1l. Minutes CHANHASSEN CITY COUNCIL
REGULAR MEETING
SEPTEMBER 24, 1990
' 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, Councilwoman Dimler
and Councilman Johnson
STAFF PRESENT: Don Ashworth, Roger Knutson, Paul Krauss, Jo Ann Olsen, Gary
Warren, Todd Gerhardt, and Scott Harr
APPROVAL OF AGENDA: Councilman Johnson moved, Councilwoman Dimler seconded to
' approve the agenda with the following additions under Council Presentations:
Councilwoman Dimler wanted to discuss Kiowa Circle, Old St. Hubert's Church and
an update from staff on their meeting with Met Council. All voted in favor and
' the agenda as amended and the motion carried.
CONSENT AGENDA: Mayor Chmiel moved, Councilman Johnson seconded to approve the
' following Consent Agenda items pursuant to the City Manager's recommendations:
a. Lake Susan Hills West 5th Addition Project 90-16 (Private):
1) Approve Final Plat
2) Approve Development Contract
3) Approve Utility and Street Construction Plans and Specifications
d. Approve One Day Temporary Liquor License Applications:
1) Chanhassen Lions Club, Oktoberfest, September 28
2) Chanhassen American Legion, Softball Tournament, September 29
e. Approval of Accounts
f. City Council Minutes dated September 10, 1990
Planning Commission Minutes dated September 5, 1990
' Park and Recreation Commission Minutes dated August 21, 1990
Public Safety Commission Minutes dated August 9, 1990
g. TH 101 Realignment Project, Authorize Acquisition:
1) Resolution 890-115: Taco Shop
2) Resolution 890-116: Chanhassen Village Apartment
' 3) Resolution 890-117: Apple Valley Red-E-Mix
4) Resolution 890-118: Builder's Development, Inc.
All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously.
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
C. REINITIATE WEST 78TH STREET DETACHMENT IMPROVEMENT PROJECT 87-2_. CALL FOR •
PUBLIC HEARING. I
Councilwoman Dimler: Item 1(c) has to do with the reinitiation of West 78th
Street detachment Improvement Project. We're now at a cost of about $2 million.
We're close to $2 million. I just wanted to ask Gary, I didn't have a chance to
come in and look at the old report . How much of an increase is that?
Gary Warren: Councilwoman Dimler, last time we upped the cost by about 10% to
recognize just inflationary factors and such. Actually this time I believe we
may be down a little bit. Gary Ehret is here. Maybe Gary.
Gary Ehret: The reinitiation which occurred in August of 1989, the estimated I
project cost was about $1.75 million so it is up about 10% again.
Councilwoman Dimler: Okay, and you're sure prices are going to go up instead of
down? With a recession coming now, let's think about this.
Gary Warren: The oil is going to be a big impact obviously but whatever
assessments and project costs will be the unit cost as bid and such so as you're
aware, these are estimates in the feasibility anyway. We'll actually pay
whatever is constructed at the time it's constructed. i
Councilwoman Oimler: Okay, so we're just going to approve the $2 million and it
could be less?
Gary Warren: Right . Exactly. 11
Councilwoman Dimler: Okay. And then my other concern was that I want to make
sure that we preserve the hard fought for right-in/right-out.
Gary Warren: The right-in/right-out is a part of the construction plans at this
point based on Council direction, that's correct.
Councilwoman Dimler: Okay, thank you. Did you have anything?
Mayor Chmiel: No, you answered the questions that I had. 11
Councilwoman Dimler: Okay. Then I move approval of item 1(c). '
Councilman Workman: Second.
Resolution #90-119: Councilwoman Disler moved, Councilman Workman seconded to ,
approve to Reinitiate West 78th Street Detachment Improvement Project 87-2,
Phase 1 and called for a public hearing to be held on October 8, 1990. All
voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously. I
PUBLIC ANNOUNCEMENTS:
Mayor Chmiel: I have a public announcement regarding a Resolution commending I
•
the efforts of the agencies and personnel that assisted at the accident
occurring in Chanhassen on September 10th of this year and it reads: Whereas,
the City of Chanhassen relies on the cooperative efforts of area emergency
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
response agencies, and Whereas, on the morning of September 10, 1990 an accident
11 occurred on State Highway 5 in the City of Chanhassen, County of Carver, and
Whereas, the potential seriousness of this accident cannot be underestimated
because of the number of vehicles and victims involved, including a school bus
loaded with elementary school students resulting in property damage to 4
vehicles and injuries to 49 people, and Whereas, the emergency Mutual Aid was
necessary and requested from the following agencies, Carver County Sheriff's
Department, Minnesota State Patrol, Chanhassen Fire Department, Chanhassen
1 Public Safety, Chaska Police Department, Chaska Fire Department, Eden Prairie
Police Department , Excelsior Fire Department, Minnesota Department of Natural
Resources, Waconia Ridges Paramedics, St. Francis Regional Medical Center
Paramedics and Minnesota Department of Transportation. Now Therefore, Be It
' Resolved by the City Council of the City of Chanhassen, that the professional
efforts of the above agencies contributed to effective rescue efforts and
management of the accident and it is with sincere gratitude that the City of
' Chanhassen commends these agencies and it 's personnel in providing assistance on
the day of need. Passed and adopted by the Chanhassen City Council on the 18th
day of September, 1990. I really feel that those accommendations were really
needed and recoginition should be given because of the efforts that were
extended by them. It was great work. The next item on our agenda is the
Visitor's Presentations.
Councilman Johnson: Mr. Mayor?
Mayor Chmiel: Jay?
' Councilman Johnson: Would you like to, this is Values Week here in town. Would
you like to make an announcement on that also?
Mayor Chmiel: I think we did last week but it's well worth it to announce it
one more time. The Golden Rule Community Values is what they have within the
School District of #112 and it's called Be Excellent to Each Other and it's
' Values Week 1990 which is from the 23rd thru the 29th. It basically is a
celebration of the community values within the cities of Carver, Chaska,
Chanhassen, East Union and Victoria. It's a week that's filled with activities
focusing on responsibility, integrity, learning, human worth and dignity,
environmentalism, citizenship and respect for others and generousity. I think
that many of the younger adults in the schools are following this and it really
is an important value for all of us. As we see the Values Week at a glance.
' Sunday, September 23rd, the ministerium has involved in the planning of the
participation of local churches to kick off the week's focus on community
values. Monday, September 24th local clubs, businesses and service
organizations have identified ways to promote Values Week. Tuesday and
Wednesday, September 25th and 16th, John Crodell, a nationally recognized
motivational and inspirational speaker will be addressing ways to promote Values
Week. And on Thursday and Friday, it's also activities continuing in schools
' and communities. Each school has planned activities that focus on the community
values. Saturday, September 29th there's a huge celebration on the High School
campus in Chaska following the booster club's garage sale and that celebration
begins at 4:30. Many of these values are just not taught at home. They're
taught in church and they're taught in school. I think it's just a fantastic
program that they have going on this. Thanks for reminding me Jay.
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
VISITORS PRESENTATIONS: None 11.
PUBLIC HEARING: CERTIFICATION OF DELINQUENT UTILITY ACCOUNTS. I
Mayor Chmiel: I think everyone has had opportunity to review. If I could get a
motion on this we can move right along. This is a public hearing. Is there
anyone else, before I go that quickly, who would like to address this specific
item?
Councilman Johnson moved, Councilwoman Disler seconded to close the public I
hearing. All voted in favor and the motion carried. The public hearing was
closed.
Councilman Johnson: Mr. Mayor, I'd like to ask one question. The same one I 11
ask every year I guess.
Councilwoman Disler: Why be different this year? '
Councilman Johnson: Yeah, why be different this year. It seems as some people
utilize this as a way to use this as a tax deduction is one of the rumors that
I've heard. It comes on your tax bill now instead of as a other bill so they
try to deduct it from their income tax which, do we ever supply this type of
information that these charges are being added to someone's tax bill to the
State or Feds or anything?
Mayor Chmiel: Maybe the County may have a way to cover, that by specifically
putting in on there that it 's a delinquent utility account.
Councilman Johnson: Yeah, I think they do but when you submit your taxes and
whatever, you don't submit a copy. '
Mayor Chmiel: If some people choose to do this, that's their perogative. If
they get caught, the IRS will take care of it. I guess we can't, I don't know
if there's any way that we can do anything. Roger, is there any?
Councilman Johnson: Submit the list to them?
Roger Knutson: You could submit the list to the IRS.
Councilman Johnson: They probably wouldn't know what to do with it. It's not
in their book.
Roger Knutson: You hear people, that comment made quite often and that's why
they do it but I don't see how the economics work for people. If you look at
the late charges that's put on it, no one's taxes. You lose. You can't win.
Don Ashworth: I believe we do publish the names. That should be a detriment in ,
and of itself but it doesn't seem to be.
Mayor Chmiel: Well, some people may come on hard times too and I guess we can't
overlook those.
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
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Resolution $90-120: Councilman Workman moved, Councilman Johnson seconded to
approve the Certification of Delinquent Utility Accounts. All voted in favor
and the motion carried unanimously.
AWARD OF BIDS: PARK PLACE II (CHANHASSEN LAKES BUSINESS PARK 5TH ADDITION).
PROJECT 85-13B.
Gary Warren: We received bids for Park Place Phase II as authorized. We
11 received 9 bids very favorably and competitively bid. The low bidder, Northdale
Construction Company, we are very familiar with them from their activity in town
here over the last several years and they do satisfactory work. Low bid is
' $133,411.50. The engineer's estimate was $140,000.00. We are therefore
recommending award of the project to Northdale in that amount . We did want to
add a caveat here that it was conditioned on us getting, we have a couple of
temporary easements yet we're waiting to come in the door but we expect them to
be in here soon.
Mayor Chmiel: Where's Northdale from?
Gary Warren: Northdale is Elk River.
.Mayor Chmiel: Elk River? •
Gary Warren: Yeah, here in the metro area.
' Resolution 190-121: Councilwoman Disler moved, Councilman Workman seconded to
award the bid for Park Place Phase II (Chanhassen Lakes Business Park 5th
Addition), Project No. 85-138 to Northdale Construction in the amount of
' $133,411.50. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously.
AUTHORIZE PREPARATION OF A FEASIBILITY STUDY FOR HINNEWASHTA PARKWAY UPGRADE.
Gary Warren: Mr. Mayor, at the last meeting staff was directed to pursue two
questions. One was a consideration whether this feasibility study could be done
in-house. The other was to communicate with the City of Victoria since the
southerly 1,300 feet of the roadway lies in their jurisdiction, as to their
participation in such. Relative to the first issue, we have looked at staff
backlog. We do it as a matter of fact with our project loadings to see where we
stand. The decision as far as the use of a consultant in the matter relates
more however to the design of the project and the continuity through into the
construction phase. We do not have staff time available to eventually deal with
the design and as we did on Frontier Trail, we found it very helpful to have the
consultant involved early on with the project to work with the neighborhood
meetings and to take the input . So it was a combination of not having staff
time and also to have the continuity through the design of the project that we
made the recommendation for Engelhardt to pursue the project and I think you all
can recognize that I think Bill did a real good job on Frontier Trail.
Mayor Chmiel: Yes. I just have one specific question on that Gary. What's
your position on putting this out for bids rather than just assigning to a
specific consultant or engineering company?
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Gary Warren: I guess my approach has been that there are certain projects
appropriate to bidding professional services and that's somewhat a dirty term
sometimes when we talk about professional services because dollars aren't always
the prudent bottom line issue here. I have followed a policy to try to work
with a limited number of consultants as long as they are performing satisfactory
for the City and I do that for a specific reason. That being that if we get too
diffused in our assigning of projects, we give every firm in the metro area one
little project here, it 's a practical matter but we lose their allegiance. They
have bigger fish to take care of so I have tried to be restrictive in using say
4 or S consultants. Not to give it all to one obviously, and to choose from
those consultants the expertise that I think suits the project. In this case
Engelhardt because of the good local I think impression that Bill has and the
ability to work with people in that regard. I think this is a good choice for
him to open this up and put the consultants through an exercise of preparing
proposals and statements of qualifications and running through that process.
Quite frankly, that puts them through a lot of extra effort and puts us through
extra time and effort to probably come up with the same conclusion. So in this
regard, then professional services I think that we look for the best consultant
and I think we have several of them out here who have been doing good work for
us and I pick from that group. Concerning Victoria, I did talk with their city
planner. We've exchanged messages with Miriam Porter. She's out of town this
week. Their indication to me is that they're interested in the project.
However, they don't know at this point in time, they haven't sat down '
budgetarily to figure out how they would pay for it. Preliminary to discussions
that I did have with them was the fact that the feasibility study would be an
element to identify really what the cost implications would be. This roadway
like for us is in their State Aid system but they weren't certain, not having a
full time engineer on staff, what their balances were and such so they',ve got
some things to work out. So I would say they're giving support for the project
but there is no firm commitment at this time as far as financing the project.
The City can choose not to improve the road for that southerly 1,300 feet. My
approach to the project has been that the feasibility study is not a large
expense in that it would, that's the tool where we can work out the details and
the expenses and give Victoria something to more specifically address.
Mayor Chmiel: I think there's a real safety problem on Minnewashta exiting onto
TH 5 as was discussed with the residents within that area and I would like to
see us somehow consider that as part of the full project only because our
residents probably use that more so than Victoria. I'd like to have probably
the safest kind of intersection within there. They presently are, as you well
know, taking off on the road that parallels TH 5 and coming back out on that
highway. It 's a better sight approach for them and I understand that but I
think we have to look at the overall picture of this thing. ,
Gary Warren: I think the response, overwhelming response at the neighborhood
meeting I thought was good and timely as far as this feasibility study is
concerned here. To be able to address that issue and also to get MnDot to maybe
more commitedly address some of the needs that are out there so I really think
that as you say, that's a very important element to make sure that we address in
the feasibility study. I
Mayor Chmiel: Any other discussion?
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• City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
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Councilman Workman: Gary, what have we budgeted for the engineer's fees?
Gary Warren: Bill usually works on a time and material basis. His overall fees
basically run about 6% of the construction cost of the project. Bill is
typically on the low end quite honestly in consultant fees for doing feasibility
studies. So he has a standard engineering contract on file with the City like
our other firms and we would use his standard contract which normally is about a
6% fee.
1 Councilman Workman: What is the scope?
Gary Warren: What's the total dollars? I think we're looking at the upgrade of
Minnewashta Parkway with a trail system is in the $400,000.00 to $500,000.00
range.
' Councilman Workman: 24 or 25.
Gary Warren: Right .
Councilman Workman: Okay.
Councilman Johnson: That 's his total fees. Not just the feasibility study.
Gary Warren: Right. I'm sorry. That's through the design phase. His
1 feasibility study would be 1% to 2% of that.
Councilman Workman: So we're talking about 8% total?
Gary Warren: No.
Councilman Workman: Okay, you're talking about a total of 6% so about
$25,000.00?
Gary Warren: Right .
' Councilman Workman: I don't have a problem with Bill Engelhardt. It's just the
matter of a lot of money. Will those fees and will those costs be picked up by
State Aid eventually or are those costs that are merely born by us?
Gary Warren: No, those are eligible costs for reimbursement under State Aid up
to a maximum of 8%. So it's within the State cap.
Councilman Workman: Good. I was at the meeting the other night with you and
Evan Green and it was a nightmare revisited almost where a neighborhood gets
together and you think they all have kind of a common goal for safety but you
hear comments that sometimes don't take into account the whole picture, etc. .
We've had a lot of people that have wanted Minnewashta upgraded for a long time.
I want to be certain that we are letting these people know exactly what's going
Ito be happening because I know when this thing's widened and curbed, it's going
to be curbed isn't it?
Gary Warren: That is a design element we haven't addressed yet but it needs to
have storm sewer and typically we would be.
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
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Councilman Workman: Storm sewer. Trails. It's going to be a third wider
perhaps. I don't know but the whole focus on wanting a better road is going to
come down to one person's evergreen tree or petunia or other and I don't know, If
maybe we can't avoid that . I just hope that we can head this stuff off as
quickly as we can. I don't know how we tell people out there, because the
assessments are going to come and we all know how that works. Can we at the
time of the design and before the design, take into account safety features as
far as crosswalks? Flashing lights you know and the people up on the north end
there that have the beachlot that are always trying to get across. Are we going
to be able at this point repost speed limits and put in safety features and are
those costs going to, are we going to be able to take care of those costs with
State Aid?
Gary Warren: State Aid is available to address the signage packages, painting,
striping, crosswalk, attributes of that nature. The plans have to be approved
by the State so if there is any geometric roadway issues that we would say
dictate an adjusted speed out there, this is the time when we would do that .
We've done that on all of our projects when we run them through the State Aid so
this would be the time to include those elements, that's correct. The total
dollars of the project we will be taking a close scrutiny of that to see how it
relates to our State Aid budget and our funds that are available. Now we've
been getting some cutbacks because the legislature's cutted back on the motor
vehicle excise tax contribution again and some of those things are bringing our
annual construction funds down a little bit but as you're aware, we didn't
construct a State Aid road last year to sort of pick up for the road that had to
be paid for on Bluff Creek and Lake Drive East. We're going to be consciencious
on the dollars. We can't, I don't think build a Cadillac necessarily but we
certainly are going to be taking a hard look in the design as far as the safety
features and the placement of the trail and utilizing our neighborhood input
concept here to try to head off some of these issues. We can never please them
all you know.
Councilman Workman: Maybe we're jumping the gun with questions like that at
this point until we see the design.
Gary Warren: We keep a file on all the roads like that and we put in memos and
such from neighborhood input questions, comments from other departments and that
file is the first thing that I turn over to the design engineer and he goes
through that and then I sit down with him to try and fill him in on all the
issues as far as the road is, as best I know them so we do have some record of
previous input and comments that we want to make sure we address and this is
certainly part of it.
Councilwoman Dimler: I just have one little question about, being that the
intersection that the Mayor talked about going onto TH 5, is MnOot going to be
involved in some of the funds? Can we use their money for that intersection? I
Gary Warren: If they agree. What our approach to this would be is to try to
make that happen. I think that is part of the project. There's going to be
several months now where we will be working obviously in honing the scope of
this. I think Mr. Green certainly got his ears full at our neighborhood
meeting. Evan is sympathetic to try to resolve some of these things so he, like
the rest of us, has to live within budgets and I know the upgrade of Minnewashta ,
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
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Parkway intersection is not programmed in MnDot 's vernacular. It's not
programmed so we'll have to put a package together with some recommendations and
see if we can't piggyback that with our project.
Councilwoman Dimler: I highly recommend that we do that .
Councilman Johnson: Both sides. TH 7 and TH 5.
Councilwoman Dimler: Yeah, TH 7. Is TH 7 bad? No, it's not bad.
Mayor Chmiel: TH 7 isn't quite as bad.
' Councilman Johnson: It 's not as bad as TH 5.
Gary Warren: The sight distances are better on TH 7 which makes a big
' difference.
Councilman Johnson: I think the trucks are even moving faster on TH 7 though.
' Councilwoman Dimler: I think so too. That's all I had.
Mayor Chmiel: You mentioned MnDot. We met this morning with them on another
' intersection bright and early this morning at 7:00. It's just like trying to
take the bark off a tree. They're that close with their money. We were halfway
successful. Any other discussion?
' Resolution #90-122: Councilman Workman moved, Councilwoman Dialer seconded to
authorize preparation of a feasibility study for Minnewashta Parkway upgrade.
' All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously.
1990 SPECIAL ASSESSMENT ROLLS:
' A. REVIEW ASSESSMENT ROLL FOR DOWNTOWN REDEVELOPMENT, PHASE II, PROJECT 86-11B,
UPDATE IF REQUIRED.
' Mayor Chmiel: I don't think we need an update on that one do we?
Don Ashworth: No. Staff did meet with the owners or at least carried out
' correspondence. Although they may not totally be happy, I do not think there
will be any further appeals.
Mayor Chmiel: Okay, is there anyone wishing to address this at this time?
Councilwoman Dimler moved, Councilman Workman seconded to approve the Assessment
Roll for Downtown Redevelopment, Phase II, Project 86-11B. All voted in favor
and the motion carried unanimously.
B. REVIEW ASSESSMENT ROLL FOR NORTH SIDE PARKING LOT, PROJECT 87-17, UPDATE IF
NECESSARY.
Mayor Chmiel: I think that's moving along as well?
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
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Don Ashworth: Really the same report. Again we have notified and I do not
anticipate any further appeals.
Mayor Chmiel: Anyone wishing to address that at this time?
Councilman Workman moved, Councilwoman Diller seconded to approve the Assessment
Roll for North Side Parking Lot, Project 87-17. All voted in favor and the
motion carried unanimously.
ADOPT ASSESSMENT ROLL FOR LAKE DRIVE, TH 101 TO CSAH 17, PROJECT 88-22A. ,
Gary Warren: Mr. Mayor, this assessment roll for 88-22A, staff has directed,
taken time here to review the appeals that were received which I have summarized
in the staff report and basically we have come up with a proposed modification
to the assessment methodology. Specifically speaks to the street assessment .
Staff had followed through on our typical approach here for street assessment
wherein on larger roadways, trunk highways and such we typically do not assess
the full road cost but instead we assess a commercial/industrial type roadway
segment . 36 foot roadway which is our standard for that. In looking
specifically at the Market Blvd. project we had done that. However, the Market
Blvd. section, which is ultimately going to be TH 101, is a much more beefed up
section if you will and therefore the front foot cost for assessment in that
neighborhood were $150.00 roughly per front foot whereas on Lake Drive itself,
which is a 36 foot roadway, we were closer to $110.00 per front foot . So we
said, well here we have a roadway that is very specifically a 36 foot roadway
which is our section and we thought that it would be more appropriate to be
consistent throughout the whole project scope even though we had two different
road segments to assess so we're proposing that the street assessment rate for
the project be modified to be uniform throughout the project scope and that
specifically the new rate, the $100.25 per front foot rate be adopted for this
street portion of the project. This impacts most specifically the Ward property
and the Rosemount property where it fronts on Market. We also had some front
footage, 167 feet of the Rosemount property which lies in the southeast corner
by their entrance, that by all rights should have been included in the original
assessment footage which hadn't so we have added that into the project scope and
the actual cost for building Rosemount's entrance which is about $45,000.00 had
been in the tax increment funds but by rights, I mean it was drieway entrance
built for Rosemount and it really should be cost that they're assessed for so we
did add that back in. So there were some slight modifications because of the
footages in there to each of the watermain assessment and therefore we have
basically recalculated the roll with that but by far the major adjustment that
we are proposing is that the street assessment rate of $100.25 per front foot be
applied throughout the project. That has a net result of about $51,000.00
reduction on the Ward property which was a major impact with their front footage
being all on Market Blvd. . With that, the rest of the discussion I believe,
there may be some representatives from the Wards here or others that may wish to
address the roll but I think it would be best if we hear their discussion and
then we can address that specifically at your discretion.
Mayor Chmiel: Very good. Thank you. Is there anyone wishing to address this 1
particular issue? If there is, please come forward and state your name and
address and who you're representing.
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Bob Worthington: Mr. Mayor, members of the Council. I'm Bob Worthington
from Opus Corporation, 9900 8ren Road East, Minnetonka. I'm here representing
the interest of Opus as well as the Alscor Investors Joint Venture No. 2 which
are the owners of, on our map Outlot A and the official plat map, Lot 1, Block
3, Chan Lakes Business Park. We were here at the last meeting when the issue of
the assessment on that particular piece of property was raised. We stated our
objection to having the entire parcel completed as a part of the assessment roll
given the fact that a portion of it was in wetland and had been declared, during
' our discussions with the Rosemount project, as undevelopable. We asked staff to
look at the property and find out if there could be any further adjustments
made. In talking to Mr. Ashworth earlier today the conclusion was that we could
' not . For those of you who aren't aware, the property is currently under option
by Rosemount. We are hopeful that the whole issue of protest in terms of those
costs can be resolved with them exercising that option and accepting the
assessments as being fair but since we are still the owner of the property we
' want to reserve our right later on if we cannot negotiate a more reasonable cost
for those assessments to come in later on and take whatever legal action that
may be available to us in order to do that. But at this particular point in
time, if the Council wants to with that comment in the record, wants to adopt
the roll, we're not going to stand up in the door and say never. So I guess
that simply is our case and I'd be happy to answer any questions you may have.
Mayor Chmiel: Okay, thank you.
Bob Worthington: The letter, by the way that I sent last week, I have one here
' and I'd like to have it officially entered as a part of the record.
Gary Warren: Is that the September 7th letter?
Bob Worthington: Yes.
Gary Warren: That is in the Council's packet.
Mayor Chmiel: Any questions?
' Councilwoman Dimler: Am I to understand that it has been reduced to $181,404.40
and you're still objecting to that figure? Your letter here states the higher
figure.
' Bob Worthington: That $181,000.00 is the reduction?
Councilwoman Dimler: Yes. Your letter states $201,624.22.
Bob Worthington: I wasn't aware of the fact that there was a reduction. Mr.
Warren just stated for the record. That 's nice and we appreciate that and it
' may be after we review it, that may be something is very satisfactory but at
this particular point in time, since I only have this opportunity to state my
case in a public forum, I'm stating our case perhaps in a more negative way than
ultimately will be the result but I have to do my duty.
Mayor Chmiel: Good. Thank you. Anyone else?
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
John Ward: Mr. Mayor, members of the City Council, John Ward, 5916 Hanson Road
for the Ward property owners. We appreciate the assistance of the city staff
and engineering consultant in going over figures with the professionals that we
hired and we appreciate their re-analysis of the roadway but there's still
concern about a couple of items. The main item that we're concerned with is
the fact that even with the reduction it's still far in excess of the
approximate amount of the feasibility study. I believe it comes down to around
double that amount . The professional people that we hired indicated that they
were puzzled by the total cost of the project in terms of what they see in other
communities and we're wondering about the accountability. We had some
difficulty in getting a complete numerical breakdown for each category so we
could compare it to what an appropriate figure should be for certain stretch of
road or a certain stretch of sidewalk. We had some trouble getting those
numbers for comparison. We are also concerned about the landscaping assessment
as it pertains to our property. I believe we're talking about an 840 foot
stretch and we are being assessed for landscaping as the other property on Lake
Drive is being assessed and it does appear from a drive by of the property that
landscaping was indeed placed on Lake Drive but as our property, what we
received was basically an attempt to put it back in the same condition that it
was in previously. There appears to be one roll of sod against the curb to hold
the dirt from rolling down and then there seems to be some type of seeding above
that . Both of those would amount to a very minimal cost. I would guess
conservatively $1,000.00 or $1,500.00 at the outside and we've received ,
absolutely no trees, shurbs, or other landscaping. What it appears to be is
basically a restitution of the premises to what they were in the form of an
erosion control rather than any landscaping. We think the assessment in that
area specifically of $11,860.00 measured as it is with the other owners who did
receive landscaping, it's quite inappropriate and we would ask the Council on a
simple drive by to review that themselves and to see if there is some merit to
what we have to say. We would ask that the letter that we gave copies to the
Council last week, be part of it.
Mayor Chmiel: Would someone like to address some of those specifics? '
Gary Warren: I'll touch briefly on the landscaping issue. Gary Ehret who has
further discussions with representatives from the Ward property can maybe fill
in some of the other questions here. The landscaping assessment, total value
here on the Ward property is $11,258.40 is based on the landscaping as an
aggregate. As far as the project total is concerned. Some properties got 2
trees. Some got 4 trees. Some didn't get any trees based on the practicality
of actually planting certain elements on the project. With the slope and such
on the Ward property, there's no question that Mr. Ward is correct that there
weren't any trees planted as part of this project at this point in time but the
concept , the methodology of assessment is that the whole project is looked at
from an area assessment standpoint . On the flip side of that issue we could
look at the fact that the City did not choose for example to take the extra cost
that we had in processing a Corps of Engineers permit for the wetland that is on
the Ward property. To get approval for that. Now this is a cost that is
specifically we could say was a result of having to deal with the permit on the
Ward property but that project cost goes into the total project and is spread
amongst all of the users out there because they all benefit from it. So that's
why the assessment methodology, we don't count trees specifically on each of the
properties and make an assessment based on that. We'd be here forever basically '
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
.,
coming up with a uniform assessment rate. I don't know, Gary do you want to
1 address anything else that was mentioned?
Gary Ehret : Well, there were a number of concerns there so it 's hard to keep
track of them but the initial assessments at the time the feasibility was
11 completed, the proposed assessment for Phase I were about $82,000.00 and some
change for the Ward property. The current roll's about $135,000.00. That is a
significant increase. The primary explanation for that is the function of the
1 assessments that the property receives. When the initial roll is prepared we
assume X amount for storm sewer costs. X amount for sanitary sewer. X amount
for water. X amount for roadway. We calculate the rates. Come up with the
total estimate. If you look at the aggregate costs proposed for assessment now
' as compared to initially for the project , the costs are extremely close in total
to the estimated assessments before. The Ward property is somewhat of an
anomaly in the fact that if you took another property such as the Rosemount ,
' when the costs and the project was actually bid, the storm sewer cost came in
less than the feasibility but the roadway costs higher. In the case of a
Rosemount , the reduction in storm sewer costs and therefore storm sewer rate
helped offset the increase roadway costs. Their composite assessment did not go
up as dramatically. In the case of the Ward's, the two assessments that they
received, watermain and roadway, the roadway costs did go up significantly. The
watermain was within $2.00 per front foot of what it had been estimated. They
' did not receive the benefit of a storm sewer reduction because they were not
assessed for storm sewer. So on an aggregate, the assessments for the project
did not go up significantly but by the method of assessment to the Ward's, they
went from 82 to 135. In terms of the availability of information, to the extent
that we are the City's consultant and therefore our records are public records,
we can share that information. It was discussed because of the complexity of
' this project , my file is about yea thick so at this point I can't say that we,
we did provide the Ward representatives with the footages used. The rates used
and the methodology used. What we did not provide at this time were specific
costs.
Mayor Chmiel: May I ask one question? On the roadway cost, that $110,258.00.
Does that include that $11,000.00 in there?
' Gary Ehret : Yes. Yes, that is the total for roadway, lighting and landscaping.
' Mayor Chmiel: Okay. Any other discussion?
Councilman Workman: In my viewpoint, you know we really can do nothing except
maybe apologize for increased costs which we don't have a whole lot of direct
' control over. I don't think we intend to raise the costs of the project but the
cost of the project is there and need to be paid for and it needs to be fairly
and evenly assessed which according to Gary and Gary we've done that. So if we
were to reduce or modify in one area, we'd be all over kingdom come and so I
don't know that we can discuss it all night and not come up with a solution.
