it, you have part of the gable filled with like a shingle type material. Which kind of, if you look at it from the right angle, looks like it would be slanted. Why wouldn't it, would it be much more expensive to actually angle it instead of just having the triangle filled? Dennis Griswold: It's a horizontal line. Sacchet: Right. Dennis Griswold: Mark Guenther could maybe address the specifics on that. Sacchet: Okay. Mark Guenther: i believe Kate has also handed you some additional smaller copies of this as well but yes. We added with the gables up on the roof here. You see the cedar shake detailing here and on the end of the building as you mentioned there's a trim board with the same cedar shake detailing there. It's still horizontal cedar shake look. It's all vinyl, cedar shake look. Sacchet: I really like the changes you made. My question is, whether it would be within reach, instead of having cedar shakes on that 2/3 or M of the gable, to actually angle the roof instead. Dennis Griswold: Oh, a hip roof?. Sacchet: Yeah. Dennis Griswold: Do you want to address that Mark? Mark Guenther: We'd have to take a look at it but I believe that would be possible to add a hip roof onto that. Sacchet: So that's my first question. And that's probably more a question for Mr. Griswold. I mentioned that before about how these village homes on the southeast comer changed from a 4 unit to 6 unit and therefore encroach quite a bit more into the trees. To take those out and we would have to give you something in exchange like what I could see potentially a reduction on the park and trail fees or something like that. Is that something worth considering? 14 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 Dennis Griswold: It could be accommodated by a cash rebate if you will. Or it could be accommodated by putting them back into the original position which would still leave the width of a right-of-way for the trail there. Sacchet: Now you said there were actually 4 units moved? Dennis Griswold: 2 and 2 so there were a total of 4. If you look at, the 2 were here and here. This is where they have relocated to. Sacchet: Okay. Dennis Griswold: And they came off of this building and this building. Sacchet: Okay. Got it. Then another question I have for you is, there has been some discussion off and on about moving the north cul-de-sac a little further away from the wetland. Do you have any comment to make about that? Dennis Griswold: You're talking about this area here? Sacchet: Right, exactly. Dennis Griswold: What I'm trying to do is balance off the cul-de-sac at that point and still having the units within the setback area there. Sacchet: And you do apparently still have an issue with that building 17 1 believe. Dennis Griswold: There might be a comer. I think we're doing some setback averaging in some areas to accommodate the overall. Sacchet: So you're saying that you don't see an easy way that that cul-de-sac could be moved a little bit away from the wetland border? Dennis Griswold: One way we could do it is leave the building 17 and 18 where they're at and reduce the front yard setback on those 2 buildings by moving the cul-de-sac 10 feet over. You would still have the two driveways that go directly onto the street would still have more than adequate parking. So I don't think, and it is at the end of a cul-de-sac. I don't think it would be noticeable at all there. Sacchet: So it could be done that way. Dennis Griswold: Yes. Sacchet: Okay, thank you. In terms of putting conservation easements over E, F, the trees on the north side of McAllister property, the south side and potentially some of those specific trees that we expressed interest in, do you have an issue with that? Dennis Griswold: Not a conservation easement, no. Sacchet: Yeah, I'm not talking dedication. I'm talking conservation easement. 15 Planning Commission Meeting- Januat2f 16, 2001 Dennis Griswold: CO~TeCt. And we're not talking public access to it. Sacchet: No. Just preservation. Protection. Dennis Griswold: Con'ect. No, I have no problem with that. Sacchet: And you're fine with the level of park and trail dedication fees that are in the context of how the plat is right now? Dennis Griswold: The way I understand them to be, that we would be paying full fees and being rebated the value of the trail that would be put in along the wetland. And I'm okay with that. I understand the PUD concept where there is a little give and take if you will and I would, I have pointed out several times that that is a great public benefit in this particular case. Sacchet: Okay, that's all the questions I have. Thank you. Burton: Any other questions for the applicant? Deb. Kind: Yes Mr. Chair. You heard our discussion about building materials. Do you have any issues with shingle qualit37 or using shakes on any of the homes? What else did we talk about? Or and brick percentage. Any problems with any of that discussion? Mark Guenther: Forgive me, I'm not up to speed on the brick percentage overall but from what we've heard on what was specified on the shingle quality is not an issue. What you've seen in the rendering and what you've seen in the drawings is what was submitted for the products that we're putting on and the amount that xve're putting on. So we're using a vinyl shake look. In these areas we're using a lap siding here. A vinyl lap siding here and then brick in this area on the village homes. And then the other products we have mentioned xvas brick and stone as well. Kind: I think the discussion was to calculate what the percentage of the brick that was shown on the elevations and just kind of put a number to that so that we're all in agreement. Dennis Griswold: We're happy to do that. It does vary from product to product and we didn't know that exact percentage right now but we can figure that. Kind: And then the elevation that you presented for the back of the village homes that was presented last time we met. What did that look like? We did not actually have a copy of that in our. Mark Guenther: The last time the changes that we made to the elevations since then obviously were the end ends, they're visible. Then we added the gables. Kind: You don't happen to have the drawing of what it looked like before so I could see the before and after. Mark Guenther: The drawing before. That I don't have. But the drawing before, ifI can just explain on the back side. On the twvo levels what we've added were the gables up on the roof to break up the roof and the shakes. The vinyl shakes... 16 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 Kind: And then the gable over the door on the side, which I like. And just for the record, I disagree with Uli about hipped roofs. I hate them. So for what it's worth. You can't please us all. Mark Guenther: ...here was more consistency because there is no other hip in this... Kind: Right. I'm with you on that. I agree. No offense Uli. Sacchet: It's alright. Kind: I'm very pleased with the improvements to the village home. I think it looks much better than what we originally looked at. Anything else for the applicant? I guess not. Burton: Questions? Okay. Alright, thanks. And we'll open it up for some public comments and please limit the comments and keep things moving so we can be done at a reasonable time here. But if anyone would like to approach, just come up to the microphone, state your name and address and provide us with your comments. Anyone? Sue are you making your way? Susan McAllister: Yes, I'm making my way. Burton: Can you state your name and address too. Susan McAllister: My name is Susan McAllister and I live at 7461 Hazeltine Boulevard and I'm Pulte's neighbor officially I guess if they get permission so. I want to just give you a really quick handout for,- well that outlines some of the important features of this PUD because it sits on the Bluff Creek watershed so I'll just do that real quick. And do I have to bring my little egg timer? Am I being timed or do I have to go quickly or? Burton: Keep going. Susan McAllister: Okay. Here's a matrix that I did and then I will be talking about... Okay. I've taken a lot of photographs. Actually they're panoramic views of the different areas that are being saved in the, with this PUD. Proposed being saved. And I'm just going to go through some of the bullets. In December, 1998 Chanhassen passed the Bluff Creek Watershed Natural Resources Management Plan and incorporated into our city's ordinance as the Bluff Creek overlay district. I was part of that. You know defining where the primary zone was. I was a landowner and I'm very excited about it and I'm wanting... Bluff Creek is part of a regional ecosystem and essential link to recreational parkways and wildlife preserves from Lake Minnetonka, White Bear Lake to valleys of St. Croix, Mississippi and Minnesota Rivers. As a wild sanctuary the Bluff Creek provides a vital wildlife habitat and refuge from surrounding urbanization. Bluff Creek is a model. It's goal can meet the needs of both natural systems and people through integration of Chanhassen's more populated areas while maintaining Bluff Creek's natural conditions. Future generations will be able to enjoy and appreciate the trees, wildlife and nature in the Bluff Creek. To preserve the Bluff Creek area the city's goal is to acquire lands adjacent to the stream as opportunities arise and funding permits. Development in Bluff Creek needs to be ecologically designed by being built around natural features allowing for continuous greenway along the creeks of Minnesota River to Lake Minnewashta. To be effective wildlife corridors and greenways need to be connected to larger reserves such as farmland and woodlands. Open space needs to be preserved for ecological protection through development options such as mixed or cluster development such as this, easements and alternative zoning. This is taken from the President's, this statement is taken from the President's Commission on American Outdoors 1987. "We have a vision for allowing every American 17 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 easy access to the natural world. Greenways. Greenways are fingers of green that reach out from, around and through communities all across America created by local action. They will connect parks and forests and scenic countrysides, public and private, in recreation corridors for hiking, jogging, wildlife movement, horse and bicycle riding." So I'm listing now the benefits to the city of the Arboretum PUD are as follows. Number 1. This preserves a primary zone in the Bluff Creek Overlay District. Number 2. It saves the mature trees north of Highway 5 and west of Highway 41. Number 3. More efficient and effective use of land which is density transfer. Number 4. Design compatible with surrounding land uses to future residential and church uses planned near it. Number 5. Development is consistent with the comprehensive plan. Number 6. Park and open space preserved, 44 plus acres of open space including 26 acre wetland plus full park and trail fees and totlot equipment totaling $595,200. Number 7. 41% will be affordable housing. Number 8. Energy conservation through the use of efficient building designs and clustering of buildings. My last point is, is planning commissioners it is up to you to continue to uphold the goals of the Bluff Creek Overlay District. And I just want to show you real quick the photographs. This right here is, I'm looking south around Camp Tanadoona Drive actually looking south. To the north wooded area on the left, and this is Bud Olson's property right here but this tree line goes way out there. On the left and the 11 acres that we're talking about on the right, and this is where that mitigated wetland area will be behind these trees. Okay, then I'm standing in my driveway taking a photograph of the length of this 11 acres which is really this part right here as it's coming up 41 so. That's very beautiful trees. This next is the new wetland area west of Highway 41 which is actually right in front of here. This is it in the winter time. I just happened to have a photograph of the summer. I was standing in the field looking to the east to Highway 41, sort of by the south side of, you know south of corner of 5 and 41. Looking to the east and I took my panoramic camera and pieced these pictures together but I took it from the way north side, which is really these trees are connected to my property but the trees behind here are you know, would be their trees. And here's my farm house right here. You can't see it from there but it just continues on. This is a fence row of trees xvhich means it's not very xvide and was put there probably from the agricultural purposes. You know to what the different fields want so it just keeps continuing down to the stand of trees that's going to be partially removed and then here's Highway 5. Next we have the, I'm kind of like by Bud Olson's property looking to the south. Actually I'm probably in the middle of this wetland and that's not easy to do I can tell you. I've got to take a nap...anyway. It's comfortable to roll around in long grass. We'll keep going. Anyway, this is the whole northern part of the trees on the wetland. And okay, now I'm in Longacres trail area down here and here's I believe, Dennis is this 2 ½ acres that's going to be preserved? Dennis Griswold: 2 ½ to 3. Susan McAllister: 2 ½ to 3 acres, okay. So this is looking across from Longacres trail to that, what outlot is that? Is that an outlot? Aanenson: E. Susan McAllister: Okay. And then lastly I'm on Highway 5 looking at the other side of the stand of trees going from the east going west and that's that. So I just... Anyway I just wanted to go through really quickly some of the points that I happened to come by with the comprehensive plan. Page number 25 talks about one of the most difficult impediments to providing one facet of life cycle housing and/or affordable housing is land cost. Developers must be brought in as partners in providing life cycle housing. Finally land development costs must be brought down. To do this the review process must be streamlined. Local, regional and state fees must be reduced and development must utilize existing infrastructure investments more efficiently. In addition the city will provide density bonuses in order to promote the provision of affordable housing opportunities that may otherwise not occur. Number 28, I 18 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 outlined something per city ordinance. See here's pursue life cycle affordable housing. One of them !~' new proposals where there is a density range. On affordable housing the City of Chanhassen may in The bonus units must meet affordable housing cfi:. affordable housing strategy on several fronts. We arc v properties that are currently zoned for medium or opportunities. Burton: Sue, can you wrap it up. Susan McAllister: I'm wrapping it up. Okay. Oka- shows the different comparisons for affordable ho:~' and the percentages on it and it shows the compari~:. really to compare it to because actually when you to get you to understand how much they're givin:. trail fees. The comprehensive plan says they xvc:~ you to know how important that is. I just also You recommended approval of this Kate so you l'ec-~' the City at this comer of Highway 5 and 41. Is that v~.. Aanenson: We're recommending approval with Susan McAllister: Okay. My last little supplelne~, motion out and I did give it to you and I know you this very quickly. I appeared before you on Decc~-~ Everybody nodded their heads. Nobody spoke condition because everything was tabled that discuss it and include it in your final motion. As PUD as long as the resolution approving it incluci~ know that Mr. Griswold and I have discussed it to speak to that you can but I just didn't know that it? Thank you. Burton: Thank you. If anybody else would like to ~:: your name and address. Leah Hawke: Leah Hawke, 7444 Moccasin Trail. don't have handouts. Mine are more questions thaz but I was late so help me out. Last time I raised :i Has that been resolved? Sacchet: I would think so. Leah Hawke: What was the result? Because it's clarifying that the intent of the council to limit; :3 Sacchet: Let me regurgitate what my understand it:. correct, if that's alright with you Mr. Chair. : on ~f . . :': cr Oil ?ying ;vflnt · for ','© tl --osed . LO '::~t him ::~e. Is ~ing, Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 Burton: That's fine. Sacchet: Alright, it's my understanding is that the City has a goal of 30% affordable and it's obvious that you can't do that per project. I mean you have one family house development going in, there's nothing going to be affordable. So therefore it's necessary that in developments that include more life cycle type housing, that there's a higher percentage of affordable in there because in comparison to other cities we are actually lacking behind. We have about a 25% affordable rate at this point in the city versus the goal of 30. And I believe that, for me puts it into a workable context. Leah Hawke: Okay. So the council says 30% but we can't achieve that so, I mean when we go to the council then, they're not going to kick it back to you and say wait a second, we said 30%? Sacchet: It's not a ceiling, the way I understand it. Leah Hawke: So Kate, just to clarify. It's not 30%. That's not what the council, the intent of the council is at this time. Aanenson: I can only speak for the question that was asked to me and the question that was asked to me, and I clearly put it in-my report on page 6, the third paragraph. I was asked whether or not we had a goal of 30%. I was asked if it was for all new development. My answer is yes. To get it in all developments. It is not, we cannot, we have a project coming forward tonight that does not have 30%. If it's the city council's goal to put it in every project, I'd be happy to try and achieve that. I've made it clear since 1995, actually it was read in something that Mrs. McAtlister just put. The only way to achieve that is in a different type of product. We do not have a single family detached affordable housing. The only way to achieve it is through different types of housing projects. Every project that we've done to date that's been affordable has exceeded 30%. If the question was to try to get every project 30%, then we have to start looking at that. That's not what I understood the question to do and if the council changes that or what's further clarity then I need better direction on that. Leah Hawke: Okay. That's fine. So there is no meeting that you're aware of Kate where that issue's going to be clarified? Aanenson: The Mayor