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1h. Minutes CIHANHASSEN CITY COUNCIL REGULAR MEETING NOVEMBER 6, 1989 ' Mayor Qvtiel called the meeting to order. at 7:30 p.m.. The meeting was opened with the Pledge to the Flag. COUNCILMEMBERS PRESENT: Mayor Crmiel, Councilman Boyt, Councilman Workman; ' Councilwoman Dimler and Councilman Johnson STAFF PRESENT: Don Ashworth, Gary Warren, Dave Hempel, Paul Krauss, Jo Ann Olsen, Todd Gerhardt, Jim Chaffee and Elliott Knetsch, City Attorney. ' APPROVAL OF AGENDA: Councilman Workman moved, Councilman Johnson seconded to approve the agenda with the following additions under Council Presentations: Councilman Boyt wanted to discuss a letter to the Met Council, Lake Ann Park fees and Frontier Hanes. All voted in favor and the motion carried. 1 RECYCLING PRIZE DRAWING AND PRESENTATION OF CHECK TO RECYCLING PRIZE WINNER: IMayor Chmiel presented a check in the amount of $500.00 to Mrs. Angela Simmons for recycling. Then Mayor Chmiel drew a name for the recycling drawing. CONSENT AGENDA: Councilman Johnson moved, Councilman Workman seconded to approve the following consent agenda items pursuant to the City Manager's recamtendations: a. Approve Addendum to Development Contract for Reed Addition. ' b. Approve Addendum to Development Contract for Seven Fourty-One Crossings. g. Resolution #89-115: Approval of Administration Subdivision, Lots 4 & 5, Block 3, Kurvers Point, Robert Conklin. h. Approval of Accounts. ' i. City Council Minutes dated October 9, 1989 City Council Minutes dated October 23, 1989 Planning Commission Minutes dated October 18, 1989 1. Resolution #89-116: 1990 Property Tax Levy, Certification to Carver County. All voted in favor and the motion carried. Councilman Workman: Mr. Mayor, could I make a couple comments? Mayor Chmiel: Sure. Councilman Workman: Cane, in talking it over with the City Manager that perhaps we could expedite our schedule by placing the consent agenda items we pull off to the end of the meeting. Is that something that might be a deviation that would maybe help us out. i1 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 1 Councilman Johnson: That's how we used to do it except for when people were [-) ' here for the Consent Agenda items, they'd have to stay until midnight. Councilman Workman: I don't think these would be tonight but we could do that ' too. We could be flexible but then we could take these 4 items and then we would be done by 9:00 discussing these or something. Is that a legitimate concern? ' Councilman Boyt: Why don't we see if there's anyone here to discuss them? Councilman Workman: If I could make one other comment too. As we proceed with the meeting tonight, I'm not sure who maybe all knows but Tom Hamilton's father passed away this weekend and we could all think of him tonight. Mayor C vdel: Is there anyone specifically here for item c, d, e, or j? If ' you're not familiar with what's on the agenda. Gary Carlson: Your Honor, I was wondering if item (f) could be pulled off for a brief discussion... Councilman Workman: I'd pull (f) . F. APPROVE AMENDED ASSESSMENT ROLL FOR MINNEWASHTA MEADOWS IMPROVEMENT PROJECT NO. 88-2. ' Gary Carison: My name is Gary Carlson. I'm the owner of Minnewashta Meadows --a and as you recall, all of our meetings with the developer from Minnewashta ' Meadows, which is myself Gary Carlson, have been brief because of the terrific work that our city staff does. As you can recall at the last meeting we were at, there were 3 items and they were discussed very thoroughly and very completely as you can see by the staff's report and so once again rather than take up the Council's time, it was able to rely on it's staff to resolve those issues. The one thing I would like to point out is based on the original Council's action that caused that problem, was the majority of the residents on ' Church Road wanted same improvements. They wanted same sewer and sane wanted sewer and water and so that Council elected to provide the service and same I think are on a public hearing here tonight to accept their part of the ' assessments and I accepted my part of the assessments. That Council elected a couple of residents not to have any assessments and basically I'm being asked in that explanation by the city staff to pay for their improvements. The only way to now resolve that is as explained in your papers there from staff is to credit ' me when they sell. I think that's a simple resolution. Of course I would rather have the Council correct the previous Council's error in what they should have done is the majority of the residents wanted the improvements and clearly ' the other two properties in this case benefit. They should have said well you're going to be assessed. You're the benefitting properties. I don't know if this could be resolved. I'm willing to accept having to pay for their improvements and wait for a future but it might be noted that both of those residents have sold. That that original Council had exempted for some reason that they not accept their assessments. In other words those residents have sold and I think the Council could correct that problem by going ahead and ' assessing those properties for those benefits. Or basically number two, 1 2 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 i assessing them so I'm not required to pay for them now and then deferring those ' assessments or number three, at least letting that amount that I'm paying for than to have sewer and water available to their property which is already to their property provided for by my payments of their assessments is to at least let that have interest applied to it as well as being a set amount which staff didn't present that idea. I didnt have a chance to mention it to Gary but of course the amounts and the projects he's dealing with, he can't take up every little concern but I would like to at least have that added. At least the interest for the fact that I'm paying for their improvements and at such time as they decide to sell again or they require sewer and water, that those reimbursements will be coming back to me. That I would at least receive interest on that amount. Other than that I don't know what the resolution could be. It should be that they should be called in and given an assessment for their benefits on those two lots but if we're going to resolve it the way the staff has, I am perfectly willing to live with that because it does at least provide for some relief in the future. But again, as you can see the staff did an excellent job and the project is still in my hands but soon to be sold to a builder who's going to again, build it out. I didn't came away, I did provide a full 17 foot strip all along Church Road so that Church Road could be widened to a full city street and none of the other residents that are here taking assessments had to give up any right-of-way. I gave up the full 17 feet on my side and I did take down a $30,000.00 plus hate so that I could have one home on each lot so I've done quite a few things to improve the neighborhood up there but again, the City's done a lot of help me so it's going to be a better neighborhood up there because of both of our work. So again thank you to the City. Mayor Chmiel: Gary, do you want to enlighten me a little bit more? ' Gary Warren: The Frizzel property and the Kerber property are the two that Mr. Carison's referring to. As he accurately referenced, they were deleted, not included in the assessment roll when the Council initially authorized the improvement projects. This was based on their arguments about hardship and not needing sewer and water and such at the time. In order to have those properties 11 assessed at this time we would basically would have to go back and rehold the public hearing to include than into the process. It was with that in mind that I figured that the best route here would be to utilize the City's connection ordinance which allows the City to came up with an appropriate assessment for those properties so that when they do connect, that we then would have the opportunity, they don't get by scott free. When they do connect to the system, they will pay their fair share for that utility service. From an interest standpoint, similar to Lake Lucy Road trunk watermain project, I guess we do have the ability to utilize an interest, apply an interest rate to that from the date of levy. To recognize whether it's a year or 10 years down the road, that there's some inflationary impact on that fee. I guess that wouldn't be unreasonable. Mayor Chmiel: You're saying basically from what we have here, we'd have to go through the process again once more of the public hearing. Reopen it and I'm not sure whether that would be an advantageous thing to do at this particular time. Maybe Council has same. ' Councilwoman Dirtier: Gary, have those properties changed hands or are they still Kerber and Frizzell's properties? 3 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 I ] Gary Warren: It's my understanding, based on what Gary Carison has said, that they have changed hands. I don't know that for a fact. Councilwoman Dimler: So we're dealing with different owners? Mayor Chmiel: Two different property owners. Councilman Hoyt: I think it would be very easy to resolve this by simply adding the interest costs. We don't have to hold a public hearing to do that and we could finish this issue. It's his money and it's tied up for who knows how many years. He certainly deserves to accumulate interest on that so I would move approval of item (f) with the change indicating that the assessment roll will accumulate interest at whatever the City's normal charge for that is. Councilman Workman: I'd second it. ICouncilman Johnson: What is our policy on connecting? Now that they have sewer and water available to their property? IIGary Warren: The policy reads that if they're within 150 feet of service, which they should be here, that if their systems fail that they would have to hook ' into the system. They could not sink a new well nor a new septic system. Councilman Johnson: If their systems fail but if their system's fine, they can continue on? II Mayor Cmiel: Indefinitely providing they're 150 feet. [-I ' Gary Warren: If they're farther than 150 feet, then we have some discretionary. Councilman Johnson: So what is the possibilities these people are going to want IIto connect in the next 20 years? Gary Warren: Each of the properties could subdivide. IICouncilman Johnson: Kerber's is real small. He's already got two houses on it. Gary Warren: Well, it's questionable about what type of structures they are. iDon Ashworth: I should note that we can't require the physical connection literally going onto somebody's property and making that type of connection you end up with all kinds of suits and claims and whatever else. But we do have an Iincentive in terms that we do start billing that property monthly sewer and water bills. In fact I think you'll recall it was maybe less than a year ago when the appeal came in 2 to 3 months ago, if I remember properly. A property ' owner up off of Lake Lucy and questioning that entire policy. We did keep it in effect. In fact it may be in this adminstrative section where he has a follow-u0 note saying he's not going to be able to immediately connect. It will II be this next spring but he is paying the monthly sewer and water bills, or quarterly so I should note that for the record. Additionally, if the City Council approves this, what we're really doing is authorizing staff to enter into an agreement with Mr. Carlson whereby reimbursement to him based on our Iconnection charge policy would occur. That should also have some type of a 4 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 1 clause in there that states that he has to really help us in that process so if for some reason we fail to collect the money, that we will try to collect it but we're not going to be responsible if for same reason we fail. And secondly, his reimbursement must, the requestion for reimbursement must be within let's say a one year period of time of sale or connection or whatever else. That way it won't go on indefinitely. I've talked with Mr. Carlson on this and I believe he's in agreement to both of those statements. Councilman Johnson: Would a sewer connection charge of $6,000.00, that'd be half of this $12,000.00. $6,500.00, whatever. Would that be those areas or whatever? I mean that sounds a little high to me. Gary Warren: Sewer and water. , Councilman Johnson Sewer and water? Okay. in Ashworth: It goes by area though. I think Kiowa was like $11,000.00 just ' for sanitary sewer. Councilman Johnson: To connect? ' Gary Warren: Because of lot density and everything else. Don Ashworth: It was very expensive. ' Mayor Chmiel: Any other discussion? Resolution #89-117: Councilman Hoyt moved, Councilman Workman seconded to approve the amended assessment roll for Minnewashta Meadows Improvement Project No. 88-2 with accumulated interest at the City's normal rate. All voted in favor and the motion carried. Councilman Johnson moved, Councilman Workman seconded to amend the agenda to move the consent agenda items that were pulled off to before Council Presentations. All voted in favor and the motion carried. ' VISITOR PRESENTATIONS: None. PUBLIC DARING: ADOPT ASSESSMENT ROLL FOR CHURCH ROAD SANITARY SEWER IMPROVEMENT PROJECT NO. 87-5. Public Present: Name Address ' Merlyn Wanous 6231 Church Road Harry Campbell 6241 Church Road Gary Carlson 3831 West 62nd Street Gary Warren: I'll just give a brief introduction here and get everybody oriented. This is the Church Road project area. The line on the map here shows 5 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 • actually the routing of the Lake Virginia Forcemain that was constructed down Church Road by the Metropolitan Waste Control Commission. At that time the City [-I looked into the request from a number of the residents in the area on servicing I them with sanitary sewer and we also looked at the watermain in the feasibility study. The project was split into project areas. Mr. Carlson's project, which we just discussed was the southern half and the project that we're having the I assessment hearing on this evening to cover sanitary sewer which was installed for the north half of the project area which affects the Wanous, the Campbell and the park property. The feasibility study that was prepared looked at the assessment rolls from a number of standpoints and the front footage standpoint I and the unit assessment standpoint was basically the roll that I think appeared to be the most reasonable. It looked at buildable units on the property. The roll which was included in the packet and the assessments notices which have I been specifically sent out, are as we're showing here, which we are submitting for approval. Basically the park property on the west side...units assigned to that property. The Wanous property makes up basically 3 parcels or a total of 7 units and the Wanous property which we've had discussions with Mr. Wanous. It I is a subdividable property so there are 2 units there. The unit price, the unit assessment which has been established is $3,343.04 for each unit. The assessments are shown in the total column. Mayor Chmiel: This is a public hearing. Is there anyone wishing to address this item? If so, please came up to the podium and state your name and address please. I Merlyn Wanous: My name is Merlyn Wanous. I live at 6231 Church Road. I have been assessed like for 4 units. I do have 3 units, 3 lots. I'm just wondering, I do I have rlgct)s through a public hearing or everything else in order to divide this into or what is the procedure? I Gary Warren: You would have to go through the platting process which would require various hearings to subdivide. Merlyn Wanous: I was just wondering how you could make 4 lots out of 3 lots. I ' do have 3 lots that are there. Now I'm being assessed for 4 units. I mean I'm • paying my share. I'm not saying that but I'm just kind of wondering how in the world, I mean why they put in an extra stub there when there's only 3 lots Ithere. Gary Warren: We looked at similar to Mr. Campbell's property, what is the I minimum density allowed by the zoning ordinance for subdivision. While you're right, you do have 3 lots established now, you could came in and resubdivide the property and end up with 4 lots so we use the City's minimum requirements which II is 90 foot of frontage and 15,000 square feet of land for a per lot assessment. Mayor Chmiel: I don't quite understand that. Gary Warren: The dark lines on this map show the current subdivision as it stands. As Mr. Wanous has mentioned, Lots A and B and C and his residence I believe is... Merlyn Wanous: Is C, correct. I 6 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 11 Gary Warren: Are the lots of record. Likewise, Mr. Campbell's property here is one lot. However, when we applied the minimum subdivision requirements for this area, a lot can become 90 feet of frontage on a roadway and 15,000 square feet and other requirements with lot depth but basically if Mr. Wanous or Mr. - Campbell or both care to come in and go through the platting process and resubdivide their property, the lines in blue basically do reflect that there . are an additional 3 lots on this side in addition to his current lot and Mr. Campbell could basically get another lot out of his. Councilman Boyt: Aren't those lot lines drawn differently though? Haven't you combined A and B and then split than? Gary Warren: Yes. , Councilman Boyt: And you can do that because they're both under the same ownership? Is that the thought? I ti II Gary Warren: No. We're just looking at the land as to how it could subdivide. Eden if it were separate ownerships and the two owners got together and joined and platted, they could subdivide the property. I Councilman Boyt: So you put in a stub every 90 feet? Gary Warren: Roughly. , Councilman Johnson: Currently there's only 2 houses on all those lots? Merlyn Wanous: That's right. Gary Warren: The unit assessment process, if we would have... ' Merlyn Wanous: Right, it would be the same. Gary Warren: If we would have only given him 3 and him 1, the cost would have 1 gone up accordingly and probably would have been about the same price. Councilman Boyt: Now what would be the possibilities of going on existing lot lines and only putting in the stubs to serve existing lots and then later if someone canes back and says I want to subdivide, how does that complicate it? Gary Warren: It complicates it from the fact that what we are doing at this , point in time is distributing the total project costs that we've incurred to install the sanitary sewer. If we put in say 2 less units in this assessment, the per unit assessment will go up. You will still cover the City's cost in this regard and if in the future if it actually does subdivide and we do get the extra units coming in, the City will use it's connection charge policy to collect an additional connection similiar to our discussion with Mr. Carlson. Although those proceeds, the project is already paid off, will not be redistributed. They will come back into the City's treasury. So we try to I guess take the best shot at reflecting what the potential for subdivision is. ' Councilman Boyt: So we could go either way? We could charge him for having 4 lots there or we could charge him for having, what is that 6 lots? 11 7 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 ' Merlyn Wanous: Three. I've got three now Councilman Boyt: Well 3 and 1 would be 4. We could charge that way or we could [-] charge for having, it looks like 6 lots to me when I count the blue lines. Gary Warren: With Campbell's property. ' Councilman Boyt: And if we charge for 4, then the City's going to walk away with $12,000.00 at same point if they ever subdivide. Is that the way you want ' it to work? Merlyn Wanous: Well I just wondering why the stubs are there. With the property as indicated now, I've got it divided. I've got lots and everything else and I'm sure that, well I don't intend on ever subdividing it but someone else might so I guess it's just, I was just curious as to why, the lots are there. Why an extra stub was put in. &tra cost. ' Mayor Chmiel: For the future. Merlyn Wanous: Well okay, for the future. Gary Warren: Very similiar to the Frizzell and Kerber property where we drew up 2 stubs for each of those lots because we don't want to have to go back and dig up the street, among other things, in case they do subdivide. Merlyn Wanous: Oh, okay. E-1 ' Councilman Johnson: If you do try to subdivide in th future and those stubs weren't there, then it'd be more expensive even. ' Merlyn Wanous: Thank you. I was just wondering. Councilman Johnson: Did we ever look at this on a per foot basis? I think we did back 2 or 3 years ago. Gary Warren: We looked at it every different way you could I think. Actually ' the assessments from the feasibility study to this point in time have came down because we're very fortunate we had some good construction environment out there and the unit assessment or the current assessments are considerably down from the feasibility study estimates. ' Mawr Chmiel: Anyone else wishing to address this? Councilman Boyt moved, Councilwoman Dimler seconded to close the public hearing. All voted in favor and the motion carried. The public hearing was closed. ' Councilman Workman: I just have one note. Gary, do you realize there's an error on the assessment roll for Lot C? I don't know that that will make a difference but... ' Councilman Johnson: Under total assessment. Councilman Workman: Under total assessment for one unit. i8 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 1 Gary Warren: Oh. Same bottom line but that's... Councilman Workman: Is that how slush funds start? i Gary Warren: Not unless you direct it. Thank you. We'll correct that. Councilman Johnson: Does that total now? I Councilman Workman: Yeah. Now it does. Resolution #89-118: Councilman Workman moved, Councilwoman Dirtier seconded to adopt the Assessment Roll for Church Road Sanitary Sewer Improvement Project No. 87-5 with the correction noted for Lot C. All voted in favor and the motion carried. PRELIMINARY PLAT TO SUBDIVIDE 9.5 ACRES INTO 18 SINGLE FAMILY LOTS LOCATED SOUTH OF PLEASANT VIEW ROAD AND EAST OF POWERS BOULEVARD, VAN EDCKHOUT BUILDING CORPORATION (VINELAND FOREST) . ' Paul Krauss: As you're aware, the City Council's reviewed this item on several occasions in the past. Access considerations have been one of the primary issues that were surrounding this parcel. The primary issue culminating in the acceptance of an overall access plan that would have served the site by creating a thru street running from Lake Lucy Road and Nez Perce up to Peaceful Lane eventually emptying out onto Pleasant View. The access issues have been largely resolved. The applicant managed to acquire a parcel located up here at the intersection of Lake Lucy Road which was a concern at the last meeting. That parcel was needed to provide sufficient right-of-way to build a street. That ' lot would be reduced in size slightly to acco m,odate the street but it can be done without causing a variance. We're also recommending that the unused portion of right-of-way up in this area be vacated which would have the effect of enlarging that lot as well. Drainage issues have also largely been resolved. The 3 small ponds that were previously illustrated have been deleted in favor of a single larger pond located in the northeast corner of the property. The pond can be accommodated without impacting the building site which the former arrangement would have and it would also be easier to maintain from the City and Watershed District standpoint. Staff is comfortable with the concept of the pond but has recamended that modifications be made in it's location and design that would be intended to improve tree preservation. Additional