Councilman Johnson: The only solution I would see would be if we could break
' Market Blvd. away from Lake Drive and assess them separately so Rosemount would
get a Market Blvd. assessment and they'd get a Lake Drive assessment . The
Ward's would only get a Market Blvd. so whatever the expenses were assessed
directly to Market Blvd. . I don't know where those increased costs were
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
concentrated. Whether it was on Lake Drive or Market. If it was on Market 1
Blvd, then the Ward's won't want us to do that because it would probably raise
their assessment and lower Rosemount 's but if the increased cost ended up being
on Lake Drive, where I think we had the bad soils and stuff involved, then that If
would increase everybody elses and reduce the Ward's which of course then we'd
have the church not wanting that and a few other folks.
Gary Warren: That is the reverse of where we started from as far as the street
assessment . Now we're saying okay Market from the specific street construction
is concerned was an inflated rate and we're saying okay. We recognize that that
should be done so we were saying alright, we'll clear the deck here on the
methodology. Let's make it uniform which is an important thing which I'm sure
the City Attorney can attest to and we apply that across the rate so the Ward's
on one side have benefited by $51,000.00 in that regard so we're following that
through all the assessment methodology. Maybe we can argue about a tree here
and there but I think that the integrity of the roll, I guess it's our
recommendation that it not be arbitrarily adjusted.
Mayor Chmiel: John, did you want to say something?
John Ward: A brief comment if I might. It appears that the way the landscaping
is set up, that on a portion that's TH 101, there's no landscaping. Then
there's everything landscaped on Lake Drive. It's not just a question of
whether one lot got 2 trees and one lot got a shurb and 3 trees. TH 101 got
nothing except a strip of sod to keep the dirt off the roadway and all the
landscaping, 100% of the landsacping is on Lake Drive and we don't think we
should have to pay for that . We're going to have our own landscaping worries
later on. We don't think that we should have to pay for Lake Drive landscaping
to that extent with the fact that all that was applied to our property was
strictly erosion control at this time.
Mayor Chmiel: Okay, thank you.
Councilman Johnson: Are we too late to get this on this year's or next year's I
taxes?
Gary Warren: No. '
Don Ashworth: We're still in line.
Gary Warren: October 10th is the certification date. ,
Councilman Johnson: We certify it but if they decide to come in and pay it
within 30 days, then we've got a problem. '
Gary Warren: No.
Councilman Johnson: Because we can still drop it off?
Mayor Chmiel: Right.
Councilman Johnson: We just can't add anything on after October 10th?
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11
Mayor Chmiel: Right . Any other discussion?
1 Councilwoman Dimler: I had a discussion on the ones, the Lutheran Church of the
Living Christ . Maybe nobody's here to address that one but it did have a
provision in there that the City purchase Outlot A. Have you made a formal
' offer to purchase that outlot?
Don Ashworth: We met with representatives on two different occasions. I felt
' that we had agreed to an amount that would solely be dependent on getting the
final surveys in associated with that final plat . That process has now been
completed and we're at a position where we can meet with the church and finalize
' it.
Councilwoman Dimler: You are planning to purchase it then?
' Don Ashworth: Part of the project costs had always included that acquisition,
yes.
' Councilwoman Dimler: Okay.
Mayor Chmiel: Any other discussions? If not, I'd entertain a motion of some
' type.
Resolution *90-123: Councilman Workman moved, Councilman Johnson seconded to
adopt Assessment Roll for Lake Drive, TH 101 and CSAH 17, Project 88-22A. All
' voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously.
Councilman Johnson: Can we not take this to the County until after the 8th? Or
' before the 10th?
Don Ashworth: If the Council would like.
' Councilman Johnson: I've not looked at the landscaping side of this. The
streets I have no problem with but it's true. There was absolutely no
landscaping done on Market . I really have a problem then including landscaping
' throughout the project .
Councilwoman Dimler: I agree with you Jay and that's why I didn't say anything.
' I would be inclined to reduce it by $11,000.00. Can we take a look at that?
Gary Warren: There definitely was seeding and sodding that was done out there.
' Councilman Johnson: Yeah. But that's done on every street.
Gary Warren: There was difficulty currently because of the way the property
' hasn't been developed to do much. An alternative would be to include some
commitments from the City in the future when the sight develops to add trees or
whatever at that point in time.
' Mayor Chmiel: We can bring this up at the next Council meeting.
Councilman Johnson: That's what I was saying. If there's any action. If we've
' got one more chance.
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
Mayor Chmiel: We can bring this up again at the next Council meeting.
Councilwoman Oimler: That will give us a chance to go out there and look at it . I
Councilman Johnson: Right. As is, you know.
Gary Warren: From the standpoint of the City Treasurer, at least the rest of '
the roll, if I'm getting the gist of the discussion, you're satisfied with, so
at least Jean could be preparing the rest of the roll for certification. That
would be helpful for her time probably. ,
Councilman Johnson: I think she ought to get the whole roll ready for
certification and just not submit it until the 9th. '
Mayor Chmiel: Yeah. That sounds right.
Councilman Johnson: Or if we have discussions with the Council members. • I
ADOPT STORM WATER UTILITY DISTRICT.
Gary Warren: On August 27th the Council received public input on the storm ,
water utility district , surface water excuse me, utility district concept and
ordinance. Since that time staff has been about the business of further
addressing the questions and concerns that were raised at that meeting. If you
will, I'll just run through briefly each of the subheadings here so that we
don't belabor the point here but I did want to at least highlight the gist of
our report here. The comment was raised about double dipping, as it was called
wherein the city would be, has already charged developers who, they've paid
basically to construct their storm surface water improvements and now the City
is coming back and asking for them to pay again for these improvements. This is
very definitely not the scenario. We are not proposing to change any of the
current city policies as far as developments. When developments come in, even
after the adoption of the district , they still would be required to construct
storm systems and meet the watershed criteria and the city criteria for
conveying and retaining storm water. The utility district dollars, more
specifically address deficiencies in our existing system which at the discretion
of the Council there are areas where it may be appropriate to use the utility
funds to construct some improvements but for sure the. . .will be to assess
improvements wherever we see it's justifiable and sustainable. Further the
utility, big part of the utility is to provide documents and water quality and
for planning purposes to address diagnosis of our lakes and also maintenance of
existing structures so double dip concept is not the case. User fee versus tax.
I guess nobody here is trying to disguise this in any way, shape or form. We
wanted in fact to stand on it's own as far as that it's more appropriately, in
our opinion, a user fee but semantics being what they are, it still is a payment
extraction from a property owner. The user fee though and the utility district
concept in particular where it's different from a tax in our opinion, is an ,
important distinction, is that these are funds that the dedicated to utility
district to be used in that utility district and cannot be arbitrarily extracted
from the fund to offset any other shortfalls that may exist within the city and
therefore it is very specifically used to address the goals that will be adopted
as a part of the program. Farmland issues. As we know, we've all been
concerned to be fair as it relates to the farmland and the undeveloped land and
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
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we have done some checking in other communities and basically we are
recommending the modification at this time in the ordinance such that farmland
would be addressed as a residential, single family unit . That would be assigned
regardless of the acreage that's involved with it . That being roughly $20.00
per year. This does not address the total impact necessarily and the criteria
' as far as sediment and erosion but as we know, there are various differences in
that between each farmland and how the farmer maintains his property so we are
going with that recommendation and that has an impact of maybe 3% less revenues
into the fund. Coordination with other agencies. There are numerous letters
that we included which we were able to obtain here in the last 4 weeks from the
respective agencies. The concern obviously was that we are being redundant here
and duplicating efforts which I think we all are sensitive to. Riley-Purgatory-
Bluff Creek Watershed supplied us a letter. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife. Met
Council. Basically confirming that and encouraging the program and also
basically confirming that we are not, they are in fact looking to the city I
' think to be able to be the enforcer. To be the implementer in some of these, in
a majority of these programs. A case in point , the Watershed District which
adopts it 's plans, which the City will then chaperone into it's own plan, they
are certainly looking for us to provide the enforcement arm and to take on some
of the responsibilities, if not most of the responsibilities for dealing with
water quality. So we feel there is not a redundancy here. We still will
maintain our contacts with subdivision reviews. We will still maintain our
contacts with the regulatory agencies to get the technical support which as we
heard Conrad Fiskness offer from the Watershed District, to provide us with, use
them as a resource but quite honestly we don't see them as a funding source to
' be able to address the necessary elements of our program. Therefore that's our
conclusion in the matter. Again we will also be pursuing any grant funding or
anything else. This does not exclude us from being a recepient of grant funds
from the Clean Water Act or any of the other programs just because we have our
' own funding source. Involving the City Council in expenditures anticipated in
other surface water management utility. I don't know, Paul maybe you want to
touch on that item. As you know we both wrote this report. . .
Paul Krauss: That wasn't one of my hot . . .at all.
Gary Warren: Well, it is now.
Councilman Johnson: It's called the hot potato.
' Gary Warren: Basically that was to address the Council concern as far as
establishing an entity that was self perpetuating. That was going to be out of
control so to speak. That once you started it can't be stopped. By converting
' the ordinance to an annual review of the program, the expenditures and revenues
on an annual basis consistent with the City's annual budgetary process, there's
I guess a commitment there specifically that allows the control to say where are
' we going. What kind of revenues, balances are we maintaining in the fund and to
review on that annual basis what the goals of the program are. As we've been
trying to convey initial elements of the program are going to give us better
definition for the magnitude of some of the improvements out there. The cost of
' the water quality plan. We've made our estimates on it. The cost of the water
surface management plan. As mandated, we've made estimates on it but until we
get into the specifics, we don't have the detail cost estimate to put on these
things so the program I think needs by rights, to have that adjustment and
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
accountabilit y and that 's what we are certainly proposing i n the ordinance.
Goals of the district . You questioned as to what are our goals. This is a
normal offshoot from the Chapter 509 Surface Water Management Plan and it's
healthy in that it takes more than just a casual review of what do we want to do
in the City. It takes the input by rights of neighborhood groups, Lake
Association members, the community as a whole to formulate what do we want to do
for water quality, erosion control and all the related items. I have taken an
extract here from the State Statutes which I don't always like to do but I
thought it was still pretty comprehensive in nature and this really addresses
the goals of the 509 plan which I included. Then we also, Paul and I took a
shot here at specifically pulling out some goals that might be considered by the
City as far as water quality, water quantity, ground water, erosion control and
such. Each of these goals is a part of the 509 plan would be a detailed policy
statement that then would have a policy written on it to establish what are the
City's intentions in say achieving water quality and controlling erosion and
such and can end up being quite lengthy actually in a report if it's given the
proper attention. Water quality management plan. The plan itself includes
$72,000.00 for preparation of the water quality management plan within our
budgetary process plus another $50,000.00 for ongoing monitoring. We put in an
excerpt which I thought was timely from the City of Eagan. I should note that
they charged us $50.00 for their plan so they're being accountable for their
budgets. But they're a little bit bigger as we all know than the City of
Chanhassen but as far as lakes and I think wetlands and stuff, we're pretty
comparable and their water quality plan alone showed the 3 year commitment of
about $1.2 million to deal with some of the specifics that they have to or are
confronted with. The City of Eagan, for whatever reason, has the ability to go
out and spend the money up front for the water quality plan which then armed
with that they went into the utility district concept to now fund this $1.2
million and other needs. It 's a tact that could have been followed here but
when confronted with it we, staff looked at it and said well how are we going to
fund the $300,000.00 to start so that is basically when we said well the utility
district concept really provides that and more appropriately so because it's
specifically dealing, instead of having the general public advolorem pay for the
cost for these studies, the utility district which would be set up on a user
basis for that was preferred. So I ran through it pretty quickly here but
basically our conclusion at this point in time in addressing those issues was
that the utility concept still was something that we are recommending the City
strongly consider as a most appropriate tool for addressing the City's water
quality and water management needs here. We have modified the ordinances which
are in attachments 7 is the ordinance and attachment 6 is the policy that goes
with that. We had modified those to reflect the changes here that we're
proposing on the farmland and undeveloped status and they are included in this
packet for your consideration. '
Mayor Chmiel: Is there anyone wishing to address this at this particular time?
Gayle Degler: I'm Gayle Degler from 1630 Lyman Blvd. . I have a couple general 1
comments. First of all through the media and through talking with different
people, we kind of get the feeling that agricultural has been blamed for a lot
of the pollution problems that now exist in the city of Chanhassen and I for one
have to definitely disagree with that statement and-fact. I think the history
of Chanhassen points that out and in the last 20-25 years, or say it the other
way, 25 years ago there were a lot more agriculture people in Chanhassen than
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
11
there are today and I think there's a direct correlation. As agriculture has
declined in the city, our pollution, our quality of the water has gone down.
I'm not saying agriculture has no part in the problem but agriculture definitely
is not the major problem that Chanhassen is facing when talking about water
quality. Thinking back to the last meeting, some of the Council members
' comments. One of them had to do with water quality and I did not get the
detailed copy of this new form but in what I did receive it didn't mention
anything as to where our funds that were being collected were going to go. As
' to how they were going to be used towards water quality. If that was one of our
major concerns, so far I didn't see it. It might have been there but I'll admit
I didn't see it . The other thing, one of our councilmembers mentioned at the
last meeting was what was the financial impact would such a utility have on
farmers and I think I was one of the people that was specifically named. What
financial impact would it have upon me and nobody from staff has even contacted
me or talked to me so it was hard. I had no way of giving my input and I
' thought that was a direct comment that was made that it should have been looked
at and I'll comment just partly on this. Obviously farming in eastern Carver
County, we're at a direct disadvantage compared to even the western part of the
' County. Our taxes are significantly higher. We have to put up with more
transportation and everything else. Other problems involved in living in this
community. As far as other financial impacts, obviously whenever you tax
yourself personally, there goes part of your profit . Also, if you're renting
land, whenever they get taxes more, they're going to pass that directly onto you
in higher rent . Another comment . Eagan was used as a model in preparing part
of this and Eagan was just another one of the cities that have this utility
' concept and no city that uses this utility concept taxes agriculture land. I
don't think, obviously I don't think Chanhassen should tax agriculture land
either. You sort of subdivide parcels of property, agriculture and non
' development . I'm not quite sure why the division there. Question now. Are you
going to assess each parcel, each agriculture parcel as a residential fee? Is
that what I'm understanding?
Gary Warren We are looking at it as a homestead type of standpoint. So I
don't know, your distinction between parcel. Several parcels under your
ownership, is that what you're saying?
Gayle Degler: Correct . If they're all homesteaded, that would be considered
one residential?
Gary Warren: Right.
Gayle Degler: Okay. I just wanted to understand that. But that I'm sure was
1 taken from Eagan but Eagan is more specific. They don't call it agriculture.
They don't call it undeveloped. They use the green acres classification and I
think by using the green acres classification they do a little bit, I think
they're a little bit more specific in protecting agriculture. In order to get
the green acres classification, you can't be a speculator or a developer that's
holding this land in agricultural use until it's developed. In that way if
that 's your main purpose in holding it in agriculture until it's developed, then
' you don't get this green acres exemption and that way you would not be exempt
from your program.
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
Mayor Chmiel: Thank you. Anyone else? If seeing none or hearing none, we'll
bring it back to the Council. Jay, do you want to start?
Councilman Johnson: Sure, I'll start. I like what Gary has done here. I agree
with his movement of the agricultural land to consider it the same as my lot . I
think we weren't getting enough from the agricultural land to create the hassle
we needed to and like you say, our farmers need as much help as they can get
right now. So I still continue to be and have always been in favor of this. We
have to have the funding source to get this work done and now we have. This
will give us this funding source. There was one correction that we need to put
into here. Under appeals of fees, Section 19-146. I don't know if everybody
got this or not. I think Gary's got a bunch of copies of it. Need to add a
sentence in that paragraph does inadvertently left off. Pass those around. No
adjustments will be made for property classifications I, II and III. Basically
saying that these are the residential classes that are the lowest classification
so we're not going to adjust them any lower.
Gary Warren: Yeah, they're not based on acreage or any of the runoff concepts.
They're fixed rates so there as low and bottom as you go.
Mayor Chmiel: That's given already isn't it?
Gary Warren: Pretty much. Eagan's ordinance also adjusts it from that
perspective because there are people that may want to come in and say I've got a
corner wetland here on my residential lot. Don't I get credit but to tie up
staff time to deal with that small magnitude, it just doesn't make sense. So it
needs to be qualified.
Councilman Johnson: Couldn't we or should we say something about no fees will 1
be adjusted to below that of property classifications I, II or III so that
becomes our bottom?
Gary Warren: What we're trying to I guess stop is that classifications I, II
and III aren't coming in for adjustments. That's the intent here. The actual
adjustment of other properties. Some properties may get a total credit I guess
depending on what their status is acreage wise.
Councilman Johnson: So you're saying a large acreage, industrial tract or
something that's doing a real good job and for some reason they get some kind of
an adjustment, they could actually end up paying less than my 19,000 square foot
lot?
Gary Warren: I guess in an extreme case and I wouldn't expect it because of the t
costs involved but some industrial site plan could come in and they're going to
do water treatment on their land I guess to the point where we might say hey
geez, they're really cleaning things up here and therefore they would not,
because of the investment they have, they wouldn't be getting it.
Councilman Johnson: Actually a few years, the storm water amendments that were
made a few years ago to our Clean Water Act is going to require industry to do
storm water treatment prior to release. Eventually.
Mayor Chmiel: Okay. Anything else? Any other discussion? 1
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
Councilwoman Dimler: Yes.
I d like a to, I have quite a few things here. I
agree that we need to maintain our storm sewer system and I agree that we need
1 to address water quality issues as I've said. I agree with Mr. Degler that
agriculture is not the main culprit and I'm glad to see that we're treating them
as single family residential. I also agree that we need to comply with the 509
' plan. I do however question the cost of $135,000.00 to do that and I'd like to
have Gary address how those costs were established.
' Gary Warren: We established that cost based on input from our consultant as far
as what previous plans have cost other cities who have actually gone through the
process and it 's based on a per acre cost per city. So we used a unit factor
based on the 23 square miles of the city and that's how we came up with that
cost. Obviously that cost would be worked out. This is one case where we would
propose, actually taking qualifications and interviewing consultants before we
went forward with it and the cost would be shook out as a part of that process.
' But I think from my experience, I did a 509 plan for Shoreview and Roseville.
Grass Lake Watershed and it certainly can get up into that magnitude. I don't
think that the cost is very far off.
Councilwoman Dimler: It just sounded high to me and I called some other people
too. Senator Earl Renicke thought it was high and he was in on the initial
legislation so I just thought I'd comment on that. And I do want to commend
Gary and Paul for the comprehensive research and the work that they've done on
this. I still have a few concerns. You've answered most of them. I'm still
concerned that we're only spending about $122,000.00 out of the $1.7 million for
' water quality and if that is our aim, I just think our administrative costs are
way out of line with where we should be spending it on water quality.
' Gary Warren: I would say that what we're showing right now is the up front
costs to do the water quality with the diagnostic studies and the legs to get
better definition on what do we need to do the legs. And the actual
recommendations which may come out of that report, or which will come out of
' that report, indeed could lead to construction costs or other costs that would
build from there. So this is sort of the starting point as far as the water
quality is concerned. It 's not the final dollar to be spent by any means.
Councilwoman Dimler: But I also agree with Mr. Degler again who said that we
don't have any specific plan to clean up the lakes or anything and I guess that
leads me to my next point is that it seems like we're putting the cart before
' the horse here. We said that Eagan did it the right way. They did the study
first and then implemented the plan. I'm wondering why we don't go ahead and do
that because it just seems to make more sense that way. I'm really
' uncomfortable with getting a program going when we don't really know. We know
we have problems but we don't know specifically what they are and we don't now
specifically how we're going to eradicate them but we're going to get a program
' going anyway. You understand what I'm saying? I know you're going to say where
do we come up with the initial $300,000.00 to do the study?
Gary Warren: And I wanted to qualify that I don't think I said that Eagan
' necessarily did it the right way. I think maybe there's two right ways. It's
just a choice as far as funding mechanisms is concerned on the city. Eagan as
you're seeing still ended up implementing utility district to be able to fund
' the magnitude of improvements so the end result is you still, following this
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I
approach, you still end up establishing utility district. It's pay me now or
pay me later so to speak. The definition, I mean I guess I won't argue the fact
that if Council prefers and we can find a funding source to do the water quality
plan and the 509 plan and try to put those specifics together, great . But the
dollar commitment and the magnitude there was felt that that's going to have to
compromise other programs in the city to do. Since we probably will get to this '
end result anyway to fund those improvements that would come out of those
programs, then let's be up front with everybody about this whole program and
address it at this time. '
Councilwoman Dimler: Okay, I understand what you're saying but I think you
forget that we have a financial wizard that works for our city. Don Ashworth.
Okay. My last point is that I'm still opposed to increasing city staff to
implement this program and I think in light of a recession as I mentioned
before, it's pretty tough to justify hiring more personnel. And I know you're
going to say we need them.
Gary Warren: Well actually what I was going to say is that we aren't looking,
again when we put the study itself together, we're looking at a 5 year window.
I would expect 5 years time that yeah, because of the growth of the city and
such, there will be some increases there to address it but that that will not
happen initially in the program here until we have the reports that we talked
about and the definition of the policies as far as one very obvious water
quality policy that some of the cities will do is that okay, we want to sweep
all the streets immediately and catch the spring runoff before it runs off and
get all the road salt and such or debris picked up and implement more aggressive
maintenance programs of that nature. Well, that typically does result in staff
additions and stuff but that 's after the policies have been established, the
Council has had input to it and there's a conscience decision.
Councilwoman Dimler: But we're street sweeping now anyway?
Gary Warren: We have one street sweeper and one person and he does it Fridays
and basically between keeping up with the road construction and just normal
complaints and concerns, I mean that's we've got 74 miles of roads in the city
and it doesn't go quite that fast I'm afraid. I
Mayor Chmiel: We'll have to increase the speed of the sweeper.
Councilwoman Dimler: No, I understand. '
Mayor Chmiel: Okay, Tom?
Councilman Workman: I'll make this quick so I can go home and go to bed and get
treatment . I have a lot of, doesn't it sound like my voice is like 2 octaves
deeper? ,
Mayor Chmiel: That's what happens when you get older.
Councilman Workman: If my grandfather the dairy farmer were alive and this were I
a proposal, he'd be in here and the Mayor would be in a headlock and. .. I
however Ursula don't know that finding farmers completely void. . .
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Councilwoman Dimler: I didn't say they were but they're not the main culprit
I said.
Councilman Workman: I have a lot of some of the same reservations on the
funding and whenever we institute something of this magnitude and nature and one
of the telltale portions of a sentence Gary is, on page 6, before we are unable
to do this for the simple reason that the plan and studies being proposed must
be completed before we have adequate understanding of what the problems are and
what needs to be done to resolve them. It's sort of tells us we have a problem.
We don't know what they are and then it makes us a little nervous about shooting
in the dark and everything else. I became heavily involved in the Lake Lucy
' fiasco of trying to get that lake cleaned up so the rest of the wateshed could
get cleaned up and we could get a million dollars but we couldn't put a boat
access and everything else. There was a lot of anguish and a lot of energy
spent on that for the sake of clean water and clean lakes. I think this is a
1 noble project . I think we need this proposal and this program of some nature.
We've had an awful lot of concern about calling it a utility and not a tax and
maybe we need to call it a tax. I think we need to come up with money to get
' this stuff accomplished. I don't think we can get that done without hiring some
additional people. Unless Gary knows something I don't . But it is still fuzzy.
The details of double dipping, I don't buy that. I get nervous with all the
other agencies that are supposed to be doing this but they don't do it. They
don't have the money so why I say it's noble is because we, the City have to
take this on or nobody's going to do it . We've got a lot of water passing out
of our city. Emminating from our city that isn't in such good shape because of
' primarily development . Development pressures and we have to do something about
it . I'm open to all sorts of modifications on funding and maybe on what we need
to specifically narrow in on but I think that the Council thinks that we need to
' do something like this. We're just not so sure what it is exactly that it's
going to be. Gary brings up street sweeping tonight. We've heard that before
that it can help. That it can do some things. Education. In Eagan's index,
they indicate one portion, Segidisk readings. Well, Segidisks. Getting in a
boat and lowering a disk and looking and if you can see the disk, you have good
water. If you can't see the disk, you don't. But clear water doesn't mean you
have clean water. And I'm being facetious by taking one little thing out of
there obviously. What's new? I'm not going to say let's raise taxes to do this
but I think I need somebody to come up with another idea other than a utility or
tax to get this accomplished because I think we need to get it accomplished.
' Mayor Chmiel: Amen? Thank you.
Councilman Johnson: Can I respond to that last one? Real briefly.
1 Mayor Chmiel: Okay.
' Councilman Johnson: I think this utility district will provide us a funding
source where we can go after other funding sources. It's no longer real cheap
to go after federal funds, state funds, whenever. It's not real easy to draw up
a grant to do this. The former company I worked for, we had one guy who
primarily what he did was go around and get hired by cities and counties to get
them federal funds. For doing 509 plans and for doing these plans and for doing
clean-ups. Of course, we got paid up front for getting them money. We had to
foot up on getting the job to do the plan. Usually we have more detail and
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inside information and such but I think that without a funding source, I think
one of the things we should be doing in this utility and I still think it should
be a utility, is going for whatever federal funds we can find and this will give
us some of the money we need up front to go after those grants. I think as far
as, I don't care if you want to call it a utility tax or utility fee. It really
doesn't matter. We need the money. We've got to do the work. It's been a
couple years since I read the storm water legislation that went through a few
years ago. I know that towns over 100,000 had to have storm water management
plans by such and such a date and then towns over 25,000 was a few years later.
I'm not sure if our size town ever had to have a storm water management plan but
I would suspect we do.
Councilwoman Dimler: With 509 we do. That's what 509 is all about. 1
Councilman Johnson: What year do we have to have that plan finished?
Gary Warren: 1982.
Councilman Johnson: 1982?
Gary Warren: I'm not being facetious. The legislation initially set up I think
was.
Councilman Johnson: This is different legislation I'm talking about. The
industrial clients even have to have, like Honeywell and 3M and all these guys,
they have to have individual water quality plans for their individual plants.
Storm water runoff plans in any town over 100,000 people.
Roger Knutson: To bring you up to date. A lawsuit was started against EPA
which was resolved fairly recently and EPA is required to have all it's storm
water regs by I think November 1 of this year. In talking to someone over
there, they have no idea how they'll do it but a court has ordered them to do it
and the first cut is, I think it only applies to cities over 100,000. That's
the federal that Gary's talking about the 509 plan.
Gary Warren: That 's non-point source storm water discharge which is a little
different.
Roger Knutson: The 509 plan, you're required to adopt a response to the
watershed management organization's 509 plan. Adopt your own local plan within
2 years basically after the other plans are adopted.
Gary Warren: And all 3 watershed districts have draft plans in right now.
That's the only reason we tried buffers as far as the deadlines at this time.
Councilman Johnson: So we've got 2 years from when they adopt their plans? I
Roger Knutson: . . .Roger, that 's what he's saying.
Mayor Chmiel: Okay, thanks Jay. '
Councilman Workman: Can I make some more comments?
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Mayor Chmiel: Go ahead.
Councilman Workman: One I wanted to bring up was that the mapping that maybe
would be accomplished. I don't know to what detail the mapping of wetlands
would, how detailed it would be but I know that every meeting that we've sat ,
' just about , has a concern about a wetland in it. We're talking about water just
about every Council meeting. Will that help us or will it not and Gary would
probably say yes. Maybe what we, Don you and I were having a discussion earlier
about how it 's, and Gary you'll laugh at, whenever the engineer has an estimate
on a project , the bid always comes in just under that estimate. And he's got a
good record but maybe he's done it to us again. Maybe we need to take off 25%
of this. Keep things honest . I don't know what 25% of 1.7 million is. It 's a
' lot of money and then that will keep things honest.
Mayor Chmiel: That 's what I was looking at. Sort of a 60/40. We've got a 5
' year window frame that we're looking at and if we find that the additional
dollars are going to be needed, then we go to the additional dollars and get
those. Increase that appropriation to the Council.
tCouncilman Johnson: We look at the amount we charge every year so what we pass
tonight . . .
Mayor Chmiel: Not that we question your integrity in coming up with your
estimates but we just don't know where we're coming from. We don't know the
total amount of dollars.
Councilwoman Dimler: It never goes lower. It usually goes higher.
Mayor Chmiel: Well that 's the norm. But I think it's something that we need.
There's no question. Someone's going to have to do it and I think we're going
to have to do it . We're going to have to be responsible for that. As property
owners. As farmers. As business people. I think we have to do that but that 5
year window is something that you have indicated as well. But I think Tom's
saying he's a little more lenient than what I am. I'm looking at sort of a 60%
of it right now and then moving from there on in. If those additional dollars
are needed, then make those appropriations at that particular time.
Gary Warren: There's no commitment other than an annual commitment to any of
this if the ordinance is adopted. We took the 5 year window just to try and
give you a feeling as for what we think might be the long term commitment as far
as the program. $300,000.00 that we've been kicking around here is the dollars
to get the initial studies, define I guess the need more specifically. I don't
' know how many different wants I can say that . We all wish that we could start
construction tomorrow on some of these things but this is lakes and such are
very complex dynamic things that change with development and other things and
' take detailed study to be able to come up with some conclusion to say yeah, we
should have an aeration device in here and over here we ought to be doing a
sedimentation pond. Over off of Lotus Lake over here. We can't jump to that
stuff without this initial investment. The commitment to fund this utility, I
I think there's a very honest commitment, at least from Paul and I as far as
saying that we expect this on an annual basis to have to stand the acid test of
the budgetary process which you folks have control over.
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
Mayor Chmiel: That 's right .
Councilwoman Dimler: But you're not anticipating that at some point the
Council's going to say okay, we're going to stop this now.
Gary Warren: May very well. I wouldn't flinch. '
Councilwoman Dimler: That would be different.
Gary Warren: I would say that from what I've seen and the frustration that Paul 11
and I are dealing with I think is in trying to follow through on your
initiatives as far as riding. . .of the water quality of the city here and we're
kind of saying that based on that commitment , we don't see that changing in the
city. This is the type of a program and it may change $100,000.00 here or there
and I'm not trying to be casual about that quantity but it may change as we get
into this. I fully expect it because we're all going to get educated on just
want 's happening out on our lakes. $80,000.00-$90,000.00 of Eagan's plan was
just monitoring and sampling and it's because those lakes change from year to
year so dramatically and it takes unfortunately, the expense of evaluating
segidisks and other things of that nature. It takes money.
Mayor Chmiel: Yeah, as we brought up before. The water quality within our
lakes I think is pretty good in comparison to some of the concerns it is with
the rivers and there's no comparison really when you look at those but I really
still think that we may be just shooting just a little high dollar wise and I
feel that we should probably cut back on it . I'm not saying stop the program. I
think it 's needed. The need is there but let's be realistic with it a little
bit more and come up with a different figure than what we've got at the present.
Gary Warren: You mean adjust the actual baseline rate? The $20.00 per year for '
a residential single family. You would like to drop that to $5.00 or something
of that?
Mayor Chmiel: Yeah.
Councilman Johnson: No, no, no. $16.00 I think he said. I
Mayor Chmiel: Take 60% of that .
