2m. Minutes CHANHASSEN CITY COUNCIL
REGULAR MEETING
FEBRUARY 25, 1991
' Mayor Chmiel called the meeting to order at 7:30 p.m.. The meeting was opened
with the Pledge to the Flag.
' COUNCILMEMBERS PRESENT: Mayor Chmiel, Councilman Workman, Councilman Wing,
Councilwoman Dimler and Councilman Mason
STAFF PRESENT: Don Ashworth, Roger Knutson, Jo Ann Olsen, Paul Krauss, Charles
Folch, Todd Gerhardt, Todd Hoffman and Scott Harr
' APPROVAL OF AGENDA: Councilwoman Dimler moved, Councilman Workman seconded to
approve the agenda with the following changes and additions: Mayor Chmiel
pulled off the Public Announcement regarding Girl Scout Week off the agenda
' until the next meeting; Councilwoman Dimler wanted to discuss the agenda for the
City Council's goal setting meeting and Councilman Wing wanted to discuss the
ordinance for trees and plantings. All voted in favor of the agenda as amended
and the motion carried unanimously.
' CONSENT AGENDA: Councilwoman Dimler moved, Councilman Workman seconded to
approve the following consent agenda items pursuant to the City Manager's
recommendations:
b. Zoning Ordinance Amendment to amend Section 20- 576(3) regarding Contractor's
' Yards as an Interim Use, First Reading.
c. Zoning Ordinance Amendment to amend Section 20 -41 by adding language stating
that amendments shall not be adopted that are inconsistent with the
Comprehensive Plan, First Reading.
d. Zoning Ordinance Amendment to amend Section 20 -406 regarding Variances to
' the Wetland Ordinance to Following the Procedure as stated in Division 3,
Variance of the Zoning Ordinance, First Reading.
' e. Zoning Ordinance Amendment to Revise Article V, Flood Plain Overlay
District, First Reading.
h. Set Special Meeting Date for the Board of Review.
1. City Council Minutes dated February 11, 1991
Planning Commission Minutes dated February 6, 1991
m. Resolution #91 -15: Approve Resolution Designating All Municipal Buildings
as "Smoke Free ".
All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously.
1
r
City. Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
A. APPROVE REVISED SOUTH LOTUS LAKE BOAT ACCESS STUDY, AUTHORIZE PREPARATION OF
PLANS AND SPECIFICATIONS.
Councilman Wing: First of all I'd like to make it very clear that my comments
in no way reflect upon Todd Hoffman. It's just a general statement and I kind
of wanted to just express my appreciation to you regarding your questioning the
South Lotus access cost. Although new on the Council I've been active in the
city on an advisory commission for many years and one thing I've become nervous
' about is when I hear the experts say or the advisory or study reports from the
experts. I think they need to be routinely flagged and again Don, I would just
thank you for speaking out and doing that because we've saved several thousand
dollars and accomplished what we set out to do versus had we just gone ahead
with that report word by word. A comment I guess I wish to make is I think that
studies and reports that are done by the so called experts, I would like to see
studied by staff. Applied to Chanhassen specifically and possibly even trimmed
' prior to reaching Council, or at least with recommendations. If you had not
spoken up that night, we would have gone ahead with that as such and perhaps
spent money unnecessarily. I see the very worse thing that could happen if
11 staff did study these and try to apply them to the City and even trim them was
that we might trim a little bit more and I'm not convinced that that's a
negative solution. That's my only case. I would just suggest to staff that
when these cases do come in, that they be carefully reviewed as they
' specifically would reflect upon Chanhassen and could they be trimmed and cut
prior to a Council presentation in case we should miss it.
11 Mayor Chmiel: Thank you. Would you like to make a motion to approve then item
1(a)?
Councilman Wing: Yes, I would approve it.
Councilman Workman: Second.
Councilman Wing moved, Councilman Workman seconded to approve the Revised South
Lotus Lake Boat Access Study and Authorize Preparation of Plans and
Specifications. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously.
F. ZONING ORDINANCE AMENDMENT TO AMEND SECTION 20 -29(0) CHANGING THE FILING OF
AN APPEAL TO THE BOARD OF ADJUSTMENT'S DECISION FROM 10 DAYS TO 4 DAYS,
FIRST READING.
Councilwoman Dimler: Okay. Item 1(f) has to do with the Zoning Ordinance
amendment changing an appeal to the Board of Adjustment's decision from 10 days
' to just 4 days. I really agree with it but I did ask Paul just now, I have one
case scenario where it might be a problem and that would be if someone goes out
of town for 2 weeks. Does not see their notice. The meeting is held. It is
' approved. The 4 days go by. The person comes home and the structure is going
up and they didn't know anything about it. I'm wondering if we can cover those
kinds of, there are people that go south for the winter. You know a neighbor
may not notify them. I know 6 days won't help in that case but just if you're
out of town for 2 weeks and this would all transpire and you wouldn't have any
recourse. And you may be very aggrieved with the structure that's going up next
to you. I don't know. I just want to throw it out for discussion. If there is
some way we can cover that.
2
1
i
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
Mayor Chmiel: Is there any discussion? Any feelings?
Roger Knutson: Maybe I can make just one brief comment. First, as far as
someone being out of town. If they forward their mail, they're going to get not
a notice of the decision but they're going to get a notice of the hearing. So
if someone comes up and they're going to put up something next door to me and
I'm out of town and I have my mail forwarded, I'll have plenty of time to get.
You know I won't know what the Board of Adjustments is going to do but I can at
least dash off a letter. Call a friend and have a friend show up. Something
along those lines. So there's still opportunity to be heard. I mean if you
don't have your mail forwarded and you're gone for a long period of time, I
guess there's, at some point I guess the world must go on. And as far as after
the decision making, I think the experience has been that most people who are
really concerned about it probably, not always but generally participate in the
hearing. They show up either by letter or in person and make their comments and
although it's true that someone might, that's basically the only way you're
going to know what the decision is unless you happen to call City Hall later.
And again, if you're out of town and can't appear, you can always call City Hall
the next day and find out what that decision is. The basis for this is,
balancing the need for everyone to have an opportunity who dislikes a decision
to appeal with the fact that in the summer when you have a short construction
season, and most of these things don't get appealed. Very few do. '
Audience: Oh no.
Of
Roger Knutson: We're faced with no one being able to go ahead until 'after that
10 days is run. And oftentimes people come in at the last minute and they need
their building permit. They didn't realize. Oftentimes someone comes in, they
didn't realized they needed a variance and all of a sudden they're stopped.
It's balancing that type of concerns. A lot of people get going versus the need
to get people informed and have the right to appeal. So all and all I think
the Planning Commission and staff feel that was a good balance. You're right.
It is possible that someone won't know about it.
Councilwoman Dimler: It could happen.
Roger Knutson: It could happen. It certainly could.
Councilman Mason: Roger, do you have any idea what percentage do get appealed? 1
Roger Knutson: Maybe Paul can answer that but I'll bet most people, virtually
every appeal since I've been involved here has been by the applicant. I don't
recall a situation where a neighbor has appealed. Maybe they have in the last
few years but.
Paul Krauss: Well I think there was one down on Lake Riley and it was the lot '
that had the contamination by the aviation fuel. When that variance first came
in, I believe there was, it was contested by a neighbor but that's the only one.
That's 1 in 3 years. '
Mayor Chmiel: That's a highly irregular kind of situation as well.
I
3
1
1
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
1
Don Ashworth: And I don't recall an appeal that ever occurred after that night.
In other words, we knew that night or even in advance of that night that they
were proposing to appeal if it didn't go the particular direction. Again, I
don't know of any in let's say over a 10 year period of time where there's been
an appeal. A day later, 2 days, 10 days or 20 days. The other part was, a
' typical application process is at least 6 to 8 weeks. I don't know from the
time though, that includes our processing time. What is the lead time from the
time the homeowner gets the notice of the proposed hearing until maybe the 4
days later?
Jo Ann Olsen: 10 days.
1 Paul Krauss: Yeah, it's 10 days so it's about 2 weeks prior to the meeting that
the notices are sent out and then you have the whole following week. I mean for
the variance we heard tonight, somebody would appeal it Friday afternoon at
4:30.
Mayor Chmiel: Just one clarification. As we have it from 10 days to 4 days,
' conceiveably if it started on a Friday it would go through Monday. Should we
say 4 working days?
Councilwoman Dimler: I thought that was the intent.
Don Ashwor.th: That was the intent.
•
Mayor Chmiel: Is that the intent?
Paul Krauss: Well since the meeting's always on a Monday, the following four
' days are always.
Councilwoman Dimler: I'm not going to press real hard for it. I just wanted to
bring it up as a possibility so if everyone seems to be comfortable with it, I
will move item (f).
Mayor Chmiel: Is there a second?
Councilman Mason: Second.
Councilwoman Dimler moved, Councilman Mason seconded to approve Zoning Ordinance
Amendment to amend Section 20 -29(d) changing the Filing of an Appeal to the
Board of Adjustment's Decision from 10 days to 4 days, First Reading. All voted
in favor and the motion carried unanimously.
G. FINAL PLAT APPROVAL, LAKE SUSAN HILLS 6TH ADDITION.
' Councilman Mason: On just the landscaping and the trees. On the second page of
the packet I just wanted, it says applicant shall provide 1 tree per lot and
additional landscaping along entrance and boulevard. Developer shall provide
' $150.00 per lot. What is 1 tree per lot typically?
Paul Krauss: Well it's, in fact I was talking to Councilman Wing about that and
I believe that's what the Council presentation is going to be on. That is a
subdivision requirement that basically says that you get 1 tree per lot plus
4
1
' 1 .
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991 1
seed or sod of disturbed areas. It's rather minimal I'll grant you that but
it's also been only the last year or two that we've actually had an enforcement
mechanism in place to guarantee that. If your next question is could we do more
or should we do more, probably yes but that gets into another issue.
Councilman Mason: That maybe is the next question but not here. Well yeah, I 11
was just curious as to what 1 tree and $150.00 gets for landscaping. I would
guess probably not a whole lot.
Paul Krauss: We make people give us letters of credit or cash escrow of $750.00
figuring $250.00 for the tree and $500.00 for the seed and sod. And the seed
and sod doesn't even cover the entire lot. It's only those portions of the lot
that are disturbed by the construction.
Councilman Mason: Okay. '
Jo Ann Olsen: This was just, to give you background. This was part of the PUD
agreement. That $150.00 so this is a little unusual. It was part of the whole
PUD agreement.
Councilman Workman: Can we have Councilman Wing maybe bring up his comments
now? '
Councilwoman Dimler: Just briefly.
Councilman Workman: Okay? Can we maybe have Councilman Wing discuss this now? '
I have an alternative view. Maybe you guys know my view but I'd like to hear
maybe Councilman Wing's in relationship to all of this because, Mr. Mayor is _
that okay.
Mayor Chmiel: It certainly is. I have a little point here I'm trying to
clarify with Don. Go ahead. '
Councilman Wing: On the Council Presentations one thing I wanted to address and
request the Council's consideration of. If we look at prior generations that
came into Chanhassen and took the timber off the land for agricultural use.
This used to be a hardwood forest and as our precedessors came through
Chanhassen for agricultural purposes or whatever, they logged off all the trees
and then it became agricultural. Well now we're coming in after those folks and
we're taking the land back from agricultural uses and we're putting in roads and
houses and blacktop driveways and so on and so forth and I just felt that maybe
we could start giving a little more back and try and reclaim some of the land.
I'd like to use the term reforest but use it very, very sparingly.
Councilman Workman: Relief.
Councilman Wing: Well, relief is a fine word if you'd like to use that. The
one tree has troubled me and I was just wondering, if the Council would suggest
a change to the City Ordinances, specifically Section 18 -61 that requires 1 tree
and if they would at some future point consider having staff look into altering
that section to up that to 3 trees. Specifically 2 in front, 1 in back. One of
which must be a maple. All 3 must be hardwoods and so on and so forth. I think
the cost would be minimal. I think the impact on the City's future would be
5
i
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
great and I think it would be legacy if we could start adding additional trees.
I think for folks to come in that are working hard for these homes, to put the
trees into their mortgage is one thing but to have to come out and forest their
lot at a later time, is increasingly difficult. I'd just like to encourage some
of these open areas, specifically this one tonight. I wish we could have
stopped it earlier and had these additional lots coming into Lake Susan with
additional trees right off the bat. I wish we had an ordinance in place so my
only point here Mr. Mayor is I would like to just ask the Council's
' consideration of perhaps having staff look at changing this ordinance to require
additional trees, additional landscaping. Possibly at entryways to these
housing areas we could have pine trees set in with their signs. I think there's
changes we could make that could very easily reforest the city without great
cost or impact.
Mayor Chmiel: I guess I sort of agree with that position Dick. I know in the
' last 2 years I've reforested my particular piece of property with 57 new trees.
Councilman Wing: That's not excessive is it?
Mayor Chmiel: No. No. Plus the fact I probably had about 15 or 18 there
previously. But I'm a firm believer in doing a little bit of reforestation.
' Councilman Wing: Mr. Mayor, my original request was going to be for 6 and I
chickened out.
Councilman Workman: I think we've got the right, I think we're on the right
trip down the road. I think we're riding in the wrong bus on this thing.
Because we discussed this a little bit prior and I have the opposite view that
the ordinance should never have been put in, at least not like that. In other
' words, have the developer put the tree in or 3 trees or 6 trees because when I
come in and I'm a new homebuyer, I don't want anybody fooling with my mortgage
in the first place. But what kind of trees really matters to me? Now I can't
think of a developer that might put in some strange tree. I don't know. Sumac
or something.
Councilman Wing: The ordinance has an entire page of trees you can choose from.
Councilman Workman: Okay, but what I'm saying is if the developer's going to be
putting. Is the developer going to have to put these trees in?
Paul Krauss: Not necessarily.
' Councilman Workman: In many cases they will.
Paul Krauss: Well what we've been trying to do is give the greatest amount of
latitude. For those of you on Council for a while, Tom you may remember we
' started enforcing this a year ago October I think and at the time we had a lot
of developers complaining about enforcing it even though it had been on the
books for 10 years prior to that. What had happened is it was sometimes written
into development contracts and then development contracts were voided out after
the roads were built and it was just a lack of enforcement. What we tried to do
is make it as easy a§ possible whereby we alert people, we wrote into the zoning
ordinance and the subdivision code. We had to work this out with the City
6
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
Attorney to get it in both places. We then required that, we put notice on the
building permit. In fact the thing's a printed form now that comes with your 1
building permit that says you're obligated to put in 1 tree and seed and sod and
if you don't, you have to deposit escrow to get your Certificate of Occupancy.
Then you have, after you get your CO, if we have your $750.00 guarantee in the
bank, we will give you a full growing season to install that so if you the
homeowner want to have a landscape architect or a nursery come in and give you a
landscape plan and see where that tree is supposed to fit in, you have that
entire basically first year to do that and we'll be happy to work with the
homeowner to do that. So we tried to give them as much flexibility to the
homeowner to make that decision as possible. If you just, we looked at making
the developer do it up front and I've seen cities where you have a bunch of
vacant lots and driveways cut in and a tree and a tree and a tree and what
happens is, as soon as the bulldozer comes in to put in the foundation, the tree
gets torn out. So I think that was the most effective way to do it how we
structured it now.
Councilman Workman: You're saying what then? It's up to the owner of the home
to have 1 tree in? '
Paul Krauss: Well we make it, the obligation is when you take out the building
permit, it's written onto there. How the builder contractually handles it with
the owner or the buyer we leave up to them. As long as we have somebody's
$750.00 in the account, we don't care.
Councilman Workman: But it's never the builder's $750.00. '
Paul Krauss: It occasionally is.
Councilman Workman: But it's always going to end up to be the buyer's $750.00.
I've learned to understand why seed and sod or sod even needs to be in there
because of all the dirt, whether it's blowing or running off or other, but I
don't think the 1 tree accomplishes quite what we want to do. In that case,
what we should do is require that every lot in the city have 10 trees on it. If
you don't have 10 trees on your lot, you're out of compliance. But once my tree
grows up or once I buy the house, I can cut down my tree and we don't have
enforcement on that end of it.
Paul Krauss: That's true. '
Councilman Workman: If the tree is not what I want or if the tree is in the
place where I don't want it, which could very easily happen, then we've done
nothing. By requiring a builder to put 3 trees where I and maybe.I have a knack
for doing my own yard and I want to do my own yard and I want to maybe wait that
1 year to do my own yard because next year I'm going to get some sod off of
another place or something else, maybe I have that option. Maybe I don't. '
Paul Krauss: You would.
Councilman Workman: I just don't see us accomplishing a reforestation here by
requiring even the 1 tree because the 1 tree is so token. You're right. I mean
if it's 6 trees, you're doing something but 1 tree is just laughable and that's
the way the builder's I think take it. Plunk a tree in. Is it living or isn't
7
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
it? Who cares. It's a tree in the ground you know but then all the other
' situations where if I want to have that selection for myself as to where the
locations be because we just built my house in the middle of a cornfield.
Councilman Wing: That's what I heard Paul say. You have the entire year to
make that choice.
Councilman Workman: Yeah but not if I'm coming into the house and the builder
already has the tree in the ground.
Paul Krauss: No, we don't do that. I mean we don't have the tree in the ground
I before the house is up. And in fact what a lot of the builders do, I believe
Joe Miller Homes does this and Rottlund, when they were building here does, is
that and we've accepted this that in lieu of paying the cash fee to us, they
give purchase certificates to a nursery, specifically for a tree and sod to the
homeowner. So there's a commitment, and they have an obligation to spend it and
they can determine where they're going to go with it and what else they're going
to buy and where they're going to put it. Right now too the specific
' requirement is that you have a tree in the front yard and I think that was
designed to get at some sort of a boulevard planting type of...so that the
trees, so you have tree lined streets. That's why, well there were no trees in
' the backyard at all. I can't defend the 1 tree requirement. I don't think it
achieves a whole heck of a lot. I suppose it's better than nothing which is why
we enforce it but it should be re- examined I believe.
' Councilman Workman: Well case in point. When we allow somebody or a developer
to build in a heavily wooded area and we force them at the drop line and we do
everything and don't do anything to trees. Don't cut down this tree and we pick
' each tree. I buy the house. Half a million easy. I can do that. I move into
this nice big house. Huge trees. I get out my chainsaw a week after I move in
and I can start cutting those trees down. 100 year oaks for my fireplace and
' why not?
Jo Ann Olsen: Some of those lots we have tree removal plans and we'll require
them to.
Councilman Workman: I own my house. I've been there a week or a year or 5
years.
Jo Ann Olsen: Well yeah, I know. We've had that discussion.
Councilman Workman: No, I don't think anybody's going to be able to tell me
what I can do.
Councilman Wing: I've never met a person in my life that has reforested his
lot.
Councilman Workman: A person could do it.
Councilman Wing: He certainly could. I've never met one in my life.
Councilman Workman: So on the reverse side, one tree does nothing.
8
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
Councilman Wing: I'm agreeing. That's why I'm requesting more.
Councilman Mason: Paul makes a point though. It's better than nothing. It's a
step in the right direction and I agree. I think it needs to be re- examined.
Councilman Workman: Well it lets us sleep at night but it doesn't do anything ,
for, I just don't think it does a whole hell of a lot other than create a
situation for builder /buyer and purchasing vouchers at nurseries.
Mayor Chmiel: I think what we can do is have staff review this and come back
with some specific suggestions. Oftentimes, I know from remembering back when I
bought my first house, I probably couldn't afford the second tree. That
sometimes presents a problem too. Who is responsible for putting those trees in
or how do those trees get there. That's something I think you should review and
come up with some suggestions.
Councilman Wing: Could I just comment quickly on that Don as it was part of my 11
thoughts on this. If I could have the floor for just momentarily?
Mayor Chmiel: Certainly.
Councilman Wing: The cost issue has been brought up numerous times and I don't
wish to create any hardships for anyone but I am thinking about the young couple
that's got every dime in this house and they're both working with young
children. •When I go out to buy a new car, I get a price down and suddenly the
air conditioning, which is kind of a luxury, is $900.00 and I just cringe. I
debate and all of a sudden I throw the air conditioner on the bottom line. It
goes to the bank. I get the money and then I enjoy it for the next 3, 4, 5, 6
years. But had I not bought the air conditioning, I would have never, ever been ,
able to, out of my paycheck, come up with the money to put it in later. So I'm
saying that the people coming in, most people I,think like wooded lots and
trees, would appreciate it. If it goes onto the mortgage, it's out of mind. Out
of sight and it's done. On the other hand, if these young couples or even
myself would suddenly have to come up with 5500.00- 5600.00 - 5700.00- $800.00-
$900.00 for trees, it'd probably be one of my last priorities. I think it's a
way of accomplishing something. Giving something to Chanhassen and in fact the
money is that bad of an issue, just maybe Chanhassen isn't the place you want to
live then because we kind of are asking for something back a little bit rather
than just buy a house and move in in these lots. ,
Mayor Chmiel: I like your,analogy because they both apply. They cool down with
your air conditioning in your car and eventually that tree is going to shade
that house.
Councilman Wing: Well there certainly are environmental issues involved.
Councilman Workman: Money certainly isn't the problem. There are people that
maybe can't afford their next meal in the city and I'm not going to knock that.
I'm just saying it's the principle of a matter that we're again telling people
why they can, can't, should do on their property just as they're coming into
town.
Councilman Mason: Better tell them up front. 1
9
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
1
Councilman Workman: Well yeah, but I mean we're telling them an awful lot and
11 the cost is going to them and this isn't the first thing we're telling them that
they have to do. So I think this is the wrong way to go about it.
Mayor Chmiel: Okay. Paul? I guess you have direction to review that and is
there going to be a time that you'd like to see this come back?
Councilman Wing: Next meeting. I wouldn't address that. I wouldn't address
that. That's up to you.
Paul Krauss: Mr. Mayor if I could. We've scheduled an issues paper on all
varieties and variations of landscaping, including this issue for the next
Planning Commission meeting. Now it's just to get the ball rolling and to tell
them what's in the ordinance and what we'd like to achieve.
Mayor Chmiel: Very good. Thank you.
Councilman Mason: Make a motion to approve this?
Mayor Chmiel: Yes, I'd like to have a motion.
Councilman Mason: I'll make a motion to approve 1(g), Final Plat Approval, Lake
Susan Hills.
Mayor Chmiel: Is there a second?
' Councilwoman Dimler: Second.
' Councilman Mason moved, Councilwoman Dimler seconded to approve the Final Plat
for Lake Susan Hills 6th Addition as presented. All voted in favor and the
motion carried unanimously. -
K. APPROVAL OF ACCOUNTS.
Councilwoman Dimler: I wanted to ask Don Ashworth a few questions about the
approval of the accounts. They're usually on our consent agenda and normally
I go along with them but this time I did have a few questions. I saw 14
invoices from BRW and all of them had to do with contracts that date as far back
as 1986. Some of them say for inspection and I guess I want to know, why are we
having them inspect the project. Is it their project and are they inspe:
their own project? Why aren't our city inspectors inspecting this and why are
we spending all this extra money?
Don Ashworth: I think you'd have to go down through each individual contract.
Councilwoman Dimler: Well I guess the one that I was thinking. When they say
for project inspection. It's my understanding that it's BRW's project and we're
letting them inspect their own project? Is the City not inspecting their own
project? Is the City not inspecting their project?
Don Ashworth: We employed them to inspect that 'project for us, yes.
Councilwoman Dimler: And it's their project?
10
1
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
Don Ashworth: Well they are the engineers but the contract was awarded to
Schafer Contracting for the main portion. I think Schafer had 2 or 3 of the 1
contracts. Who did the north side parking lot? We probably had 5 different
general contractors. None of which being BRW.
Councilwoman Dimler: The City inspectors never inspect it? The reason I want '
to do this is because we ended up with the downtown the way it was and I'm
wondering if that's part of the problem of why it happened the way it did. That
they were inspecting their own project and there was no, what do you call it,
balance there. The City really seemed surprised when it happened.
Don Ashworth: You will employ an engineer who will take a project from kind of
the beginning to the end which would include preparing the original feasibility
study, preparing plans and specifications. When the contract is awarded to the
low bidder, Schafer Contracting, they typically then will carry out staking and
inspection of that project to insure that what the contractor builds conforms to
the original plans. Later in the agenda tonight we'll have Bill Engelhardt in
front of us talking about Minnewashta Parkway. I think Bill's on that one.
Bill Engelhardt: I don't think it's tonight.
Don Ashworth: I'm sorry, but there's a good example of where you again have
hired an engineering firm. They start the process and literally go through the
end. Whether or not what we have there is a reflection of BRW, I guess in some
ways you'd answer that question yes because what they have done is they have
inspected the project to insure that it was in fact built the way that'it was
initially designed.
Councilwoman Dimler: Okay. Is there anyway we could get the City involved in
those inspections so that we have no surprises?
Don Ashworth: I'm not sure if you're saying is there a way that we could hire
another engineering firm.
Councilwoman Dimler: No, our own inspectors. Our building inspectors. Do we
have anybody that does that kind of inspection? '
Don Ashworth: Not within the building department. Within the engineering
department. Dave Hempel is a good project engineer but we put him in charge of
50 other projects. For him to take on a more major project such as the
downtown. Well I'll give you an example. They had two full time inspectors
through BRW's office that all they did was inspection in the downtown area. '
Councilwoman Dimler. Okay, and then the other question I had is like we're
talking about a contract that dates what, back to 1986? Can you tell me a
little bit about what that project is and why we're still inspecting it in 1990? 1
Don Ashworth: The original project was anticipated to break itself down into
two phases. The area north of the railroad tracks which would include all storm
sewer, sewer, water and roadways within the downtown area. The second phase of
the project, and it was known that that would take literally a 2 year period of
time. The second phase was to construct, over the top of the railroad tracks
because we did not have the approval to cross the tracks at Market Blvd., to
11
r
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
finish Market Blvd and 79th Street. That was the third year. In the interim
period of time, we had requests and positively acted to starting two new
projects. One which was called the north side parking lot project which became
a separate project but was an extension of the BRW work as far extending
individual lateral, sewer, water, street lighting and the south parking lot
project which included the parking lot from in front of the Bloomberg Dinner
Theatre all the way on over to in front of Country Suites Hotel. There is a
fifth project which is the West 78th Street Detachment. That project we have,
where are we at Charles in terms of that? BRW did all of the initial plans and
specifications.My recollection is we're up to the point of literally bidding it..