data has been provided on tree locations and conditions have been recommended to improve preservation efforts. As noted in the last meeting, there continues to be 2 variances associated with this proposal. The first is to allow for a 10% grade on the new street near Lake Lucy Road. Staff supports this variance primarily due to environmental considerations. Lowering the road grade would require the grading of a more substantially larger area which results in additional tree loss. We believe that the road design being proposed can safely accommodate the traffic that we anticipate having on it and environmental concerns as well and are recamiending that the variance be approved. The second variance is to allow only 30 feet of frontage on Lot 2, Block 3 which is a neck lot accessed by Pleasant View Road. Staff supports this variance as well. We note that the lot complies with all RSF district standards say for lot frontage in that the lot ' 9 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 would be accessed by a private drive. As we've noted in past meetings, the subdivision ordinance allows lots to be accessed by private drives although it does require a variance in the RSF district. Furthermore, we note that the variance that's being introduced on this project stems not from the developer's desires but rather fran the City's in terms of where we intended to place the road alignment. To adequately serve this site and the adjoining sites, it's necessary that that road alignment be held to the south which makes it impossible to provide adequate frontage onto that lot. Based upon the foregoing, staff is reca'rmendirg approval of the plat with the two variances subject to appropriate conditions. Mayor Chmiel: Is Mr. Van Beckhout here? I don't see him. Okay. Is there any further discussion by Council? ' Councilman Boyt: Sure. I'd like to see a map of the proposal as it stands. As I understand, we don't have one. Paul Krauss: Asap of the proposal as it stands in what way? Councilman Boyt: This is it? ' Paul Krauss: That's the lower half of it Councilman Boyt. Basically what you've got is two separate plan sheets. The one that you've got there is an ' updated one that only pertained to the south end of the property since that's where the road realignment was and the ponding configuration. The other sheet was provided in the last packet and that is this one here. It was so large that it didn't fit on, it had to be put on two sheets. They're of a different scale. ' Basically though if you can take, it doesn't really line up that well but on this sheet here, that shows generally how that layout occurs. I Councilman Boyt: You're talking about the, how wide is it? It's in here somewhere. That extension off of Pleasant View. 16 feet wide, is that what you're talking about? IIPaul Krauss: The extension off of Pleasant View right here is 30 feet. Councilman Boyt: Well I don't think we've got an accurate plat map of what's being proposed. In the first place I think that it's off is in the holding pond. I don't think that's accurately reflected because the one I've got is 8 feet deep and I know that's not the current plan. Paul Krauss: Councilman Boyt, this is the current plan. This is a reduction of the one that you have before you. That pond is 8 feet deep at this point and IIwe've recommended modifications that will shallow that up. Councilman Boyt: Okay, well I want to see the plat drawn the way it's going to end up and my first one concern is of course the pond. I don't want a permanent II pond 8 feet deep created in somebody's backyard. The other thing is, this shows a road going through a 30 inch maple tree, a 20 inch maple tree. It shows a proposed housing site on top of a 30 inch oak tree. I'm not prepared to accept that so there's something wrong with this layout if we're putting it through a 30 inch maple tree. Paul Krauss: If I could respond to a couple of those things. We did note the 10 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 1 location of the road relative to the trees and think that the plan can be modified to save those 2 trees which occur right in this area here. We've recommended a condition that would do just that. I'd also have to add that this is a preliminary plat and that these refinements we intend to have introduced prior to final platting. Councilman Boyt: Well I'm glad you're doing that but I guess I'm pointing out, ' I know the staff report was sensitive to some of these issues but when I look at Block 3, Lot 11 and see what I can only imagine to be the proposed areas of housing sitting on top of a 30 inch oak tree, that's just not going to work. Paul Krauss: Councilman Boyt, those are illustrative building pads. That is not to infer that the house would look exactly like that or be placed in that area. , Councilman Boyt: The oak tree's right dead in the center of it Paul. Mayor Qviiel: The 30 inch oak is yeah, what he's saying. ' Councilman Boyt: That 30 inch oak tree is probably 200 years old. Well, in my opinion they're not going to cut it down. That's just me but I'm saying that it's 200 years old, it deserves to live a while longer and I'm sure not going to let a house come in there and arbitrarily lay out a piece of property so they cut it down. I Mayor Qmiel: I sort of agree with you Bill but also the property owner, if he wants to develop that property and put a house on there, is he going to reshift the entirety of the plat in order to accommodate that? Councilman Boyt: It's not an easy issue. I don't reach a knee jerk conclusion here. I'm saying that we've got a fairly sizeable piece of property and this , piece of property has sane unique trees on it. Mayor Qmiel: I agree. ' Councilman Boyt: And so we ought to take every possible opportunity to save a tree that's 30 inches in diameter. That's all our lifetimes added up and we don't probably accumulate the number of years that tree's been sitting there. So I think that's a serious issue. I think that the public wants landmark trees protected and a 30 inch oak tree looks to me like a landmark tree. Councilman Workman: Paul, when we're talking about this 10% grade, are we talking about it on Vineland Court? Paul Krauss: No. It's on the street that he's identified as Vineland Drive. I It occurs right in this section here. Councilman Workman: Right as it comes up to Lake Lucy Road? I Paul Krauss: Yes. Councilman Workman: And we've also got one on Vineland Court don't we? , Paul Krauss: No. Vineland Court met the 7% standard. 11 11 1 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 f Councilman Workman: It comes close but not close enough. Paul Krauss: I also have to add that in accepting the 10% grade, we insisted that it be designed to have a landing area at the top, at the intersection so you're not approaching the intersection on an angle but rather on a flat. So IIthe grade is introduced after you're moving away from that intersection. Councilman Workman: Didn't we originally, wasn't the original proposal for 1 pond and then staff recommended 3 ponds and now we're back to 1? Paul Krauss: No. I believe the last one was 3. There was a pond right in II behind those homes over there. I believe there was a smaller, I'm not sure where the third one was but one of the, the third one was in the ravine. There was a dam proposed in that ravine that raised some issues for us. Do you recall where the third one was? IDave Hempel: Yes. It was just north of Lot 8, Block 2 in the backyard there. I believe it's Lot 5, Block 1. IICouncilman Workman: But did we go from 1 to 3 and now we've decided on 1? Paul Krauss: No, we went from 3 to 1. We were concerned with the 3 ponds that ' they had proposed at the last meeting. The ponds intruded severely into the backyards of these homes with the result that there would have been a 'drainage easement as you come out the back door and they couldn't have built decks on them." Having 3 small ponds also raises sane significant maintenance and function problems in terms of maintaining water storage that we need. Councilwanan Dimler: I guess I just want to ask Paul to put my fears to rest about that 10% grade in the wintertime. Getting up and down, is that going to be a problem? I Paul Krauss: We don't think so the way it's been designed but I guess I'd leave that to the engineering department to expand on. I Gary Warren: We have unfortunately several examples of that. Near Mountain, the next phase is built with the understanding that it's going to be a 10% grade. Lake Riley Meadows I believe is a 10% grade. A lot of the roads in Carver Beach are close to that. We'd prefer not to have to go to that but I would say realistically we have ranged from a half a percent grade up to 10% as reasonable. IICouncilwoman Dimler: No accidents? No problems? Gary Warren: Well even a 1% grade can be a problem if people don't use care during hazardous conditions but it's still manageable fram our maintenance standpoint. 1 Councilman Johnson: Tom brought up a real good point. Now are we going to maintain that pond back there? Having that pond kind of in everybody's back yard, if we have to go in to do maintenance, we've got to go through yards similar to what we did in Near Mountain to go in and maintain in the winter. r 12 City- Council Meeting - November 6; 1989 1 Dave Hempel: Councilman Johnson, we are requesting a 20 foot wide utility and drainage easement between Lots 4 and 5. Between Vineland Court and the pond to gain access with our vehicles. ' Councilman Johnson: Right where the storm sewer goes thru? Dave Hempel: That's correct. . 1 Councilman Johnson: I have concern also on that one lot. A good builder might be able to work around those trees. The building pad is not shown as, it shows a 3,700 square foot building pad there. I guess I'm not very near the mic today but he's oh, 75 foot from the back lot line and they've rearrange microphones here. Quite easily he could build further to the one side of that lot and with same care maybe save that 30 inch oak but at least those 2-18 inch oaks could be • saved without any trouble. That's a big lot. If we don't have a full set of drawings here, we don't know what the size of the lot is but I would venture to II say, do you have those lot sizes anywhere? Councilman Boyt: We've got a scale here. I don't think it's all that big Jay. Paul Krauss: It's 18,700 square feet. Councilman Johnson: With the existing hones and access and everything else in there and the topography, there's not much else to do other than not put a house on that lot. That doesn't make a lot of sense either. I don't know how to resolve that issue. Councilman Boyt: I think the way to resolve that issue is e have them come up with a building pad that doesn't knock out those ancient trees. Councilman Johnson: How big is Lot 12 and 13? Paul Krauss: 12 is 15,750 and 13 is 15,000. 1 Councilman Johnson: There's no room? Paul Krauss: There's no roam to shift it to the south, no. ' Councilman Johnson: They'd just have to build the house on the south side. It'd be an odd house. Would the front of that house be facing the Vineland Court or Vineland Drive or it's up them? Paul Krauss: It's really up to the builder. 1 Mayor Qriiel: Mr. Van Beckhout is here now. Just to update you. What we're looking at is Lot 11. There are several trees of consequence in size. One that Councilman Boyt has brought up. A 30 inch in diameter oak and has some real concerns about that as well as a few of the other trees adjacent to that one specific lot. Can that existing house on that lot be shifted in any way? Chuck Van Eeckhout: I've instructed the designer to use very large, oversized footprints so, because as a builder, I really have trouble with very nice lots but there's no place to build except to destroy the whole lot and the narrow 1 13 IICity Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 IIfrontages have given us trouble so we do have more frontage on these lots than many lots do. With regard to trees, as you're I'm sure aware, the ability to save a few trees on a lot can very, very greatly enhance the value of that lot. I Both tome as a developer and builder and to the homeowner caning down the line so we're going to do everything we can to work around the trees. Any person that buys the lot, virtually all the time they're going to be working to design II around the trees. It's impossible sometimes to save, and I've gone through this so many times where you work and work and work and save these 4 or 5 or 6 beautiful trees and 2 years later they're dead. There is no good answer to that II problem. The thing that we have to do is stay as far away from it as you can. Disturb than as little as we can and with a little luck we'll save half or two-thirds of them. The good mature trees on the lot. It's just a bad situation. We just have to do the very best we can with it and we will do the II best we can with it. Where we have say 8 or 10 good trees on a lot, I don't feel so bad about that. I think 3 or 4 nice trees on a lot is all a lot really needs if you're•talking about the big mature ones. Also we have a very good I supply of native trees of the 2 and 3 and 4 inch size that we're going to move around so we'll have a very nice wooded subdivision when we're done with it. How we get from here to there is something we're going to work very hard on but trying to figure it out at this stage is a little difficult. 1 Mayor Chmiel: So in other words what you're saying is there's no way that you can say that you can save that 30 inch oak? IIChuck Van Eeckhout: Well if that were the center, if that were the only one in the area, well, I can't say, no. There's not a way that I can tell you how we're going to do that to save that tree, that's correct. I may feel, you may II or may not agree with me but I have not done an analysis on it in that detail [-I yet. I may feel that that tree should go for the benefit of 3 or 4 others so we II have 4 or 5 nice trees but not that particular tree so I guess until we have a finite boundary to work with and have done some more detailed design work on the house as to what we should put in there, it's a little hard to say exactly what you can or can't save. But keeping in mind everyone has the same intent. There I isn't a homeowner anywhere that would prefer to have a tree taken down. I guess just appealing to the basic value of the situation, there isn't a builder that should want to have a tree taken down unless necessary because he's really hurting the value of that lot. A lot with nice trees on it can be worth I $10,000.00 more than the lot that's just bare so we really have an interest in saving those trees. I Councilman Johnson: I think something you just said was very interesting. We had the forester in here last year talking to us about trees and how to save than and have to protect them. He's a good resource. You can talk to him. One II of the things people do will say okay now we're not going to take this tree down but then they drive the delivery trucks underneath the tree and everything else. Once you compact the soil on top of those roots, anywhere underneath that drop zone, that tree will die in the next 2 years. Just exactly what you explained Iis probably what happened. You tried real hard to save the trees except for all the builders came in with their pick-up trucks and drove up there and parked underneath the trees and the delivery trucks and everything. You really have to II quadrant off, if you really want to save it, you have to put up your stakes and your yellow tape all the way around the drip zone of that tree so you don't squish the roots. The roots have to breathe so you have to have loose soil on top of them rather than compact. 14 II City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 Chuck Van Eeckhout: If you can protect the entire drip zone of a tree, you can 11 probably save it but there are a number of factors involved. Like we had a very dry summer. That stresses a tree. Then you dig close to it. Somebody says, ` you can call one guy that says you can dig up within 10 feet. Well you're chopping off 20%-30% of the roots and that stresses a tree. Then you get into species like red oaks are very sensitive. Ash, you can do about anything to it and a lot of other trees you can abuse fairly well without... I Councilman Johnson: Yeah, willows you can cut then down and they'll still come back. 1 Chuck Van Eeckhout: ...to kill them and maples are somewhere inbetween. We've had pretty good luck with maples. The red oaks are extremely sensitive. If you've got a dry season going and you stress it a little bit. You drive on it over here and so... Councilman Johnson: Hopefully next year won't be a dry season. That's the only moment I wanted to make there. Councilman Boyt: If I might, there's a couple things. I'd like to see a change in the conditions. Condition 6 which deals with tree preservation. That there's going to be sane sort of site review. I think the DNR forester should be included in that. A development of a tree preservation plan. I think that all trees to be preserved should be staked off at their drip lines. So I'd like to see those changes made to Condition 6 for approval. I think that you can take that housing footprint. You can turn it 90 degrees to the way it's turned right now and you eliminate most of your - problems with those trees. But I don't have your faith in developers. You know you but I know developers from what I've seen and they'll cut down a tree if it's in the way. That's just the nature of the beast I think so I think any tree, you just look at this tree map and you've got 30 inch maples. 30 inch oak trees and we ought to be moving everything to not cut those down. TO not cause them to die because we've gone in there. So I'd like to see a separate condition that says that those 30 inch trees will be preserved. I'm sure that the DNR forester can show you how to preserve them and you can develop your piece of property and they'll still be there and be healthy. You turn that housing footprint and you've saved yourself a lot of problem with those trees. Chuck Van Eeckhout: Basically the way it would won ' way k, instead of that typical housing footprint is we'd put the setback boundaries in there and within those setback boundaries we'd search for a place to do the least possible damage to that lot which gives us a great deal more flexibility than an arbitrary footprint which we're showing here. Councilman Boyt: I don't think you've got the setbacks in there now and I'd sure like to see that. With that lot particularly in mind. And I sure want to know how you're going to save that 30 inch maple tree on Vineland Court. Councilman Johnson: Is the storm sewer directly underneath it? Councilman Boyt: Well, run it down the other side of the road. Move the road ' to the south. 15 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 Paul Krauss: We think that that can be taken care of in the final design where you shift the curb line of the road a little bit to the south. Run the i I utilities on the other side and if you need to, change the grading and use a short wall on the north side. II Councilman Boyt: The pond, whatever you're building back there, designated as a wetland. So maybe that's condition number. I think you've got a great piece of property. Obviously you know that. I think the City has demonstrated that they want to work with you to be able to develop the property. In exchange for that, I I'd like to see condition 12 read that the 30 inch oak tree will be preserved and condition 13, that the ponding area will be designated as a wetland. I think it is anyway. No? Paul Krauss: There's nothing there right now Councilman Boyt. It's basically an open field. ' Councilman Boyt: It will be. As soon as we put water in it. Councilwoman Dimler: Then you have to meet the setbacks. IICouncilman Boyt: We don't even know how big the thing is. Is it going to take the same surface area when it's 4 feet deep as it does when it's 8 feet deep? IPaul Krauss: Conceiveably a little bit less but we're going to take a drainage easement over the entire pond in it's final configuration anyway. IICouncilman Boyt: Okay, once the houses are in place, the wetland is going to [-I develop and so I'd like to see something worded so once the wetland develops, it is in fact a wetland. It's going to be anyway. 1 Paul Krauss: Well, the design though is basically to promote open water and even if they shallow up the pond, their intention is to have an open water amenity in there and not really a wetland. There are ways to achieve that but I'm not sure at this point whether this thing's going to take on wetland characteristics or not. Councilman Boyt: Well if you put water in there Paul, I think and we can sure get some expert to give us information here but if the people living there don't tear them down, it will became a wetland. Councilman Johnson: Cattails will grow. II Gary Warren: Mr. Mayor? The other concern I guess that I would have is we're looking at this as a storm water retention basin and also as a sediment pond to obviously protect the Lotus Lake on the downstream side. If we carry it through with a wetland distinction, the City will have to get it's own alteration permit ' if and whenever we need to go back in to remove sediments to see that this pond retains it's water quality characteristics. Councilman Boyt: We're going to have to do that all over the City Gary because II we've been doing this pretty regularly with holding ponds. Councilman Johnson: We've been putting them in wetlands. 