Councilman Workman: But we still need to come up with the initial cost of
getting this thing up and running.
Councilwoman Dimler: You'll have that won't you? '
Councilman Workman: But by reducing will we be., we'll probably be under funded
for the first year and I wouldn't hold out too much hope for federal funding.
The federal government's broke. The State's broke. We're broke. It's kind of
a coincidence.
Mayor Chmiel: Yeah. It all goes somewhere but saying what you were saying, '
$8.00. Maybe it should be just a little bit more.
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
.1
Gary Warren: Roughly the program as it stands now with the $5.18 per quarter
11 for residential single family would be generating about $320,000.00 in the first
year. Now obviously we go through a quarterly billing cycle so we don't get
that all up front . If you drop that rate whatever percentage of that , then 60%
of that is $192,000.00.
' Mayor Chmiel: Less $128,000.00. That would bring it roughly to about $190 some
thousand dollars.
' Councilman Workman: Can we establish the utility without setting the fee at
this point or wait 2 weeks? Then we don't have to do it on the back of an
' envelope.
Mayor Chmiel: I think that could be done.
' Councilwoman Dimler: With the understanding that we're going to reduce it .
Because I wouldn't want to..
' Councilman Workman: I'd like a little more accurate.
Councilwoman Dimler: I'm not going to vote on it if that isn't the
' understanding.
Gary Warren: R question for the attorney if I could. If the ordinance is
adopted, then to modify that ordinance do we need any hearing?
Roger Knutson: No, but you need a new ordinance.
' Councilman Johnson: How do we set the fees in this ordinance? I'm looking for
that within the ordinance.
Mayor Chmiel: What happens if we delay this 2 weeks to the next meeting?
Gary Warren: I don't see anything magic about bringing it up again and
discussing it . We certainly could table it one more time and I can get a little
' better definition. You're looking for us to look at with the revenues would be
generated if we cut the fees down to 60% of the current proposal.
Councilman Johnson: See the fees aren't in the ordinance so we can pass the
ordinance without establishing the fees.
Roger Knutson: The fees are based upon the budget that you approve separate
from the ordinance. This is nothing but a structure for. . .
Mayor Chmiel: This does not have it, right .
' Councilman Johnson: So we can establish the utility and we're not collecting
any fees until first quarter of next year anyway right?
11 Gary Warren: That's correct but we'll need time.
Mayor Chmiel: We need modification to what's existing.
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
Gary Warren: You could adopt the ordinance and then we could come back at the
next meeting with the cost scenario for a different rate structure.
Mayor Chmiel: I don't see any problem with that, do you?
Roger Knutson: No, it 's a totally separate item. '
Mayor Chmiel: Okay, good.
Councilman Johnson: I move approval of the ordinance adoping a Surface Water
Utility District .
Mayor Chmiel: Is there a second? 1
Councilman Workman: Second.
Councilman Johnson: With the modification to Section 19-146. Appeal of fees as
I read earlier. No adjustments will be made for property classifications I, II
and III. ,
Mayor Chmiel : Okay, is there a second?
Councilman Workman: Second. I
Councilman Johnson moved, Councilman Workman seconded to adopt the Storm Water
Utility District with the modification to Section 19-146. Appeal of fees. That 1
no adjustments will be made for property classifications I, II and III. All
voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously.
REDMOND PRODUCTS, 18930 WEST 78TH STREET:
A. SITE PLAN AMENDMENT FOR EXPANSION OF THE PARKING LOT RESULTING IN VARIANCES 1
TO THE SETBACK REQUIREMENTS_
B. SITE PLAN AMENDMENT FOR EXPANSION OF THE PARKING AREA WEST TO LOTUS LAWN AND
GARDEN CENTER.
Jo Ann Olsen: What we've done is combine the two applications into one. Both,
applications were held separately in front of the Planning Commission. They're
separate actions.
Mayor Chmiel: Let's just address each one individually then.
Jo Ann Olsen: Okay, the off site improvements. In summary, Redmond is in the
need of additional parking on their site and what they're proposing are off site
improvements and on site improvements. The off site improvements are parking
lot on the Lotus Lawn and Garden lot located just west of the Redmond facility.
They're proposing 78 parking stalls with two variances to the zoning ordinance.
The first would be that they're proposing mass parking versus what's required
under the ordinance for the parking stalls and the driveway lanes. They're
proposing that they have 3 parking lanes right up against each other. The other
one is the gravel parking. The ordinance requires that it be bituminous '
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
surface. It is going to be a temporary parking- lot. Only for 3 years and at
that time it will be converted to a natural state that can be used by the Lotus
Lawn and Garden site. The on site improvements are a reconfiguration of the
existing parking lot south of the building. Just adding approximately 104
' parking stalls on the site. Improvements on site are resulting in a variance of
the impervious surface coverage and the variance to the front yard setback.
Staff has met with the applicant several times trying to work out some other way
to resolve their problems. We have had a tour of the site as all the Council
' members. We understand that they are over crowded. That the site first
designed did not envision the number of employees that they do have now and that
they do need additional parking. The problem is that it is resulting in
' variances to the setback. You have to prove hardship other than economic.
. .variances up to 8O impervious surface and the setback variance have never
been approved in the industrial office. . . We'd be setting a big precedence by
doing that . Staff recommended, or the Planning Commission recommended denial
' because of the variances. The Planning Commission on the off site improvements
recommended approval with the conditions of staff which essentially made it
would have to be bituminous surface and not the mass parking. The Planning
' Commission also discussed to allow them to design it and build it as an
experiment . Staff cannot support that recommendation. In fact that is being
recommended approval with certain conditions. . .at that time. . . But we are
' recommending approval of the off site parking lot with the conditions in the
staff report . As far as on site improvements, we recommended again to the
Planning Commission, again because of the variances, the Planning Commission
unanimously recommended denial of the application for on site parking lot
' improvements. We have provided a recommendation for both the on site and off
site improvements. We are recommending approval but the conditions would not
permit the mass parking, the gravel parking, covered and would not permit the
' variances on the on site.
Councilman Johnson: Jo Ann? On the off site, one thing that Eden Prairie just
' recently did was grant Southwest Metro Transit the ability to put in a temporary
parking lot that 's going to be within the Highway 212 corridor where they're not
putting subgrade in. They are compacting the clay, the dirt that's there and I
think there's an old parking lot there so they've also got some other rock in
the area. Just compacting that and throwing asphalt over it and the engineers
are telling us that it will last the 3 years that's being asked for. Before 212
improvements start over there and then they lose the parking lot anyway. For
the off site here, is there any idea whether that might be a feasible
alternative rather than putting in compacted subgrade and compacted rock which
ends up more expensive?
Jo Ann Olsen: No. I'm certain that that would be a compromise that we could
do. The reason that , and again we should probably have Gary addressing these
but the engineering standpoint was that the gravel with the runoff and being
able to paint the parking stalls on the site and engineering reasons for not
having the gravel versus the bituminous. As far as the surface, subsurface.
' Councilman Johnson: It depends upon, you know if you've got your wetland soils
in there, then that won't work but if it is the good hard clay we've got a lot
of in parts of the city, it might work.
Jo Ann Olsen: I can't answer on subgrades.
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
1
Councilman Johnson: The engineers need to answer that and they went upstairs.
Up celebrating for passing the last one. They've got the Champagne flowing
upstairs.
Councilman Workman: Can we hear from the applicant?
Mayor Chmiel: Yes. Please state your name and address. 1
Sandra Reitsma: My name is Sandra Reitsma. I'm director of Human Resources at
Redmond Products and I live in Elk River. We are here this evening with some
requests that we will feel are permanent solutions to our parking problems. I'd
like to explain our problem by explaining the demographics of work force a
little bit . In 3 years we have more than tripled the number of employees that
work at Redmond Products. We have over 250 employees and at any given point in
time we have had between 50 and 80 additional temporary employees working there.
We have 175 parking spaces so we know we have some parking problems. The
average age of our employees is 32. 56% of our employees are female and these
two facts alone point to one of the major issues that we have which is daycare.
When looking at alternatives such as carpooling, it becomes a major problem
where we have a number of employees who are taking their children to various
locations in the morning. Needing to go to various locations in the evening to
pick them up. 35: of our employees live in the Chanhassen area and if we can
stablize our operations a bit , I know that we will have more employees move to
the Chanhassen area. 30% of our employees come from a fair distance away. We
have people that come from St . Paul, from Roseville and as I said, I personally
live in Elk River. While we are in Chanhassen to work, we're also here during
the day. We're using the services and the businesses that are located here in
Chanhassen. We have had our parking problem for a period of time and we have
looked at a number of alternatives and I'll just quickly go through a couple of
those. We have looked into carpooling. We do have a number of employees who do
carpool. We have also looked at Dial a Ride and the area that it covers is
restrictive and the hours that it operates does not really cover the time that
our facility is open. We have looked at off site parking. We have talked to
some other businesses in town but as there is no park and ride in the area, this
is only a temporary solution for us. We're looking for a permanent solution.
We have looked at some additional sites to help get us through this such as the
Lotus site and that will be talked about a little bit more in. detail with the
following speakers. I just want to say that we're a successful company and we
would like to keep that success here in Chanhassen and what we're looking for is
a reasonable solution to our parking problem. We need a place to park. I'd
like to thank you. The next person that will be speaking is Gene Strobel. He
is our engineering manager and he'll talk about the specifics of our request.
Thank you. 1
Gene Strobel: As was stated before by Sandy, our parking problem is a fairly
serious one and the reason we came together with two proposals, one being the
Lotus site was to provide a temporary relief for that parking problem though we
don't want to do a bandaid approach to what we consider a permanent problem.
What we're proposing to do is to take and modify our existing parking lot to
accommodate 279 cars of permanent parking spaces and this will give us enough
parking to basically utilize our facility to it's maximum potential. We're
looking at the Lotus site as a temporary site, a 3 year site to use for mass
parking and what we're asking for are basically 4 things. One is that we're 1
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City Council- Meeting - September 24, 1990
1
allowed to do mass parking on the Lotus site and that we are allowed to use
11 compacted rock rather than a bituminous surface. Secondly, we're asking that we
have two variances to the City ordinance. One being that the setback would we
be allowed to go into the setback with cutting into our berm and providing more
parking spaces there. And fourth, to change the percent of impervious surface.
What we're trying to do is to honor what we believe is the intent of the
ordinance. Is to set Chanhassen industrial office park aside from an urban
blight of pavement from property line to property line. In doing so our
consulting engineer's came up with some solutions that we thought would maintain
some aesthetic appeal to the community. One is to do some terracing with
retaining walls on the building side of the berms and retain the height of the
' berm so that the view from TH 5 is more pleasant than seeing a mass of cars.
Also, some of the issues that are involved that the Planning Commission has, or
the Planning department has is the location of the driveway in adjacency to
Lyman Lumber. We're willing to relent and keep it where ,it currently is, our
' parking entrance. But what we do is this is a permanent solution to a problem
that we've been observing for a long time. One other item that I should note
and I'll point out , in this location of the building we do have some plans that
I are under study to looking at maximizing our site so what we want to do is to
square off the building by filling in a little notch in the corner of the
building and that would raise our impervious up to 80'4. But what we'd like to
' point out is, and part of that intent is to try to maintain the green space and
we do have our property site plan shows our property extending out into TH 5 and
we've highlighted the area that the fact that between TH 5 and a frontage road
there will always be grass and that we're also putting in a landscaped berm and
' it will have trees on it so we're going to try to maintain a good appearance in
the community. With that I'd like to turn to Larry Perkins who is our Chief
Operating Officer has a few comments to make. Thank you.
' Larry Perkins: Honorable Mayor and members of the Council, we appreciate the
opportunity to come before you tonight . I was a City Councilman myself for 3
years in a city just about this size so I can appreciate some of the tough
' decisions that you have to make. The purpose of us coming before you is to ask
for a couple of variances because we'd like to stay in Chanhassen. We like it
here. It 's a nice community. There are nice people. There's a lot of brain
' power available in the metropolitan area. As I've talked to a couple of you
individually, you know that there are other alternatives that we've had to study
as good managers of our business. We're willing to forego those. There are
other states that we could save a couple million dollars a day just by being in
those states because Minnesota isn't known for it's dramatic attraction for
people that like to manufacture products. But it's a nice place to live. We
like the area. We're willing to spend about 6 1/2 million dollars.
' Approximately 40% of that would be to our real estate which would increase our
tax base. We're willing to spend some of those dollars knowing full well that
we'll be improving the building. beyond it's marketability so I think that's just
' a statement of another commitment that maybe we'd only get 50 cents back on the
dollar that we spend on the real estate and we're willing to do that because we
think we'll stay here for a long time. Five years ago we had 40 people. Today
' we have about 250 permanent people and we'd like to cap this site off at about
300 permanent people. We'd like to, some of this money that we're investing is
to get much more efficient . To eliminate the need for those 80 temporary people
so we'll be a much more stable work force and we think that it's a good long
range solution to our problems. We've spent about 5 months and a lot of money
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I
studying all the alternatives. We have at least a dozen different variables in
the air. Most of them we've solved and that's why we're before you tonight
because the parking issue is a serious issue that we want to solve before we
invest and set our 5 year future plan to work. We're proud of the fact that
we're the number one selling conditioner, hair conditioner in the nation. We're
the number 5 hair care manufacturer in the nation and there's about 35 million
bottles out there roaming around the country that say Chanhassen. Manufactured
in Chanhassen, Minnesota on the bottom of them. We have talked to our neighbors
and there are no objections. They're in favor of what we want to do and the
other point that I wanted to mention is that we depreciate your favorable
action. We want to get started if we can possibly before winter comes. At this
point I'd like to introduce Tom Redmond. He would like to say a few things. We
think we've been a pretty good community member and so with that I'll introduce
Tom.
Tom Redmond: I don't know how I got in this pickle. Have you got a cold?
Councilman Workman: I'm not sure what it is.
Tom Redmond: Want a Contact? I was over at Target 's grand opening for their '
big store and had a cold and stopped into the hotel and paid $10.00 for that .
I'm going to use every one. Anyways, I don't know how I got into this pickle
you know. When I started this thing I thought I could do maybe a million
dollars a year and have a nice quiet life and everybody would leave me alone and
have a good time with the family. It didn't work out. So we 'kind of grew you
know and everytime we made a new move I always thought we kind of over extended
ourselves you know. When we built this place the first time, I walked into the
50,000 square feet and I thought, my God. What have I done? I'll never fill
this place up you know but it always grew and grew and grew and grew until it
always outstripped whatever vision I had or plans we had so now we find
ourselves kind of up against it you know. Where the water hits the wheel. We
don't really want to cause a problem here. I don't think we ever do in our
relationship with this community. I think we've always tried to do a little
more than we absolutely had to. I know the way we run our business is we've
never had the federal government come in and tell us to take x ingredient out of
our product . I mean if we thought it wasn't right , we never used it. When we
were planning to move over to this other site, the ONR and the rest of the
people were tickled pink with what we were going to do. I don't think anybody
is more environmentally conscience than we are. We've bought some land out here
in Victoria and we've bought some land down in Belle Plain and we're putting it
back into it 's natural surroundings and pulling out all the fences and planting
the natural flowers that were. That 's the way we run our company. I mean you
know we do as much as we possibly can. That's the way 'we build our products so
we just need some help. I mean we like it here in Minnesota and regardless of
the taxes and all the other -complaining that people have about Minnesota,
believe me if you've traveled around the world, there's no better place to live
than America and there's no better place in the United States to live than
Minnesota. One time my wife and I decided well what the hell. We're
manufacturers. We can live wherever we want now. So we traveled all over the
country. Went to everyplace and we went up and down the west coast you know.
They don't have any snow up there and wound up in Walnut Grove, California.
Thought that was the place to live you know. But the kids were having sex at
age 10 so we decided maybe that wasn't the best place to raise kids and so we I
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wound up really with deciding that Minnesota was the place to live and we will
always have a presence here you know. We wouldn't move away because this is
where my family lives and my grand kids and so we need a little help. Whatever
we do you're not going to be ashamed of it and neither are we or we wouldn't do
' it . And we're not going to take advantage of the situation. That 's the way we
run the company. If we have a problem, we always work it out. We do things by
consensus and I think if you give us a little help in this one, we can work
whatever problems we have out and I think between us we can come up with a
' solution to the problem that benefits you and benefits all the people that work
with us over there. So thanks for your consideration.
' Mayor Chmiel: Any other discussion? Who'd like to start? Tom? Being we ended
with a Tom I thought we'd start with a Tom.
' Councilman Workman: It 's a proud name. It would be a first for me to accept
pharmaceuticals from somebody testifying here. I have one question and I'll be
brief as usual . I noticed we had a State Senate candidate, Terry Johnston in
the audience earlier running for the legislature. God bless her but to what
' extent , and maybe Terry will help us someday. To what extent does the City of
Chanhassen compromise it's minimum standards to keep valuable industry and taxes
and jobs right here where we want them despite the poor record and showing and
' dismal, sad state of affairs in St. Paul. Isn't that where you're from? Is my
question clear?
Councilwoman Dimler: It's real clear.
' Councilman Workman: I very rarely miss an opportunity to take a shot at the
situation down there. I'm in the insurance business. I know a little bit about
' workers comp and it used to be workmans comp which was better. Now it's
workers. And it 's a sad deal and you guys are in a pickle but that 's the one
thing that I thought , if it comes down to that with the City of Chanhassen and
us and a decision we have to make so to what extent do we compromise those
standards. Our crack planning staff and Planning Commission would say forget
it . Thus we're political and I don't have the answer. The impervious is
dramatic. More dramatic than we've seen in a lot of situations. I worry about
' how our hard fought TH 5 upgrade, how things look from that as more and more
people use it . The U.S. Open's coming by. Gravel lots. Mass parking. How does
that look? And I haven't been able to come up with the answers other than I
' really like Redmond Products to stay in town. So under that statement I'm
willing to compromise and I'm anxious to hear the rest of the Council's wisdom
as to how far I should compromise.
' Councilwoman Dimler: I too would like to see Redmond stay. I'd like to see
them be able to maximize their capacity there and I don't know exactly what that
means but on page 4, on the handout that we were given, there are some
' recommendations and as far as I can see, we're not talking about gravel. We're
talking about 2 inch bituminous. Is that correct Jo Ann? Okay, and no mass
parking permitted? We're talking about landscaping. We're talking about
erosion control because there is a wetland there. I think that's great. We're
talking about a letter of credit which I assume they've agreed to provide.
Okay. And the last point, number 7 is talking about the on site parking. I
guess that 's where I would be willing to make some compromises. We're talking
about 7O% impervious surface here but I thought it was closer to 80. Are we not
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
at all including the extension of the building in this?
Jo Ann Olsen: What that- condition is saying is they must maintain the ordinance
requirement .
Councilwoman Dimler: At 70% including the extension of the building? ,
Jo Ann Olsen: No. The ordinance only allows a maximum of 70k. What they're
proposing with the parking lot is approximately 79%. With the addition of the
building, I believe it 's about 80%.
Councilwoman Dimler: So we're saying that if we stay here at 70k, that we
wouldn't allow the expansion of the building or is that under a different .
Jo Ann Olsen: That is not part of this issue. We have not reviewed the
expansion of the building. That would be a totally new site plan so they would
be coming through.
Councilwoman Dimler: But we put 70 in there. We're actually excluding that
already?
Jo Ann Olsen: Correct. If they can work out a way to provide the green space
in placement of that .
Councilwoman Dimler: I guess when I went to look at the site, being that
they're digging into the berming and TH S doesn't appear to be, visualization
from TH 5 does not appear to be affected, I wouldn't have any trouble with
granting that setback variance. The impervious surface, as far as I can see,
they're taking out flowers, lighting and things like that. I guess I really
wouldn't object to letting those become parking spaces. There's other
landscaping provided is there not? If they're taking out the flowers and the
lighting and stuff, are we requiring other landscaping to replace that? ,
Paul Krauss: Well it becomes problematic. There's no place left to put it.
It 's being paved over. You've basically got parking lot islands, landscaped
islands that will disappear.
Councilwoman Dimler: I'm not sure that that will, I mean it's nice to have the
landscaping there and the flowers there but I'm not sure that that would make a
whole lot of difference from TH 5. That's what I'm saying. So I think if we
need to compromise, those would be the areas where we're going to compromise.
Mayor Chmiel: Okay, thank you. ,
Councilman Johnson: I have a question as to van pooling. You didn't talk about
van pooling and also how much contact have you had with Southwest Metro on
trying to establish a van pool and that kind of work? I think we mentioned that
the other day and I'm having problems seeing what's the difference between
getting picked up from the van pool or your car pool at your babysitters house
or getting picked up at your house. Why is having to stop at a babysitters
house different? Can you address those for me for a quick second?
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
1
Sandra Reitsma: If I could, I'd just to say that we have looked at trying to do
some van pooling and as I said, we have employees that are in the area. We do
have people that car pool but we also have people as I said who come from as far
away as Elk River, St. Paul, Roseville. All these different areas and when
we're looking at that, a lot of it 's not real conducive. The traveling is not
real well lined up to stop and pick up people. The other thing that we're
talking about with the daycare is the issue of being able to go and get your
children. To drop your children off. To get your children. If they're sick or
1 whatever and if you don't have a car available to do that , there's a real
problem with that . We have real resistance. We have a real fight from our
employees when it comes to that. They're the ones that are going to be called
to get their children. They want to be able to go to those different locations
and get those children.
Councilman Johnson: That 's true. There's a lot of people in this world that
take a city bus.
Mayor Chmiel: Take a bus and leave the driving to us. Okay. Anything else
1 Jay?
Councilman Johnson: Well, where do we draw the line? We've pretty much drawn
1 the line in the industrial park at the ordinance. The ordinance was made as the
line. We drew the line and that 's a pretty good place to stop. Gary, you
weren't here earlier when I asked a question as to they're talking a temporary
parking lot . 3 years and they want to put rock in. Southwest Metro's doing the
' exact same thing. 3 year parking lot except for we're not putting rock in.
Eden Prairie's going to allow us to compact the soil and put 3 inches of
bituminous over the top of the soil. They figure it will last 3 years and
1 wouldn't last 10 or 15 like you want a regular parking lot but they're not
asking for 10 or 15. They're asking for 3. Would that be a reasonable
compromise on the off site parking? Given adequate soil conditions of course.
' Gary Warren: I guess that 's the question is two. There's two parts. One is
the type of use that the lot is going to have as far as the vehicles themselves.
Trucks or whatever and also what is the condition of the subsoils. We know at
' least from the Jay Kronick property that these are some pretty lousy soils I
think. Now I don't know what the results are. I haven't seen them specifically
in that area but I know that they were pretty bad and we actually disposed of a
1 good portion of the black dirt that was excavated from the City's pond to the
north of that property was disposed in that area to level it. So the blacker
the dirt , the poorer the subbase and so on.
1 Councilman Johnson: Is there any economic development district correct?
There's still some money in it? Can there be money used for correcting soil
conditions in an area like this?
1 Don Ashworth: I would have to research that . I'm not sure. You can do soil
corrections. The legislature did make major changes as to what can be done
' within economic development districts, which this one is. Secondarily we're
allowed an extension on that district with the funds solely be used for the TH
101 realignment .
1 Councilman Johnson: So no special legislation?
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
Don Ashworth: Right . My initial position would be, I think you'd have a very
difficult time spending dollars for that purpose. I
Councilman Johnson: I mentioned when Jo Ann and I were there for our tour of
the place, the possibility of looking at ordinance amendment on the setback side
of it . If the sole purpose of the setback is aesthetics. If there are no
environmental or other purposes, than what they are proposing that you use the
same aesthetics as a 30 foot strip of grass. That still leaves the problem of
the 707 green space which I do not believe is totally aesthetics. It's water
runoff. Storm water. A lot of other things beyond aesthetics so I don't know.
I can see changing our ordinance to allow the equivalent of the 30 foot setback
by a combination of berming, vegetation and whatever. Putting up an earth fence
there.
Mayor Chmiel: Berm?
Councilman Johnson: Berm, yeah. The fence on the back side of the berm so the
berm's vertical. I'm only a civil engineer. I can't think these technical
terms. Maybe I'll borrow some of his Contact . See I'm in a quandry there
because I don't think with, I've always been for the last 4 years very tough on
variances because they spread like wildfire. I can see why the neighbors would
like to support you in requesting this variance because they'd like to do it
too. They'd like to expand and expand into the setbacks and they'd like to do
it too as their business gets better so you know, if they support you and you
get it , then they've got a better chance of getting it . That 's what we don't
want . We don't want this to continue to grow. We've set our standards for our
city and a variance is saying we're going to reduce our standards.
Councilwoman Dimler: Well maybe Jay I can help you with your quandry because
that was my exact feeling when the St . Hubert 's PUD came with, they're way above
70% and we were saying they have drainage problems already but we went ahead and
approved it . So I have trouble on the other hand giving it to a PUD because
they're a PUD and not giving it to someone else. It isn't necessarily fair. I
mean they can't help that they're not a PUD.
Councilman Johnson: . . .ordinance though. I mean they didn't have a variance. '
Councilwoman Dimler: St . Hubert 's? Well yeah but by granting them a PUD you're
saying they don't have to meet our regular ordinance requirements.
Councilman Johnson: And that 's legal?
Councilwoman Dimler: Sure. 1
Councilman Johnson: If we could grant these guys a PUD, we could do the same
thing. But that 's not legal. I mean you know, it's a legal framework you're
working with here.
Councilwoman Dimler: You're talking semantics here.
Councilman Johnson: Sure we are.
Councilwoman Dimler: Let 's make them a PUD then.
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
1
Councilman Johnson: Can they apply for a PUD?
Paul Krauss: I'm sure they could. There's always been the premise for a PUD
though that the City is getting something back.
' Councilwoman Dimler: We didn't get anything from St. Hubert's.
Councilman Johnson: Actually we are getting something from St. Hubert's. I
think we are.
Councilman Workman: We're getting a corporate business and viable business to
stay in town and provide jobs.
Councilman Johnson: I think they're committed, they're going to stay in town.
They've said they're going to stay in town in one form or another. Whether it's
' only a corporate headquarters and their manufacturing goes elsewhere. I don't
see that and I don't take lightly their threats either you know. Give me
something or I'm going to move. I don't do that .
Councilwoman Dimler: You do have some Chan people working here though.
Councilman Johnson: I'm sure we do.
Councilwoman Dimler: So I think that 's something to consider.
Mayor Chmiel: Okay. Anything more Jay?
Judy Bedder: Can I say something? I live in Chanhassen and I've lived here
many years.
Mayor Chmiel: Would you like to come up to the microphone so we can pick you up
please on our recordings.
1 Judy Bedder: As a resident of Chanhassen I would like to continue working at
Redmond and have the facility there. I enjoy just having 5 minutes to work. No
' different than you Don or you Ursula. It's nice. I think we should give them
the consideration. I really do. We employ people from town. When we need
temporaries we help our youth out. The college kids. You know we use them in
the summer. I would really like to see us help them. And I urge you to do so.
Thank you.
Mayor Chmiel: Can I have your name please?
1 Judy Better: My name is Judy Bedder.
Mayor Chmiel: Thank you. I guess I'll put my two cents in now.
Councilwoman Dimler: All right.
Mayor Chmiel: I think that , I know that Redmond is a compliment to the city of
Chanhassen. We appreciate you being here. I think that in looking at a lot of
these things that I have read and what I've been listening to, I too would like
to see us somehow do an accommodation of this. I'd like also to sort of take
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
I
something from which the Planning Commission discussed. The possibility of
treating this proposal as an experiment . I see other businesses in town, as Jay
said, who as they develop and as they grow, get into sort of a bind and back
into the pickle and how can we really address those. How can we as a community
wanting to support our industries provide that kind of situation for them.
Experimental basis I think would not be a bad idea so we know where we're going
if in the event this happens in another location. Maybe you have a little bit
of input on that .
Paul Krauss: The whole experimental idea that the Planning Commission, or ,
several of the Planning Commissioners had was something that staff frankly took
exception to because we had problems visualizing how it would occur. On the one
hand we have an ordinance that says thou shalt do this. On the other hand we're
saying well ignore that staff. Just let them do whatever they want to do and
we'll see if it works. I can't do that . You can give them a variance to do
that if you can find rationale to do that but I've got to uphold what either you
tell me it says in the ordinance. I don't have the discretion to throw the book
out of the window which is sort of what the Planning Commission was asking us to
do to try out that mass parking scheme. You know ordinances are not perfect and
there are times that ordinances need to be improved and modified to accommodate
new situations. And I don't want to get too hung up on precedent here or too
much sounding like a bureaucrat but you know nobody's denying that Redmond's
been an excellent corporate citizen and we all want them to stay. We would have
preferred that they build their new plant in the community but barring that we'd
like them to expand their- old one. The concern we have, and we would have love
to have found a solution for them, is how do we differentiate between their
business and the next business to come into town or the next business to
expand? PMT which is building an expansion right now could have come to us with
the exact same discussion. Basically saying I employ people in the community.
I'r. a good employer. I'm growing and I need you to accommodate me. I'm not
saying that we can't accommodate people but I'm leery of using the variances to
do that or to use experiments if you will. If the ordinance is flawed, if the
ordinance needs to build in more flexibility, possibly we should look at
changing it and coming up with some ideas. I'm not sure what they'd be at this
point . I'm just real concerned, I guess as to the precedent value.
Councilman Johnson: There was one other on the percent impervious surface which
is a precedent I don't like, was purchasing the property that's currently used
as a city retention basin and wetlands behind Jay's Lotus Lawn and Garden's
area. I think Jay owns that right now and we have an easement over it . It'd /II
end up being Redmond owning it and we have an easement over it and that would be
part of their contiguous lot and they would then be over the 70%. Technically
they would meet the ordinance. What they've actually done did not actually add
any drainable surfaces or anything. It just played games with the existing land
but they got to the point of technically meeting the percent impervious. Then
the other one would be to change the ordinance to, if there were no other reason
other than visual to allow the berming in replace of the 30 foot setback under
certain conditions, very specific tied in conditions.
Paul Krauss: If I could touch on that 30 foot setback for a moment. I think
the applicant's admirably shown that from a visual standpoint it will look no
different as you're passing by on TH 5. In this site that probably works well.
I mean from a design standpoint . From performance standpoint, I support those ,
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
11
kinds of approaches. Again I look down the road a little bit though and
11 visualize what does that get us into and with the new comp plan, one area where
we have sort of a residential industrial interface is along Audubon Road. Now
some of the comp plan's been changed by the Planning Commission because of that
but we're still going to be facing situations where we have new industrial
buildings across the street. Across Audubon Road from those residential areas.
We're looking at the possibility of changing the ordinance to require increased
buffer yards but right now that 30 foot parking setback is the only thing that
will separate that new site from that single family home. And that 's the most
we can require theoretically under the ordinance right now. When a precedent is
established for something less, again I've got to try and think how would we
differentiate between that new applicant and this one tonight. Possibly there's
something I'm not thinking of but I'm not sure how that would be done.