may have on it on the agenda. I haven't been apprised of that, no. Leah Hawke: Well I just want to raise that I think that issue is still outstanding with the council and the council has indicated a 30% maximum affordable housing in new developments so I just don't want to be back here because it got kicked back to the commission again. Sacchet: I mean I can only speak for myself, ifI may make a comment but I think it'd be highly impractical to require 30% affordable in every development. Actually I would take that a good step further. I think it's impossible. Leah Hawke: Did anybody follow up with the council to ask that question? Anybody on the commission given that I raised it? Sacchet: No. Leah Hawke: Because I did and I'm still confused but we'll let it rest. 20 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 Blackowiak: Mr. Chair, I think it's a math thing. I mean you can't reach a city wide goal of 30% if we're at 25% right now. You cannot reach a city wide goal of 30% unless some exceed 30%. It's simple math so it's going to have to happen and if this is one place where we can make some up, then so be it. Leah Hawke: And I'm not trying to be disrespectful to the commission. However I did sit on the meeting on the Livable Communities Act when it was passed by this, by the former council and I heard 30%. I spoke to this commission the last time I was here saying I'm a homeowner in Longacres. I heard 30%. Explain to me why it's not 30%. I've also followed up on that and it's my understanding that if this commission needs clarification, they'll get it but it's 30%. And so you know I don't know where I go with my comment. I'm just telling you for the record that's what I'm hearing. Audience: 30% max correct, is what you're saying? Leah Hawke: In new development. So I'll leave that as a comment. The second comment I had is, at the parks and rec commission it was my understanding that this property, they only approved it contingent on it not being homeowners property. Is that correct? So does that mean parks and rec did not approve this or they did approve it? Aanenson: Their recommendation is being forwarded to the City Council. The Planning Commission wanted to see what that was. The Planning Commission is going to make their own recommendation and ultimately the City Council will decide whether or not there's concurrence on that. Whether they want it modified, add to it but ultimately it's a recommendation only and the council will ultimately make the decision. Leah Hawke: Okay. And then as far as the comprehensive plan and the parks due this development. Again it's my understanding that there are requirements that there be a park-within half a mile of this development and there isn't one. We're also not putting a whole lot.of recreational area in here and I know that our goal is to put more affordable housing in the city. However I do think, and I'll say it again that they are due the same park and recreational areas as any other development. And I'm confused a little bit with density transfer. Help me understand this. They're moving the density from this area up here, is that correct down to here? Aanenson: No. Leah Hawke: No. From here to where? Aanenson: North of... Leah Hawke: Now can they then count that Outlot E as recreational area? Isn't that part of the number? They're moving the density, isn't that just a wash? So then the amount of recreational area that goes in there is still the required amount. Aanenson: The park and recreation commission looked at this project to decide what they wanted. They chose to take park and trail fees and compensate for the construction of the trail. They also in reviewing it, it's my understanding to strike a balance with the PUD to say what, under a PUD should be some sort of play area for the residents in that unit. If they wanted a large community park, they can't get full park and trail fees in the park so that was their decision is my understanding. 21 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 Leah Hawke: So how does that work out for the City? It is a benefit to us to take that trail fee? I mean has anybody looked at the amount then that Pulte's paying per acre not to put a park in there? Because it seems to me that it's more beneficial for a developer to give that fee versus putting the park in there. Has that math been done? Are we getting a good deal here? Aanenson: That's something that the Park and Recreation Commission looks at. That's their decision whether they want to take a park there or not but certainly there's value in building the home. That's the other cost. It's not just a land cost and the trade off. There's also value in constructing a home and selling it so. Leah Hawke: So you're encouraging me to ask that question back to the parks and rec? This is not the, this is not something that this commission should consider? Sacchet: May I make a comment Mr. Chair? It's my understanding from some of the data that we actually looked at for this meeting that Pulte is relatively hard hit. Much harder than any other somewhat comparable development has happened in recent history in this city in that they are requested to pay full park and rec fee, and at the same time we have trails. We have open space. We have totlots. We have all this recreation stuff. So I would actually lean the other way from where you're going with this. I actually wonder whether it's fair to them to hit them with all that. And that's why I specifically asked the applicant before whether this was, whether he was okay with paying this full fee and have all this other stuff and he affirmed that so it seems like they're really extremely cooperative. Leah Hawke: Okay. So there would be somewhere for me to go to get the cost analysis of who's getting what out of this deal, as far as the parks and rec portion of this goes. Who has the financials behind putting in the park or keeping the fees? I mean I think that's my only question. Where do I get a hold of that? Aanenson: I would assume Park and Recreation went through that exercise. Leah Hawke: So they ~vould have that? They would have that? That's been done? Aanenson: I can't answer that question. I'm not sure how they made the decision. I don't supervise the Park and Recreation Commission. Their recommendation goes to the council and ultimately they're going to be the ones to say whether they concur or not. Leah Hawke: Okay. Alrighty. I think that will be it for now. Thanks. Burton: Anybody else like to address the commission? If nobody else would like to then we're going to move onto our comments and our motion. This is going once. Okay. Alright commissioners, it's to us so why don't we have our discussion and then move along here. Anybody want to share their comments? Uli, do you want to go first? Sacchet: Yeah. I'll start with my comments. As I mentioned before I do believe we owe Pulte a decision here or recommendation. I do feel that this is a very good project in terms of the city overall and I would like to fine tune some of the conditions but basically move ahead and give, pass that onto the council. The things I'd like to fine tune are the following. Do we want to do them one at a time or should I go through all, because we really have a whole collection of recommendations in front of us? Burton: I'm not opposed to taking then one at a time if you guys aren't. 22 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 Kind: The suggestion I would make is to maybe get all of our comments and then take, revise the conditions when we make the motions. Sacchet: Okay. In terms of my comments to the motion. I do believe that we should include something about the McAllister property with that 300 foot setback. And I'm not quite sure where the balance point of that is because as of right now we have the 300 foot setback requirement. If we take that literally we would have to disallow Outlot C, Unit 24. That duplex that is next to, but I don't want to go to that extent. If since Ms. McAllister said that the applicant was in agreement u)ith that condition that she submitted last time, I would recommend that we include that in our conclusion. I'm happy to hear that the applicant is willing to include in a conservation easement all the wetlands and tree stands so I'd like to make sure we're very clear what those stands are. I would like to address at least those two village homes that were moved there in the southeast comer. I don't like them there. I'd rather would direct staff to negotiate a rebate on the park and trail fee. That would seem to be appropriate to me. And then I do have so,ne condition I'd like to add to the recommendation for approval of the Environmental Assessment Worksheet. I believe there's some things that are not accurate in there. Currently it says in the findings, that is in the Findings of Fact that only few if any trees get impacted. That's not true. The current proposal calls for removal of approximately half of the significant trees and I would consider that a significant environmental impact. And then with the recommendation about the Bluff Creek overlay. I'd like to spell out that really no construction is going to take place in the primary zone. That's the main comments I have. Burton: Okay, thank you. Anybody else want to comment? LuAnn. Sidney: I do think this is a good use for this piece of property. This land and we certainly need ' affordable housing in Chanhassen. I think it's a good development for that pUrpose. And for a PUD this is really the perfect location. I know Ladd had said that before. I'm pleased with the buffer to the north. Not too many PUD's have that opportunity to have such a wide buffer inbetween land uses. I guess the one concern I had, and certainly we've addressed the McAllister property at length before and it sounds like we're going to have maybe an ordinance revision or amendment to the ordinance coming up to address the 300 foot setback issue and I think that's where we'll be talking about that. So I'm wondering whether a condition is necessary about that. But the one thing that I would like to comment about is the village homes. I think Pulte has made significant improvements in the appearance. I am still concerned, as I said when the concept plan came before us that the buildings will look massive. I do think they will be very tall and have the appearance more, I want to say like an apartment building and I would really like to see a lower profile product I guess would be more appealing to me but I understand the need for the affordability of the village homes and probably the location for those. So I guess just that comment. I do think you know if that could be soften in some way with buffering or landscaping, I'd really like that so, that's it. Burton: Thank you. Deb. Kind: Yes Mr. Chair. I agree with LuAnn's comments about the location of this PUD. I think it is a good location. That high end residential would not be appropriate on such a prominent, high traffic intersection of Highway 5 and 41 and the buffer to the neighbors is good. I agree with LuAnn on that. I have the same concerns about the village homes as far as the height goes but I'm very happy with the revisions that were made to the design. The architectural design. I'm pleased with how that's looking and of course would like to add some specifics with the design standards regarding quality of material that we discussed with staff. The concern about the western gateway. I agree with Kate about the 23 Planning Commission Meeting- January 16, 2001 Arboretum being the true gateway to Chanhassen on the western side and that with the impressive upgrades that they're planning on doing in the coming years, I think that will be our first positive impression of the city of Chanhassen, not this Pulte development. So I'm confident that our western gateway is covered by the Arboretum's plan. Last time this was before us I had the quandary between have the expectations been changed for the neighborhood versus what are the advantages of saving the trees by clustering the homes and we didn't really hear from any of the neighbors talking about that today. Whether it was worth it to save the trees or not. I kind of hoped somebody would come up and say that it was worth it in addition to Sue who did come up and say that so I appreciate that. And I tend to agree with Sue. That the trees are worth saving and that we will not end up with any more units than would otherwise be there if it was a standard subdivision and that it's worth it to cluster the homes together to save the trees in the primary zone. And so the notion of changing the rules on the neighbors I think really, this project isn't doing that because if the neighbors really did check with the city code book they would know that twin homes were allowed in low density. And a reasonable assumption would be made that that would be happening there. That there would be twin homes because on the south side of West 78th Street it is zoned for town homes and that would be a normal transition would be townhomes, then twin homes and then regular single family residential. So ! think as far as expectations, that would be a reasonable thing to assume and that this plan does a nice job of keeping the twin homes along the perimeter of the wetland so the view for the neighboring Longacres development really is no different than it would be if it was regular, standard subdivision. The idea of a PUD is good planning and I like the idea of saving the trees. My favorite neighborhoods are PUD's. My neighborhood's a PUD. Longacres is a PUD. Some of the nicest areas in town are PUD's. And this clearly meets our PUD requirements and criteria. I'm not sure ifI want to read them ail at this point. I think that staff, if anybody in the audience is interested in seeing what the PUD requirements are, it's clear there's 8 requirements criteria to measure whether it's a good PUD and you have to answer yes to every one of them that's in our code book. It's consistent with our comp plan. The parcel is guided for housing and the overall density is less than if it was developed as a standard subdivision and that is really the key question and it's listed on page 7 of the staff report. The issue for the city to resolve is if this plan makes good use of the PUD principles and my answer is yes. With the conditions, some changes to the conditions ~vhich we'll discuss if this goes to a motion. Burton: Comments? Ladd. Conrad: Just quick. I think the neighbors, the residents, the people that are here expect us to challenge staff and the applicant to make sure that the rules are followed. That's typically what we have to do. StaffI thought did a very goodjob of following up on the rules. Probably one of the better jobs. Making me feel comfortable that we're on target with the rules that we do have. So from my perspective of being around a few years, ! think we are. Some issues were brought up that, how do we interpret the 30% affordable. I think that's really a community deal and should be followed up. I think we're interpreting that properly based on what I know. Parkland within a half mile. That's a good point. I think we should challenge the Park and Rec Committee. I don't want to send it back but I think I'd like to have them give the City Council a comment on that .... attached and negotiated it. That's an interesting point. We always wrestle with that. Unfortunately because we're not the Park and Rec Commission we don't always get to see how that happens and they don't report to us. They report to the City Council. So that's an interesting point to pursue. I think you should. The only thing I didn't see in the staff report was a tree preservation. We talked about it but we really didn't delineate it. Aanenson: That discussion was in the report in the cover memo. The significant areas that we would require as preservation on. These are the significant areas at a minimum that you're require a preservation over and again that would be initially right up front. It'd be part of the conservation act. I 24 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 put a sample into the ordinance. Again that would be under the homeowners association. The other goal is, we mentioned, I know Uli's walked the site. I know some of you have, I mean it's been over a year, walking it different times but there's some other significant trees on that property that we also want to work to preserve. 