16 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 1 Councilman Boyt: We don't have to designate it a wetland because I can assure you that as soon as it gets water in it, it's going to become one. I'm just saying to clarify things, let's call it what it's going to be. We can give you the housing footprint approvals and avoid future variances but it's eventually going to become a wetland. It's just a matter of whether we let it grow, filtering vegetation or not. I Mayor Qmiel: One of the concerns that we might have here is that if we designate that a wetland, with one of the lots here you have to have a 75 foot setback as well minimum...meet that? Councilman Boyt: I think we should word this so it allows that house to be built without a variance. I'm just saying that eventually this water area will certainly turn into a wetland. I don't want to create a situation where the lot becomes unbuildable because they can't get a variance. Councilwoman Dimler: Yeah, that's what we're looking at. Councilman Boyt: I agree with that but I also don't want to create a situation in which, and we've got an area which would certainly naturally became a wetland and we don't let that happen. Councilman Workman: Isn't that a larger issue that we're basically heading in the direction of right now with the Qirry Farms situation? Does it need to be a part of this really in that we're addressing that right now? Councilman Johnson: Over there we put conservation easements around the , wetlands and they were mostly existing wetlands before we modified them into open water wetlands. Paul Krauss: Councilman Workman, there is a little bit of that issue that's entering into this. I guess I'm beginning to feel a little uncomfortable though if the presumption is that every retention pond in the city autocratically is a wetland and particularly in this case in advance of it showing any kind of characteristics of one so we don't know what to classify it. This is a functional pond. It's designed to hold standing water. It's designed to be an amenity. If the standing water function works right, it won't be growing a lot of wetland vegetation. At this point in time it does not have any wetland characteristics. It's not even wet. I think there's a danger in deluding the wetland ordinance with the presumption that every ponding area is automatically a wetland. Councilman Workman: So then I'm correct that it is of a larger nature that we're looking at and that it probably shouldn't be a part of this until the future when we decide as a city how we're going to characterize these individual. Paul Krauss: I believe so yes. Councilman Boyt: We have, I'm not trying to make this into a larger issus than it is. The City has quite a record of every time we create one of these things, trying to make a wetland out of it. If they had more space here, I'd be pushing for the 5 characteristics of the Fish and Wildlife area. We have as a County 17 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 and a City and a country a record of draining 80% of our wetlands and they're gone and every once in a while we get a chance to create one. And yes, I would make the presumption that every time we get to create one, we'll create it. I'm not trying to be difficult here. I'm just saying, this is an opportunity. We ' can enter it with a plan on how they build the houses and I don't know. If you think it's impossible, okay. ' Mayor Chmiel: I think what Paul is saying is that it's just basically to be used as a functional pond and not basically as a wetland pond. I sort of agree with his analogy on that. And that I'm not sure whether I would like to see ' that indicated as such at this particular time, just as Tom is saying. Councilwoman Dimler: I have a concern there too because I don't want to see a whole lot of variance situations created. You know we're creating variance ' situations and then we're having to make decisions on variances in allowing then to enjoy their lot and all that just because we designated it as a wetland. Councilman Workman: Bill, I don't know if I disagree with you that we're going to be creating a wetland and that that's good. I'm just saying, I don't think we should call it a wetland until it first of all is one and even before that, allowing the home to be built. We don't have a 75 foot setback against putting a wetland near a house but. The other way around we do so we get the house built and then we get the wetland and it becomes a part of the bigger picture that was surfaced with Curry Farms a little bit and then we can take care of it. I I don't know that it needs to be a part of that. I think it's going to create more problems right now with this. That's all I'm saying. Arai Paul said, it was an amenity but I think at this stage it's a little early for a field that isn't even a wetland yet. Councilman Boyt: I think Near Mountain is a good example where they went out, created ponding areas and we created conservation easements around them. Just a I year and a half ago. Jo Ann Olsen: Those were wetlands to begin with. Councilman Johnson: Yeah. ' Councilman Boyt: How about Saddlebrook? Councilman Johnson: Those were wetlands except for the one on the north. Councilman Boyt: I think it's supposed to be dry. Mayor Chmiel: Well, I think we should probably move on with this. ' Councilman Johnson: I'd like to ask Paul one question. Why do you believe we'll have a pond there? Is the water table that shallow? ' Paul Krauss: Councilman Johnson, it's designed so that the outlet is set so there's going to be water below the outlet. You can design a pond to hold standing water. You can put plastic... 1 Councilman Johnson: I realize that, oh! 18 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 Paul Krauss: They're not showing that but there are ways to keep the weeds down if that's their intent. But it's designed to have standing water. Councilman Johnson: Do we know it's not going to leak out the bottom? Do we _ know enough to say that this is going to be standing water? In Canada they built this multi million dollar dam that never held any water. The same thing can happen with these things. Depending upon what the geology is in the area, ' ' during a storm you get a lot of water and then it slowly just seeps into the ground and is gone because your water table is way down below and the porisity you know so like you say, until it's there and it's functioning, we don't know if it's going to hold water unless it's designed. If you put in a liner and make it hold water. If you design it to hold water, you bring good clays in and make it, but I haven't heard any discussion that they're going to put any extra effort to make this thing hold water. ' Gary Warren: The tendency would be with our clays here that normally we see retention. Evaporation also plays a role as far as how much water stays in II those ponds and by expanding the surface area of this, you would tend to , encourage more evaporation. Councilman Johnson: Right. When we go shallower and bigger, we'll have less ' tendency. Mayor Ctmiel: Okay, can we have a motion with the concerns that you have ' regarding the trees? I think if we'd just drop the other portion of it and just have that as a functional pond right now. Councilman Boyt: Okay. We can drop item 12 or 13, whatever it was. I can see it's not going to pass. I still think it's a good idea. What I would like to do then is I'll move approval of a preliminary plat with two changes. Item number 6, change to read DNR forester review and all trees staked off prior to any grading. Councilman Johnson: To the drip edge. I Councilman Boyt: Yes. Staked off at the drip line. Councilman Workman: What do you mean all trees? 1 Councilman Boyt: Everything that's going to be saved is going to be staked off. That way it will be safe. Councilman Johnson: Designated to be saved. Councilwoman Dimler: Do you want to designate what size you want to save? I Councilman Boyt: I think that's what the DNR forester and city staff are going to do. Then as a separate item, I'd like to indicate that the preliminary plat is approved conditionally on a saving of the 30 inch oak tree and the 30 inch maple tree. That's item 11 and it's also Vineland Court. Or, Block 3, Lot 11 and the Vineland Court road. Councilman Workman: You're saying it's condition 12? r 19 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 Councilman Boyt: Condition 12, yes. I ] ICouncilwoman Diml,er: Even if the DNR forester's review doesn't require that? Mawr Qmiel: The DNR forester's opinion will be accepted. ICouncilman Boyt: Well, he's not going to go out there and say cut that tree, save that tree. He's going to go out there and look at what you're building and say, you're going to lose that tree. IIChuck Van E)eckhout: One possibility and I have not examined that particular tree or those two trees. The health of those trees could be a factor and if a I professional evaluates those trees as not being long for this world anyway, maybe it's better to sacrifice them. I'm not saying that. I'm just saying that I would rather not be locked into that finite position. I'd rather be locked I into a position where the staff and forester could decide which trees have to be saved or other representatives but I think if we lock ourselves into a -certain corner, we face the probability or possibility of having to came back to Council for further review. ICouncilman Boyt: Well it's going to come back anyway. This is just the preliminary plat. 11 Mayor Qi'►iel: Yeah, it's going to come back. IIChuck Van Eeckhout: Okay. Councilman Boyt: It's going to come back and I'm just saying that I think our intention should be that it's going to take an overwhelming reason to cut that Itree down. Chuck Van Eeckhout: And I agree with you 100%. IIMayor Chmiel: You have a motion on the floor. Is there a second? Councilman Workman: Second. Councilman Boyt moved, Councilman Workman seconded to approve Preliminary Plat I #89-8 for Vineland Forest with the following variances: V1 - Variance to allow 30 feet of lot frontage for Lot 2, Block 3 IIV2 - Variance to allow a 10% grade on Vineland Drive and subject to the following conditions: II I. Obtain final plat approval and enter into a development contract with the city and provide the city with the necessary financial sureties to guarantee proper installation of the improvements. 2. Final design and approval of utility, drainage and street plans, incorporating comments contained in the staff report and attached report 20 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 1 from the Engineering Department. Plans for retention pond are to be modified by relocation of the pond to the west, and by revising the grading plan to create the minimum sized pond required for water storage and quality. Tree preservation shall be taken into acount during the redesign. The pond shall be equipped with a skimmer device. Detailed construction plans and specifications, including calculations for sizing utility improvements shall be submitted for approval by the City Entineer. construction shall be in accordance with MnDot specifications except where modified by the City's standard specifications. As built mylar plans will also be required upon completion of construction. I 3. Comply with all requirements of the Watershed District approval. 4. Change the name of Vineland Drive to Nez Perce Drive. The street shall be paved up to the western property line. A barrier shall be erected at the edge of the pavement indicating that "This street is to be extended in the future". Notice of the street extension shall be placed in the chain-of- ' title of each lot in Vineland Forest. 5. Dedicate Outlot B to the city for access and utility purposes. ' 6. Provide a tree preservation and erosion control plan prior to grading the site. The plan should strive to minimize tree loss. The plan should be revised to protect the two maple trees along Vineland Court, protect trees around the retention pond, and minimize tree cutting in the ravine while providing for it's reforestation. Walk the site with staff prior to grading to mark preservation areas. Protected trees that are lost due to construction will be replaced by suitably sized trees approved by staff. A financial guarantee covering the cost of landscaping should be provided with the development contract. The DNR forester will do a site review and all trees to be preserved shall be staked off at their drip line prior to any grading. 7. Provide the following easements: I a. RGW dedication for all platted streets. b. Temporary road easements over the temporary cul-de-sac at the end of ' Vineland Drive. The easement would be vacated whenever the street is extended. c. Outlot B should be dedicated to the city for access and utility purposes. d. Drainage and utility easements over all storm water retention areas, access to these areas for city crews and over storm sewers. e. Standard drainage and utility easements over each lot. I f. Ten foot roadway easement over Lot 8, Block 2, Carver Beach Estates and such grading easements as may be required. g. Temporary grading easement over property located east of Vineland Drive near Lake Lucy Road. ' 21 1 City Cbuncil Meeting - November 6, 1989 [-J h. Utility easements over sewer lines located outside the public right-of-way, including 20' wide easement between Lots 4 and 5, Block 3. ' 8. Park dedication and trail fees are required in lieu of kland dedication. on. 9. Upon final plat approval the applicant shall supply to the city two mvlar copies of the plat, one reduced to 1" = 200' scale and the second at 1" = 500' scale. II10. Provide a comprehensive erosion control plan for the project. Type III erosion control is to be outlined as required. Seed and mulch all disturbed areas immediately upon completion of rough grading activity. 1 11. The City Council review the vacation of the unused Lake Lucy Road approval. right-of- way concurrently with final plat g II12. That the 30 inch oak tree on Lot 11, Block 3 and the 20 inch maple tree in Vineland (hurt road be preserved. IIAll voted in favor and the motion carried. REQUEST TO USE TETON LANE FOR SCHOOL BUS ACCESS, MINNETONKA SCHOOL DISTRICT. Mayor Chmiel: Is there someone wishing to present that? Is there anyone here Ifrom Minnetonka Schools with their proposals? If not, Don? Don Ashworth: We did receive a letter from the School District asking the Council, or at least informing the Council of the problem they're having Uregarding getting school buses into that area and has asked the Council if that will remain closed or if there's a possibility that it would open. We also received a request from the neighborhood, a petition that the access be ' considered, that Teton be re-opened. I should note that I have not contacted neighbors, either representing the petition or those people likely to be against simply because I wanted to have this opportunity for Council to determine what I type of procedure you wanted to follow. I would make the assumption that if there is going to be any form of reconsideration, that you would want to do that in some public hearing type of a format. Again, this item is solely being II presented to try to determine what type of process the Council would like to look at or maybe simply to have myself write the school district and saying that it's going to remain closed. Mayor Chmiel: I know there are a few neighbors from that specific area. Is there a spokesperson for the neighborhood? If you'd like to state your name and your address please. 1 David Ewald: Mr. Mayor, my name is David EXald. I reside at 6370 Teton Lane. Perhaps if you'd like I could give a few remarks on this item unless you decide you want to defer it to a different time. IIMayor Chmiel: I thought maybe if you so desire, to just reiterate your position on this. I know that I received a call last night to take the opportunity this morning to see the bus maneuver. Last night I had driven the area several i22 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 different times and have done a lot of sketches all over. I wasn't able to make that meeting only because I had a meeting at 7:30. Maybe you'd just like to state your position. 1 David Ewald: Basically Mr. Mayor, members of the Council, we're here to propose that you remove the barricade or permit the barricade to be removed between the pre-existing Teton Lane and the part of Teton Lane that was put into our neighborhood part of the Curry Farms development for three reasons. Safety, convenience and practicality and from a plain, I guess what strikes us as a camoon sense standpoint. What's most important to us is the safety issue because we've got 18 homes up in that part of the neighborhood and virtually all of them have little children. I know everybody here, just about everybody that's here with my tonight has small children. I have two small children and we're looking at them getting onto the buses in the morning and we did want to offer that opportunity this morning. We realize that it was short notice to cage out and see what the bus has to do when it comes up into the neighborhood but it does have to came up and the kids get on the bus and then the bus, which is a long, full sized bus, has to back up across essentially a T in the road which we think is hazardous. It would be particularly so in the afternoon once it drops children off. I like to think that both of my children who are little , girls ages 1 and 4, that they're bright kids but when they're outside and with their friends I call them feet without brains because they tend to just, you know zoom all over the place and I would truly hate to see and I think everyone would hate to see sane sort of an accident because of a bus having to back through an intersection like that. It just doesn't seem to make sense. That problem I think is only going to get worse. Most of the children now are in the 2, 3, 4 year old range. There are several children that are in junior high school. Several that are in kindergarten and several that are in elementary but we've got a lot of children coming on line that are going to be using the bus in the years to cane so I think that problem's going to get worse. The second issue is convenience and practicality. Right now, if the barricade goes back across Teton and we won't be able to go out that way anymore, the only way up into our neighborhood is going to be through Bretton Way. That's the way that most of the people, even if Teton was open all the way. Everybody would go out that way to go to Chanhassen which is as you know is where we'll all go to shop and to do all those things and we'd only go out the other way to go towards Excelsior if we had to go that way for some other reason but it just seems like it would help to balance out the traffic flow where some people have to go that way. It just seems to make sense. The other issue with that is the emergency vehicles. Having one other way into the neighborhood and out just seems to make sense. To be able to have those fire trucks be able to came in and go out another way or to came in from two different ways or whatever. When our oldest daughter was 6 months old we had an emergency vehicle came and save her from choking to death one time and I'll never forget that and I was really grateful that the way in was close and we happened to live on a real major road then but anybody who's been in a situation like that before can certainly identify with it. The last issue is just a plain kind of common sense. The road's already I there. We feel that we've already helped pay for it in the price of our house and whatever lot premiums we paid. It was I think about $18,000.00 for Centex to put the road in. It's already there. Kind of a nice road. It's I think what they would call been upgraded to rural standards. I'm not an engineer so I won't pretend to talk authoritatively on that but it's there and all that would really need to be done to have just a perfectly reasonable functioning road is to have it smoothed out a little bit where the two curbs meet so that you could 23 11 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 II just drive smoothly through so it just seems like it would be relatively easy to do. So just to reiterate, I guess safety. Convenience and practicality. Common sense. It seems to us that it seems like a pretty good issue. So that's 1 } all I have to say on that issue. IMawr Chmiel: Is there anyone else? I Marc Simcox: I'm Marc Simcox and I live at 21600 Lilac Lane and I've been up here many, many times concerning this particular issue and there's several things in same of the information that's been put out that I'd just like to clear up same apparent misinformation. I don't want to appear to be insensitive to these people that live in the C7entex Farms neighborhood but there are also several shall children under the age of 6 on the north end and the primary reason that we didn't want Teton Lane to be used as part of the access to Curry II Fars in the beginning was safety. Exactly the same reason that they're saying that they don't want the traffic going down through their neighborhood. Yesterday, one of the neighbors observed a car passing another car on Teton ' Lane. This is exactly what we talked about 3 years ago when we started this. There are some things out that was put out in a information packet that are incorrect and they should be clarified. One of the things is, I think this is II from Don Ashworth to the City Council and it bears a clarification because it is incorrect. It talks about at one point that Don did not know when this would be open to thru traffic and I believe in the original resolution to close Teton Lane as actually a money saving measure that was suggested by Centex. It was ' stated that it wouldn't be opened again until there was significant development either on the west or the east side so it isn't a question of whether or not it's going to be open. It's when the development occurs. That's the answer to II that question. Also, there was sane discussion here that if it turns out that the neighbors to the north file a petition to open Teton Lane, it would be ironic because they'd be paying for easments for those owners and then in turn opening that road up for those owners. The fact is is there was absolutely not Ione red cent paid to anyone on the north side of Teton Lane. The only easement holder there was Frank Natoli. Frank Natoli turned his easement over at no cost and also gave the City an easement onto his property to turn around vehicles so 1 there is no cost to the City for easements for the north side of Teton Lane. The easement costs are going to go to the homeowners on the south side of the Teton Lane closure. Another one is the third one that comes to mind when I read Ithis is that the question is which city Lilac Lane is in. Well Lilac Lane, an extremely deep grade and a very sharp left turn onto Teton Lane, all of the existing Lilac Lane, the pavement area is in the city of Shorewood. 17 feet IIof Lilac Lane is in the City of Chanhassen. That's just to clarify that and the 17 feet that's in the City of Chanhassen is the hillside on the south side of the road. It's not, it has no pavement on it at all. Another thing that was brought up, I think that the problem that the homeowners are having on Teton ' Lane with the bus problem also stems back again to the developer. Several points were made in the letter that the homeowners brought out. One was that the streets are dark. Another one is that there's no sidewalks. Another one is Ithat the road was closed, it was necessary to close the road due to the condition of the pavement on the north end and that the traffic flow would be, is to reduce the traffic flow. That's exactly the argument that they're making why they want the Teton Lane opened to relieve their neighborhood of their own II traffic flow. They don't want their own traffic going through their own neighborhood. I think it's an alarmist attitude. I don't know, this isn't the City of Minneapolis. We don't have the sidewalks on every street and I think 24 I City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 1 that the homeowners were aware of that when they moved in and if they weren't aware of it, it's not the former Council's actions fault. It's the fault again of the developer. Failure to notify them. The barricades were up prior to the construction of the homes up there. There was never a question as to whether that road was going to be closed from day one and when they moved in there, they knew that. I think that everyone that's concerned with this on the north side, of the road that is largely affected by this, hasn't changed their position one iota since day one. The closure of that road should go forward just as we've fought for the last 3 years to finally make it happen. Qrrry Farms Resident: Mr. Simcox? Are you a resident of Chanhassen or a 1 resident of... Marc Simcox: I'm a resident of Shorewood but it doesn't make any differences , Curry Farms Resident: Thank you. ' IIMayor Chniel: It's nice to see your friendly face again. Florence Natoli: Yes. I promised you I wouldn't cane back again. I thanked you all at the last meeting because you had solved by problem. Okay, I've got this petition here and I hope you notice that sane of than are double names. The husband and wife both. It does not say how many children are involved in this school bus business but yesterday and today, it just happened this morning and tonight we happened to be going in and out and the bus had 4 children on it in front of our house. If it's going to be such a problem for this big bus to go down and make a turn in front of Resrmer's on the cul-de-sac and he has to do all this backing up and everything they're talking about, does the Minnetonka District have a mini-bus which could come up there and pick up those few children and turn in the cul-de-sacs? There's one at every turn up there and they wouldn't have to use this great big huge bus. As I say, there was only 4 kids on that bus. Now before Centex built the homes there and when we first moved there, there were a lot of children going to school. The Johnson's had kids. There was a duplex next door. There were kids there. There were kids in every house up there that's still there of the old ones. Those kids went out to Lilac Lane and CR 17 to catch the bus and they were little kids too. They weren't big kids but the whole thing here is, this was passed over a year ago and I don't want to see the Council now turn against what they already passed and that was that it was going to be closed. As fax as the Fire Department and the police getting through, we were going to have than came through there anyway and as I mentioned at the last meeting, the fire plug is right across the street and it's on Ashton Court. Right on the corner so really they wouldn't have to cane through on Teton Lane at all. They can cane right up Ashton, Bretton and all the other streets but this is what's discouraging to us...the way it was supposed to and we agreed and Centex agreed to close it if we allowed them to use it for emergencies. Now we went along with it and I'm sorry now that we didn't make than build that $250,000.00-$300,000.00 road going out onto CR 17 because it would have been more expensive for then than what this has been. They're fighting it all along and they're talking about kids. Franco Loris signed this petition and he has no children and I doubt if he's ever going to have any. So anyway, I do think that there is a solution. Close that thing the way it was supposed to be a year ago and get a small bus for these kids that can turn on a cul-de-sac. Thank you and I hope I don't have to come back again. 