Councilman Johnson: When I'm considering an ordinance change, I would envision
that it would not be applicable of decreasing the distance to a residential
zoning. That if we're going to allow a decrease of the setback, the only way
you could do it is with achieving the identical visual impact as the full
setback is but only to another industrial/business/commercial whatever zoning.
That distance setback for noise and other purposes to the residential, the
harming doesn't do it for me because there's more reasons there than just
strictly visual. So over everything else. So that 's what I'm looking at as far
as the front parking there.
Councilman Workman: Jay, if I could interject . A lot of the comp plan
discussion involves TH 5 specifically and what is TH 5 going to look like. Now
it would appear to me, and maybe what Paul is saying is maybe in the future we
want , if we're going to have light industrial office on TH 5 and we don't want
' to look like Eden Prairie as people are beating the drum, we're going to want it
set back even further. Potentially or to dictate how that looks. That 's the
catch that maybe we're getting into here. If you just have a green fence and a
wall up kind of fooling people, does that accomplish the same thing?
Councilman Johnson: No, No. I'm saying it has to have the exact same visual
impact as what the required 30 foot setback would and I would not allow fences
to give you that visual impact . It 'd have to be of natural material. Such as
what they are doing. With the berm there they're using sod and trees and bushes
and flowers and whatever to give you the visual setback. But to put up a fence
across there and paint it green, that doesn't buy me anything. I agree with
you.
Councilman Workman: Paul, would we be requiring further setbacks from the 30 in
the future?
Paul Krauss: We're actually looking at trying to change the ordinance to do
that , yeah.
Councilman Workman: Would this fall under an existing use?
' Councilwoman Dimler: Then it would.
Councilman Johnson: This wouldn't be for them. This would be for their back
lot line more or less which is up against residential.
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
Paul Krauss: . . .yes, that 's correct . That's their only residential exposure is
on the back side. I
Councilman Johnson: And then they'd be grandfathered because they're already
there anyway. I
Paul Krauss: Right .
Councilman Workman: Well you know, two of these requests, the mass parking and ,
the rock or pavement are temporary so they're not going to be there forever.
And we're saying that we're not going to notice any change in the front setback.
If there's going to be, we're going to know about it and Dave Peterson's going
to publish it in big letters in the front page of the paper. You know the
impervious is going to change but I don't know. I refer back to my original
question and that 's. . .
Councilwoman Oimler: Mr. Erhart would like to say something.
Mayor Chmiel: Yeah, Tim. I
Tim Erhart : Tim Erhart and I run a business in the industrial park of
Chanhassen. I have for the last 5 years. Our business too has grown
dramatically since we started and since we moved here in 1985. As opposed to
coming in here and asking for exceptions to the ordinance, I think we've
remained good citizens. We saw the growth coming. We planned for it . We
increased our space about 75% last year. We stuck with the existing ordinances
on parking. We're paying the taxes for that existing 75% addition. I would be
extremely surprised to find that another business could come in a year later and
be granted variances in a situation where we simply did our planning properly.
Avoided a contest with the city and basically were acting as good citizens. And
I just cannot see how you can take one business, for whatever reason or threat
and to make exceptions when there really is, as I can see, no hardship other
than a desire to stall in order to either optimize their profitability or their
flexibility. I can see no reason other than those two things. If their growth
is there, certainly the finance will be there to do the thing properly because
usually growth allows spending in that area. So those are my comments and I
would ask that you view disfavorably on this proposal.
Mayor Chmiel: Thank you. I
Larry Perkins: I'd like to speak to just a few points that may clarify. Also
to give our commitment . As far as visually, I can assure you and I think those
that know about Redmond and have watched Redmond through the years, that we will
do everything. The place is probably one of the most beautiful sites on the
east side of town now. It will continue to be that way and I can assure you
that our frontal view will be equally as good looking as it is today or better.
As far as the experimental point, I guess we wouldn't object if you wanted to
experiment with that concept but we couldn't, it would put us in jeopardy in
terms of putting a time frame on it because we have these multi-millions of
dollars that we'd like to spend and that doesn't come lightly and I want to
assure you that didn't come lightly to us. We spent, as I said, 5 months and
several hundred thousand dollars in fees studying this project. I'm probably
the one to blame for not building. . .decided not to build out on the new project
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
11
site. The 55 acre site because it simply was about 5 times too large for good
1 strategic planning as far as where we want to go in the next 5 to 7 years. So
then we brought ourselves back to square one and tried to decide what the best
thing for the company would be. We don't bring up other alternatives to
threaten in any way but you people as business people would look at your
alternatives as well and that 's the only reason that we've spent these 5 months
studying. As far as the impervious, I'd like to point out a couple of things.
We own 9.2 acres so we own down to here. Now obviously the State has an
' easement over this but if you consider this green area here which we feel, we've
looked at the drawings and feel will always be some amount of green there. It 's
about an acre of green and if you consider that and not take the 7 acres, if
' you're looking at the intent we feel that we're at the 70% then and meet the
intent of that total acreage. Not just the acreage that we're able to utilize.
I might point out also that Lyman right next to us has much more than 70%
impervious. Also wanted to point out that this gravel area over here, we
' proposed a berm in front of the gravel area so visually would also be equal and
not be able to be seen from the highway. So I just wanted to point out those
few things and I'm happy to any other questions you might have.
Mayor Chmiel: Okay. Thank you. Paul, that issue of the green space adjacent
to the highway. Which the highway department has the easement over.
' Paul Krauss: Mr. Mayor, it's a roadway easement . They own the underlying land
but it 's got a roadway on it . It's no different than a single family lot that's
platted for the center line of a street . We don't include that area in the lot
' computation for that single family lot. Nor do we include it in this case for
their hard surface coverage. In face some of that area is going to be paved
under as TH 5 is widened.
' Mayor Chmiel: Okay. Any other discussion? Did you find anything in the book
Jay?
Councilman Johnson: I just opened it .
Councilman Workman: I think Mr. Erhart raises some good points. So getting
' back to my original question again, how far do we compromise? We could still do
all of this tonight and in 5 months they could decide they don't want to be in
town anyway and that it would be a nice property to sell. I don't know. You
know that doesn't guarantee, our passing of this doesn't guarantee that they'll
remain in town anyway. I mean if they're operating on markets and business and
they're going to continue to do so despite what the city does for them or
against them.
' Mayor Chmiel: Okay. Any other discussion? I'm not hearing any other
discussion. Is there a motion? Awfully quiet. You can see it's a hard task
' for us to come up with a solution.
Councilwoman Dimler: Is everyone okay with conditions 1 thru 6 on the staff
recommendations? Page 4 and 5.
Mayor Chmiel: Yeah, I don't have any.
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
Councilwoman Dimler: So we could pass those and take number 7 then and
re-evaluate it? I
Councilman Johnson: It 's so integral to the whole thing.
Councilwoman Dimler: Well no. The other ones are the off site.
Councilman Johnson: 1 thru 6 only cover the off site?
Councilwoman Dimler: I think so. '
Mayor Chmiel: Yes.
Councilman Johnson: Okay.
Councilwoman Dimler: And number 7 deals with the on site. ,
Councilman Johnson: The only variance in 1 thru 6 is mass parking?
Councilman Workman: That 's not a variance. Mass parking wouldn't be a variance 1
is it?
Councilwoman Dimler: Well you're denying that though here. '
Paul Krauss: It's approved the way it's written.
Councilwoman Dimler: That the mass parking not be permitted?
Paul Krauss: Right .
Councilwoman Dimler: So how many sites would that give them?
Jo Ann Olsen: Down to 60. I
Mayor Chmiel: 60 to 75, is that what the total was?
Jo Ann Olsen: I don't recall. 1
Mayor Chmiel: Yes Tom.
Tom Redmond: I'd like to clear up a few misconceptions. We don't have any
secrets. Never did. Never will. If you want to know what we're going to be
doing 3 years from now, ask us. We'll tell you what we're thinking of doing
from now. We have the same agreement with our employees. We have no secrets
from them. None. If they want to know what building plans, 4 times a year we
have a big pizza party. We tell them everything we're going to do. All of our
building plans. All of our dreams. All of our products. We have no intention
of leaving Chanhassen in 2 months or 5 months. I mean if we could stay here the
rest of our carreer, we would. And we will always have a presence here. Now
let me deal with this gentleman's contention that we're doing this for profit or
the big business syndrome. He's right. We are. Last year every employee in
our place got a $2,000.00 check for Christmas regardless of their position.
Whether it was Larry Perkins, our 'C00 or if it was Linda, the lady that keeps 1
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the place clean. They all get the same bonus. Everybody got a 10% contribution
to their profit sharing. Everybody got a 50; matching to their 401 K. We've
got the best insurance. We've got the best drug. We've got the greatest hours.
Everybody gets summer hours off and at the end of the year when it came to
divide the rest on December 22nd, everybody got a check for 20% of their annual
salary. You bet it's for profit but our people share in it and that's exactly
what this is going to do. That place is paid for. If I could stay there and
guarantee everybody a 20%c or 25% check at the end of the year, I'd do it so
you're absolutely correct.
Larry Perkins: . . .commitment, Councilman Workman I understand what you're
' saying but if you put that money into the place, we're not leaving. I suppose
we could get the variance and quick sell the place and go someplace else but
once we put the money, I think that's our commitment to you that once we do that
we are. . .we want to get busy about that because of growth but I think it's,
' we're. . .commitment .
Councilman Workman: I'm not accusing anybody of carpet bagging or anything else
and thank you for the Congressman. No, I'm just saying there's forces out there
that even a well run business has no control over and that could happen. Not by
design but by people so.
' Councilwoman Dimler: I was asking about how many, if no mass parking, that
brings them down to.
Jo Ann Olsen: 65.
Councilwoman Dimler: As opposed to?
JO Ann Olsen: 78.
Councilwoman Dimler: Okay. I think 65 is acceptable. I mean I'd like to give
1 them the 78 but I do see certain dangers in emergencies. Having cars locked in.
Councilman Workman: Ready to make a motion on the first 6?
' Councilwoman Dimler: Yeah. So I move approval of Site Plan Amendment #85-1 for
the off-site improvements with conditions 1 thru 6.
Mayor Chmiel: And what about condition 7?
Councilwoman Dimler: And condition 7 I recommend that we take another look at .
' Sit down with staff and see what we can come up with.
Councilman Workman: Second.
Mayor Chmiel: Discussion is open.
Councilman Johnson: On item 1, 2 inch bituminous mat. Is this also assuming
proper underlaying and stuff as a regular parking lot? Can we modify the
wording to allow a designed 3 year lot? Normally you have what? 3 to 6 inches
of rock underneath the 2 inch mat.
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Gary Warren: That leaves 6 right? If they can provide the soil information
that verifies it , that we're going to get a 3 year life, proper tonage parking
lot, I guess providing that documentation we can look specifically at the
design. That will obviously cost money for them to do that .
Councilman Johnson: No semi's allowed. Of course by the design, no semi's 1
going to get out. They might get in. They might not get out. So would we be
looking to modify condition 1 somehow or another to state that if bituminous mat
is proposed, without the rock underlay?
Gary Warren: Gravel?
Councilman Johnson: Yeah, the gravel.
Councilwoman Dimler: Can we just say something as deemed acceptable by the
engineers?
Councilman Johnson: Yeah, that could be easier.
Councilwoman Dimler: I would accept that amendment .
Councilman Workman: Second.
Mayor Chmiel : Wait, wait . Amendment to the existing with an acceptance by the
first and second.
Councilman Johnson: The design of which will be approved by the Engineer.
Councilwoman Dimler: Yeah, that 's fine.
Mayor Chmiel: Clarification of item 7 to be looked at at number 7? Come up
with a conclusion regarding the 70% impervious. Is that what you were saying?
Councilwoman Dimler: Yes. The 70% impervious and the setback variance.
Councilman Johnson: Are we going to look at our mass parking regulation at any ,
time to see? This is written, I don't know. We've never discussed mass parking
the 4 years I've been here. We prohibit it and I don't know why.
Councilwoman Dimler: It's not safe. 1
Paul Krauss: Well we don't have in town typically places that can benefit by
it. When you see the sporting events where everybody arrives and leaves at the
same time. One of the issues that was raised tonight was that van pooling was
unsuitable because people needed to run for daycare and that kind of situation
for a sick kid. When you mass park, you're there until the bell rings and
there's no leaving. There's some questions I suppose from a management
standpoint for if the City in fact has any interest in making sure that it 's run
correctly and I'm not sure if there's any problems associated with it or not but
we don't have any in town just because it's basically not suitable for most
places and right now the ordinance doesn't allow it. It says you'll have a
parking stall that's 8 1/2 feet wide and 18 feet long and it's got to have a
drive up. . .
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
Mayor Chmiel: Yeah. Good. Alright . We have a motion on the floor with a
second to have the recommendations with item 1, the acceptability by the
Engineer added to that. Item 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and the on site improvements to be
relooked at .
' Councilwoman Dimler moved, Councilman Workman seconded to approve Site Plan
Amendment 185-1 for the Off-Site improvements as shown on the plans dated August
21, 1990 subject to the following conditions:
1. A revised site plan shall be submitted for the City Engineer's approval
showing that the parking lot shall be paved with a 2 inch bituminous mat and
' that the mass parking area proposed by the applicant not be permitted.
2. The parking lot will be permitted for three year (36 months) until October
31, 1993, and at which time the area must be restored to its original
condition. If the use of the parking lot is extended beyond three years
curb and gutter must be provided around the parking lot perimeter and the
site must connect to the storm sewer in West 78th Street.
t3. A revised grading and landscaping plan shall be submitted providing the
required berming and landscaping.
4. Type III reinforced erosion control shall be installed at all locations
shown on the plans prior to construction and maintained for the life of the
facility adjacent to the wetland off-site. A detail of Type III reinforced
' erosion control shall be shown on the plans.
5. A concrete driveway apron (city standard) shall be installed at the entrance
' to the parking lot .
6. The applicant shall provide the City with a letter of credit in an amount
approved by the City Engineer to cover the cost to remove all of the
off-site proposed improvements and restore the site back to it's original
condition.
' Also to approve tabling the on-site improvements and condition number 7 for
further review by staff. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously.
' Mayor Chmiel: We will take a look at that portion of it and then get back to
the applicants as well as back to Council. Okay?
Paul Krauss: Is there any direction as to what areas we should pursue?
Mayor Chmiel: Well that's a good question Paul. I think you're going to have
to review the completeness of it and come back with some kind of specific
direction I'd say. . . Okay? Good. Thank you.
INTERIM USE PERMIT TO EXCAVATE 60,000 CUBIC YARDS OF CLAY MATERIAL FOR
CONSTRUCTION OF NEW TH 5, SHAFER CONTRACTING, INC..
Jo Ann Olsen: We just wanted you to change from an IUP to an Earth Work Permit.
That was brought up at the Planning Commission. Technically it's an Earth Work
' Permit .
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Councilman Workman moved, Councilwoman Dialer seconded to approve Earth Work
Permit 190-4 with the following conditions: I
1. The applicant shall provide the City with a letter of credit in the amount
of $38,150.00 to cover any road damage, maintenance of erosion control
measures and site restoration.
2. The applicant shall submit $401.00 grading permit fee as required by the
Uniform Building Code and all city and county staff time used to monitor and
inspect the operation shall be paid at a rate of $30.00 per hour.
3. The applicant shall provide a Traffic Control Plan for staff approval
providing specifications on how truck hauling traffic will be controlled,
specifically during rush hour periods.
4. The applicant shall obtain and comply with all permit requirements of the
Riley-Purgatory-Bluff Creek Watershed District .
5. The applicant shall make arrangements to cap the existing well in accordance
with all state, county and local requirements prior to initiating grading
operations.
6. The applicant shall supply the City with a mylar as-built survey prepared by '
a professional engineer upon completion of excavation to verify the grading
plan has been performed in compliance with the proposed plan.
7. Temporary settling basins shall be constructed during the grading operations
on an as needed basis or as requested by the City.
8. Topsoiling and disk mulch seeding shall be implemented immediately following
the completion of excavated areas.
9. Noise levels stemming from the operation are not to exceed MnPCA and EPA 1
regulations. If the city determines that there is a problem warranting such
tests shall be paid for by the applicant .
10. Hours of operation are limited to 7:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. Monday through
Saturday and prohibited on national holidays. If the City Engineer
determines that traffic conflicts result due to rush hour traffic flows, the
hours of operations will be appropriately restricted.
11. The city will work with the County Sheriff to coordinate speed and weight
checks. If trucks are violating traffic laws, staff will require that the
operation be shut down and will ask the City Council to revoke the permit .
All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously. '
Councilman Workman: I would say that staff's hard work on the Wanegrin deal
paid off on this. Am I correct? '
Mayor Chmiel: Yes. Thank you staff.
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CONSIDER SCHOOL SPEED ZONES ON LAREDO DRIVE, KERBER BOULEVARD GREAT PLAINS
BLVD. AND WEST 78TH STREET.
Gary Warren: We've got several school speed zones here that we're all I think
interested in seeing addressed and fortunately we've been able to finally get
our pedestrian counts. Motion for approval?
Councilwoman Dimler: Uh-huh.
Councilman Workman: I'd move approval.
' Gary Warren: With that I'll conclude my comments.
Councilman Johnson: Actually the only thing I'd like to show is if the
' newspapers are aware, make sure they're aware what sections we just approved
because I think this is an important thing in our city. It 's probably long over
due.
' Councilman Workman: I could give them my report .
Councilman Johnson: I think they have copies of the report. Please refer to
' the reports and get the streets right because people are going to be expecting
their streets to, and some weren't approved and some were.
Mayor Chmiel: There's one part in here which I agree with and that's on page 5.
It says, it should be noted that establishing school speed zones alone is not
enough to decrease the accident potential. Children must be made aware of
routes and crossing points and they should take to and from school utilizing
crossing guards or crosswalks where the driver anticipates pedestrian
activities. I think that would be something possibly for CSO's to talk to the
children in the schools or the Sheriff's Department. Whoever, to bring this up
' to the kids.
Councilman Johnson: I think at the beginning of school I think they do this as
part of.
Mayor Chmiel: Well I just want to make sure.
' Councilman Johnson: I'll tell you, having the last year, now having a sidewalk
out here on Laredo you know. I've driven this for 10 years going to work with
children in the street as I drive by and it is.
' Mayor Chmiel: They're still there with their bicycles and they're still
walking.
Councilman Johnson: They're mostly on the sidewalks now.
Mayor Chmiel: I've seen them on the street unfortunately.
' Councilman Johnson: I've seen the adults walk down the streets with sidewalks
on both sides. In fact I saw somebody walk down West 78th Street the other day.
Right down in amongst all the traffic. Just walking down the street . 3 foot
from a sidewalk.
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Mayor Chmiel: Any other discussion? We had a motion.
Councilman Workman: I did move approval.
Councilwoman Dimler: Second.
Resolution #90-124: Councilman Workman moved, Councilwoman Dimler seconded to
approve the following:
1 . Adopt resolutions establishing school speed zones along Great Plains
Boulevard (15 mph), Kerber Boulevard, (20 mph) and Laredo Drive (15 mph), as
noted in the staff report dated September 19, 1990. '
2. Adopt resolution for No Parking signs along both sides on Kerber Boulevard
300 feet north and south of the driveway entrance to West Village Heights
Townhouses.
3. Move crosswalk on Kerber Boulevard south to coincide with the entrance to
West Village Heights Townhouses.
4. Implementation of traffic control signs as indicated on Attachment Nos 2 and
5.
5. Notify bus company to direct their drivers to unload in school parking lot
not on street whenever possible.
All voted in favor and the motion carried.
COUNCIL PRESENTATIONS: ,
Mayor Chmiel: Before we do that, I did forget . I did not ask for an approval
on this resolution and I think we need it .
Councilman Workman: So moved.
Councilwoman Dimler: Second. '
Resolution #90-125: Councilman Workman moved, Councilwoman Dimler seconded
approving the resolution commending the efforts of the agencies and personnel
that assisted in the bus accident that occured in Chanhassen on September 10,
1990. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously.
Councilman Johnson: I thought we did that on September 18th? '
Mayor Chmiel: No.
Don Ashworth: It shows it in there, I reminded Don that we tabled that. That
was our work session and we didn't do. . .
Councilman Johnson: Oh, okay. Because Margie asked me about that. I said,
no I think we already passed that .
Mayor Chmiel: Kiowa Circle, St . Hubert's Church and Met Council. '
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
I
Councilwoman Dimler: Okay, I'd like to talk about Kiowa Circle for a moment .
iMayor Chmiel: Where is that Ursula?
' Councilwoman Dimler: Off of Frontier Trail.
Mayor Chmiel: Is there anyone I know that lives on that street?
' Councilwoman Dimler: Yes. That 's why I want to talk about it.
Councilman Johnson: We've got a former Council member that used to live there.
' Councilwoman Dimler: Yeah, right and he wrote a complaint. No actually with
the improvements on Frontier Trail, they all went wonderfully. However, a lot
of the heavy equipment got parked on Kiowa Circle and also they did some digging
' there to do the sanitary sewer so actually the whole road looks like a mess now.
There is still equipment parked there. There's no more other activity. Several
of the neighbors have called me and said when are they going to come in and redo
' or resurface Kiowa Circle now so I would ask for an update on where we are in
that project and hopefully it will get done before winter sets in.
Gary Warren: Yes. Councilwoman Dimler and I have spoken about this. I don't
know if the crews were there today. You'll have to tell me.
Councilwoman Dimler: I haven't seen anybody.
IGary Warren: But they will be there tomorrow to patch the sewer rehab
excavation that was done. We did a spot repair of the sanitary sewer in that
' area and that has been left to settle out and now actually city crews are going
to do it because of the. . .sticks and how things are working but it should be out
there tomorrow to patch that.. We've been in contact with the contractor to close
' up and button up and get his equipment out of there so hopefully that will
happen this week yet as well.
Councilwoman Dimler: So you're telling me you're not going to redo the whole
surface. You're just going to patch the sewer? The area where they repaired
the sewer?
' Mayor Chmiel: Has it been reviewed and looked at?
Councilwoman Dimler: Yeah, look at it because I know what the street looked
like before and it's much more cracked with all that heavy equipment. Even the
circle parts where they stored all their heavy equipment .
Gary Warren: We've got video from what it looked like before the project
started so our original intentions were to rebuild that as you know because of
the construction and such.
Councilwoman Dimler: I'm just asking for a resurfacing.
Gary Warren: Well to resurface, if we've got a bad sub-base, that's what we
have to look at and evaluate. We just have the street swept. It should have
been swept last Friday so we can get a good look at what's there so we'll be
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looking at it this week and see what 's appropriate.
Councilman Workman: And you're going to do the assessment. . . ■
Gary Warren: I think the Boyt residence has got a big assessment coming.
Councilwoman Dimler: We're not getting it . . . St. Hubert's Church, as you all
saw the article in the Villager about how in disrepair it is. There are many
citizens that are concerned about keeping St. Hubert's here in town. The old
church. Apparently the Historical Soceity has no money. An idea was presented
that since we're having the Oktoberfest on the 28th, if people would like to
make donations, if we couldn't have something there to accept donations for that
purpose.
Councilman Johnson: Should we not form some organization to do that?
Preservation organization? Committee? Something of volunteers.
Councilwoman Dimler: If we'd like to. Whatever way you want to handle it but I
think it 's a good idea. I
Councilman Johnson: I don't think it's appropriate for the City per se to
accept donations.
Mayor Chmiel: I don't think we should do that in my opinion.
Councilwoman Dimler: People like the landmark. '
Councilman Johnson: I think that is one of our most prestigious landmarks of
the old city. I love old buildings like that and I would be willing to be part
of any kind of committee for preservation.
Councilwoman Dimler: Even Herb Bloomberg mentioned it today as a landmark in
Chanhassen so I hate for it to fall apart and we lose it.
Don Ashworth: Maybe we can do a pledge type of thing where people can sign up
and make a pledge potentially over a period of time. '
Councilwoman Dimler: Does the City own it?
Don Ashworth: That 's a continuous 5 year leases. At the end of each 5 year
period, both sides and relook at it and decide if they want to get out.
Councilwoman Dimler: Okay. Well I think what they need most drastically at ,
this point is the roofing for about $40,000.00.
Mayor Chmiel: $45,000.00 I think was the last one. '
Councilwoman Dimler: I mean I'm not asking to restore the whole thing you know
but just take care of the immediate needs. I'm sure people would be willing to
make donations.
Mayor Chmiel: We've gotten 2 bids on that have we not? What were those?
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11
Todd Gerhardt : Contentions were that the roofing is the problem. The drainage
11 is a problem. The electrical's a problem. Foundation is a problem. The
windows were a problem.
Councilwoman Dimler: So basically you're saying there's no problem?
' Todd Gerhardt : It 's a big problem but I mean if you fix, there's two issues.
The roof is one of the most , the worst problem but the electrical is also
' another problem that is shorting out . The wiring has never been redone. It's
100 years old. I mean that 's something else we have to seriously look at I'm
also having somebody go back out and look and see if we can't patch the roof for
' the interim solution. It seems that it's only leaking in one portion of the
building and it 's in the most northerly easterly corner of the building so I'm
having somebody go back and check it and see if they can't go back and patch
that .
Councilwoman Dimler: Okay. I bring it up because this is the kind of project
that the citizens like to rally around.
' Todd Gerhardt : If you're going to start an organization, you have to almost
create a non-profit organization to get the tax break and there are criterias
' and an application form and you have to elect officers and create By-laws.
Don Ashworth: We can do it as an off shoot of the city. Just make out pledge
sheets. Right now we have an old St. Hubert's fund.
' Todd Gerhardt : Use that as a tax write-off? Do they write it off?
' Don Ashworth: If we're spending money, we don't need the tax write-off right?
Councilman Johnson: The people donating the money.
' Don Ashworth: Oh, okay. Well, they're still donating to the city.
Todd Gerhardt : Is that a tax write-off if you write a check to the City?
Don Ashworth: I guess we'll have to take a look at that .
' Todd Gerhardt : My water bill you can write off? I don't think so. You're
writing it out to the City.
Don Ashworth: To help out Old St. Hubert's Church. If that's what we billed
it and they wrote it out, Help Save St . Hubert's Church Fund.
Roger Knutson: I don't know the answer.
' Todd Gerhardt : It 's not a difficult thing.
' Councilman Johnson: It's not difficult to form a non-profit organization. I
just formed one last year. The Chan-Chaska Soccer Club. It doesn't involve a
week. I should say Tom Bill did the legal beagle work and he's one of the
parents of one of the soccer players. I'm sure we can find some legal beagle
' here in town that will donate an hour and form a non-profit organization for us.
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
It 's not that big of a deal. Who knows, maybe even some well known city
attorney would donate their time.
Mayor Chmiel: Okay, let's look and see what we can do.
Councilwoman Dimler: Let 's explore that . ,
Mayor Chmiel: And all the legalities.
Councilwoman Dimler: And maybe use the opportunity while everyone's gathered at '
the Oktoberfest to see if they want to make donations. Then the last thing.
Councilman Johnson: Ursula, would you volunteer to be on the board with me of a
non-profit organization if we set one up?
Councilwoman Dimler: Yes. 1
Councilman Johnson: Okay. You've got 2 board members if you like and he's
voluteered. Would you like to be on our board too.
Roger Knutson: I'll talk about that.
Mayor Chmiel: Paul, do you want to give an update on Met Council? ,
Paul Krauss: Sure. As you're aware, we've had a lot of discussions with the
Metro Council regarding a fundamental difference of opinion of how many people
live here. . . We confirmed that the census figure which was 11,700 and the
number of households was pretty accurate. You know a lot of communities you
read in the paper, New York City and Detroit are claiming that huge number of
housing units were overlooked in larger cities. We didn't have that problem and
I guess we were concerned today because of what you had told us about things
being missed. Sharmin went back and caught most of them so the census was
pretty accurate. In any case, we had a meeting with 4 people from the Metro
Council . 2 from their Comp Planning staff, 1 transportation person and I person
who is a statistician working with Mike Munson on the regional model. Marcy
Wartiz, our Council Rep was there. The Mayor was in attendance for part of that
meeting. Gary Warren was there and myself and Jo Ann.
Councilman Workman: Who are the Met Council people Paul?
Paul Krauss: It was Ann Brayden, Tory Flood, their statistician is a guy named
Borbog Sing? Relatively new staff person over there.
Gary Warren: Rich Thompson.
Paul Krauss: Rich Thompson is the new staff person in Comp Planning who is
handling our comprehensive plan. He was there. Rich is the person also who
just worked with Savage when Savage got their 2,300 acre MUSA line addition. I
think those two facts, that fact is significantly hopefully. We didn't ask nor
did we expect them to say today that everything that we've presented to them is
hunks dory by lock, stock and barrel. We wanted to re-open that dialogue. See
we had tried to have a cooperative approach with them. I started meeting with
them last September and we've been feeding them information ever since. 1
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11
Somebody over there clearly dropped the ball because they didn't respond to us
for 8 months and when they did respond it was something that was completely
different than what we had expected. I think that there's more of an
understanding that came out of this meeting today. One of the things that I
enjoyed about it is I've never been able to get Met Council people to actually
11 come out and look and we had them do that today. We borrowed a van and we took
them around the community. One of the things we really tried to emphasize is
that they're very protective and possessive of the MUSA line and some of the
' discussions that the Planning Commission's had with different alternatives is
that we don't want to create a little donut hole in our MUSA because the Metro
Council won't accept it . But what we tried to get across to the Metro Council
is that Chanhassen is a macro sized donut sized hole in the MUSA. That we're
surrounded on four sides by urbanization and I think that came across real well
on our trip. We took them over down TH 41 into Chaska and basically said you're
now west of our downtown. Further west from Minneapolis outside and we drove
' them back in on Hwy. 18. Industrial on both sides and bang, there's a cornfield
and I said, that 's Chanhassen. There's the MUSA line and it comes across
visually quite well when you do that . We also skirted Lake Lucy Road and showed
' them how basically all we have left inside the MUSA now is infill. We tried to
get across the point that we have large properties inside and outside the MUSA
are tied up for long periods of time. The Temple of Eck is 175 acres that
hasn't been on the market and who knows when it will be. That's obviously, from
' your discussions of several years ago, that 's prime land but it's not available.
As the MUSA's expanded, we took great pains to show the Metro Council that if
the plan is adopted the way the Planning Commission has drafted it, it will be
' taking in two large parcels, Jerome Carlson and Prince's and we said we don't
expect these properties to develop in the 10 to 15 year timeframe. Ultimately
they may but don't count this against us because they're here and I think there
was a willingness to recognize the sorts of realities that we deal with. To the
extent that they've never been receptive in recognizing that kind of stuff
before and now I think that they are, I think it 's made some progress. We'll
see shortly. They're aware, we told them that the quasi-official date for the
' public hearing for the comp plan is October 24th and we told them we're going
ahead with that . The Planning Commission's asked us to proceed and that 's what
we're doing.