1 Charles Folch: Yeah, they're nearly complete with their plans and specs. They
just need to currently right now right of entry on the Eckankar property to do
some preliminary surveying to provide additional information to finish up the
plans and specs and then they will be ready for approval and then to move into
the...bid process.
Councilman Wing: None of these can be done by us?
Councilwoman Dimler: Well I guess that's the next question. When does that
1986 contract over and do you recontract? I kind of have trouble approving this
if it's so long ago and it keeps going from one phase to the other. I don't
really know what we're approving here.
Don Ashworth: I'm trying to look at what the services were. Each of those have
been a separate contract. If you notice where it says project file. These were
all coded by Gary and assuming, do you know did he hold these for a period of
time or anything Charles? Why are we getting an influx of them at this point in
1 time?
Charles Folch: These are dated as being received on February 1st so we
basically had them for almost a month now.
Councilwoman Dimler: Do you know why they're all coming in at the same time?
' Mayor Chmiel: Unless probably all through the month of December, as it shows
December 31st. We probably didn't get them until January and then we reviewed
them. It probably took a little bit of time. That's why that's coming in
together.
Councilwoman Dimler: Okay. Would it be feasible to write a little bit about
' the project so that we know what we're approving?
Don Ashworth: Sure. If you would like to take and have these bills held until
such time as we can get some additional information as to what it is, what
specific service was provided in each of these cases, I think we can do that.
Councilwoman Dimler: I'm just a little bit leery of always blanket approving
' everything without knowing what we're approving.
Mayor Chmiel: Okay, would you like to move the approval of everything except
BRW's?
12
1
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
Councilwoman Dimler: Right. I move approval of everything except BRW awaiting
an explanation of, little further explanation for our own information what those 1
project costs are.
Mayor Chmiel: Maybe what could be done, being that these are from December 31,
maybe Don can get back to you and if that's satisfaction, then proceed in
payables.
Councilwoman Dimler: That will be fine. 1
Don Ashworth: I'll make sure that all Councilmembers receive a copy of what is
sent to Councilwoman Dimler. 1
Mayor Chmiel: We have a motion on the floor with the exceptions of BRW's bills
to be paid. Is there a second?
Councilman Workman: Second.
Councilwoman Dimler moved, Councilman Workman seconded to approve the Accounts 1
Payable dated 2 -25 -91 with the exception of Check numbers 042957 thru 042962 to
BRW awaiting further explanation. All voted in favor and the motion carried
unanimously. 1
VISITOR PRESENTATIONS: None.
AUTHORIZE UPDATE OF FEASIBILITY STUDY FOR TETON LANE AND LILAC LANE PROJECT '
91 -4.
Charles Folch: Mr. Mayor, members of,the Council. This item was put before you
at the last Council meeting and at that meeting there were some discussions
raised, primarily revolving around a neighboring property owner who had
testified that he had spoke with Mr. Donovan on the prior weekend and stated
that Mr. Donovan had no intentions of selling and /or developing this piece of
property. Staff was then posed with the question as to whether or not we had
actually seen any official purchase agreement for this property. We had not and
there was also some question as to whether the City actually owned the 33 foot
road easement that Teton Lane exists within. Thus this item was tabled pending
verification of these items. I have since spoken with the developer and he has
provided staff with a copy of his purchase agreement for the property which was
dated in October of 1990. In addition I attempted to acquire a letter from Mr.
Donovan himself. However, he was out of town. In his absence, Mr. Donovan's
real estate representative submitted a letter stating Mr. Donovan's agreement in
initiating the feasibility study which was based on a recent phone conversation
he had with Mr. Donovan. On the other point I had also contacted Carver County
Recorder's office and verified that the City of Chanhassen is indeed listed as
the owner on the Certificate of Title for the 33 foot road easement covering
Teton Lane. If this information that's presented tonight has adequately
satisfied the Council's previous questions and if there are no other further
questions concerning this item, then I would agree recommend authorization for 11 Engelhardt and Associates to prepare the feasibility report update for
improvements of Teton Lane from Lilac Lane south to Ashton Court and Lilac Lane
west of Powers Boulevard. This would be conditioned upon receiving a cash
13
1
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
escrow or letter of credit from the developer in the amount of $5,000.00 to pay
for the cost of the study.
•
Mayor Chmiel: We won't move on that until we receive that in hand?
' Charles Folch: Pardon me?
Mayor Chmiel: We will not move on it until we receive the $5,000.00?
Charles Folch: That's correct.
Mayor Chmiel: Is there anyone else wishing to address this? Yes sir. Come
forward and please state your name and your address please.
Jim Ostenson: Thank you. My name is Jim Ostenson. I'm with James Development
Company. I'm one of the partners in North Shore Partners that's proposing to
develop this property. It appears that we've somewhat stepped into a hornet's
nest and into a piece of property that has a lot of, comes with a lot of baggage
' I guess. When we originally sat down with the staff last fall, we realized just
by itself what a difficult piece of property this would be to develop with
basically roads on three sides and an adjoining city to the north, which really
wasn't interested in having development. And then at the same time to
understand all of the controversy that went on in this whole area with the Curry
Farms development and the feasibility study that was done at that time. So it
was suggested then that in order to resolve some of these issues that we update
' the feasibility study which had been done 2 years ago, actually 3 years ago now
in 1988, and try to determine where the City Council was with respect to some of
the assessments that are going to be posed against this whole area. Teton Lane _
•
and Lilac Lane and that. We've also met with the City of Shoreview to talk to
them about what their status is regarding development. I guess one thing we're -
a little bit concerned about is we've already given the staff a check for
$2,500.00 which was kind of the original estimate of the feasibility study. Now
we see that the feasibility study's gone up to $5,000.00 and actually it's just
an updating of the same numbers that were presented 2 years ago. I guess we'll
talk to staff about that and the consultant and see if there's some way we can
pare that down but we would like to develop the property and we would like to
get a feeling from the Council as to, what your disposition is with respect to
assessments. We're only going to have 12 to 15 lots in that area. Something
that this project can't handle all by itself. There is going to be benefit
that's going to go to adjacent owners, including residents as well as people
that live on parcels of land that could be subdivided in the future. So we look
forward to working with Chanhassen. We hope we can resolve some of these issues
up front before we come in with our final plan to you.
Councilman Workman: Jim, do you plan to have a neighborhood meeting of any
kind?
Jim Ostenson: We will. Definitely. We always do. You're invited.
i Councilman Workman: I don't live in the neighborhood.
Jim Ostenson: They're always fun to come to.
14
1
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991 1
Mayor Chmiel: Any other questions? If not, thank you. Any other discussion? 1
Councilman Workman: Maybe Jim again, you can answer this Is the next
intention to open up the barricade or was that going to be a requirement of this
whole thing or would you be giving away your hand prior to the feasibility study
or what? What do we have going up there? That's the wild nest of weiner dogs
you're walking into up there.
Jim Ostenson: I would really like to get some feeling from the Council as to
really where the Council is coming from. We've presented probably 6 different
plans to staff. We've shown access coming just off of Lilac. We've shown
access coming just off of Teton. We've shown access just coming off of, I think
it's Ashton which is to the south. We've shown thru roads going from Ashton to
Lilac. We've had just numerous different alternatives. There are pros and cons
on all of them. The major negative from our standpoint, we can make the traffic
work and I think we can satisfy... The question is, who's going to pay for all
the improvements, number one. And number two, are all of the improvements
necessary? Again, the feasibility study that was done has already outlined what
improvements are necessary. The amounts and everything and the costs just have
to be updated. But we're not predisposed to open up Teton Lane and take down
the barricade. As far as we're concerned, we can come in off of Lilac. Bring
our cul -de -sac down south from Lilac in here and that would be it. We don't
have any problem with that. But I guess somehow this thing has to get off dead
center and we have to realize before we spend a lot of money, as well as time,
as to where the Council's coming from with respect to assessments. Obviously we
can't afford to improve the whole area.
Mayor Chmiel: Well, my normal understanding is, when developers come within a
community, they normally pick up the assessments for water, sewer and storm. At
least that's the way I understand it. I guess I have no real problem if you
chose to have an access of Lilac either but maybe somebody else has some other
discussion. ,
Paul Krauss: Mr. Mayor, if I could. We've been working with Jim and had a
series of meetings with him and I'll have to be honest that some of the desire
to see that area opened or Teton opened is coming from us. When we're getting
an additional 15 homes in there, or whatever happens, and Mr. Donovan's already
subdivided the corner lot and we have additional lots that are probably going to
get access off of Teton, we have to come before you in good conscience and say
we think that with all this traffic that's being introduced, that we should try
to avoid the two extraordinarily long cul -de -sacs that result. Particularly
when the only thing separating them is a barricade. Depending on which '.
alternative is used, it's likely that Teton Lane will be used to gain access
into this property so it's going to have to be improved from Lilac to some
point. Whether it's ultimately connected or not's going to be your call but
right now from what we've seen, we would feel obliged to recommend that it be
opened.
Jim Ostenson: Mr. Mayor if I might respond to your comment. I agree with, to 1
the extent that a developer puts in sewer and water and streets, it's his
responsibility to pay for it. My only comment was that to the extent that a
public road is improved and the developer pays for his half. The other half
that's of benefit to adjacent residents that will benefit from it in the future
15 1
r
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
and receive monetary value from it in the future, that would be assessed to
' them. To the extent that they can use the road. Take advantage of the
improvements that are installed in it.
Mayor Chmiel: I'm just looking at the other answer that's going to come back
from the other side. We can live with it just the way it is and we're
completely satisfied and happy. Therefore there's no need and the only reason
that it's going to be upgraded is because of the development coming in.
Jim Ostenson: And again, that was when we looked at several alternatives, if we
came in from Lilac to the north, we don't need Teton.
' Mayor Chmiel: Right. That's why I mentioned.
1 Jim Ostenson: Yeah, maybe that's the alternative and that's certainly one that
we've already looked at. And we've discussed with Shoreview. Is it Shoreview
or Shorewood?
Mayor Chmiel: Shorewood.
Jim Ostenson: I always get them mixed up.
1 Mayor Chmiel: It'd be a long ways.
Jim Ostenson: They wondered what we were doing there. Shorewood.
Mayor Chmiel: Well ood. Thank you. Tom? Richard? Ursula?
9 Y Ursula.
1 Councilwoman Dimler: I see that you do have a purchase agreement on record and
•
this is not just playing around. That's the only thing I wanted to make sure
of.
Mayor Chmiel: Okay, I need a motion to authorize a feasibility study.
Councilman Workman: I'd move it.
Mayor Chmiel: Is there a second?
Councilman Wing: Yes sir.
Resolution #91 -16: Councilman Workman moved, Councilman Wing seconded to
' authorize the feasibility study for the street and utility improvements to
Teton Lane between Lilac Lane and Ashton Court and a portion of Lilac Lane west
of Powers Boulevard (CR 17) conditioned upon the applicant /developer providing a
' total security (letter of credit or cash escrow) in the amount of $5,000.00 to
pay for the study and that the consulting engineering firm of Englehardt
& Associates be designated as the engineer on the project. All voted in favor
and the motion carried unanimously.
1 Councilman Workman: Don, is there any reason why a lot of the neighbors aren't
here? The Natoli's?
1
1 16
1
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
Mayor Chmiel: I did specifically had a call from them and discussed this with
them. '
Councilman Workman: And?
Mayor Chmiel: And you don't see them here this evening. '
ESTABLISH 1990/91 LIQUOR LICENSE FEES.
Don Ashworth: The liquor license process is one in which staff presents the
proposed fee schedule for the following year, or for the current year to the
City Council. Once you establish that fee, the individual applications are sent
to the owners. So tonight's action is not approving the liquor licenses
themselves but solely one of setting fees. Coming into the 1991 budget we had
not anticipated increasing liquor license fees. However, with the significant
fiscal crisis that has occurred at the State level, the number of cutbacks that
we are looking to as a city, I felt that anytime we had the opportunity to
relook at our fee schedule, the revenues derived from those, we should take that
opportunity. Accordingly I am recommending that we increase those fees by
generally 5% over last year. I think that the fees have traditionally been
linked to our police contract. We did not carry out again that direct link this
past year because again we had increased fees in 1989 but I would like to remind
the Council that we did make a relatively large increase in our overall fee
schedule. What we're paying to the Sheriff's Department to assure that we have
adequate patrol, etc. in our community. So again, staff is recommending a 5't
increase.
Mayor Chmiel: I guess I don't feel too badly about a 5% increase. I guess I -
have a question in regard to renewing these licenses. In any way when we do
this, do we provide information back to each of the establishments? Information
regarding checking ID's. Renotify them. Making sure their employees do this
because we've had some situations occur within the community and I think it
would probably be our place to do this again. To notify, just to make sure that
everyone understands what the name of the game is and in the event that
violations do occur, there can be revocations of licenses.
Don Ashworth: I do not recall that the, the application process, the actual
forms are quite extensive in terms of backgrounds of owners, who is actually
operating the facility. Other type of information but you bring out a good
point and that is that along with that should be a restatement of the City's,
it's more than a desire. A mandate that we must have compliance with the laws
dealing with the sale of liquor to minors. '
Mayor Chmiel: Yeah, and I realize it's not the owner's fault but directly it is
because of the people they hire and I guess it's from us to them and it's up to
them to inform their employees. '
Don Ashworth: That's a good point. We can easily insure that as a part of the
packet that we do include an additional notice to that effect. 1
Mayor Chmiel: Jim, would you like to say anything?
17
' City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
Jim Jude: Yes I would. Mr. Mayor, Councilmembers. Jim Jude from the Dinner
Theatres. I'm here to respectfully resist any unnecessary new business costs.
That said, if no one else is here to say anymore in opposition to that, I've
said my piece. I guess my question is or questions are, is this part of a more
11 comprehensive plan to deal with the current and anticipated shortfalls in the
budget? Can you give me some idea of collectively what this 5% increase amounts
to for those businesses?
Mayor Chmiel: Totally?
Jim Jude,: Totally. How much that might offset this shortfall you're talking
about?
Mayor Chmiel: We're going to have a tremendous amount of shortfalls
unfortunately this year, next year and the year after and the year past.
Unfortunately all State aids are being cut from the State and so it's only a few
other ways that the city can go back out and make sure that we can obtain our
shortfalls as well. We don't like doing it but unfortunately it's one of those
' situations that do come up.
Jim Jude: Yes, and I respect that opinion and it's not, I don't think a 5%
increase in what the fees are represents anything really terribly substantial.
My question is, as a total amount, is it substantial to what some anticipated
shortfalls may be or is there a more comprehensive plan to deal with other
' things and, keeping that in mind, can we as retailers perhaps expect some more
increases like this as this being the tip of the iceberg or something? These
are just basic questions and perhaps you could shed some light on that.
' Don Ashworth: The total amount raised through the recommendation is $2,500.00
so the total fees collected are about $47,000.00. 5% would be roughly
$2,500.00. You might say well that represents a small amount but it is the
aggregate of all of those small amounts which have helped us get through this
State crisis. First reduction made by the State was $56,000.00. The additional
cuts that have been outlined will bring us to a level of about $146,000.00 is
our best guesstimate at this point in time. Mayor Chmiel had requested, just by
coincidence, as a part of the Chamber will be meeting tomorrow and he will be
making kind of a State of the City message at that point in time. He's requested
that we go through proposed cuts which amount to general administration has
' outlined $30,503.00 in cuts. Public works, $75,155.00. Public Safety
$22,211.00. Community Development, $4,635.00 and Park and Recreation $7,625.00.
In aggregate that amounts to $140,000.00. Very close to our $146,000.00 goal of
' which this $2,500.00 will get us $2,500.00 closer to.
Jim Jude: Right. Well we certainly are willing to share in the burden of that.
My caution is though, as these aggregates may mount up, these aggregate amounts
that you're talking about, may put undue pressure on a lot of the retailers. I
just would like to remind us all of that and certainly appreciate it. Thank you.
Mayor Chmiel: Thanks Jim.
Don Ashworth: I will make a copy of that available for all Councilmembers. I
' had wanted to kind of elaborate on that memorandum so that you're fully aware of
18
1
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
what these comprise. Some of them are rather extensive in terms of giving up
public works position. Delay in the engineer's position, etc.. 1
Mayor Chmiel: Very good. Any other discussion? Hearing none, can I have a
motion?
Councilwoman Dimler: I'll make the motion to, oh what shall I say? Establish
the 1991 liquor license fees as presented by Mr. Ashworth.
Mayor Chmiel: Is there a second?
Councilman Mason: I'll second it. '
Resolution #91 -17: Councilwoman Dimier moved, Councilman Mason seconded to
establish the liquor license fees for 1990/91 as presented by the City Manager.
All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously.
CONSIDER GAMBLING PERMIT APPLICATION FROM THE CHILDREN'S HEART FUND, JAMES
DITTMER. 1
Don Ashworth: The City I'll say has been fortunate, I don't know if that's the
right word to use, but several years ago there was a real question as to
charitable gambling and who should be allowed to carry out that charitable
gambling within the community. A decision that was made that Chanhassen would
be primarily looking to the Chaska Lion's for carrying out that service. Over
the years that has been very beneficial to the City itself. I think the figures
I showed were, I have to relook at it myself. To date approximately $85,000.00
has been returned to the local park fund and with $230,000.00 being generated
for the High School Endowment Fund. Approximately 2 months ago Chanhassen Bowl
made a determination not to continue working with the Chaska Lion's and it
appears as though have made a decision that they would like to look to the
Children's Heart Fund. My concern is that we really do not have any rules in
place as to how it is we're going to be looking at each of these different type
of applications and whether or not by the lack of our policies, we are in fact
encouraging one type of charity to potentially compete with another. Where one
will give whatever percent back to the operator or back to, as a management fee
versus another organization that may not give that same amount. There are
additional rules that we should reasonably look at. For example, City of Chaska
has a part of their ordinance says that it has to be a local organization that
is carrying out the charitable gambling. That's a requirement that we very well
may wish to see implemented in Chanhassen. Since this is really the first
application that we've had for a long period of time, staff is recommending that
we deny this application. That we refer the item back to Public Safety
Commission and ask them to look at each of these different areas and provide a
recommendation as to ordinance modifications that might be looked at to insure
that when we review charitable gambling, that we know that we're treating all
organizations equally.
Councilman Workman: I believe the City of Chaska has an ordinance that says no
organization outside the city's boundaries can do this. It has to be a local
community organization that can do it. Now we might be the lacking for that
organization in the city but I think if pushed, we could come up with that
organization. I think that's the direction we should be heading into to
19
1
il City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
I maintain that control as soon as possible. Now originally I think John was
going to go with somebody and I'm sure I understand the reason why Chaska did
that because I think John Dorek ran into a problem with Chaska because he was
II going to maybe tell Chaska how they could, the Lion's, how they could spend the
proceeds. You can't do that under State law apparently because he wanted them
to take a percentage of it and put it towards an effort which would make bowling
a high school lettered sport. You can't tell charitable organizations how to
II spend their money. So I think the only way you can guarantee that it's going to
maybe be used in a local sense is to get an organization that has local ties to
the community and I think we've been lucky that the Chaska Lion's have been so
II generous with us and the school district. It's been unbelieveable. But I don't
think we can afford to allow this to get out of town.
Mayor Chmiel: I agree. Fully agree. Any other discussion? Is the applicant
II here by chance?
Councilman Mason: Just one quick comment. I really liked Don's forthright
II comments about, clearly his opinion but how we do need to keep control of this
I think his comment about approving a moratorium on gambling permits until
Public Safety Commission has reviewed the item is a very good idea.
II Mayor Chmiel: Yes it is. Indeed.
Councilwoman Dimler: And I so move.
II Councilman Wing: Second.
II Resolution #91 -18: Councilwoman Dialer moved, Councilman Wing seconded to deny
the Gambling Permit Application from the Children's Heart Fund and recommend
that this item be submitted to the Public Safety Commission to determine whether
policies can be established to govern future charitable gambling applications
II and the requirements for that process. All voted in favor and the motion
carried unanimously.
II PRELIMINARY PLAT TO SUBDIVIDE 78 ACRES INTO 68 SINGLE FAMILY LOTS, LOCATED
NORTHWEST OF LAKE RILEY ON LYMAN BOULEVARD, JOHN KLINGELHUTZ.
I Jo Ann Olsen: This was first reviewed by the Planning Commission last October
and in the meantime a feasibility study has been initiated to look at bringing
sewer and water to the site. There's also been quite a few revisions to the
plat to meet some of the conditions that staff and the Planning Commission have
II put against the plat. One of the major ones was the addition of right -of -way
from improvements to Lyman Blvd. and the addition of an outlot for parkland as
requested by the Park and Recreation Commission. So it's been reduced from 75
1 lots to 68 lots. As far as the plat itself, all the lots do meet the
requirements of the ordinance except for 3. Those are Lot 5 in Biock 4 which
apparently does not meet the lot depth requirement and then Lots 1 and 2 in
11 Block 5 which where the right -of -way currently exists for Lake Riley Road, they
do not meet the depth requirement and they're not buildable lots. The applicant
has submitted, today they faxed over a revision to Lot 5, Block 4 which would
make it meet the lot depth requirement. Lots 1 and 2, Biock 5, nothing could be
I done to those until the improvements to Lyman Blvd. and Lake Riley Blvd. has
been vacated so they understand this and it will become all one outlot,
II ' 20
II
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991 1
including Outlot D so that whole area could be combined into one outlot with a
roadway easement going across it for the existing Lake Riley Blvd..
Councilman Wing: Which one's weren't buildable? Which lots? '
Jo Ann Olsen: Lots 1 and 2, Block 5. The ones by Lake Riley.
Mayor Chmiel: Upper right hand corner. '
Councilman Mason: So Outlot D and 1 and 2 will just be an outlot?
Jo Ann Olsen: Right. And where it says Lake Riley Road and where it shows like
a new Lake Riley Road going through, like a whole triangular piece would be an
outlot with easements going across there for roadway. That just makes it
cleaner and then in the future when everything, the new road is in and streets
are being vacated, they can replat it at that time.
Mayor Chmiel: ...the total number from previously to what they are now? 1
Jo Ann Olsen: 75 to 68. And now we're taking 2 more out. Essentially,
temporarily. 1
Mayor Chmiel: 66 with one out.
Jo Ann Olsen: As far as the streets go, they're meeting all the requirements of
60 foot right -of -way. We are requiring temporary turn arounds until the streets
to the east and west are connected for future development. Lyman Blvd., again
they are providing the right -of -way for the future improvements and this right -
of -way will also serve for a right turn lane and a by -pass lane. That was one
of the concerns at the Planning Commission that there is going to be a lot of
additional traffic on Lyman Blvd. now and that we need some additional safety
factors. So the right -of -way that's being provided will allow for those and
that will be part of the development contract and improvements of the site that
they will have to provide those turn lanes. The private drive is referring to
the farm that's up in the Outlot A. Right now it has to be provided with an
easement to the north road and once the north road is constructed, we are
requiring it to be removed. The private access to Lake Riley Blvd.. This will
allow the wetland to be converted back to it's natural state. This will all
have to be done through the Corps of Engineers and the DNR and the City. We
have talked with those, agencies and they all agree this is something that should
be done. The south road, we have concerns that that's being located right
adjacent to the right -of -way for Lyman Blvd. so we are requesting that that be
pulled back. We can work with the applicant by using private drives to pull the
building pads also back away from the wetland and away from that large drainage
ditch. We think that they can still maintain all the lots but we will be 1
requesting that we work with them on realigning that because possibly, even
though there will be boulevard area, that's a potential for traffic conflict
with a cul -de -sac going right adjacent to a road. As far as utilities, again
the feasibility study is in the process of being performed at this time to show
the water means of access to the site. That will really determine whether or Hoot
it's feasible. It does have quite a long distance to go and it will be costly
but that should be done in the next couple of months. The feasibility study. '
21 '
' City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
The grading, there will be pretty much mass grading throughout the site and
pretty heavy duty grading along the wetland and we are requiring Type III
erosion control to protect the wetland from that. Also we are requiring berming
along TH 212 and along Lyman Blvd. to provide screening from the adjacent lots.
' The drainage, the applicant is providing drainage ponds adjacent to the wetland
to protect it from direct runoff. We are requesting that the ponds be combined
into one large one that can be more accessible to the City maintenance crews.
As far as landscaping, what we were discussing earlier tonight, the engineer for
the applicant has stated the applicant has mentioned that he may be replacing 3
trees per lot for replacement of the trees. We have not confirmed that that is
true. We're not making that a condition but we will be requiring replacement of
' the trees that are being removed and that would be one option. We are requiring
additional landscaping along the Lyman Blvd and again also along Highway 212
for screening. Park and Rec has reviewed the acception of Outlot B for
' parkland. It will be going back in front of the Park and Rec Commission to
confirm that any increase or additional park fees that are necessary since the
parkland is not as large as what was originally requested. They will also be
required to provide trails along the roads. As far as the lots, we are also
requesting that Lot 1 and Outlot E be combined. When you have a remnant outlot
like that, it's usually hard to keep it maintained so we usually have it
combined with adjacent parcels so that's what we're requesting that. We are
recommending approval of the preliminary plat with all the conditions in the
report. Just briefly on the wetland. They're not altering it. They are
protecting it with the ponding adjacent to it. We have several conditions for
that approval also and we recommend approval of both.
' Mayor Chmiel: Okay. I like basically what's here with the changes that have
been made. One of the only concerns that I have for a couple of those lots,
they have enough depth to them. Concern for decks. Will they all be
accommodating for decks when they build homes on these particular parcels?
Jo Ann Olsen: They're all meeting the minimum requirements. Some of them might
be tight like the Lot 5 in Block 4. It depends on when they situate the house.
It depends on haw big the house is. There's never a guarantee that they'll
always have room. A lot of times now they put those garages up in front of the
house and push the house back and then they still want to have the deck so
they're meeting all the minimum requirements as was stated during the Board of
Adjustments meeting and we are trying to look at all the ones that do have decks
' to see if there is room. There's a question on some of them along the wetland
to the 75 foot setback but all we can do is just try to keep an eye out for it.