60 inch plus. We're aware of those. Some of those are also the city's project. That's why I was saying that the trail, we're looking at trying to move the trail. We're trying to minimize the tree loss so there's other trees, while they won't be in a specific conservation easement because we've had problems with that, we are going to work to preserve individual trees that are significant. And we've identified those. We've already talked to the developer about modifying some grading and overlay of depth of grading plan and to work to preserve as many as we can. Sacchet: If I may comment on that. What I did identified a most significant trees between 30 inch and 60 inch caliper. And we were locating where they are and we found that we can actually, and it is in the conditions, I think it's 5 out of the 8 or something like that, can actually reasonably be saved. Attempt to be saved and the applicant was affirmative when I asked whether we could also include them in the conservation easement. Conrad: Okay, thanks Uli. Bottom line, I think it's a good project. I think the developer came back with some better designs, or at least a better design that makes me feel comfortable. All my comments from last meeting were answered and resolved. I think we haven't done anything with the turkey population there but I think we should notify the DNR and see what they would suggest so I think in one of the motions we should actually do that. Aanenson: That was in the EA findings but I can make sure that's clarified as it goes to the Council. Conrad: Yeah, I'd like to move that forward so, I like the density transfer. I really do like the project in general. The traffic is still an issue but I'm okay with that. . Burton: Alison. Blackowiak: Mr. Chair, I just have a couple of comments. I can't speak for park and rec. I don't know why they haven't worried about a neighborhood park, because I agree with Ladd that we should probably have something in that area and I'm not sure what that is. I do disagree with Uli though. I do not think the trail, park and trail fees are excessive. It's a big chunk of land and park and rec does have a formula I know and I'm assuming that they applied it consistently and properly and I'm not even going to, I don't even worry about that. They make their recommendations separately. We review them or read them periodically but how they got there is really their business. I agree that Bluff Creek, we should have no construction of primary zone. I think that's very important to emphasize that that is our intent and we'll achieve that through the conservation easement, etc but just make sure that that's understood. I do believe we have to address the McAllister property and put something in the conditions regarding this 300 foot separation and be proactive instead of reactive and make sure that that's included. And finally, I still have major concerns about West 78th Street and Highway 41. I believe that we're going to need a signal there sooner than later and I'm pretty worried about that. But again, I'm just going to have to have confidence that that can be resolved positively. Overall, I do support the project. It's a little big but it does meet the intent of the PUD ordinance and I guess that's all I need to say right now. Burton: Okay, thanks. My comments are pretty similar. I'd like to thank the staff for it's hard work on this project. It's been a long project with a lot of modifications and I also think the applicant's done a nice job working with the staff and addressing the issues as they've come up. I guess I'm generally pleased with the project and it's appearance. I think it's a creative and sensitive way to attempt to 25 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 preserve the natural resources to balance neighbors concerns and to meet the city's goals with respect to housing. And it also allows development of this, it's been a historically troubled lot. I think this is the, different people have taken runs at doing things here and nothing's ever worked and it's been kind of tied up for a long time so it's nice to actually have something happen there. With respect to the McAllister property, I personally think that we can address her concerns by bringing up her conditions at the next meeting and modifying those, but in the interim I don't have a problem with adding the conditions that were suggested by I think her attorney drafted those and then presented to us at the last meeting but I think what we'll probably do, we'll take care of her concerns. I agree with Uli on perhaps trading some fees for a tree. Some preservation of trees. I would like to see the resources that we have preserved rather than I think take the money and try to do something else with it. I think that's an area I'd like to see explored and the council can decide what they want to do with that. I don't think that this property is the gateway to Chanhassen. I still think the corner should be nice and I think it will be nice but it isn't the gateway. I guess that's about it. I think that the project shows a lot of effort on a lot of people's parts and I would note that we did receive some correspondence from neighbors that maybe people in the audience don't -know that we have. We have a letter from Mr. Robert, or excuse me, Bill Naegele in support of the project. We also received a petition from residents on Dogwood, is it Road? Yeah, Dogwood Road. Residents that were in favor of the project. And we also had a letter from Mr. Steve Berquist, former City Councilmember in favor of the project and I just wanted to note that. And with that we can move on to entertaining motions. Conrad: Mr. Chair, just some clarification. Do you instruct staff to negotiate on reduced park and trail fees for reduced home units? Let's say the developer can make a profit of $20,000 per home times 4. Is that something that you want staff to pursue? Bm~ton: Yeah. Conrad: So you would reduce park and trail fees by that so it's worthwhile, okay. Burton: That's just my opinion. Conrad: If somebody makes the motion, I think you've got to know what they're, and I'm making that number up. I don't know how we can make some motions tonight without talking about the McAllister property. Because once you put the plat in effect or the site plan you are saying, you can put a house here. Aanenson: Well I think what you could say is, unless that gets removed you can't put a house there. It's going to forward to the City Council and by the time they do final plat, you're 2 months out. But what my recommendation would be is that, unless the conditions on the interim use permit are modified, that those two units would not be able to be placed there. Unless the conditions are modified. Blackowiak: Are you talking about 23 and 24? Aanenson: Correct. Blackowiak: Okay. Okay, the 2 units in 24 or, I'm sorry. I just need to clarify that. Is there 2 units in 24, 1 and 2 and then there's Building 23, 1 and 2. Aanenson: Those are going to be within 300 feet of the barn. 26 Planning Commission Meeting- January 16, 2001 Blackowiak: So which 2 units are we talking about? Aanenson: 24. Blackowiak: So it's Lots 1 and 2 and 24, okay. I didn't know if you, you said 2 buildings so I didn't know if you meant. Aanenson: I'm sorry, 2 units. Blackowiak: Okay. Sacchet: IfI may add. I believe it also affects actually that manor home on the south side. That's only minimal impact but it's really that. Aanenson: From the barn? Sacchet: Yeah. I'm not sure, can anybody find that? Aanenson: 250, yeah it'd be the first 2 units. Sacchet: The first 2 units. Aanenson: It'd be Lots 4 and 5 in that Block. Sacchet: And it would not touch on 23? On the north? Aanenson: Those would be eliminated unless the other plan is modified. That would reSolve that issue. · Sacchet: I believe that if we include the proposed language that was brought to us last time that they'd be comfortable. So are we ready to make a motion? Burton: Yep. Sacchet: I would like to make a motion for the first piece here. I make a motion the Planning Commission recommends that the City Council approve the resolution for a comprehensive plan use amendment from low density residential to medium density residential and medium density residential to commercial and approve the ordinance for a planned unit development rezoning property from agricultural estate, A2 and rural residential, RR, to planned unit development residential PUD-R subject to the following conditions. 1. Contingent upon review and approval by the Metropolitan Council. 2. Compliance with the development standards stated January 16, 2001 and site plan dated October 23, 2000, and revised January 16, 2001. And I'd like to add a third condition on it which is basically language that's submitted by Ms. McAllister. Let's see if we can do this literally. This resolution shall not entitle the owner of any land adjacent to the new development to seek enforcement of any existing setback requirements in such a way as to prohibit the development of the new planned unit development in accordance with it's approved conditions. And b, shall not entitle the owner of any land located in the new planned unit development to seek enforcement of any existing setback requirements in such a way as to prohibit the construction, maintenance and use of any adjacent land of buildings and structures that now are or would be currently allowed by the zoning code as it now exists. The way I understand this third condition, it basically means that the McAllister property couldn't enforce the 300 foot setback on 27 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 Pulte and Pulte, or whoever would be the residents of all the adjacent units could not enforce it on the petting farm and I think that would settle the issue. So that's my motion. Burton: Is there a second? Kind: I'I1 second it and offer a friendly amendment. I think it's Kate's condition that she would like added that it's contingent upon the approval of the other requests. A. The subdivision request. B. The site plan review. C. The Wetland Alteration Permit. D. The Environmental Assessment Worksheet. E. The Conditional Use Pe~wnit for subdivision in the Bluff Creek Overlay District. Sacchet: That's great. Burton: Do you accept the amendment? Sacchet: Accept it. Burton: Any discussion on this? Conrad: Yeah. Kate, are you comfortable with Uli's? Aanenson: Yes. It accomplishes the same thing. That was drafted by her attorney. I understand what the condition is. I'm going to forward that to the council that they understand that. Meanwhile we're going to track the other process through. The concern is that there's a 300 foot separation and that's one way to, one mechanism to resolve it. And that was the other issue that we discussed here making sure that it's in the restrictive covenants. That they understand that there's a group home in the area and that there's also a petting farm. And we'll make sure that's in the covenants. And we'll forward that onto the council. Conrad: And what motion, we xvant those there. And what motion should somebody. Aanenson: The... That would actually be in the subdivision requirements. That's coining up. Sacchet: That's the next one. Conrad: Okay. Burton: Any other discussion on this one? Sacchet moved, Kind seconded that the Planning Commission recommends that the City Council approve the resolution for a Comprehensive Land Use Amendment from low density residential to medium density residential and medium density residential to commercial; and approve the ordinance for a Planned Unit Development rezoning property from Agricultural Estate, A2, and Rural Residential, RR, to Planned Unit Development Residential, PUD-R, subject to the following conditions: 1. Contingent upon review and approval by the Metropolitan Council. 2. Compliance with the Development Standards (dated January 16, 2001) and site plan dated October 23, 2000, revised January 16, 2001. 28 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 This resolution shall not entitle the owner of any land adjacent to the new development to seek enforcement of any existing setback requirements in such a way as to prohibit the development of the new planned unit development in accordance with it's approved conditions. And b, shall not entitle the owner of any land located in the new planned unit development to seek enforcement of any existing setback requirements in such a way as to prohibit the constructions maintenance and use of any adjacent land of buildings and structures that now are or would be currently allowed by the zoning code as it now exists. 4. Contingent upon the following approvals: A. The subdivision request. B. The site plan review. C. The Wetland Alteration Permit. D. The Environmental Assessment Worksheet. E. The Conditional Use Permit for subdivision in the Bluff Creek Overlay District. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously. Burton: Who wants to make the next motion? Kind: Mr. Chair I move the Planning Commission recommends the City Council approve the. pr. eliminary plat for the subdivision of a 120.93 acres into 2 additions: 1st addition has 26 blocks including 199 units and Outlots A-F, and the 2nd addition has 24 blocks including 180 units and Outlots A-C, subject to the following conditions, 1 through how many do we have here. 29. With the following changes. See if you can stay with me guys. Number 4, just as a typo error. Remove the words, staff recommends. Number 22 be reworded to say, a conservation easement shall be created to preserve OUtlots E and F and the treed areas shown as preserved on the plans. The conservation easement shall be dedicated in Phase I. And then I would like to add a number 30. Before the final plat the restrictive covenants shall be approved by staff. Number 31. The outlot west of Highway 41 shall be consistently referred to as Phase I, Outlot F on all plans. I don't know if you recall from a couple of meetings ago it was sometimes called Outlot E. Sometimes F and I just want to make sure that that's the same on all the plans. Number 32. the applicant shall post a sign at the end of dead end streets that say, there's only one street but, that say this road may be extended in the future. Number 33. To insure clear communication the applicant shall have all homebuyers sign a disclosure statement that would be part of their restrictive covenants. The statement shall include information about Miss Rosie's Petting Farm, Gateway Group Home and the potential future road extension. Signed statements shall be submitted to the City. 34. Remove units that encroach in Highway 5 setback. And then you'll have to help me with the language on these maybe. Number 35. Staff should consult with DNR regarding the necessity to relocate turkeys. Number 36. Staff shall prepare a report regarding trees for fees options. I think that's everything. Sacchet: May I do a friendly? Kind: You can second it and then. Sacchet: Okay, second. Friendly amendments. In the motion itselfI like to be specific. The Planning Commission recommends the City Council approve the preliminary plat dated October 23, 2000, revised January 16, 2001. Then I like in condition 22 that you propose to modify. Besides Outlots E and F and treed areas, I'd like to be more specific. I'd like to include the large wetland to the north and to the east, 29 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 Basin 3 and 5. And I like to mention the trees, the stands. I'd like to say the significant stands of trees to the north of the McAllister property and on the south side of the development, west of the NURP pond. And I would also like to add, include those trees that are specifically mentioned to be preserved under the tree preservation list which is 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. 5 out of the 8 large trees. Kind: The wetland part I think would be more appropriate in the wetland motion. Sacchet: Okay, that's fine. Then condition 27 needs to be edited. It should read, the buildings will be required to be designed by an architect and engineer as determined by the 'building official. The condition the way it's in there is garbled. Then instead of your 36 condition I would like to actually go a step further and say that the Phase I, Block 1, Lot 2 building shall be a 4 unit building. Basically be reduced from 6 back to the 4 and ask staff to look into how the applicant could be compensated through a rebate. I don't know whether I would need to include the park and rec people. I would like that up to staff but basically ask staff to work on an acceptable agreement through a rebate on the park and trail fee. Kind: That one I'm not sure ifI would accept. I would rather have staff research it before we decide whether the 4 units should be eliminated or not. What the cost would be involved. Aanenson: I guess what I was thinking is, give them the options of, what I heard the developer say is one option was let's put them back where they were. So I guess I'd give them a couple different scenarios of, based on what I've heard you say tonight. Conrad: Yeah, you don't have my vote on that. Sacchet: Ah'ight, I pull back on that one. I ah'eady pulled back on the angled roof. I would like to add, let's see do we need to add anything else. Burton: Excuse me, so far you've accepted the. Kind: Yes so far. So far I'm accepting. Burton: Go ahead Uli. Sacchet: Actually you added the other ones that were mentioned before. I think that's what I have for this motion. Burton: Any other discussion on this? Kind moved, Sacchet seconded that the Planning Commission recommends that the City Council approve the preliminary plat dated October 23, 2000, revised January 16m 2001 for the Subdivision of 120.93 acres into 2 additions; 1st addition has 26 Blocks including 199 units and Outlots A- F and the 2'd addition has 24 blocks including 180 units and Outlots A-C subject to the following conditions: Final platting for the commercial area located in Outlot D shall include a site plan review and approval. , Submit soils report to the Inspections Division. This shall be done prior to issuance of any building permits. 30 Planning Commission Meeting-January 16, 2001 . . , o o . 10. 11. 12. Submit streets names to the Building Department, for review prior to final plat approval. An erosion control plan shall be incorporated on the preliminary and final grading plans and be submitted to the City for review and approval prior to City Council review. The erosion control plan shall include, but not be limited to, Type llI silt fence adjacent to all wetlands and an erosion control blanket on the steep slope adjacent to the eastern wetland. Staff recommends that the applicant use the City's Best Management Practices Handbook for erosion control measures. All utility and street improvements shall be constructed in accordance with the latest edition of the City's Standard Specifications and Detail Plates. Detailed street and utility plans and specifications shall be submitted for staff review and City Council approval. The utility systems, upon completion, will be owned and maintained by the City. The private streets shall be constructed to support 7-ton per axle design weight in accordance with the City Code 20-1118 "design of parking stalls and drive aisles." The private streets shall be located in a strip of property or easement 40 feet wide. Wetland buffer areas shall be surveyed and staked in accordance with the City's wetland ordinance. The City will provide wetland buffer edge signs for the applicant to install after the utilities have been completed. The applicant shall pay the city $20 per sign. The applicant shall provide detailed storm sewer calculations for 1 O-year and 100-Year Storm events and provide ponding calculations for stormwater quality/quantity ponds in accordance ' with the City's Surface Water Management Plan for review and approval prior to City Council approval of the preliminary plat. The applicant shall provide detailed pre-developed and post- developed storm water calculations for 100-year storm events and normal water level and high water level calculations in existing basins, created basin, and/or creeks. Individual storm Sewer calculations between each catch basin segment will also be required to determine if sufficient catch basins are being utilized. In addition, water quality ponding design calculations shall be based on Walker's Pondnet model. Stormwater ponds must have side slopes of 10:1 for the first ten feet at the normal water level and no more than 3' 1 thereafter. The applicant shall enter into a PUD agreement/development contract with the City and provide the necessary financial security to guarantee compliance with the terms of the development contract. The applicant shall apply for and obtain permits from the appropriate regulatory agencies, i.e., Watershed District, Metropolitan Environmental Service Commission, Health Department, Minnesota Pollution control Agency, Minnesota Department of Natural Resources, and Minnesota Department of Transportation and comply with their conditions of approval. Fire hydrants shall be incorporated per the Fire Marshal's recommendations. The applicant shall include a draintile system behind the curbs to convey sump pump discharge from units not adjacent to ponds or wetlands. The appropriate drainage and utility easements shall be dedicated on the final plat for all utilities and ponding areas lying outside the right-of-way. The easement width shall be a minimum of 20 feet wide. Consideration should also be given for access and/or maintenance of the ponding areas. 