Councilwoman Dimler: Good, thank you.
ADMINISTRATIVE PRESENTATIONS:
' POTENTIAL ALTERED SURVEY/VARIANCES. 6285 AUDUBON CIRCLE, GORDON KOEHNEN,
PLANNING DIRECTOR.
' Paul Krauss: This one is quite unusual and is a little bit frustrating to deal
with. There's a house being built up on Audubon Circle and it's nearly
' complete. It 's been built very slowly. I think it's taken about a year, year
and a half to be built. One of our building inspectors in going up there took a
look at it and said it just didn't seem right to him. It seemed like it was too
close to the street and when he scaled it off, realized that there were
significant variances on the thing. When this was brought back to our
attention, the inspector and Sharmin Al-Jaff took out the survey that was used
to support the building permit and realized that it sure appeared to us as
though the cul-de-sac bubble which should have been shown on the survey, had
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City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
been erased. In the text I've shown you copies of both surveys. I called the
surveyor. He was a fellow who was pretty reputable and who I've known for a
while and I said, well what gives with this? He indicated that when it left his
office it was on there and that the applicant had in fact . . .remove it because
there was no easement covering it. It's rather complicated by the fact that
nobody can find an easement document for the bubble. The straight section of
the road is covered by an easement that's recorded at the County and the County
shows the bubble on their half section maps which nobody can figure out but the
applicant for the building permit was aware of the fact that there wasn't a
recorded easement or that nobody could find an easement for the property. We
discussed this matter with our city attorney, my first reaction was to try and
go and slap a stop work order on it . I thought better to call Roger first
before we did that and we basically have several points that shook us up in
trying to resolve this matter. The first is that the property is torrance
property and apparently State Law is contradictory. On one hand it says if the
City uses a street for 6 years it's basically yours. On the other hand it says
that or implies that this doesn't apply to torrance property. Apparently
there's no case law on it . Roger said you can take it before a judge and try to
have him adjudicate in our favor but even if we won, all that would do is give
us the right to then try the fact on whether or not he had submitted a false
document and then you've got to prove that it was a false document and who
falsified it . What it boils down to is we're pretty convinced that somebody
handed us a jimmied survey and we've never had this happen before. We're not
sure it 's going to happen again because some of the circumstances around this
lot are pretty unique. There was a clear reason for the builder to do that .
The lot is very steep in the back. Slopes off and then the soils get poor so
there was probably a desire to push the house closer to the street . If you want
us to pursue this, we will. I guess after talking to Roger though, I don't
advise that you tell us to pursue it legally because we're not sure that we'd
have a terrible amount , a great amount of success. It's frustrating because
we're pretty certain we know what happened but we can't do a whole lot about it .
Mayor Chmiel: I guess this has already happened and as I see it there's really ,
no action on it at this time. How do we prevent this from happening again?
Paul Krauss: Well I tried to get at that in wrapping up the report . A couple
of things. First of all, once you're stung you look for these things a little
more. When you're handed a registered survey, I mean that's gospel. You never
think that anybody's going to alter it. Altering one's illegal and surveyors
can lose their license. People can be prosecuted for doing it so it's really an
odd ball deal that happened. We are going to take more pain though. I mean
when Sharmin put this down on my desk and she said what's wrong with this surve
and I was looking at it, I couldn't tell until she told me where the cul-de-sac
bubble was. We are going to try and double check ourselves where they have a
feature on the street like a cul-de-sac bubble, we should have knowledge of that
and be able to check it . One of the other things though, we've been talking to
Roger on and off for months about doing is the City's always had a problem in
filing easements and getting title to property and recording documents. It's
done on a real hit and miss basis. A lot of times we depend on the developer to
do it and that 's like asking the devil to do your work for you. You know you're
.running the risk that they're not going to do it properly. It's not in their
interest to do it . And we've had problems. There's a history in the city, not
so much recently because Gary's taken a lot of that over, but of easements on '
54
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I
City Council Meeting - September 24, 1990
the north side sewer project was one where easements were never recorded. They
were sitting in a drawer by a former City Attorney or whatever happened, it just
didn't , they don't show up anyplace. What we'd like to do is have Roger's law
firm be responsible for recording documents and easements. The developer would
be required to give everything to Roger. Roger would verify them and have a law .
clerk file it and we pass that charge along to the developer as a cost of
developing because they're paying their attorneys to do it right now. With that
we're confident that Roger can take their title and make sure that everything is
filed and nothing gets released in any way, shape or form until everything's
been recorded and we're satisfied that it's done. We think that's the best way
of doing it and making sure that we don't get stuck with non-existing easements
' again in the future. Roger and I have been talking about this. Get Gary and
we'd like to firm up that proposal and bring that to you in another
administrative item in the near future.
' Mayor Chmiel: Okay, thank you.
Councilman Johnson: Mr. Mayor?
' Mayor Chmiel: Adjournment?
Councilman Johnson: No. I'd like him to proceed on pursuing the altered
document by referring it to the Board of Engineering and Surveyors. This is
their jurisdiction. A registered survey's been altered. The State Board should
be investigating it . They have investigators that are paid to do this. Hand
them over what we've got and let them run with the ball. Not us.
Paul Krauss: We could do that . I wasn't aware that we could use that option.
It appears that if an alteration occurred, it occurred after it left the
surveyor's office. Now we can't determine that. We were given a blue line copy
and apparently a copy of a copy because the original that was given to the
applicant . . .the change is tough to follow so if they have an investigative unit ,
we'd be happy to forward it to them.
Councilman Johnson: Yes they do.
Councilman Workman moved, Councilwoman Dimler seconded to adjourn the meeting.
All voted in favor and the motion carried. The meeting was adjourned at 10:45
' pm .
Submitted by Don Ashworth
City Manager
Prepared by Nann Opheim
1
55
11
I
CHANHASSEN PLANNING COMMISSION
REGULAR MEETING z; }�
SEPTEMBER 19, 1990
' Chairman Conrad called the meeting to order at 7 :45 p .m . .
MEMBERS PRESENT: Tim Erhart , Steve Emmings , Ladd Conrad and Brian Batzli
MEMBERS ABSENT: Annette Ellson, Jim Wildermuth and Joan Ahrens
STAFF PRESENT: Paul Krauss , Planning Director and Jo Ann Olsen , Senior
' Planner
' PUBLIC HEARING:
INTERIM USE PERMIT FOR A GRADING PROJECT TO EXCAVATE 60,000 CUBIC YARDS OF
MATERIAL LOCATED NORTH OF MCGLYNN DRIVE, JUST SOUTH OF HWY 5, SHAFER
CONTRACTING.
Jo Ann Olsen presented the staff report on this item . Chairman Conrad
called the public hearing to order .
Krauss: If I could just point out . We did notify the Timberwood , we did
notify them as a matter of courtesy since they may be able to view this
from a distance and we haven 't heard back from them .
Conrad : Anything that you 'd like to?
' Scott Spesiak: Well I 'm Scott Spesiak with Shafer Contracting representing
the applicant . I don 't have anything to add unless you have questions
about it .
Erhart moved, Emmings seconded to close the public hearing. All voted in
favor and the motion carried. The public hearing was closed.
Erhart : I 've got one thing here . On the last temporary excavation we came
up with this $30 .00 per hour for staff time to do the inspections . I 'm
concerned . I 'm concerned we set a precedent with the Jeurissen thing and I
' have a concern with that . Let me ask a question . When we issue building
permits , and see this applicant is required to pay I think a $401 .00
building permit . When someone builds a house and we charge a building
permit , do we then additional charge them for the inspection time to go out
and inspect that construction at some hourly rate?
Krauss : No we don 't . However , when you look at the building permit fees
for anything other than a single family home , a commercial development for
example that 's fairly substantial , the building permit fees are quite large
and cover substantial amount of time .
Erhart: For commercial?
Krauss: For commercial , industrial type of thing .
Erhart: Why? Because you can get away with it or what? Are you providing
a service relative to the price?
1
I
Planning Commission Meeting I
September 19 , 1990 - Page 2
Krauss: Sure . I mean we have to staff up to have our experts on staff toll
go out there and we need to coordinate with heating contractors . I mean
it 's the whole works . We did not come up with that $30 .00 an hour charge .
That 's taken out of the Uniform Building Code for grading operations .
Erhart: Oh , you mean they actually recommend an hourly charge but not for
inspections for buildings? I
Krauss: Well because the difference is we don't have a building to figure
in costs for the inspection . If there was a construction going on , we
would have that base and would have generated the cash to cover the
expenses .
Erhart: My concern with the thing is that it puts the City in a position
of arbitrarily deciding how much staff time gets charged to an applicant .
Then it sets you up for a situation where as the thing progresses , let 's
say that our City doesn 't get along with this particular applicant and one
thing leads to the other and then all of a sudden, well because this guy i
not maybe cooperating we send more people out and then he starts pointing
fingers at us . You 're trying to burden me with all these additional costs"
just to get back at me and we 're setting ourself up for a real conflict .
have a concern and I just wanted to express it and see what some of the
other commissioners .
Conrad: Do you have a solution?
Erhart : Just make the initial , well one of the solutions is to be
consistent with the building permit . The other one of course is to figure
in the permit which you estimate it will cost to manage the thing .
Krauss: You could do that . I mean you can come up with an estimated cost "
up front . I should tell you though that one of the things we 're looking at
at a department head level in response to the budget shortfall the City 's
in right now , is the whole prospect of rather than looking at taxes as a II
solution , is user fees . Now that surface water management fund sort of
perphiferally comes under that heading but more directly we found , we 're
surveying a number of communities and we found that a large number of II communities charge permit application fees for development applications .
But then they also bill staff time . They require an escrow and bill staff
time for Jo Ann 's time on a project or something like that . Right now we ,
don 't do that . That 's all on the cuff .
Erhart: Yeah , I understand .
Krauss: This is a rather unique situation where the Uniform Building Code ll
gave us the right to do that $30.00 an hour charge and we're using it now.
The Jeurissen application I think it 's fair to say presented us with
potentially significantly more inspection related problems or concerns or I/
issues than this application does . We frankly see only minimal need to
inspect this site . There are several reasons for that . The location is
different . We don 't have the impact to residents. It is a MnDot
coordinated project and comes under their regulations and they will be over
seeing it and they have inspectors out as well so we think it 's a little
bit different .
I
1 Planning Commission Meeting
September 19 , 1990 - Page 3
11 Conrad: You bring up a good point . You know if you 're a small contractor ,
you kind of have to know what you 're going to be assessed for . I hear your
' point Tim . Paul 's point , or counter point is there 's nothing there to
assess . There 's not a building going up with a value so the permit is ,
there 's nothing to establish a fee based on . I guess we should forecast or
project an anticipated cost to somebody . I think these are different
situations . I 'm not uncomfortable at all doing what we 're doing . I guess
the only thing I feel sensitive to is like , what are we telling the
applicant that they 're going to be assessed? We really haven't . We sort
of said $30 .00 an hour . You know , 30 times what?
Erhart: Well Paul 's got a good argument . One guy , to set a uniform rate
' based on cubic yards or. something like that is, maybe it 's unfair on one
guy because he isn 't a user and requires a lot of monitoring , will incur a
lot of city costs while the other guy who follows the rules like we know
you will , he deserves to not have to be charged as much so that 's the other
side of the argument . I just wanted to bring it up as an issue . I 'm not
uncomfortable with the way it is .
Conrad: It 's a valid issue .
Krauss: I don 't know if it enhances your comfort level at all Tim but we
feel , if we 're going to get into this , the inspections on this right now
and possibly other ways of charging in the future , we believe it would be
encumbant upon us to provide accurate bills indicating what we did and when
and keep consistent time sheets much as the consultants do who bill us for
their time .
Erhart : Yeah , that wasn 't what I was concerned about . What I 'm concerned
1 about is this , for some reason you have an employee who just doesn 't have a
lot to do this month and it 's so easy to say , well maybe take another trip
out to Jeurissen . It adds up and the temptation is there when you do it
' this way and it 's going to happen . I 'm not saying there 's a better way .
Conrad: But how can we pin it down? I guess I 'll follow up . How can we ,
' it 's like we know the $30 .00 an hour and we said we want , I said for
Jeurissen , I wanted somebody out there , I don 't care if it 's daily to see
what 's happening in that particular case until I was convinced that they
were doing the right thing . They should pay for that and convince the
' inspector that they 're doing the right thing and the sooner they do that ,
the faster their fees stop . But again , projecting to an applicant what the
potential cost would be rather than saying $30.00 an hour , can we go beyond
that? Can we forecast what we expect over a period of time? Can we be
saying that this will be $30 .00 an hour . We estimate 10 hours per week and
something like that . Is that appropriate Paul?
Krauss: Well , I wouldn 't be surprised Mr . Chairman if we could,
particularly with a little more experience in this , develop estimates that
when , like a consultant when they 're working with us. When they approach
that estimate and they haven 't finished the job it 's encumbant upon them to
explain why and get permission to proceed on further . We tried in the
Jeurissen and in this application to undertake an analysis of what site
restoration costs were . Ballpark figures of what inspection costs were and
that 's reflected in the letter of credit . So certainly we 're talking about
a fraction of what that letter of credit is or inspections and we have
Planning Commission Meeting
September 19 , 1990 - Page 4
worked up a number . A ballpark number . Right now , given the fact that we
haven 't done any of these yet , I 'm a little bit relunctant to second guess
what the ceiling might be . But certainly with a little bit more experiencil
we could do that .
Scott Spesiak: Just as an applicant I guess I need to express our feeling
also in that we don 't like to see something open ended . However , I think II
it does behoove the applicant to perform according to the application
submitted and also the recommendation of staff before . . .guidelines that ar
put on the approval . If the application does those , then the
inspections . . .shouldn 't be a real problem . On the other hand , if you don 't
operate according to the things you 're going to perform that you said you
would , then you 're open to . . . I think it would be hard to predict . . .what II
that 's going to amount to .
Emmings : In that regard we could , you know to help get a handle on that .
I suppose one thing you can use is the City 's own experience with
individuals . . .proven themselves to be worthy of close inspection . And
maybe part of the application ought to be some references in the sense that
we 've done work in these communities so we know who to call and check and
see how they 've done in the past . If there 's somebody we don 't have
experience with in that regard .
Batzli : I think that becomes arbitrary though then . If we personally hal
had experience with them and had problems , to set a rate based on what
other communities ' experiences have been with that particular contractor ,
it 's almost like getting a black list .
Emmings: Well , it 's not a black list .
Batzli : If you 're going to set a rate on it .
Emmings : We 're not going to say you can 't mine here . We 're just going toll
say that based on your work and other people 's experience with you , we 're
suspicious . I wouldn 't have any trouble with that .
Krauss: I hope it came across in the report that we have had , or the City
has had a relationship with Mr . Spesiak 's firm in the past and it 's been a
very good one and we don 't anticipate any of the concerns that were raised
during the Jeurissen escapade that surfaced here . And we 're much more
comfortable therefore with this proposal . But again, I don 't know how thall
would be a variable where we 'd set a ceiling on what we might do .
Erhart: How did you come up with the $401 .00? I
Olsen : It 's right out of the Code in here . The UBC .
Krauss: Based on volume .
Erhart: Based on volume? So that 's the number based on volume . I was I
going to suggest that we just base it on volume but you 're already doing
that . That 's the one thing , to make the whole thing based on volume and
treat everybody the same .
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11 Planning Commission Meeting
September 19 , 1990 - Page 5
I
Emmings: I don 't know if that 's really fair . If I 'm a good clean operator
' and I do exactly what I say I 'm going to do , I don 't see why I should have
to pay .
Scott Spesiak: Pay for the person who isn 't . Volume isn 't solely
necessarily commensurate with problems . ,
Emmings: We want to punish the bad guys and reward the good guys don 't
we?
Conrad: I thought so .
Erhart : My concern is , it 's the nature of organization . There 's $30 .00 in
an hour , the temptation is that somebody 's going to send a guy out there to
gain the revenues .
Krauss: Well you know , I 've worked as a consultant and I can tell you from
experience that that often happens when you 're a consultant because you
' need to be billable . We 're not a for profit enterprise . I mean there 's
not that kind of pressure , at least there isn 't right now .
Erhart: There 's an inherent nature in any organization to expand whether
it 's government organization or private . To justify people . Economic
times as it is , to maintain people and it 's one of those things that 's
going to lend itself to abuse I think . I 'm not saying I 'm dead against it ,
I 'm just saying I think it 's going to lead that way .
Conrad: Let 's watch and see what happens .
Emmings : I concur with the staff report on this .
Erhart : Everything else I agree with .
Batzli : I really like the staff report but . My only question Jo Ann , or
did you prepare it? Was I thought we had a fancy title for our earth work
' permits .
Olsen: We had mineral excavation .
1 Batzli : My only question was , in the earth work permit section of the Code
that we just passed , we have language that they have to apply for an earth
work permit . I don 't really see us saying in here that we 've given it to
' them or they have to apply for it . I know you went through the analysis
but my question is just to the procedure of how and again see , I 'm not
going to talk about this thing . I 'm going to talk about procedures and
things . As to how we improve the earth work permits if there 's an interim
use involved or something else , do we not then call an earth work permit?
Do we call it an interim use? Procedural question really .
' Krauss: We 've been calling it an interim use permit for earth work . It 's
not a two track permit procedure . It 's not like a site plan .
Batzli : But you did go through the conditional use or interim use criteria
as well plus the earth work permit criteria . So it was really kind of like
you were two tracking two permits at once in one application even though
I
Planning Commission Meeting
September 19 , 1990 - Page 6
I
you never really mentioned it .
Krauss : Well you have two sets of standards . ,
Batzli : That 's right . My only question , or problem with it is if our
ordinance says they 're going to apply for an earth work permit but yet in I
the conditions of approval we never say anything that we 've given it to
them , just question as to whether should do that . I don 't know . I think
we should just take a look at the earth work permit . I have no problem
with this that this is how we should do it but I think we should somehow II
get in there that approval of interim use/earth work permit or something
because I think they do , you did a nice job of analyzing the ordinance but
then we never really said we were giving them that permit .
Olsen: It 's similar to like a conditional use for a fast food restaurant '
where we go through the specific conditions . I
Batzli : I guess I view the earth work permit as more of a wetland
alteration kind of process where you give them separate and that 's kind of
how I expected them to see coming through here . And if we do it in one
shot like this , that 's fine . But I don 't know , the other commissioners
didn 't seem to .
Krauss: We can also ask the City Attorney if he feels there should be in II
the future two motions on that . We didn 't interpret it that way but maybe
if you did , he might as well .
Conrad: Anybody care about what Brian is saying?
Emmings: Not a bit . I
Batzli : That went without saying .
Erhart: I didn 't understand it .
Emmings : Where is Shafer , Minnesota? That 's the burning question .
Scott Spesiak: It always is . It 's on Hwy 8 east of Lindstrom . Almost to
Taylors Falls . It 's actually just off Hwy 8 . There 's a little sign there
that says that 180 people live there. I think that 's the 1980 census . I
Conrad: Paul , can you check with our attorney just to make sure we 're
handling it properly . I guess , from a procedural standpoint , geez I don 't I
know . I really don 't know .
Krauss: We can certainly ask Roger . By the way , I should tell you that w
were trying to cooperate with the contractor and with MnDot on this becaus
the earth is going to be moved for TH 5 and we were going to expedite or
propose expediting their request by getting it on the City Council meeting
on Monday . We could certainly find out the answer to that question between
now and then .
Conrad: Okay . Any more discussion? Is there a motion?
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11 Planning Commission Meeting
September 19 , 1990 - Page 7
11
Batzli : I move that the Planning Commission recommends approval of Interim
' Use/Earth Work Permit #90-4 with the conditions outlined in the staff
report .
Emmings: Second .
Conrad: See , all the power goes to the guy making the motion .
' Batzli moved , Emmings seconded that the Planning Commission recommend
approval of Interim Use/Earth Work Permit #90-4 subject to the following
conditions:
1 . The applicant shall provide the City with a letter of credit in the
amount of $38 ,150 .00 to cover any road damage , maintenance of erosion
control measures and site restoration .
2 . The applicant shall submit $401 .00 grading permit fee as required by
the Uniform Building Code and all city and county staff time used to
' monitor and inspect the operation shall be paid at a rate of $30 .00 per
hour .
3 . The applicant shall provide a Traffic Control Plan for staff approval
I providing specifications on how truck hauling traffic will be
controlled , specifically during rush hour periods .
' 4 . The applicant shall obtain and comply with all permit requirements of .
the Riley-Purgatory-Bluff Creek Watershed District .
5 . The applicant shall make arrangements to cap the existing well in
accordance with all state , county and local requirements prior to
initiating grading operations .
' 6 . The applicant shall supply the City with a mylar as-built survey
prepared by a professional engineer upon completion of excavation to
verify the grading plan has been performed in compliance with the
' proposed plan .
7 . Temporary settling basins shall be constructed during the grading
operations on an as needed basis or as requested by the City .
8 . Topsoiling and disk mulch seeding shall be implemented immediately
following the completion of excavated areas .
9 . Noise levels stemming from the operation are not to exceed tInPCA and
EPA regulations . If the city determines that there is a problem ,
warranting sucy test shall be paid for by the applicant .
10 . Hours of operation are limited to 7:00 a .m . to 6:00 p .m . , Monday
through Saturday and prohibited on national holidays . The the City
' Engineer determines that traffic conflicts result due to rush hour
trafic flows , the hours of operation will be appropriately restricted .
11 11 . The City will work with the County Sheriff to coordinate speed and
weight checks . If trucks are violating traffic laws , staff will
1
Planning Commission Meeting I
September 19 , 1990 - Page 8
require that the operation be shut down and will ask the City Council
to revoke the permit .
All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously. 1
PUBLIC HEARING:
ZONING ORDINANCE AMENDMENT TO AMEND SECTION 20-409, GENERAL DEVELOPMENT
REGULATIONS OF THE WETLAND ORDINANCE REGULATING ACCESS THROUGH CLASS A AND
B WETLANDS , (TYPES 2-8). I
10 Ann Olsen presented the staff report on this item. Chairman Conrad
called the public hearing to order . 1
Batzli moved, Emmings seconded to close the public hearing. All voted in
favor and the motion carried. The public hearing was closed.
Batzli : What happened to the gravel?
Olsen: It was denied . They do have to remove it . In working with DNR , II
we 've given them now until I believe May . May 15th of next year because
the winter months will be better for them to remove it .
Batzli : And the DNR basically said that gravel is not a good way to go? 1
He had some expert at ONR telling him that .
Emmings: He came here . 1
Batzli : He came here? That 's what I missed then . Okay .
Olsen: And he said that there was a . . .difference between gravel , in this 1
case between gravel and a boardwalk but that they still preferred
boardwalk .
Emmings: In general they 'd prefer it .
Batzli : I like it . I think it 's good to clarify it because we did have J1
kind of an ambiguous part before . I would just clarify paragraph 6 . Ther
would be a comma after the word level and change the word and/or so it
would read , above the ground level , or ordinary high water mark where open "
water is present , .
Emmings: Did you know you stole his idea?
Batzli : Did I? I 'm sorry . I retract it .
Olsen: So you 're taking out or? 1
Batzli : I 'd take out and and put in or .
Olsen: So what happens when there 's ground and water? Does that apply
then?
Erhart: Whichever is highest . I
11
Planning Commission Meeting
September 19 , 1990 - Page 9
Emmings: It 's the ordinary high water mark I would think that will always ,
wouldn 't you always be using?
Olsen: Well the vegetation goes beyond that .
' Emmings: Oh yeah . You 're absolutely right .
Krauss: When you 're giving them the option, they could pick the lower of
the two .
' Batzli : Well mine doesn 't work at all . I 'll let Tim fix it then .
1 Erhart : It doesn 't say whichever is the highest .
Krauss: That 's right . '
1 Erhart : The and sounds funny .
Batzli : I think it needs clarification is the problem . I think you 're
1 trying to keep it 6 to 8 inches above no matter what it 's going over is the
intent and that 's what we need to get it to say . Yeah , whichever is
highest because you 'd have to keep it at the same level .
Olsen: The thing would be going like this but you 'd be going? By the time
you get to the water , you might be 6 feet?
1 Krauss: No . Why? I mean if it followed the ground elevation 6 feet above
that and when you entered over the water , you 're 6 feet over the water
elevation . Or 6 inches rather .
1 Olsen: But he 's saying , whichever is highest .
1 Erhart : Well at any given point .
Krauss: That 's the way I interpret it .
Olsen: So it should say 6 to 8 inches at any given point above the ground
level?
1 Krauss: Or wherever it 's measured .
Batzli : Wherever measured , yeah . Did that help or are you confused?
Olsen: I 'm confused. . .
Erhart : To me , I just had a note that it didn 't quite read right . I didn 't
have any sure fire solution to it .
Batzli : Yeah. I didn 't think about the case where you're going down a
1 slope .
Emmings: Well you could say 6 to 8 inches above the ordinary high water
mark and 6 to 8 inches above the ground when above the ordinary high water
mark .
1
Planning Commission Meeting
September 19 , 1990 - Page 10
Erhart : At any point period .
Emmings: Does that make sense? I
Batzli : I think that does .
Emmings: So it will be 6 to 8 inches above the ordinary water mark . '
Erhart: Or ground level .
Emmings: And 6 to 8 inches above the ground level when.
Batzli : Higher than the ordinary high water mark . ,
Emmings: Or being installed above the ordinary high water mark . Does that
make sense?
Erhart: The most clear way to do it is to separate it into two sentences .
When installed above the ground .
Emmings: Not above the ground . Above the ordinary high water mark .
Olsen: Are we losing that that 's still within a wetland? I
Emmings: If the water 's low you can be above the ground but below the
ordinary high water mark . I think you want to use the ordinary high , OHW II
as your break point .
Batzli : I love drafting things by committee .
Emmings: No , it 's horrible . 11
Conrad: It doesn 't work . I
Olsen: You can say , well have staff come back with another one .
Conrad : Whoever makes the motion has the opportunity . '
Batzli : Let 's skip over Steve . You work on something. Tim , have you got
anything? 1
Erhart: No , I didn 't have a solution . My comment only was that it reads a
little awkward . I think the intent is there but . '
Conrad: Any other comments?
Emmings: Yeah . I don 't understand the first sentence of Paragraph 7 .
Olsen: I think that 's where we 're saying .
Emmings: It says access , vehicular access on fill through a wetland will
only be considered when the access must be for vehicles . You 've already
said it 's vehicular access .
Olsen: Right .
11
Planning Commission Meeting
September 19 , 1990 - Page 11
I
Emmings: I think you said the thing twice there . I think what you 're
really saying is access on, if you drop out vehicular and say access on
fill material through a wetland shall only be considered when the access
must be for vehicles . Or the other way around .
Olsen: Oh , okay . I see what you 're saying .
' Emmings: Otherwise say vehicular access shall only be considered. No , I
like it better that way . Just drop vehicular . Then it says what I think
you want it to .
' Conrad: Access on fill material?
Emmings: On fill as opposed to an elevated walkway .
Batzli : In other words , if you can put rocks in there , you can only do
that if it has to be for a vehicle .
' Emmings : Otherwise you 're saying vehicular access will only be allowed
when the access must be for vehicles . That makes no sense at all .
' Erhart : Are you going to change that?
Emmings: I can write something here .
' Erhart : Okay . Let me try one on the other one then while you 're working
on that . Pedestrian access through a Class A wetland , walkway elevated 6
to 8 inches above the ground level or ordinary high water mark where open
' water exists , measured at any point along the length of the boardwalk and
shall be a maximum width of 6 feet . Walkway elevated 6 to 8 inches above
the ground level or ordinary high water mark where open water exists
' measured at any point along the length of the boardwalk and shall be a
maximum width of 6 feet .
' Olsen: Do you need the open water?
Erhart : I took it out and then actually I put it back in .
' Batzli : I don 't know that that takes care of the one scenario where the
ground is above the ordinary water mark .
' Emmings: I think the problem with the way you 're saying it is when the
water level is below the OHW.
Batzli : Right . When the water level is down .
' Emmings: Then you 're above the ground.
' Erhart : You 're going to be above the ground .
Emmings: Yeah , but you want to be 6 to 8 inches above the ground when the
ground is there . You want to be 6 to 8 inches above the OHW even though
you 're over ground .
Planning Commission Meeting
September 19 , 1990 - Page 12
Erhart: Oh , oh , oh , oh yeah . Okay .
Olsen: What if we put the walkway elevated 6 to 8 inches at any given
point that occur above the ground level or ordinary .
Conrad: I really think staff can work the words out . '
Batzli : I think you want to say , it 'd have to be 6 to 8 inches above the
ordinary high water mark and 6 to 8 inches above the ground level when
installed above the ordinary high water mark . That 's what you 're trying till
get across .
Olsen: Right . But do we need to specify that that 's only within wetland II
above the ordinary high water mark or do you think that 's clear?
Emmings: Sure it is because you 're talking about access through a wetland "
Olsen: Okay .
Conrad: Can 't the City Council read these Minutes . 1
Batzli : I think you want to emphasize that it 's 6 to 8 inches above the
ordinary high water mark and a special case when you 're above ground above "
the ordinary high water mark .
Emmings : That will do it . Make a motion .
Batzli : I move that the Planning Commission recommends approval of Zoning
Ordinance Amendment amending Section 20-409 as the staff has in Section 6
and 7 except in paragraph 6 it will be rewritten to read that the dock or
walkway is elevated to 6 inches to 8 inches above the ordinary high water
mark and 6 to 8 inches above the ground level when above the ordinary high
water mark . ,
Erhart : When being installed in a wetlands .
Emmings: That 's already there . '
Batzli : When being installed above the ordinary high water mark and shall
be a maximum width of 6 feet . In paragraph 7 , vehicular will go away . Anil
did you have another change Steve? That 's the end of my motion.
Emmings: Second .
Batzli moved, Emmings seconded that the Planning Commission recommend
approval of Zoning Ordinance Amendment to amend Section 20-409, General
Development Regulations of the Wetland Ordinance regulating access through "
Class A and B wetlands amended to delete the word 'vehicular' out of
paragraph 7 and with paragraph 6 reading as follows:
6. The dock or walkway is elevated 6 to 8 inches above the ordinary high I
water mark and 6 to 8 inches above the ground level when above the ordinary
high water mark and shall be a maximum of 6 feet in width.
All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously.
11 Planning Commission Meeting
September 19 , 1990 - Page 13
11 Conrad: Would you be flexible enough to let staff to .
' Batzli : I would certainly be flexible enough so that staff and work it
out .
Conrad: So the City Council can understand it or Don , you can explain it
to them . Okay . That 's it folks .
APPROVAL OF MINUTES: Emmings moved , Batzli seconded to approve the Minutes
of the Planning Commission meeting dated September 5 , 1990 as presented .
All voted in favor and the motion carried .