Mayor Chmiel: Is there someway we can convey that concern from the City to the
developer?
Jo Ann Olsen: Well we are requiring in one of the conditions that if it does
have patio doors, that they have to show on the survey that there's enough room.
Mayor Chmiel: Any other discussion?
Paul Krauss: If I may Mr. Mayor, just by way of digression, it occurs to me
that the thing we're trying to guarantee on these lots is that there be a
' minimum depth, buildable depth on every lot. What that magic number is, I'm
frankly not sure. It seems no matter how much room we give for a house to be
1 22
1
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
situated on a lot, somebody comes along and builds a bigger one than we could
have ever anticipated. But you know, we may want to consider in the future
adopting a standard that there needs to a minimum buildable depth of at least 50
foot on every lot. That would accommodate probably 90% of the homes that are
made or maybe a 60 foot minimum. Right now Jo Ann is working with this builder
extensively and all the lots that are along the wetland have been redone so that
there's more depth than there was when it first came in to us. We're doing the
best we can to guarantee it given the current ordinance.
Mayor Chmiel: I guess what I'm looking for is to eliminate the problems and • 11
frustrations that people have once they buy that house and once they're in it
and they don't realize what they have to have. I think that somehow if we could
convey this to the developers or builders that they at least be aware of it
because I guess it's the same thing coming back in and causing a lot of
problems. We can eliminate that problem before it starts. I'd like to somehow
address that if we can. '
Councilman Wing: Somehow Mr. Mayor I feel it almost needs to be a condition
because it's been such a problem. You brought up, I mean tonight was just a
typical example. Would a condition in fact force that developer to discuss this
with the buyer so there's no misunderstanding of what the conditions are?
Mayor Chmiel: I don't know how we can do that. I guess that's what I'm looking 1
for is some expertise.
Paul Krauss: It gets into an area that's very tough to enforce. I've. been in
communities where there's conditions that are placed on an approval that the
promotional literature disclosed whatever or that the builder in discussing
things with the proposed buyer disclosed something. But we're frankly not there
and it's tough to enforce that in any kind of meaningful way.
Mayor Chmiel: I guess I'm not trying to put it as an additional burden for the
builder or developer but somehow if they themselves can take hold of it and
convey that information, that's the way to go but unfortunately in the past it's
not happened that way. Maybe we can take a turn around and with all we have to
do but maybe we can look at that and give it some thought. 1
Jo Ann Olsen: Just for quick clarification. We do have that as a condition on
the wetland alteration permit but we could do a similar condition for the rest
of the subdivision too. That it's stated if there's a patio door, that they
have to show on a survey that there is room.
Mayor Chmiel: That would be acceptable. That would be good. I'd like that.
Because it eliminates a lot of problems for everybody. I don't think the
builders or developer's going to do that. Have those kinds of problems either.
Councilman Mason: A couple comments. I'd really like to see the developers '
talking about replacing the trees. I think this is what we've all been getting
at and my inclination when I see that kind of cooperation with the builders,
yeah we're all getting at the right track. I think that's a real positive step.
I have a question about how do you get a wetland back to it's original state
when you put a gravel road through it?
23
City'Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
Jo Ann Olsen: We're taking it out. Were you talking about Lyman Blvd.?
Councilman Mason: Well, I can't find it in here right off hand but I read in
the packet and you just mentioned that the gravel road that would be going
1 through the wetland, that will be taken out again?
Jo Ann Olsen: Yeah, it's an existing gravel road and it's obviously that the
wetland at one time was one whole wetland.
' ' Councilman Mason: Oh, okay. I see.
•
Jo Ann Olsen: It's going to the farmhouse.
Councilman Mason: I misunderstood. Okay. That's already in place and it will
' be removed?
Jo Ann Olsen: Yeah.
Councilman Mason: Great, okay.
Mayor Chmiel: All the contours, as far as engineering has had a chance to look
at this as well?
Charles Folch: Yes.
Mayor Chmiel: It looks like it flows, from what I'm looking at here, all seem
pretty good. Okay. Any other discussion?
' Councilman Workman: Is the developer going to say anything?
Mayor Chmiel: That was my next question.
' Bill Engelhardt: I'm Bill Engelhardt representing John Klingelhutz tonight and
I guess the only thing we want to say is that we've tried to work With the city
staff all through this project. It's taken us a little time on it. Even a few
delays but we think we've got it down to where we're meeting all the city
conditions and we continue to work with the staff and we appreciate all the help
they gave us for trying to get this project...project for the city of
Chanhassen. And all the conditions that are set forth, we basically agreed to
them and we are committed to the tree planting. We realize that we have to do
that and we'll be doing some of that.
Councilman Workman: I just have some questions about the Lake Riley Road and
Lyman Blvd. hook -up. Is this as we see it, the way we want it to sit? And
then, what's.
' Bill Engelhardt: What came up during the Planning Commission hearings was a
concern from the neighbors along Lake Riley Blvd. and how we were going to deal
with the, it was a smaller piece of property along Lake Riley and as we got into
it, we discovered that the thrust of their presentation was that they wanted to
see those single family. And our original lot was a little bit too small for
single family and as we started to look at realigning Lake Riley Blvd., their
concern also was at the time traffic volumes and would this road be upgraded and
24
1
1
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
11
how would it be upgraded. About the same time that our plat was coming through,
Carver County was finishing up their transportation study and they indicated
that this was going to be a, what a minor collector or minor arterial and they
require a 45 mph curve through there. So once we put the right -of -way for that
curve, for the 45 mph curve, we found that that helped our lot along the lake
which then would accommodate the people by having that single family and
everything came together. So what we've done is that we've said well we will
plat that right -of -way on our property at this time so that's preserved for the
city so when you go ahead and you want to build that Lake Riley Road or Lyman
Blvd., you're going to have the right -of -way all set up and you'll be all ready
to go and so that's how that came about. And that right -of -way's in there
designed for the 45 mph curve to meet the County standards. We ran that past
County Engineer, Roger Gustafson and got his approval on it. Went through the
City staff and they looked at it also. So that's why you see that right -of -way
in there. So we're going to plat that right now so you've got it and it's
preserved.
Councilman Workman: And what happens to Lot 1 and 2 there?
Bill Engelhardt: At this time we're going to make it an outlot and then once
that road is constructed, then the old right -of -ways would be vacated and then
you'd come in with a replat for the outlot.
Councilman Workman: Jo Ann, did I hear in here that Lot 24 had to be square?
Block 3. Or had to have 4 sides. Did I read that in here? Block 3, Lot 24.
Jo Ann Olsen: I think that was from an old one. I thought they had fixed that.
It doesn't look like it.
Councilman Workman: Well, is it fixed? Was it 10 feet almost?
Jo Ann Olsen: The reason we point that out is just sometimes it's difficult for
setbacks.
Councilman Workman: That's okay there?
Jo Ann Olsen: This one you can still do because you can still take pretty much
a straight 75 back from that 10 foot and then you have the 30 feet all along the
cul -de -sac and the street.
Bill Engelhardt: ...those 23 and 24 are good sized lots...
Mayor Chmiel: Okay. Any other discussions? 1
Councilwoman Dimler: I just have a question real quickly about, there was some
discussion at Lyman Blvd. may at some point become a County road. Has that been
completely dispelled as it's never going to be or what's the discussion on that?
Jo Ann Olsen: It's still discussion once the road is improved.
Paul Krauss: The Eastern Carver County Transportation Study projects where
would those roads be improved over the next 10 -15 years. There's implications
for this being a County road but there's no approval yet to do that. That's 1
25
11
1 City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
something we need to work out with Roger Gustafson and the County Board long
term. This may be a question that you'd like to ask too. I'm going to have a
presentation for the Council on the Eastern Carver County Transportation Study.
I believe the earliest we could arrange it is the first meeting in April where
' we'll have Roger there and the consultant who did the study.
Councilwoman Dimler: Okay. But right now, approval of this would not interfere
with that?
Paul Krauss: No. What we're getting is we're getting the right -of -way reserved
whether it's a county road or a city road. Whoever.
Councilwoman Dimler: Okay, thank you.
Mayor Chmiel: Okay, any other discussion? If hearing none, I'd entertain a
motion.
' Councilwoman Dimler: I move approval of the preliminary plat. Whatever.
Mayor Chmiel: To subdivide the 78 acres into 68 single family lots?
Councilwoman Dimler: Yeah, did we want to make any adjustment to the
recommendations?
Mayor Chmiel: Yes, with one addition into the conditions. I think Jo Ann has
already written that in.
Councilwoman Dimler: Okay.
' Councilman Workman: Well I would second it.
Councilwoman Dimler moved, Councilman Workman seconded to approve Preliminary
Request 1190 -10 for Lake Riley Hills as shown on the plans dated January 10, 1991
with a variance to permit a 220 foot offset between the intersection of South
' Road and Lyman Boulevard with the following conditions:
1. Review the preliminary plat to provide for the following:
a. Lot 5, Block 4 shall have a depth of at least 125 feet.
b. Lots 1 & 2, Block 5 be platted as an outlot (combined with Outlot 0)
with roadway easement across the outlot for Lake Riley Boulevard.
2. The applicant shall remove the gravel road bisecting the Class A wetland
into 2 wetland areas coordinated with City staff, Department of Natural
Resources, Corps of Engineers and Fish and Wildlife Service.
3. The applicant shall provide a tree removal plan with detailed information
on the size and type of trees being removed and with a landscaped plan
provided for the replacement of over 4 caliper inch being removed.
4. Approval is conditioned upon compliance with all conditions of the Wetland
Alteration Permit.
1 26
1
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
5. Outlot E in Block 3 shall be combined with Lot 1, Block 3.
6. Plans shall be drawn and submitted to the staff for approval for a berm and
screening along Lyman Boulevard and between Lot 1, Block 1 (combined with
Outlot E) and Lot 1, Block 3 and along Highway 212. 1
7. Final plat approval will not be granted until the findings of the
feasibility study being prepared by OSM, Inc. are known and the City
Council takes appropriate action to provide municipal water and sewer
service to the site.
B. The developer shall provide current planned right -of -way grade and 1
elevation information for the future Trunk Highway 212 improvements for the
segment of roadway through the subdivision. Noise abatement measures such
as earth berming shall be shown on the plan along the southern border of
the Highway 212 corridor.
9. The developer shall submit plans and specifications for the street and
utility improvements for City Council approval. In addition, supplementary
information such as flow calculations for the sanitary sewer and storm
sewer segments verifying pipe capacity shall also be submitted. Temporary
cul -de -sacs on North Road shall be barricaded and signed designating them
to be temporary in lieu of future road extensions.
10. The developer shall provide the following easements:
a. Easements over the temporary cul -de -sacs.
b. Easements over all sanitary and storm sewer extensions outside of
dedicated right -of -way.
c. Easements over the detention ponds and the corresponding maintenance
accesses.
d. Standard drainage and utility easements.
e. Dedication of all rights -of -way.
The developer's engineer shall review the total capacity of the ponding
basin needed to meet the predicted retainage requirements and verify that
the proposed ponding area can be accessed for City maintenance.
11. Wood fiber blankets will be required for slope stabilization on all rear '
lots bordering the wetland area and on all areas where slopes are 3:1 or
greater. Type III erosion control shall be installed around the wetland
and all proposed detention ponds on the project. The entire site shall be
seeded and mulched immediately following completion of the grading
operation.
12. The developer shall provide a registered engineer's report on soil, i
footings and structural design and certification verifying that the grading
and drainage has been constructed according to the approved plans prior to
issuance of building permits. ,
13. The developer shall work with staff on refining the South Road cul -de -sac
location and configuration in an effort to improve the buildability of the
adjacent lots. The developer shall also prepare plans for city approval
27 '
1
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
and construct safety improvements on Lyman Boulevard at the intersection
' with West Road. The improvements to Lyman Boulevard will involve a right
turn lane for west bound traffic and a by -pass lane for east bound traffic.
' 14. The developer shall receive Watershed District, Pollution Control Agency,
Health Department and other applicable agency permits.
15. The aplicant shall enter into a development contract with the city and
provide the necessary financial securities associated with the project.
16. Dedication of Outlot a as park. For this dedication, the applicant will
' receive 75% park fee credit. The remaining 25% or $125.00 per lot will be
paid at the time of building permit applications.
' 17. The developer shall construct a 5 foot wide concrete sidewalk along the
southern boulevard area of West Road in lieu of trail fees.
18. The applicant will grade Outlot B according to a grading plan provided by
' the City.
Additionally, to approve Wetland Alteration Permit for Lake Riley Hills
Subdivision as shown on the plans dated January 10, 1991 with the following
conditions:
1. The applicant shall provide a drainage, utility and construction easement
' over Outlot C and the proposed ponding areas and the 866 contour shall be
the edge of the protected wetland.
2. Any surveys for lots adjacent to the Class A wetland will provide the 866
elevation with verification that the home and any further improvements such
as porches or decks will maintain the 75 foot setback the 866 contour.
,. 3. A development contract will be recorded against the property and will
protect both the Class A wetland and the ponding areas adjacent to the
wetland with a conservation easement and not allow any alteration to these
areas.
4. This approval is conditioned upon compliance with all conditions of
Preliminary Plat #90 -10.
All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously.
Mayor Chmiel: I might make one suggestion. These blue line drawings, let's put
them up on top here. If Jo Ann needs them, there's no sense in going back and
having more and more plans developed or printed 1 should say. We'll save a
tree.
Jo Ann Olsen: I don't need these back. It's end of the road for these.
28
1
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991 1
VALVOLINE INSTANT OIL CHANGE, PROPERTY LOCATED NORTH OF HIGHWAY 5 JUST EAST OF
GREAT PLAINS BOULEVARD ON WEST 79TH STREET:
A. PRELIMINARY PLAT TO SUBDIVIDE TWO PARCELS INTO ONE LOT AND TWO OUTLOTS,
LOTUS REALTY.
B. CONDITIONAL USE PERMIT FOR THE CONSTRUCTION OF A 1,238 SQ. FT. BUILDING.*
C. AUTHORIZE FEASIBILITY STUDY FOR IMPROVEMENTS TO WEST 79TH STREET FROM TRUNK
HIGHWAY 101 /GREAT PLAINS BOULEVARD EAST TO CUL -DE -SAC.
Mayor Chmiel: This was held as a conditional use hearing by? II
Jo Ann Olsen: Yeah, it's a site plan. It's not a conditional use. It's a site
plan. '
Mayor Chmiel: Okay, that was my question. Thank you. Because I don't remember
there was a public hearing on it. How shall you rephrase that? ,
Paul Krauss: *Just delete action on that.
Mayor Chmiel: Okay. Jo Ann? '
Jo Ann Olsen: We've had a meeting since the Planning Commission as far as this
property and all the adjacent property on that kind of penninsula. One of the
things that staff has always wanted is to replat the whole piece to make it
clean. Since we the City is in a purchase agreement with purchasing some of the
other properties, we have agreed to require all those properties that come in -
with a plat, including the Valvoline site. And in doing so, to keep the
Valvoline site able to move ahead with the site plan, we are going to plat, or
not plat but to create the Valvoline property as a metes and bounds. We can do
that in the Planning department by just stamping off on that description. So
that's what we will do and again a condition of that, along with the other
properties would be that they would have to all be replatted. So this would get
rid of the problems with those outlots too because they'll be platted into ,
adjoining properties. The conditions of approval that we had as part of the
subdivision that was reviewed by the Planning Commission will still be
conditions of approval, that metes and bounds approval by a development contract
being drafted by the City Attorney's office. That is being done and once we get
that, they will all be recorded with a metes and bounds. So to make a long
story short, you're no longer acting on the preliminary plat. You're going to
be creating it as metes and bounds and just adiministratively stamp off on. All
the conditions, just to make you feel comfortable, will still be a requirement
of that and will be recorded against the property. So really tonight we're just
moving ahead with the site plan review and the feasibility study. I can answer
questions on that if you want.
Mayor Chmiel: Have we ever done this before Jo Ann?
Jo Ann Olsen: Creating metes and bounds parcels?
Mayor Chmiel: Yeah. 1
29 '
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
Councilman Workman: Of this magnitude?
Jo Ann Olsen: Created just one metes and bounds parcel, sure. We've done that.
But never if that was going to be the final form and this is just temporary.
We're just creating this so that lot exists for Valvoline to purchase from Brad,
from Lotus Realty so they can continue with their site plan improvements. So
there's a lot created for which those conditions can go against and maybe Roger
can, but we've already started the process of platting this lot. Even as it's
being created as a metes and bounds.
Mayor Chmiel: Well some of the points here, and I understand Brad's position.
He is proposing all this but do we have the approval of the adjacent property
owners as to what he's basically suggesting?
Jo Ann Olsen: That's going to be, that's part of the purchase agreement that
they do have to provide that. Actually it's the City.
Mayor Chmiel: Do we have that now?
Jo Ann Olsen: I don't know. It's part of the agreement. Purchase agreement.
Paul Krauss: Do we have signed affidavits or whatever from all the property
owners involved that they agree to the plat? I thought it was something they
were talking to Brad about.
Todd Gerhardt: I thought that was included as a part of the development
contract that they would be signing.
Paul Krauss: That Brad's got to provide...
Todd Gerhardt: I would think that Roger...
Mayor Chmiel: I would think that we would move on that until once we had.
Jo Ann Olsen: Well we won't. We won't stamp off on the metes and bounds until
we have all that with the development contract which actually you do approve.
The development contract will be coming back to you with all the conditions. So
we've already initiated replat of the whole property too. So there's two things
going at once.
Mayor Chmiel: Roger, shed some light.
Roger Knutson: I'll try to. If you will, this one got a little ahead of the
ballgame. Understandably because these things happen sometimes. There's an
attempt to clean up the whole area so rather than having one little small plat
here, one little small plat, plat the whole thing. And so rather than plat this
now and then have to replat it, let this one go by metes and bounds subdivision
on the condition that they enter into an agreement allowing the plat, agreeing
to the conditions. If they don't, they don't get the metes and bounds
subdivision approval. They need the metes and bounds subdivision approval so
that master planning process does not hold up their building plans.
30
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
Todd Gerhardt: And as a part of that development contract, there will be
separate agreements with each of the property owners that are playing a part of
that plat to sign off and agree to platting the property. So that would be
Brown, Minister's Life, and then the HRA.
Roger Knutson: Remember, the basic difference between metes and bounds and
platting is just ease of legal description. It's a lot easier for the county to
follow. A lot easier for us to follow. On the ground you don't notice the
difference. You can impose the same conditions on a metes and bounds
subdivision as you can on a plat. Still require development contracts.
Councilman Workman: Isn't the terminology master plan a little generous for '
this area? There really is none. Isn't Valvoline actually a product from the
lacking of a master plan?
Paul Krauss: Councilman Workman, I don't know. This is a tough property.
There's a lot of individuals involved going a lot of different directions. It
looks like it's falling into place. It's falling into place because the HRA is
buying 3 of the lots.
Councilman Workman: On the other end.
Paul Krauss: On the other end and where the street is. Oddly enough we don't
own the street right now. We have an easement over it and there's other land.
It's falling into place because Brad Johnson is working out an arrangement to
buy the building from Minister's Life and if he fails to do that, he still has
Minister's Life approval to work something out because they are getting an
expanded parking lot or potential for an expanded parking lot out of this which
they need because it's something the Hanus building now, there's not enough
parking. It's also falling into place because Gary Brown's Car Wash is now
getting, it's on a very tiny lot. The building is in a very odd location and
that won't change right now but Gary Brown will have sufficient land so that in
the future there's potential to redevelop that property correctly. There's a
whole series of actions over the last 12 years that got us to this point and
unraveling it's kind of difficult. But utilizing the agency or the HRA with
Brad running around trying to get the agreement of both property owners, I think
it's coming together to the point where we can guarantee you that the thing's
going to be replatted. That 79th Street is going to be improved to a good
standard. That that area is going to be, public rights -of -ways are going to be
cleaned up with the junk cars going out and the trucks going out. It's going to
be landscaped. Brad Johnson has plans to add detailing to the exterior and to
landscaping for the Hanus building. I'm not sure that Gary Brown has any plans
for the car wash but he has the potential now to do that. Plus you've got the
site plan for Rapid Oil here tonight that hopefully is a good quality site plan
and is well landscaped and fits in. Unraveling this thing is something of a
nightmare. I mean it's taken us a series of meetings over 3 or 4 weeks to do
it. More than that, it's rather cumbersome but we can't help that at this
point.
Councilman Workman: So, do we have to take these separately and go on metes and
bounds first?
Jo Ann Olsen: The action. '
31 1
City'Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
Councilman Workman: Needs nothing?
' Jo Ann Olsen: Needs nothing right. It's just to kind of let you know the
change in course that we're taking. We still need to review the site plan,
' which I can do a little summary on that if you want.
Roger Knutson: No action is needed on the metes and bounds subdivision.
' Paul Krauss: You understand the plat is being prepared now and we'll be
bringing that back before you as soon as we have it.
' Jo Ann Olsen: And you'll have the OC in 2 weeks, or on the llth as far as the
metes and bounds subdivision. As far as the site plan, the Planning Commission
did recommend approval with the conditions that were in your report. The
' applicant has submitted a new plan that showed sort of an island and arrows to
direct traffic. Staff was initially saying to reroute the traffic so that
there'd be no crisscrossing of it and no traffic conflict. The Planning
Commission did not feel as strongly that that was necessary and that instead
some directional signage and again like an island could direct the traffic and
prevent any of the safety hazards that staff felt that there might be. The
applicant has that and he can show you tonight. They brought it to us on Friday
' so we didn't have time to review it in the report. Also, they've added some
additional landscaping which improves the site over what was proposed in front
of the Planning Commission. We still are recommending that some of the, that
' additional trees be provided. It's still a lot of bushes and we want some more
hardwoods and evergreens. Other than that we are recommending approval with the
conditions in the staff report. I'm sure the applicant's here and he would want
to step up and talk.
' Brad Johnson: I'm Brad Johnson, 7425 Frontier Trail. I'm not the applicant but
I'm the promoter I guess of this. I'd like to introduce Rick Hauser who was not
at the last meeting who was one of the, would be classified as the developer and
then we have Valvoline, Bob Mikulak who will handle the presentation and your
questions relative to the site itself. So Bob.
' Bob Mikulak: Good evening. I have a lot of information. A lot of different
things that I could cover. Keep it short. I'll leave it to if you have
questions in regards to anything such as the waste oil treatment. I have a
letter and some information on it. Pictures of the building and so forth. The
initial, if we take a look back to what the Planning, what we came through in
the Planning Commission. I guess I went back and did some work with item number
2 which was to take care of what they called the internal, guiding internal
traffic including signage, curb cuts, center islands and stripes. If I can look
at, somehow allow you to, do you want these up in front here?
Mayor Chmiel: Why don't you get the.
Brad Johnson: It's not there.
' Mayor Chmiel: Well, somebody borrowed it. However's the most comfortable for
you to do it. Whatever's best.
32
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
Bob Mikulak: I'll just hold it if that'd be fine. If you can see it I guess.
What we did is, based upon the review that we had last time, I guess my
understanding of it was to go and present what we did here and what we did is
came back with a center island there which divides the traffic and provides
additional arrows on the pavement there. We did have enter /exit signs on the
outside of it originally. We included two additional in the center so there are
a total of 4 now providing enter /exit. In regards to the landscaping, *we took a
look at the north and south ends and connected the two adjoining planting beds
on the south and did some additional on the north. Per talking I guess a little
bit to Jo Ann on Friday, she didn't get it until after the report was prepared,
we looked at that a little bit and left it for Paul. Or, I'm sorry, not Paul.
Charles, to look at the traffic. We did talk today and I guess he has a little
bit of something he might want to bring up and describe. I guess at this point
he feels that the first one might be better than the second one that we put
together here so he may want to go back to what we originally presented here and
you might have some input on that. I'll let him do that. I guess in regards to
the landscaping, if we are going to continue adding more at this point, I don't
know what, I guess Jo Ann did look at it a bit. Currently we have 52 plantings
on the site. If we're going to go into additionally adding additional trees and
we're going to I guess request to step back on the plantings. Basically we've
got so much on the site that it's getting to the point of being totally
landscaped. I don't know if either one of you want, if you want to bring up
what we talked about on the traffic flow and if we can get that resolved. I'd
be open to discuss that with you or answer any questions that you might have.
Charles Folch: Mr. Mayor, members of the Council. In our previous review of 1
this site plan, it was our recommendation that, to reverse, basically reverse
the circulation direction of the traffic movement through the site. Basically
when I take a look at an entrance like that, I evaluate it from two main
perspectives. One is to try and minimize any unnecessary traffic movement
conflicts. The other thing I'm concerned with is also trying to eliminate
anything that may potentially confuse drivers as they try to ingress and egress
from the site. Basically with those two premises, those were the basis for
recommending the reversing of the traffic circulation pattern. At the Planning
Commission meeting it was recommended that possibly some sort of island or
median type situation might be developed to try and mitigate that situation.
However, in looking at it, the way it's currently set up, I don't see really any
improvement to those two basic concerns. On a third note, basically the width
that is proposed for that opening is 42 feet wide. City ordinance requires a
maximum of 36 foot wide entrance for a commercial entrance to a site. So there
are certain things that are conflicting but basically if I was to look at the
two site proposals that are shown, I think the lesser of the two or the better
in a sense, would be the other or the original proposal.
Mayor Chmiel: Okay. As I look at that, it looks like you've got two arrows and
they're shown coming in. On the opposite side it has one in and one out. Now
you're saying that is at 42 feet as opposed to what city standards are 36
maximum?
Charles Folch: That's correct.
Mayor Chmiel: If you narrow that down, you've
got approximately about 9 foot
width for each car. About 36. That'd be right. If you've got 2 vehicles going
33
.City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
1
in, you'd have 18 feet on each side is what you're saying.
1 Charles Folch: Well slightly less. They're showing a 2 foot, basically a 2
foot curb median there so you actually would 34 feet split between 4 lanes so
about 8 1/2 foot per lane. Just to make it clear though, our first preference
1 would be to of course see the site modified to change the circulation pattern to
a counter clockwise. That would allow vehicles to come in, make a right hand
turn, and another immediate right circulating around counter clockwise.