31 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. 21. 22. 23. 24. 25. No berming or landscaping will be allowed within the right-of-way except landscaping along the frontage road in accordance with the Trunk Highway 5 Corridor Study. The lowest floor or opening elevation of all buildings shall be a minimum of 2 feet above the 100-year high water level of adjacent ponds, wetlands or creeks. If importing or exporting material for development site grading is necessary, the applicant shall supply the City with detailed haul routes and traffic control plans 'for review and approval. Also, any off-site grading will require temporary easements. The cul-de-sac in the northeast comer of the site shall be revised to meet the minimum street grade requirement of 0.75%. Staff also recommends that the cul-de-sac be moved to the west and possibly shortened in length to minimize grading, tree loss, and the impact to adjacent wetlands. The applicant shall report to the City Engineer the location of any draintiles found during construction and shall relocate or abandon the drain-tile as directed by the City Engineer. Access to the commercial parcel may be limited to a right in/right out along Century Boulevard and a full-shared access off West 78th Street with the parcel to the east. A cross access agreement will be required at the time of final platting. Site grades adjacent to West 78tl~ Street, Century Boulevard, Trunk Highway 41 and Trunk Highway 5 shall be compatible with the future widening of Trunk Highway 5. Landscaped median islands maybe permitted within the public streets contingent upon the developer entering into an encroachment agreement with the city and the medians do not pose a traffic safety issue. A 5-foot wide sidewalk shall be added along the south side of the public street in the northwest corner of the site. A Conservation Easement shall be created to preserve Outlots E and F, the significant stands of trees to the north of the McAllister property and on the south side of the development, west of the NURP pond, and to specifically mention the tree preservation list which is 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. 5 out of the 8 large trees. The conservation easement shall be dedicated in Phase I. Accessibility shall be provided to all portions of the development and a percentage of the units may also be required to be accessible or adaptable in accordance with Minnesota State Building Code Chapter 1341. Further information is needed to determine these requirements. Walls and projections within 3 feet of property lines shall be of one-hour fire-resistive construction. Any building classified as an R-1 occupancy ( a building containing three or more dwelling units on the same property ) and with over 8500 gross square feet of floor area shall be protected with an automatic sprinkler system. 32 Planning Commission Meeting- January 16, 2001 26. A final grading plan and soils report must be to the Inspections Division before permits can be issued. 27. The buildings will be required to be designed by an architect and engineer as determined by the building official. 28. The developer and or their agent shall meet with the Inspections Division as early as possible to discuss plan review and permit procedures. 29. Landscaping and tree preservation: a. Tree protection fencing shall be installed around all areas designated for preservation. b. All evergreens used as overstory trees in buffer yard areas shall be increased to a minimum height of 8 feet. The plant schedule on the landscape plan shall be changed to reflect this requirement. c. The minimum number of shrubs shall be required in buffer yard areas along Highways 5 and 41. Applicant shall work with staff to meet minimum requirements for shrubs along W. 78th Street. d. Boulevard trees along West 78th Street shall be spaced 55 feet apart. e. Ail Colorado spruce specified in landscape plans shall be replaced by a new selection of evergreen. f. Revise plant schedule to show seven-foot evergreens for understory trees. g. A minimum of three overstory trees shall be added to each of the tot lot areas. h. A revised landscape plan shall be submitted to the city for approval. i. The applicant shall work with city staff to preserve any or all of the following trees: #1369 (52" oak), #1743 (60" oak), #1742 (48" oak),'#2173 (42" oak), and #1881 (36" maple). j. A walk-through inspection of the silt/tree preservation fence shall be required prior to construction." 30. Before the final plat the restrictive covenants shall be approved by staff. 31. The outlot west of Highway 41 shall be consistently referred to as Outlot F on all plans. 32. The applicant shall post a sign at the end of dead end street that say this road may be extended in the future. 33. To insure clear communication the applicant shall have all homebuyers sign a disclosure statement that would be part of their restrictive covenants. The statement shall include information about Miss Rosie's Petting Farm, Gateway Group Home and the potential future road extension. Signed statements shall be submitted to the City. 34. Remove units that encroach in Highway 5 setback. 35. Staff should consult with DNR regarding the necessity to relocate turkeys. 36. Staff shall prepare a report regarding trees for fees options. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously. 33 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 Burtoii: Okay, that one moves along. May I have the next motion please. Kind: Mr. Chair, I'll move the Planning Commission recommends approval of Site Plan Review #99-21 for 32 club homes, 105 manor homes, 82 coach homes, 160 village homes subject to the following conditions, 1 through 2 1 guess, with the following changes. Number 2(b). Dedication of the north wetland trail alignment shall be as a trail easement. And then I'm proposing that we eliminate 2(e) because I think that was covered in the previous motion, but I'm open to discussion on that. I'll keep going. And then I would like to add number 3 which says residential design standards shall, (a). Include vinyl shakes as an acceptable material on all home styles. (b). Prohibit ship lap siding. (c). Specify that all buildings use a UL Class A asphalt/fiberglass shingle, 230 pounds or better. Did I get that right Kate? Aanenson: Yes. Kind: Okay. (d). Specify that all foundation walls shall be screened by landscaping or retaining walls. (e). Specify that central air conditioning shall be included in the base price of all homes per the EAW noise abatement recommendation. (f). Specify the percent of brick for each building style. And then number 4. Commercial design standards shall prohibit standing seam siding as a curtain wall. Number 5. This is my mother's condition. Applicant shall consider providing benches in the totlot area. Burton: Any discussion on that? Sacchet: Yeah, I would like to keep some form of the 2(e) in there. If we consider Outlots E and F and the trees already covered, we didn't cover the wetlands so I would like to mention the wetland, the two large wetlands. Kind: The wetland would be covered in the Wetland Alteration Permit. Sacchet: Oh, that's still coining? Kind: Still coming... I was just trying to clean it up but it doesn't matter. Burton: I'd rather, I'd personally leave that. Sacchet: I would leave it. But I would like to say specifically include wetlands to the north and wetlands to the east. Or we could even specify basin, I think it's 3 and 5. Kind: Sure. I'I1 accept that. Did you second my motion? Sacchet: Well, if you want to make it all inclusive I'd also like to really be complete then. Burton: Why don't we second it and then. Sacchet: Okay, second. Burton: Okay, go ahead. Sacchet: I would like to make it inclusive. I mean somewhere I'd like to see the whole list. I'd like to see Outlot E, F, forested area to the north of McAllister, forested area on the south side, west of the 34 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 NURP pond, the specific trees, the significant trees that we're preserving plus the two big, large wetlands. I'd like to see that complete list somewhere and this seems a good place to put it because most of it is already there. Kind: I accept that amendment. Sacchet: Thank you. Burton: Any other discussion? Ladd. Conrad: Kate, did you understand everything that was? Aanenson: Yeah. Uli's right, it's in a couple different places that's why I gave the attachment too. To show that. I mean I was thinking in my head you could use that as the exhibit, as shown in exhibit, but as this goes forward, before it goes to final plat I understand what you're. The other point is, if this is a park and rec commission motion so I would leave it as it is but say the Planning Commission has the following additions to it, just so you know I'm not going to completely modify that. Just so they can see what the park commission put in there distinctly. What their commission. Kind: So it would be best to have Uli's addition be, let's see. Where did I leave off?. On 5. Have Uli's be number 6? Aanenson: That's fine...we'll just put in italics because I'm going to do a Planning Commission update and say your concern is that you make sure it's clear that these areas are all to be in easement. Burton: I think our opinion should be expressed. Sacchet: Mr. Chair I do have a question actually in this context, t mean the condition number 2 says upon conclusion of the discussion Tuesday of the Park and Rec Commission and so on. So you're saying that this is actually their recommendation that's going to the council? That's why it's identified that way. Because I felt a little awkward having it in this way but that explains why it's in that way. Aanenson: It's the mechanism to carry it forward and for you to see it and to carry it forward. Sacchet: Thanks for clarifying that. Conrad: Continuing on Mr. Chair, and Deb's specifications for building materials you understood what she said? Aanenson: Yes. I'm in concurrence, yes. Conrad: And those are not? Aanenson: Right. The EAW clearly states that the air condition, that's for noise attenuation. That's in there. I think for clarity to make sure that's in the conditions and that's what I'm hearing. That's all in one spot. Same with the conservation easements. It's not only trees but the wetlands. That's all one... Burton: Okay, any other discussion on this one? Okay, it's been moved and seconded. 35 Planning Commission Meeting- January 16, 2001 Kind moved, Saeehet seeonded that the Planning Commission recommends approval of Site Plan Review//99-21 for 32 club homes, 105 manor homes, 82 coach homes, 160 village homes, subject to the following conditions: 1. The development must comply with the Arboretum Village Development Design Standards. 2. Upon conclusion of the discussion on Tuesday, January 9, the Park and Recreation Commission made the following recommendations to the City Council. It is recommended that the City Council approve the Arboretum Village PUD as depicted in the aftached plan and the following conditions of approval regarding parks and trails: a. Full park and trail dedication fees be collected. b. Dedication of the north wetland trail alignment as a trail easement. c. Pulte Homes shall construct the north wetland as a public amenity with reimbursement from the trail's dedication fund. d. All totlots shall have a minimum capacity of 40 children. e. Outlots E and F, the forested area north of the McAllister property, the Basins 3 and 5 be preserved in perpetuity by a conservation easement. The conditions of this easement to be very restrictive to ensure that the present condition and integrity of these places remain intact. 3. The Planning Commission recommends that the following design standards be incorporated in the development: (a). Include vinyl shakes as an acceptable material on all home styles. (b). Prohibit ship lap siding. (c). Specify that all buildings use a UL Class A asphalt/fiberglass shingle, 230 pounds or better. (d). Specify that all foundation walls shall be screened by landscaping or retaining walls. (e). Specify that central air conditioning shall be included in the base price of all homes per the EAW noise abatement recommendation. (f). Specify the percent of brick for each building style. 4. Commercial design standards shall prohibit standing seam siding as a curtain ~vall. 5. Applicant shall consider providing benches in the totlot area. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously. 36 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 Burton: Okay, that one moves along. Next motion please. Sacchet: Okay Mr. Chair. I move that the Planning Commission recommends approve of the Wetland Alteration Permit #00-4 to fill .54 acres of wetlands in two separate basins subject to the following conditions. 1, 2, let's see. That goes through 13. And I believe they can actually stand as they are. Kind: I'll second that with one friendly amendment. I just can't leave it alone you know. Number 10. I would like to add wetland easement shall be dedicated to the city as part of Phase I. Burton: Do you accept that amendment? Sacchet: Wetland easement. Well weren't we talking that it's a dedication that we don't want. Yes, easement. Kind: Wetlands are going to be dedicated. Aanenson: Right. The easement is the mechanism to get in equipment. Sacchet: Okay. Alright, accepted. Burton: Any other discussion? Blackowiak: Mr. Chair, excuse me. Kate, didn't you talk about a 984 foot contour or something? Was that in this context? Aanenson: I think what Uli's saying is outside the primary zone and we clarified that so that's. Blackowiak: So you don't need to say that? Okay. Aanenson: If you want to put it in there, that's fine. It's outside the primary. I just want to know if you wanted a specific number in that area because... Sacchet: I was thinking to add that into the Bluff Creek motion. Aanenson: No. Yes. Number 6. The last motion. Blackowiak: Okay. Sacchet: Right. Burton: Any other discussion? And it was seconded I recall. Sacchet moved, Kind seconded that the Planning Commission recommends approval of Wetland Alteration Permit//00-4 to fill .54 acres of wetlands in two separate basins subject to the following conditions: The applicant shall resolve the encroachment of the following structures into the wetland buffer setback: 37 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 2, , . 5~ . 0 10. 11. 13. Phase I: Outlot A, 1/2 Court Basketball Outlot B, Lots 16 and 17 Outlot C, Lot 19 Phase Il: Outlot B, Lots 7 and 9 Outlot C, Lot 19 The applicant shall provide an invert elevation for the proposed storm sewer inlet on the upstream side of Drainageway 1 to ensure that wetland loss will not occur due to excessive drainage of the drainageway and to ensure that the drainageway will not become wetter. Wetland buffers of 0-20 feet with a minimum average width of 10 feet shall be provided around Basins B and C. Wetland mitigation areas must be constructed prior to wetland impacts occurring. Wetland mitigation must occur in a manner that is consistent with the Minnesota Wetland Conservation Act (MR 8420). The applicant shall provide proof of property ownership for Outlot F, as well as a Declaration of Restrictions and Covenants for Replacement Wetland. The applicant shall submit a wetland banking application. Silt fence shall be provided adjacent to all areas to be preserved as buffer or, if no buffer is to be preserved, at the delineated wetland edge. The applicant shall re-seed any disturbed wetland areas with MnDOT seed mix 25 A, or a similar seed mix which is approved for wetland soil conditions. Drainage and utility easements shall be provided over all existing wetlands, wetland mitigation areas, buffer areas used for mitigation credit and storm water ponds. The wetland easement shall be dedicated as a part of Phase I. Wetland buffer areas shall be surveyed and staked in accordance with the City's wetland ordinance. In addition, the applicant shall provide vegetative barriers to define buffer edges. The applicant will install wetland buffer edge signs, under the direction of City staff, before construction begins and will pay the City $20 per sign. NURP ponds shall be constructed/expanded in conjunction with the construction of Phase 1. Based on the proposed developed area of 64.66 acres, the water quality fees associated with this project are $98,929.80 and the water quantity fees associated with this project are $192,363.50. The applicant will be credited for water quality where NURP basins are provided to treat runoff from the site. This will be determined upon review of the ponding and storm sewer calculations. Credits may also be applied to the applicant's SWMP fees for oversizing in accordance with the SWMP or the provision of outlet structures. The applicant will not be assessed for areas that are dedicated outlots. No credit will be given for temporary pond areas. Current information indicates that the project proposes water quality ponding for approximately 44 acres. This results in water quality credits equaling $67,320.00. The project also proposes providing 1 outlet structure, which 38 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 results in a credit of $2,500.00. At this time, the estimated total SWMP fee, due payable to the City at the time of final plat recording, is $221,473.30. This amount will be finalized prior to final plat approval. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously. Burton: Okay that one moves along to the council. Next motion please. Sacchet: IfI may. Burton: Sure. Sacchet: I'd like to move that the Planning Commission recommends approval of, and I would like to specify the Arboretum Village Environmental Assessment Worksheet of July, 2000 and approval of the Findings of Fact and Negative Declaration for an Environmental Impact Statement dated November 14, 2000 with the following note. With the exception of IV/D/8 and V/A because those two state that only few, if any trees are being cut and that it is no significant environmental impact. This is not true because the current proposal calls for the removal of approximately half of the significant trees and that is in my book significant environmental impact. That's my motion. Burton: Okay. Is there a second? Kind: I'll second that. Burton: Any discussion on the motion? Sacchet moved, Kind seconded that the Planning Commission recommends approval of the Arboretum Village Environmental Assessment Worksheet dated July, 2000 and approval of the Findings of Fact and Negative Declaration for an Environmental Impact Statement dated November 14, 2000 with the exception of items IV(d)(8) and ¥(a). All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously. Burton: Okay, that one moves to the council. And we have one more motion. Somebody. Sacchet: Alright. The Planning Commission recommends approval of the Conditional Use Permit for subdivision within the Bluff Creek Overlay District with the condition that all disturbed areas shall be reseeded immediately following construction. And I'd like to add, no construction will take place in the primary zone... Burton: Is there a second to that motion? Conrad: Second. Burton: Any discussion? Aanenson: I need to just qualify that. I need to get some opinion from the attorney because our sewer project is in the primary zone. And it's all laid services so I guess I would say except for utility, required utilities or something like that. I'd put a qualifier in that. 39 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 Sacchet: Yeah. I mean I think ultimately it's really bad. I mean we don't allow anybody else to build there then we go build there ourselves. But unfortunately that sewer has to be somewhere. Aanenson: And it has to be in the lowest area. So I just want to make sure that that's clear that that's where it's going. Burton: Do you want to amend your? Sacchet: Yes. I'm fine if you say no construction shall take place in the primary zone, except for sewer line. Aanenson: Can we just put utilities? Sacchet: Utilities as needed. Because I really think we should explore every possible alternative there to at least minimize that. Burton: Second anyone? Conrad: Yeah, I seconded that. Burton: Any discussion? Sacchet moved, Conrad seconded that the Planning Commission recommends approval of the Conditional Use Permit to permit for a subdivision within the Bluff Creek Overlay District with the condition that all disturbed areas shall be reseeded immediately following construction. And that no construction shall take place in the primar3~ zone, except for city utilities as needed. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously. Burton: Okay that does it and that moves, the whole thing moves to the council. Is that February 12th? Aanenson: Correct. Burton: And before we, I think we'll have people moving around and before we start the next one maybe we'll take like a few minute break here and we'll go on. Thanks. (The Planning Commission took a short recess at this point in the meeting.) Burton: Back on now with a public hearing. Oh, before we do that the next on the agenda, we had some discussion here at the break about the agenda tonight and ! think we were too optimistic about how much we could get, plow through and it seems to be the consensus that the last item is not going to be started in time for it to be reasonably considered tonight so I think what we've discussed is moving it to the, I talked to Kate and the next commission meeting schedule that it could be on would be February 20th. So ! think what we're going to end up doing is moving item 5 to the February 20th meeting. My understanding is that it then comes on first. Is that right Ladd, from experience do you know? Conrad: We can move it, yeah. 40 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 Burton: Yeah, it will be first on the agenda on that meeting and, but instead of making people wait around until later in the evening, we want to let everybody know now. Now that we can see where ~ve're at. And we apologize. It's hard to know where you're heading. Well okay, we can move on then. REOUEST FOR LOT SIZE AND LOT COVERAGE AND BUILDING SETBACKS TO PERMIT CONSTRUCTION OF A SINGLE FAMILY HOME LOCATED ON LOTS 998-1000, CARVER BEACH, 960 CARVER BEACH ROAD, ANITA BENSON. Public Present: Name Address Wally & Cheryl Schwab Matt Jacobs Dennis Schilling Keith Peterson Bob Nelson Kermit Austad Joe & Lori Harrington Jerry & Janet Paulsen Deb Lloyd 950 Carver Beach Road 921 Western Drive 941 Western Drive 921 Hiawatha Drive 970 Carver Beach Road 980 Carver Beach Road 901 Carver Beach Road 7305 Laredo Drive 7302 Laredo Drive Bob Generous presented the staff report on this item. Burton: Any questions for staff?. Conrad: Bob, Mr. Chairman. Bob, if we did not put any sewer stubs of water connections to this property, what was our thinking back then? What were we thinking of?. It was a lot of record so why didn't we do that? Generous: I don't know. I looked. They just thought it would never develop. No one would want that small a lot. Of course other areas of Carver Beach we have 2 lot sites and 3 lot sites that have developed. However they did make them pay the area charge for those improvements but not the lateral charges. Sacchet: Yeah Mr. Chair. I just want to clarify a few things. One thing is, it's a lot of record. That means the owner has the right to build on it? Generous: The City has to permit a reasonable use of the property. Sacchet: A reasonable use. So that's the right. Now in terms of how this proposed house fits into the neighborhood, I mean it fits on the lot somewhat. But considering it's a tuck under garage and then a two story, actually almost a 3 story house. Generous: Correct. Sacchet: Most houses in that neighborhood are ramblers. So how do you conclude it fits into the neighborhood? Could you elaborate on that a little bit. 41 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 Generous: Well I went out to the neighborhood and just on that street I tried to take some pictures of the different house styles that are there and up the street to the east there was a split entry home and several to the xvest. Down the hill there are tuck under homes that were, well they looked like one story because they had more hill but they are a tuck under which is similar to this design. Property immediately to the northeast was a story and a half. So while it may be a little higher than the other houses in the immediate vicinity. You have a mix you know. Sacchet: Okay. Burton: Any other questions for staff?. Kind: Yes Mr. Chair. On page 6 of the staff report there is discussion on the second paragraph about granting the impervious surface relief would not significantly alter drainage patterns or increase storm water runoff. And that would be the 36% impervious. If we go with the minimum which is 30% impervious, would there be any benefit in that 6%? Are we really gaining much by holding the house size down to the absolute minimum that could be on this small lot? Saam: Not very much. 6% impervious area, you're not going to see much additional runoff in 6% or much less. Kind: Okay. The house pad size could, we could compel the applicant to make it smaller to meet that 600 square foot plus the garage size which makes it 384 square feet smaller and then that would be the 30% coverage. I guess I'll have to think about that and discuss it a little bit more with you all later. What else? I guess that's it. Burton: Okay, any other questions for staff?. Sidney: Yes Mr. Chair. Last page of the staff report includes this letter from Roger Knutson. I'm wondering if you could summarize that and simply the last two sentences there. Generous: Basically the lot area and lot width variances aren't enough. We have to provide additional relief to permit development of this property. Then the options he gave were for her to construct a smaller house or to grant a coverage variance. And he says you can, it's up to the City which they want to do. Grant the variance for a smaller house, a one car garage or the impervious surface. Which would be the least impact to the neighborhood, to the community. Burton: Any other questions for stafF?. Okay. If not, would the applicant or their designee like to address the commission? Is there somebody here? Generous: I haven't seen them, no. Burton: Okay. Let's have a motion to open the public hearing. Sacchet moved, Blackowiak seconded to open the public hearing. The public hearing was opened. Burton: If anybody would like to address the commission please approach the podium and state your name and address. 42 Planning Commission Meeting- January 16, 2001 Wally Schwab: Good evening. I'm Wally Schwab. I live at 950 Carver Beach Road. Directly adjacent to the proposed site. Last hearing you heard me talk about what I and others have been told about the buildability or non-buildability of the property. We won't go into that again considering the time. I would like to address a little bit of a proportionate error on the plan view of the proposed site. IfI may. I have here the submitted drawing showing a large area between the property line and my house when in reality it is a 10 foot and I do have the 20 foot setback as opposed to the lesser setback that the original drawing shows. Given the proximity I'm sure that you can understand that I'm not real excited about having a skyscraper 20 feet from my house. The entire upper Carver Beach area has been, as I alluded to last time, laid out with spacious lots. This right here is my lot and this is my neighbor's lot right here who does own the property. This is the mini lot that is in question. When you look at that area of Carver Beach Road you are aware that the houses are, as was alluded to, basically rather tight. Some of them do have a lower garage area but they're basically all wrapper types. I don't believe that the proposed structure fits into that area. What we are doing is disrupting the continuity of that area of Carver Beach Road, in my opinion. Part of the paperwork here involving this refers to the fact that there are no incentives for the properties on either side of this parcel to be purchased these lots. I take exception to that. It says since they are currently developed. They have enjoyed this private open space for at least 34 to 44 years. I have lived in my place for 19 years. In those 19 years my enjoyment of that property has been mowing it. When the property was sold as a result of my getting tired of mowing it, and not doing so, and this is fact, and the City called the original owner, Mr. Osmundson, and he at that time was no longer interested in keeping it. That led to the property getting sold. After it was sold in 1997-98, the first year after it had been sold it turned back into a weed lot. Last summer about midway through the summer I once again got tired of it being a weed lot and started mowing it. Which I didn't mind doing. What I'm getting at here is, there are no incentives for the properties on either side of the parcel to purchase these lots. That is incorrect. Myself, Mr. Nelson, and Mr. Peterson would be very interested in purchasing these lots, incorporating them into our properties and thereby preserve the continuity of Carver Beach Road. Thank you. Burton: Thank you. State your name and address please. Keith Peterson: Keith Peterson, 921 Hiawatha Drive. Some of the stuffI stated last time but I feel like it needs to be brought up again so I apologize because you probably know what I'm going to say but anyway. Section 20-58 of the general conditions of granting. A variance may be granted only if the following are met. The purpose of this variation is not based upon the desire to increase the value or income potential of a parcel of land. In the findings of Mr. Generous' report it does say the ability to develop the site will increase the value of the property. Anita Benson is not building this house to live in so the only purpose is to create a profit. She bought this property for $4,200 and at the last meeting if the variances would have been approved, her selling price for just the lot would have been $27,200. What concerns us is the lot. The seller of this lot, who was a realtor and Mr. Schwab, were told that, by the City of Chanhassen that it was a non-buildable lot. When the City Engineer of Chanhassen buys it and then it's a buildable lot. So we see a little problem with that. And then number 4 alleges difficulty or hardship is not a self created hardship. Anita Benson was the City Engineer of Chanhassen and she was well aware of the codes before she bought this lot. Therefore we agree that it is a self created hardship. Then I was reading the zoning. To a division of for the non-conforming uses part and I forget, to me I understood this to mean you guys are supposed to kind of do. And number 3 says the purpose of this division is to encourage and eliminate a non-conforming uses, lots and structures or reduce or impact on adjacent properties. If the code states to encourage elimination of a non-conforming lot, should the City Engineer of Chanhassen purchase it and try to develop a lot that needs a 9,000 square foot variance, variance for lot size and variance for lot width and variance for lot coverage. Then in Mr. Generous' report too he states there is two lots within 500 feet that needed a variance. The first one, number 94-9 43 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 required a 5,000 square foot lot size variance and a 20 foot front setback variance on the east side of the house. Because of a rule that was in the plat book that was never built and had 20 year old trees on it, it required that 20 foot setback. And the road is now vacated which actually makes this lot and Mr. Schwab's lot 12,000 square feet so. And I'd also like to note that even though this house needed a variance, it's still 80 feet from Mr. Schwab's house, 114 feet from Mr. Nelson's house and 510 feet from the closest house to the east. Then the other variance, number 85-5 required a 17 foot rear yard setback variance and the nearest house to the rear yard is 380 feet so I don't think they mind it too much. But then the last thing is, I look at the picture of this house. Take away the tall trees and imagine a rambler sitting 20 feet next to it. This house will be way over 2 times taller and it 'doesn't look like any of the houses in the neighborhood so thank you very much. Burton: Thank you. Anybody else like to address the Planning Commission? Sir. Bob Nelson: My name is Bob Nelson. I live at 970 Carver Beach Road, which is the property that is directly west and north of this mini lot as Wally called it, and I guess we all call it that. I just wanted to point a couple of things out. With the staff report that we received, it was dated 1/11 which was last Thursday. We received it on 1/12 which was last Friday. That's only 5 days and part of it's a weekend so we haven't had a lot of time to prepare, even though we've been here before and I'm sure you guys received it probably after we did. So that doesn't give us a lot of time to prepare and as you'll see down the road, I may be a little short on some of the support that I've garnered here but actually the Vikings helped me out a little bit. I had some time on Sunday to get out and do that. But as Ladd brought up, the non stubbing of the water and sewer. That's got to indicate something with a small lot like that. I'm not sure what that is. To me it indicates that it's really not a buildable lot. There was another reference to we've had the enjoyment of the 34 to 44 years of the open space that that provides. Well maybe that's in our favor because all the other lots are very open and .spacious. Now since we didn't buy this lot we didn't realize it was buildable. And in regard to the setbacks, or I'm sorry, to the variances that were denied before. It stated that they were denied because they were too much. Actually they were denied because this really, the house didn't fit there. This one doesn't fit there either. Not in that neighborhood. I've got 30,000 square foot lot. They've got 12,000 square foot lots now and those are the small ones. There was a reference to 2 or 3 lots that are in the neighborhood that only have the same amount of space. I'd like to ~know where those are. I can't find them. If there are, there's an 8,000 square foot lot which is close but it's still not 6,000 square feet. The variances are, you know you want a 60% reduction in the lot size. You want a 33% reduction of frontage and you're looking for an additional 11% lot coverage. That's quite a bit for a 6,000 square foot lot I think. Another thing, there was no purchase incentives that Wally brought up. We've made numerous inquiries via telephone with Ms. Benson. We receive only answering machine which is fine. We can leave a message but never a call back. Actually I even broke down and called her work today. She's not available. She's out of town for the entire week so we have no way of doing it. We would be interested at a reasonable price to purchase that lot and divide it up like Wally had mentioned. They also mentioned the critical differences in the scale that was presented in a report versus what actually is. I think that's a concern for us. And that brings me to what I talked about before and that was ethics. Both with us and with the report that we have. There's many different stories that were told to different citizens that called in to inquire about this lot. We did not realize it was a buildable lot until basically after it went up for sale and when we inquired it was already sold. We see a very active role in the staff in getting the variances passed here, both on the previous proposal and this proposal. That concerns me. Why is that happening? I'm not sure. The majority of the neighbors that I canvassed and I was only able to get to about 20 of them on Sunday, are all against this. I do have, it's my only copy but since we had such a short time I've got a number of signatures with their addresses that they oppose this proposal. I also in questioning that last item, we questioned the 44 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 $4,200 that it was purchased for and the potential $27,200 that it could be sold for. That might answer all those why's that we have on our other questions. Thank you. Burton: Thank you. Anybody else like to address the commission? Kermit Austad: I'm Kermit Austad. I live 980 Carver Beach Road. Just west of that there. What I can't understand is how these, when the sewer went in and went from 