CITY COUNCIL UPDATE:
Krauss: We approved the preliminary plat , well extension of plat approval
' for Summit at Near Mountain . Lundgren had approval for that final phase
but isn 't proceeding at this point but wants to in the future because of
the economy . There was a metes and bounds subdivision approved on the
south side of Lake Susan . I think we mentioned last time that the
' ordinance provides that metes and bounds go directly to Council to expedite
them . This was a little unusual because of the access . It 's the property
that 's next to Al Klingelhutz ' house and there was a concern that there are
' 4 homes on different lots now using a common access point . We wanted , on
the face of it , this was a reasonable request and what they 're proposing to
do was using a separate driveway except for the last few feet of it where
it had a common entrance onto TH 101 . It was a question , was that a
variance type situation . We believe that it wasn 't and we discussed that
for a while and ultimately the Council approved that . There 's not a
question that the project was in doubt but how it was approved . The
Frontier Retail Center came up for consideration . As with the Plannirg
Commission meeting , parking was again a consideration . We had tried to
follow up on some of the conditions of approval for that . We proposed
' reinstating a couple of conditions and we proposed some changes in language
because of some things that have happened . We made it clear to the City
Council what was recommended by the Planning Commission and what was
recommended somewhat differently by the staff . Your recommendation came
' through clear . The City Council basically , when all said and done , backed
up most of your , in fact virtually all of your recommendations . One that
we tried to reinstate had to do with the rental vehicles and the City
' Council did what basically you did which was say it was an administrative
problem and we should take care of it independently of that . So the
project 's been approved . We 're not aware of the developer 's timeframe but
he did indicate that he was under the gun to get work started on that and
we 're waiting to hear back from him .
Conrad: Why is there a rub with Clayton Johnson?
' Krauss: Why was there a rub?
' Conrad: Yeah . Why is Clayton so up in arms about this one? Is there a
particular reason? Is that his style? Is that a concern that he just had
with this project because he certainly was not , he was hostile . I 'm
' curious why that was . Without getting real personal or anything like that .
What did . . .I 'm trying to understand . Is there more than I can see on the
surface?
I
Planning Commission Meeting f
September 19 , 1990 - Page 14
JI
Krauss: I don 't know . I really don't . We tried to conduct ourselves in
professional manner . I hope we 've succeeded . In that you can 't always
give people what they want and how they react to it . I really don 't know ,
what the issue is . You know one of the things that came up in a meeting
last night had to do with , there was joint meeting of the City Council and
HRA and one of the things that was discussed was the outlook for Market
Square shopping center and that seems to be a little bit on edge right now "
and I don 't know if that 's entering into Clayton 's outlook on things .
Conrad: Just to be upfront . Clayton called me and was concerned after hell
spent his life before us for a couple hours , or whatever and then was
concerned that staff was making some contrary arguments to what , or
contrary recommendations to what we had suggested . I wanted to , which is II
staff 's perogative of course . We can and I think in some cases , as long a
City Council knows what we said and what the reasons for staff
recommendations are , I think that 's appropriate . I think that 's a role II that they have to play . But to Clayton was concerned that the report
didn 't reflect exactly what transpired that night and I 'm probably bending
some of the words a little bit . I guess I brought in the staff report and
I just want to be real comfortable that when staff , and I asked Steve to il
review it . I hadn 't told him whether I thought it was good or bad . I jus
wanted to know if he feels it 's good communication going to City Council
and I think anybody else , I 'd sure welcome to review this . I only have on
copy but I just want to make sure that when we make a recommendation , that
it 's real clear to City Council what we say and then what staff is
recommending that 's different than what we say . Then they can take a good
look at it and I think that 's the only thing that really I want to review 11
little bit as a result of that particular application .
Krauss: Your point 's well taken Mr . Chairman . We attempted to do that II through highlighting and striking and basically giving an analysis of why
we think something should be different from what the Planning Commission
recommended . Mr . Johnson had four points of contention as I recall that w
to work out before the City Council meeting . On two points he was
correct and there was an omission in the staff report in terms of
conditions that we had all agreed to should not apply to the Dinner Theatre
because they exercise no control over that . That was our mistake and we II
readily agreed to change that . The two other points had to do with our
belief in our things sat . There was also some , you asked us to follow up
with them on getting easements and examining them . They were not forth
I
coming with those easements nor were they forth coming with your
alternative to platting .
Emmings: I haven't really looked at this yet Ladd but if nothing else , the'
verbatim Planning Commission Minutes are attached .
Conrad: Yeah . Well , I worry about that . Don really when you , how much II
time do you get when you review a staff report versus the Minutes that are
attached? Are you really able to go through the Minutes and see what the
mumbo jumbo we sort of said for 2 hours?
II
Mayor Chmiel 's comment could not be heard on the audio tape .
Conrad: Okay . I worry about that because and therefore I 'd like to get aril
much synopsis overview up front and I think Paul you do a pretty good job
II
Planning Commission Meeting
September 19 , 1990 -- Page 15
11 of that but I don 't want to tip my hand whether I thought this was a good
or bad report . I want to see Steve 's opinion and then we 'll pass it around
' and see what the others think .
Krauss : If you have any comment for us and wish us to revise our
' procedures somewhat in the future , we 'd be happy to .
Conrad: I have nothing right now .
' Krauss: The last few things that were discussed, the CUP for the Cellular
tower was approved based upon your recommendations . Mr . Wanegrin gave us a
somewhat colorful rendition of his impression of the conditions of
' approval . The Mayor gaveled him down a little bit .
Conrad: That 's good .
' Krauss: I gather he 's rather uncomfortable with them . They haven 't
started any work and we haven 't heard back from them since . The last
thing I wanted to update you on is the comprehensive plan . We are
' continuing to work on completing the text . It 's a rather time consuming
procedure . I just , in fact yesterday , completed the revised transportation
element which incorporates the Southwest Metro Transit Study that you
' reviewed and the Eastern Carver County Transportation Study . I 'm
forwarding all that stuff to Mark and Mark is assembling the document for
us . We had called you a while ago with two dates for the public hearing .
October 10th was one and September 28th or something was the other . I did
' check , well it 's clear that we 're not going to make the September one and
I 'm beginning to suspect that we might not make the 10th either . For
several reasons and I 'll get into that in a second . I did contact the
school district . The cafeteria which I believe was where the other
meetings have been handled , is available on the 10th and I checked because
I think the meeting date we may try to roll over to is the 24th and it is
' available for that too . They tell me though that we have to be out of
there by 10 :00 which has some appeal . But is that the way you conducted
the meetings in the past there? That there was a time deadline because
they said the janitors have to be out of there .
Batzli : Don , when we did the Eckankar meetings , was there a time limit
over there?
Mayor Chmiel : Not for those specific ones , no. . . .10:00 . I know in some
school districts , if it goes beyond the 10:00 timeframe , they charge so
' much more .
Krauss: Maybe that 's the case .
' Conrad: Yeah. I would not close the public hearing if people still wanted
to talk so we could continue the public hearing later or the best thing is
to pay overtime or whatever we have to do , the janitors . I can't imagine
it lasting longer than 11 :00 but 10:00 , it may . I just might .
Krauss: Well I would propose , we 're looking for off nights . Off regular
meeting nights so we could start a meeting possibly at 7:00 . In terms of a
I format , I anticipated getting the word out through the newspaper or mailing
list that Mark and I and possibly the City Engineer would be available at
Planning Commission Meeting
September 19 , 1990 - Page 16
possibly 5:30 or 6:00 and we 'd have the board set up so people could come
in and ask questions and get an understanding for what 's happening . I
would work with the newspapers so the newspapers understood . Again
reiterated the process and told people what 's changed since the last time
so they can see if their question 's been resolved or not .
Conrad : So when you worked with the newspapers , you 're going to show , the"
could carry a map showing the final . They show a map?
Krauss : I 'm hoping they can . It 's tough for them to transcribe that to all
scale that they can print . I 'll work with them on that . In fact I 've got
one of the reporters coming in here tomorrow .
Batzli : Full page .
Krauss : Well that 's what it would take .
Batzli : So in black and white you 'd be able to tell the different zones .
Krauss : They probably would ask us to pay for that . We could do that .
I 'll try to find out what that will cost . We 'll do that . Now , one of the
reasons for the delay , last time we met I gave you a copy of the memo that
was our response to the Metro Council . We 've been doing follow up work
with that . I 'm not sure if we had met . Yeah , we did with Rich Thompson II
prior to the last meeting . I 've been in contact with Rich and he has set
up a meeting here with about 5 or 6 Metro Council staff people next Monday '
afternoon . What we hope comes out of that is a better understanding of
where everybody 's coming from . What the issues are . What we 've done and
how we 've arrived at everything and then we 're going to give them a tour of
the community because it 's a safe bet that most of them haven 't seen it . II
The meeting with Mr . Thompson last week or 2 weeks ago went very
satisfactory in terms of his open mindedness in how this could proceed . I
think that if we shoot for that October 24th date , we will at least have a
comfort of knowing that-this meeting is behind us and that hopefully we 've '
gotten some , if not agreement , understanding from the Metro Council on
where we 're coming from on this thing . Now I know we discussed that last
time and we 're not waiting for them to say yeah or nay on our plan and I
don 't think we have any intention of asking you to change that but I 'd lik
to get this meeting out of the way . Steve Keefe is also having a breakfast
meeting out here . The Chair of the Metro Council is coming out here next
week . The Mayor 's involved with both of these meetings . Marcy Waritz , ou
Council representative will be probably at both of these meetings as well .
Conrad: That sounds real good Paul . I 'm impressed with all that activity "
Krauss: If we went to October 24th , does that meet your needs as well?
It 's an alternate Wednesday night . Would you prefer , I can have Vicky give"
a call around .
Conrad: Now that 's MEA weekend . But MEA doesn't start until Thursday . '
Krauss: Is that one of the conditions . . .
Conrad: Well I 'm going to take some time off . ,
Planning Commission Meeting
September 19 , 1990 - Page 17
Batzli : What better way spend to s nd Y our time off . Relax .
' Krauss: If that doesn 't work let me know and , our agendaes are obviously
getting somewhat light . Now we 've got some items in the pipeline but maybe
we can jungle a meeting or possibly even a cancel a regular meeting and
shift some stuff to a later One and just hold it because clearly we have to
have a dedicated meeting for the comprehensive plan .
Emmings : Or what 's the regular meeting date preceeding that October
24th? October 17th . Maybe that regular meetinb could be the .
Conrad : Let me check on my schedule .
Krauss: I 'll have Vicky contact everybody on the Planning Commission
tomorrow so we can check that out . And I think that does it for me . One
' last thing . We had an item here from McGlynn 's and I told you I 'd try to
tell you in advance if we had any administrative site plan approval that
may be coming down the pipe . McGlynn 's is adding employees at a rapid clip
' and has run out of parking spaces and needs to expand their parking lot .
Emmings : Another one?
' Olsen : They have room to do it .
Krauss: Except they have room to do it , yeah . I 've worked with them and
we 've sort of clapped out a plan for how they could get sufficient stalls
to get them through the winter simply by , it doesn 't take a lot of grading
but it 's an add on to some parking lot that they have now . I would be
requiring a landscaping plan for buffering from Timberwood and all that . I
think the parking lot expansion itself is fairly innocuous and falls within
the perview of administrative approval . You should be aware though however
that McGlynn is doing a box office business there and is going to be
' advancing their construction schedule and expansions . They will also be
coming in probably in a meeting later in November for .a site plan approval
for a fairly significant building expansion .
' Emmings': Is this on their frozen stuff like this?
Krauss: Well apparently what this is for , as I understand it , and I don 't
' know if this was trade secret or not I 'm giving away but they got a large
contract to supply breakfast pastries to 60% of the Burger Kings in the
world and it 's a new product and they need to expand to accommodate that .
Now the parking problem that they have is a problem they 're experiencing
now with their staff without the expansion which is why I feel I can do
that under administrative approval . They will need a larger parking lot
for this building and that will all come down to your approval of the site
plan .
Emmings: Do you think we need to scale up our parking requirements for
these growing businesses?
Krauss: That 's like so many things we do Steve . It falls into the
category of they 're each so different that you can 't guess . It really is
tough .
1
Planning Commission Meeting IF
September 19 , 1990 - Page 18
I/
Emmings: Who knows they 're going to get a contract for 60% of the Burger
Kings or something? I mean no , it 's something like that that does it
probably . I
Krauss: Even from business to business you know. When we worked with PMT ,
Al Iverson was in here last week talking about parking on the property nex
door . Well , Al 's had a very significant parking problem on his site which
we 're trying to take care of with his new addition and that 's because his
employment grew by leaps and bounds and he 's got a medical products
assembly function where you tend to pack more people in a building . 1
Emmings: Maybe what we have to do is say our parking requirements are
going to remain the same but we also want to be sure that you 've got some II
land you can expand parking into should you need it . I mean maybe we have
to have some kind of a set , be able to show something to set aside to get
some more parking on there because , now it 's come up 3 cases that I know o
so it must mean something 's not working right .
Krauss: Well I don 't know . I think by and large the parking standards
have worked fairly well . It 's the exceptional ones that throw you and wheil
a business is growing as fast , I mean Tim can explain this phenomenum more
than I but when you 're growing that fast , you don 't have the capital to
expand facilities and you tend to get the people on and the product out an
you 're cramming more and more into the site . It gets ahead of the
construction aspect of it .
Conrad: Okay . Anything else on that subject? Paul has a note to us .
Metro Council rural development standards . Tim , did you get a chance to
review that.?
Erhart : Yeah , and I was real excited about it . I think we 've finally
found something out of Met Council that they 're seeing what 's happened with
this 2 1/2 acre lot and I think they 've got a move in the right direction
here and according to Paul , I guess this is already an adapted policy
change .
Conrad: So if we like the concept of- this , what do we need to do? ,
Krauss: I think you need to put it on a work program and tell us to bring
back something to you that would bring that about . I mean it 's clearly
going to require a change in the ordinance and may require a change to som�
of our policies . I would want to speak to, this came from Carl Loren who
I 've never been quite clear as to his title but he 's fairly high up in the "
heirarchy at the Metro Council . I 'd like to confirm some things with him
because this is , they are talking about rural development issues . Rural
area development issues and this policy is probably going to be refined in
that case but you may have read in the paper that Anoka County is basicall
thumbing their nose at the Metro Council . They 're also telling the Metro
Council that their policies are wrong because their policies , for them ,
because the policies were designed in the interest of protecting farmland
and Anoka County was never known for it 's farmland . But Anoka County ,
you 've got some of the communities up there who never anticipate developing
at suburban densities. They 're perfectly content to continue developing
with hobby farms and that kind of thing and since they don't want any sewell
and theoretically don 't want any roads , they can pretty much tell Metro
1
Planning Commission Meeting
September 19 , 1990 - Page 19
1 Council they 're going to do whatever they 're going to do because they 're
not asking the Metro Council for anything . So that 's kind of thrown this
whole issue into the spotlight . Rural issues are also important to us here
because some of the ways they enforce these rural issues , or rural policies
frankly border on the absurd . We have a donut hole in the MUSA line in
1 southern Chanhassen surrounded on 4 sides by MUSA acreage yet when they 're
looking at TH 212 , there is a movement afoot by some of their staff people ,
I think I might have related this to you , to have TH 212 be 4 lanes to
TH 41 , throttle to 2 and then open up again when it gets to Chaska . Now
anything more absurb than that I guess I couldn 't conceive of . They 've
since relented on that position and now their new position is , okay we ' ll
buy that but you 're going to stop 212 at TH 41 which will run all the
'
traffic through downtown Chaska . Now Chaska is basically saying over their
dead body . The alternative which is being proposed with the EIS for 212 is
that 212 run outside of Chaska west of the community where it can touch
' down on the old highway and kind of get traffic and then run around the
community . I guess , and by the way , this has also been the bugaboo on
expanding TH 5 .
' Batzli : South of Chaska? Between the river and Chaska? Where would it
run?
' Krauss: No , it would run north .
Batzli : Between the High School and downtown?
' Krauss : Yes .
Batzli : Boy that would be wild . There 's a lot of steep slopes right in
there .
Krauss : Well , it 's already programmed to go through . I mean it 's designed
' to go through there . There 's a way to do it . I 'm not familiar with
exactly where it 's route but there 's been a similar hang-up on TH 5 . The
reason why the construction program for TH 5 ends at CR 17 is because the
Metro Council said you 're not going to build 4 lanes outside the MUSA line .
Now that is completely avoiding the fact that traffic from Victoria and
west and from Chaska is feeding onto TH 5 and there 's plenty of cars on
that stretch of road . They put their blinders on and when they don 't come
' out to the community to see for themselves , they can kind of convince
themselves that that 's the reality .
Emmings: So 4 lanes out to CR 17 and then become a gravel road .
Batzli : Stage coach only .
' Krauss: To get back to Tim's issue . I guess I was real surprised to hear
Carl say that we were not bound to have 2 1/2 acre lots in the rural area .
When I querried him on it , I said well when did you guys change your mind
' because in 1987 , as I understood it . I wasn 't here at the time but with
the Lake Ann Agreement , that you were adamant that that 's what we have to
do .
Emmings: But don 't we have to under that agreement , whether or not . . .
11
Planning Commission Meeting I
September 19 , 1990 - Page 20
Krauss : Well , I 'm sure we would have to . The 1 in 10 is what they 're
enforcing but if it 's in violation of our contract , because there is
actually a contractual agreement , I 'm sure we would have to have our
attorney contact their attorney and do all the usual attorney stuff and
figure out a way around it .
Emmings: That 's called billing hours . 1
Erhart : You can get a release for that .
Krauss: Well we 'd want to get some legitimate documentation .
Conrad: Are you done?
Emmings: Yeah .
Conrad : We 've been dragging this out . ,
Emmings: We can adjourn .
Krauss : So should we add that to the work schedule?
Erhart : Well I surely would .
Conrad : Steve , do you think we should add it to the work program?
Emmings: What 's that? 1
Conrad: Do you think we should look at this issue further?
Emmings: Oh yeah . Absolutely .
Batzli : Yes .
Emmings: Nothing should get between , however . This isn't something we
have to do before the comprehensive plan and the comprehensive plan ought
to get first priority in my opinion . I want that out of my life . 1
Conrad: Yeah . There is a schedule or outstanding activities staff has
distributed to us . An updated project list . Any comments? '
Batzli : Mine was rezoning the BF to A-2 . Just as it pertains to the
comprehensive plan , I still keep on I guess harpping on the fact that I
really don 't want us to include in the comprehensive plan that that area II
down there is going to be something that we 're going to change in a matter
of a month after we adopt it . Or thinking of changing it .
Krauss: I ' ll have to get you the exact language Brian because I wrote it II
about a month or two ago but I wrote it in the context of . . .item of
discussion at the Planning Commission. They're concerned about
environmental sensitivity of the area and they 'd like to look at approachell
for saving those features .
Erhart : That 's what I remember too . Our discussions as noted in the text "
11
11 Planning Commission Meeting
September 19 , 1990 - Page 21
Conrad : I like that item to be acted upon . The BF to A-2 or to just
discuss that area . I think that 's , of the things that are down there , it 's
' real hard for me to prioritize . Some things take longer than others in
terms of staff time but that particular subject is a good one . And we 've
got it scheduled late fall .
' Krauss: Getting later all the time .
Conrad: Anything else?
Emmings: Did they say what year?
' Conrad : It does say 1990 .
Batzli : I would like , and this is something I just noticed the other day
and it kind of irritated me was at Swings . Under their conditional use
permit , weren 't they supposed to erect some fences and do some things for
safety of the kids using the miniature putt-putt and all that other good
stuff?
1 Olsen: I do n 't recall that .
Batzli : Well I would like us to review that because I figure after 2 years
it 'E time they put" up their fence if they 're supposed to put one up .
Conrad: Yeah , speaking on those same terms , the rental group is certainly
adding to their rental equipment in their front yard .
KrausE : On 78th Street?
' Conrad: Yeah . You know I really didn 't mind when there was 1 or 2 . It
was okay but now , they 've just got a whole assortment there and I don 't
know . Are we getting any complaints from anybody?
Krauss : No , and I guess it 's a little surprising . Do you want to give me
one?
Conrad: I guess I 'd prefer to hear a complaint from the business
community .
' Krauss: I think it 's encumbent upon us to react and because of our
conversation about that , we ' ll held off but there has been an increase in
' equipment here . I forget the gentleman 's name. . .at the store . I talked to
him the other day and he said that more equipment was out there because of
the construction going on which used to be under the portico there but they
had to move it out because of construction . However , I 've seen 2 trucks
' offered for sale parked out there and there is a panel truck with a sign on
it sitting on the boulevard and that 's dangerous for us to leave that there
because that leads to all sorts of other abuses on other sites as well .
Conrad: Do they know that that 's not legal?
Krauss: I discussed it with them on the phone and he said he wasn 't aware
of it up until now and he had been doing it for 4 years .
I
Planning Commission Meeting I
September 19 , 1990 - Page 22
Conrad: It 's one of these cases where I just wish we could say , hey . It II
is illegal and we 're not making a big deal out of it now but you 're really
stretching your luck . It 's getting close to tacky but I really wish II somebody in the business community would issue the complaint or call City
Hall . Not me and it 's not really affecting me but boy , if I were somebody
in downtown , in the Chamber of Commerce .
Erhart : Well I think if it was a next door business guy who felt his
business was being adversely affected because they were using up the
parking lot . So far I 've never gone in there when the parking lot 's been II
full , although it 's slowly getting more and more . I think what you did at
the restaurant , that may come to a head.
Krauss : There was an interesting situation where the week after the ,
Planning Commission item or on Tuesday , which I 've never seen before , I
couldn 't get into the parking lot .
Emmings moved, Baztli seconded to adjourn the meeting. All voted in favor
and the motion carried. The meeting was adjourned at 8:45 p.m. .
Submitted by Paul Krauss 1
Planning Director
Prepared by Nann Opheim 1
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CHANHASSEN PARK AND RECREATION COMMISSION
MEETING UNEIITED
REGULAR
SEPTEMBER 25, 1990
11 Chairman Mady called the meeting to order at 7:32 p .m . .
MEMBERS PRESENT: Dawne Erhart , Jim Andrews , Wendy Pemrick , Curt Robinson ,
Jim Mady , Larry Schroers and Jan Lash
STAFF PRESENT: Todd Hoffman , Recreation Supervisor ; and Jerry Ruegemer ,
Program Specialist
APPOINT ACTING CHAIR: Andrews moved , Pemrick seconded to appoint Larry
Schroers as Acting Chair for the meeting . All voted in favor and the
' motion carried unanimously .
APPROVAL OF MINUTES: Mady moved , Andrews seconded to approve the Minutes
of the Park and Recreation Commission meeting dated August 21 , 1990 as
presented . All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously .
RECONSIDER LOCATION OF PARK , LAKE RILEY HILLS.
Public Present:
' Name Address
John Klingelhutz 350 East Hwy . 212 , Chaska
( The recording of the meeting was started at this point in the discussion . )
Mady : . . .we would have taken the land first and money second so . But this
' looks like a good balance .
Schroers: Are there any other questions or input from the commissioners?
11 Lash: I have one . I guess it 's a question and a comment . In the
recommendation Todd I didn 't see anything , and I don 't know if I just
missed it , about putting trail along Lyman Blvd . .
Hoffman: With the remainder of the pieces , part of the easement , it . . .
When Mark brought his recommendation last time , he talked about recording
the easement . That was omitted in here but we would require the trail
easement along Lyman Blvd . and then as additional pieces would be looked at
and the park is starting to be developed in 4 or 5 years and we start
taking a closer look at each individual piece along Lyman Blvd . , try to
11 connect those trail segments so we can get that put in . Yes , that 's
correct . We would want to require a trail easement on Lyman Blvd . as well
as over at Riley .
Lash: Okay , that was I guess my main concern and my understanding , when we
had some discussions about the Comprehensive Plan and how trails
specifically , how we were going to accomplish some of these things that we
wanted to try to accomplish when we were prioritizing , I guess I kind of
thought my understanding was that we 'd try and take easements in a lot of
areas and collect as many fees as possible but then put them on the busier
roads . I was thinking this looked kind of backwards . I mean we weren 't
asking for easements or trail on Lyman but then we were putting in the
1
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
September 25 , 1990 - Page 2
sidewalks on the two residential streets and I was thinkin g that that
seemed like it was backwards from the way I thought we were trying to head
with , take the easements on the residential and the trails on the County
Roads .
�. Hoffman: Yeah . It 's the opinion of at least myself and the folks in
engineering that in a new subdivision when you 're installing brand new
roads , going ahead and putting the sidewalks in at the same time , it 's a
cost saver . Let the people know up front who are moving in that there will
eventually be a sidwalk in their front yard because it 's there already when
they 're looking at their lots and then again the piece on Lyman , we would
just take the easement at this time because it 's not a new road . It 's not
just being constructed and we don 't have the means to connect that piece in
a timely manner for a few years . You 're correct , we have talked about that
' in the past in some of the other subdivisions . Not taking the money there
and putting it , or just banking it and taking a look at some larger
collector routes and possibly getting them trails first before we go ahead
' and put sidewalks in subdivisions . But as far as getting them in and
having the available for the future , at the time the subdivision was
initially , the ground was broken and the streets are laid in . . .that 's the
time to put those sidewalks in .
Schroers: Are you saying Todd that you want to add that easement to your
recommendation right now?
' Hoffman: Correct . Along Lyman Blvd . to Lake Riley .
Mady : Did we not put those easements in last time around?
Hoffman: Yeah . They were .put into that .
' Mady: Our recommendation last month was they were already in there so now
all we 're really doing is re-evaluating the site of the park itself .
Hoffman: Correct .
Schroers: Do you want that wording in the recommendation to include the
easement?
Hoffman: Correct . . . Other questions from the commissioners?
Schroers : If not , is there anything Mr . Klingelhutz would like to add?
John Klingelhutz: Not really . I was a little surprised . . .
Mady : Between John and Todd , is it going to be possible for you guys to
attempt to straighten out that jag in the park boundary by moving a lot
line here or there? Will that be feasible? It 'd just make it I think
easier for the residents and everyone to do that .
Hoffman: That 's something we haven 't talked about . It 's fairly minor . . .
Schroers: If there isn 't any further discussion , would someone like to
entertain a motion on this?
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Park and Rec Commission Meeting
September 25 , 1990 - Page 3
Mady : Okay , I 'll try . I 'll move to recommend that the City take Lots 21 , II
22 , 23 , 24 , 25 , 26 as parkland in subdevelopment along with $90 .00 per lot
park fee and that a sidewalk be constructed along North Road and West Road II
in lieu of trail fees . That a trail easement be taking along Lake Riley
Road and Lyman Blvd . .
Schroers: Is there a second for that? I
Robinson: I 'll second it .
Mady moved, Robinson seconded that the Park and Recreation Commission 11
recommend that the City require Lots 21 , 22, 23, 24 , 25 and 26, Block 3,
Parcel II be dedicated as parkland. As part of this dedication, the
applicant will prepare the site according to a grading plan provided by the ll
City . It is further recommended that the applicant construct a 5 foot wide
concrete sidewalk along North Road and West Road and provide a 20 foot
trail easement along Lake Riley Road and Lyman Boulevard. In return for
these requirements , the applicant will receive a $410 .00 credit on park
dedication fees per lot and 100% credit on trail dedication fees. The
remaining $90 .00 per lot park dedication fee will be collected as part of II
the Building Permit process. All voted in favor and the motion carried
unanimously .
ACQUISITION OF HANDICAP ACCESSIBLE PLAYGROUND EQUIPMENT.
Hoffman : Item 5 is kind of a neat item in the fact that we have an I
opportunity to purchase the first ever handicap equipment which would be
installed in any city park in Chanhassen . As well we have the opportunity
to purchase and install a handicap accessible fishing pier . . .Lake
Susan Park . As it states in the report , the amount that is available
through the Block Grant situation . . .available for housing rennovation and
that type of thing . The housing situation in Chanhassen . . .take advantage '
of that. money . The Council acted at their last meeting to reappropriate
that money to these two separate individual projects . The fishing pier at
Lake Susan and the handicap accessible equipment . In their conversation
that evening , they tried to decide which location would be best . At
Lake Susan , which is just an up and coming park or at Lake Ann Park which
is a proven park and generates a lot of activity and a lot of use and they
wanted to determine which park would be the most appropriate site for that II
equipment . It 's my belief that Lake Susan Park , with space available
there . The facilities which are currently being installed at Lake Susan ,
that that park would be , next summer and the few years after that will be
just as busy as Lake Ann Park is currently . It 's real close to the
industrial business and it 's going to get a lot of use from there . As well
we have the next park shelter , which . . .constant use by group picnics and •
that type of thing and we have a lot of space there . If you 've been out
there recently you 've seen the addition to the playground area and there 's II
a lot of space to the south and to the west of that . That area for
additional expansion which can be put in future years as more funds become '
available . I 'd still like the commission to discuss the pros and cons on
each . . .and once we decide the locations , we 'll work with the . . .Mark Koegler
is looking at different companies which purchases this type of equipment
from and probably go ahead and. . . I
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Park and Rec Commission Meeting
September 25 , 1990 * Page 4
Mady : Todd , not that these aren 't both excellent sites but one thought
came to mind when I read it was the , as more and more kids are being
mainstreamed in the schools , I 'm not sure if there are any physically
handicapped children that require this type of equipment at the school but
has City Center Park even been considered?
Hoffman : No , it was not considered and that 's .
Pemrick: Jay Johnson brought it up in the Minutes .
Lash: That was my question . And I did a little bit of checking today . I
talked with Kathleen Macy at Chan . I checked into this particular thing
last spring . I talked with Bob Ostlund from the School District . At that
time when we were talking about City Center and putting in new playground
equipment and Ed had been talking a lot about handicap accessible things
' being added to the parks and I thought it would be nice if we could
coordinate with the school district . I called Bob Ostlund to ask him if he
knew of funding mechanisms that the school district could get so as we put
1 in our phase , they could put in a phase that would make the whole thing
nicer and he said there wasn 't any . So when I saw this come up in our
packet , I was kind of pleasantly surprised because I thought that would be
the perfect site . I worked last year with a little boy who next year will
be at Chan who is in a wheelchair and I watched him last year trying , at
the kindergarten center , to get to the playground equipment through
pearock . Well , I mean there 's no way you could take his wheelchair
through there and we sat on the little deck and talked about what we were
going to do . He 's too heavy for me to carry and I said what do you think
we 're going to do . We have a problem here and he said , I don 't know but I
want to play over there . So I said , well we ' ll have to think about it for
11
a minute and pretty soon I said , do you think you can get over there by
yourself? You ' ll have to crawl and he said I want to try and he crawled . I
mean he has no control from the chest down and he crawled all the way
through this pearock on his stomach and crawled up on the playground
equipment and went down the slide for probably the first time since he was
a baby if somebody carried him so it was really , for me it was a very
moving and it was a frustrating experience to see what a child like that
has to go through . I know he 'll be at Chan next year and I know from
working at Chan , that there are other kids with special needs there who
could definitely benefit from handicap accessible equipment . Kathleen Macy
said they 'd be thrilled if we 'd be able to do something like this and I
think if it 's at all possible , that should be our first site for
consideration because it would definitely get the most use . I don 't know
what all kind of criteria we have to meet and I don 't know if there 's a
time limit on when we have to order this or what all is involved but that
would definitely be my first choice as a site . And I also think with the
' summer activities of the youth sports going on there , it would be get night
time use . So it would be 9 months of the year , daytime use every day and
almost every night during the week in the summers .