' Vehicles would leave the site basically hugging the east curb line and therefore
you basically have an efficient and safe movement of traffic through this site.
1 Bob Mikulak: It still doesn't eliminate all congestion. You have congestion
regardless of anything. I mean you're going to have it exiting the site no
matter how you do it. I don't care what we came up with. We can go back to our
original plan and it had the two, the entrance and an exit, you still have
' congestion leaving and coming onto the site via a left hand turns which you
can't avoid.
Charles Folch: I guess I'm not necessarily trying to address any congestion
issues. The two main issues that I mentioned previously or wanted to try and
eliminate any driver confusion as they come in, enter and leave the site. And
number two is to eliminate any unnecessary turning movement conflicts.
Mayor Chmiel: Alright. Does anyone have any questions regarding this? 42 foot
as opposed'to 36 which is allowable?
•
1 Bob Mikulak: We would have no objection to dropping it down and meeting the 36.
It just makes it tighter and I guess a little smaller than what you would
' normally have for a drive but if that be what you want, 36 will work fine.
Charles Folch: If I might comment on that particular alternative. 8 1/2 foot
spacings for lanes is relatively narrow. Normal parking stalls are 9 x 19 or
larger.
Mayor Chmiel: So you're saying the 42 feet would still be acceptable?
1 Charles Folch: Well I'd prefer to see the 36. I guess my preference is to see
the alternative that doesn't have the median at all.
Mayor Chmiel: Okay, the median strip out. That could present a problem with
the center median there as far as snowplowing and getting in and around it and
how many cars it'd probably come over that when it's slippery. Do you do wheel
1 alignments there?
Bob Mikulak: May have to huh. Not currently.
Councilman Mason: What's the rationale for the median being there?
' Bob Mikulak: During the Planning Commission meeting it was brought up by one of
the members that that would help us regulate and control. The original concern
was the fact that a car coming, can you still hear me? A car coming out of here
and across here would then cross the traffic here on our site and exit. The
1
34
1
1
. City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991 1
median was then to come through to eliminate that. I guess that's why or how
the median, island, whatever came into play.
Councilman Mason: How often, we're talking 36 to 42 feet, what are the chances
of having 4 cars meet there?
Bob Mikulak: I can tell you what our car count is or what the site is based on
initially, which is about 25 cars per day or 2 an hour. Approximately.
Councilman Mason: Well yeah but that's kind of misleading isn't it because you
don't, 1 mean you have busy times and.
Bob Mikulak: I'm following that up by, what we're going to have is an area
obviously of some hours with no cars and sometimes of our peak times, if you
want to call it that. Based upon the history with the other 300 sites that we
have nationwide and our busiest stores here, it's very uncommon for us to have
any more than 2 cars inside the facility and 2 or 3 waiting. People just don't
wait around any longer once they know our business. They'll come back when
there aren't, so the site does not generally have a whole lot of cars on it.
Our busiest weekend, Thanksgiving weekend, would be the el primo or really the
most cars on it but I would tend to think that you could probably have 4 or 5
cars waiting. If we looked at the parking spaces, the parking in our type of
facility is primarily used for the employees themselves. The customers, I don't
know if you're familiar with our establishments a little bit but it's more or
less a drive up. You sit in your car and somebody comes out of the facility and
chats with you about what you have questions need answered and you pull right
in. Get the services performed and pull out without getting out of your
vehicle. So there won't be a whole lot of in and out parking situations either.
Councilman Workman: Todd, you do have that larger blow -up of the facility? You
had it at the HRA meeting.
Todd Gerhardt: I don't know if I got that back...
Brad Johnson: The site one? '
Todd Gerhardt: No, it's a 5 x 8 photo of what the facility will look like.
Brad Johnson: Oh, he gave it to me. It's hanging in my office. He's got one. '
Do you have a photo of what it will look like?
Bob Mikulak: Here's an illustration of a couple of sites. Is that what you're '
requesting?
Brad Johnson: No. That one photograph that you handed out. Color photograph. 1
Bob Mikulak: Oh, a rendering?
Brad Johnson: Yeah. '
35
11
City Meeting - February 25, 1991
Councilman Wing: One thing at the Planning Commission wasn't really answered. I
understand you have an oil separater. All the oils are collected and recycled.
Bob Mikulak: I've got a little sheet here if you want me to about dealing with
' waste oil. I gave out to Planning Commission.
Councilman Wing: No, the waste oil's not the issue because that's being
recycled and collected and there's a separater. The only other question I had
' was the number of anti- freeze recycles you're doing because that's going right
into the sanitary sewer, as I remember you saying. So if you're dumping a large
copuous quantities of anti - freeze, as you company ever considered recycling that
' rather than just dumping it into the sanitary sewer?
Bob Mikulak: Do we have a current recycling program, no.
' Councilman Wing: Have you considered it?
Bob Mikulak: Have we considered it? They've looked. Valvoline is part of
' Ashland Oil and Ashland Oil itself is very progressive in that fact. Currently
you know, I guess I'm not really a chemist. All I can tell you is what, I go
through and see the reports and so forth. Anti - freeze in it's actual make -up,
' the way they make it up is not what you would call, according to EPA, have any
problems currently right now. So they do not have any plans currently to work
with that. I think the plan is more to make the anti - freeze compatible with
just general outright spilling rather than being concerned with how to treat it
with a neutral base. In other words, manufacturing of it is being changed.
Councilman Wing: The only reason I bring that up. We just approved 3/4 of a
million dollars to clean up the City's water as it flows out towards the river
in treatment and it's a little discouraging to encourage a business to come in
and actually add to that clean -up that we're going to have to do anyways. It's
' not clean water that's going in there. I'm just wondering if it'd be possible,
I don't know if Jo Ann or Paul can look into this but could their sanitary sewer
effluents be checked or in some way inspected to see if they're in fact adding
to the problem we already have? And I understand that anti - freeze isn't
necessarily an issue and it's not even, it's not on a hazardous materials list
but it's certainly not clean water going down. You know if there's large
amounts of this being done. If it's not a major part of your business, then
maybe it's not an issue but I just bring that up for conversation. I think that
the Minnesota PCA is suggesting that it's a recycleable material and if
possible, might be ideal to go along that line. I would certainly want to
encourage that rather than dump it down our sanitary sewer which we're already
paying to try and clean up.
Bob Mikulak: I guess I can only say that as soon as something does come out
with what we could do with it, we would have that. Our company or subsidiary or
sister company, Igloo is the first manufacturer to come out with the air
conditioning, you know the pollutant. We were the first one to patent a
recycleable machine for that so that capability does enter, we will obviously
have it. Currently that technology doesn't.
Councilman Wing: I just want to make one other comment. You know all the
meetings I've attended, the issue of the landscaping has been significant,
36
1
1
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
whether it's been Council or Planning Commission or staff. Another Councilmen
from a neighboring City Council and another City newspaper made a statement that
I sort of felt comfortable with and this woman clearly stated that it's not
going in her neighborhood. And I don't know what happened in Minnetonka and
I've seen it neither here nor there. The building aesthetically, I don't see as
an addition to our city yet and I don't want to in any way incringe upon your
right to do business here and I'll probably use the service so in lieu of the
fact that I don't like the building, to me it's just block and plastic with a
sign sticking up trying to attract highway. I wish our signage ordinance was a
little more aggressive at this point because I'd like to curtail what this
building represents but in lieu of that, the issue of landscaping which you
seemed a little nervous about. It's a real key here and if this is sitting on a
wooded lot, it kind of obscures itself and 20 years from now this building isn't
going to be any more attractive if all these trees we're requesting have
matured, what's the impact going to be on an attractive wooded lot and I think
by adding landscaping, Valvoline is coming in and adding something to the
community. So what you're taking away aesthetically and perhaps in terms of
pollution, at least you're giving back something that kind of offsets my
negative feelings towards this so I would encourage the Council and staff to
pursue the issue of these.trees and maximum landscaping. From my personal
concerns at least.
Bob Mikulak: Just to answer you why we do that. I guess I've answered it a few
times. The reason obviously why we exist is due to marketing and the ability to
attract people at our establishment. If we plant ourself in a wooded lot, the
only way we get business is by somebody driving past on TH 5 coming into us.
Councilman Wing: No, I don't think hardwood trees that are of the shade is
going to do much to your signs or your building. It just gives it an
aesthetically pleasing lot. I'm not asking you to cover the building up with
shrubbery. I'm asking for tall shade type trees which I think staff has asked
you to improve upon and include more of. I would agree. I wouldn't ask you to
cover that building up with just landscaping shrubbery but I don't believe that
maturing hardwood trees in fact do that. They're going to be up and above the
building within a few years.
Mayor Chmiel: By the time you have that building in place for 3 to 5 years, if
your trees still have not grown by then, you'll become well established in that
particular area and they just would be automatically attracted to you.
Bob Mikulak: We love your thinking. We wish that obviously that happens.
Mayor Chmiel: Okay, any other discussion? Do you have a specific '
recommendation Richard on that landscaping?
Councilman Wing: Well I have to refer to Paul because it's been batted back and
forth and I know that, I believe Planning requesting more shade trees. More
hardwood trees as part of it.
Jo Ann Olsen: Yeah, there's a condition in there.
Councilman Wing: But are we talking about lots or just a couple more or are we
going to outlot the lot?
37
1
11
, City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
11
Paul Krauss: ...we've asked for 3 hardwood trees along 79th Street boulevard,
' on the north side of the site.
Jo Ann Olsen: Another conifer in the back on the south side.
' Councilman Wing: I guess my number one request was that south side so that
TH 5...
' Paul Krauss: We're proposing replacing bushes with coniferous trees because
here's...nobody should have to look from TH 5 into an opened garage door from
the back.
' Councilman Wing: How about the southwest and the southeast corner? Why
couldn't we add a minimum of 2 to 4 trees? And we're talking deciduous now. Not
• blocking trees which is, let's call them ornamental hardwood shade trees to the
south side. Or the east. Wherever the trees would physically fit is I guess
the areas I'd like to see filled in. Again, not with blocking or not with the
intent of covering up the building but whatever hardwood tree was elected to be
there. By the way, in my opinion, Valvoline is going to gain as these trees
mature. It's going to wind up on an attractive wooded lot with a building
that's going to be sitting there rather than just stark. I don't see that we're
in any way affecting your marketing whatsoever. If we start talking the pine
trees and so on, those become blocking trees and I'm not asking for that. Paul,
my opinion is there's a lack of deciduous trees in the plan at this point.
Mayor Chmiel: Under the recommendations Jo Ann, Planning Commission action. I
don't see anything there although I know it was discussed because I sat in at
that particular meeting.
Bob Mikulak: Number 3 I believe is the one that addresses.
Mayor Chmiel: All deciduous trees with the 2 1/2 inch caliper.
Bob Mikulak: It says in the last portion I guess.
' Mayor Chmiel: But it doesn't say total.
Bob Mikulak: It doesn't state anything about number.
' Mayor Chmiel: Total numbers of what they're looking at.
Jo Ann Olsen: Under the new conditions on page 14, the conditions in front of
' the City Council we have revise the landscape plan to add the 9 trees, relocate
bushes and extend berm as outlined in updated staff report.
Mayor Chmiel: Okay, you're right.
Councilman Wing: Being the Planning Commission's here, would it be appropriate
' to ask if they had any, what their final thoughts were on this? I'm kind of
curious where they left it in regards to the trees.
Mayor Chmiel: Well, as it indicates here, they added an additional 9 more
trees.
38
1
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991 1
Bob Mikulak: Is that additionally 9 more or just have a total of 9 trees?
Paul Krauss: No, it was actually 9 more. 3 hardwoods along the boulevard
and...
Bob Mikulak: Well that's an excessive requirement.
Paul Krauss: ...the bushes at the corner of the building...
Mayor Chmiel: I'm sure you realize that the area you're going into is going to
be one of the gateways into the city. We have some concerns with that.
Bob Mikulak: Sure.
Mayor Chmiel: And I think Valvoline is the type of company, more specifically
Ashland and I know Ashland quite well. I don't think they'd have too much
concerns with it.
Bob Mikulak: Well, I guess I can only tell you based upon what I do all around
the country for them.
Mayor Chmiel: Well, Chanhassen's a little different than the balance of the 1
country as well, or at least we think so.
Bob Mikulak: It's a prime community, otherwise we obviously wouldn't mant to be
here either. We like that.
Mayor Chmie -1: That's probably true. But one other question too before we go
much further. And I assume that you're going to also have a location for waste
oil to come into your particular facility?
Bob Mikulak: Yeah. '
Mayor Chmiel: To be in compliance with, isn't it MPCA's requirements?
Bob Mikulak: I can give you what I gave the Planning Commission... 1
Mayor Chmiel: Okay. Any other discussions? Did you see that one? I think
what we mentioned is some different changes. Specifically one of the ones
Charles had and the ones that Richard has brought up. Tom, did you have a
concern there too?
Councilman Workman: No sir I did not.
Mayor Chmiel: Okay. Alright any other discussions with this?
Councilwoman Dimler: I guess I'm just not real clear which pattern, traffic
pattern we chose. Did we?
Mayor Chmiel: No. We did not choose the traffic pattern for access of site as
yet.
Councilwoman Dimler: Is that something we should do? 1
39
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
1
Mayor Chmiel: Yeah. Charles just to discuss that a little bit further.
Reiterate just rather briefly on those.
Charles Folch: Maybe if you can, if you have in your packets and can turn to
the two figures that are shown in detail there.
Councilman Mason: Is there a page number on that anywhere?
' Charles Folch: It follows the application.
Mayor Chmiel: 15. After page 15 and then go 2 more pages.
Charles Folch: Figure No. 2 is the circulation pattern which was proposed at
the time this was presented to the Planning Commission. At that time it was our
recommendation based on the concerns that I mentioned before, to reverse the
I pattern to pattern number 3. However, the applicant explained that there would
be some additional cost factors and difficulties in reversing the structure of
the building in order to facilitate the circulation pattern for Figure No. 3.
Basically it appeared that the Planning Commission agreed with them on that. I
think therefore that's the reason alternatives such as providing the island
median were looked at to try and improve the traffic conflicts and try and
' control traffic a little better using the clockwise circulation pattern which
was originally proposed. My first preference would be to see a circulation
pattern such as No. 3. However, we're basically down to two concepts. The
Figure No': 2 or the new pattern which, or the new schematic which was presented
' tonight with a median. I would recommend reverting back to circulation'pattern
No 2.
' Mayor Chmiel: I was almost going with you with 3 Charles and let me tell you
why. It's because of the access coming into the site and you have the parking
spots. Anybody that so chooses they can park within that particular area.
Normally as you go the opposite direction all the way back in there and around,
that flow of traffic going against the grain of traffic coming back out with the
parking spots located causes a problem as I see it
' Charles Folch: Exactly.
Councilwoman Dimier: I agree that No. 3 is the best to me too.
' Mayor Chmiel: Do you understand what I'm saying?
' Bob Mikulak: Yes 1 do.
Mayor Chmiel: I see that as more of a plus for you than a negative but I don't
know what it does with the rest of the building.
' Bob Mikulak: This concept here I guess is what we came back with in answer to
the Planning Commission. It helps somewhat with people who enter the site and
' hit it by mistake. You have an opportunity to pull in and park and get out of
that parking spot without causing conflict to all of the other traffic flow.
There may be other people going through the site at the time. It's an
improvement I guess. Basically I'll go with, you know whatever.
40
1
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
Councilwoman Dimler: Can ou tell us why you didn't 3?
Y y y did like No. 3.
Bob Mikulak: This one? 1
Jo Ann Olsen: It's Attachment No. 3 but they're referring to the.
Mayor Chmiel: Counter clockwise as opposed to clockwise.
Paul Krauss: The reverse.
Bob Mikulak: Okay. I guess I went through that explanation on. If I start at
the beginning, I guess first of all it comes back to the development of the
site. Pros and cons. You know you're going to obviously say a bunch of things.
We have developed 300 sites. We do know what we're doing somewhat when we
develop them and how we located the building obviously is in the prime front
corner. We set it to the rear of the lot so it has the TH 5 there. We
currently chose the selection or the traffic flow into the building for a couple
of reasons. Number one is if we have the cars coming per No. 3 drawing, we have
vehicles stacking on the side which is exposed to TH 5. It's very hard to
attract business when you have vehicles parked out front. You and I, basically
nobody wants to wait today. That's unfortunate but that's just the way the
things are and business operates. If we were to have vehicles stacked there, we
have a situation where we'll be losing business. And if we lose business, then
we obviously can't stay in business. We don't want that to happen. So we put
the cars to the other side which is along that so called east border. It is
somewhat restricted and hidden from the traffic view on TH 5 where we're
basically gaining our business. If you take a look at how the building is
designed, it's not merely I guess when we came in and talked about it before _
everybody thought we'll just flip the building over. It's not just a simple
mechanics of flipping the building over. There are a lot of interior
components. The steel work. There are a lot of things that go on the inside of
the building. I'm not the only one that takes this building or site plan and
reviews it. There's a total list of people that obviously check through it and
say this is the way we ought to put it together so what we had is a. culmination
of all the expertise, be it here locally and in Lexington, Kentucky who put this
together as the best way that we can operate this facility and hopefully
generate the 25 cars per day that we need to make it economically feasible. So
what we're doing is we're looking at obviously getting the ultimate out of that
piece of property to make our business function. If we go ahead and start
cutting back on the ultimate, we obviously then are taking a larger risk
economically that it doesn't work.
Mayor Chmiel: I would think that going counter clockwise, again going back to
No. 3, will give you additional vehicle parking because it's a greater depth to
it coming into the facility.
Bob Mikulak: But we don't need any more than a couple, and people basically i
turn away at that point.
Mayor Chmiel: Well, I've seen as many as 5 cars parked in each double line and
I happened to have been the sixth because I needed an oil change quick. I went
to the one on TH 7. I believe there were 5 cars, 1 in the bay, 4 others sitting
and I was the next one there. But as I look at the traffic flow coming in a
41
City,Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
counter clockwise position, that gives you additional parking so there's no
' congestion being out on that street.
Councilman Workman: He's talking about the view from TH 5 though.
Mayor Chmiel: Yeah, well still that's.
Bob Mikulak: You know we've got a total of 12 spaces that can stack up to 79th
' before it gets there. Obviously you have your opinion and we have ours. We're
taking it based upon all the other sites that we've designed and how we put it
together. I'm not the only one that goes into that so.
Mayor Chmiel: Are all the sites the same size as what you have here now?
Bob Mikulak: Actually this is a luxury. We have a little bit more room than we
do at a lot. We have some that are on corner sites which are quite tight. The
piece of property here is quite large. I can show you a few other illustrations
of corner sites and of other regular sites if you want. I can show you where we
' have this exact, this similar situation only to what would be to the east. In
Michigan we have a joint access similiar to this traffic flow and so forth is
the same and it works. The adjoining property also using that access. Our
initial plan was to have two curb cuts.
Councilwoman Dimler: After hearing you say 25 vehicles per day. Did I hear you
correctly?
Bob Mikulak: Correct.
Councilwoman Dimler: Okay. I don't see that as a traffic hazard. I guess with
that I would stick with No. 3, the counter clockwise pattern.
Bob Mikulak: But we don't have a traffic hazard or a traffic problem.
Councilman Workman: You'd rather have No. 2 wouldn't you?
Bob Mikulak: I want our plan based upon.
Mayor Chmiel: Based on what they have there Tom.
' Councilman Workman: I guess I always get a little nervous when somebody says
they know their business and we want to tell them how to run their business a
little bit. I think Council's concern is that as traffic's coming in, the
I potential that the exiting traffic, or the egress. Is that the egress? The
egress is crossing the ingress and that doesn't look good on paper it
probably doesn't work good or feel good to an insurance agent if he's in the
room. But maybe how that could be fixed is to slow the traffic that is
egressing out of there with maybe something of a speed bump so they're got to
slow before they shoot out of there.
Councilman Mason: How fast can they shoot out of there anyway? I mean it's not
like they're going to be lead footing around that corner there?
1
42
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
Councilman Workman: But in that sense then why should we be worrying about
which way they come in?
Councilman Mason: Maybe we shouldn't be. I mean I'll admit.
Councilman Workman: That's my point because they're saying stack the cars so '
that people can't see that they're stacked and they can get in there. That's a
free market decision that they're making and once these people get inside this
lot here, why should we be worrying about which way they come in or out of their '
building?
Councilman Mason: Yeah. I was at the Planning Commission meeting for this and
I originally liked No. 3 a lot better but I guess I'd go along with what the
Planning Commission decided that if they really think it's better for their
business and the Planning Commission was happy with it, No. 2. I'm assuming,
you've got stacking for 7 cars and 2 in the bay right, so that's 9? '
Bob Mikulak: Correct. We show that you could ultimately have more back past
that if you wanted to. We could have a few more cars back here. Ultimately I
guess basically when 12 cars stack outside,...79th there's a conflict with the
street itself.
Councilman Wing: I agree with Mike. I was at that meeting and I think '
the Planning Commission discussed this at depth and with the changes and the
small amount of traffic, I was actually wondering at the meeting why we were
even discussing traffic because it was such a minimal thing at that point. Now
if we get up to 80 cars.
Mayor Chmiel: You figure 25 cars in a day. 1
Bob Mikulak: That's 2 an hour.
Mayor And I went through there in probably about 3 1/2 minutes. You '
didn't have any other vehicles in your facility so I had 3 people working on it
at one time.
Bob Mikulak: They'd like to do that on the oil alone.
Mayor Chmiel: But that's just about 2 hours and 5 minutes out of the full day.
I'm taking it 5 minutes each for each car. Of course it probably takes you 10
so that's.
Bob Mikulak: I would say 10 to 15 minutes is an average time that they are ,
servicing a vehicle. The traffic flow that we generate on this particular site
or on many, the amount of cars that you're going to have criss crossing is
almost non - existent. '
Councilman Wing: I would move on this issue Mr. Mayor that we follow the
Planning Commission's recommendation along with the changes that were made and
described here. I guess I would like to finalize the landscaping issue which,
if I can read this. ...applicant to increase the landscaping on the site and
that was not necessarily to put in more crab apples or barberry bushes. It was
talking about hardwoods. Along West 79th Street, I'm asking for additional '
43
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
1
hardwoods wherever available. Minimum of, let's see, minimum of.
' Mayor Chmiel: We have 9 in here already. 9 additional.
Councilman Wing: Okay.
Paul Krauss: 9 addition trees, 6 of which are conifers that are designed to
screen the garage doors.
' Councilman Wing: Yeah, I want 6 deciduous. I want 3 in front and 3 in back.
' Councilman Mason: What have you got against conifers?
Councilman Wing: Oh I love them. Those are blocking.
Councilman Mason: That's what we want here.
Councilman Wing: No, they don't.
' Paul Krauss: If I may. 6 bushes are being proposed to be replaced by an equal
number of conifers. Up in this area over here, there's a proposal for 3
' deciduous trees. There are already 3 trees somewhat ornamental but trees
located on this line and 2 on that.
Councilman Wing: See I'm looking at this picture that has a lot more trees than
' he wants and this is what I'd like it to look like. And here's the large
deciduous that are up above the building kind of shading and adding to this
wooded lot appearance. I'm looking for this wooded lot appearance in 20 years.
Mayor Chmiel: Okay, but I think in adding those 9 trees, they've in_ycated will
take care of that concern with staff's review of the finalized report. So you
made a motion. Is that a motion?
' Councilman Wing: Well that was just to move on that parking issue.
' Mayor Chmiel: Okay.
Councilman Workman: We're going to move on the whole thing?
' Councilwoman Dimler: On A and B?
Mayor Chmiel: I think we have 3 different portions. Three different items.
' Preliminary plat to subdivide into two parcels and that was covered. Conditional
Use Permit for the construction of the 1,238 sq. ft. and authorize feasibility
study for improvements to West 79th Street from TH 101 /Great Plains Blvd. east
' to cul -de -sac. Those will take care of about the entirety of that particular
property.
' Councilwoman Dimler: Do we want to discuss the C portion separately?
Mayor Chmiel: That would be the last part of it...feasibility study for
improvements.
44
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991 1
Councilman Mason: I have a question. What's going on with this 42 feet, 36
feet thing?
Paul Krauss: It become a moot point if we go back to the original design that
had a 36 foot curb cut.
Charles Folch: I guess that would be my question too Mr. Mayor. Are we looking
at approving this concept or approving the original or just allow them their
original circulation pattern?
Councilwoman Dimler: I don't know because I'm for 3.
Mayor Chmiel: My understanding was that they're going either No. 3 which is
counter clockwise as opposed to clockwise.
Councilman Workman: That wouldn't be mine.
Councilwoman Dimler: But see that's not what they ended up with. I recommended
No. 3 and.
Mayor Chmiel: Well, I already stated my position as to why _ thought the other
side was fine. I'm amenable to.
Councilwoman Dimler: So you answered the question.
Councilman Workman: What's the question?
Councilwoman Dimler: Are we going with the original or the new? '
Councilman Wing: My request was that it, if we moved on, I was going to support
the new one.
Councilwoman Dimler: Which is what Planning Commission approved?
Councilman Wing: Yes.
Councilman Workman: And my decision was to allow the business people to decide
how they want their inner workings to work.
Charles Folch: Tom are we dealing with the median concept or just the open
driveway? Okay, just the open driveway.
Councilman Workman: From my standpoint.
Councilwoman Dimler: So you're going back to the original? ,
Councilman Workman: Right. My point was, that they've built 300 of these or
whatever and they know.
Councilwoman Dimler: That's different from Richard who's going with the
Planning Commission and I'm going with 3.
Mayor Chmiel: Put a little clarification on that.
45
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
Councilman Mason: Yeah, I think we need that. I think we need some
clarification. The median is the Planning Commission one right?
Bob Mikulak: No. This is the one I brought'..very first. This is the one
I brought to the Planning Commission meeting.
~~ Councilman Mason: Right.
Bob Mikulak: The Planning CoMmiaaion asked for a median with additional
signage.
Councilwoman Dlmlar: So that's what you come up with?
Bob Mikulak: So I add additional signage.
Councilman Mason: And that's still going the way you want the cars to go right?