18-20,000 feet. Now they're trying to get it on 6,000 feet which at that plan it was a non-buildable lot. Now if it would have been buildable, I think a lot of local people here would have taken advantage of that a long lime ago. Also you put a house, I seen a drawing out at, looked like a 3 story from the front and you place that in an area where it's ramblers and stuff, you know what it does to your resale value for that house and the ones around it. Because I've built houses for 40 years and we never did this because of the fact if you build supposedly a $400,000 house and you've got a $125,000 rambler to it, you know what it does to that $400,000 house. Right down. The house just don't fit there. That's all I can think of. Thank you. Burton: Thanks. Anybody else like to address the commission on this one. Debbie Lloyd: Hello, my name's Debbie Lloyd and I live at 7302 Laredo Drive and I was here at the last meeting when we addressed this property. And I want to say to the neighbors, forgive me if I misunderstood you but did not a number of you approach the city staff and ask if this were a buildable lot? Audience: So we can buy it so it wouldn't be built on. Debbie Lloyd: Correct. And you were told they have no report of that question being asked. And I want to tell you that you're not the only ones in this community that have had that response from the Planning department. And I think it's time we start holding the planning department accountable for what they tell the citizens of this community. Thank you. Burton: Thank you. Anybody else like to address the Planning Commission? Okay, motion to end public hearing. Sacchet moved, Conrad seconded to close the public hearing. The public hearing was closed. Burton: Comments. Sacchet: Dear oh dear. Conrad: I don't know where we go Mr. Commissioner. It's real uncomfortable. It's real uncomfortable. I don't like it and there's a lot of hearsay that we, I just don't like it. So on the one hand I think we should, if it is, legally it's buildable regardless of who said what to who. Legally it's buildable. But legally I have no need to allow a huge house, even in a. Burton: Is it buildable without a variance? Conrad: You've got to let them build. Burton: Well I'll wait. 45 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 Conrad: And there will be variances but you've got to let them build so, so you know, on the one hand I think we should say well the house can have 600 square feet and we can let them have a garage. That's it. Now they just might do that and that would, I'm not sure if that's smart to do or not. IfI owned property that was fairly cheap. But we could just let them build the minimum and hope that they may sell. Burton: Comments Uli? Sacchet: Yeah, just to expand on that a little more. What you brought ou{. From the letter from the city attorney it's my understanding that we do need to grant the two parts, the size variance and the lot width variance because it's a reasonable use to build a house on it, okay. But that by itself is not enough. To build something they need either relief on the impervious surface coverage, or on the minimum house size and/or that 2 car or is it 3 car, 2 car garage requirement. So one of those 3 is necessary to make it buildable. So it appears that from a legal viewpoint we have to give them 1 of those 3. Now if we restrict what's being built there further, and I think that's where you were getting at, we are bringing down the value ultimately of that structure. By bringing down the value of that structure, it also impacts the value of the surrounding...I mean out of context, I don't believe it fits into the context. But out of context it's definitely a nice house. And it's very nice how it fits on that lot with the front and side setbacks and back setback and that really has to be noticed. So if we restrict it, we say well we don't give them the impervious surface variance but we give them a variance on one of the other ones to make it somewhat workable, we decrease the value of the structure which then in turn has a decreasing value effect on the neighborhood. So that's what I'm saying, it's Catch-22. Now we can say it doesn't fit into the neighborhood now. Well, is there a potential that maybe as there's turn over and you guys build new houses and your kids want a second story on top of your rambler, that all of a sudden it starts fitting better? I don't know. But I thin we have to be open minded here a little bit and I'm really torn because on one hand it doesn't fit. There seems to be some funny business. I mean I feel uncomfortable about the fact that somebody builds a lot that may or may not be buildable. Happens to be somebody that knows supposedly ordinances very well and all of a sudden it becomes buildable. Yeah, well that's my comments. I don't think it helps much but. Burton: Okay, thanks. Do you want to? Go ahead Alison. Blackowiak: Okay. Yeah I agree. I do like this house plan. Much better than the last plan. However, like the last plan I don't think it fits into the neighborhood. I just don't, I can't see why she wants to build this house on this lot. I just, it's and it's Habitat for Humanity is no longer involved. I don't understand. I guess maybe I don't even need to understand. I won't even go there. I don't like the house on the lot. I think that if there is the possibility for the neighbors to make some kind of an offer to the present property owner, that maybe should be explored before we go on and start granting variances. But then again I don't want to run afoul of the law in terms of not granting the proper variances because indeed it is a lot of record. Whether or not it was ever mentioned to be built on is another question but it is a lot of record so we don't want to run into that problem I don't think. But I think if there's a possibility that the neighbors would be interested in purchasing it and a possibility that if the present owner is, it doesn't look like going to be living there personally, then maybe that option should be explored before we move forward with granting variances for a lot that I really don't think should be built on in the first place. Burton: Other comments? 46 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 Sidney: Yes Mr. Chair. I think Ladd stated things correctly, at least in my opinion that I think in this case we're dealing with a proposal that has a huge house on a small lot. We really don't want that. It just doesn't fit the character of the neighborhood. So I think we should start the applicant off at the smallest house possible and work up if that's necessary. But you know realizing that you have to have reasonable use but it still has to fit into the character of the neighborhood. It's just too big for the surrounding property. Nice house though. Burton: Deb. Kind: I'I1 go next. You probably could tell from my questions of Matt about the impervious surface that I have a quandary similar to Uli's and that is, it's a nice looking house and if6%, 36% of 30%, what difference does it make? It's pretty similar as far as runoff goes but we could limit it to, it's a puny lot. What are we calling it, a mini lot? I kind of like puny. That's what my daughter would say. So we should put the smallest, mini house on that lot and how would the neighbors feel about that as far as the bringing down the prices of homes in the neighborhood so, Uli already touched on that and I agree with that so that's my quandary. And also the aspect about reasonable use not departing downward from the neighborhood, pre-existing standards. Variances that blend with pre-existing standards without departing downward meet the criteria. I think that we could put a condition that says the building height should not exceed 2 stories including the garage level, which knocks offa story of the house and we could approve the minimum surface coverage which is 30% and then approve the necessary setbacks for, or necessary variances for the lot size and the what else. And the lot frontage. And limit the height and that can fit the smallest house possible. I think we could do that tonight. I would be willing to do that tonight. Blackowiak: Mr. Chair before we go further. I read that the site coverage is 25%. Bob I heard you say something about 30%. If we're going to even be considering lowering percentages, what's the percentage we should be looking at? Generous: Well 25 is the ordinance requirement. Blackowiak: Correct. Generous: 30% is based on that analysis of the 600 square foot per square living area. A 25 by 24, or 24 by 24 garage and a 20 by 30 foot driveway. Blackowiak: Okay. The driveway plan that was submitted was less than 20, whatever you just said. Sorry. It was kind ofa Y shape almost and so the surface area of the driveway was, let me see. Generous: 576. Blackowiak: I'm sorry? Generous: 576. Blackowiak: 576. And what was what you were saying? Generous: 600. Blackowiak: Okay. So we're not gaining that much, okay. So it's 30% then is what your take is would be the bare minimum? 47 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 Generous: Yes. On the 2 story home meeting the criteria for single family home. Blackowiak: So 2 story above and beyond the garage? So 3 story looking at it? Generous: No, no. No, you could call that, it would be a tuck under. So you could have part of the first floor adjacent to the garage and the second floor. Blackowiak: On top of, okay. Generous: And above the other living area. Kind: That's xvhat I xvould propose that we could do tonight. Blackowiak: Okay, thank you. Burton: Well my comments also are that I really don't like this issue and like Ladd, I kind of sunk when I kind of thought, here we go again but I do think that this one needs the extra scrutiny. Normally I'm pretty forgiving on variances but there's some factors here that mandate that we look at this one a lot harder. One is the lot size and I think the applicant's relationship with, in history with the city merits us looking at it a little tougher. And then neighborhood opposition and I also think it's pretty apparent that all the neighbors thought this was a non-.buildable lot or one of them would be the owner of it. You look at the standards for granting a variance and one of the main one is a reasonable use. And I look at the language in our report and from what I know of land law and real estate law, that a reasonable use includes a use made by a majority of the comparable property but there are other uses which could be reasonable uses. I don't think it'd have to be, that this has to be a house or it's not a reasonable use. And I don't know enough as to whether or not there are other reasonable uses of this property which would past mustard. For instance, could renting the property just as a vacant lot to the neighbors be a reasonable use? It might be. Could it be used for storage within the zoning? I don't know. I haven't studied that but perhaps there are other reasonable uses that can be made of the property and at this point I'm not entirely convinced. I do think that the house is an obvious reasonable use but ! think that there could be other reasonable uses. And then if we determine that there are other reasonable uses, it does seem that I just don't believe that this would ever, the chances of this being litigated are pretty slim. Just for the amount that. Btackowiak: From the attorney. Burton: I think there's not enough at stake on the owner's end to warrant a lot war on this one. I question whether the purpose of the variance is to increase the value or income potential of the parcel of land. Don't know but it sure does seem to be and as to whether or not the hardship is self created or not, it's kind of interesting because I don't know the law on that. When you acquire an existing condition, is that self created? And it'd be one thing if you owned it since it was platted but when you acquire it at a later date, is that self created? I don't know the answer so I can't say that that one passes. Granting the variance will not be detrimental for the public welfare or injurious to the other land. It does seem that it would be injurious to the other land so I'm not sure I could pass that requirement. And it makes me wonder, what if this lot was even smaller than it is? You know, what if this was 2? Are they still going to, will we still have to shoe horn a house in there because it could fit with? I don't think we would have to. So ! have problems with it and I'm inclined to vote against it. So does somebody want to make a motion? 48 Planning Commission Meeting- January 16, 2001 Conrad: Well let's talk about this. The intent, obviously the city didn't think this was going to be a lot. That's why it wasn't stubbed in. We didn't think it was going to be built on. We thought somebody would buy it. Merge it with, never happened. Somebody's got it right now so we can do a couple things. Matt, we can test the law saying they don't qualify for the variances. That's one alternative. The other alternative is for us to allow the owner to put a minimal size, because it is a very substandard lot, we will allow a very small house on this which means 600 square feet of living space, 720 feet of garage space, and a driveway that accounts for 600 feet. That is what they can do. Two stories high max. Now that could be bad. That's one of those, they could do it and I don't want that tS happen. I would think that would discourage it. Kind: That was helpful. Sacchet: Basically what you're saying is, if you give the lot size variance and the frontage variance, that's what they can do. 600. Conrad: I don't care about the variances to tell you the truth. They can build the minimum. If they, if it's a lot of record, they can build the minimum that the law requires and that's 600 square feet of living space, a 2 car garage and a driveway that gets there and they can't build more. Burton: To me the burden is on the applicant and the applicant hasn't met the burden. That doesn't mean that by denying it that we're saying that they couldn't come up with something. But they haven't given us something that carries that burden. They can come back. Conrad: And deny that because, what's your rationale for denying it? Burton: Well they haven't explored, they haven't articulated their analysis of other reasonable uses and why they may or may not work. Conrad: Yeah, we could do that Matt but I, I really can't think of one reasonable use other than a house or selling it. You know it's not crop land. I just can't imagine what it would be. Blackowiak: Excuse me Mr. Chair but ifI look at the findings for variances and specifically (c) and (d) regarding the desire to increase the value or income potential and alleged difficulty is not a self created hardship, I don't know that this application meets those two criteria. And if you don't meet all the criteria, you don't have to grant a variance. So for me it's a fairly cut and dry. Burton: You can say right there. The applicant hasn't met their burden on those two items. Blackowiak: Right. Burton: They have given us no evidence. Conrad: What are the items again? Blackowiak: (c). The purpose of the variation is not based upon a desire to increase the value or income potential of the parcel of land. And (d), the alleged difficulty or hardship is not a self created hardship. Now just because the lots were platted in 1927 doesn't mean that the present purchaser didn't know the condition when the purchase was made. 49 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 Kind: In fact you could argue she knew. Conrad: Okay. That's probably reasonable that we could deny it. Sacchet: And we can also include (e) if you. Burton: I think all of them you could make an argument with. Sacchet: The granting of the variance would be detrimental to the neighborhood. Burton: Well it would. If we give them the bare minimum, that's a loser for the neighbors and if you let them do it it's a loser. Conrad: There's enough of them that maybe that's enough to pursue. Burton: So does somebody want to make a motion? Blackowiak: Okay. I'll do this one. I'll move the Planning Commission denies Variance #2000-14 for a 9,000 square foot variance from the 15,000 square foot minimum lot size to permit development on an existing 6,000 square foot lot, a 30 foot variance from the 90 foot lot fi'ontage requirement and an 11% variance from the 25% site coverage to permit site coverage up to 36% for the construction ora single family home based on the fact that the applicant has not demonstrated Findings C and D as outlined in the staff report. Page 7. Burton: Is there a second? Kind: I'll second it. Burton: Any discussion? Well I'll wait. I'm going to vote for it but I also think the applicant hasn't met their burden on any of the conditions, not just those. Blackowiak moved, Kind seconded that the Planning Commission denies Variance/42000-14 for a 9,000 square foot variance from the 15,000 square foot minimum lot size to permit development on an existing 6,000 square foot lot, a 30 foot variance from the 90 foot lot frontage requirement and an 11% variance from the 25% site coverage to permit site coverage up to 36% for the construction of a single family home based on the fact that the applicant has not demonstrated Findings C and D as outlined in the staff report. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously. REOUEST FOR A 50 FOOT SETBACK VARIANCE FROM THE CENTER OF THE CREEK TO PERMIT CONSTRUCTION OF A SINGLE FAMILY HOME LOCATED ON LOT 11, BLOCK 1, SHADOWMERE, 500 BIGHORN DRIVE, DEAN AND SUE STANTON. Public Present: Name Address 50 Planning Commission Meeting- January 16, 2001 Dean Stanton Don Mehl Wayne Brown Janet & Jerry Paulsen Debbie Lloyd 510 Bighorn Drive 490 Bighorn Drive SALA Architects 7305 Laredo Drive 7302 Laredo Drive Julie Hoium presented the staff report on this item. Burton: A quick question for you. How does our city ordinance about th~ 50 foot setback from the creek interplay with the DNR requirement. If you said they're both the same. So if we did grant a variance, they'd still have to get a variance from the DNR? Or how does that work? Hoium: If we just adopted that. Burton: That's just like a standard that they have? Hoium: Yes. Like the 75. If we granted a variance from the 75 foot, I believe the DNR would also. Burton: Is it a separate requirement though from the DNR from our requirement or we just adopt. Aanenson: We adopted the shoreland regs with some modifications... Burton: Okay. Any other questions for staff?. Sacchet: Yeah Mr. Chair. I'm a little confused about the precedence because there is a letter in this packet that states 3 properties within 500 feet have portions of their buildings or separate buildings that are within the 50 foot setback...and it lists 510 Bighorn Drive by that 29 foot. 520 Bighorn Drive by 43 ½ and 610 Carver Beach Road by about 30 foot. Were you able to verify those three locations? Hoium: We were not able to verify it. The retaining wall for the 520 Bighorn Drive does not show up on these surveys and the survey that we have for 510 Bighorn Drive, it is outside of the easement that was created by the city. We don't show it encroaching. Sacchet: So it's possible that they build a deck in the case of 510 and a retaining wall in the case of 520 since it was surveyed. And then the 610 Carver Beach, we don't know what's there. That's also a porch. Hoium: We don't have any record of any buildings on that lot. It pre-dates aerial photographs. Sacchet: It's before, okay. So it's not necessarily a precedent that could be used directly. Now there isn't all that much encroaching. I mean it's just like two little comers. The main thing that's encroaching is that retaining wall for their entry porch right? Hoium: Correct. Sacchet: What I want to clarify is like the driveway is immaterial. That's not considered a structure so that doesn't encroach? Hoium: Correct. 