25 City Council Meeting - November 6; 1989 IIMayor Qmiel: Thank you I Steven Dome: My name is Steven Dome, 6398 Teton Lane. With due respect to the [i lady that was here previously, I myself was blessed with the birth of our third child. Within the houses on both sides of my and myself, there are over 10 children under the age of 5. The children that grew up in that neighborhood are perhaps grown and gone and had to ride the bus at their time but we have the children coming up, growing in our neighborhood. I think that is a prime safety factor. A mini bus is not going to do it in 5 years when there's 15 children ' getting on that bus instead of 4. I also recognize the fact that this is the City of Chanhassen. We want to work together and the fact that our neighbors that perhaps don't live in this community, don't pay their taxes in this county II or city have such a concern when this is our community. Mayor Qmiel: Thanks Steve. Anyone else? If not, we'll have any discussion from Council? ICouncilman Boyt: Sure. Maybe I can give you something to react to since Jay and I were here the last time this came up. I'm beginning to lose my faith in compromises. The developer came in. There was a preferred way out of this development. We were very determined as a Council to have a second access. That method I think was going to be quite expensive as I recall so we began looking at other alternatives. It was clear that we were not going to put this II road through. We don't have the council minutes in our pack but I think if you review those, we were trying to came up with some way to minimize the risk to the people that lived on Lilac and that little bit of Teton and still give the neighborhood an emergency second access that the Council was committed to. I believe if we go back in the plans far enough, this thing was one proposal was just to make it one long cul-de-sac. We didn't want that because there would be II no opportunity for a second access. Teton Lane, when the developer came in and upgraded that as part of the agreement, it wasn't upgraded to do anything other than serve as an emergency access and I believe kind of a long driveway to some of the people who were going to live on the end of it. Teton is close to some I existing homes. There's not a right answer here from a safety standpoint. I certainly understand the new neighbors. I would like to think that your developer was open with you when you bought your house. It was certainly the Council's intention to make it very clear that that was going to be closed off. I think we've seen the issue with the sidewalk. Don't talk to me about a sidewalk in that development. The developer wasn't very open with people about that plan. I'm not convinced the developer was probably open with you about the II plan to close off Teton Lane. The City made a commitment to those people and I think that when we did that we said there will be an opportunity to open this up but it's going to wait for development. If we go back in there and open it up I now, someone, either Centex or the Minnetonka School District or somebody is going to pay to make that urban standard road and it's not going to be the people that live on Teton Lane. I would suggest to the Council members who are I new to this that this is an action that shouldn't be overturned. The Council entered it as an attempt to balance the forces of the existing people who lived there and the people that we anticipated coming in. To try and give than a second access without putting the people who lived there prior to that at II additional risk. Now because of the developer and I gather same of the neighbors out there having difficulty reaching agreement, we're sitting here 2 years after the fact trying to explain to people why we still want to close it ' off. It wasn't the best solution at the time. It's probably not the best 26 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 solution now. Maybe we should make the developer go ahead and buy that property out to Pleasant View and build that road the way it was supposed to be built but we sure as heck shouldn't put Teton Lane through prior to the time when we camdtted to putting it through back with the development contract. , Councilman Johnson: I think Bill covered it pretty well. We did a lot of compromise, it was about 2 years ago I guess when we started on this one. This was a real tough one. Sane people have already turned over their easements for this road under the understanding of what that road was going to be. If we change that, I think we've got a problem. We're going back on our word and I don't like to see that happen. This reminds me of moving in next to an airport ' and asking them to close the airport because it's too noisy. You move into a neighborhood that's there. We've already taken the sidewalks away from the neighborhood because the residents don't want sidewalks in their neighborhood so we've taken the sidewalks out. That was put in there for public safety purposes. I don't see any reason to change this at this time. I do feel for the people here. My kids actually walk all the way to school which is about the same distance as what your kids are going to have to walk to the school bus because we can't get school bus service because we're too close to the school so they have to walk to school. My one son did that for 5 yeas without sidewalks before the city finally put sidewalks in for the last 200 yards of his trip to school. Now he goes to middle school and he does walk 2 blocks, catch the bus and drive to middle school. We're not taking anything away because there never was anything there. I think we should just continue our existing action. Councilwoman Dimler: I guess I would just like to ask Dave Ewald the question, what did the developer tell you about Teton Lane? I'd like to have an understanding of what your understanding was when you bought your property. ' David Erald: Councilwoman Dimler, once again I'm David Ewald. It was never an item that we discussed. I didn't ask about it. Frankly I assumed with the barricade up there and there was a sign tha said no construction traffic, I just assumed that the barricade was there to kind of hinder that and never asked. Perhaps that was my omission but nothing was ever told to us one way or the other about the road. Councilwoman Dimler: Okay, and was that true for all the other neighbors as well? ' David Ewald: Evidently. Councilwoman Dimler: Did you think after the construction then automatically the barricade would came down? David Ewald: That will sound self serving. That's what I assumed. That it was there to kind of prevent construction traffic and with that being over, it would be opened up. Councilwoman Dimler: Thank you. Mr. Natoli: Nobody paid any attention to that anyway. There were trucks going through there all the time... 27 IICity Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 IFlorence Natoli: There are so many cracks on that road already, it's nevei going to last the 10 years they thought it would. [-] Mr. Natoli: You should inspect that road. It's cracking all over already. The garbage trucks are carting down from Centex now that aren't supposed to be... We have 80 to 200 cars a day and same of than are going 50 mph... You can't even walk out there without being scared. Councilman Workman: Well I went through there this morning. I went through the ' barricade. Councilman Johnson: Did you pass somebody on the way? Councilman Workman: I guess first I'd like to start out Jay, Bill, the sidewalk issue's dead. I don't know who you're scolding. Either myself and Ursula and the Mayor or the neighbors. Maybe we're all being scolded but that's a dead I issue. What we have before us is a bus problem. I did get a chance to get up there this morning and there is a problem and how is the Council going to resolve it or help them resolve it. Basically telling these people you've got II your bed, now sleep in it isn't I don't think what we want to do. Since Jay tells personal stories, I'll tell a little one. As a UPS person in my younger days, driving that truck, supervising drivers, the number one hazard with driving a UPS truck is back it up. Do not back it up whenever you don't have to ' back up a truck because you're going to run somebody over or something and it happens all the time. We have a full length bus pulling up here, moving towards the new addition of Teton Lane and backing up towards the barricade and then going back down Bretton right? Bretton? So there's a problem there. The barricade would be one very easy way for that bus to make one loop right through IT] there. We seem to have a very, very serious problem with removing that barricade and I think Mr. Simcox told me that there's a 99 year trust on the I property to the north there that's undeveloped and so probably won't be developed for 99 years or something. Am I correct in that Don? ' Gary Warren: That's the Donovan property. He's alleged that he has a long term trust. I Councilman Workman: So the barricade will still be there when our children's children are here? The problem is still the bus. How are we going to get a bus, short of a minivan to carte up there and turn around? That's the issue. It would appear as though I have an answer but I don't. Short of driving it on the I sidewalks that are there. I'm not exactly sure and I'm proud to say I didn't have a part of this initial development of all of this but there's a serious problem here and how are we going to resolve it? That's the issue. I feel for I the Natoli's and everybody to the north also. I just can't understand how we would take a road, point it and line it up directly with another road and then throw a roadblock in front of it any different than we would with any other road in the city. It would appear to me as though the barricade should come down. IIThat's to the detriment to the people who've been there and it would seem common sensical to have the barricade down but we have all sorts of legal problems with that. That doesn't diminish a bus problem that we have to get rid of. 1 Councilwoman Dimtler: I'd like to put a plug in here. I don't know how many times I've asked Gary Warren about the size of our cul-de-sacs to allow buses to turn around and maybe we ought to be putting that in our codes. 28 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 1 Councilman Boyt: They can. They won't. They can turn around in the cul-de-sacs and they won't. They can and they won't. I'm just telling you that's the fact. We can turn a snowplow around a cul-de-sac. Councilwoman Dimler: Can you make them really big enough, don't you think if you make them big enough the bus won't come in and turn around? It'd rather ' back up? Councilman Boyt: That's right. ' Gary Warren: That's right. Councilwoman Dimler: They would rather back up than to come into a big enough ' cul-de-sac and turn around? Gary Warren: I can't speak for the school district except when you had brought the issue up a while back we had checked into it and their policy, it was explained to me that they do not go down cul-de-sacs. Even if it was the size of the Metrodame, to turn around. That they would not go down. The thinking on a cul-de-sac is if it's short enough to be a cul-de-sac, it's short enough for kids to walk to an intersection to be picked up. Councilman Johnson: That was Chaska school district? , Councilwoman Dimler: That's right. Have you checked with Minnetonka? Gary' Warren: That was Minnetonka. ' Councilwoman Dimler: I thought it was Chaska. Councilman Johnson: Chaska has said that in the past many times. Gary Warren: Our cul-de-sacs, our new cul-de-sacs of which Teton Lane is one, has sufficient turning radius to accam►odate your average bus. Councilman Johnson: Mr. Mayor, there was one option that we considered 2 years ago that did get tossed down. We'd have to talk with the Natoli's and the Lilac, which was a barricade like they have at the airport that swings up and swings down with a remote control that the snowplow can have and the bus driver can have but nobody else can have. So that we could have that. Now it does became a maintenance problem. If that thing breaks down and the bus comes in and the bus driver has to be bright enough to know a different way to get in. In 9 years now of parking in a remote parking lot out there at the airport, it hasn't broken down anytime I've gone through those. They may do a lot of maintenance on them, I don't know. We tried that one before. I'm not sure what the affect of a school bus twice a day on Teton Lane would be. It'd be a lot better than 200 cars a day. But that is an option but I think we'd need to see what the campranise with the Lilac and Teton Lane people would be on that and maintenance records and the cost to do it. Mayor Chmiel: Has anyone ham staff had any discussions with Minnetonka? Don Ashworth: I've talked with than yes. 29 , City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 I Mayor Chmiel: And is the reasoning for their not turning in a cul-de-sac, did they indicate that? L ' Don Ashworth: They stated to me that they have a policy that they will not allow their bus to go down a cul-de-sac road and the reason is that they've had too many instances in the middle of winter where the bus gets down to the end of II the cul-de-sac and finds stalled vehicles and they literally then have no way to maneuver to get it back out and they've had to send another bus in to take and bring the kids in, etc. so that's became their policy. ' Councilwoman Dialer: So a minibus wouldn't be the answer either. They wouldn't send a minibus down. Mayor Chmiel: Policies change too though. I mean there's one way for them to relook at this as well. I think maybe we should have additional discussions with than. ICouncilwoman Dinner: Check the possibility of a minibus? Mayor Chmiel: But I think for right now, we will have to respect the previous I decision that was given on having the barricade in that specific location and that hopefully we can come up with sane kind of resolvement with the school district and the bus company in utilizing the cul-de-sacs for turn around. ' There's two different ways they could make those turns and I also looked at that. Right going onto Ashton and Teton, there's a cul-de-sac there that I'm sure the bus can turn around right before the barricade. Make a right, go back around and come back out. Cr to go all the way up Teton Lane up to that [-] I specific cul-de-sac to make it's turn also. So with that I would say we should proceed in that particular manner and come up with a conclusion hopefully on it. Thanks for coming. Appreciate it. I'll make that as a motion. 1 Councilman Boyt: I'll second it. Councilman Workman: Is this something we need to vote on? Mayor Chmiel: I think we should. IICouncilman Johnson: So you're moving not to reconsider? Mayor Chmiel: Right. IICouncilman Boyt: Well it's really not a reconsideration because this is...so they're just bringing it up. IMayor Chmiel: There's a motion and a second. Councilman Workman: Could you repeat your motion? IMayor Chmiel: You're kidding. I Councilman workman: I mean is it just a motion to negotiate with the school district? ' 30 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 , Mayor Chmiel: Tb negotiate with the school district to see if something can be resolved with it and I don't see any reason, they have specific rules and regulations and those rules and regulations are not cast in concrete either. I think they'd have to show due cause as to why, just what Don said because if there's a vehicle in there and they can't make that turn, if there's someway they can make that within those cul-de-sacs. They're large enough. More specifically that one, you're not going to have cars parked on it. ' Mayor Chmiel moved, Councilman Hoyt seconded to direct staff to meet with the Minnetonka School District to see if a resolution can be worked out for a school bus to turn around in Curry Farms. All voted in favor and the motion carried. APPEAL INTERPRETATION OF ZONING ORDINANCE REQUIREMENT OF 100 FOOT FAT DEPTH 'FOR A DOCK ON A RECREATIONAL BEACHLOT, OUTLOT A, STRATFORD RIDGE, ROBERT PIERCE. ' Jo Ann Olsen: The Board of Adjustments approved � II the appeal to the interpretation of the ordinance. It was unanimous approval and it can be discussed. Mayor Chniel: It can be discussed by Council but having unanimous approval , action is to review that. pp the Councilman Workman: So we'll look to amend the ordinance? There wasn't a variance? Jo Ann Olsen: No variance. Councilman Workman: So they can build a dock now? Jo Ann Olsen: They were given an appeal to that decision, correct and also as part of this, then we will process an ordinance anendTient to clarify exactly what the intent is. They agreed that the way the ordinance is written right now, it's not clear that they have to have that lot depth. They do have a 100 foot depth as it is stated so they meet the ordinance. Councilwoman Dimler: It was my understanding that Council would have input onto the clarification? Jo Ann Olsen: Correct. ' Mayor Chniel: Okay, any discussion? Councilman Johnson: I'd like to have the Minutes because I was just getting back from the airport so I wasn't able to get here to hear it. I'd like to have the minutes as quickly as possible. There's a timeframe upon which, I forget how many days it is before it can be appealed but I'd like to see the minutes , first. Jo Ann Olsen: The ordinance states by either the owner or somebody within 500 feet. I don't know what the past policy has been. Councilman Johnson: There's something else in there because we can do it too. ' 31 IICity Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 Councilman Boyt: Any citizen can do it. {{� I L Councilman Johnson: Any citizen can do it and that's how we've done it in the past is a member of the council saying we're also a citizen and we are appealing it. Mayor Chmiel: Don, you're shaking your head yes. IIDon Ashworth: That's correct. Councilman Workman: We don't have the minutes though do we? ICouncilman Johnson: No, it just happened at 7:00 tonight. Councilman Boyt: They don't take minutes. IJo Ann Olsen: I write then down. They're not verbatim. 1 Councilman Boyt: I would like to see this appealed. As a citizen I would challenge that decision. Minutes or no minutes, I think it's a decision that bears investigation by the Council as a whole. And personally, I think it's the wrong way to go about changing an ordinance. If we want to change an ordinance, we ought to put it through a public hearing and change it. We shouldn't have the Board of Adjustment and Appeals writing ordinance changes for us. All you have to do is read the minutes from the first time the Council made this discussion to see that Barbara Dacy, Roger Knutson and virtually, well that was the staff that spoke on it at the time, made it real clear how they were E-1 defining that lot depth issue. So to came back now and say that the City I Attorney and the senior planner did it wrong is and given that was a Council action, not a Board action, I think the Council ought to review it. If we're going to change the ordinance, let's change the ordinance. Turn the thing down. ' Change the ordinance and do it right. Councilwoman Dimler: Well Bill, you're right. The City Council is the only one that can change the ordinance but what the Board can do is act on the ' interpretation and that's what we did tonight. Mayor Chmiel: Tom? ICouncilman Workman: I don't have any comments. Mayor Chmiel: The only thing I went back to Jo Ann was your letter of November II 12th of 1987 and in there you indicated, the question was if the Commission wants to be able to permit the applicant to have a dock on a recreational beachlot and how can they do it. The Board of Adjustment and Appeals has the I ability to grant a variance. The better approach would be to amend the ordinance. I think I agree, we should probably have the public hearing to amend the ordinance and go from there. Jo Ann Olsen: That will still be done. What the Board did tonight was the way the ordinance is written today, that it still can be interpretted differently. And they agreed that it was not interpretted correctly. 