Hoffman : I did miss that in there . I just thought now that Jay mentioned
City Center Park . We would need to work on location , the most appropriate
location would probably be where the new equipment was installed . No?
Lash: No , I think behind the school where the old junky stuff is .
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Park and Rec Commission Meeting
September 25 , 1990 -- Page 5
Hoffman: Back in the corner? Okay , because I haven 't talked ed to Kathleen
but some of that equipment is just real outdated . . . A month from now when
the outcome of the referendum on the community center so we could then go
forward with full force in creating a new plan for that area and working
with the school district .
Lash: Does this have to be ordered by the end of the year? Ii
Hoffman: No .
Lash: So maybe that 's something that we could work on even before we know
the results of the referendum so when we get the results we could just go
with it and not have to worry about things . '
Mady: We just worry about actually it 's being built . . . That equipment can
fit anyplace actually .
Lash : And if we could combine with what we think we have in mind for our
plan for it , then we 'd have this super structure there that would be really '
nice .
Hoffman: $6 ,000 .00 , we 'll get about a three piece structure . A swing , a
slide with some sort of play apparatus . '
Lash : But then the base has to be .
Hoffman: Hard surface . '
Lash: Right .
Hoffman: We need to take a look at the handicap parking at the school lot I
and trailways and that type of thing to get to and from the equipment .
Mady : Larry? In Hennepin Parks , are you using any of the hard rubber '
resilient surfaces or anything like that that would be wheelchair
accessible?
Schroers: We do have an area that is a hard rubber surfacing material and
I believe that that would accommodate wheelchairs nicely . The one drawback
to that surface is that it 's expensive . It gets glued onto a concrete slab '
so you have to pour a slab and then it 's glued and per square yard it is
considerably more expensive than fibar material or pearock but I think that
it is ultimately a better surface and it certainly would accommodate
handicap much better . Also , from experience I can say that it 's like
anything else . If you want to do it after the fact , you install equipment
and then go back and try to make it handicap accessible after that . You 've
really gone the long way around and spent a lot of money so it 's real
important I think to get started with it right off the bat on a new project
and that seems to be the direction that things are going in all sorts of
public areas and I wouldn 't be surprised to see it become a requirement at '
some point in time in the future so I would go with it .
Mady: Todd , this is an ongoing funding mechanism . I was wondering , would 11
there be money available after the first of the year that maybe we could
buy the equipment now and then by February or March there might be
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Park and Rec Commission Meeting
September 25 , 1990 -- Page 6
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additional funds available that we could gather for say the surfacing
I material?
Hoffman: It 's not a guaranteed fund for us but in the opinion of Paul
Krauss , it will be , some money will be there available next year and if we
I make a good showing this time around , it will be available . . . We may be
somewhat surprised by what they cost to even come in for just that trailway
and the surfacing and the equipment . Remember also in the 1990 budget we
had $4 ,000 .00 in there for new playground equipment at Chanhassen
Elementary . . .situation in the shortfall in housing starts . . .could be
added to that $6 ,000 .00 in this first phase in 1990 .
Lash: So you don 't have any idea what we can get for this $6 ,000 .00?
Hoffman : In the initial conversations with Mark , who was checking with the
I different manufacturers . I also have to go through somewhat of a formal
bid process and you 'd have some type of idea on what type of equipment you
wanted and how much surface we 're looking at and that type of thing so we 'd
get a bid estimates . But it 's going to be a fairly one piece structure
with some activities taking place on it . Probably a large piece for about
$6 ,000 .00 and . . .future years . As well , this equipment is . . .handicap
children .
' C,rhro€:rs : It 's modular type so it can be added to .
' Lash : And are you talking about the surface material too?
Schroers : The surface material? Yeah , you just extend the border and the
I concrete base and expand on it .
Lash: But you think for $6 ,000 .00 we could do that and get a couple of , I
mean roughly what he 's got showing on the thing?
Hoffman: On the thing there? We didn 't talk about the surfacing material .
T do not know if Mark put that in the original . . . So again , once we find
out exactly what the . . .we 'll bring it back to the commission .
Robinson : I guess I 'd rather not use any additional money at this time .
I think if we do it with the idea that we can attach to it later as funds
I become available . Again , I don 't know what we 're going to get for
$6 ,000 .00 .
Lash: What if we can only get the surface?
Robinson: Then I say we get the surface material .
Schroers: The last time I checked installed it was something like $17 .00 a
yard or something like that .
I Lash: The other thing Kathleen said was that the APT has been earmarking
funds for replacing the old junky equipment behind the school too so maybe
that 's something we could try and coordinate with them . Although if they
I think that we 're going to do it , they ' ll maybe use the money for something
else .
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Park and Rec Commission Meeting II
September 25 , 1990 - Page 7
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Schroers: Do you want to modify your recommendation then Todd to just
state or to recommend to purchase the handicap accessible equipment but not
designate a site at this time?
Hoffman: Well , unless you want to designate the school site .
Robinson: Let 's designate a site . I think we can do that tonight . I
Erhart : I think so . The school site first .
Robinson: I would say so .
Pemrick: I like the idea of that too . It would get the most use . I
Schroers: Okay , is there anymore discussion on this?
Rcm)-ick : I had a question . There is talk in here about a fishing pier . IsI
th:.i connected with those funds as well?
Hcffman : With the funds , correct . I
Pemrick : But that would be included in the $6 ,000 .00 allotment?
Hoffman : No . We could , unfortunately these dollars are included with the I
fishing pier which would be installed at Lake Susan Park .
Erhart : Part of the $17 ,000 .00 . I
Pemrick : Okay . That would be taken out of that . Okay , page 34 .
Lash : Do we know how much the fishing pier 's going to cost? If there 'd bell
a little left over .
Pemrick : $18 ,750 .00 . II
Lash: I 'm not saying that I want to do this but if we wanted to , could we
take the whole $17 ,000 .00 and use that at City Center?
Hoffman: That would need to go back to the Council and the Council at
their last meeting approved the reappropriation for these two separate
II
projects .
Mady: The pier at Lake Ann is accessible isn 't it? I
Hoffman: Correct . . .
Mady: I guess to me , we 're handling a need at Lake Ann that way . For 6
grand we 're not going to get a whole lot in a play structure , especially ifli
we have to buy expensive base . I 'd like to see us recommend maybe to the
Council to reapportion that money to handle the need that we 're not
addressing . We haven 't addressed yet and $6 ,000 .00 probably isn 't going toll
address it very well . We 're handling the handicap fishing situation
with Lake Ann . Maybe we could use 2 , maybe we could use 3 or 4 of them but
at least we have 1 . Right now we have no handicap accessible play
equipment and $6 ,000 .00 isn 't going to buy us a whole lot . We know that .
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
September 25 , 1990 - Page 8
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Hoffman: Only a portion of that $18 ,000 .00 is coming from this block
grant . Another half or two-thirds of that funding for that pier is coming
from another source through Paul and the Planning Department so .
11 Erhart : Do we lose that then?
Hoffman: Yeah , we 'd lose that . . .
Schroers : Actually what we 'd be losing is a total fishing pier at Lake
Susan . Just because it 's designated handicap , it 's for everyone .
Mady : So we 're losing $9 ,000 .00 is what we 're losing . We 're ultimately
going to be putting in a fishing pier in at our own expense then .
Hoffman : Not the City . . .
Mady: Bottom line .
Schroers : Alright , if that 's the case , would we like to .
I Lash : I 'd like to make a motion on this one . I would move that we
recommend to City Council that the City Center Park be the site for the
funding for the handicap accessible playground in the amount of $5 ,898 .00 .
Is that, all I need to do?
iMady : I ' ll second .
Lash moved, Mady seconded that the Park and Recreation Commission recommend
to the City Council that the City Center Park be the site for the funding
for the handicap accessible playground equipment in the amount of
$5 ,898 .00 . All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously .
REVIEW SECTION OF COMPREHENSIVE PLAN IDENTIFYING PARKLAND NEAR LAKE ST .
JOE .
Public Present:
tName Address .
Mark Malinowski 7250 Minnewashta Parkway
Terry Forbord Lundgren Bros . , 935 E . Wayzata Blvd . , Wayzata
Richard Wing 3481 Shore Drive
1 Hoffman: Mark was unable to attend tonight . . . As you can see , the . . .
comprehensive plan folks came in and said look at the area around Lake St ,
Joe that is designated as park or open space , had concern with how that
would affect their . . .property in that area . Mark Malinowski is in the
audience here tonight . He is the particular property owner that contacted
the city in this regard . As you can see by Mark 's report , the property ,
the Malinowski property is east of Lake St . Joe . . . The upcoming look at
Minnewashta Parkway , it will be upgrading that road and the addition of a
trail in that area . There is supposed to be a trail in that area along
Minnewashta Parkway whether it be on the east side of the road or the west
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Park and Rec Commission Meeting
September 25 , 1990 - Page 9
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side of the road , is not known at this time . But that as well . . .taking not
designating the Malinowski property as open space and designated parkland
for future use or something of that nature . As it states in Mark 's report ,
it still would be possible . . .trail loop around Lake St . Joe and . . .
Schroers: So that would be kind of just a horseshoe shaped loop around the
lake?
Hoffman: Correct . I believe Larry . . . , and you 're probably the person most
familiar with that area . . . nature trail back in that area . And again , the
comprehensive plan is just a tool . We 're not talking about particular
trail segments in this area . . .
Mady : I guess I 'd prefer the Comprehensive Plan being more of a verbal
document stating that we need property , open space property in an area .
Until we actually we do site plans and go out and walk spaces and have an
opportunity to obtain specific sites , it 's very difficult for us to
designate some individual 's property as a site . By the same token , I hate
to rule somebody else 's site out because we 're not in the position now to
buy anything or to get anything but if we open right now and say okay ,
because this individual doesn 't want his site to be part of the selection
process , that 's fine for him but then what do we do with the other 11 ,000
people in this city who own property and come in front of us and say , I
don 't want you to take my property . All of a sudden we have 12 , 25 , 150
different sites that we 're not supposed to look at . I think what happens
is we all of a sudden have a problem . Right now we don 't have a problem .
The situation is we 're probably never going to take this site . Although we,
need an area in Minnewashta Parkway badly , we need an open ballfield . Your
site isn 't probably conducive to doing that . By stepping in now with the 11
very first one saying this site we 're not going to ever take and we 're
going to say that right on the plan , we 're going to have more and more
people coming in here saying I want you to take my property off the plan .
Then all of a sudden we do have a problem I think . I would rather us not
get. site specific , either pro or con in the plan if we can help it .
Hoffman : To address your first comment about just being verbage and not
being a piece of paper . As you may recall , in looking different segments
of the comprehensive plan as Mark is doing , he has . . .visual aid more or
less than the last comprehensive plan was developed in 1980 and prior to
that time . . . just use those as visual aids in that document and realize 1
that . . . They 're trying to look into the future but the comments are very
valid . We don 't want to start picking apart the comprehensive plan . . .
Schroers: I agree with that statement Todd and also with what Jim has
said . Setting a precedent could cause acquisition problems for us down the
road . What I see here with the 6 .5 acres that Mr . Malinowski 's property , 11
the portion of it that we could acquire for park dedication wouldn 't help
us in that area anyway . It 's not large enough . So I think in that , Mr .
Malinowski could have some reassurance that we wouldn 't be considering his
property for parkland . I
Erhart : Is there also mature woods on that site Todd?
Hoffman: On this site? 11
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Park and Rec Commission Meeting
Sept ember 25 , 1990 - Page 10
Erhart : Yeah , on the 6 .5 acres of your property . Is it very wooded?
( The answer could not be heard on the tape .
Hoffman: As stated in Mark 's report , the house on that would be real close
11 to the lake . . . I guess Mark 's interpretation is the original intent of
acquiring some parkland in this area . . .natural setting that was there . . .
' Mady: We did about a year and a half ago or there abouts , Carol Watson was
still on the panel at that time , look at the area on the back side of Lake
St . Joe . There was someone who was looking to subdivide and at that time
we looked real closely and determined that the marsh area was simply too
dense and too wet . Too soft to even really consider putting a nature trail
in at that time so if I remember correctly , we were thinking more on the
nature of Lake St . Joe 's a nice item and these would be wonderful in the
' future but we 're not going to be able to go in some areas real close to it
anyway so it 's just more when it gets developed , maybe we can put a path
=a:- Dmnd the outside edge of it possibly but an active use through the area
is coin@ to be very difficult anyway so it probably wasn 't smart. so I don 't
know . Unless something changes drastically between now and then , I don 't
kn',w how that 's going to happen . I just don 't foresee anything if it
happens .
Hoc.fman: . . .Mark to look at the natural area in there . More so it 'd be
the acquisition of some land . . .taking a look at the parkland and
' distribution . . .there 's a real void there . The only think we could come up
with is a small neighborhood park on the south side . . .real small area .
C,chroers: If we decide not to designate this property as single family
resid .ntial , will that impair Mr . Malinowski 's ability to obtain a building
permit?
Hoffman: That 's currently what it is . It 's just a single family
residential that 's unplatted .
' Schroers : Oh , it 's unplatted . I thought reading this it seemed to me like
it indicated that it was designated park and open space .
Hoffman: It 's designated as a potential site on the comprehensive plan
for .
Schroers: Oh , but it 's not zoned that way?
Hoffman : If Mr . Malinowski decided to subdivide , at that time you 'd take
it with the tools that we use in our department , we take a look at
comprehensive plan to see , is there anything designated in this area which
we could take a look at . And yes , there is , under the current plan , that
is park and open space . Then it would comeback to the commission and
start taking a look at . . .area similar to what we were doing tonight and
really all we 're doing this evening is pre-determining that even if that
area is subdivided . . .
Schroers: Are you looking for some kind of a motion on this?
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Park and Rec Commission Meeting II
September 25 , 1990 - Page 11
Hoffman: Correct . A motion to approve Mark 's recommendations . . h
pp . t at- that
property be dropped from the comprehensive plan .
IIAndrews: Could I ask an odd question? Is the reason why we 're dropping
this from the Plan because it 's not suitable to be developed as an active
park? Is that why we 're making this request or decision? I
Hoffman : That would be one of the main . . .
IIAndrews: My point would be , why is that every park that we look at has to
be considered as an active park . Currently we do not have any , or very
little wild , natural areas in the city and I have been to one park where an
elevated wood walkway was built over a marshy area and it 's a very
beautiful way to walk through a marshy area . I guess I 'm hesitant to say
that this is unuseable land . Maybe unuseable as a ballfield or a tennis
court hut I Guess I look at natural wild spaces as having a value on their
own .
Schroers: I don 't think that this is too much of a , I agree with what you
sav Jim but I think this particular property is not a real natural area and
wild ceoaces . He stated there 's already a house sitting on it and there 's
neighborhoods . It 's all residential in that area .
Andrews: How many acres is Lake St . Joe? II
Hoffman: 33 .
II
Andrews: 33?
Lash: I think this is kind of a , this is more of a two fold item in the
fact that Mr . Malinowski brought it to our attention but then Mark gave it
his attention and I think from his , looking at his opinion , it isn 't
something that would suit our needs in that particular area and then the
cthcr half , I mean although I agree that you don 't like to set a precedent
on these finds of things and I also agree that maybe instead of being so
specific we should just sort of in the plan say in a certain area , you know
near Lake St . Joe we 're looking for park property or something instead of
designating . If I looked at a map and on top of my house I saw that the
city had stamped it park/open space , it would make me real nervous that
something was going on that I didn 't know about so I think this is kind of II
two fold . I wasn 't aware of the fact that there was a home there and I
can 't imagine that we 'd ever go in and bulldoze down somebody 's house and
condemn their property and take it for a natural park . That just doesn 't II
even make sense so you know Mark is recommending it 's not , it doesn 't fill
our needs out there . There 's a home there . It 's creating anxiety for the
property owner and you put it altogether and I guess I just think we need
to reword or redesignate our site and maybe just put it in , like Jim said , II
in the verbage that in the Lake St . Joe area and then any time something
comes , a large scale development or something in that area , we 'd be able
to . Can we do that or not? Do we have to pick a specific site? I
Hoffman : Again , we can put in the verbage but then the map or the diagram
is .juFt put in there as an aid . If the comprehensive plan was all words ,
it 's fairly dry so . . .show the intent .
II
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
September 25 , 1990 - Page 12
h : Or are you going to be specific , as specific as Mark was in
�,� Y g g P , P saying
that the northwest area or the southern area didn 't he , would be the two
prime? I can 't remember where he had that now .
Mady : I think you 've missed the point though . Lake St . Joe area was put
in the map as a possible open space area by the Park Commission long before
I was here , back when they were very natural area oriented . The reason was
Lake St . Joe was a very natural type of setting , especially the back side
of it . This area is no different than what we 're trying to do , like
putting in the comp plan that we 'd like to gain all the property around
Lake Ann . There 's absolutely no difference between this and that . And we
all know that with Prince living there , it 's probably going to be , that
might be a pipe dream but it 's still nice to leave it in the plan , in the
comp plan as a potential so it 's always there . So we always know about.
it . Whether it happens or not in 20 years , we won 't know that but at least
we :-_ \' . designated the areas as natural areas that should be looked at and
reviewed and this is an area that should be looked at and reviewed .
Th€re 's nn one saying we 're going to bulldoze the house and buy the
property but it 's still , an opportunity comes in that we should be aware of
it and future commissions should be aware of it and future staff should be
aware of it because as we 've seen , commission changes from year to year .
Staff changes and we 're not going to be here maybe 10 years from now to
remember that maybe that was the way it should have been .
Lash : So you 're saying that you think our goal would be to someday
eventually acquire all of the property . I mean all of this area that 's
sh-swn around here on the map?
Mad : I don 't know if it 's a goal . I think it 's just something that we
1 should , it 's been designated as something we should be looking at if an
opportunity presents itself . That 's all it is . I guess I 'm on the nature
that we ha "en 't done anything at this point in time . Taken no steps to
doing anything and until the owner or a developer comes in and does
somet hi r -_1 , we 're not going to be taking steps on it because we just simply
don 't do it that way .
Hoffman : We have somebody here that would like to give us an insight on
that issue .
Terry Forbord: I think I can answer a lot of your questions or at least
give you some insight . My name is Terry Forbord . I 'm Vice President of
Lundgren Bros . and this is kind of a hasty appearance for me because I just-
found out you were meeting today when I met with Mr . Koegler . We own about
100 acres of land around Lake St . Joe , or we have the option to secure the
property for 3 years . We have met informally with city staff oh , probably
2--3 times about properties that we do control in the area . We began the
assembly of some of these parcels about 2 years ago . We tend to try to
work as quietly as possible for a number of reasons but for those of you
who are familiar with the area , this is really one of the toughest areas
' that I 've ever , ever tried to assemble land because from a land use
standpoint , there 's really a mish mash of development and small , really
oddly configured parcels and physical constraints that are very difficult
to work with from purely just a planning perspective . By physical
constraints I mean topography , wetlands . Now our company , maybe we 're
masticistic but we tend to look for sites like that . The workload is twice
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Park and Rec Commission Meeting
September 25 , 1990 - Page 13
I
as much , sometimes 3 or 4 times as much because of all the governmental
agencies you need to work with but we find that it 's a successful formula
for us in what we try to do so we look for sites like that . The problem ir
this area with trying to make all this work from a master planning
standpoint , is the economics . Because there are so many small little
parcels and structures on them , the economics become almost impossible from
a development standpoint . Remember structures are a liability when it
comes to land development from an economic standpoint . Raw land is much
more easy to deal with but when somebody 's home in on there , they have a
value in that home whether it be emotional or physical or whatever and so
when you try to master plan an area , 100 , 200 acres or whatever , obviously
were trying to make it make economic sense first to determine if it 's even
workable . Then try to work with the city to meet the city 's goals and
objectives as well . Now I 've been following the Comp Plan process . It 's
been underway off and on for 3 years , or even longer than that I guess but
w,e, 'v,e been following it and watching and in the last year it 's really
t.:.p; ej up and I 've been in contact with the consultants and city staff andll
to let them know informally because we haven 't made a formal application .
But informally that we will be making a formal application for this area
for part of it in the very , very near future . But because it 's a shoreland
district and there are certain guidelines that one has to operate in that ,
' t affects property within 1 ,000 feet of an environmental lake which Lake
St . Joe is and we 're totally cognizant of the fact that the consultant and
the City would like to see some type of park , active in that area . What
I 'd ask you to do tonight , being that all of this is kind of in the process
and it has been in the process for some time . We haven 't completed the
lane assembly . We 're attempting to and we don 't know if we will be able
to . I said , because of the configuration of the parcels and the value
that some of the parcels have affixed to them from a sale standpoint , it
really makes it . When you add all these things together and you figure can
I subdivide and can anybody even afford to buy the lots because the raw
land price was so high , and that 's what we 're working on now . If a
-,articular parcel or a certain acreage was designated well this is where
the park 's going to be , that could skew the master planning for that whole
rice . What we 're trying to do , like I say , is master plan the entire area
which is a benefit to the City . Benefit to the County . Benefit for what
you 're attempting to do and it 's certainly a benefit for the people who end,
up living there and building their homes there . So if we could just kind
of , we know there needs to be a park there . We won 't know where it best
works until we 're done doing what needs to be done there . And hopefully
that sheds a little bit of light on what you 're trying to do . The way we
envision it , I 've walked every inch of the land there so I 'm real familiar
with it . The physical constraints there with the wetland areas is a real
sensitive area and it needs to be dealt with accordingly . I guess what we
envision ideally , and unfortunately it never works out that way but ideally
where you could have a passive and an active area somewhat hopefully
contiguous with one another so maybe you have some of your active areas
over here or maybe you have some soccer fields or whatever and then you
have some nature trails that you could walk off into . Now that 's ideal and
all of that obviously is dictated by how you 're able to put the correct II parcels together . So maybe that will give you a little insight of what 's
occurring in the area . There will be some type of park in the area and
where exactly it ends up , we don 't know yet . But hopefully within the next
. months I ' ll have a much , much clearer idea of what 's occuring . We
probably will be submitting a conceptual plat to staff for at least part of
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Park and Sec Commission Meeting
Sept tuber 25 , 1990 - Page 14
I
the area oh I would imagine for sure within the next 3 months or so but we
11 h.ve the property on the south side and some property on the north side .
so '- here 's about 100 acres total .
Hoffman : Could you expand just a little bit , or explain to us on the south
side of the area?
Terry Forbord: Well it used to be referred to as the Bollie property for
11 those of you who are familiar with the city . If you look at your map , all
of -,- he land that 's on the very south side of Lake St . Joe , all the way down
to TH 5 and part of that land is in the city of Victoria .
SSchroers: It 's a low area in the corner there right?
T e: l / rol herd : In the northwest corner of the property , I can 't remember
1 ' of it . Mrs . Brickley told me the name of that lake . It escape:
• Hit _he) 's .
ccrs : No , right down by TH 5 .
• i' Forbord : Oh , correct . That 's correct . Right down by TH 5 there is
a wetland area that goes northwest over towards Lake , is it Wasserman?
in Victoria , is that the name of it?
iH - ffrnan : Not this particular one .
1 5chr -)er::: : No , that would be Steiger but there 's another little lake back
behind St Joe called Tamarack and it would be going up to the farm .
?" w '" think that was .
' Terri Fr,rbord: Mr . Thomas ' farm . It goes all the way up towards Mr .
Thomas ' firm . That little lake behind it . Some people call it the Swiss
Mountain Farm on 13 there .
• hnc rw : Yeah .
Terry Forbord: Yeah , that wetland you 're correct , it does go northwesterly
all the way up to that lake . I guess is that Tamarack?
' Schroers : Tamarack . The railroad tracks run along the side of it .
Terry Forbord : But it 's just a very , very special area and we 've spent a
lot of time .
Schroers: How much of that property are you looking at now? From TH 5 ,
how far west do you go?
Terry Forbord: To the city limits .
Schroers : Isn 't that Victoria right there?
Terry Forbord: That 's correct . To the city limits .
Hoffman : Do you have your map . . .?
I
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
Sept.= r; `_,er 25 , 1990 - Page 15
Schroers : Yeah .
I
Lash: Put TH 5 is below that . Is that what you 're thinking Larry? 1
Schroers : Well there 's quite a bit of agricultural land up in there isn 't
there? I
Terry Forbord: In which part?
Schroers : It would be in the south part from TH 5 . 1
Hoffman: This area contains agricultural , wooded and lowland wetlands .
Terry Forbord : Yeah . It 's a real mix of different vegetation types .
TLece 's a lot of Army Corps , DNR regulated wetlands in there . That 's
eleen =nt with it . And I 've already met with both agencies or we deal with
ther.i , l1 the time anyway so they know us real well but , they 're all aware
of what we 're doing . But like I say , the only reason I wanted to get up
and ie t let you know , because I could tell it was a concern for you and it
:ah jib 1 d be . I mean that 's what your charge is and it 's certainly a concern
tc, us because we want to make any neighborhood , community that we create we
wr,t the people who live there to be able to have access to all the things
that anybody that lives in the city should and that area is in need of some
t - •:De of area because they have to go up to Minnewashta Shores I believe nowll
is the closest park . The difficulty with this is trying to make it work
ecc emi.c. ,lly because the land value that the people have set on their
mccrm ties in that area , and I don 't know if any of you have looked , is
._s'- phenomenal . It. almost is to the point where that even if one was ablell
to subdivide , even if we are able to pull this off and who knows . Maybe we
won 't he able to , that who 'd be able to buy homes in there? I mean the
lote may end up being $75 ,000 .00-$80 ,000 .00 lots and that certainly isn 't II
'-be real worl'-i for everybody . What we 're trying to do is make some sense
out of it so that 's where , we 're fully cognizant of the fact that a park is
g: te be in that area .
= h: Can you provide Todd with a map or a little more defined area of the
property that you are working with?
Terry Forbord: . . .going to develop within 12 months . The earliest we 'd be
in there on the first phase would be probably the spring of 1991 . 1
Hoffman: 1992 .
Terry Forbord: My , it 's going by awfully fast isn 't it? But and that
would be for , or we tend to do small phases . We don 't just go in and blow
everything . We 're not like that so .
lass: There 's no sewer and water out there is there?
Terry Forbord: There is sewer and water in Minnewashta Parkway . And there
is Enough capacity , the preliminary estimates and until you actually get
into the hard , hard , hard work , the technical detail , the preliminary
est. 'matee are there 's plenty of capacity there to service the area but I
mean I may be speaking a little too soon to guarantee that .
11
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
September 25 , 1990 - Page 16
Lash : Do you have any idea on how many homes you 're thinking of?
Terry Forbord: No .
Lash: Or is this hard to say?
' Terry Forbord: We tend to be a very low density builder . We 're probably
the least dense developer in the city . At least that 's what they tell us .
Pemrick: What would the approximate size of the lot be?
11 Terry Forbord: That 's too early to say . It 's real tough . The Shoreland
District has certain requirements and the City 's adopted the DNR reps for
' that area . The DNR regulations but the DNR 's in the process of changing
that because it was , what happens a lot of times is they pass regulations
and they find out the regulations don 't work so they end up taking a look
' at it again and that 's what they 're doing now . It 's too early to say .
Mady : Are you looking at any property north of King 's Road? You don 't
have to tell me if you 're not , if you 're in the middle of something I can
understand your situation but .
Terry Forbord: We do own property , we have an option on property north
of King 's Road .
Mady : I just wanted to get a feel for how far north we 're looking .
Terry Forbord : Yeah it goes , like I say , I think there 's 40 acres north of
King 's Road and there 's 67 acres south and around Lake St . Joe .
Schroers : From what we 've looked at before as a commission , the area north
of King 's Road would probably lend itself better as an active park area .
' Terry Forbord: From a physical standpoint , I mean a site standpoint ,
that 's correct . From an economic standpoint , I don 't know if it does and
so what we 're trying , and we 're cognizant of that . What we 're trying to
' figure out is how do we deliver to the City and the future neighborhood
that will exist there and the residents that live there , how do we deliver
to them what they need and still make it affordable . That 's always the
biggest challenge on our park . I mean how do you do it? When you 're
paying , I mean if the people realize what the raw land prices were , I mean
it 's impossible to just give land away for parks . It just doesn 't work .
No matter would it be Lundgren Bros . or anybody else . They 'd walk away
' just because the numbers don 't work so we 're trying to figure out a way and
we're not quite there yet , to try to make this all work . But we 've done it
before . Hopefully it will work .
' Hoffman: The commission did take a look at that piece north of King 's Road
so they are aware of it . . .
' Mady: Yeah , and the price .
Schroers: From our point of view what you 're telling us tonight , or what
I 'm reading into it anyway , is that now there is at least a glimmer of hope
of acquiring some parkland in that area . You know we know that there is a
I
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
September 25 , 1990 -- Page 17
large chunk proposed to be developed and we should be able to get some
parkland . Before tonight the way it was looking , there were so many
smaller parcels owners that wanted to subdivide and these properties just
did not , according to the formula that we used to acquire parkland , we just
wouldn 't be able to get enough parkland to accommodate our needs out there
so it 's definitely some encouragement and we hope that you find a way to I
make it work .
Terry Forbord: There are two things that , we 're basically , what we 're
going to be doing as a city , we want to provide that too . I mean it helps I
us . I mean the parks , we don 't look at them as a negative . The key
driving force though is the economics . I mean if the numbers don 't work ,
it doesn 't work for you or us or the future people that live there so what
we 're going to be trying to do , there 's a couple sites that it would be
ideal for . If you 're familiar with the topography in the area , one of the
things that 's sensitive about this area , you don 't want to just go in and
pick any site and then just grade it flat like a pancake because then
you 're wrecking the land and the land 's beautiful just the way it is . You II
try to leave it as much as possible just the way it is but there is a
couple specific sites where a 3 acre play area would work just perfectly . II
Just perfectly and then there 's some passive area adjacent to it that would
accommodate what you were talking about Jim , the type of trails where one
can just walk through and enjoy it the way it is . Our studies , we find
that there 's more people that prefer that than people would realize . A lot,
of people just like parks , just the raw land the way it is so what we 're
going to be doing is bringing something forward to the city and to you
folks and trying to get your help in helping us solve this problem as well II
because we 're trying to deliver what the city needs at the same time . So
if you could just bear with us here for the next few months and just
realize that there will be a park . That we 're trying to figure the best
place to put it and we 're trying to accommodate all those needs . We just. II
don 't have our homework all done yet . Thank you .