Alright'
Paul Krauss: But we're not recommending it. I don't want to complicate it
further but if, our first choice was flip the direction around. If we're going
to keep the direction the way it was originally proposed, we'd prefer to go with
the original concept. We don't believe that this one that's on top here is very
safe and has too large a curb out'
Councilwoman Oimlar: So you're going with the original?
Bob Mikulak: Thank you.
Jo Ann Olsen: We like No. 3 though'
Councilman Workman: The one behind Paul?
Paul Krauss: The one behind.
Councilman Mason: But it's not the traffic flow we want there?
Councilwoman Dimlor: No it isn't.
Mayor Chmiel: It's not the traffic flow per se. Too many ideas and too many
concepts.
Councilwoman Dimler: So, all those for 3.
=° Mayor Chmiel: Alright' As we see what we're discussing, we have one of two
options to go and one is to either clockwise or counter clockwise and it looks
like it's clockwise position with the recommendation of the Planning Commission
for the access into the site. And the landscaping portion, making sure that
that width is 36 feet wide. Is that right Charles?
11 Charles Folch: That's correct. 36 foot wide.
Councilwoman Dimlar: That is not what staff recommends however.
46
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
Mayor Chmiel: I know but we have two different ways of going.
Councilwoman Dimler: Is that the one you're moving that one?
Mayor Chmiel: No, I'm not moving it. I'm just clarifying different things
we've got going.
Councilman Workman: Is there a motion?
Mayor Chmiel: I'm looking for a motion from the floor to approve the proposals
accordingly or make suggestions and recommendations to what is shown. Or to go
along with staff's recommendations. '
Councilman Workman: Well so really what we've got a problem with is trees and
ingress and egress. Am I correct, are we down to that? '
Mayor Chmiel: Yes.
Councilman Workman: Well I'll make a motion. To add 3 more hardwood trees to
the site and go with what would be Diagram 2 or the original darker green and
allow the applicant to operate his business as he.
Mayor Chmiel: Point of clarification Tom. You said 3. In here we have revised
landscaping plan to add 9 trees.
Councilman Wing: We want 3 additional hardwoods. ,
Brad Johnson: Above that 9.
Councilman Wing: Above the 9. Yeah, there's only 3 hardwoods on the property."
Bob Mikulak: There are 3 hardwoods in that 9 that you're talking about. '
Councilwoman Dimler: We want 3 more.
Councilman Wing: 3 additional ones to the south or wherever they can be put '
reasonably. And I'll second the motion.
Councilman Workman: So then is my ingress /egress thing clear? ,
Mayor Chmiel: Your ingress and egress is in a clockwise position.
Councilman Wing: I'll second that motion. '
Mayor Chmiel: Any further discussion?
Councilwoman Dimler: I just want to clarify that we're not voting on 5(c) at
this point, just 5(b)?
Mayor Chmiel: No, we've not discussed that as yet. Okay, we do have a motion
on the floor with a second to approve basically the preliminary plat (a) and (b)
with the proposed access to the site with the additions of the trees and in a
clockwise position.
47
,City,Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
Councilman Workman moved, Councilman Wing seconded to approve Site Plan Request
#91 -2 for Valvoline Instant Oil Change facility as shown on the plan dated
January 15, 1991 with the following conditions:
1. Relocation of the trash receptacle and enclosure to where it meets the
required setback.
2. The traffic circulation plan shall be in a clockwise manner as shown on
' Diagram 12 in the staff report.
3. All deciduous trees to meet a 2 1/2 inch caliper and coniferous trees must
' be a minimum of 6 feet in height at time of planting. Revise the
landscaping plan to add the 9 trees, plus 3 additional hardwood trees,
relocate bushes and extend the berm as outlined in the updated staff
report. The financial guarantees for landscaping improvements shall be
' required at time of building permit issuance. The applicant shall meet
with staff for their approval regarding landscaping on the north and south
side of the site.
' 4. The applicant shall be permitted one pylon sign not to exceed 64 square
feet in area and 20 feet in height, not more than 4 directional signs not
to exceed 4 square feet in area and 5 feet in height, and one wall sign not
to exceed 15: of the wall area. Any lettering or symbols on the backlit
barrel will be considered wall signage.
' 5. All roof top equipment shall be screened. Screening shall be provided by
elevated parapets or by screens constructed with materials compatible with
the building. Exterior wood slat fences are not acceptable.
' 6. The applicant shall provide existing off site contours for all areas within
100 feet of the property line including 79th Street. The applicant.shall
also coordinate the boundary site grades with 79th Street in order to
establish a compatible grade match.
7. The applicant shall coordinate and provide detailed information of the
storm sewer connection to the proposed storm sewer along 79th Street.
Refinement of the site drainage scheme will need to be performed,
particularly near the driveway access to ensure that the flow is directed
' towards the private catch basin. Runoff calculations prepared by a
professional engineer and a contributing drainage area map is required.
8. Existing sewer elevations and service elevation connections are required.
•
' 9. The applicant shall be required to install a city standard concrete apron
at the driveway entrance.
10. There shall be no outside storage.
' All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously.
Mayor Chmiel: The next item is item (c), authorize feasibility study for
improvements of West 79th Street from TH 101 /Great Plains Blvd. east to
cul -de -sac. Ursula, you had something to say?
48
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
Councilwoman Dimler: Yes, I wanted to discuss 5(c) a little bit and it's not
that I disagree with the feasibility study. I just get a little nervous that 1
everytime I read that we should be giving it to a consulting firm because
they've done and they know best and you know all this. We're going to save
money. Well, I'm all in favor of saving money and I just don't think that this
is so difficult that another firm; consulting firm couldn't jump in there
probably for the same price. I would like t� see it go up to bids and let's see
because we never know what we're talking about here. What costs are we talking
about?
Mayor Chmiel: Well either that or we could have staff go out and get a
recommendation for another engineering firm as well. '
Councilwoman Dimler: Whichever way but I'd like to see a little bit more
openness there. Otherwise we're always just saying well this firm is familiar
and therefore let's hire them again. I'd like to see somebody else have a shot
at it.
Councilman Workman: Hasn't it already been designed by them?
Councilwoman Dimler: I don't know.
Mayor Chmiel: Not necessarily.
Councilman Workman: I thought it says that they have some alternatives.
Mayor Chmiel: That we discussed last time and it's our understanding that the
prints are available for anybody and we have them on file. Is that correct?
Charles Folch: They're actually rough sketches that we have on the '
alternatives.
Mayor Chmiel: But any existing drawings, whether BRW has them or whoever, those ,
basically are ours in the first place?
Charles Folch: That's correct. '
Councilwoman Dimler: Okay, so what procedure would we go through to try and
open this up to other consulting firms? 1
Mayor Chmiel: There's a whole bunch of different firms that could be applicable
to this. One that I'm sort of familiar with would be Bonestroo. I don't
remember the total names but Otto Bonestroo from, where is he from?
Paul Krauss: Bonestroo, Rosene and Anderlik.
Mayor Chmiel: That's the one.
Councilman Workman: BRA. '
Mayor Chmiel: Or whoever else.
Councilwoman Dimler: How do we go about though. 1
49
1
' City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
Mayor Chmiel: Just a minute. We'll get Don.
' Don Ashworth: Staff will come back with some alternatives and recommendations
to give to Council.
Mayor Chmiel: We can move on this with that recommendation for change and come
up with some other.
Councilman Workman: I'll second Ursula's motion then.
Councilwoman Dimler: Thank you.
' Resolution $91 -19: Councilwoman Dimler moved, Councilman Workman seconded to
authorize a feasibility study be prepared for improvements to 79th Street
conditioned upon approval of the site plan for the Rapid Oil development and
that the developer provides a letter of credit or cash escrow to pay for the
cost of the study. Also, directing staff to come back with recommendations for
an engineering firm to prepare the feasibility study. All voted in favor and
the motion carried unanimously.
COUNCIL PRESENTATIONS:
' Councilwoman Dimler: I guess I have a, as I looked over the agenda that was
presented to us here, I guess it was on February 7th when we were setting the
' date, I see that we're going to have public works, park and rec and public
safety and finance come before us with their goals. My understanding was that
we were going to set our own goals and I guess that's what I would prefer to see
at this time. Is that we set our goals and then later have a session with them
' to see how our goals fit into their goals. Does that make sense? Any other
comments on that?
' Councilman Wing: I'd like to do that at some point. I don't know if it needs
to be done, I think you've got this set up and you have approved this and you'd
like to pursue this meeting.
' Mayor Chmiel: Right and then I think we can establish something beyond that at
another time.
' Councilman Workman: So you're saying we wouldn't meeting with staff?
Mayor Chmiel: Yes. My suggestion is that we still meet with staff.
Councilwoman Dimler: At this first goal setting session?
Mayor Chmiel: That's correct.
1 Councilwoman Dimler: And then we set our own goals after we meet with them?
' Mayor Chmiel: That's right.
Don Ashworth: I think you'd be feeding into the process staff is going through.
Much like the budgetary process in that there is, staff presents goals that
they're hoping to achieve within public safety, public works and the Council has
50
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991 1
an opportunity to interface with those and say well, that sounds good but I
really would like you to take in and add whatever. We accumulate all of the
Council's statements, staff and bring back a proposed program so that, let's say
by your missing on that day, my missing, we're still going to have opportunity
into the system.
Councilwoman Dimler: I guess my idea was that rather than us fitting into their
goals, that it should be the other way around. That we would set our goals and
they would fit theirs into ours according to my thinking.
Mayor Chmiel: Well some of the things are necessities within the City with
their respective goals. Each of the departments.
Councilwoman Dimler: Right, right.
Mayor Chmiel: And I think what we have to do is look at that first and then you
can blend in some of your goals back into that as well. The way Don and the way
I had discussion with Don and he's been doing it this way with staff, is to get
4 or 5 goals from each of the staff members. Each staff member then pursue that
as their goal throughout the year and go on a quarterly basis of checking to see
where these goals are. What's been accomplished. What hasn't been accomplished
and why not. 1
Councilwoman Dimler: But there's no hard feelings if we don't go along with
their goal and say forget that one?
Mayor Chmiel: Oh no.
Councilwoman Dimler: See I don't like to be put in a position where I'm having 1
to deny someone their goal then. You understand?
Mayor Chmiel: Yes. 1
Councilwoman Dimler: I'd rather see it done the other way around.
Councilman Workman: These are '92 goals? 1
Councilwoman Dimler: Or '95?
Mayor Chmiel: These are '91 goals. Believe it or not and if we don't get going
with this, they'll probably be '92. So my suggestion would be this, that
everybody was alright for March 2nd right? 1
Councilwoman Dimler: No. I had a call today that March 2nd doesn't work.
Mayor Chmiel: Too bad.
•
Councilman Workman: March 2nd is not good.
Don Ashworth: Ursula had called me and I have a conflict on that particular
day.
1
51 1
1
. City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991
1
Councilwoman Dimler: Yeah, and Norma called me today and asked me for alternate
1 dates.
Don Ashworth: Right, and I had given those to Don but we were going down
through them.
' Mayor Chmiel: But it looks like nothing fits in with anybody.
' Councilman Workman: All the way through April?
Mayor Chmiel: Oh, that's ridiculous.
1 Councilman Workman: Why don't you guys just all tell me your goals and I'll
sift through them and let you know what I come up with.
Mayor Chmiel: I figured I could schedule mine anytime that anybody had time.
Councilman Wing: And I'm willing to do the same.
Councilwoman Dimler: The 2nd is not good for me or Don. The 16th we can't.
' Mayor Chmiel: The 16th or the 23rd. It looks like there's 1, 2. Tom, you
couldn't make the 23rd?
Councilman Workman: 23rd, no I cannot. The 30th I can.
Councilwoman Dimler: The 30th is fine.
' Mayor Chmiel: Yeah, the 30th you had. Ursula has 30th okay.
Councilman Mason: I can't the 30th.
1 Councilman Workman: I can make the 6th of April.
Councilman Wing: We could work on '92 goals.
Mayor Chmiel: Maybe we'll have to and review the first 3 months goals list of
what's being done. And review that at the same time.
Councilman Mason: It sounds like next year when we do this we'll have to start
planning this calendar in November.
Mayor Chmiel: No, let's go back to September.
Councilwoman Dimler: April 6th then?
Councilman Mason: Can we all agree on April 6th right now?
Councilman Workman: Sure.
Mayor Chmiel: April 6th?
Don Ashworth: This far in advance has to be open.
52
1
1
City Council Meeting - February 25, 1991 1
Councilwoman Dimler: April 6th is fine.
Mayor Chmiel: April 6th is fine with me. April 6th. April 6th. Going once.
Going twice. April 6th it is.
Councilman Wing: I just want to let the Council know that at a seminar that the
City sent me to, and now I'm sorry that I picked up this that you know, I know
enough now to be dangerous. '
Councilman Mason: I doubt that.
Councilman Wing: At this seminar, I improved my knowledge of tax increment '
financing by over 700:. I only absorbed less than 1% of what they told me. A
mayor from a neighboring city, and this will be coming public very soon so, they
did have a Council retreat with a facilitator, which I mentioned to Don, where
they sat and they all threw all their dreams for the city into a pile and then
they voted on the top 5 recommendations or goals. One of them was concretely to
improve the downtown business situation. That was their first one. And then
they went on down the line. Then they brought staff in and said, here are our
goals. How can you help us implement these and what I'm looking for Don and
Council is long term goals within a reach of this Council. 3 to 5 years. 2 to
4 years. And more of a policy statement than anything else. So I'm hoping that
at some point this year we can create that to go into next year a little
stronger' maybe. I'm hearing every commission saying, where are we going and
what do you want us to do. I don't want these piecemeal things that we have to
argue about. I'd like people to come.
Mayor Chmiel: Let me just ask Todd what the city manager said from the City, we
won't say the city. What was his response? I loved it.
Todd Gerhardt: Goal setting? Baa humbug?
Mayor Chmiel: Well that's putting it mildly. I appreciated it.
Councilman Wing: The mayor from this city, I won't name names but she said it
was a wonderful experience.
Mayor Chmiel: Oh it is. There's no question. Alright, we have April 6th. We
have one more.
Don Ashworth: We did that one earlier.
Councilman Workman moved, Councilwoman Dialer seconded to adjourn the meeting.
All voted in favor and the motion carried. The meeting was adjourned at 10:15
p.m..
Submitted by Don Ashworth
City Manager ; II
Prepared by Mann Opheim
53
` r
UNEDITEE
CHANHASSEN PARK AND RECREATION COMMISSION
REGULAR MEETING
FEBRUARY 26, 1991
Chairman Schroers called the meeting to order at 7:31 p.m..
MEMBERS PRESENT: Jan Lash, Dave Koubsky, Larry Schroers, Curt Robinson,
Dawne Erhart and Jim Andrews
MEMBERS ABSENT: Wendy Pemrick
' STAFF PRESENT: Todd Hoffman, Park and Recreation Coordinator and Jerry
Ruegemer, Recreation Supervisor
APPROVAL OF MINUTES: Andrews moved, Robinson seconded to approve the
Minutes of the Park and Recreation Commission meeting dated January 22,
1991 as presented. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously.
CITY CENTER PARK MASTER PLAN.
Hoffman: As indicated in my brief cover memo, this master plan was
undertaken, it was identified to be undertaken for the past 2 years at
least. Because of the cloud of the community center issue surrounding this
site, the master plan was never undertaken, nor were any of the park
improvements that were budgeted for in the past 2 years undertaken either.
But now with the cloud of the community center cleared up, we can go ahead
and take a look at a master plan. Look at some future, potential future
changes. Reconfigurations for this park site since it is going to be the
location which the T -ball, ragball and pee wee age kids continue to play
for many years to come here in Chanhassen and obviously that age group of
kids has increased and will continue to increase into the future. With
that, if you have any specific questions prior to Bruce Chamberlain who is
here from Van Doren - Hazard- Stallings making a presentation concerning these
proposed master plans. We'll let Bruce take the floor. Specific
questions? Okay.
Bruce Chamberlain: Thank you Todd. What we've done is come up with two
different concept alternatives for City Center Park. Both of them take
into consideration the things that were brought up at last month's meeting
as far as new park amenities and also things that I talked to Todd about,
both prior to that meeting and after the meeting. Things like the school
' wished for a basketball court on tha south side of the school and
additional softball fields. Additional soccer fields and the moving of the
running track and also there's a concern brought up about the hockey rinks.
Configuration because it's difficult for the players on one rink, it's
necessary for them to cross over the other rink to access that rink. So on
one of our concept alternatives we took that into consideration and came up
with an alternative. I just want to go over a little bit initially what's
in the park at this point. The elementary school is right here. Four
tennis courts in this area. The running track in this area right here.
There are three ballfields currently in the park. One in that location,
there and there. There's a path with a crossing at this point on Kerber
Drive. The path is a community path for children to go to the school and
also there's an easement and right -of -way for a path extending into this
community, cul -de -sac in this area right here. Parking area right here.
Along side the school and also another parking area on the south side of
the school. The hockey rinks are in this location. The fire station.
r
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
February 26, 1991 - Page 2
11 City Hall and the associated parking lots for City Hall. What we wanted to
do was try and focus on the recreation amenities in the park and try to
' centralize the access for those amenities. I'll show you a concept form.
You can see that we decided to centralize and bring in an extra access for
park users along Kerber Drive on the west side of the elementary school.
What that does is it allows everyone who is driving to this site to use the
park amenities. Have a central location where they know they come to park
and then deseminate from there. There's corridor access to all the
ballfields from this central parking area right here. Either between the
' ballfields to get to either of these two or central location for these
three ballfields right here. There's a concern in the community for some
additional soccer fields also and through, we got some information from
Todd. Who's the soccer?
Hoffman: Soccer association.
' Bruce Chamberlain: Soccer Association on field sizes so we took that into
consideration also. There's four soccer fields in this scheme. Two
smaller and two larger. One of the soccer fields is uninterrupted by the
softball and baseball diamonds. That was a concern there so we tried to
take that into consideration and we were able to do that. Three of the
fields are overlapping softball diamonds. We tried to keep them out of the
infields and the ag lime areas as much as we could but that was not
possible all the way around. But we did keep them off of the pitchers
mound in all cases. There's also a concern for additional tennis and we
' added, in this scheme, two tennis courts. Both to the west of the existing
four tennis courts. You can see those in this location right here. As
part of this scheme, we tried to make the crossing for the school path a
little bit more safe than it possibly is now and also centralize the
' location of any intersections along Kerber Drive. Both for the parking
area and also for an existing street. So we brought the entrance to this
parking area, this on the other side of Kerber Drive, parallel and in
' conjunction with this drive. And also moved the crossing, the crosswalk
over to that area so that it's a safe crossing for the children and anyone
else who uses that path. Then we bring the path around the park facilities
' and up to the existing pathway and into the school. There's an existing
play area right here. There's also an existing play area right here but
that will be upgraded and changed somewhat I understand and we wanted to
take that into consideration so that new play facility is conceptually
shown in this area.
Schroers: Are we expanding that play area? Is that going to be larger?
Hoffman: Than the area currently? The area currently encompassed by the
play area will not need to expand to accommodate this new structure, no.
Bruce Chamberlain: Also the school's concern about a basketball court be
located as close as actually we located it exactly where they wanted. it.
That's where they wanted it is on that side of the school and near the
1 parking lot so that was the location for that. In this scheme we left the
hockey rinks as they are and the warming house as it is. The running track
which is I believe 220 yard running track surrounds the soccer field in
this location. That's also uninterrupted so there wouldn't be any other
crossing over that.
1
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
February 26, 1991 - Page 3
Robinson: Can you tell me the width of that area between those 3 fields?
Bruce Chamberlain: This area? '
Robinson: Yeah. About how many feet is that?
Bruce Chamberlain: Approximately 50 feet. So there'd be a 50 foot
aisleway between the fields.
Robinson: I was thinking about spectators, both for the ball diamonds and II
that big soccer field. Now will they be able to stand on the running track
or behind the running track or where will the spectators be?
1
Bruce Chamberlain: If there's a need for spectators, even bleachers in the
softball areas, they could easily be accommodated in this area.
Robinson: I see.
Bruce Chamberlain: As far as the running track, there's plenty of space II from the stand -off for the soccer field, excuse me. Stand on the running
track or behind the running track. Around all the soccer fields there's a
10 foot buffer zone that is between the actual soccer field and the running
track in this case. They could stand anywhere on the running track and be
a safe distance from the play area.
Schroers: Does that softball fields have to overlap in the outfields? ,
Bruce Chamberlain: On the soccer?
Schroers: No, on the ballfields. '
Bruce Chamberlain: No. It was just because of the way the print was done. '
And you can see the actual lines on these ball diamonds that are about 5
feet wide. The ones we get in there really do some fine detailing. We'll
be able to pull either this field back 5 feet, 10 feet or this one to the
west a little bit. '
Lash: Larry, this is for T -ball and ragball and pee wee. I mean I haven't
seen the ball go out of the infield yet of course I have a few years left
to watch.
Schroe'rs: Well another question I had was, will these fields be available
for some form of league play as far as softball? It says softball fields. II
I'm wondering if the women's league or industrial league or anyone would be
able to play on these fields?
Hoffman: Currently they use a portion of these three fields for some '
practice games and these would be made available in late April for practice
or you'd scheduled them so you wouldn't be hitting into each other you know '
from a safety standpoint. And again with the 3 new fields at Lake Ann
bringing those to 6, at some point in the future we anticipate allowing
those to be used for practice really on in the season once they're
established to a proper degree. 1
1
11 Park and Rec Commission Meeting
February 26, 1991 - Page 4
11 Schroers: And you don't think that we'll have an additional need for
fields for league play? That Lake Ann will accommodate what we have now?
' Hoffman: Certainly not in the near future, no. These fields here will be
full with the youth activities in that 5 to 10 age group category. What I
see happening in the next 3 to 7 years is that City Center Park will be
maintained for that age group. Bandimere Park will at some point be
developed for the 10 to 14 to 16 year age group and then Lake Ann Park will
be left for the adults. So three athletic complexes will be used in those.
' respective age groups.
Lash: Do we have enough money Todd to do, at the last meeting we talked
' about the play structure, the tennis courts, roofing the warming house and
trying to do something to the hockey rinks and it looked like all the money
would be eaten up just doing that. How are we going to do all this with
' the ballfields?
Hoffman: That's correct. The money, the $68,000.00 included an allocation
for a master plan. The reason a master plan is being developed is to
insure that that $68,000.00 investment is used wisely and not, you will not
be, we'll spend that money on something which will not meet the future
needs of the future reconfigurations of this park. So this portion of the
capital improvements for this year is just to show the future possibilities
for this park and then to allow the commission to decide if they like one
of these concepts and if we should work towards that on down the line.
1 Lash: So this isn't going to be done?
Hoffman: No. This is just so we make sure that the play equipment. Is
that disappointing?
Andrews. Parts of it will be done.
Hoffman: Correct, yep. Parts of it will be done. The tennis courts will
remain in their location and that was a question. Whether or not we should
have those tennis courts remain in their present location or whether we
should dismantle them and remove them and install two new courts in some
other location on this site. That type of thing. So those questions were
addressed as part of this development of this master plan. At the last
' meeting and in the January meeting we took a look at some of the types of
things we potentially could do with this park and these plans are based on
that discussion and discussion with tennis enthusiasts in town, people from
' the athletic association, the school folks and those types of people.
Robinson: Is there a property line there as to what belongs to school
district and what's the city?
Hoffman: Yes.
Robinson: Where's that?
Bruce Chamberlain: See this line up there. This line straight down to the
west. Down to this edge...and this is the school property.
r
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
February 26, 1991 - Page 5
Robinson: Does the school district have problems with the industrial
league playing on school property ballfields?
Hoffman: For a practice session? No. -The agreements over the years as to
the development of City Center Park have been verbal in nature. A
cooperative effort to maintain and develop this site in such a manner to 1
meet the needs of both the school kids and then the community as a whole.
Lash: When we talked at the last meeting about, I think we had earmarked
about $20,000.00 or roughly for the tennis courts. Was that just to fix
the old ones?
Hoffman: That's to fix the four existing. The request for additional
tennis courts comes as looking on down the road for a site in Chanhassen to
hold some type of tournaments or large instructional and this site with
four tennis courts already there would be the best suited park site in
Chanhassen for that type of use.
Lash: What all would be involved with just trying to get the fields set up
in that configuration? Would city staff be able to do that and would we
have to tear the whole thing apart and reseed everything and lose a whole
season? What would something like that cost?
Hoffman: Yeah. We would potentially, or we would lose an entire season.
A cost estimate is something I've not taken a look at but there is some
fairly significant grading in the area where the lowland comes in. Some
fill would be needed to take place so it'd be a major undertaking but it
would be something that City maintenance crews could accomplish.
Robinson: That is a neat plan though. Boy, isn't it? 1
Bruce Chamberlain: Ready for number 2? Number 2 is actually the same as
number 1 except it builds a little bit on it. Number 1 is that the City
eventually acquires that future 3 acres that's been talked about for a
while. Also, that the hockey rinks stay in the same location but to
mitigate the problem that there is now with, see in this area the warming II
house is here. Free skating is in this area and in order for the players
of this hockey rink to get to that rink, it's necessary for them to cross
over the first rink and access it through the center. I talked with II
Chanhassen maintenance people and we really decided that there's really no
solution because of snow removal problems and the close knit nature of that
area. There's retaining walls around the hockey rinks on the side and also
on this side. They come very close to the edge of the rinks. So the only II
way that we felt we could get around that problem is to reconfigure the
hockey rinks and turn them at a 90 degree angle to what they are currently.
That would require the hockey rinks to be reduced in width by 5 feet, which
is still plenty within standards and also it would require the moving of
the lighting as currently is existing there. There's lighting actually I
believe 6 lamps for the hockey rinks and the rinks are kind of divided into II thirds. There, there and there and also two up on the upper edge. It
would require the moving of those lights in order to reconfigure the hockey
rink in this area.
Erhart: How expensive would that be to move the lights? ,
1
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
February 26, 1991 - Page 6
1
Bruce Chamberlain: We haven't done any cost estimates or cost figuring
' yet. It would be, I guess I could say considerable.