11 32 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 1 Councilman Boyt: I think that it's amusing that an appointed board can say I that, officially say that the City Council's decision was wrong and that's what they're saying. Mayor Chniel: Everyone has an opinion. Councilwoman Dimler: No, we didn't say the opinion was wrong. The interpretation, the way it was written, it was left open to a different interpretation. Maybe Elliott could you address that please because you're the one that gave us that direction. Elliott Knetsch: I think what the question was, the Board of Adjustments and Appeals is the• proper board to look at an interpretation of the ordinance that has been made. Interpretation was made that since the ordinance did not specifically say lot depth, it was somewhat vague or ambiguous and the applicant did appeal that interpretation. So the ball was in the court of the Board of Adjustments and Appeals and they looked at it and because it does not specifically say lot depth, they felt that since the lot is 100 feet at some point and at a point close to where the proposed dock would be, that that does meet the way the ordinance is written. They were not trying to say what the original intent of the City Council was and I don't think it's their job to say what the original intent was. They were looking at how the ordinance reads. Councilwoman Dimler: That's right and now we can, like you say, the Council can decide the new wording but at this particular time, the way it's worded, the interpretation could be different from the intent of the former Council. Cbuncii an Boyt: I'm sorry I got upset about it. There will be plenty of ' opportunity to discuss it so. Elliott Knetsch: Certainly it's within your rights as a citizen and a council , member to bring up the Board of Adjustments and Appeals decision for review by Council. Councilwoman Dimler: Well I think the Council does have to handle the new , ordinance wording. That was not the intent of the Board to do that. We didn't try to do that. What we were doing was interpreting the loopholes so to speak that the present wording leaves. Mayor Niel: Mr. Beck, it looks like you want to say something. Peter Beck: The only thing I wanted to say was...the Council hasn't ever been presented with this issue before tonight. They haven't decided... During the discussions, the last time Mar. Pierce requested a variance and everyone kind of agreed the document made sense but they preferred it be allowed by means of an ordinance amendment instead so then he requested the ordinance amendment and there got to be different versions of it. Because there were different versions of it, the prior City Council didn't adopt any of them and the result was no dock. During that discussion on that ordinance amendment, Cbuncilrember Johnson pointed out that he probably complied but that issue wasn't before the Council so they didn't really decide on it. All we really did this time was say Councilrenber Johnson has a point. Let's present that issue to the City and the only way we can do that is through the Board to decide if the lot complies and then the dock can go ahead in with the conditional use permit. It hasn't been 33 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 IIto the Council before. If the Council wants to take it up, by all means they 1-] can. We can do it tonight or any other time. ' Mayor Chmiel: What is total lot size? Peter Beck: It's over 31,000 square feet and 550 some feet of frontage on the lake. The general consensus I think of all the public bodies has been the dock II isn't, the only question has been how to put it there and really the right answer was an ordinance amendment but the prior Council just couldn't get 4 votes for one particular version of the ordinance. We just present this as one I way, fairly simple way to resolve Mr. Pierce's problem so he can go ahead and sell those lots because the homeowners...and then we couldn't agree more that the Council should take that opportunity after that to clear up that language in the ordinance. Councilwoman Dimler: Does that clarify? IIMayor Chmiel: Yes. Are we going to have a motion? Councilman Workman: I'm not sure I know what Bill's getting at other than the ordinance, doing something against an ordinance. Do you feel there's something wrong with this dock? Councilman Boyt: Well, I think what we're doing here is we're talking about, II we're setting precedent in terms of how we're going to write this, rewrite the ordinance. And I think rather than set precedence on this one issue, we should not do that. We should go through a public hearing. Wa should give people a [-I II chance who want it, to have inp��t on this and then we should resolve it in a reasonable fashion. All you have to do is read the Minutes from May 31, 1988 to see that apparently there's been quite a reversal in the part of our Council's ' thinking about what we meant here because Roger Knutson very clearly says, it's my understanding that they're talking about lot average and he did not have a 100 foot average lot depth. Councilman Johnson says, it doesn't say average lot depth. Barbara Dacy, that's defined. Roger Knutson, the lot depth is an II average. Now for the Board of Adjustments and Appeals to turn around and say well, they didn't get it right. I think that's a big decision. ICouncilwoman Dimler: Jo Ann, would you address that please? Jo Ann Olsen: As far as the lot depth, it doesn't under the regulations for the ' recreational beachlot does not state lot depth. Councilman Johnson: It just says depth. IICouncilman Boyt: I understand that and I don't dispute that. Jo Ann Olsen: I know but that's where the discrepancy lies. I'm the one who 11 wrote the first report, the variance report and that's how we did define it and interpret it. I guess you read lot depth or 100 foot depth, when you really look at it, it doesn't say that. ICouncilman Boyt: There's another issue somewhat related to what we're going to do with the ordinance. I think that a case could be made that this is not a buildable lot as it sits so it doesn't have, when we came around to discussing 34 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 1 this for an ordinance change, I would suggest that we do not want to create a situation in which a recreational beachlot is entitled to water rights that wouldn't be there if that was a private home. And so, I think the issue is more ccmplicated than we want to plow into as a Council and make a binding decision tonight on. And if we overturn, if we go along with the Board of Adjustment and Appeals, then we have in fact given these people the right to put their dock in and said you're grandfathered and then when we look at the ordinance itself, we no longer have an opportunity to control this. Councilwanan Dimler: Would you explain why that's not a buildable lot? Councilman Boyt: It doesn't have the depth. Councilwoman Dimler: For a beachlot? I Councilman Boyt: I'm talking about, can somebody put a private hone on that lot? ' Peter Beck: Mr. Mayor, Councilmembers. Before Mr. Pierce purchased the property and subdivided it, this property was part of a larger lot that had the right to a dock and it had a dock and boats and that's exactly why we limited Our request to only what the property would be allowed if it was still in a single lot which is the 1 dock and 3 boats. He'd like to have 4 boats because he's got 4 waterfront or Lake Minnewashta Parkway front lots but I told him let's keep it at the 3 boats because that's what it always was allowed as a single family property. Now standing alone, just the portion that is the beachlot, is you're right, is not buildable as a single family lot because it doesn't have, it couldn't meet setbacks and a number of things wedged between the parkway and the lake but when it was part of the bigger single family property that went back to the west of Minnewashta Parkway, it was allowed and did have a dock. ' Councilman Boyt: But as I recall, that dock was removed and wasn't replaced until, it doesn't have a dock now. ' Peter Beck: It does not have a dock now, that's right. Councilman Boyt: And when it was subdivided, it wasn't created as one lot on two sides of the road, reasonably enough. The ironic thing Mr. Mayor is that May 31, 1988 I argued for giving Mr. Pierce his dock. I'm just saying now that I think the way to do it, as you've indicated, is to change the ordinance and I don't think given that we're talking about almost 2 years, well a year and a half later, that the couple of months it's going to take to rewrite the ordinance is going to be that critical. I'd rather see us do it that way. I guess I'm through debating. Councilwoman Dimler: But I think the fact remains that they're here before us now and we're acting on the ordinance as it's written now. That's all we could do. Mayor Qhmiel: Any other discussion? ' Councilman Workman: This dock isn't a permanent dock? It's not going to be built now right? It's a permanent dock but it won't be built until next spring? 35 i City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 I Peter Beck: It will be a seasonal dock just like any other dock in the Icommunity. Mayor Chmiel: Not a boardwalk? IIPeter Beck: No, no. It's not a concrete pylon, no. It will be just a regular like any other homeowners dock with roam for 3 boats on it. IIElliott Knetsch: Before they put in the dock, they would need to came in for a conditional use permit and you can see the proposal in more detail at that time. I Peter Beck: It's not a matter of that it would go in this season of course but the subdivision is developing now and has purchase agreements on a couple lots and they depend on whether there's a dock or not. What kind of a spec house he builds on the third lot depends on whether there's a dock or not. That's part of the reason but really the main reason we went this route is because we tried everything else. We tried the variance. It was denied because he should get an ordinance amendment. We tried the ordinance amendment and Council just didn't click on a version that they liked so really there wasn't much else to do except to look at what the ordinance said and as staff and the Board said, when you read it, it appears to allow a dock on a lot like this so that's why we went 1 this route. Councilman Boyt: When was the ordinance amendment discussed by the City Council? Peter Beck: That was that May 31 meeting that you ng w were reading to the Minutes. I'll get my notes. IICouncilman Johnson: It's where we argued to get the right wording in there. II Councilman Boyt: Okay. What we did pass there, I knew we passed something, was canoe racks and then discussed at great length this issue about lot depth. I didn't sense that we turned anything down there. I just throught we passed part ' of it. Peter Beck: The ordinance was not amended as recommended by the staff and the Planning Commission that would allow a dock. That part of the ordinance 1 amendment was not adopted so the dock still wasn't allowed and still isn't unless this appeal is upheld. Councilman Boyt: I guess I don't see in here, the ordinance where there was even a suggestion about lot depth in the proposed ordinance. II Peter Beck: There wasn't. It dealt with it in a different way. I'm trying to remember. I think the staff recommended one approach and I can't remember exactly what it was but the Planning Commission came up with a different approach and I believe that was to include the right-of-way in the lot depth and II the Council had both of these suggestions and, well you can read the Minutes yourself but the end result was that none of them were adopted that would allow a dock on this particular beachlot. But in the meantime, nobody had ever really I said that would it be inappropriate to have a dock in this situation. It just never got to a solution that implemented it. 36 I City Council Meeting - November 6; 1989 1 Councilman Workman: Pater, can you guys be patient until we got our ordinance amended with the intent that that's the direction we're heading in? Peter Beck: You know, you'd have to talk to Bob about that. He's been that I route before but be it with a different Council but it takes 4 votes and I think it will be easier for the Council to consider it and discuss it without carrying the baggage of this particular project along with it. I just think you would :" find it an easier task to deal with it on a more city wide scale than in reference to this particular project. Councilman Johnson: Jo Ann, who was public noticed on this variance? ' Jo Ann Olsen: It was in the paper and then all the property owners. Councilman Johnson: There was a Lake Minnewashta Homeowners Association? I. mean they're the ones that were in here yelling about the dock in the first . place. Were those people, was Jeff Bros informed? ' , II Jo Ann Olsen: It was all the same list as before. Councilman Johnson: Did you give us a list in here of who? I Jo Ann Olsen: No. It's not in the report. Councilman Johnson: Because I'm surprised that they weren't here. Were they I here for the appeal? Jo Ann Olsen: No. They were sent a notice. No, they weren't. ' Councilman Johnson: Well what exactly was decided by the Board? Jo Ann Olsen: They agreed that the interpretation using the lot depth definition was incorrect and that the way it's written could mean that the recreational beachlot had to have 100 feet in depth and it does have 100 feet in depth. Councilman Johnson: So they agreed with what I said a year and a half ago but the rest of the Council didn't agree with me? ' Jo Ann Olsen: Yeah. That wasn't being discussed at that time. They weren't discussing the appeal of the interpretation, which is what they did tonight. ' Councilman Johnson: Who made the first interpretation? Jo Ann Olsen: Staff did. ' Councilman Johnson: But then the Council affirmed that when we told him he couldn't put in his dock? Now he has to came before us for a conditional use permit? Jo Ann Olsen: He would still have to do that. I Mayor Chmiel: Sure. 37 i City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 IICouncilman Johnson: How long does that take? Jo Ann Olsen: A couple months. [-] 1 Councilman Johnson: So we've got a couple months to change the ordinance one way or another. When he comes before us with a conditional use permit, the ordinance could be different one way or the other. So the time's there? 1 Peter Beck: But in the meantime if we get into this log jam on the ordinance, at least he could proceed. 1 Councilman Johnson: He can advertise his property any way he wants to advertise his property but he does not have a conditional use permit for a dock. If he wants to advertise his property as having dock rights, you might want to do I that. But when it comes the time he gets his conditional use permit, he better be ready or the ordinance might be firmed up to say average lot depth at that point in time and he won't get his conditional use permit. That's a II possibility. Then again, I argued the other way last year. But I'm pointing out the possibilities. I'm pointing out the possibilities. I'm not pointing out what I'm going to vote for because I probaby made it pretty clear what I Ithought the purpose of the 100 foot was last year. Peter Beck: And I think really we are proceeding because it did appear that all the public bodies didn't think the dock was unreasonable. The real hang-up was I how do you accomplish it. The Planning Commission has recommended it a couple times. The Board of Adjustments and the City Council discussion, it wasn't really an issue that they didn't think a dock should be on this 31,000 square foot beachlot. It was only, how do you amend the ordinance to accomplish that II and it didn't agree on an amendment. I-1 Councilman Johnson: I think what really happened was we never got around to really getting at that issue. The issue just kind of. Peter Beck: The 100 feet? ICouncilman Johnson: The 100 feet issue. ' Peter Beck: Absolutely. That's why we brought it up tonight. You brought it up but it wasn't really decided. Councilman Johnson: At that point it wasn't. They didn't want to talk about IIthe racks and not the... Peter Beck: That's why we brought this request to focus people on that as a I clean way to resolve this particular piece of property and recognizing you would probably want to go ahead... ' Councilman Johnson: If you looked at the development pressure that was on staff at that time, the amount of work they were doing and our consistent 1:00 in the morning meetings that we were having, you can tell why something like lot depth change on this ordinance slipped through the perverbial crack. I think that's II probably enough for this issue. We can go on and if anybody wants to appeal it, they've got their 5 or 10 days, whatever it is to appeal it. 11 38 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 Councilman Boyt: I intend to appeal it. I already have indicated my intention to do that. Elliott Knetsch: It's 10 days. Filed with the zoning adminstrator. ' Councilman Boyt: Can I borrow a piece of paper and I'll make it easy. Elliott Knetsch: It doesn't say written notice so. ' Councilman Johnson: So the zoning adminstrator is here tonight and Bill has said he's doing it so it's filed with the zoning adminstrator. That will be put on a future council agenda. Councilman Workman: So we don't have anything to do? No motion? Mayor Chmiel: I don't see any. Councilman Boyt: If you guys want to vote on this, you're welcome to vote on it tonight. Councilman Johnson: I'd rather wait. ' Councilman Boyt: But I'm just saying that I want the Council to vote on it and I'd really like the Council to do an ordinance amendment process. I think we've got the couple months to do that. Councilwoman Dimler: We're going to do the ordinance amendment if possible. Councilman Boyt: Well we should turn this down and do it through an ordinance I amendment. Councilman Johnson: I don't think there was any affect on this because he still has to come in for a conditional use permit. Councilman Boyt: Can't turn it down Jay. Councilman Johnson: Why not? Councilman Boyt: If we agree with the appeal, he's got the right to a dock and ' we can tell him maybe something about the conditions of putting it in but we're not in a position to turn it down. Councilman Johnson: Okay. Councilman Boyt: Okay? We support the staff and Council's previous position and deny the appeal. Now we consider a zoning ordinance. We change the zoning ordinance. Councilwoman Dimler: But this staff had a different position this time Bill. ' Councilman Boyt: Sure. I read the report. Councilwoman Dimler: They were in support of approval. I 39 City Council Meeting - November 6; 1989 Mayor Chmiel: I guess I'm looking at either entertaining a motion or go on your intervention portion for the 10 days and appeal that accordingly. Councilwoman Dimler: You mean uphold the position of the board now and Bill can still appeal. Mayor Chmiel: If you uphold the position of the Board. Councilwoman Dimler: He can still appeal it. In Ashworth: No. Councilman Boyt: I don't think so. 1 Councilman Johnson: Once the Council votes on it, he can't appeal it. Councilwoman Dimler: I thought you said any citizen has 10 days to come in. ICouncilman Johnson: That's because the Council's been doing it wrong for a number of years. I argued this point 2 years ago with the prior Council. We I cannot hear the appeal the night of the Board's decision. We have to wait to the next Council meeting as far as I'm concerned. We should not be affirming or denying the Board's position at the same night that the Board hears it because II that's the way it was done when we were a township and it's always been the way it's been done. That was another interpretation of the ordinance that when I came on the Council I said I didn't agree with the interpretation. I think that we should get the Board's Minutes before we decide. I'm not going to decide on II what the Board said when I wasn't there and I don't have the Minutes of the meeting or anything. I have nothing in front of me to confirm or deny. Now can I do that? Was I there to listen to you? No, I was on an airplane. ICouncilwoman Dialer: You're not going to get verbatim Minutes anyway. Councilman Johnson: I'm going to get same kind of Minutes. The official 1 Minutes. Councilwoman Dicier: But I will tell you what the motion was if you want to Iknow what it was. Councilman Johnson: No. I want the official Minutes approved by you as a member of the Board. You approve your Minutes every time. Then I'll hear this. ' Councilwoman Dialer: Elliott, what do we do? IICouncilman Johnson: What's the hurry? Elliott Knetsch: Briefly I think, to summarize what your options are, number 1, I you could tonight vote to affirm, reverse or modify the Board of Appeals decision now that an appeal has been filed. Or, you could wait to a subsequent Council meeting to have a hearing on the appeal at which time you will vote to IIaffirm, reverse or modify the Board's decision. Councilman Johnson: You see somebody else can appeal tomorrow? 40 I City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 1 Elliott Knetsch: That's correct. Councilman Johnson: It doesn't make sense for us to affirm an opinion before the 10 days has expired. We'll just have to do it again in 10 days. Elliott Knetsch: I think the purpose of waiting to a subsequent meeting would be so that others who may feel aggrieved by the decision would have a chance to cane to the hearing and present their ideas. We already know that there is an appeal filed so there will be Council action either affirming or reversing the decision. I Councilman Johnson: What's the hurry? Councilman Boyt: Well, let's decide something. I Mayor Qmiel: I don't see any. Councilman Johnson: I move we just close the discussion and move onto it 8. , Mayor Qmiel: I guess we could. Councilman Boyt: Whatever you want to do. Mayor Chmiel: ' I'm sort of twisted inbetween here. I can understand the position of the applicant as well. Wanting to proceed with his lots but on the other hand, I also feel that we should review and change the ordinance as per se and go through that process I think of a public hearing aspect and getting the input from the other people within the community. Councilwoman Dimler: I agree 100%. My only point is that they are before us now. The only ordinance we have right now is the one that we have interpretted. More loosely perhaps than the intent was but that was the decision of the Board and that was the right of the Board to make that decision. Now, when Council goes back, and they should have the benefit of the timing here that they're here before us. That's my argument. When Council gets together now and we interpret the wording any way we want to. We can change it. We can leave it the same or we can make it looser or whatever we do with it, they would no longer be affected by that because the benefit of the timing that they're before us now, that's the ordinance and the interpretation that we're using. Councilman Workman: one question. Now is that to our advantage? ' Councilwanan Dimler: It isn't. But are we always here to benefit ourselves or do we want to benefit our citizens? Councilman Workman: I think when I say us, I mean... Councilman Johnson: The citizens he's talking about. 1 Councilman Workman: I agree with Jay on that. I think we can wait and finish this up in January and then we can do it. ' Councilman Johnson: See if there are any other appeals filed. I 41 11 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 • ICouncilman Workman: I'm not worried about that. I'm just saying, let's get... Mawr Chmiel: Okay, proper action for this would be? IIElliott Knetsch: Tb schedule the appeal hearing for a subsequent council meeting. II Mawr Chmiel: Okay. 1 Councilman Boyt: I would ask that staff begin pursuing the ordinance change along the lines of the discussion we've had tonight. Start that at the Planning Commission at the next agenda and see if we can't make progress on this thing. 1 Councilwoman Dingier: I don't know if staff can go ahead because they don't know what our, my intent is not to have it uniformally 100 feet. I don't know how everybody else feels. I mean we don't have a consensus on that. Councilman Johnson: We can take a straw poll right now. I believe at the point the dock is at you should have at least 100 feet. 1 Councilwoman Dimler: But not uniformally throughout? Councilman Johnson: Or even the average. IICouncilwoman Dimler: ...lots are just not that perfect. II Councilman Johnson: No. I don't think the average should be in there. I think at the point that the dock is at, you should have at least 100 feet at that [-] point. 1 Councilwoman Dialer: And they would meet that. They could meet that. Councilman Johnson: They could meet that by putting the dock in the proper IIposition. That's r'y opinion. Councilwoman Dimler: And I agree with you. 1 Councilman Johnson: Well that's 2. It takes 4. 3. Councilman Boyt: I want public input. This is one of the most contested Iordinances in our city. Councilman Johnson: I agree. ICbuncilwoaan Dimler: That's because we make it so. ICouncilman Johnson: No. Councilman Boyt: We're granting rights to a beachiot that we don't now grant to a single family residential lot on a lake so I'm just saying, what we've talked I about, I think you can draft something. If nothing else, start where you ended 1 up last time and let's get this thing in the hopper and see what comes out. 11 42 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 Councilman Johnson: I think we have 3 out of 5 members of the Council saying that at the point of the dock we need 100 foot. Bring that forward to the Planning Omission. , Mawr Chmiel: I guess that's basically where we're at. Councilman Boyt: Sure. That's sensible. Councilman Johnson: So there's same kind of direction at the end of this. Imam we put the appeal on the next Council agenda. Mayor Qmiel: Is there a second to that? Councilman Boyt: You can't do that. I would prefer you not do that. I can tell you, I'm going to be out of town on the 20th. You can hold that over until the next meeting in December or I can wait 10 days to file my appeal. 