51 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 Sacchet: That's my questions. Thank you. Burton: Any other questions for staff?. Kind: Yes I have questions that continue along the same line as Uli. The retaining wall and the walkway count as a structure but the driveway does not. Hoium: Correct. My understanding that a driveway can be built over easements. Aanenson: If you get an encroachment agreement. Hoium: If you get an encroachment agreement. Kind: Okay. And the roof that overhangs the walkway is not shown on this plan, but from the elevations it appears to me that it's flush with the garage and so that the encroachment really isn't 17 feet of the structure. Building structure itself. It's a smaller number. My ruler would say probably about more like 10 feet rather than 17 feet. Not knowing the exact scale of the attachment that we have here. So I'm kind of thinking along the lines of what Uli was commenting on that it's really just of the main principle structures. These two little teeny, tiny corners can encroach in and then it's the overhang over the xvalkway. That's not the principle structure so. And then my other question is, the definition of reasonable use and I have this problem every time this stuff comes up. And that is the notion that a reasonable use is defined as the use made by the majority of comparable property within 500 feet. Well the majority of comparable property within 500 feet are larger homes with 3 car garages. So I see that as a reasonable use for this property. Hoium: Staff is just basing it on what is required by the ordinance and you can also have the same type of home, same value of home with the smaller building size. Kind: Sure. I buy that too. Okay. Those are my only questions of staff. Burton: Any other questions for staff?. Blackowiak: Mr. Chair, a couple more about the existing setbacks. Now 510 and 520 Bighorn, wouldn't they both have been built after the 50 foot setback requirement was instituted? Hoium: Correct. Blackowiak: So did they get variances to do the building in the setback area? Hoium: No they did llOt. On the surveys they are outside of the easement which, I'm not sure if we can tell the easement is the hashed line. Blackowiak: There's a map in here I know. Hoium: And on 520 the retaining wall is not on the survey. Blackowiak: So when you talk about precedent, isn't that a variance that's been granted generally Kate I guess. 52 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 Aanenson: ...a variance for a one stall garage. That's a hardship. In this circumstance I'm not sure that the survey came correctly.., did the work without a permit it altered that. That sometimes happens when they do landscaping so I guess I suspect that's probably what happened. Blackowiak: Well that's what I'm guessing happened too. Aanenson: Did they have permission to work in there, is that what you're asking? Blackowiak: Well in my mind something that sets precedence is a decisidn handed down by the planning department or something or City Council that says you may do this and that sets precedent and if somebody does something that they didn't have permission to do, then it technically doesn't set precedent does it? Matt? Attorney Matt. Burton: Well it depends on how long you've been doing it. Blackowiak: Well I mean I just think, I don't think that this really sets precedent. 610 Carver Beach has been there forever. That's ancient. So I mean I think that that's something that we can't even really consider but I just don't necessarily agree that those two set precedent because maybe they shouldn't have been there. My second question is this 75 foot, you know we go back and forth on why do I keep thinking 90? Where am I getting my 90 frontage? Sacchet: The width at the setback. Blackowiak: Okay. And so 75 feet from ordinary high water mark unless your neighbor is farther back, in which case you take the higher amount of the neighbor. Okay. Now 610 Carver doesn't make sense because that's way up on the hill so we just throw that one out because that's been there forever and it doesn't really apply I don't think in this instance. Aanenson: Right. So what you're doing is, as everybody follows that same rule when the subdivision went into place, what you're doing is pushing it further into this... Blackowiak: So in your opinion then, it's better to hold at the 75 foot and give, what's the better? Aanenson: Right, I guess what's the worst of two evils. That's the exercise we went through and it was our conclusion that the 75 foot minimum could be held there because everybody else in that subdivision was held to that standard... Blackowiak: Right. And you're comfortable with that as opposed to 91...Okay, thank you. Sacchet: May I attach a question to this? Burton: Yep. Sacchet: Are the neighbors okay? Is this is going to be a hearing. Burton: We're going to have one. Sacchet: So we'll hear, okay. 53 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 Burton: Any other questions? Okay, would the applicant or their designee like to address the Planning Commission? Dean Stanton: Yes I would. Burton: State your name and address. Dean Stanton: My name's Dean Stanton and I live at 510 Bighorn Drive, which is the lot right next door here. We currently live here and we also purchased this lot. Originally w~ bought that lot in November of '89 and we were going to start building on it in the spring of '90. There was a title dispute with the developer. Dragged into a lawsuit over a couple year period. In the meantime we had sold our house so we ended up buying the house next to it. When we bought that house in '90, the deck and everything was on it when it was built new. And that is kind of a dispute that it was added on afterwards because when we looked at it the first time, it was brand new. It was a Parade home and it had the deck on it. And that's 29 feet from the creek. Because I measured that and then I also measured the house next to it, 520 and I don't know when that retaining wall was put up. It's part of the deck structure so I think when it was brand new that xvas put up also. Because I don't remember them adding on a deck after the fact. And then the other property, this might, my map's not very good but that's like a four season, or three season porch with a fireplace and stuff. It varies from 33 feet from the creek on one corner to 28 feet as the closest. 57-58 feet over here. So I guess I would argue that there has been kind ora precedent set. When we bought this lot we asked the developer about where we could put the house and I think I even asked him at the time about being so close to the creek and he said we'll look at the other houses up the street. And I guess I didn't check into that there was a 50 foot setback at that time. Originally when we start digging we had more of a squarish built house design and apparently we can't find the original permit but the builder did start digging and then that's when we found the title problems came out and so we stopped construction. But nobody can find the permit so I don't ka~ow if that means anything or not. I guess I would like to comment a little bit on, and I guess I've got these photos since we're talking about, I don't know how well they're going to show up. Okay, that's up the creek. Let's see that would be up here on the creek looking down and you're looking at 520 and 510 Bighorn Drive. This, well you can't really see it very clear but that's 510 Bighorn Drive where we live now. Shot from the creek side there so you can see the deck and the stairs. Trying to show the distance. I can hand these over. They're probably a little clearer. This is the 520 Bighorn. It shows a retaining wall. And then this is the, that three season porch. The one on the leftjust shows the porch. The one on the right I shot on the edge of the porch showing the creek. Just trying to give you some visual proof of the distances but I'd be happy to have somebody come out and measure it. And I guess if we're looking at this, the proposed house, it's 1,000 feet smaller than the one we live in now. We tried to fit it in this little pizza slice of an opening that we have the best that we could. Staff seems to think that if we took out one garage and made a 2 car garage that we could still fit it in, but according to our architect we would still have points that would intrude on the creek side. And I think that although the, I don't know if it's the law or ordinance or whatever says a minimum of 600 square feet, 2 car garage. I don't think my neighbors would be very happy if I put a trailer home on there. So I guess I just wanted to address the, I guess there's a number of points. Whether you can grant a variance or not. Number A. I guess I think that a reasonable use would be the properties within 500 feet. If you look at the homes within 500 feet, that whole development, not just the ones within 500 feet but the whole Shadowmere development, every home in it has a 3 car garage. Homes within 500 feet are all either larger or more expensive than what we're proposing to build so I think that we're trying to blend in with the neighborhood. Where if we go down to the minimum standards that the law says you can put on the lot, we would actually be detracting from the neighborhood. When I look at B it says, the conditions upon which a petition for variance is based are not applicable generally to other property within the same zoning classification. Staff and finding for the 54 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 lakeshore variance said, this is the last vacant lot within Shadowmere and I think that would be also applicable to the creek side variance because it is the last buildable lot in that development so it would not affect any other lots in that area. If you did find for it. Purpose of the variance is not based upon a desire to increase the value or income of the lot. Basically we're just trying to build a home on it. We tried 10 years ago. Had some problems. Enough time has gone by where we got goofy again and tried to do it again and now we're running into this problem. So we're just trying to build a home on it. We're not trying to increase the value. I guess you could argue that a larger home would be more valuable but I guess we got 3 kids. It'd be nice to have a 3 car garage. And even if we cut it down, I think that with the elevation there it would be hard to come in the front door without either bifinging in a ton of fill or putting a step ladder there. So I guess we're just asking for the front entrance. D. The alleged difficulty or hardship is not a self created hardship. In finding for the lakeshore variance they said this lot was plotted in 1987. I think you could find the same thing for the creek side variance. When we looked at it, those other homes were up there closer to the creek. I guess we felt we could build a house in there and we're trying to stick within the regulations as much as we can. I think E. I don't think it would be detrimental to the public welfare. The neighbors in the cul-de-sac are all for it. I don't think anybody is going to complain about it. And F. I don't think we'll impair anybody's supply of air and water if you would be so kind as to grant it. I guess the other thing is, Wayne has got a couple of other issues he can bring up. Wayne Brown: I'll just touch on a couple of points that Dean already talked about but I want to elaborate. My name is Wayne Brown. I'm an architect with SALA Architects in Minneapolis. Just a thing though I want to point out is that we've tried really hard to affect this area, this natural area by the creek as little as possible and I think actually they're starting, we could simply fill a lot more land and meet your requirements but I think it would actually be more detrimental to the creek than the way we've chosen to do it which is to extend the small appendage with a retaining wall to create access to the front door. I don't want to open the door but okay I'll do it but I think we're trying to do it in a way that is...most sensitive to the natural landscape there as possible. One other, I guess in the staff's granting or recommending granting a variance on the lake side, I think that seems apparent that if that wasn't documented we would not have a footprint big enough to do anything. So I think that's it unless you have some questions. Oh, just a little history. This is what this plot looked like when it was approved by the City in 1987 and so the shaded area is the buildable lot area. This line over here is, was the natural creek bed at the time. But the city imposed the holding pond, which I assume the builder built. And actually it changed the creek bed, which is essentially causing the issue that we're facing now. Aanenson: Well there was a large erosion problem. Actually the City went in and did a project because of the proximity and the erosion in that area so...problem. Wayne Brown: So there's maybe there's an argument really to modify the creek. Aanenson: Well you'd have to get a grading permit to fill in the creek within... Wayne Brown: I think that's it unless you have questions. Burton: Any questions for the applicant? Dean Stanton: I guess there's one other thing I wanted to mention is that when the surveyor did the survey it was in September of the drought season and he took the center line of the creek. That creek is really an open storm sewer or open runoff. When it rains it fills up slightly and if it doesn't rain for a month, then it gets down to a trickle. And in September when they did the survey it was down to a 55 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 trickle and unfortunately the water portion was up against our edge of the bank. If you look at the width of the creek bed, we would have picked up another 5 or 6 feet if we had measured it when there was any water running through. So there's some kind of I think slop there if you take the center of the creek bed itself. The surveyor unfortunately took where the water was, which when it was drought we lost 5 or 6 feet on the setback. If we measured it again this spring we would pick up 5 or 6 feet. Wayne Brown: Just one more point. I did have a discussion with the surveyor today and he did acknowledge that in that bend, had there been water, we might have a creek bed that was 10 feet wider or 5 feet wider. Some distance that's different which would essentially have given us a different point on the survey, which would also affect the actual distance that we're talking about as we're going here. So it is, and it is true you... There is very little structure that is part of this variance request. Kind: Did I figure it out right where the roof is? Wayne Brown: Yes you did. It's really an arm or it's just, it's not even roof. It's just an open trellis over there. Kind: Oh, better yet. Burton: Okay, thank you. Any questions for the applicant? Okay, let's open it up for public hearing. Can ! have a motion. Sacchet moved, Kind seconded to open the public hearing. The public hearing was opened. Burton: Okay, Would anybody like to address the Planning Commission on this matter? Please approach and state your name and address. Don Mehl: My name is Don Mehl. i live at 490 Bighorn Drive, which happens to be Lot 12 of the development. And as the closest neighbor to the property I just wanted to comment on a couple of things. Our property's located directly to the south and it's immediately adjacent to the lot in question. We moved into our home 12 years ago in January, '89. We designed our house and positioned it on the lot in such a way that the views were primarily directly to the west out the front, or directly to the east toward the lake. The rear of the garage and only one window of our house actually are overlooking Lot 11. The lot that they're talking about. The rear outer two corners of our house actually have a room extending in an angular fashion outward to the southeast and the other one to the northeast toward the lake and a deck runs inbetween those along the entire rear of the house. And from that deck we cannot see hardly anything of the home to the south. And we wouldn't be able to see anything of the proposed home to the north. Also, very little of the proposed home will be seen from our front yard. The house as proposed will be tucked back in and it's just really hidden from view. As far as we're concerned there's nothing in the request of the variances that will have any affect on us whatsoever as the closest neighbor. Seeing the proposed house plans tonight, I believe they've done a nice job with the design. I also believe that it will blend well with the surroundings. In the 12 years we've been there, I've never seen that creek fill up where it has over flowed it's banks. During a spring melt or during a heavy rainfall, there will be a lot of water flowing down that creek, but it only lasts for a few days and it's always been contained within the banks. I don't -know what erosion might be doing to it. I have no way of measuring that. The Stanton's have every right to construct a home on that property as long as there's no safety issues and if it can be done legally and within city codes. And you folks have to decide on the variances. I just want to go on record as the closest neighbor saying that if you vote in favor of the variances, they just will not have any significant impact on us. Thank you. 56 Planning