Hoffman: It would entail the dismantling, removing the current footings,
pouring new footings, rewiring so by the time you get down to it, it would
' be a large sum of actually purchasing new lights. So unless the problem is
to such a degree that it causes severe distress to some of the hockey
enthusiasts or the folks using those rinks, it would be difficult to go.
' ahead and do that.
Lash: So what did we have it at the end of last meeting to put towards the
hockey rinks? Like $5,000.00 or something didn't we?
Hoffman: Yeah. Basically in discussions with Dale Gregory, Park Foreman,
with the money going towards the majority or the remainder of the money
' left after the play structure going towards a tennis court, they will do
some intensive maintenance to those hockey boards. Be it shoring up their
stability and painting and that type of thing. That may cost $1,000.00 to
$2,000.00 to $3,000.00. That type of thing but after that, we'll look for
replacements sometime in the future.
Robinson: With money always being a concern, it looks like you could do
' alternative 1 and as a second phase or whatever, do the second alternative
or make the second alternative additions to that because it is so similar.
It's just the hockey rinks and the addition of the 3 acres.
Bruce Chamberlain: Also in the alternative 2, we moved the warming house
also. Again, that's an option that can be added later. If we really
thought you deemed it necessary or that was a high priority, 1 would just
make the access and the traffic through this hockey area a little bit more
convenient.
Schroers: And this is what the Chanhassen Hockey Leagues are having to use
now that we've lost the indoor facility.
Hoffman: They use this only for practices. All their games are taking
place at the community center in Chaska.
' Bruce Chamberlain: You can see aga4 that everything in the central
portion of the park remains the same as concept 1. The parking area
entrances off of Kerber Drive again, the area and the basketball court are
in the same areas. Configuration of the softball fields and soccer fields
' are the same. Running tracks also and tennis courts. And the possible
future acquisition of 3 acres on the north side of the site, we think that
there's really only one best alternative for the use of that site. That
11 includes one soccer field and the inclusion of two additional softball
diamonds. To mitigate any parking problems off of Saratoga Circle on that
side, we also included a parking lot that could accommodate 28 cars plus in
that area and that would alleviate any on street parking problems that may
11 occur near facilities in that area. Again, if community members are
driving to.the site, they have two central locations at this point now if
the future addition comes to pass. One, for the main area of the park off
11 of Kerber Drive and then another for these facilities and maybe even they
could accommodate tennis courts possibly off of Saratoga Circle.
1
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
February 26, 1991 - Page 7
1
Schroers: Are all the ballfields, soccer fields, hockey rinks, are they
all official size? Regulation?
Bruce Chamberlain: Yes. We confirmed with the soccer element in
Chanhassen and came up with two sizes that they wanted so we included those
into this master plan. ,
Hoffman: And those are not only what they wanted but official sizes for
the American Soccer Association for that particular age group. And then
the baseball diamonds or ballfields are 180 foot distances down the foul
lines. They're not fenced because there's no need for that fence there.
It's just merely a backstop and then that 180 foot distance to the next
field.
Lash: Do you think that we'd be able to, this year with the funds that we
have, or the things that we've kind of allocated it, would there be enough
money left to do the little basketball area that they wanted to put in on
the north end there? Or the south end?
Hoffman: Depending on cost estimates that come in on the tennis courts, it II
would be tight but it's a possibility.
Lash: Maybe we could try to shoot for that at least, if we could get that II
in.
Hoffman: And it would be appropriate to have the same contractor that
comes in to do the tennis court overlay to install it. It would fit nicely II
into that improvement program.
Lash: Is there an area that ultimately when we did all this other stuff on!'
the north end to put in a little basketball area too? The way it operates
now, and you may know this already but the first thru third graders use the
north end playground and then the west or the south, whatever you want to II
call that side, is used by the fourth and fifth graders. Well second -third
graders like to shoot baskets too so if we had some baskets on the north
end, I'm sure they'd get used too. Now we don't want it in the parking lot"
because that's where they ran into the problem before where it gets backed
over.
Hoffman: With the future acquisition there certainly would be some space I
to install that but in Plan 1 or Concept A which we currently are faced
with, we're bound by the tennis courts and the parking lot.
Bruce Chamberlain: I'm sure we could squeeze but things are starting to
get fairly tight. We're already now starting to put...
Andrews: Do you think as far as parking, you know with the future use of II
this park, what you have designed in either phase is enough to facilitate a
crowded park with possibly both soccer games and tennis matches and
baseball games going on? '
Bruce Chamberlain: Yeah, we believe so. Right now there's somewhat of a
strain at time on the existing parking lot. Again, this parking area, the II
way it's designed right now, accommodates 30 cars and I think it could
accommodate up to 40. And because of the space constraints, we really
1
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
February 26, 1991 - Page 8
can't do a whole lot more but actually 1 do think that would be sufficient.
' Lash: We have both of the school parking lots on either end and the one up
here by City Hall.
Hoffman: If you go ahead and point out all the parking lots which do
encompass the area.
Bruce Chamberlain: As the master planning goes into the next phase, that
would be something that would be programmed and decided based on...
Schroers: Did you actually set this up and design it with the phase type
1 thing in mind? You're just planning on future acquisition for the second?
Bruce Chamberlain: Actually the way it's laid out, it lends itself very
' well to phasing. Probably the initial things that would be done would be,
obviously the upgrading of the play area on the south side of the school
and also the basketball court. The next steps would probably be the
addition of the tennis, the two additional tennis courts and also the
' inclusion of the three ball diamonds and parking area. At that point
there's not much involvement in putting a soccer field in. The areas where
additional grading is necessary, it really doesn't interfere with the three
ball diamonds so that could be the next phase. The areas in this corner
and also in this corner where additional fill is needed.
Schroers: Okay, what I was referring to was a phase between Concept 1 and
Concept 2 because they're so similar. And having Concept 2 as Phase 2
then?
Bruce Chamberlain: Yeah.
Schroers: Just when that property would become available or if?
Hoffman: The property was looked at as part of the community center
proposal. The owner also is the developer of the apartments there to the
east. They would like to develop one more apartment which would take up
the space which is shown still on his property. That area there and then
he would be willing to sell that parcel but obviously there needs to be a
push. There needs to be a need to go out and spend that kind of money on
' additional acquisition here. It's a good idea to have it on the plan like
this so it's identified and possibly even put it in the Comprehensive Plan
as a future open space acquisition and at such time when it did become
' available or the wheels started turning on some type of land purchase or
land, the selling of that parcel, then at that time we could take a look at
our different alternatives.
Schroers: Is it safe to assume then that staff favors Concept 1 at the
present time?
Hoffman: Certainly. Concept 1 is the most attainable at any time in the
future. Foreseeable time. Concept 2 would take some additional need or
desire by the community to have those additional ballfields and additional
land. There's also the possibility of, depending on the healthy economy,
to take a look at some support from the school district in that future
acquisition of that property.
i
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
February 26, 1991 -- Page 9
r
Robinson: What do we have out there now? We've got a soccer field. I
don't know how regulation size it is.
•
Lash: I think they can have 3 games going there at once.
Bruce Chamberlain: Three soccer fields and three baseball fields. 1
Hoffman: The soccer fields currently are in this location. Over to the
warming house area. One by the track and this area here. There's three
separate fields...and that's for fall soccer.
Schroers: Any more questions or input from the commission?
Andrews: What do we need to do here? Do we need to make a motion to
pursue a plan here or this advisory only?
Hoffman: We should take a look. These are proposed. If we could like to II
identify any changes...
Lash: I think it looks like a great plan and I'd like to see us look into II
getting some rough estimates before next year's budget is put together as
to how much it would cost to go forward with Phase 1 and see if it's
something we could get into fairly soon. I think we're going to be needing"
that space very soon, if we don't already.
Bruce Chamberlain: We can be more detailed also as far as the phasing that
would occur and break down the prices accordingly.
Andrews: It seems like most of these changes can be separated, like you
say, like realigning the hockey rinks. One addition tennis court or the
regrading of the fields so it's sort of modular. We can put it together in
different orders or all at once if we choose to.
Bruce Chamberlain: There's really only a few elements that need to be
prioritized and in order and those would be, I wouldn't include three ball
diamonds without including a parking area. It would create kind of a mess 11
as far as circulation.
Schroers: Even in Concept 1, if we felt at some point in time that the
hockey rinks were a problem, they could be turned.
Bruce Chamberlain: Without disturbing any of the retaining walls that are
currently in place.
Lash: Also like I said, the soccer wall and possible basketball up on the
north side, would be the only two additions I'd like to see with that.
Andrews: My main concern is still parkinv. I look at all those bal- lfields
and 40 spaces kind of scares me.
Lash: Can you point out to him where all the school parking lots are.
People park there all the time now.
Andrews: But that's on the other side of the complex. 1
1
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
February 26, 1991 - Page 10
Lash: But it's not for, if you called the two closest to the school.
That's where we park now. If we play on that field now, we park on the
south end parking lot. It's the closest one to the ball diamond.
Bruce Chamberlain: I guess you could imagine people, if the ball diamonds
were programmed and you knew what ball diamonds you were playing on, the
people using this diamond would probably park here. People using this
diamond would probably park in that parking lot and people using the other
facilities on the west side near Kerber Drive would probably use this one.
Hoffman: Or they could park on Kerber. The portion south would still be
available for parking and then the rear parking lot at City Hall.
Lash: Without being able to park on Kerber though, that is going to cause
a little bit more of a.
I Hoffman: They'll still be able to park on the southern half of Kerber once
you get past the crossing zone. The signs do end there. Somewhere up the
street here where there's still parking available.
Bruce Chamberlain: Also to address that concern, more there's possibly an
opportunity if we really squeeze, to get another row of cars in this
I parking lot on the west side of City Hall. Possibly.
Lash: Do you have any ideas of what we would do the season that this was
out of play?
' Hoffman: In thinking of that in the interim here, if immediately after the
4th of July when the games ended for that particular year, grading was
commenced and seeding took place sometime in late fall, it stills, the best
case scenario is Lake Susan Park with the irrigation that was available
there. We are going to be able to play there this June. But that's
leaving the month of May for it to grow so even in the best case scenario,
if all the grading could be done, the ag lime could be put in and it could
be seeded, we still would never make that so we'd have to then move them
out to the satellite parks which are developed at that time being North
I Lotus, Outlot G. Whatever that may be after tonight's meeting. Rice Lake
Marsh Park, Carver Beach Park, Meadow Green Park. We would have to do some
tight scheduling. There would be a little bit of chaos in the athletic
I association probably for that summer.
Lash: Let's wait 2 years.
I Andrews: How do we put this all in a motion?
Bruce Chamberlain: Does anyone have any more questions?
I Schroers: The plan looks good.
I Lash: Are you looking for a motion? Is that what you're looking for?
Schroers: Okay, an you added a second basketball court and soccer wall.
I Lash: Well actually 1 wouldn't mind seeing the basketball court in phase 1
if it's possible but 1 think the soccer wall would almost have to be in
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
February 26, 1991 - Page 11
phase 2. When that property would be.
Schroers: So if we make a motion to recommend concept 1 for the master
plan and add the soccer wall, the additional basketball court and leave
open the potential for moving into concept plan 2 should the additional
property come available, that would just about cover it wouldn't it? Okay, II
I guess we need a motion to that effect.
Andrews: So moved,
Lash: Second.
Andrews moved, Lash seconded that the Park and Recreation Commission
recommend to approve Concept 1 for the master plan for City Center Park
with the addition of a soccer wall and additional basketball court while
leaving open the potential for moving into Concept 2 should the additional
property become available in the future. All voted in favor and the motion"
carried unanimously.
APPROVE PURCHASE OF PLAY AREA EXPANSIONS, BANDIMERE HEIGHTS PARK, CARVER '
BEACH PLAYGROUND, CURRY FARMS PARK AND LAKE SUSAN PARK.
Hoffman: To quickly give an overview, all four of these expansions were
included in the 1991 CIP. The numbers were designated as part of that.
Currently all the play structures at those particular parks are of the
redwood structure by Landscape Structures located in Delano, Minnesota.
They were all purchased through Earl F. Anderson. Dave Owen is our
representative from Earl F. Anderson. We met on site during some blustery II weather at times at all of these particular play locations to ensure that
border was sufficient. To make sure that the play areas or the expansions
which were proposed matched. To ensure that the play amenities of the
different play apparatus were varied and to ensure that we were meeting the '
appropriate age category for each of those parks. Throughout that process
he called back and confirmed with me the plans that he was working on to
ensure that we both understood which direction we were headed. You have in il
your packet each one of the diagrams. They also include, or most of them
include as a Phase 3, all of the purchases which we're looking at at this
time are designated as Phase 2. I'd like to put up some larger boards just
to ensure that everyone has a clear understanding of what is currently at
each one of these parks and then what we are looking at purchasing in this
Phase 2 addition. And then potentially what could be added to complete or
to add to these parks in future years. Bandimere Heights Park is a small II
play structure to begin with. The additional $3,500.00 was earmarked, we
had a request from the neighborhood there for an older age group kids. As
such, the yellow area is the play structure that currently exists. This
vertical ladder was moved to Curry Farms which you note that on your plans II
there. It's pulled off to Curry Farms. Charged to this project along with
two poles to mount it and then a vertical ladder. That included with this
deck structure, the curved tube slide and then the super scoop. Additional II
border wood and then I believe phase 2 included a wheel and additional wood
wall and then the border and the additional pea rock. Anything to the
north in this area would be incorporated in as a Phase 3. There's no
question, moving on to Carver Beach.
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
February 26, 1991 - Page 12
11 Lash: This was supposed to be for older kids?
Hoffman: When you're working with $3,500.00, yeah, Older kids, the upper
arm mobility is what they usually bring in. The vertical ladder to cross
over and then you go down the slide and that's off of a 70 foot or 70 inch
step on each deck so it's the higher deck. The larger area, the longer the
tube slide.
Koubsky: Is Bandimere spelled right on that?
i Hoffman: Incorrectly spelled. Again, taking into consideration the
clatter bridge, which is a crossing mechanism. Any of the bridges... are
considered to me an older age group category...
Lash: That's Phase 3 though isn't it?
Hoffman: Yes. That would be Phase 3.
Koubsky: These totlots in general Todd. You know when I grew up we never
' had much like this and I know with insurances, people started getting sued
with kids getting hurt on what they had so they went to really dull and not
exciting playgrounds but I guess they were safe for everybody. Is there
any type of an insurance problem with any of the development of these, what
1 think are much more fun but obviously with you know chain climbers and
things like that, may pose more of a physical risk for some of the kids.
Hoffman: Any of the equipment that we would recommend purchasing would
fall under the Consumer Safety Guidance Report. It's a federal consumer...
safety and a review board reviews just about everything that is made in the
U.S. or installed here...all of these play structures for fall heights,
pinch points, trap points. Those types of things...and that's the other
reason we're going to the...surfacing or the 12 inches of pea rock with the
border.
Schroers: I think where you run into liabilities if it's found that the
City was negligent in maintaining, taking care of or knowing of a safety
' concern and not addressing it.
Hoffman: Carver Beach playground.
1 Andrews: I have a question about Bandimere. Did the neighborhood give you
an indication of what they considered to be their older age group that they
were concerned about?
Hoffman: Any time you talk about, or at least 1 believe 1 presume what
they mean when they talked about it was a comment... You look at that age
group from about 3 to 6 and then about 6 to 12. Children 12 and older
basically, they'll dabble in play equipment areas but they'll spend a
majority of their time to the older age group would be 6 to 12. Other
questions about Bandimere? What exists currently at Carver Beach play
' ground, the border was not there. The play structure shown in yellow in
the middle currently exists...sand surface which probably only reaches a
depth of anywhere from between 4 to 6 inches. There is also a slide which
is excessive in height and does not have the closed...on the stairs and
would be removed. There's an older swingset, 4 swingsets which would be
Park and Rec Commission Meeting 1
February 26, 1991 - Page 13
left in here until such time as it became too difficult to maintain and
would be removed. Proposal for $5,000.00 in the expansion for 1991 is
shown as Phase 2. It includes again the clatter bridge going across to a I
14 inch deck. The deck underneath and then we would put a 75 inch deck
with a vertical ladder up to that deck. A new loop pole which is a
climbing apparatus up onto the 70 inch deck and then a tube slide coming II down to that location. It also includes the entire border to enclose this
area and allow for the surfacing material, the pea gravel for the entire
structure. That includes moving that chain bar which is kind of located...
Phase 3, or the pulley system was originally included in the phase 2 but '
with budget constraints that could not be included as part of that. Then
Phase 3 would...
Lash: Did you say the old slide was coming out? ,
Hoffman: Yes. Currently this playground that exists in this fashion with ,
the sand throughout the entire area, there's a small balance beam. The
slide in this area and then the swingset. Any particular questions or
concerns in Carver Beach? Hearing none, Curry Farms. We have designated a
total of $2,500.00 of the $10,000.00 which was available for general park II
improvements as part of Curry Farms. That $2,500.00 does meet with the
proposed improvements at Curry Farms for 1991 which includes the addition
of play equipment, finishing the volleyball courts, installation of the II asphalt walking trail and then also the separation and installation of the
ballfield in that area, including the backstop, aggregate infield, bases
and pitching mound. Again the yellow area is what currently exists._ We
would remove the vertical ladder down to Bandimere. Install a crawl tunnel"
with 20 inch deck up to a 42 inch deck which is a somewhat lower deck with
a climbing apparatus out on this end. A tube slide and the tire swing. As
you can see, this is geared towards for the most part a younger age group. II
Over the past we've heard, the Curry Farms folks that at present the
majority of that age group there is somewhat younger age category.
Andrews: I have a question regarding all these parks. We've talked about II
moving equipment around. Is this equipment that is modular or
transportable enough or as neighborhoods mature and other ones become
younger, that it really is feasible to reconfigure our playgrounds from one"
place to another?
Hoffman: From one playground to another?
Andrews: Yeah.
Hoffman: It certainly is interesting. There's a feasibility to do that. II
All the structures that currently exist have basically been custom designed
and there is potential there to pick up pieces and moving equipment and
placing it elsewhere. Lastly, Lake Susan Park playground expansion. The II
Lake Susan community park...where there's going to be a large number of notIO
only daily park users in the family and that type of form, but also as
group picnic reservations come in, ball games that take place at the
ballfield there with the family...in need of a play activity. With the
addition of this structure here, with the exclusion again of the track
rides, which brings in all the dark colored areas and then as well the
swingset structure. This phase 2 was identified as part of phase 1
purchase so it was in place. You modified that to include some of the
11
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
February 26, 1991 - Page 14
11 newer elements which Landscape Structures has come out with. Being the
wave slide, a wave pole and those were two things that are incorporated...
Lash: For Phase 3 would we be able to stick in a couple of those diggers?
' Hoffman: Sure.
Lash: Those are always used a lot. They're real popular.
' Hoffman: Diggers are also in addition to the...popular as well.
Lash: Just to back up for a second. When I mentioned the digger, I
noticed on Bandimere you had the super scoop digger which to me is more in
line with the younger age kids.
Hoffman: It was brought in there as a means of attempting to bring the
dollar amount. There's nothing we could do in the structure itself so we
just installed that...
' Schroers: Okay, is the Phase 2 all scheduled to go in 1991?
Hoffman: Correct.
Schroers: And are the people that you've been working with, they are going
to install them?
11 Hoffman: The City maintenance crews will install these.
Schroers: And we have the staff and the time to do all that?
Hoffman: All the Phase l's or all the initial development, all of these
were installed by the Park and Maintenance crews and these additions as
well...would be a number priority or something installed in the...
Schroers: Unless there are additional questions or comments then we could
look for a motion that these capital improvements project be approved as
shown.
Andrews: I'll make the motion that we approve these projects as proposed
' and ask that they be completed as early as possible this year.
Erhart: And I'll second that.
Andrews moved, Erhart seconded that the Park and Recreation Commission
recommend to approve the play area expansions for Bandimere Heights Park,
Carver Beach Playground, Curry Farms Park and Lake Susan Park as proposed
by staff asking that they be installed as early as possible in 1991. All
voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously.
Lash: Are you going to be prioritizing which ones you want to put in
first?
Hoffman: As to these particular projects? We certainly, I'm working on a
work funtion prioritization and in doing that today, I labeled these all as
a priority 1. If we want to get into specifics as to which one you'd like
1
Park and Rec Commission Meeting 1
February 26, 1991 - Page 15
to see included first among that ranking system, I'd certainly welcome your"
opinion in doing so.
ESTABLISH 1991 LAKE ANN PARK ENTRANCE FEES. '
Hoffman: In accordance with the Chanhassen City Code, Chapter 14, Park and
Recreation, Section 14 -59, Parking Permits, the parking permit fee for Lake ,
Ann Park must be established by resolution by the City Council each year.
The history was provided there so you have some information on what has
occurred with gross revenues and then with the fees which were charged to
accumulate those gross revenues over the past 4 years. As you recall, last
year in trying to review this item, I think I paged back all the way to
September and then we talked about it in 4 different meetings during 1989
to finally come up to a conclusion or recommendation for the 1990 fees. As 11
you can see, those fees which were $2.00 for a daily, $5.00 for an annual
resident, and $10.00 for a non - resident annual accumulated in $12,500.00
gross revenues which was up a thousand from the year prior. As well, some
of the majority of that discussion that time around centered around how we
would operate the gate function itself. Who would be allowed in without
paying. Who strictly has to pay. How are we going to handle the adult
softball. Those types of things. The conclusion which was made and the
recommendation which was made at that time is that participants of youth
activities and instructional activities, whether that be a baseball
program, swimming lesson, playground program, something of that nature,
where they've signed up. They've paid a fee to be in the program. Those
people and their spectators and /or parents would not be charged a fee to
enter the park. That includes teams coming in from out of town visitor
teams coming in to play a Chanhassen team in a particular ballgame. It was II
also recommended at that time to include 15 park stickers or $75.00 worth
of park stickers right into the adult softball fee. Those two
recommendations and those two guidelines or procedures worked fairly well
or worked extremely well. The best of any that's been used in my
experience at the gatehouse for the past 4 years. We had the least amount
of problems and things seemed to operate fairly smoothly. There's also
been talk in the past about, it's somewhat unusual to have this type of
charge at a community park. We've talked that it is not unusual to have
this type of charge at a beach. Strictly a beach function but Lake Ann is II
more than that. However, as noted in my memo, under the current economic
situations which we're surviving, omitting the fee or dismantling at this
time is not recommended either. What is recommended is that since things
did operate smoothly, we stick with the same fees and recommend those fees
and the same procedures as 1990.
Andrews: I'd like to make one comment. I think for the sake of smoothness II
I agree it ought to be left alone but I've had a position of being a
conservative when it comes to revenue and I think with the State and
Federal government projecting, I've heard figures around 40% as far as
reductions or contribution to local government and I guess I have a concern!'
about that we have to watch our available - resources and our available
sources of money carefully and if indeed we do see our funding dry up that
we'd have to take a look at raising our fees for 1992.
Schroers: As a benefit to the newer members of the commission, I think we
might point out that this is an issue that we have spent a lot of time on. II
It wasn't easy to reach a workable and acceptable solution and as far as
1
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
February 26, 1991 -- Page 16
11 revenues that's generated in the overall budget of the park operations,
it's really not all that significant. I mean if we raise the gate fees by
a buck or two, we're not really doing ourself a major justice by doing
that.
Hoffman: If you recall Jerry's end of the year report, when you take off
the employee cost and those types of things associated with that, we were
down around just in excess of $5,000.00 for a net revenue.
Lash: I have just two comments that I thought of tonight. Originally I
thought this was just fine and I still do. It worked last year and we
spent hours discussing it last year. I think that's fine but one gripe
that I end up with, and this is pretty petty I have to admit but I realize
there are a lot of teams, men. Well, maybe women too. Softball teams who
have non- residents on their teams and then they're getting the sticker for
the resident fee. But I don't see that there's anything we can do about it
but that kind of gripes me. Number one that they're non - resident and then
they're getting the thing for the same price and can use it as many times
as they want. Not just for games. But another thing just came to my mind
and that's how similar some of the facilities at Lake Susan are to this
park and is it something we want to think about. Do we want to have a
similar kind of system at Lake Susan or is that just always going to be
free admittance? ...adding on at Lake Ann if it's free and it's got the
boat access and the swimming beach and the picnic shelter and a lot of the
same facilities.
11 Erhart: Maybe they'll go over there then.
Lash: Well yeah, maybe they will. Or maybe it would behoove us to have
the same kind of system over there and double.
Erhart: If you buy a pass for Lake Ann, you could get into Lake Susan?
Hoffman: The situation, it has been discussed time and time again.
Initially the fee was established at Lake Ann as part of the beach program.
Lake Ann was initially basically a beach setting. The ballfields were
installed at the same time. There will not be an official, there's a sand
area at Lake Susan Park. You would be hard pressed to find anybody who
will partake in swimming there because of the water quality. It will not
be maintained as a beach. It will not be marked as a beach and there will
not be lifeguards there so Lake Ann will continue to be the popular and the
most favorite spot for that type of activity.
' Schroers: Is the shelter at Lake Susan available for reservations?
Hoffman: Yes. As noted in one of the upcoming items.
Schroers: Okay. Well I guess that is something that we could look at some
point in time in the future if we feel that it's warranted but for right
now we're dealing with the 1991. Were you thinking about that for this
season?
Lash: No, no, no. I just thought it was food for thought. That if we're
going to have this set up at one facility that is I think comparable in a
11
Park and Rec Commission Meeting 1
February 26, 1991 - Page 17
II lot of the things offered that it just doesn't seem right to have it at one
and not the other.
Schroers: Well that's a good point. II
Lash: Just to think about it. ,
Schroers: Okay, with that is there anyone interested in submitting a
motion?
Lash: I would move that we approve the park fees as used in 1990 for Lake 1
Ann. For 1991. The same as 1990.
Schroers: Okay, is there a second? II
Erhart: Second.
Lash moved, Erhart seconded that the Park and Recreation Commission I
recommend to establish the 1991 parking fees at the same rate as 1990 and
that all park users, except youth participants of organized recreational II and instructional activities and their parents /spectators, be required to
pay the fee. Further, it is recommended that all adult softball teams pay
for 15 park stickers ($75.00) as part of their team registration fee. All II
voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously.