4 II Councilman Johnson; I'm going to be out of town on the 20th too but .I'm flying back for the meeting. Councilman Boyt: I'm impressed. Councilman Johnson: Just because the schedule worked that way. I only have to be there until noon. Mayor Qimiel: I'd just like to keep this moving. I Councilman Boyt: Well I would like to keep it moving. Let's do the ordinance ancient. That thing in a month and a half will be up here in front of us and we can straighten it out and get it done. Jo Ann Olsen: So you don't want me to continue the appeal? Councilman Boyt: Well yeah. You have to continue the appeal. I'd prefer you I to do it to the first meeting in December. Elliott Knetsch: The action of the Board of Adjustments is vacated pending the outcome of this appeal. The City Council will have the final decision now. Mayor C oriel: That's right. ' C uncilman Johnson: Then I'll move that the appeal is heard the first meeting in December. 1 Councilman Boyt: Second. Councilman Johnson moved, Councilman Boyt seconded to place the appeal hearing for the interpretation of Zoning Ordinance requirements of 100 foot lot depth for a dock on a recreational beachlot until the first City Council meeting in December. All voted in favor and the motion carried. I 43 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 IIWETLAND ALTERATION PERMIT FOR THE INSTALLATION OF A DOCK IN A CLASS A WETLAND LOCATED AT 745 PLEASANT VIEW ROAD, JEFF MAY. IIJo Ann Olsen: The property is located on the north side of Lotus Lake. It did go in front of the Planning Commission. They recaimerded approval of the wetland alteration permit for the installation of a dock and boardwalk. Basically...has been used and they replaced it with a new dock which required than to receive a wetland alteration permit. They have not altered the wetland anything beyond what already had been with the existing dock or previous dock. ' The Planning Commission did recommend approval with the conditions in the report. Staff is recommending that the City Council also recommend approval with the conditions. II Mayor Chmiel: Mr. Mayor, do you have anything else that you'd like to add what the staff's report is or take a position? II Jeff May: No. I think they had a rather lengthy write up on it and we understand that those... ' Mayor Chmiel: Okay. Very good. Discussion by Council. Jay? Councilman Johnson: None. Mayor Chmiel: Bill? Councilman Boyt: I'd prefer to wait a few minutes. Maybe we can drift this � - 1 way. Mayor Chmiel: Okay. I'll go with the next one. I don't have any real concerns over this. I was down to the site. I reviewed it. It's being used in the ' existing location of an existing dock. I should have worn my overshoes. Mr. May and I were slipping all over there. 11 Councilman Johnson: Did you get same wet socks? Mayor Chmiel: No. Thank goodness. Just mud but I guess I really don't have any real concerns. Ursula? Councilwoman Dimler: I don't have any real concerns either. In fact I think we should grant it. Mayor Chmiel: Tom? ' Councilman Workman: Nope. Mayor Chmiel: Okay Bill. ICouncilman Boyt: I guess we're back to me. I just want to clear up, when did you initially talk to city staff? IJeff May: There was quite a write up on that too. What happened... Councilman Boyt: Maybe I can save us time then. Do you agree with the staff IIreport on this? 44 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 Jeff May: Absolutely. I Councilman Boyt: So you agree with the fact that they came to you and talked to you about needing a wetland alteration permit before you started any work? Jeff May: No. There's a bit of misunderstanding about that. It's yes and no in a sense. I want you to understand that I took the initiative on this. I had Jo Ann out. I talked to her. We talked about 2 things. We talked about the fact that if we put out a dock there, okay? We would have to have a wetland alteration permit. We also talked about the fact that if I wanted to do anything other than to put in stairs like we did on that slope, that I would have to have one also. We went ahead and put in the stairs so that we wouldn't have to change the slope at the time and here's where the bone comes in. At the time when I talked to her, I did not know that there was a dock there. I had been told that there was a dock there. I hadn't thought that there was a dock there. I hadn't even been done there. Okay? I talked to her. I went down there subsequently after the area dried up down there. I went down there and I saw that we had a dock in down there. Now it was an old dock. It was less than 50%, just like she mentioned. I was not aware of that ordinance. That's ignorance on my part and I'm probably guilty of one thing and that is talking to neighbors. Talking to people who I felt should know and the universal reaction I got is, well you're grandfathered in. You don't have to worry about it. So I erred. We went ahead and we put the dock in over the existing dock and we left the remnants of the dock that was there there and I found out that I was wrong. That there was not an intention to just violate the ordinance in a sense. And we found out that we were in violation of the ordinance and that's why we're here. We didn't intend to be. It was to me logical Bill you know and I was wrong on this but it was logical that if you have a path to a dock, a built up path to a dock that's been there for years. There's been a dock there. It's been used by the people previously. I really didn't think based on what I was told that there'd be a problem. I found out subsequently that there was a problem. Councilman Boyt: What I'm really after I guess and I'll ask one more question ' and maybe you can be thinking about where I'm trying to go here is, as we have this problem it seems like from time to time with it seemed logical so I did it. And yet it's not, sometimes it's in rather serious non-compliance with city ordinances and I'm just wondering, having been there, what the best way is to inform people about this. There is in our staff report it says on July 31st there was a follow-up contact with staff in which you were told that the dock was a non-conforming use and again it would require a wetland alteration permit. Jeff May: Yes sir. That's also covered. It was also indicated that I had a certain amount of time in order to put that in. If you'll go through the ' Minutes as I had explained, we were told we had several months to do that and I travel very extensively and I was over in Hong Kong and China for a good portion of that time. I was in the process actually of submitting that or writing it out when we got that certified letter. Now I don't recall that there was a date that was given. It was you've got several months to go ahead and get that in. So we went ahead and put it in. If you notice also, when I received a notification from the DNR, I responded immediately on that. I 45 IICity Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 Councilman Boyt: Well the DNR notification, which was in September, is quite a while after July's contact. I'm really not, and maybe this is not the right I ] venue. Maybe we can talk about this afterwards. I'm not trying to publically IIflog you here. Mayor Chmiel: Yeah and I think that that would be something that would be IIdiscussionary after the meeting if you so choose. Councilman Johnson: It's an old issue. IIMayor Chmiel: Yep. Councilman Boyt: Well not for Mr. May but it's an old issue for the City. IMayor Chmiel: It's an old issue for us and I think that Mr. May's intent wasn't trying to do anything that he wasn't supposed to be doing... Jeff May: Bill, there is one issue and I don't know how you solve it. Okay? Because it's not very easy. It was brought up at the Planning meeting. People in this area who have lived here for a long time really believe that if you've ' had a dock, that you're grandfathered in any situation. Now I don't know how to, you can say that they should know better and I should know better and you're right but it's not common knowledge. In other words, and there's a tendency for ' all of us, or most of us. Maybe not all of us. There's a tendency when you move into a new area like I did, there is a tendency to listen to your neighbors that have been there for a long time because they should know. Or to listen to ' people who have a dock on any lake because they should know. I'm not claiming that that's right. That's not right but that's in a sense what happened to me and I don't think I'm alone in that area and how you solve that I don't know because a lot of times people won't intend to knowingly violate something and they end up doing it anyhow. Mayor Chmiel: I would like to make a motion that City Council approves Wetland 1 Alteration Permit #89-7 as shown on the site plan dated September 27, 1989 and subject to the following conditions: I 1. The existing path shall shall be seeded with low growing vegetation and shall not be widened beyond 5 feet. 2. The path may be mowed but shall not be fertilized. II3. Any expansion of the dock or path further into the wetland shall require a wetland alteration permit. II4. The portions of the dock that is within the wetland will be a permanent boardwalk and not a seasonal dock. IIIs there a second? Councilman Johnson: Yes. 1 • Mayor Chmiel moved, Councilman Johnson seconded to approve Wetland Alteration Permit #89-7 as shown on the site plan dated September 27, 1989 and subject to 46 11 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 , the following conditions: ' 1. Ripe existing path shall shall be seeded with low growing vegetation and shall not be widened beyond 5 feet. 2. The path may be mowed but shall not be fertilized. 3. Any expansion of the dock or path further into the wetland shall require a ' wetland alteration permit. 4. The portions of the dock that is within the wetland will be a permanent ' boardwalk and not a seasonal dock. All voted in favor and the motion carried. ' CONSENT AGENDA: ' C. AUTHORIZE PREPARATION OF PLANS AND SPECIFICATIONS FOR CONSTRUCTION OF WELL NO. 5. Councilman Johnson: I'd like more time to review this. I found some inconsistencies in the report. I move to table item 1(c) until I've had a chance to talk to Gary. ' Councilwoman Dimler: I'll second that. Councilman Johnson moved, Councilwoman Dimler seconded to table authorization of plans and specifications for construction of Well No. 5. All voted in favor and the motion carried. D. APPROVE CONTRACT AMENDMENT NO. 1 FOR LAKE DRIVE/TH 101 PROJECT 88-22. , E. APPROVE CONTRACT AMENDMENT NO. 1 FOR PHASE II OF DOWNTOWN REDEVELOPMENT PROJECT NO. 86-11B. Councilwoman Dimler: Mr. Mayor, I'd like to take item (d) and (e) together because my concerns are the same. Actually I just had a question. These are both HRA projects and I did talk to Don today about my concern about bringing , HRA projects back to the Council when we really don't know what the original, what we're amending here and I don't think we have the background to know what the originals were and so forth. I guess in the future I would like to see these go back to the HRA and then the City has the responsibility to make the assessments and that money can be turned back to the HRA or if we can work out something of that nature rather than having Council deal with it all the time. Discussion? Councilman Boyt: Yeah. There is, I think with regard to Lake Susan Park, the City Council spent a lot of time working on that issue and... ' Councilwoman Dimler: I'm not talking, I'm just using these two as an example of being HRA projects. 47 I City Council Meeting - November 6; 1989 Councilman Johnson: They're city projects. ICouncilman Boyt: I agree in terms of I'd love to separate the HRA business from the City Council business and stay out of the HRA stuff. ICouncilwoman Dimler: Well that's what I'm getting at. Councilman Boyt: I agree with you on that. Don is the guy to speak to this but I I think there are unfortunately parts of this in which the City does in fact have to be the deciding body. ' Councilwoman Dimler: Well yes. On the assessments. Councilman Boyt: But I agree with the part that says let's not having the City Council vote on something that the HRA can do all by itself. I think these are Ithings that we have to do. Councilwoman Dimler: And my concern is, you know as we saw with the downtown I that the HRA approved it and the City Council approved it and they didn't know what they were approving and we had all this with the downtown as it was. If we can clarify somehow who's responsibility is what instead of mixing it. Don, ' would you address that? Don Ashworth: It does become difficult because State Statute as it deals with public improvement projects has those responsibilities back over to a city and II it gets back into sane of special assessment things that we talked about before. This particular project and if I'm hearing you correctly, you're using this more as an example more so. IICouncilwoman Dimler: Yes. I'm not really concerned about... Don Ashworth: What I can explore with the City Attorney is literally on future II contracts, ensuring that if there is HRA involvement or responsibility, that in fact the contracting authority then would go back to the HRA. In same instances if it's going to be a public improvement project with special assessments, we I may have to get into sage form of an agreement that would exist between the HRA and the City where we would be acknowledging that they are the contracting agent on that particular project. It sounds to me as though that may resolve sane of I the concerns that I'm hearing from Council na►bers and still meet State Statute. I talked with Roger about that briefly but this elaboration, Elliott if you would carry that back and make sure maybe that Roger gives me a call sometime tomorrow. IIElliott Knetsch: You bet. IICouncilman Johnson: Can I throw my 2 cents in? Mayor Chmiel: Yeah. Coo ahead. IICouncilman Johnson: So what you're proposing is HRA does all the contracting, ► builds it and then we have to assess it? The HRA has no assessment authority to assess people. So this is where we as a group go back and we assess these IIpeople for this money. I believe we've harried off all control over how that 1 48 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 • money's spent to the HRA and do you feel good about that? I have a slight gut level feeling right now that when I go for an assessment hearing, I would have wanted a vote on that contract because it's my vote that's assessing them, not the HRA's. They don't have to be here at the assessment hearing. ' Don Ashworth: The only thing that I could see that may help would be, the -.7 initial improvement hearing, call people and say what it is that's proposed to-; be done and how much money it's going to cost to do it. After that period of time, the HRA would be responsible for doing it in accordance with the way that hearing was conducted by this City Council. When you then move into a subsequent special or the special assessment hearing, if they in fact have goofed up in the process, they become accountable then for why those goof ups occurred. It still doesn't, there still... Councilman Johnson: If they double the cost of a project, double the people's ' assessments from what the regular assessment hearing is, you know. They're at ' home watching the NFL football and we're here. ' Don Ashworth: I'm assuming that you would not accept that type of a-report from them. You would not... Councilman Johnson: We've already spent the money. Councilwoman Dimler: No. Don't we set the parameters beforehand? ' Don Ashworth: That's what I'm saying. I'm saying that the Council would set those parameters and if they... Cbuncilwanan Dimler: And they can't go outside of those parameters. Don Ashworth: I'm sure there's some pitfalls. Again, Ursula called me earlier today and I've been scrambling in terms of thinking how this might work. There may still be same pitfalls. Councilman Johnson: And in this case, they have let these contracts through the ' City so we have to vote on it. Councilwoman Dimler: Okay, my point is that I want to have some more accountability. Mayor Chniel: What you're looking for is more information so you can base your decision on it? Councilwoman Dimler: Yes. And also that when things go wrong, we want to know who's accountable. Mayor Chmiel: Maybe our representative on the HRA could clarify this. Councilman Workman: Ultimately our option is to do away with the HRA and have an economic development commission. Councilwoman Dimler: I think that's a wonderful idea. , Councilman Johnson: We can appoint ourselves as the HRA too. • 49 i City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 IICouncilman Boyt: Let's talk about the current opportunity to see this happen right in front of us and that's on the tree plan. If we started out 4 months ' ago or 5 months ago, the Mayor, Mr. Workman and myself met with the consultant from the Arboretum and BRW's latest tree expert. We worked through that and I thought resolved a plan that the 3 of us were willing to be accountable for. II Okay? Now it should have, in my opinion, it should have stopped right there. If they had adjustments, they could have came back to the Council but we had the authority, responsibility and accountability to have a good tree plan in downtown. Instead, it's gone to the HRA. It's about to go to the Public Safety I Commission. It's gone to the County. I can tell you that it's again, we're going to have some sort of octopus here in which everybody's got a finger in it and nobody's accountable and that's a real visible item there and I think the City Council, if in fact we have control over that, ought to take it and make ' the decision and then stand behind it. Mayor Chmiel: Yeah, I agree with that. IICouncilman Johnson: On the trees though, it is a public safety issue also. ' Mayor Chmiel: That was being reviewed from Public Safety. Councilman Johnson: Yeah, so I'd want to hear from our commissions as to their opinion. Councilman Boyt: You know, get all the data you want to get. I'm just saying [-] II that the decision belongs in one place and if we try to make everybody happy, we're going to end up with a clock tower down here on West 78th Street which is the same kind of thing. We can just go on and on about the things that suddenly nobody wants to own around here. I think the tree plan, the City Council ought Ito own it and we do it the way we are willing to stand behind it. Mayor Chmiel: Okay. IICouncilwoman Dimler: But then we lost control. Councilman Boyt: Well right at this minute I couldn't tell you who has control Iover the tree plan. Councilwoman Dimler: Exactly. How would you propose that we make the HRA more ' accountable for their actions then? Councilman Boyt: I personally think that that's the City Manager and the Attorney get together and they say, the HRA decides this one. The Council I decides that one and we don't both decide the same darn thing. That simplifies it sane. II Councilman Johnson: There may be some times when due to contracting and state law we both have to vote on something. When it's a joint project between the city and the HRA. Some items may be joint projects. These particular items, the Lake Susan, the park definitely is not an HRA function. It's a city function so it's a joint type matter. Anyway, I move approval of (d) and (e) . Councilwoman Dinner: Why don't you let me do that since I pulled them. 50 I City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 Councilman Johnson: It didn't seem to be happening so I was pushing things , along. Mayor Chmiel: Okay, Ursula. ' Councilwoman Dimler: But I do want those concerns looked into so I move approval of items (d) and (e) with the understanding that we will get a report back from staff. Councilman Johnson: I'll second that. Resolution #89-119: Councilwoman Dimler moved, Councilman Johnson seconded to approve Contract Amendment No. 1 for Lake Drive/TH 101 Project 88-22. All voted in favor and the motion carried. Resolution #89-120: Councilwoman Dimler moved, Councilman Johnson seconded to approve Contract Amendment No. 1 for Phase II of Downtown Redevelopment Project No. 86-11B. All voted in favor and the motion carried. J. APPROVE PLANS AND SPECIFICATIONS FOR PUBLIC WORKS AUXILIARY STRUCTURE FCUNLIATION. Councilwoman Dimler: Again, I pulled this one. I talked to Gary Warren about ' this today. I guess I don't see the urgency of this thing wanting to get put in right away. I want to remind us that we do have free storage from Chaska and I would like to see more detailed plan with costs and all that before we go ahead with anything on this. I don't see the urgency and I guess I want to table it. Councilman Bout: I think that's what this is all about is getting that detailed plan. Gary Warren: Mr. Mayor, if I could. As Ursula mentioned, we had talked earlier about this. The September 25th meeting, the item with the sale of the property was presented to Council and in that staff report there was a cost range presented of $136,000.00-$150,000.00 for the new facility. That's still the ballpark range that we're looking at so hopefully the Council will from that meeting was at least made cognizant of the dollars that were involved with replacing that facility. The foundation we're trying to do, worked out well for us on the previous expansion of public works and that is to get the foundation in using public works staff as much as possible to beat the weather so that we have a little bit more control in the springtime to get the facility underway. I would agree that it's not a life or death situation at this point but it is not convenient for us to run down to the auxiliary buildings that are available to us in Chaska, even though. we're trying to utilize them to store seasonable equipment. We still have equipment that is down there that we have to go down to get to use such as our elevator truck for replacing stop lights and such on TH 5 so that's the reason why we brought it to the Council at this point in time so that the building foundation at least could be underway. We'd have control of our destiny so to speak and indeed detailed plans and cost estimates are being prepared as we speak here so we can formally bring it back to the Council for the next phase. 51 ' City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 Mayor Chmiel: I was just taking this, what are we talking about, 4,800 square f' feet for the building? [ I Gary Warren: Roughly, that's correct. Mayor Chmiel: Roughly at about $23.00 per square foot comes up to about $110,000.00 and $23.00 I feel is a pretty strong figure and you and I had some discussions on that. ' Gary Warren: Construction costs you're using? Mayor Chmiel: Right. Gary Warren: We've got some engineering and soil testing and surveying and stuff so when you add it all together, you're in... Mayor Chmiel: I'm using a high figure and I think that that might be just a little high but I still thing that $130,000.00 is still high. Gary Warren: We certainly don't need the Cadillac and that's not the intent IIhere. Mayor Chmiel: Right and we're not doing that. We're just putting the bare ' minimum, dirt floor. Two doors. Electrical and 1 or 2 lights and that's about the extent of it. Gary Warren: Right. We have to do a block building. We can't do a metal building so there are some limitations there that we're dealing with but a [-] foundation should be under $15,000.00 of that total and that's not going to change really no matter what we decide to go up from there. IIMayor Chmiel: Block buildings we're finding, we can build those cheaper than we can metal buildings. 