Schroers: Thank you for your information . Okay , we need to get back to
Mr . Malinowski here . On his property and from what Todd said , that this is
going to have to come back to us again in the future at the time of
development , I don 't really see that we 're gaining anything at this point II
in time to designate it as the park and open space or single family because
we 're going to have to address the whole issue again .
Andrews: I guess I feel that the appropriate thing to do would be to defer,
any action whatsoever until Lundgren Bros . has a chance to be successful or
unsuccessful in their whole planning . This present parkland may be
totally , could be totally released if Lundgren were to provide us with. what'll
we needed but their plan could still totally collapse if the economics
aren 't there and I would hate to take an action based on a possible outcome
rather than , and I 'd prefer to wait on something that was definite . '
Mady : Todd , we obviously have a lot of work to do on the Comp Plan so this
maybe is more appropriately dealt with in a final form with the whole comp
plan instead of doing it on a hodge podge style . This little site now and
then do the rest of it later .
Mark Malinowski : My concern initially when I called the city because I
read in the paper , there was need for parkland west of Lake Minnewashta .
11
g Park and Rec Commission Meeting
September 25 , 1990 - Page 18
I looked at myself and said , my land sits right in there . I wonder what 's
on their mind and I called and I asked if there was any parklands anywhere .
I was told no . They really didn 't have much . They might like to buy some
land around Lake St . Joe but that 's no big deal to them . Then I came into
the planning meeting and looked at the land use plan and my God , I see all
of my land is in green . I said what does that mean? Mark Koegler who sat
I over there at the time , well he explained that means parks and open space .
That 's when my concern became real . What I would like to see I guess is
with the new comprehensive land use plan comes out , that my property be
shown like it is which is single family residential . The rest of the
property around the lake , in the colored portion of the map , it shows it to
be like blue trees or whatever , around the perimeter of the lake . Then
where the actual lot is where the house would sit , would be yellow . That 's
' where I have a concern . Something like this could affect the property
value . Very real concern . My personal intention is I love open space . My
intention , I don 't have any plans right now other than to live comfortably
on that property just as it is . I might want to add on to my house or
maybe build a new house there but my intention is not to cut down all the
timber or bulldoze the land flat . I have a real love for open space and
' that 's why I bought that property .
rchroers: You don 't have plans to develop it at some point in time?
Mark Malinowski : No . I don 't have any plans like that . I can 't say
they 're not going to change at some point . I 'm very happy in Chanhassen
and I 'm not a developer . I came from a farm background and when I looked
I around at the city and all the small lots , I finally found a place where I
really and truly could live in and that 's what the 6 1/2 acres around Lake
St . Joe , I 'm very comfortable there . I might want to add one thing . Have
' any of walked down by Lake St . Joe? What you 're going to do if you put a
trail through there , you 're going to move that wildlife right out of that
area . Right now there is deer around . I have deer tracks in my yard .
There are green herons that rest on my pier . There 's a wonderful natural
' area . If you put a trail through that marshland , you 're going to move that
t,i ldlife right . I guess I have no other comments other than that .
Mady : I guess no one else has maybe been through it but I ' ll disagree with
you a little bit. there . If your comment were true then the DNR would have
a real problem . Nature trails do impact a nature area . Obviously they do
that but they don 't become super highways in any stretch of the
imagination . Those deer are going to be there until something drastically
happens to the deer population in the whole state or until Victoria
develops to the extent of what is now an Edina . You 're still going to have
' a large deer population there .
Schroers: I work for Hennepin Parks and we have an extensive trail system .
' It 's very common to see a deer on the trail . There are times when the
geese and other wildlife on the trail are almost a hazard to the people
that are using the trail so it 's hard to say that it 's going to displace
the wildlife if you build a proper nature trail .
Mark Malinowski : I agree the deer can live anywhere . Deer is easily
adaptable . There 's no more loons on Lake St . Joe and if you talk to Mr .
Bollie , there used to be . The wildlife 's moving out . . .and I 'm sure that
everybody . . . no more green herons . Rest assured . I really don 't have a
1
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
September 25 , 1990 - Page 19
problem with a trail . That 's not a problem . That 's what I 'm saying
because . . . All I 'm saying is I would prefer to see my property as it
really is , it 's single family residential shown on the comprehensive plan .
Lash: I think the information we got tonight sheds some new light on this II
whole thing and if we 've got all the area around Lake St . Joe designated as
park property , the way I understand it , if anything happens there . Anyone
comes in and chooses to develop it , at that point in time we have the
option to buy it . Is that right? No?
Hoffman : No . We would just . I
Lash: I thought we had first crack at it but if we couldn 't afford it ,
then they could do it . ,
Schroers : That was just on that one particular parcel that was for sale at
that time . That 8 . whatever acres . The people wanted to give us first
option on purchase of that particular property and to be perfectly honest ,
I don 't remember exactly what happened with that . I think we just decided
that we couldn 't afford to outright purchase that property . But it wasn 't
all the way around Lake St . Joe . I think that that would be just part of
the normal dedication process like anything else .
Lash: I mean anything on the comprehensive plan . I 'm sure that Lori tried,
to explain to me one time when something is designated , it gives us first
dibs at it doesn 't it?
Hoffman: No . It 's designated an area , we 'd have to be heads up enough to II
catch wind that the area is for sale for a developer to come in here and
develop it and take a look at outright acquisition as well . Of if a large
development were to take place in this area , we would just have the right
to require as much land as we can by city code under that current ordinance,
, . .Klingelhutz addition and then after that we would have to look at
outright purchase of the land for the value . That type of thing . If it 's
designated and the Commission and the Council feels strongly enough that is
land was up for development and we wanted it as parkland and we weren 't
willing to purchase it , we wouldn 't have any specific right to it . We 'd
have to go through condemnation proceedings . It really doesn 't give us any
special , what it is is it 's a planning tool and as eluded to earlier . . . use
that comprehensive plan in planning for future parks and open spaces in the
city .
Schroers: It just says that that 's a potential place for a park but it 's
not designated as park property .
Andrews: I think we need to make a motion to go one way or the other here II
although I don 't have that motion .
Schroers: I think that what we should do is vote on the recommendation as II
stated here by staff and if that passes , so be it and if it doesn 't pass ,
then we 're going to have to , we 'll make a different recommendation .
Robinson : Yeah , by staff it 's Mark 's recommendation and I just wanted to
say , based on what I heard here tonight and the respect I have for Mark 's
recommendation , I would support Mark 's recommendation . I
11
11 Park and Rec Commission Meeting
September 25 , 1990 - Page 20
Schroers : I do too . I don 't think that Mark has shown us anything in the
past that would make me want to question his judgment . He 's been very
thorough .
Lash : So is that a motion Curt?
I Robinson: Sure . I 'll recommend that the Malinowski property be designated
as single family residential rather than park/open space and that the
remainder of Lake St . Joe area now shown as park/open space remain as park/
open space .
Erhart : I 'll second that .
' Robinson moved , Erhart seconded that the Park and Recreation Commission
recommend that the Malinowski property be designated as single family
residential rather than park/open space and the remainder of the Lake
I St . Joe area remain as park/open space on the Comprehensive Plan . All
voted in favor except Jim Mady and Jim Andrews who opposed and the motion
carried with a vote of 5 to 2 .
' Hoffman: Larry , Richard Wing is in the audience . He 's a resident of this
area . He just happens to also be a person running for Council who has one
comment to make on the Lake St . Joe area .
Richard Wing : I was just really here to learn tonight but being a resident
of Lake Minnewashta for a quarter of a century and being real familiar with
11 this area , I really appreciated your comments about why do parks always
have to be active . I think my use of them probably is more the nature park
or the passive parks . I was sitting listening to this this evening and my
' heart kind of stopped because I use that area so much , whether it 's cross
country skiing or it 's biking or it 's jogging . Whatever the case was and
in our home we have a large picture in our den with our family on our bikes
with Lake St . Joe in the background with a sunset . I just would urge you ,
' as you look at this particular parcel , when you think of Lake St . Joe ,
think of the boundary waters or think of Christmas Lake . I guess all I
really intended to say standing here is that that 's a real jewel . That is
11 just a one time jewel . It 's a deep lake . Very heavily , it 's not the type
of lake you walk around . The topography of the land is low and it 's very
weedy and so on and so forth and I 've been around it . It 's certainly not
accessible to the public but I just want to leave that one word with you .
If your future thoughts , that 's really a jewel .
Schroers: Thank you .
RICE MARSH LAKE PARK PLAYGROUND IMPROVEMENTS.
' Hoffman: Basically this item was generated from the engineering
department . They took at look at what was occurring in our cul-de-sacs and
some of the side streets with the basketball hoops . . .just left and right
with the new subdivisions that were coming in so they cut that sort of
' activity off . Since that time they have had some problems . . .shall remain .
That was the position that is somewhat difficult to enforce . . .feedback from
the commission . Anyway that 's the way this one came about because there is
a backboard and a pole in the cul-de-sac and this neighborhood . . .said if
I have to pull it out , can we have it installed in the park . . .for that type
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
September 25 , 1990 - Page 21
of use . We drove out into that area and Rice Marsh Lake is . . .type of
facilities that are there , there 's not a whole lot of space . As well
there 's the outdated playground equipment there in that location that we 've
talked about in the past . However , the . . . So it'd be a project that
financially could be done with only a $1 ,000 .00 . Something of that nature .
. . .take out the outdated playground equipment which is there which has as
most recently as 2 years ago caused an injury which . . .so we should have
been pulling out that earlier than we are but the equipment now is gone .
The aggregate base is . . .for the pad for the new basketball court and this
item is strictly being brought to the commission tonight . It has an
outdtaed . . .
Schroers: Where it says existing play structure . Is that new stuff or is
that the old? I
Hoffman: That 's a new piece which is somewhat similar to the pieces we 're
currently installing that was probably put in 6 years ago . It 's a wood
type structure which basically matches what we . . .
Schroers : -Okay , so that 's going to stay?
Hoffman: Yep , that 's going to stay .
Lash : Did you just say that 's going to cost $1 ,000 .00? I
Hoffman: For the backboard and that type of thing . The additional money
for the , with the additional aggregate base , the gravel .
Lash: So where is that coming from?
Hoffman: Where is it coming from? Basically taking a look at the capital II
improvement budget for the 1990 year , we are somewhat behind in our
spending . It 's hard to believe .
Robinson: Coming from the tennis court up by the well . ,
Mady : You know Curt 's tennis court he hasn 't gotten for 3 years .
Lash: So coming from something we haven 't spent . . .
Hoffman: Well the situation , taking a look at the $150 ,000 .00 which was
budgeted during the 1991 and 1990 budget . Taking a look at what projects
have been completed and what has not bee completed . Just take for instance
the $40 ,000 .00 for playground equipment at City Center Park . That 's not '
going to take place . There was $15 ,000 .00 in there for a Boy Scout
project . I 'm not sure how that $15 ,000 .00 got in there . What it was going
to be used for but we had spent a fraction of what was budgeted in this
project so to take , to get this much benefit for $1 ,000 .00 , a couple
thousand dollars is just , it 's really .
Erhart: So we 're not taking from a project?
Hoffman : No .
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11 Park and Rec Commission Meeting
September 25 , 1990 - Page 22
Robinson: I guess , and I was going to say maybe Jan is saying . I guess
what I 'm saying is , it says no action is necessary . I guess I would have
rather , if we were going to do something like this , that it be brought up
to us and we agree to spend that thousand bucks down there .
Hoffman: We certainly can do that .
Mady : This also comes Todd where we 've been doing recently with , when the
residents from Centex Homes came in here not too long ago and the ongoing
parade of new developments would come in asking well gee , can 't you give us
a little bit more . Well this one 's only a thousand bucks . Sometimes it 's
like $5 ,000 .00 . Sometimes $10 ,000 .00 . We have been saying it 's not in the
' budget . We 've got everybody else asking for it . It just can 't get done .
I 'm concerned that because this one 's cheap and easy it 's going to get done
when we 've got all these other things that might take a little more effort
to do but they 're going to get put on the back burner . This one all of a
' suc'den came out of nowhere and got put right to the head of the class when
in the scheme of things , maybe it 's real important . Maybe it isn 't real
important but from where I 'm looking at this one , all of a sudden it just
' came up out of nowhere and it 's going to , it sounds like it 's going to get
done in the next couple of weeks .
Lash : And we didn 't know anything about it .
11 Mady : We didn 't know anything about it and we 've been fighting and trying
to get this tennis court over here and we can 't get it done and play
1 structures are getting delayed and not being installed and it just , I don 't
know . It makes us look bad .
' Lash : I hate to give a message that we don 't want to get anything done .
Todd 's making some initiative to get something done for a change and I like
that so I don 't want to act like we 're sloshing the pans and telling
him . . .but I guess I was just curious with knowing what a tight budget we
Ihave , where the money came from . That 's what started it .
Erhart : And Todd 's all red in the face .
Robinson: For getting something done for a change .
' Lash : No , there was a complaint that we never get anything , it seems like
we never get anything done and now we get something done and all of a
sudden we 're jerking the reins .
' Mady: We 'll be patting him on the back in about another 15 minutes .
Schroers : Maybe a good way to put this would be that spending this
proposed thousand dollars to get this basketball court in here is not going
to be preventing us from accomplishing something else that we want to do .
Mady: It makes good sense from a public safety standpoint too .
' Hoffman : The situation was , walked down there with Dale and we said , that
area which the current playground structure is on is an appropriate size
for the playground area . That equipment should have been ripped out of
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
September 25 , 1990 - Page 23 It
there 2 years ago when we had the suit against us for the . . .that occurred II
there . . .
Mady: We may be , or the comment earlier about City Center Park and the
cage . We 've talked about how bad some of that equipment is for the 5 year
I 've been up here anyway . Maybe we should look for , instead of a thousand
bucks , maybe another $200 .00 and buy some pearock to put underneath that II
cage so the next kid who drops 10 feet from the top of it and there are
more than one broken arm a year up there , that maybe we can prevent one of
those .
Hoffman: I thought about that . The situation there is , at what point do II
we start admitting it is on school property . We want to be cooperative in
the spirit of things . . .
II
Pemrick: What gets done with the old equipment? The outdated equipment .
Where does that go?
I
Hoffman: Basically , they 'll probably cut that slide in two .
Pemrick : It 's destroyed , yeah . I
Mady: If it 's unsafe for us , it 's unsafe for everyone .
Schroers : Well , if we 're not going to take any action on this at this II
time , let 's move on to item 8 .
Mady : I just wanted to let you know Todd that I planned on saying this is II
a good idea but I thought we should do some staff bashing when we had the
opportunity . .
Hoffman: Thank you for that . II
Mad : Besides I knew about 2 items later I was going to be patting you on ,
the back so I figured I should humble you up first .
Hoffman: I did get that comment though from the City Manager . Where 's the
money coming from? I
SITE PLAN REVIEW, TROENDLE ADDITION.
Hoffman : Item number 8 is a fairly simple site plan review which basically,
is just brought before the Commission as an informational item to let you
know what 's taking place in the city . We continue to fill up and those
types of things . It 's a subdivision of 8 .7 acres into 15 single family
II
lots . If you 're familiar with this area . . . Frank Beddor purchased this
property from the Troendle 's over there . Nez Perce Drive is a new road
that has gone through the area just recently , within the past year the
commission has reviewed the Vineland subdivision which is just off to the II
south of this site . The park needs are being met by the adjacent parks .
The Carver Beach Park , the playground and the Curry Farms Park is across II
the major road there so it is somewhat close as well . . .
Andrews : Is it intentional that they 're trying to make access for the
people on the north side of Lotus Lake as long and difficult as possible
Park and Rec Commission Meeting
September 25 , 1990 - Page 24
for Carver Beach? There seems to be a lot of obvious choices here for a
connection and it isn 't going to happen .
' Hoffman: Yeah Nez Perce , this piece will eventually , this will continue
through and eventually hook up . . .so this will be a connection road between
Pleasant View Road and then down all the way back to Kerber .
' Schroers : It must be almost right underneath the water tower the way it
looks .
' Hoffman: It basically is east of the water tower .
Andrews : By North Lotus on top of the hill?
eHoffman: This site?
' Andrews: Yeah . There 's a little pond there that they filled in .
Hoffman : . . . It 's like one piece over .
Arlrews: It 's one piece to the east of that water tower?
H,-'ffman: Yeah .
' Andr <_ws: That 's got to be it then .
' Hoffman : There 's one big piece in there that 's . . .
Mad)' : Are they going to develop Nez Perce in the flavor of the rest of the
'
road and make it only 12 feet wide?
Hoffman: No . The initial . . .nicely curved and quite wide .
Lash : So do you need a motion on this?
Hoffm: n: Yes .
! ash: Okay . I make a motion that we accept park and trail fees in lieu of
dedication of land .
Mady : Second .
Lash moved, Mady seconded that the Park and Recreation Commission recommend
to accept park and trail fees in lieu of parkland and trail construction.
All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously.
' PARK DEVELOPMENT UPDATE:
A . LAKE SUSAN PARK
B . .SADDLEBROOK TRAIL
1offr;in: This is a fairly exciting item . If you 've been to Lake Susan
Park , it has . . .
Mady: It 's fantastic .
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Park and Rec Commission Meeting
September 25 , 1990 - Page 25
Hoffman: . . .at an unbelieveable rate . After what we went through at Lake II
Ann but, what we did in 2 years at Lake Ann and what we 've done in 3 years
at Lake Susan . '
Mady: 2 weeks at Lake Susan .
Hoffman: Yeah , it 's just incredible . As stated in here , the seed is in
the ground . It 's been in the ground approximately one week . They seeded
it last Saturday . They mulched the outfield . The infield was sodded .
It 's elevated . The baseball and large backstop is there . It 's a legal
baseball field . You 've got all the distance requirements . The irrigation II
system is in . It 's running on a Monday , Wednesday , Friday schedule right
now and there 's 7 different districts to the watering system . It goes on II
at night and shuts off at 6:00 a .m . in the morning so the field is getting
watered constantly throughout the week . With this warm weather that we
had , we should see some tremendous growth out there at that park . If you
have a chance to take a look at it , you 'll see just the initial phase is,
going to be completed this fall including the tennis courts , the parking
lot . The parking lot improvements to the lot which is there and placement
of the play structure . The replacement of the volleyball court which was 1
moved . The baseball field being done as well as the sight where the
archery is being molded to fit somewhere down behind the baseball field . . .
Schroers: I 'm glad you brought that up because I missed that item in there
and I was going to say , there was one very important item there that 's
missing . '
Hoffman: It 's been addressed and it will be there as well as an additional
item which was not included . It was electricity run out to the backstop so
the baseball association can have access to that for their pitching machine'
and that type of thing and any concession activities that would take place
in the interim between the time when it 's initially developed . . .but there
will be electricity there as part of that project . Then they ' ll wind down
this spring or this fall . The last thing which will be completed , the
light pole will be delivered about the first of December and those will all
be concreted in and wired and install those . . .sedimentation which is taking
place following . . . Installation of the trail segment there down by the
lake . Lake Susan Hills West neighborhood which has their trail segment
just running to the west side of Lake Susan and then they 'll complete the
clean-up probably sometime in June .
Mady : Todd , I couldn 't remember , we are putting lights on the balifield?
Hoffman: No . '
Mady: No , we 're not . I couldn 't remember and somebody from the baseball
association asked me and I told them I thought we were not and he said we II
were and I said it 's been a couple years . It 's very possible .
Andrews: What lights were you talking about? Parking lot lights?
Hoffman: Parking lot lights , correct . Parking lot and roadway lights .
It 's minimal lighting in the parking lot . Along the roadway down to the
boat access and that type of thing . '
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Park and Rec Commission Meeting
September 25 , 1990 - Page 26
Mad', : The road , Lake Drive is lit anyway .
' ash: I remember from the Minutes last time where Jim talked about the
warning track . Is that what you called it? Were you able to achieve that?
' Hoffman: Yes .
Mady: It 's in .
Lash: And I 'm not trying to sound negative here . Really I 'm not but
I find this kind of contradictory where it says the trails have not been
started yet . Work on the boat access , fishing pier and lake dredging will
' not be done this fall as initially programmed . In summary , the work is
proceeding on schedule . So it 's on schedule for it not to be completed
like it was supposed to?
'lady : I know the boat access wasn 't going to be started until next year .
Next spring .
' Hoffman: It 's on schedule .
Last, : It is on schedule?
ladv: It 's got to be way ahead of schedule .
Hoffman : We pushed , we tried to get started this fall and the whole
'
authorization and approval of plans and specs . . .we really have a fine
contractor . . .
' Mcdv: It 's amazing . I was out there 2 weeks ago . I drove by just to see
what was happening . If anything was happening because I knew the contracts
been let at the City Council meeting somewhere around the 20th of
' August . Maybe the 15th . Somewhere around there and I was amazed and I
called Todd the next Monday and said what 's going on? These guys have got
huge earth moving equipment . They 've obviously got it all done . The
-)ackstop 's in place . They 've just got a little bit of screening to do . I
said what happened? This is supposed to be done for 3 years .
Andrews: Is the electrical work all done? You 're all done with the
' electrical work out there already?
Hoffman: No .
' Andrews: Is there enough service out there to put lights on the field at a
later date without having to run a major electrical project again?
1 Hoffman: We talked about that . People go in and develop a field and
there 's talk about running the service right up to the field already and
running inground wires in there and possibly even putting in the standards
but you find , in the time lag between when that work gets done and 5 to 8
years later lights are put in , you end up having some problems with
deterioration of the equipment which is there . It is so close , the
electricity would be coming out of the pump house which is a couple hundred
11 yards from the fields so 5 , 6 , 4 more years , whatever . . .
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Perk and Rec Commission Meeting
c ept F rnher 25 , 1990 - Page 27
Andrews : So you have plenty of service in the general site? I
Hoffman: Yes .
Andrews: I guess that 's what I was driving at . 11
Schroers: How much pressure do you feel that this is going to take off of
Lake Ann? A noticeable amount? Is it going to .
Hoffman: I believe so because the use of Lake Ann is going to be so much
different. . It is the beach use is still going to be just as intensive . I
Schroers : No , I meant the ballfields .
Hoffman: Essentially it won 't be used until 1992 so Field #1 will be able II
to be used somewhat more for the softball programs but who knows where the
a ehall program will be by that time . We 're over double from last year
and the fields at Lake Susan will be used for the Legion teams , the Babe
fluth teams , the AAU teams , those divisions which . . . They can get one game
of practice in in an evening and . . .so it 's not going to be noticeable .
Mady : Without lights we aren 't doing a whole lot . With the increase in
tne number of teams . The Little League program has just taken off
:)nbclieveable .
Hoffman: We ' ll take a look at eventually , we 'll probably take a look at
creating a town team again . Adult baseball team for the city of Chanhassen.
for that type of facility there and neighboring communities . . .that have
that type of team . I wouldn 't be surprised to see that type of use .
r,chroers: Okay , what about Saddlebrook?
Hoffman: The trail at Saddlebrook . Again , just an update to let you know
that the construction is taking place . The aggregate is in . The neighbors
ha..e been met with on site there . They 're the ones that had concern about
hew the grading was going to take place and how . . .property and that type of
thing . I 'm not sure if I mentioned it , I believe I did . The barrier post
similar to the one they had at Lake Ann Beach will be installed there . ,
Schroers: There 's going to be one post in the center of the trail?
Hoffman: Yes . To deter that type of activity hopefully . t
Schroers : Okay . Are there any commission presentations?
COMMISSION PRESENTATIONS:
Andrews: I 'll make one coment and that was the wind brace on the tennis
courts and winter coming sooner . It will be ripped to shreds by the first II
of Dec.ember so . . . There 's 1 ,000 square feet of sail sitting up there and
know what it 's like at North Lotus Lake . The fences are literally been II pulled out of the asphalt somewhat by the wind blowing on those things so
that 's what happens .
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Park and Rec Commission Meeting
September 25 , 1990 - Page 28
Hc.ffman: Just to clarify , it 's my opinion that we 're going to make use of
the wind screen which we currently have and not purchase additional wind
screens . Look to putting in plantings and those types of things and lust
m, ke do without .
Lash: Did we talk one time about taking them down at North Lotus and
' putting them at City Center?
Robinson: Yes we did .
Lash : Inside and out?
-k,ffman: Yes . This fall when they come down , they 'll evaluate what they
' have out at the storage barn . Put it away and then if we have enough to do
anything in the spring , we 'll do that and then we 'll take a look at
<tarting initial plantings at the tennis courts so eventually we 'd have
nctura i screening .
' rare:
T mentioned last time too about how the one volleyball net was
1 acne . It must have been stolen I assumed . Somebody took it so .
Mad, : Somebody needed it worse than we did .
11 Andrew : It 's pretty sad because those things don 't get that much use up
there as it is and for someone to take one .
Robinson : And I also am told that the lights aren 't working over here on
the tennis courts .
Hc,ffm an : I 've been informed of that also .
,chrocrs : Anything else in Commission Presentations? What about the
Administrative Section?
AD"'TNISTRATIVE SECTION:
Hcffman: Just a couple of comments on the Administrative Packet . You 'll
be happy to see that the park and trail dedication fees were approved by
Council . The senior survey there is . . .commission take time to look at that
if you haven 't . Those folks spent a lot of time in evaluating their needs .
In the past , they 're somewhat . . . We talked to the folks that meet over
here at the elementary school . They want to play cards and they don 't . . .
We try to reach them in our publication by advertising the other activities
' which they place at the Excelsior Senior Center . . .
Mady: That was kind of interesting seeing that where you actually saw it
in print where they started , you 've got to realize we 're a group from 55 to
105 and we don 't all , because none of us have gotten there yet so you look
at what your parents are and you can 't think of them in that respect and
the only active seniors group you ever see in town are the ones that are
' playing cards at the school so that 's what you think of .
Andrews: I want to make one comment about that just to kind of tie it back
to that Lake St . Joe Park and that is that , more and more we concentrate on
cur active park uses . Playground equipment , ballfields , volleyball fields ,
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Dark and Rec Commission Meeting
:sept.ember 25 , 1990 - Page 29 i
and tennis courts and so forth and looking at our population and how it 's
changing in age , I think you 're going to see more and more , or less use of
those active facilities and more and more appreciation of passive
facilities . I think it 's not too soon to consider that in our allocation
c fends in the land that we do acquire .
Lash : T don 't see the active use getting less and less but I certainly
I
think we could strive more at maybe more of a balance .
Andrews: I think you do see less and less . I mean tennis was a sport that.
a few years back was just absolutely bonkers . I mean you couldn 't get on
tennis courts and now tennis courts typically , at least that I 've seen
aren 't used that often . Look at the growth of golf . They attribute that
to the aging of America . They say more people play golf now because the
population has aged somewhat so I think there will be a decline in use and
I think we should consider that . I mean we have a need right now that we
have to fulfill but maybe look at how a piece of property that maybe is '
St up for a ballfield could be returned to a passive state if possible or
rninimi7e the impact on the passive use areas .
Schroerf:; : I think your point is well taken and there are a lot of people ,
T thin": the majority of people on this commission are not , definitely not
nco:-;ed to passive use and natural areas . As a matter of fact , from the on
se'- that Lake St . Joe area has been looked at as just exactly that . That
tyre of an area . We had discussed several possibilities there . One of
as a boardwalk and other things like that . I guess I personally am
r: '- in favor of cutting right through the heart of the habitat . I think it
make: more sense to , if we 're going to have a natural trail , to put it out
around the habitat a little bit more and have something that 's a little
'c,.<: si er to maintain and that sort of thing and destroy as little of the
natural area as possible and blend it in but I think that that 's pretty
I
m, c-h what everyone is thinking for that area . We 're not planning on
looking at building a ballfield at Lake St . Joe .
Mcdy : It 's kind of cyclacle the nature of the commission . When I came on I
,.a.,;r> ago , we had just really gotten off of , the commission had been real
l<t., _-, oriented . I mean they did everything nature . This is right when
Ol!rt came on and they started turning the corner and we kind of went away
from there and focused so much on active uses because we didn 't have any
and so now we 're trying to hit that balance and it 's tough to hit it
because we 're kind of gearing off the active but yet we 've got all these
new places coming in so .
Andrews: The citizens , the taxpayers of today are demanding active uses .
Our balifields are just overrun with players and when Todd talks about
doubling the program in one year , that 's incredible growth . Faster than
the rate of the population growth by far so we have an obligation to
fulfill that I realize but just look at , and I 'm not saying that what we 're'
doing is wrong . When you see a natural area like Lake St . Joe , you iust
can 't afford to let it get away because you 're never going to get it back
again .
II
Robinson: That 's a good comment and Jim 's right .
1
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11 Park and Rec Commission Meeting
•,eptemher 25 , 1990 - Page 30
Schroers : That 's like Lake Ann also . The gentleman referred to Lake
Joe as a jewel . If it 's a jewel , Lake Ann is a mega jewel . Lake Ann
is really special .
' Andrews: . . .the plans of maintaining a park perimeter around Lake Ann and
potentially maybe Lake Lucy in the future and those are going to be the
' enter pieces of a really beautiful city .
Mad/: Tom Hamilton said it about 3 years ago . He said it 's something
like , the lakes in Chanhassen make it a great community but it also makes
it 's biggest headache . Having natural areas because what 's great for one
not so great for somebody else and they 're just always going to be
clashing . To strike that balance is not easy .
' Andrews: Look what the City of Minneapolis went through with their lakes .
They were natural . They were developed and they tried to take them , go
ack, in the direction with park perimeters so , Lake Phalen the same way
in St_ Paul . That 's gone through . . .
Medy : You look at the history of the Minneapolis and St . Paul park systems
' rid ,:hat the commissions and the park superintendents went through in the
-.arty late 1800 's and the literal tar and featherings that were done and
things of that. nature . People didn 't like the Minneapolis park system and
St . Paul park system . I believe somebody was actually killed in the
5t _ Paul because of what they tried to door what they actually did so it
and now it 's looked at as probably one of the best park systems in
' the whole county for a city wide park system but it doesn 't always meet
iith acceptance in the residents at the current time .
Schr-7.era : Is this all on record? Is Nann going to have to?
' Hoffman: Yes . . . Some comments on Oktoberfest . We 're lucky enough , our
department is coordinating the physical aspect , the layout . . . We 're lucky
' enough to have the HRA providing the majority of the funding for that . As
well we 're lucky enough to have the Lion 's , the Rotary , the Jaycees . . .who
ere doing the bulk of the work instead . . . We just went in with an
addi '- ional. 8 ,000 flyers in the Sailor this week . The flyer went out last
'
week in the Villager and more ads in the news of this week . We 're hoping
for fair weather . Hope to see you there .
Lash: You don 't need us to work?
Mady: Clean-up .
Hoffman: You could certainly help with clean-up . . . Other than that , feel
free to enjoy this one on your own .
Mady moved, Robinson seconded to adjourn the meeting. All voted in favor
and the motion carried. The meeting was adjourned at 9:23 p .m . .
' Suh;r i t.ted by Todd Hoffman
Recreation Supervisor
Pre;-tired by Nann Opheim
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