ESTABLISH GROUP PICNIC AND BALLFIELD RESERVATION FEES. 1
Hoffman: You led us right into item 5 Larry in that this particular memo
discussed group picnic and ballfield reservation fees. Group picnic fees II
are nothing new. Those have been established and used in the past years
but the idea of the ballfield reservation or generating some income by use
of the ballfields by non - resident groups is new to our community. However,"
it is used extensively in other communities to generate some considerable
amounts of money for the general park funds. Again, Lake Susan Park, the
one which I dealt with first, has been out of commission let us say for the
past 2 years with the remodeling taking place at that park. Prior to that II
time it was, people call it a private park. It was isolated. The picnic
shelter was constructed years before as part of a project to build a
wellhouse which also exists as part of that building. However, it was made
available for group reservations. They used the farmer's field access road ,
to get down into that location and it remained a popular spot at that time.
Now with the drastic changes which has taken place at Lake Susan, I would
foresee that it is going to be even more popular than Lake Ann for group
II
picnics due to the fact that it does having running water at the current
time, electricity and the nice park shelter which is there. The amenities
are listed. The recommended group rates are based off of those amenities. II
Taking a look at what other communities and what other agencies are
charging and then as well taking into consideration both non - resident and
resident groups and then as well giving a discount for recommended and
discount for school groups, government groups and non - profits. Boy Scouts
and senior groups. Those type of things. Fees which are being
recommended for a resident group for Lake Susan Park shelter is $50.00 per
picnic. Non - resident group would be $150.00. And then non - profit or ,
senior group discounts would receive a 25% discount. Again, to clarify
11
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
February 26, 1991 - Page 18
when these people are making a group picnic reservation, they only receive
the exclusive right of the shelter building and then all the other park
1 facilities are open to the public and subject to use by other people.
Larry, however you would like to take one of these. If you would like to
address each one separately or all of them as a package. It's up to you.
Schroers: You mean each individual fee?
Hoffman: Each individual site.
Schroers: Well, we should maybe just look at each site and see what kind
of questions or input it generates. One thing that I did have overall, a
, question is, has staff considered charging a damage deposit along with a
reservation fee?
Hoffman: That's a good point. It was not noted in this particular
memorandum but as part of the park facility reservation form which we
currently have, we do use a damage deposit which is in excess of $100.00.
Lash: How much in excess?
Hoffman: Hundred bucks. None. None in excess.
Lash: That was my question too.
Hoffman: If it included picnic kits, then it was $125.00.
11 Lash: Another question overall. How do you make this, the reservation
known? Say I reserved it for 2 :00 and a whole bunch of other people showed
up at noon and I got there at 2 :00. How am I supposed to get rid of those
people?
11 Hoffman: We need to entail a signage system which would allow people to
know if it is reserved for that particular day or not and then as well,
provide the people who are using the picnic shelter on that particular day
with a copy of their reservation permit. Typically those folks show up
fairly early prior to the normal picnic or recreation starting, you know at
10 :00 -11 :00 when typically the busy times pick up. They're there earlier
setting up so typically there isn't that problem but we should come up with
a signage system which will allow those people to know that specifically.
Lash: And then who would do that?
11 Hoffman: Who would change that?
Lash: Well who would go put the signs up or whatever?
II Hoffman: It would be something that could be permanently affixed, either
by a metal pole systems in front of the area or permanently affixed to the
shelter building itself.
Schroers: I think what Jan is getting at, is there a staff person that
would be responsible for going down and putting up the sign or would it be
II up to the group to put up the signs themself?
1
Park and Rec Commission Meeting 1
February 26, 1991 - Page 19
Hoffman: We would designate a staff person. Probably a seasonal
P Y al
maintenance person that is going to be coming in to do the clean up or the
maintenance after these picnics as well on the weekend. '
Schroers: We found that a two sign system works. We have a name of the
reservation area on a sign and then that sign says reserved at a given date"
and we also have metal poles with reserved signs that we put in the ground
immediately adjacent to the parking area for the parking area that is
adjacent to that reserved area. So other people coming in see on the name
of the site like Lake Susan picnic shelter, reserved. Then when they to
into park, there's also a sign that says reservation parking only and these
are on posts that you can just push into the ground and then pull out
again. ,
Lash: My other question was, the 25% fee for the non-profit and the senior
groups. Is that also based on resident and non - resident? 1
Hoffman: Correct.
Schroers: Do you want to take us through these site by site Todd? ,
Hoffman: I can. Lake Ann Park, the two sites which currently exist. The
Parkview group reservation site and then Lakeside and if you had a question"
on where those two sites are, they were designated on the map. It was
attached in the back. Parkview is up on top of the hill. Currently it
just exists as a large grassy, open area. There's picnic tables there.
Currently there are grills there but a large group picnic grill will be
installed as part of the 1991 CIP. The other amenities which are listed
are also available to that site. This group receives the exclusive use of
the picnic area and there's also a volleyball court and horseshoe pits
which are incorporated right into the site. The fees for Lake Ann
basically cannot be patterned after other parks of this particular nature
per se because we do entail the parking permit system. So the overall, the"
base rate is somewhat lower but then that is brought up, or that is
increased through the parking of the vehicles. So the recommended group
reservation sites for Parkview and Lakeside coincide. They are a base rate
of $25.00 for a resident group with one parking permit per vehicle and then"
a non - resident group rate, base rate of $75.00 with a one parking permit
per vehicle required. In the past, these company picnics which have taken
place, the larger ones which have taken place at Parkview, at times
generate in excess of $200.00 to $300.00 to $400.00 in parking permits so II
the additional revenue from those parking permits is in most cases picked
up by the company. Then in other cases where the patrons each have to pay '
individually, the money is still realized there. That increased revenue.
Koubsky: Todd, could there be options with a lot of these you know groups.
You might want to play softball or get into that type of activity where 1
they could have an optional ballfield rental fee.
Hoffman: For these particular groups? 1
Koubsky: Or would that be something separate?
Hoffman: We could take a look at that. It would per chance become ,
somewhat cumbersome in that if we reserved one ballfield for a particular
1
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
February 26, 1991 - Page 20
group that was reserving a site for that weekend and then a group came in
and would voice that they would like to reserve'all three fields, we
11 wouldn't have that availability then at that time. So we can pre -empt one
or the other. Whichever way we choose to do it. Traditionally weekends,
the reservation group sites have had their choice of all fields, 1, 2 or 3.
The ballfields are just not used that extensively on weekends. However,
there is times in the fall when they're used for in -house tournaments or
State or Regional tournaments where then those group picnicers have
problems because they do not have a field available. Another thought with
the fields 4, 5 and 6 available by June or by mid - summer, they would still
be in adequate condition where they could accommodate a pick -up game by one
of these groups. It falls back again to signage. How do you designate
then if you're going to reserve this ballfield? You would have to go over
and sign that as well. That type of thing.
11 Robinson: Did you check with some other areas Todd as to when you came up
with these fees?
Hoffman: As I mentioned, yeah. I talked with, over in the past years I've
talked to the cities of Chaska, Shakopee. I called over to Hennepin Parks.
I've had some experience with the city of Bloomington and I also talked
with people in Eden Prairie. Again, as I mentioned, Lake Ann is somewhat
unique that you have a base rate there and then depending on the size of
the particular group, you're going to realize a different in revenue there
so it's, and again as also noted in the report, the amenities which we-
currently offer at these two sites are somewhat limited. And as those
amenities, if a park shelter is built or water or electricity is brought
into those sites, these fees should and will rise accordingly.
11 Lash: I think Lake Susan has quite a few amenities don't you?
Hoffman: Oh yeah. It certainly does.
Lash: That seems like a real deal. $50.00. Isn't it?
Hoffman: In the past it's been used at a no charge type of situation.
Lash: Well you couldn't get in there before.
11 Hoffman: If the Commission feels $50.00 is unnecessarily low, we can
certainly increase that.
Schroers: I think it's good business practice to, for the first year have
your fees reasonable and generate interest and then if we find that we're
just booked, it makes it a lot easier to raise the fees.
Lash: Do you think that's compared with Hennepin? You have that
experience. Does that seem like it's right in the ballpark? I really
don't know.
Schroers: Well, I think for the facilities that are offered that you're
right. It is a good deal. I think that we could get more money for it but
I don't know that we should. On the first year I think we should go with
11 staff's proposal of $50.00 and let's look at it for a year and see what
1
Park and Rec Commission Meeting 1
February 26, 1991 - Page 21
happens and then if we feel, because this fee structure tends to come up
every year anyway.
Lash: That's true. See how it goes. I guess I'd be interested, if it
looks like it's going well and I think that they will from the past. It
sounds like Lake Ann is always booked up. I guess I want to look at having"
it be, having the resident rate be 50% of the non - resident rate and that
would be in line with what we're charging for the parking. Residents pay
half as much. Here they're paying only a third as much.
Schroers: That makes sense. In some places, in busy areas, rates are
different. On weekdays versus weekends versus holidays and you can get
this thing to be real complicated. 1
Koubsky: We might want to consider since Lake Susan does have more
amenities, it does have bathrooms with running water. There is a shelter.
There might be more things to damage there. That if you did assess damage
deposits, you might consider assessing a large damage deposit be put down
for the Lake Susan than to the other areas.
Schroers: I think the damage deposit is important. It sends the group ,
leader a message right away that we care about our facilities.
Hoffman: We've used them in the past for trash pick -up, site clean -up. To ,
insure that that did take place to a degree which we were set asiding.
Schroers: Would we have done that to anything over the ordinary $18.00 or II
$20.00 per hour out of the damage deposit for unusual clean -up or whatever?
Okay, did you want to get into the ballfields then Todd?
Hoffman: The ballfields, we have had requests in the past and groups have ,
used the ballfields on weekends for church tournaments, invitational
tournaments, those types of things. And this has gone on over, since the
inception of the Lake Ann Park. Many communities, Champlain in one, uses
these fees just extensively and they're booked weekend after weekend
throughout the summer for invitational tournaments, softball tournaments
and they're realizing some great revenue. What I've laid out here is the II
rental for fields 1, 2 and 3 only. Since the three new fields, we'll try
to lay off those as much as possible in this first year to allow the
continued growth and good health and for a one or two day rental
possibility. The rental would include the exclusive use of those fields
and the unimproved shelter as it currently exist. Manual field dragger,
hand drag. Two bags of the sparkle liming material per day. The lime
marking machine. Portable refuse and the refuse service which is provided. II
The recommended group rental rates for an 8:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. day which
does not include lights, are for a resident group. One day, $100.00. For
a non - resident group, one day $200.00. And for a two day, resident group, II
$175.00. Corresponding, $350.00 for a two day non - resident group. If
those groups choose to use the lights, the rental of the lights until 10:00
p.m. on Field 1 only would be an additional $25.00 per day. Then again the I
non-profit senior group discount rate of 25% off also included as part of
the ballfield reservation.
1
11
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
February 26, 1991 - Page 22
11 Andrews: I wanted to make a comment on the rental of lights. I look at
that, the potential extension of the rental day that you're offering as
well as additional cost to operate those lights and I don't think the
11 $25.00 fee is adequate for that. Potentially you're looking, near
September 30th, you're looking at a substantial extension of the day for
them to get more, or reduce their hourly cost to use the field but at the
same time you're incurring substantial additional costs to operate those
lights. 1 guess 1 feel that that should be raised.
Hoffman: That's a point well taken. The $25.00, it only obviously pays
for electricity and some more but not so much more than it would pay for
those additional 4 hours. Might be near $50.00.
Andrews: That's what I was going to say. I would suggest $50.00 is a more
reasonable figure.
Schroers: I would find that acceptable.
Koubsky: Would the city maintenance individual then be in charge of
turning those on and off?
Hoffman: A timer mechanism would be set for those nights appropriately.
Andrews: Typically they run well past 10:00 anyway so people can get off
the fields, get into their cars and get out anyway so you're even looking
at a cost beyond 10:00 actually.
1 Erhart: So $50.00 a day?
Schroers: Any more comments, input, changes?
Robinson: I make a motion that the group picnic and ballfield reservation
fees be accepted as presented except for the $50.00 per day fee on the
II rental of lights.
Schroers: Second?
II Lash: I'd like to add to that if I may. That this be reviewed again next
year.
1 Andrews: I'll second that.
Robinson moved, Andrews seconded that the Park and Recreation Commission
11 recommend to establish the 1991 group picnic and ballfield reservation
rates as presented by staff with the following amendments: The rate for
rental of lights at Lake Ann Park, Field #1 be $50.00 and that this item be
reviewed annually. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously.
II NAME PARKS - LAKE SUSAN HILLS WEST, OUTLOTS F. G AND H AND PHEASANT HILLS
PARCEL.
Hoffman: The item you've all been waiting for right.
1
1
Park and Rec Commission Meeting 1
February 26, 1991 - Page 23
Robinson: How many commission members do we have and how w many parks do we
have?
Hoffman: As noted in this report, we did discuss some of these outlots in 11
December of 1989. In the same timeframe of those discussions about the
Lake Ann Park fees, we were somewhat long winded back then for some reason."
It may end up to be the same case this evening. There are four outlots as
mentioned. Outlot E is not being addressed at this time. It is the
largest outlot in the Lake Susan Hills West area. That outlot has not been"
deeded to the City because the area surrounding it has not been final
platted and it has not been deeded over to the City. At such time when
that does occur, then we'll go back and plug that park in with the names so
I just brought it up this evening so as we think about if we get into a
trend for the other three parks in this area, that we should be thinking
about this one at some point in the future as well. Chairman Schroers, I
guess I'm going to leave it up to you to run through these and if you want 11
to take them in the order they appear or if we want to jump back to
probably, potentially the easiest one. Get that one out of the way first,
we certainly can do that.
Schroers: Well, let's just take them as they come. Before the meeting
some of us that were here a little earlier were discussing it and I know
that there are a couple people that have thought of some names ahead of
time which may be helpful. Let's just attack it here and see what we can
do. So on Outlot F of Lake Susan Hills West. What do we have for
suggestions?
Lash: I had several different thoughts on this. First of all I like the
idea of a name that when someone says it, you have an idea of where it is.
Like Pheasant Hills Park or I was going to say Chaparral Park but that got 11
changed to Meadow Green so that doesn't apply anymore but I like using the
development name if we can, although with this particular area, we have a
snaffu because all four parks are in the same development basically plus a II
community park there too. So then I thought, well most of the streets are
named after some kind of wildlife or some kind of bird so maybe that would
be a nice theme to kind of hook them together. Or the thing I liked the
best was to hook it in somehow with the natural amenity that Todd pointed II
out in each case. In the first case, he said that the hill was the focal
point and so I came up with some different ideas of something Hill Park.
Now if we want to connect it with where it is, it would almost have to be II
Susan Hill park. I don't know that I like that but people maybe would get
the idea that it's somewhere by Lake Susan.
Robinson: It's probably better than Outlot F. ,
Lash: Well I don't know. These are the ones that I wrote down. I saw
Sunset Trail there and I put Sunset Hill Park, Susan Hill Park, Flamingo
Hill Park, since Flamingo Road is right there. Hillside Park, South Hill
Park, West Hill Park, or West Susan Hill Park. I like the idea of Hill in
there just because it's got a hill and then as you'll see, my theme carries"
through to the rest of them as we go on.
Schroers: Okay. Well would you like to record these Todd and we can maybe"
just go with a show of hands and pick the most popular name and it will be
accomplished. Dave, did you have any?
1
11 Park and Rec Commission Meeting
February 26, 1991 - Page 24
Koubsky: Well I came close. I came up with Sunset Park which is almost
Sunset Hills Park and I think if we were going to name any one park after
the development, it'd probably be Outlot G since they're slatted for hockey
rinks there, a ballpark, you know where most of the people would want to
know where it's at. So the best I came up with is a match of Sunset Hills
I Park.
Schroers: Okay. Curt, did you have any further suggestions?
Robinson: No.
Schroers: Dawne?
Erhart: No. Sounds good to me.
Andrews: I came up with Flamingo Hill and the only reason why is, if
I were being directed to the park 1 wanted to pick a street or something
that would identify where it is to make it easier to find. I wanted to get
away from anything that used Lake Susan just so people wouldn't get
confused with Lake Susan Park. So I guess I would like it either Flamingo
Hill or Sunset Hill. Either one would be good to identify where it is.
11 Koubsky: Yeah, the idea with Flamingo too, the access to the park would be
off Flamingo Drive and not Sunset which might be confusing.
-
Lash: I just think Sunset sounds nicer.
11 Andrews: Well Flamingo and Hill is kind of a...
Schroers: Was one of it, was it Flamingo Hills West or just Flamingo
Hills?
• Andrews: Flamingo Hill.
Lash: Or Hillside. Then I had south and west just because in my mind
I picture these parks as being kind of south and west.
Schroers: Well you know we're calling this West because it's on the west
side of Lake Susan but it certainly isn't on the west side of Chanhassen so
11 we may be throwing out a geographical misnomer there by doing that.
Lash: Another thing we could try and tie it in with. I thought of this
for the third part, is Powers Boulevard. So we could, maybe if we wanted
to, we could figure out a way to put Powers in there and people would know.
Schroers: Flamingo Power Hill.
Lash: Power Hill Park.
Erhart: They're getting worse I think.
Hoffman: Power Hills is closer to G. Or H, excuse me.
Schroers: Todd, how about reading them back to us and we'll just have a
show of hands and the one that gets the most hands.
1
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
February 26, 1991 -- Page 25
1
Lash: The only problem I have with the Flamingo and it makes sense because
that's the street that connects to it, is who in town is going to know
where Flamingo Drive is except for the people who live right there. Most
people are not going to know where Flamingo is so I don't think that's
going to be a tip off as to the location at a11.
Schroers: No, but if we went with Power Hill or...
(There was a tape change at this point in the discussion.) ,
Koubsky: ...community were going to slide. Is that a big hill?
Lash: There's not that many neat sliding hills. 1
Hoffman: This could be a, potentially could be. There's also a hill
incorporated as H but this one has the, really has the potential to have a II
hill off of both sides from that focal point up there on top of the hill.
Koubsky: It could be Power Hill.
Hoffman: Flamingo Drive is going to be along street which extends all the
way down along the east edge of the park and then it does have the access
off of Flamingo Drive. Then Flamingo will curve around and hook back up to II
Lake Susan Hills.
Schroers: In your activities calendars that you send out Todd for sIsring
and fall, do you have the parks and the different facilities in them listed
in that? Or if there's an event like sliding, would you list the park and
then people can call in and ask where the park is located if they don't
know.
Hoffman: Typically the summer brochures lists all the park locations and
all the amenities which are located there.
I/
Schroers: Is that in like a graph form where you just have the names of
the parks on one and then the amenities and you just read across?
Hoffman: It has been put into that form and we had that form updated
currently. I'm looking at the number of the parks and the number of
recreational opportunities which we 'have among those parks has increased to II
a point where we should have a good quality park index or park map and that
has been the goal in the back of my head for the past couple of years.
Waiting until the majority of these parks down in this area came on line II and received names so we could include those as part of it so it wouldn't
be outdated so quickly. So that is a potential project as well.
Schroers: What have we eliminated? We don't want to attach Lake Susan to II
it. We don't want to attach West to it. •
Robinson: Why not? 1
Schroers: Because it may be confusing with the main Lake Susan Park.
Lash: What if we didn't put Lake in front of it? What if we just put r
Susan?
1
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
February 26, 1991 - Page 26
11 Andrews: I still that people not familiar to the area, that could be
somewhat confusing.
11 Schroers: It is.
Lash: See I think that gives you a general idea of where it is right off
the bat.
Robinson: And this really will be a neighborhood park anyway right?
Hoffman: Yeah.
Robinson: So it will be the neighborhood people that would be interested
in it. I would imagine.
Schroers: Yeah. I would think it would too and we need to find a way to
eliminate some of these things so we can get down to picking a name or
we're going to be here for weeks. We've been through this before. We've
got to throw out some names, pick one and move on with it. Like Todd said
earlier, you drive through these little towns around and you see a park and
it has an unusual name and it may appear unusual to someone who hasn't
lived there, but people that live around there and are familiar with it,
it's very common. You adapt and get used to it.
Hoffman: It seems to me that we have eliminated most except Sunset Hill
and Flamingo Hill. Sunset Hill Park and Flamingo Hill Park.
Koubksy: I guess I'd just like to leave Power Hill in there just because
this, in looking at this, it's got 70 or 80 feet of relief which is a
pretty big hill. If the kids want to go sliding, they can go up to Power
Hill.
Lash: That actually is kind of a cool name when you think of it. Like a
power sledding.
Schroers: Okay, in regards to Outlot F here. Todd, call for a show of
hands on the three names.
Hoffman: Sunset Hill, all in favor. Flamingo Hill, all in favor. Power
Hill.
Schroers: Outlot F is now Power Hill Park.
Koubsky: Can I ask for clarification? Do we want Powers Hill or Power
Hill?
Andrews: I think Power.
Erhart: I'm just going along with what you recommend because you live over
there. If you like the sounds of it, that's fine with me.
Schroers: I think it's good. It's timely. It's a comtemporary name.
Erhart: They can power walk over there and then they can power slide.
1
Park and Rec Commission Meeting 11
February 26, 1991 - Page 27
1
Schroers: Okay, let's move on to Outlot G which is also Lake Susan Hills
West.
Lash: This is the one Todd said has a ridge in it so I sort of course
favor the something Ridge Park. Maybe it should be Power Ridge. Are we
stuck in a rut or what? 1
Schroers: We can combine some of our ideas. The first name could be
Sunset Ridge.
Lash: Heron Ridge. That's one of the streets there. Swan is over there.
It could be Swan Ridge or Swan Park. Or Ridge. He said there's a hill in
it. By Lake Drive, it could be Lake Ridge Park. Duck Ridge.
Schroers: Any other ideas? Suggestions?
Koubsky: Lake Susan Hills Park, Lake Drive Park and Audubon Park. Those 11
are my three. People do know where Audubon is. There will be a lot of
activity in there.
I/
Andrews: How about Bird Ridge?
Robinson: Outlot G has a nice ring to it. 1
Lash: G Ridge.
Schroers: Dawne or Curt, do you have any suggestions? 1
Lash: What did you say, Lake Drive?
Koubsky: Lake Drive Park.
Andrews: That's one I had as well. I came up with. Scarey isn't it?
I/
Lash: We're all so original.
Schroers: How many names do you have Todd? 1
Hoffman: Heron Ridge, Hill Ridge, Lake Ridge, Sunset Ridge, Lake
Drive Park, Audubon Park, Bird Ridge. ,
Andrews: You can remove Bird Ridge. It sounds bad.
Schroers: Alright, if those are our suggestions. Let's go for a show of 1
hands one more time.
Lash: Can I just ask a question quick first here? What's the name, going II
to be the main access road to it? Is it going to be Lake Drive West? Is
that how most people would get to it?
Koubsky: Right. The other one would be an easement through some of the I/
properties.
Hoffman: There's the potential for the future access, I noted in here. 11
It's on your master park plan, the future Creek Drive which would come in
I/
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
February 26, 1991 -- Page 28
11 off of Audubon to serve the industrial district which is coming in to the
south portion of the tracks there. That would be where they note the
11 parking area. Again, Creek Drive is not a name which has been designated.
It's just thrown into this diagram.
Koubsky: The designated name is Lake Drive West right? For that access or
that road through there?
Hoffman: For the pedestrian access?
Koubsky: No. For just the vehicular access.
Hoffman: Currently it's Creek Drive as shown.
Lash: It says proposed.
Hoffman: Oh, Lake Drive West? It's shown two different. Lake Drive West
and then future Creek Drive so it's shown two different ways.
Lash: How are we supposed to know which one it's going to end up being?
Hoffman: We don't. These are both proposed.
I . Lash: I wouldn't want to name it after one or the other and then have it
be.
Koubsky: Should we wait to see what the road's called?
Hoffman: If you choose to go that route. Again, that's just a proposed
road. It may not be developed for a few years.
Schroers: We have some names there that don't involve the roads that we
could pick from.
Hoffman: Any favorites?
11 Andrews: Sunset Ridge. I like that.
Schroers: Sunset Ridge I liked also. Let's eliminate the ones on this one
that have road names unless anyone is opposed to that.
Andrews: What does that leave?
Erhart: Sunset.
Hoffman: I like that Larry. That leaves Sunset.
II Lash: How about West Ridge?
11 Schroers: Well there again, that could be confusing geographically because
it's more in the center of the city and not in the western part.
Lash: Okay, Center Ridge.
II Schroers: Center Ridge, there you go.
1
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
February 26, 1991 -- Page 29
Robinson: Let's vote.
11
Hoffman: Sunset Ridge. There it is, unanimous. 1
Schroers: Outlot G is now Sunset Ridge Park.
Andrews: I've got one for Outlot H you guys are going to love. Sure fire 1
winner.
Schroers: Okay, well we're there. Jim, why don't you dive us into Outlot 1
H?
Andrews: Prairie Knoll is what I came up with. 1
Lash: I like Knoll.
Andrews: And Todd said he was there and he said there was, you know he 11
mentioned this evening that they were there walking the property. There
was a very small little grassy spot at the top and a bird flew up out of
it, so Prairie Knoll. I came up with Wild Knoll and Dove Knoll too.
Lash: I had Dove Knoll. I also had Powers Knoll. South Powers Park.
Robinson: How did we get so many parks over there? 1
Hoffman: It was a planned unit development. Lake Susan Hills West was a
PUD. They need to go up and beyond the normal requirements for this
development so extensive parkland was designated. To give you a little
visualization, if it helps in this one. Especially reinforcing Prairie
Knoll, if I'm so brave to do so. The park is not going to be developed to II
a great deal. It's not going to look like a groomed park. There is the
trail. There is a play structure. There is the knoll but then the rest of
it is, it was originally prairie grass or grassland and some agricultural 1
and then it's a large flowing expanse down to an area which will not
contain houses but which is an open lowland area.
Erhart: So very natural? 1
Hoffman: Yeah, it's a very natural type area. So it does fit.
Lash: I like that.
Robinson: Yep.
Schroers: Prairie Knoll?
Erhart: Prairie Knoll it is. 1
Lash: I like the way we went with the Indian theme that we talked about
last time. None of them have anything to do with indians. 1
Schroers: Alright. Now we're on to Pheasant Hills parkland.