1 Councilwoman Dimler: I guess I just wanted to say, my concern here was exactly as the Mayor said. We only got $100,000.00 for the property and we're planning to spend way above that and I don't see that for the storage that we need, that we need a Cadillac type of a building and I can just see in the future here that once we get the footings in, then we'll came back with cost overruns and all that, that's my concern that we don't do that. IIGary Warren: Council will have authorization on the next step for the full building so if it's not acceptable at that time, dollarwise or otherwise, you certainly wouldn't have to proceed with it. Councilwoman Dimler: But once you have the footings in there, you don't make the building any smaller? Gary Warren: Square footage though really wouldn't be that big of an impact on it. It would really be the type of construction as Don referenced here. How II many windows. Are we going to heat it. Things that really add to the cost are above the ground. ' 52 I City Council Meeting - November 6; 1989 Mayor Chmiel: Any other discussion? ' Councilman Johnson: Yes sir. Mr. City Planner. If this were a regular business caning in for this, would there be anything other than a building permit required? Paul Krauss: There would normally be a site plan review. Councilman Johnson: Before we let than put in a foundation? Paul Krauss: That's correct. , Councilman Johnson: Are we treating ourselves differently than we treat... Paul Krauss: Gary and I had a discussion on this and it was determined that in past city buildings had not been subject to that procedure. This was a rather diminutive structure hidden in the back of the site. In the interest of expediency and trying to get the footings in, we determined that we really did not need to go through that procedure in this case. Councilman Johnson: In other words, what's good for the goose but this gander doesn't want to do it? It's not the first time I've brought this up either. The City does things slightly different than the rest of the world. ...interpretation of our own rules but you know, there has been many times when we've granted grading permits in advance of the site plan review and things like that so it's not that terribly unusual. We've done it for several developers. Even Mr. Burdick I believe we gave him permission to grade his area before we platted it. In one hand we're kind of stepping on our own rules but it's similar to what we've done quite a few other times and to me I see the necessity of getting it in and I also see that we're going to build this to all the rules and regulations and when the site plan review comes in, we're not going to have any choice but pass it because you're not going to be asking us for any variances are you Gary? We don't like variances. You'd have a real tough time. Gary Warren: tole haven't asked for any yet. ' Don Ashworth: One quick comment. I'm unaware of any city structures that we've built that we have not gone through the full planning process. This structure I recall that we applied the variance process... Councilman Johnson: What about the wetland alteration permit that we dumped dirt down into a wetland and then came back and asked for the wetland alteration permit later? It was done under an emergency and we figured that out later. Councilwoman Dirtier: I'm not aware of the situation but I think the City should. Don Ashworth: The facility there. The fire station. When we did this additional addition here, we went through all of the steps. So again, all of the structures that I'm aware of, we have followed all of the rules. As I had understood this, that this was a smaller structure and was being interpretted as being allowed to be issued a permit in this particular instance. I did not know or I guess I still don't that we're treating ourselves really any different than anyone else. 53 11 ' City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 IIGary Warren: When Paul and I had talked about that process, asking if we should run it through. It was considered, I forget the term that Jo Ann used but I auxiliary building or whatever and we weren't looking to ignore any of the procedures. That was that it fell into the class that it didn't dictate a full site plan review. Correct me if I'm wrong. IIPaul Krauss: Jo Ann did make that interpretation. Frankly I'm not certain of using that interpretation that Jo Ann was. We were confronted also with the fact that here we had a rather small building that needed to get into the ground I for public purpose prior to freezeup and if we put it through the procedure, which we could do, it obviously couldn't be built until next year. ICouncilwoman Dirtier: Well that was my point Paul. There is no rush. Councilman Boyt: Yeah there is. I Councilwoman Dialer: No there's not. We have free storage from Chaska. There's no rush to get going on this building. ' Councilman Johnson: Except we're supposed to diligently go after a new building. I Paul Krauss: We could also go through the site plan review procedure after the footings are in the ground. That also is a little bit uncomfortable since you'd be asked to approve a building who's shape and location is already predetermined. ICouncilman Boyt: What would you like to do? I Councilwcz'rian Dim ler: I think we should go through the regular process since there's no urgency and no hurry. ' Councilman Johnson: I see the urgency personally. Councilwoman Dirtier: You do? ICouncilman Johnson: Yeah. Councilwoman Dimler: What? ICouncilman Johnson: So we can get his up and our people don't have to continue driving all the way to Chaska to pick up and do their equipment. 1 Councilman Workman: It's not going to be up until spring right? Councilwoman Dimler: It's an inconvenience, I agree. It's an inconvenience but 1 it isn't an urgency. Councilman Johnson: Right, but if we don't start building the foundation now ' it's not going to be up until sumer. Councilman Workman: If we put the footings in now, it will be up one year from now? 54 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 ' 1 Councilwoman Dirtier: In the spring. Gary Warren: The size of the building with the exception of the office space that we added on to public works, that's a year long process by the time you get it all punched out and done so I don't think we're looking any luxury of time here. If we don't do it this spring, then the pressure will be even on to make sure that it's done by next fall. We're looking at about a year. Councilman Johnson: We did a whole site plan review and everything on that. Gary Warren: I'm talking construction. Councilman Johnson: It took a year? 1 • Gary Warren: And we did the foundations ahead of time in order to expedite than. II Councilman Johnson: That seems like a long time to build a building like this. Mayor Chmiel: A bare bones building. lb take that period of time, as you're ' saying a year. I think I could get a contractor in there to do it within about a 4 month period. Councilwoman Dimler: Okay, I move that we table. Councilman Workman: I'll second it for discussion. ' Councilman Johnson: There's no discussion on the table motion. Councilwoman Dimler moved, Councilman Workman seconded to table approving plans and specifications for public works auxiliary structure foundation. All voted in favor except Councilman Boyt and Councilman Johnson and the motion carried with a vote of 3 to 2. Gary Warren: When would be an appropriate time to bring it back? ' Councilman Boyt: How about the 20th? Councilwoman Dirtier: Can we have some more details? Paul Krauss: Could I get sate clarification too. If we have a delay in the process, do you want us to go through the site plan review on that? Councilman Johnson: Would United Mailing have to do a site plan review of this buiding if they were building this building? Councilman Boyt: It adds to cost doesn't it? By quite a bit too. Mayor CYmiel: That's a good question. 1 55 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 Paul Krauss: It could not be on the 20th. It would have to be scheduled for a Planning Camussion meeting which would put it into December which raises that problem. • II Mayor Chmiel: I don't know if that's a requirement that we would have to do. ' Councilman Boyt: Not when it means more money. Not when there's no variances. Mayor Chmiel: I wouldn't want to spend anymore dollars. And we'd make sure ' that we do all our own inspections and everything is in accordance. I don't see the need. I really- don't. Councilman Workman: So we're just waiting then in 2 weeks for... ICouncilman Johnson: I'm just saying, does our ordinance say we have to do it or do we see the need? I don't see the need either but I also want to do what the 1 ordinance says is supposed to be done. Mayor Chmiel: ('hat have we done in the past? IIDon Ashworth: That's what I mentioned. All of our buildings we have gone through the full process as it dealt with the primary structure. As we approach this, and I don't know if there's a slight interpretation issue between Jo Ann's 1 interpretation and maybe Paul's but at least I until 5 mintues ago was led to believe that as an auxiliary structure, that we did not have to go through that process. I'm trying to think of any other sort of auxiliary structure where we may not have gone through the review process. Gary Warren: What about a well house? 1 Councilwoman Dimler: Could you do sane research on that and let us know? Don Ashworth: I don't think that the little storage facility out in Lakeview II and that metal building that's out there, I don't recall that ever going through any process. I Councilwoman Dimler: Can we get staff to do same research on that? If we can go by that process, I would be in favor of that. Let's do it legally. IICOUNCIL PRFSFNPATIONS: Councilman Boyt: Okay, these are 3 items, 2 of which are pretty quick I think. 1 The letter to Met Council. In the Admin Pack Paul wrote a letter to Met Council and I'd like to see the City Council endorse the mailing of that letter. It looked real important to me. That's the one on the development in Eden Prairie. The neighborhood business zones which is a change in their zoning. The extension of the use on the MUSA line. Issues that really impact our city and I think Chanhassen should take a stand with the Met Council about this. II Paul Krauss: I might add that I spoke to Mike Franzen who's the City Planner in Eden Prairie later this afternoon and reiterated our concern about the addition of 30,000 same odd square feet of commercial up on TH 5 at Dell Road. He indicated that that's also a concern of F,ien Prairie's staff and they were ' 56 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 I probably going to look to scaling that back if possible but he appreciated our concern as well for the reason that it may damage the downtown. 1 Councilman Boyt: So I don't know if we can vote on anything tonight but I think maybe a show of support would be appropriate. Is there that support on the Council? Mayor Q tiel: Yeah, I read it. Councilman Johnson: Who's the addressee in that? Paul Krauss: It's addressed to Ann Hurlberg who's the director of the Comprehensive Planning Section. It's her office that reviews the environmental assessment worksheets. I also proposed copying Mike Franzen in Eden Prairie, Marcy Waritz, our Metro Council representative and the Minnesota Environmental Quality Board. Mayor Qmeiel: I would like to establish a precedent immediately that on any information that we're sending directly to the Met Council, that Marcy be included at all given times. She represents us and I think she should know about it beforehand and possibly just even a phone call to let her know what's coming. ' Councilman Johnson: Who's the RGU on this? Paul Krauss: Eden Prairie. 1 Councilman Johnson: So have you send a letter to than? Paul Krauss: I've spoken to than and they'll get a copy of this as well. Councilman Johnson: So they have an EAW? 1 Paul Krauss: There's actually 3 of then. Councilman Boyt: Yeah, they're in the pack. 1 Councilman Johnson: Yeah, I see than in here. The last thing in there. Councilman Boyt: They're brutal. That's going to have a big impact on 1 Chanhassen and maybe this is worthy of future discussion but I think right now time is of the essence. We need to get the letter off. Councilman Johnson: What's the date for public comment on the EIW? Paul Krauss: I didn't have a specific date and the correspondence that was forwarded to the Metro Council simply said that they were going back over the next few weeks and if we had a concern, we should get it back to than in writing. Mayor Qnmiel: Yeah, I would think that probably just by Council's position to saying to support this. By having us sign it would probably be. 57 I I City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 I I Councilman Johnson: Could we put this on our November 20th agenda so we can have a little time to review these EAW's and inform the ROU that we will be '-` providing the City of Chanhassen's opinion on their EAW following our November 20th meeting? Basically inform the Rai that's going to be considering this that I we've gotten it too late for it to be considered at this point. That we would like to express an opinion. Maybe express them as individuals too. ' Mayor Chmiel: The EAW is just a 3 sheet is all it is. Councilman Boyt: There's a couple of them in there. Mayor Chmiel: All the others besides but the one that I had looked at here. Councilman Johnson: If you can do one in 3 pages, you didn't do very much on IIthe SAW. Mayor Chmiel: That's probably true but sometimes some of them don't take that II much either. Councilman Boyt: They're proposing quite an increase in density. They're talking about going right up on our border with this sort of thing. I agree Jay ' that it's probably worth further discussion but I think the letter that Paul is sending is just pretty straight forward stuff. Saying that we have a concern about this. We want Met Council to know we're concerned about it and that's ' about the size of the letter so I'd like to see that go forward without delay if we can. Mayor Chmiel: I don't see any problem with that. II Councilman Boyt: Okay? Next item, Lake Ann Park fee. The reason I bring it up II is it's apparently going back to the Park and Rec Commission and I'd like them to have a bit of input from the Council. The Park and Rec fee stirs debate it seems every year. Last year I think the previous Council might have made this decision but the decision was made to reduce the fee. There is I believe the reason motivating that was by the majority of the Council was that there was sane sentiment in the community that no one should be charged for using a city park. I don't agree with that. I think this is a unique city park and it costs I a lot of money to keep it up and we ought to restore the fees we were charging before in my opinion because we've gone from raising $23,000.00 to $11,000.00 which nets us $5,000.00. I agree with the staff to some extent but even $5,000.00 with the budget pinch that our city has got is money that's going into II maintainng that park that we won't have without that fee. That's just my opinion. I'd like to have the Park and Rec people have the opinion of the rest of the Council when they discuss it. If you've got any off the cuff comments. IIMayor Chmiel: I guess my off the cuff comment would be that I see what the existing charges are. I don't think we should go back to the previous charges. The higher cost. ' Cbuncilman Boyt: $3.00? II Mayor Chmiel: Some people, well I should say maybe a few that can't afford it. I know you'd give the $3.00 Bill but I don't know. I want to see the park costs be covered by the people that are utilizing it as well. ' 58 r City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 Councilman Boyt: There are two sides to that. That's right. Mayor Chmiel: And those from out of town who also utilize that park, are the ones that should pay for it as well. Councilman Johnson: What do you think about the youth sports that utilize it? The Little Leaguers that came in? Mayor Qmiel: Nah. Councilman Boyt: I kind of think it should be built into the fees for the softball people and the swimming people and some of those folks. An annual pass is what, $6.00? That's the best bargain in town short of our meetings. ' Councilwoman Dimler: What are other parks doing? Do you know what other cities are doing with their parks? Mayor Qmiel: I don't know. Councilman Johnson: I don't know of any other city that charges. ' Mayor Qmiel: Maybe we should ask the Park and Rec to do a little checking with some of the other adjacent communities and see what those charges are. Everything's going up. Everything escalates. All except our salaries. Councilman Johnson: We could drop those. Councilman Workman: I'd say keep the fee. Get as much of the darn fee as we can. Use it for milfoil. Mayor C oriel: That's another good point. ' Councilman Workman: And put a big sign up at the front gate. Thank you for paying your fee. You fee will be used for milfoil and/or other, mowing or whatever. Councilman Boyt: A sign wouldn't be a bad idea at this point. ' Councilman Johnson: Your fees pay for the maintenance of this park. Councilman Workman: And hire a big thug to stand at the gate and pay him $20.00 ' an hour. Councilman Boyt: Okay, third item. Frrontier Homes. I think it's time. We've ' had, I'm sure since Jim is moving, that he probably has something to say about this but we have had one of the principles in Frontier Homes has came in and lied to us. We've had a record, I think it's probably Jim has it in here somewhere of the 6 or 7 homeowners that are still dissatisfied. We have at least one local resident or one local merchant who says Frontier Homes owes that money and they can't get it from them. I think we ought to put an ad in. I think we ought to put it in the Sailor once and we ought to put it in the Villager one time. It doesn't have to be very big but I think the wording is in 59 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 •, II here somewhere. Is it Jim? Have you got the wording in here again? It's pretty innocuous. II Jim Chaffee: Yeah, the wording's going to be just Notice, Frontier Home buyers. City of Chanhassen is requesting you contact the Chanhassen Public Safety Department prior to purchasing a Frontier Home to find out if any complaints have been filed. Wordage to something like that. Like Bill said it's pretty I innocuous. I guess the long and the short of it is, Frontier Hanes did not acknowledge any of our requests. Paul Oaks has not gotten back to us. One of the memos in there from Scott suggests that Frontier Homes have washed their ' hands completely of this whole ordeal. In a previous Council meeting the direction was to place an ad once we had reached this point. I think we're ready to do that. It question before the Council is, how do you want to proceed doing that. The last two pages of the memo I just passed out indicated the types of ads that I've checked with at the Villager. The second to the last page, if you notice the Jersey Store ad. That's a $19.00 ad. It's a 3 inch ad that we can put one time into the Villager. The second one down, Country I Western Dance Lessons, and we're talking size of ads, that's $38.00 and then the last page is a fairly large ad and that's $236.00. I talked to the Villager editor, Dave Peterson and he says if the Council wishes to place an ad that ' would be noteworthy, he would probably have an article in the paper indicating that the Council so desired an ad be placed in the paper so we'd kind of get double coverage. The citizenry would read the news report and then consequently, I hope go look for the ad. Then my other suggestion in the memo 1 is that we can go on from there. If the $19.00 ad doesn't illicit any response from Frontier Homes, then we may want to go to the $38.00 ad the next week or two and then after that maybe the $236.00 ad. If we did the 3 of them together, [-] II the total cost would be $283.00. I don't know if that's going to do anything. I don't even think the ads are going to rest Frontier Homes out of their nest. I just don't think we're going to get any action. It maybe just to place the $18.00 ad with the newsworthy item from Dave Peterson and let it go at that. ' Councilman Workman: What do you suppose the ad will accomplish Jim? A warning ng to buyers and a warning to Frontier? IIJim Chaffee: Right. It's a warning to potential home buyers of Frontier Homes to check with Chanhassen Public Safety to see if we have any complaints on file. Now those are factual issues and I don't think we can get in too much trouble liability wise if we say that. Elliott, do you have any thoughts on that at all? Roger did. ICouncilman Boyt: Well Roger drafted, I wish we had it in here. He drafted a statement that we could put in. 1 and Jim Chaffee: Right a that's what it was. TO check with Chanhassen Public Safety prior to purchasing your Frontier Home to see if we had any complaints on file. It's not saying they're bad. It's not saying anything except to check Iwith what we have on file. Councilman Boyt: Well we do have complaints on file. IIJim Chaffee: We certainly do and that's what they would find out. Councilman Boyt: Why don't we put that in there? 