Commission Meeting- January 16, 2001 Burton: Thank you. Anybody else like to address the commission? Janet Paulsen: Hello. My name is Janet Paulsen. I live at 7305 Laredo Drive. I guess you've seen a lot of us in the last 9 months. We mostly come as observers and I'm just here as an observer tonight but I just want to make one thing clear for the record. When you're measuring from the creek, you measure from the ordinary high water line. Not the middle of the creek. And that a structure could be a driveway and is definitely a parking lot. That's all. Burton: Thanks. Anybody else like to address the commission? Motion to close public hearing. Sacchet moved, Blackowiak seconded to close the public hearing. The public hearing was closed. Burton: Commissioners, comments. Anyone? Conrad: I think the setback from the lake, the variance is just fine. When the neighbor says it doesn't impact his views, then that's a no brainer. That one's over. In terms of the creek, that one's not so clear. You can rationalize other variances. Are people been building but you know, if you continue to put variances there then you have no rules so you might as well just get rid of the roles. The contradiction to that one is, we do have a driveway that's far more impactful on the creek than the structure. The retaining wall. In my mind if it was a small, if we just had some...going into that setback, I'd be for it but this one seems to be a little bit big. Too big for me. That's where I'd be at. Sacchet: I'm .a little bit torn because it seems like our regulations apply to this retaining wall and the little comer sticking out of the house but it don't apply to the driveway. While actually the driveway, especially that semi parking area of the driveway is really what sticks out. I mean it probably goes about 20 foot to that creek. I also wonder, maybe staff you can help me out with that. If my ordinance, obviously the structure is the encroachment. Now the structure here is the retaining wall. Not necessarily the front patio, correct? Aanenson: Correct. The driveway is a structure but we don't have a setback for the driveway. The setback is for the structure. Sacchet: If they would have, for one thing if they would fill it, they wouldn't need a retaining wall. They probably wouldn't apply into the encroachment. If they would make a boulder retaining wall instead of concrete retaining wall, would it fall under the encroachment? If they would put stone steps in there. Aanenson: If you're moving earth and it's over 4 feet, it's going to have to be engineered for water. If they're moving and planning to fill, yes. We would look at that. Certainly. Sacchet: So that would be encroachment too. I'm trying to figure out. Aanenson: If you're altering land within that setback, that's what I'm trying to double check here. Sacchet: And then putting a driveway in is not altering land? That's where I get lost. Aanenson: Right. If you're filling. The amount of filling that you're doing. 57 Planning Commission Meeting- January 16, 2001 , Sacchet: Okay. Then you say 4 foot? Aanenson: Yeah. Sacchet: So if it's less than 4 foot? Aanenson: Well that would be for the wall, right. Yes, right. It has to be engineered. Sacchet: Yeah, it needs to be engineered if it's 4 foot but let's say they ptit a couple of big boulders in there that are 4 foot, and that happens to give them enough of a surface to pour some concrete or whatever, or put some stone slabs in, what have you and they have a front porch. Would that be encroachment? Aanenson: Well you'd still be looking at impervious surface ultimately too, right. It isn't encroachment as far as, the setback is from the house but if you're putting impervious surface in an area that's not intended to be, or if it's going to cause erosion, that's what we may look at. Sacchet: To me it's kind of funny that we don't have an issue with the driveway based on the ordinance but we have an issue with the house sticking out, what is it, 2-3 feet? At most. Maybe even less in two corners and they're making it a little entry platform. It's a great house and it's actually smaller than any of the other houses in the neighborhood. So I have a hard time requiring that they make it smaller. Now in terms of the setback from the lake, I agree with Ladd. That's a no brainer. Is it the setback from the lake to the edge of the deck? Aanenson: Yes. Sacchet: It's not to the start of the building so it's the deck? Okay. And there is no, sometimes we have a little bit of flexibility with decks or something like that but in that case it's clear. Deck. Blackowiak: Lakeshore. Sacchet: Lakeshore. Blackowiak: Just ask Ladd. Sacchet: Okay. I'm hard pressed to deny it. But then on the other hand I'm also worried about approving it. Kind: That's decisive. Sacchet: Very decisive. Blackowiak: Excuse me Mr. Chair, I have a question. Kate I'm sorry, ! know you're trying to research something. Of course I'm going to lose my question here. I just lost it so why don't you go on and it will come back to me. Kind: Okay. Maybe I'll hit on it. Blackowiak: Maybe you will. Oh, I remember what it is. 58 Planning Commission Meeting- January 16, 2001 Kind: Oh, go. Go. Blackowiak: Where do you measure creeks from? I've heard two different things. Aanenson: Center line. Blackowiak: Center line from creeks and then so is it lakes and ponds, ordinary high water mark? Is that the difference? Aanenson: Correct. Blackowiak: Okay. So then it's been measured correctly from the, so it should be from the center line of the creek? Aanenson: Yes. Blackowiak: Okay. That was my question. Sacchet: May I expand on that question? Does center line mean where the creek is the deepest or does it mean where the middle of where the water is? Because that's two totally two different things. Especially in this case. ~ Aanenson: I don't know where you guys are going. Sacchet: I'm just saying to amplify what the applicant actually brought it up because it's pretty shallow there with these. So if it happens to be the deepest. Aanenson: You know I told Lori not to be here but clearly this is much more complicated than we all thought it was so I guess my preference is that we get additional information from Lori. You 'know I've got people that are, there's a lot of ambiguity and I'm just not comfortable at this point, at this time of the hour to try to make an interpretation here. Sacchet: That's fair. I support that. So I would suggest we table. Burton: Well do you want, let's make our comments. Kind: Sure, I'll make my comments just so staff can get a clue as to the direction I'm going here. The applicant in their letter talks about surface coverage was 14.6% and 25% is allowed. Does staffagree with those numbers? Hoium: Could you repeat that? Kind: 14.6% and 25% is allowed so they're basically saying they're way under on the surface coverage. Hoium: When we calculated we calculated a little bit more but they were still under. They were under 18%. 59 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 Kind: Okay. And correct me if I'm wrong but the intent of the creek setback is erosion and the amount of surface runoff so this actually is less than they could get. Aanenson: Let me be specific on it. This development contract set the center line of the creek in this specific instance... Kind: Okay. So now you're thinking we don't need to table? Aanenson: No, I'm not saying. I want to make sure that everybody under'stands what the difference is and if there's that much ambiguity. Kind: Because that was specified for this development? Aanenson: Correct. Kind: No matter what the code book says. Aanenson: Exactly. Kind: Okay. So back to my surface coverage question. The intent of setbacks from creeks has to do with the erosion and the amount of runoff that's going in there and this plan has a smaller surface coverage than what we would typically allow. So I guess I'm giving style points to the applicant for that. Do you agree? Aanenson: Well one other things we talked about too is...or something like that so you would reduce the speed as the water is going down and that erosion. Some of those sort of things. Vegetation plantings as a condition for mitigation. So I guess we can get some specifics from Lori on that too. Saam: And don't forget about maintenance. If we had to go in there. That's another reason for the setback. We don't want to have a house 10 feet away from us if we're going in with a backhoe. So just... Kind: But they'll still be, what was the number, 33 feet? Back. So that's pretty big. And then I have a little drawing here to share with my fellow commissioners. The dark red is what encroaches. The hash marks is what doesn't encroach so it's kind of like an even deal thing. The point being, I think that the architect did a nice job of following the creek line and the intent is there and I think they're following the spirit of what we're asking. And I think that a reasonable use for this site is a larger home with a 3 car garage and so I would be in favor of both variance requests and I think it's a nice plan. Sidney: I'll make some short comments. I know it's late. It's a tremendous house design. I really like it. I agree with the commissioners, other commissioners that the lakeshore variance, I have no problem with that. The creek variance, I'm having a little bit of trouble with. I think we need clarification on that obviously. I don't feel as strongly that we have to, well I feel strongly that I would be in favor of granting that and I need to think some more about reasonable use and granting of variances but I'm looking here at the last sentence that says variances that blend with the pre-existing standards without departing downward from them meet this criteria and I think we do need a larger house in that area and this is a tremendous design for that so. I am concerned about the driveway. That's a lot of asphalt and I think we do need to have some kind of assurance that they don't disrupt the creek in some way so if you're going to table it, I'd like to table to get clarification. 60 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 Burton: Okay. My comments are pretty much along the same lines. I'm fine with the lakeshore variance. The other one, in light of the driveway being as big as it is and allowable, I have no problem with the encroachment and with the house and I would allow that variance too. It seems to pale in light of the driveway so I'd be prepared to vote in favor of both variances tonight. But somebody can make the motion. Sacchet: Well let's move for the first one. Blackowiak: I would suggest we do this together. Sacchet: Okay. Blackowiak: If we're going to. Sacchet: I do think it's funny that we're hung up on this little retaining wall and those two littler comers when the driveway gets within 20 feet of the creek. Aanenson: If I can add some clarity. We need some direction from the report that we pulled in. That was in Lori's report and she has in here, no structure except a drive may be located within a drainage utility easement... And then she's got the structure maintain a 50 foot setback from the center line of the creek as it runs across this. That was her interpretation of this specific application. The broader issue I can come back and get the interpretation on. Make sure we're clear on that but this is her interpretation on this subdivision. Sacchet: If I may comment .... we can't really impact that slope all that much and when we come down, if anything it will be that driveway that's an issue. But if we come to where that encroachment actually is with that retaining wall in the comer, there is kind of a flat area on the opposite side of where the creek setback is measured so I really don't think in terms of maintenance I can make a case that we have a problem with that 17 foot variance. I think that doesn't fly. If from that sense the variance is absolutely, it's hard to close it. You can't. Saam: I was just reminding you guys. Either way so. Conrad: Mr. Chair, you know you're missing the issue. You're trying to add some, you're missing the issue of what the rules are trying to do. Creeks can pollute, are a major source of pollution. Especially this one and the city has done some things to fix it but major source. So you're looking at the driveway and saying well because that's so bad, well let's grab the other thing. You should probably look at the driveway and say is that really, have we really made sure that it's engineered right. I think you're really missing the point on this one and yeah, it seems rationale that there's very little impact. Yet it doesn't seem like there's very much sensitivity in terms of what the ordinance, a lot of holes in the ordinance. But on the other hand, what are you doing? I haven't heard anybody do anything other than say well, we don't know if we're 17 feet from the creek or we're measuring from the center line. The point is, what are you doing for the runoff and I haven't heard any comments tonight on that so I think you've all missed the point. Kind: Well Ladd I beg to differ. I did talk about the surface coverage is actually less than what we would allow so the runoff would be less. 61 Planning Commission Meeting- January 16, 2001 Conrad: Totally, runoff going towards the creek or towards the lake? So that's a new rule. The runoff is going to be less. I don't see that. I don't understand that. Kind: Based on surface coverage you don't... Conrad: But there are minimum standards and you're just, what you've done right now is saying anybody can go 17 feet into, you told the ordinance that anybody can go 17 feet into the setback. That's what you said. Now we may say, and if the lawyers are here they're say well no we didn't. We said you could go in 17 feet if you're building a foundation. That is what you've just done so you're, and our interpretation, anybody else who wants to build a foundation and go 17 feet in is totally legal to do that. That's, they don't even have to come here anymore so again, the challenge is, it seems like it's insignificant. It's a good house design. I think the lake is protected. ! don't think you've done a good job of looking at the creek other than saying well the ordinance stinks and if that's what you want to do. Kind: But it's a retaining wall, not principle structure. Conrad: But that's fine, so what have you done for the creek? Sacchet: Well here's something you can do. I agree, we haven't done much but ! think if we want to put something in there to help the creek, we can do much more by asking that they don't have that little parking lot there. Then asking them to try to find some other solution that would be difficult to find with that end report. Conrad: And that's xvhy I think we should table this and have them talk to staff a little bit and I'd sure like to get interpretation on a driveway that is that close to. That one ! don't believe, just like you don't. You know it almost makes our conversation ridiculous when you put that much impervious surface and within the 50 foot setback. It's like we don't need an ordinance if you can do stuff like that. So my preference is to table it. Have staff get back and say are there any mitigating ways that this could go through and yet maintain the integrity of what we're trying to do with the 50 foot setback. It's a DNR standard and we've adopted the DNR standards so typically DNR standards are minimalist standards. It's not that they're setting out huge numbers so anyway, my preference would be that you table it. Burton: I don't have a problem with that. Sacchet: The whole thing or just the. Conrad: The whole thing. Blackowiak: Yeah, ! don't think we can break it up. Burton: Does somebody want to make a motion? Conrad: I would move that we table this item. Burton: Is there a second? Blackowiak: Second. Burton: Any discussion? 62 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 Conrad moved, Blackowiak seconded that the Planning Commission table action on the request for a 17 foot variance from the required 50 foot creek setback for the construction of a single family home on Lot 11, Block 1, Shadowmere. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously. Burton: So when would it come back? Aanenson: On the 20th. Kind: So then this will be the second item on the 20th? Aanenson: Yes. It will go under ongoing items. Burton: Kate I don't know if you heard, I told the Lundgren guys they'd be first on the 20th. NEW BUSINESS. Aanenson: ...so you know what's coming up on the 20th. Bob's having meetings on the rezonings. The neighborhood meetings set up. 350 notices went out for a meeting next Tuesday. Three areas... Generous: I'm having the open house at the Rec Center. We noticed the people basically west of Galpin. Also Walnut Grove. Out to Lake Minnewashta. There's only 15 properties that were actually, we' 11 bring back were proposed for any changes but we want to discuss that there's a lot of inconsistencies between land use and zoning so we want to let them know what the options are. What's going on. What we know is going on. What the potential development is out there. Aanenson: And we'll talk a little bit more about it in our work session... APPROVAL OF MINUTES: Alison Blackowiak noted the Minutes of the Planning Commission meeting dated January 2, 2001 as presented. ONGOING ITEMS. Aanenson: We have been...agenda. Kind: Oh, I do have a question about that. Aanenson: ...ongoing goals and...what you want us to be working on. The comp plan's...the format we'll be following. I also wanted to give you...projects, status. What we're looking at in the future. And then we've got Planning Commission interviews scheduled. I started them at 8:00. I'm assuming there will probably be 4 or 5. So we do 15 minutes each. What we normally do is put the applicant... Blackowiak: Okay. So you have 4 or 5 applicants right now? Aanenson: I believe there will probably be 4 or 5. There's 2... Kind: And my question is, are we interviewing candidates to replace or to complete Craig's term or are they starting a completely new term? 63 Planning Commission Meeting - January 16, 2001 Aanenson: That's a good question. I'll have to get some clarity on that too and there's a couple people that are up and it's in April so we might want to just, you know we put the one vacancy so we'll have to look at that too. You know runner-up... I'I1 get some clarification from the cit3' manager on that. Sacchet moved, Kind seconded to adjourn the meeting. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously. The Planning Commission meeting was adjourned at 11:15 p.m. Submitted by Kate Aanenson Community Development Director Prepared by Nann Opheim 64