Andrews: Can we just vote? 1
I/
I/ Park and Rec Commission Meeting
February 26, 1991 - Page 30
Hoffman: All those in favor of Pheasant Hills Park? There we go.
Andrews: I can't believe we got that done in less than 2 hours.
Lash: I just got a kick out of reading the Minutes from last time. You
11 could tell it was late at night.
Koubsky: You know through those Minutes though, Outlot E there is a creek
running through it also.
11 Lash: What's it called?
Koubsky: I don "t know if that has a name.
Lash: That was what we talked about last time. We called it Critter
Creek. Goose Creek. We had all kinds of names for it.
Schroers: Well that pretty much gets us through item 6. We don't really
need any motion on that. -
Hoffman: A motion to recommend those, approve those names.
Lash: I make a motion that we approve those names.
Robinson: I second.
Lash moved, Robinson seconded that the Park and Recreation Commission
recommend the following park names for Lake Susan Hills West: Outlot F,
Power Hill Park; Outlot G, Sunset Ridge Park; Outlot H, Prairie Knoll Park;
and the Pheasant Hills parcel as Pheasant Hills Park. All voted in favor
and the motion carried unanimously.
Lash: Do you like them Todd? Or should we change them?
Hoffman: No. I certainly my like them but m only thought was with all due
respect to both Dave and to the Commission, to take a look at Power Hill.
We had throwing in Powers Hill Park. Do we want to designate it as a power
hill for these people to have this image that this hill is an extensive
hill? And I'm questioning that because we don't know exactly what it's
going to be developed. There is the grade, the potential there for a
community sliding hill. Powers Road is very well know in town and the hill
is probably the most distinct hill off of Powers Road so either Power Hill
11 or Powers Hill Park is, they're both. We tossed them around but I have no
objection at all to Power Hill. Just for a discussion.
Lash: Powers would lead people to identify where it is a little bit more
than what it is. But I think Power Hill is easier to say.
Schroers: I think Power Hill is a catchier name for the park.
Erhart: As long as when they grade they don't make it into a little mole
hill.
1
1
•
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
February 26, 1991 - Page 31
AMENDMENT TO MOTION ESTABLISHING PARK AND TRAIL DEDICATION FEE SCHEDULE —
LAKE RILEY HILLS.
Hoffman: As you may recall, those commissioners that were present last 11
August and September, one of the few site plan reviews for development that
we've seen in 1990 or 1991 to date, came through being the Lake Riley Hills"
development which on the northwest side of Riley lake. Being John
Klingelhutz was the applicant. At that time it was for about 75 homes on a
fairly large site. Medium density type living. We did designate a park
site initially to the north of a wetland. The map should help bring back
1/
your memory. Initially we looked for parkland in this area to the north of
the wetland. A couple of situations that came into play, is that the
developer did not want to forfeit those lots because of the sight lines to II
Lake Riley from the back, rear yards of those lots. As well, we had to
agree with that to some degree because of the grades in that particular
area don't meet with active park uses per se. So the Commission took a
look at this at a second meeting and identified this particular area as
it's centrally located. The grade is there so it's really basically flat.
There's no grade to that as it exist and with the sidewalks being proposed
on North Road and West Road, access to and from that particular location
was very good. For strollers, bikes, children walking, that type of thing."
So what was recommended at that time is that in lieu of trail fees, they
construct a sidewalk along North Road, along the West Road and then leave II
us with a trail easement along Lyman Blvd. so in the future when other
trail easements are required in that area, we could get this neighborhood
down a trail system into the Bandimere Community Park. Then these lots,
24, 25, 26, and 21, 22, 23 were designated as the park location. That was I,
passed up to the, that recommendation was passed up to the Council and then
this development lay dormant for the past approximately 6 months.
Conditions and the reasoning for that is the developer along with the
engineer...taking a look. These conditions of approval that we imposed on
them along with conditions of approval which the Planning Commission
imposed on them, they needed to take some time to go back and take a look 11
at this. What they've come up with and was the new preliminary plat dated
January 19, 1991 is shown on this bottom configuration. As you can see,
it's basically unchanged. They did change the area down around the lake
but including the proposed new Lyman right -of -way for the road improvements"
which will potentially be taking place in the future there, Lyman is going
to be classified as a minor arterial which means that the additional
right -of -way for the expansion and mpgrade of the road and also to
incorporate this 45 mph curve in this area. So all the changes to the lot II
configuration are basically cosmetic. They did come back with a slightly
down graded or down sized park location. However, it still fits into the 11
scheme, the land which we need in this particular instance to fulfill the
needs of that development. As it is shown, Outlot B contains 82,592 square
feet or just under 2 acres of parkland. This particular location was just
over 2 acres of parkland. The dark line shown in this area designates this ll
new border so as you can see, what was recommended and what was actually
dedicated to the city in this particular plan is very close. The only
recommendation is, since they have downgraded the size of the park, we can
increase our fees slightly. However, this proposal also reduced the number
of lots so the park requirement, as far as the number of people which this
development will eventually hold, also came down slightly. There's still a
difference I believe between $90.00 per lot for additional park fee over
1
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
February 26, 1991 - Page 32
and above the park dedication in the first proposal up to $125.00 per lot
with the dedicated park as well in the second...
Lash: How many lots was it before?
Hoffman: 75. It's 75 down to 68. Basically that's the reduction of lot
sizes per lot.
Koubsky: What would be slated for Outlot E there on the south side?
Hoffman: Outlot E, it's recommended from the Planning Commission, that
currently exists as kind of an orphan outlot which would be difficult to
maintain and so it would be combined as part of Lot 1 as one lot.
Schroers: Does staff feel that we're really giving up anything significant
11 by changing? It doesn't appear to me that we're really losing anything.
Hoffman: No. As a matter of fact, discussion in the past has also talked
about that we should always try to maximize our, what we take for land and
then...the park fees because then we generate no dollars to support this
parkland so in this particular instance, 68 lots at $125.00 would generate.
Andrews: $8,500.00.
Hoffman: There we go, $8,500.00. Thank you. For development of that
park. And again, there's not been any layout of the park configuration but
11 it's not a large park. Only 2 acres of an open playfield. Possibly a hard
court surface for basketball. That type of thing and play area...
Lash: So are you saying that all of the property there is useable?
Hoffman: Correct.
Lash: We're not going to have a holding pond in the middle of it?
Hoffman: It's useable minus the frontage or where the sidewalks which
11 we're recommending be constructed on the south side of the...and the east
side of West Road.
j Lash: My initial reaction was that this was pretty small and I think was
the plan that we looked at last year and we wanted to have like 3 acres
useable. Wasn't it this plan? And then we kind of ended up cutting back
and cutting it down to 2.26 or whatever it was and said boy. But this is
really getting small and now all of a sudden we're down under that even.
But if you think that's big enough. I think it seems kind of small for 68
homes. I don't know how big the lots are. Now if they're pretty good
sized lots where people are going to be able to do things in their own
yards.
11 Andrews: That's quite a bit of space. That 2 acres gives you enough room
for a soccer field and tennis courts and a baseball diamond could share
with the soccer. I mean you've got quite a bit there. If it's a flat
piece of land, you can get a lot on there.
Erhart: How big are the lots?
1
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
February 26, 1991 - Page 33
Hoffman: The lots, the median size.
Robinson: Well it's 68 lots on 78 acres so pretty good size. 1
•
Hoffman: 2.2 lots per acre or an average square footage is somewhere in
the neighborhood of 18,000 to 22,000. 1
Schroers: In order to really gain an advantage in size there, we would
have to ask for two additional adjoining lots there and I doubt seriously
whether we could coerce the developer into that.
Erhart: I think that's sufficient lot sizes that are 18,000 to 20,000.
Hoffman: And to give you an idea, to give the entire commission an idea,
this frontage is 342 feet approximately. The bottom is a total of 220 feet mi
and the top would be a total of 273 feet. So 270 by 42...
Schroers: Well if there are no additional concerns, I would be ready to
move that we recommend to the Council to accept the amendment as proposed
here.
Koubsky: I'd second that.
Hoffman: Again, as noted in the report, we needed to rescind the previous
motion which is made on September 25, 1990 and then make the new motion.
Schroers: Okay, I will move to rescind the previous motion.
Andrews: I'd like you to clarify the motion so that we're dealing both
with the parkland and the park fee.
Schroers: Just read it off. Okay, is there a second to rescinding the
first motion?
Erhart: Yes. I'll second it.
Schroers moved, Erhart seconded to rescind the motion made on September 25, 11
1990 by the Park and Recreation Commission regarding park and trail
dedication fees for Lake Riley Hills. All voted in favor and the motion
carried unanimously.
Schroers: Okay, now the new motion. I'll move that the Park and Rec
Commission recommends that the City Council require Outlot B to be
dedicated as parkland. As a part of this dedication, the applicant will
prepare the site according to the grading plan provided by the City.
Furthermore, recommend that the applicant construct a 5 foot wide concrete II
sidewalk along the boulevard area on the south side of the proposed North
Road and east side of the West Road. In return for these requirements, the
applicant will receive a $375.00 credit on park dedication fees per lot and
100% credit on trail dedication fees. The remaining $125.00 park fee per
lot is to be paid at the time of the building permit application.
Robinson: I'll second that. 1
1
II Park and Rec Commission Meeting
February 26, 1991 - Page 34
Schroers moved Robinson seconded that the Park and Recreation Commission
recommend'that the Park and Rec Commission recommends that the City Council
require Outlot B to be dedicated as parkland. As a part of this
dedication, the applicant will prepare the site according to the grading
plan provided by the City. Furthermore, recommend that the applicant
I construct a 5 foot wide concrete sidewalk along the boulevard area on the
south side of the proposed North Road and east side of the West Road. In
return for these requirements, the applicant will receive a $375.00 credit
on park dedication fees per lot and 100% credit on trail dedication fees.
The remaining $125.00 park fee per lot is to be paid at the time of the
building permit application. All voted in favor and the motion carried
unanimously.
Hoffman: And again as noted, due to time constraints, this item, the
preliminary plat was reviewed by City Council at last night's Council
meeting. That particular, those conditions of approval from the Park and
Rec were in that report but were contingent upon your approval tonight.
it
Schroers: Okay, good.
CITY CENTER PARK PLAYGROUND ADVISORY COMMITTEE.
Hoffman: The $40,000.00 which we all know is going to be expended on the
play equipment at the school site is a substantial commitment on the City's
part to improve the play structure and the play apparatus and the
experience in which both the school kids and then the after hour
participants at that site can use. In reviewing that and designing that
playground, it's a very detailed instance in that there is equipment
currently there. Some of those pieces are unsafe. Some of them can be
uplifted and incorporated back into the new play structure. Those types of
things need to be talked about. There are some drainage problems with the
II site as it currently exist. Those things need to be reviewed. I did meet
with the Chanhassen APT, the full board as noted on February 11th. We
discussed both this improvement program and then the handicapped accessible
playground which is being worked on to the north. At the conclusion of
that meeting, it was felt that the best way to handle this is not to work
with the full board of the Chanhassen Park and Recreation Commission and
the full board of the Chan APT but to have an advisory group made up of
members of both those groups and then staff and work through this
improvement for the...
(There was a tape change at this point in the discussion.)
Schroers: ...time for this project.
Robinson: I think Wendy would be good.
Lash: I thought Wendy and Larry would be a good combo.
11 Erhart: And I thought Jan would make a real good.
I Lash: And originally, I'll be honest, I looked at this and right away
I thought oh yeah, yeah. I'll do that. I'd like to do that but I'm going
to be starting school, night school and that starts the end of March and
11
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
February 26, 1991 - Page 35
that's two nights a week that I'll be gone and I just, I hate to over
extend myself. It isn't that I'm not interested. I really am still even 11
tempted to do it but I'm just afraid if I do that, I'm not going to do
justice to anything and I don't like to that. But Larry, I think you
have good input as far as maintenance and survival of equipment and things
like that. I don't want to push you into something but I really think you
bring some expertise that other people don't know. And I think Wendy does
too being a PE teacher.
Koubsky: She's not here either.
Lash: Elect her whether she's here or not? That's sort of the punishment I
for not showing up.
Schroers: Todd, do you have any idea what days of the week these meetings 11
are going to be scheduled?
Hoffman: No. I haven't designated a schedule as of yet. Once all people
on the committee are named, then I would work with those folks and try to
determine which nights would work best for them and lay out a schedule so
all parties involved would have that specific schedule between now and
completion date. It is one of those projects where there is a beginning
and an end. It's not an ongoing thing that's going to last approximately 2 II
to 3 months to 6 months before the final completion date so at least it has
a light at the end of the project.
Schroers: Well I think that there is some obligation and responsibility
that goes along with these positions and I think it's not unreasonable to
do a little bartering. I think I would be interested in volunteering for
this position and maybe in lieu of some of the spring clean -up and the 4th II
of July. If someone else would be willing to pick up some slack there,
I'll do this one,
Robinson: That sounds fair.
Schroers: Okay, you can mark me down for it.
Lash: Okay, I'll rephrase my thinking. If no one else from the Commission
has an interest, I will do it if there's no severe penalties if I don't
make it to every single meeting.
Hoffman: Okay. Would the Commission like me to approach Wendy?
Robinson: Yes.
Lash: And if she can't do it, if she's too busy or whatever, if I'm the
only one left, then I'll do it.
Schroers: And at this point in time, since there is going to be a special II
committee on that, is there really anything here that we need to consider
or do we want to look at this again after the committee's had a chance to
work with it?
Hoffman: That's the correct manner in which to approach it.
1
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
February 26, 1991 - Page 36
Lash: I do think some of these steps, your 10 helpful steps here have
already basically been taken care of as far as site and all of those
things. That's already all.
I Hoffman: Yeah, this was provided for potential persons who were going to
get involved to take a look at things that were going to be discussed.
These do not have to be discussed this evening.
11 Schroers: Okay, so then this doesn't take any further action at this time.
Let's just move right on to item 9.
PARK AND RECREATION AFTER HOURS INFORMATION PHONE LINE.
Ruegemer: With Chanhassen's population growing, certainly the recreation
population will grow also and with the ongoing population increase, it
seemed real important to open as many channels of communication as possible
to relay the information onto our constituents. It seemed real important
1 to, since City Hall does close at 4:30 and people do, some people don't
have time to give a call during our regular business hours, to offer this
service to the Chanhassen residents as far as getting information after
I regular business hours. With this information line being available for
such as rainy or cloudy days to get up to date softball information.
Possible, for program information. What time, just specific information
that people could call this information line and get information. Listed
below are different companies. Those are just for your information.
...contact different services and different types of businesses. The
cheapest that I found seemed to be the voice mail types of systems. That
involved Minnesota. Comm Paging, Air Signal and American Paging with varied
of seconds and in greeting the message and retention of the messages.
There's the information listed and price per month as far as a monthly
charge and installation. Just in other communities, this type of phone
system, the informational line has seemed to work to the benefit of the
Park and Rec Departments just in relaying information onto the residents of
that community. It would reinforce a lot of doubt. You know people
calling as far as is the game going to be played tonight or is the program
going to happen. I think it would be a real kind of a relief if people
could call. I think that would be a lot of people at ease. Also it would
save on staff time answering these types of phone calls. I'm pretty much
guaranteed on a rainy day at 3:00 on you're going to be answering a ton of
phone calls on rain outs. As far as if they do, most the time the
secretarial staff do screen these calls so it isn't relayed on to us but
there are situations that we do answer these types of calls.
Andrews: I have a question. Does that American Paging system give you the
ability to change the message after hours here at City Hall?
Ruegemer: This type of system, the voice message system wouldn't be at
11 this location. It would be a different location and you'd have the
capability of, you're given a specific phone number where you can call and
change the message at any time or if you wanted to call in. Say if
somebody left a message of any kind, you could call your certain phone
number and retain those messages if you wished to do so.
1
1
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
February 26, 1991 - Page 37
Schroers: Like you said on a rainy day, all the calls are going to come in
at 3:00 and after. Does this handle one call at a time or can it handle a
number of calls at one time?
Ruegemer: It would be, I guess I'm not really sure on that but I know it II
does. It's different from like a recording where it has that capability
of, I guess I'm not really sure if it's goes. It isn't like a recorder
system. It's different. I guess I'd have to check on that.
Hoffman: My initial reaction, one call answered at a time.
Schroers: Probably but if the message is only 20 seconds or 30 seconds, it'll
can handle a lot of calls.
Hoffman: I don't think any of these systems, there's pros and cons to all
of them but I don't think any of them have the capability of answering more
than one at a time.
Schroers: I guess my idea is that $5.00 per month with no installation
charge, you can't hardly go wrong.
Lash: I think this a great idea but the complete success will be in how
well publicized the number is so you'd have to.
Ruegemer: It is something that we can work too with this company. We
could work on a catchy digit phone like 644 -PLAY or 644 -INFO.
Lash: Todd.
Ruegemer: Just something that would be easily identifiable.
'Lash: ASK -TODD. See if you can get that. 1
Ruegemer: And that would be publicized as well as the softball meetings
coming up.
Hoffman: And again, I am just as concerned that once the product that we
do purchase, that it is maintained for a number of years. We don't want to
be switching this thing. This is one of those things that once people get 11
used to using it and you switch it on them, they're going to be awfully
upset so we want to be confident that the service that we do go with is
going to meet our needs and meet our needs in the future.
Schroers: I guess the question I would have in regard to that is the
cheapest system that is offered here, is that going to be a reliable
system. Is that something we will be able to count on.
Ruegemer: I believe it is. American Paging has been in business for a
number of years. 1
Andrews: I sure they offer upgrade systems too for a higher volume.
Ruegemer: Just for your, the retention. Currently going through like a
software package and currently they have a 9 day retention on all their
1
I
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
February 26, 1991 - Page 38
II
messages. It isn't a 24 hour and that will be for probably over a year now
11 that you can have a 9 day retention on the messages left.
Schroers: Okay, sounds good to me. Is anyone interested in a motion?
I Robinson: I make a motion that we recommend to City Council to implement
the after hours information phone line for this spring and summer's
activities and to accept the quote of $5.00 per month from American Paging
11 Corporation.
Lash: Second.
I Robinson moved, Lash seconded that the Park and Recreation Commission
recommend to approve implementing an after hours information phone line for
II this spring and summer's activities and to accept the quote of $5.00 per
month from American Paging Corporation. All voted in favor and the motion
carried unanimously.
Lash: Will this just be spring and summer?
Ruegemer: It doesn't have to be.
Hoffman: No. It should be around.
1 AUTHORIZE CONTRACT, 4TH OF JULY FIREWORKS.
Robinson: I make a motion that we accept it.
II Andrews: I've got a comment. Last year I attended the fireworks and we
were in the recommended area for viewing and I mentioned last summer to
I Todd, I remember this. About debris coming down and some of it fairly
large dropping on my face and head and some of my kids and some of it was
dangerous to eyes. So I guess I don't have a problem with the company that
I did the fireworks but I think we certainly have to look at providing more
distance between the fireworks and the crowd. It was not adequate last
year and it was dangerous and somebody could have easily been injured and
we could have had a multi million dollar lawsuit situation very easily.
II Hoffman: In reviewing this item, I did recall your comment at a previous
commission meeting and we will move that back to a greater distance.
I However we do, that night the wind happened to be coming strongly that
direction. We had the balloon released earlier, it went straight up the
beach and straight that way so the wind was against us but we should take
that into consideration. And as a note of interest, there was a, not a
II serious eye injury but a person, actually city staff person who had a
fragment of that land in their eye and had some medical attention. They
had to flush that and remove it. Point well taken.
II Andrews: But other than that, I thought the fireworks that were put on
last year were outstanding. They were really great.
II Robinson: We have Banner every year it seems like. How many years is this
now that Banner has done it for us?
II
1
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
February 26, 1991 -- Page 39
Hoffman: Back at the inception of the current tradition which takes you
back 6 years. 1
Schroers: So it basically should be just a formality for us. Curt made
the motion. Is there a second?
Lash: Second.
Robinson moved, Lash seconded that the Park and Recreation Commission
recommend to accept Banner Firework's bid of $5,190.00 to perform at the
4th of July Celebration. All voted in favor and the motion carried
unanimously. 1
COMMISSION PRESENTATIONS: None.
ADMINISTRATIVE PACKET: 1
Schroers: Anything of special interest there?
Robinson: Just a comment that I think that's neat, the articles you
included. You know we've tried distributing the whole booklets to us and
we'd never look at them so this way we got the appropriate pieces of
information that would be of interest to us. I think that's the way to do
that.
Schroers: Okay, did everyone get a chance to see that there is a notice of I
a special meeting for March 12th?
Lash: And Tuesday, April 9th. 1
Schroers: And Tuesday, April 9th, right. ■
Hoffman: Yeah, one item of importance in the Administrative Packet is the
first item. Or the jointly scheduled Public Safety /Park and Recreation
Commission meeting for April 9th. If you have any specific concerns,
obviously we will be discussing such things as recreational vehicles, be it
Jet skis, snowmobiles, ATV's, those types of things. But if there is
anything specific which you would like to see placed on the agenda, Scott
Harr and myself will be making that agenda up so prior to that meeting you II
have some.
Andrews: Some time back we talked about vandalism problems at Lake Susan
in particular. I know that was something that sort of triggered this
meeting and I'm sure that wants to be included as to what the Public Safety
officers and what the park commission and park facilities, how they're
working together on that so that will be discussed too.
Lash: I guess I have one comment on the South Lotus Lake Boat Access saga
here. I don't know if anybody else feels this way but I felt a little like II
we were lacking something on our part that this went to Council level and
then was reviewed and sent back for more work and a lot of money was cut
from it. I sort of feel like we maybe didn't do our whole job on it or
something. I think that's the kind of stuff we're supposed to be doing and II
I know I felt kind of lackadaisical there on it but I don't know what we
can do about that.
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
February 26, 1991 - Page 40
Hoffman: That's a good point that .Ian brings about. I felt the same way.
This is a project that goes back quite a ways. Prior to Gary Warren's
initial time. He has since left. He initiated the project out of the
engineering department to address drainage problems and erosion problems
11 which are basically engineering problems occurring at a park site. He
worked to some degree with Lori at that time and both of those particular
department heads left the employment of the city and then the project fell
into my lap one day when somebody asked how are we going to pay for it. Up
into that point the Park Commission, nor myself, had been familiar with it
so we were into the timeframe where we had to get this thing approved and
on line so we can have the work completed in 1991. Then this action which
I is outlined here in the adminstrative packet took place and again, I felt
the same way as Jan did. That we were somehow, we were left out a little
but not anybody was intentionally trying to do that. It was just the
particular circumstances surrounding this improvement project.
Lash: I guess I just feel like these things, by the time they hit Council
and have gone through us and we did spend a great deal of time talking
about it and picking it apart but maybe we're just not knowledgeable enough
in the cost of different things and the different options that are
available to us to do that. I know I'ni not qualified to do that and yet it
still makes me uncomfortable and maybe that's why I'm uncomfortable is
because I know I'm not knowledgeable enough or qualified enough and I
wonder why I'm here. I think it should be as lean and as good as it can
' get by the time we send it to Council and I feel kind of embarrassed that
it was so easily noticed at the Council level and that we missed it.
Schroers: We can spend more time on it but Scott was here to address our
11 concerns and try to explain things from the engineering point of view and I
felt that he did fairly well on that. I don't think we're expected as Park
and Rec commissioners to handle engineering chores really.
I Lash: Do you think if we, I don't feel like we should have to say to
whoever's here, well now is this as cheap as you can get? I mean that
I seems like.
Andrews: That was the question we didn't ask though.
Lash: Yeah. And do we need to ask that every time and if we do need to
ask it, how do we do it without sounding so crude about it and cheap?
Schroers: Contemporary government rhertoric is, is this cost efficient.
Lash: Well and they they're going to say yes I suppose.
I Hoffman: The specific concerns which he addressed were again, the
engineering aspects but then also getting back to that, the park never was
completed in the apperance which it should be so there was some aesthetic
I concerns taken into consideration as well. The cuts were made in the
boulder wall reducing it from a boulder wall, field stone type look to a
rip rap look which is, and then taking off the aggregate or the exposed
aggregate off of the drainage structures which are going to be located in
that lower pond and just having them blank concrete. So the reduction in
cost takes you from an aggregate, from a fieldstone wall with an exposed
aggregate cover on the drainage system to a limestone red rip rap type of
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
February 26, 1991 - Page 41
look to a bare concrete. So the reduction in cost you know, it affects
your appearance but not necessarily the length of the livelihood of the
improvement or the efficiency which it works.
Tom Workman: I think the cost cutting and pinching has become competition II
by Council. I too was a little nervous about using the rip rap versus the
field stone on that site until I talked to some people in that neighborhood
and they said, you get down there and you sit down there, what do you do
down there? There's really not people hanging around down there so I guess
it really doesn't matter if it saves $7,000.00 - $5,000.00 to do it. But
it's become such a competition on the Council to cut and save and be cheap
and we love it. We're cheap. It's not fun because I'd just as soon spend II
a lot of money. I think I look like a spending liberal on this Council. I
mean it's reached unbelieveable proportions, which I think is good because
I think there's a lot of fat but I think that's what people are trying to 1
do on the Council. Who can save the most amount of money. It can get out II
of hand sometimes. I don't know that we have any special insight. I think
we're just cheap.
Lash: Yeah well I think I'm cheap too.
Tom Workman: In the good sense. 1
Andrews: You're frugal.
Lash: That's why you're there. We like it. 1
Hoffman: Just on the special meeting. One other item that came about at
the site plan review. An addition which is adjacent to the new Pheasant
Hills Park, I'll bring it to you at that meeting included with the Lake
Ann Park. It's a straight forward subdivision. We'll take the fees
obviously. We don't need any additional land when we're adjacent to that II
11.67 acre site at Pheasant Hills. But it does affect somewhat the
abutting property there so just so you can take a look at it. We'll bring
that to the Commission that day as well.
Robinson moved, Lash seconded to adjourn the meeting. All voted in favor
and the motion carried. The meeting was adjourned at 9:55 p.m..
Submitted by Todd Hoffman
Park and Recreation Coordinator
Prepared by Nann Opheim 1
1
1
1
1