60 City Council Meeting - November 6, 1989 1 Jim Chaffee: That's public information and that's factual and I don't think we can get in too much trouble for that. Elliott, I know this is fresh to you. Elliott Knetsch: I would support what Roger's already told you. I don't think we would want to put specifics of complaints in the ad in the paper. I think this should alert anyone and if anyone does call, they will get that information. I think that going beyond what the language suggestions, it might just open liability that we wouldn't otherwise have a case and it won't help us get the job done that we want to get done. Councilman Johnson: If each of these homeowners puts the exact same warning in their front yard, it'd probably be a little more effective than in the newspaper that the potential homeowners don't read because they- don't live here. Councilman Boyt: I agree with that. I think that one of the issues here is, ' that we send a signal to all the home builders in Chanhassen that we're not happy about this kind of building. I don't think most of the home builders in' • ' Chanhassen are happy to have a Frontier Homes building here. Councilman Johnson: Have they violated any building codes that we can, it's just not quite finishing huh? Jim Chaffee: It's customer service. Councilman Johnson: It's nothing that we can get on their side and go after ' Frontier Haines in a legal? Jim Chaffee: If there was, we would know about it believe me. ' Councilman Boyt: I would suggest that we place the ad one time in both newspapers and that we place, I don't know what Chris' newspaper charges for an ad but we place a half a page ad at $236.00. Split it and put whatever that will buy us in each of the two newspapers. Run it one time and kind of see how that feels. Commit to it once and as Tan said, we've shot a fire across their bow. Or, we fired a shot, that's what we did. Jim Chaffe: Chris, if we bought an ad in the Sailor, what kind of coverage would we get? Just specifically to Chanhassen or would it go to other areas? Chris Burns: An ad? Jim Chaffee: Right. ' Chris Burns: It would go in the Excelsior. Excelsior residents would also see the ad as well. You could also buy den Prairie and Minnetonka...Shakopee. Mayor Chmiel: How about two $38.00 ads and call it quits? Jim Chaffee: Is that the direction I hear Council saying is split the $236.00 for that big ad? Mayor Qrtiel: I don't know if we want to go that much. , 61 City Council Meeting - November 6; 1989 ' Councilman Johnson: Well there's 3 papers. Why do we keep ignoring our third paper here? Mayor Qniiel: Haw about if we had two of the $38.00 ones rather than $236.00? ' Councilman Workman: Why don't we split 250.00 3 days. $240.00 3 ways. ' Mayor Chmiei: It'd be even all the way around. Councilman Workman: And we should compare all the ads afterwards and say, you ' know that cane January our services axe up for review again. Councilman Johnson: Why don't we just say 3 of the country western ads in all 3 newspapers? - Councilman Johnson moved, Councilwoman Dimler seconded to place the $38.00 ads 1 in all 3 newspapers regarding Frontier Homes. All voted in favor and the motion carried. NEXT BUDGET WORKSESSION, UPDATE, CITY MANAGER. Don Ashworth: I'd like the City Council to consider setting up a Work Session I for this next Monday night to talk about upcoming bonding so I'd have Springsted here. The Budget worksession, where we currently stand on that and the amended redevelopment plan basically shows all of the things that have occurred within the downtown area. The City Council decided to meeting on Tuesday, November 14, 1989 at 5:00 p.m.. Mayor Chmiel moved, Councilman Johnson seconded to adjourn the meeting. All voted in favor and the motion carried. The meeting was adjourned at 11:00 p.m.. Submitted by Don Ashworth City Manger Prepared by Nann Opheim 62 r rn CHANHASSEN PLANNING COMMISSION t P 1:: REGULAR MEETING NOVEMBER 1, 1989 11 �' r Chairman Conrad called the meeting to order at 7: 45 p.m. . MEMBERS PRESENT: Tim Erhart, Steve Emmings, Ladd Conrad, Jim Wildermuth ' and Brian Batzli MEMBERS ABSENT: Annette Elison STAFF PRESENT: Paul Krauss, Director of Planning and Jo Ann Olsen, Senior Planner PUBLIC HEARING: PRELIMINARY PLAT TO SUBDIVIDE 5.06 ACRES INTO 7 SINGLE FAMILY LOTS ON PROPERTY ZONED RSF, RESIDENTIAL SINGLE FAMILY AND LOCATED EAST OF POWERS BOULEVARD AND JUST SOUTH OF LAKE LUCY ROAD, RICHARD ERSBO. Paul Krauss presented the staff report. Conrad: Are you the applicants? Richard Ersbo: As far as changing the name, we' ll comply with North or South or whatever you want to call it. ' Krauss : You can come up with whatever the name is as long as it' s Arlington something. Conrad: Any other comments based on the staff report that you have? Erhart moved, Emmings seconded to close the public hearing. All voted in favor and the motion carried. The public hearing was closed. Wildermuth: After looking at this, I agree with the staff recommendation ' with the impact on the wetland . . .double frontage issue. . . I have one question. Jo Ann how close is this flag lot driveway coming to the wetland? Olsen: The existing driveway and it's probably about anywhere from 50 feet to the edge. Krauss : Based on the aerial it might even have been at one time. . . Here' s the existing driveway as it comes down. You can see the wetland vegetation comes quite close to where the driveway is but it's not going to encroach any further. Olsen: They're not doing anything to the existing conditions. ' Batzli: But they' ll be grading on the east side of the driveway? Olsen: Yes. I r Planning Commission Meeting November 1, 1989 - Page 2 r Krauss: The grading will take place in this vicinity. Olsen: There will be a holding pond also constructed. ' Wildermuth: There won' t be any new grading? It will be an upgrade of the existing driveway? ' Krauss : The driveway will remain exactly as it is. Wildermuth: Okay. So nothing will happen there? That's all I have. ' Batzli : The first time we looked at this, we had some sort of skimmer device didn't we going into the holding pond? Olsen: Right. That was an added condition and what happens is that it' s a DNR protected wetland so it also has to go through a permit process with that. We usually when the plans and specs come in, that' s where they add that if it' s necessary. If the DNR wants it. If the Watershed District wants it. The engineering department did not feel it was necessary at this time but it's something that we usually add. Batzli : I guess I was wondering why we wanted it the first time and not this time I guess was my question. Olsen: It seems like that was added at the Planning Commission level last time. Emmings: Isn' t it condition 4 under the preliminary plat? Olsen: Yes. ' Batzli : Okay. I guess I was looking for it in the Wetland Alteration Permit. Sorry. Is it supposed to be in the preliminary plat rather than the wetland alteration permit? Olsen: It' s part of the drainage easement that ' s on the plat also. Krauss: The preliminary plat would have the development agreement attached to it and that' s the means by which we are sure that it' s installed . Batzli : Do we normally or did we normally kind of start a trend where ' approval of one was conditioned upon approval of the other and in compliance with each other that we don't have those? Okay. My last question, and I agree pretty much with what Jim said. The drainage easement. Is that to the wetland then? ' Krauss : Yes. The outlet pipe is supposed to outlet directly into the wetland. ' Batzli : Should it clarify then which property owner they need the drainage easement from? The adjacent property owner to the west? ' Krauss : To the west. I Planning Commission Meeting November 1, 1989 - Page 3 r Batzli: Okay. That's all I have. , Emmings: I 'm wondering about the potential for development of Block 2. What if they wanted to develop that later on into more lots than one? It' s II a big piece. Krauss : You're correct. It is quite a large piece and someday somebody 11 may want to do just that. However , the house is quite large and there' s also a large pool adjacent to it that fill up a lot of ground. There ' s a free standing garage. The driveway comes up there and what you have is II relatively steep topography around it that eliminates much of the useable ground. This property's probably not subdivisable unless the home is removed which we believe there' s a potential for it but right-of-ways in the future and if in fact that does happen, we could consider sharing the II same common private' driveway upgrading it because there probably is not another means to access the top of the hill . Emmings: Let me ask, we' ve got this private driveway and the road is, that II lot, there' s 138 feet in there and then you get to the roadway. I can' t remember what we do on spacing of roads along the road like this. What' s the standard we' re looking for? I Olsen: It' s more with the subdivision main drives itself rather than individual driveways. Krauss : You' re looking at regulating the street intersections . Emmings: We've also talked about driveways that. . . ' Krauss : One of the things that we did with this plat is we had it redrawn so that this street aligned with Arlington Court to the north. The II original proposal had a skewed intersection. The separation, if that was another street going in there we'd have a problem with that. Emmings: I guess kind of putting those two things together , the fact that I this is a big parcel back here. The fact that someone may want to develop it someday whether they want to now or not and the fact that you'd have streets so close together there, it just seems to me that the sensible ' thing to do is to have an access off that cul-de-sac. At least an easement. I think their entrance to their property ought to come off that cul-de-sac but if they prefer to keep the driveway they have, I would care II as long as for the future there was some sort of easement maintained off the end of the cul-de-sac back to Block 2. I know that' s going to screw up their lot pattern but I think it ought to be there. As far as, I'm just II curious that it would actually be less confusing to have the name of that street be the same as the street to the north. That doesn' t meet the common sense test here as I sit here but is that really true that it' s easier for the emergency people? ' Krauss : Jo Ann and I were talking about this. I 'm basing this on my working with the police and fire services in other communities over the years where they tell you that if they have a fire call in, oftentimes they II I Planning Commission Meeting November 1, 1989 - Page 4 11 might just hear the Arlington and not Court or Place and they want to go to ' that one place where that Arlington is and they want to know it' s either north or south. What we have here is a common intersection. It ' s a 4 way intersection. The confusion would be if it's Arlington to the north, Lake Lucy to the east/west and something else to the south. There' s a continuity rationale there to have one place that's called Arlington. Emmings: Well I ' ll have to go with your professional experience but it seems to me, if this is the only Eagle whatever it is in Chanhassen, that would make it very distinctive and real easy to find but I don' t know. But that's my only comment is the access and then off that cul-de-sac to Block 1 2. Erhart : My understanding is that we' re looking for a variance for a flag lot? You indicated at a previous meeting that you felt our ordinance, we ought to look at changing our ordinance to allow flag lots. Maybe you could give us 60 seconds on that. Krauss : The older philosophy was that flag lots or neck lots were inappropriate. That the way to serve properties is to require that they have the full frontage on a public right-of-way. Generally that works very I well if you' re developing along a grid street system in an area that' s pretty flat. What we have in Chanhassen and what you have in a lot of your western suburbs is some very interesting topography that makes it difficult and often inappropriate to run public streets in every place. At the same time you've got a lot of ground that's inaccessible or relatively inaccessible through public rights-of-way that provides otherwise ideal home sites. There is plenty of land. They' re serviceable. They're II secluded . You don' t have, if you have a front yard right behind somebody' s back yard. There are ways in which to do that. At the same time too, there are ways in which the ordinance can be amended to require a fairly I high standard of service for those driveways. Particularly if more than one home is using it. We can guarantee that it' s built properly. That it' s maintainable. That it is maintained. That it's plowed and that it can provide adequate emergency vehicle service. All things being equal , it II would be my recommendation that the City looks at revising the ordinances to legitimize the standing somewhat of neck lots in those situations simply because we do believe that they' re oftentimes the most sensitive way of 1 serving a piece of ground . There is the existing complication that one part of the ordinance allows it at the present. The other part doesn' t. Erhart : Minnetonka allowed them with restrictions? Krauss: Yeah. I ' ll get into that. It's quite a long discussion but yes, we did and it was a process that was refined over a period of years. IUpgrading the standards by which driveways were built. Erhart : You feel that this one would pass the Minnetonka standards? Krauss: It certainly would with the one house. More issues would be raised if it was subdivided in the future but that could be dealt with as well . Planning Commission Meeting November 1, 1989 - Page 5 11 Erhart: In the past Chanhassen' s negative position on flag lots have been II based on what reasoning? Krauss : Jo Ann, maybe you could. Olsen: I'm sorry. Erhart : Why don' t we like flag lots I 'm trying to say? ' Olsen: Well some of the reasons that Paul was pointing out or some of the controls he could add to the ordinance were some of the reasons because we didn't have that where the Public Safety, a lot of the flag lots do just have small driveways that are not maintained that the fire trucks couldn' t get into and things like that and that was the reasoning. If you had the 90 feet right up on the street, then there' s access there. Someway they would be able to get to it. Someway they Erhart: Another reason would be the number of access points along Lake Lucy Road. Essentially here you've got 2 access points at 137 feet whereas if this back lot was. . . Emmings: Then you'd have a third one at 117 feet. ' Erhart: Yeah, another one so every 130 feet you've got an access on there whereas if the Lot 1, Block 2, is that what it is Block 2? Yeah. Was served with the cul-de-sac that would eliminate another access point. Krauss : Yeah, and I would disagree with that at all and normally if it I were possible. Well, if I thought it were easy to combine the curb cuts, I would normally recommend that that' s the case. What you' ve got over here though is a fairly significant change in elevation. I 'm not saying it makes it impossible to do it but it makes it difficult to do it. That cul-de-sac is up, it' s elevated up above the driveway. That driveway' s coming off a hill and you can see through the grading over here that you'd actually have to come down the hill and then go back up it again at a fairly significant grade to make the cul-de-sac. Erhart: I' ll just give you my ideas because it' s as much the developer as it is ours. Again, I've only looked at this for 10 minutes and the developer or the owner has looked over this thing for months so maybe my ideas are naive but my immediate but reaction would be that bringing the street down slightly. Use this space to bring these lots down further I south and bring the cul-de-sac down maybe out in this area. I think he still has room for the 6 lots but you could access the driveway off the cul-de-sac which would end up down in this area and that does not require you to have a steep grade in the street. It seems to me that would make these lots more valuable if you backed into these wetlands. Again, I 'm just looking at a piece of paper doesn' t give you a whole lot of insight into that but I somewhat agree with Steve in that for the future of all those homeowners and actually for yourself, not having to maintain the long driveway, it would seem to be to everyone' s advantage to have that come off the cul-de-sac if there's a practical way to do that. Assuming there' s no practical way, I guess I wouldn' t and in light I guess of what your I/ 11 Planning Commission Meeting November 1, 1989 - Page 6 I ' experience is Paul and the fact that we' re going to have a discussion on flag lots, I guess I 'd probably go along with recommending the variance but hesitantly. Going on, you've satisfied whereas in the past we were looking for access over to the east and you've satisfied we don' t need that? That would not be useful? Krauss : Well , let me say that we think that access to serve the properties to the east is still an issue. We just don't think that this is the way to resolve it. The road as was proposed, the road extension really in our view is inappropriate. A 15 foot setback from somebody' s front door for an ' existing home doesn' t work very well unless you assume that home' s going to be removed. In creating a line of double frontage lots along Lake Lucy also raises some significant reservations. ' Erhart: This pond, are we creating this pond on Lot 6? Krauss : Yes. 1 Erhart: Okay. The applicant has been made aware of all the Fish and Wildlife recommendations for the pond? Krauss : . . .to a small retention pond . Erhart: It ' s just too small? I guess that ' s all I can think of right now. Conrad: Steve, what were your comments on serving the future development? Would you go through that? Emmings: I guess my notion was just that if there' s potential for that land to develop. It ' s a big piece and it' s within the MUSA and as land becomes more valuable, if you wind up doing any kind of a development back ' there and I think you can foresee that there' s certainly a possibility, that would mean then that a road would have to take the place of that bituminous drivway and you'd have, for one thing you'd have double frontage lots. You'd be creating double frontage lots in the existing development that we' re looking at tonight and you'd wind up with a road access, well if you could, you'd wind up with the accesses onto Lake Lucy that are very close together . Potentially one where the driveway is, Eagle Circle and ' then maybe even one immediately to the east there so it seems to me that the reasonable thing to do would be to preserve an easement off the end of the cul-de-sac back to Block 2 at this time whether you use it or not but just in the event that there' s development there in the future. Conrad: Paul , what's your reaction to that? ' Krauss : I don' t disagree with the theory behind that. The problem I see with it is right here you've got a 12 foot cut. Anything we do to lower this cul-de-sac is going to make the cut more severe and we've already had, there's not a lot of trees up there right now but we've had some language put in about tree preservation there. There' s another 12 foot cut approximately over there. There's really no practical way to come right through here up the hill . If you were to go with something like that , the only way to do it would be something along the lines that Tim was Planning Commission Meeting I/ November 1, 1989 - Page 7 suggesting which might be to roll off at some point back onto that driveway II because that driveway goes up a more gentle grade. Conrad: So that property to the rear Paul , how are we going to service that if it does get split up? Krauss: At this point with the way the ordinance is structured , you don' t have to serve it. You are serving it with the existing driveway. You don' t have to further subdivide it. It' s somewhat difficult to guess at the future. I can show you this but unfortunately it just doesn' t reproduce very well . If you want to come over and take a look at it. This was the composite that we put together because it really was the only way to see it. What you've got is the home . Here' s the top of the hill . Here' s where they're excavating out the top of the hill to put in the cul-de-sac . Here's the grade and you can see how the driveway starts coming up the grade right there and there' s a pretty significant bluff overlooking the wetland. This whole area, this corner here is really not part of that hillside and is probably not developable. The home, the swimming pool and the garage are pretty centrally located and . . .against subdividing it unless they' re all removed. Erhart: This is all high ground over here? I Krauss: This is all high ground back here . Erhart: How would that be served? Krauss: The MUSA line comes through here right now. What we were I thinking, and we haven' t had a chance to illustrate this is we were looking at if the MUSA line's expanded and if this property is subdivided bringing in another public street as a cul-de-sac or a thru street and coming back down through here. (The commissioners were carrying on separate coversations at this point during discussion.) ' Richard Ersbo: I sit up on a hill that would be almost impossible for the cul-de-sac to go there. If you look over the back there, I have a drop down a hole about 40 feet and I 'm sitting up higher than that. To put a cul-de-sac from where that. . . I 'm sitting on a big hill. It' s not flat. We went over this whole thing about 10 times already and this was the most feasible way we could do the whole thing. This is the third time we were ' going to have this approved. Krauss : Let me say this. If I thought development was it not emminent but II realistic on that parcel, we would try to do something to access it possibly a different way at this point. What we would make that determination is that we respect. . .opinion but what' s more important to us if you look at the ground as easily developable. In our opinion, this ground isn't up here for a variety of reasons. The placement of the home and the grades being the most significant . Richard Ersbo: It'd be easier to put a ski slope down this. , 1 IIPlanning Commission Meeting November 1, 1989 - Page 8 II IConrad : My only comment is on the wetland alteration permit. It' s more the process than this particular application. Normally, are we still having the applicants fill out a form for a wetland alteration permit? IIOlsen: We have that when they' re actually going to be affecting or altering the wetland itself. We do give that form out. A lot of times the I applicants don't have the knowledge to fill it out. It gets pretty detailed . When it' s a larger subdivision that they really are going to be putting ponds within it and they have the services, we do still have them fill that out. This one we did not. IConrad : I guess just as a general point, I think we have to go through that process because Jo Ann you understand it but over the years I think II it' s been adapted to what kind of works and we don' t know what that is. This particular application just triggered the thought again that I 'm not seeing the real application. If it requires a permit, I guess I 'm II interested in seeing the application unless you persuade me, I understand what you' re doing but I guess I 'd like to go back through the mechanics of that process and typically what we had been doing Paul is that we'd have technical documentation, whether it be DNR or Fish and Wildlife or IIwhatever, accompany it or a report coming back from one of those experts that made us feel good . They were really helping us interpret our ordinance is basically what they were doing. But I 'm not seeing that IIanymore so I 'm not sure what we should be doing and maybe Jo Ann, given all her time here, is pretty comfortable but I 'm kind of lost again because my first reaction here was what are we doing to the wetland and how does it II impact our ordinance and obviously not much but I don't know that. So I guess to our list of things to do, I kind of want to review the process . I don't know that we need to recreate anything but it' s more the process sometime so at least I understand where we' re going again. I have no other II comments on this other than the street name. I guess I 'm with Steve. I would think a special name called Eagle Circle would be clearer than a Court, Circle, Lane. That seems harder for me. If I were driving a fire I truck, I 'd rather find the only Eagle Street in town than one that I might be confused on but again, that's not my area of expertise. Krauss : I used to drive the fire truck. In a community like ours or I others in which I 've worked, when it's all said and done. The City's fully developed and you have 400 cul-de-sacs, it' s hard to remember where they all are but if you prefer what we can do is just delete any reference to II that condition now and we can consult with the fire marshall before it goes to the City Council and get a final reading on that. 1 Conrad : Any more discussion? Is there a motion? Batzli : I move that the Planning Commission recommends approval of Wetland Alteration Permit Request #88-7 as presented on the plat stamped Received I October 11th? Mine doesn' t say October 11th though. I don' t think. Is there a different plan for the wetland? My plan' s stamped like October 26th or something. IIConrad : Yeah, mine too. 11 1 n Meeting Planning z g mnission Co t e g November 1, 1989 - Page 9 Batzli : Was there a separate set of plans? Emmings : It says as presented on the plat and it wouldn' t be would it? Batzli : Okay, well October 26th I ' ll say for now, 1989 subject to the following conditions. Conditions 1 thru 4 with the following added to the end of condition 1. The words "to the west" and a new condition 5 which reads compliance with conditions of Subdivision #87-36. Emmings: Second. , Batzli moved, Emmings seconded that the Planning Commission recommend approval of Wetland Alteration Permit Request #88-7 as presented on the plat stamped October 26, 1989 and subject to the following conditions : 1. Acquisition of a drainage easement from the adjacent property owner to II the west . 2. Approval of a permit from the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources. 3. Creation of a storm water retention pond in the northwest corner of Lot in 6, Block 1. 4. Installation of Type 3 erosion control between the development and the Class A wetland. ' 5. Compliance with the conditions of Subdivision #87-36. All voted in favor and the motion carried. , Conrad : Is there a motion on the preliminary plat? I Wildermuth: I move the Planning Commission approve Subdivision #87-36 as presented on the plat stamped October 11th with a variance to allow a 30 foot lot width on Lot 1, Block 2 and subject to the conditions 1 thru 6. Batzli : I' ll second it. I think the plans are again October 26th, not October 11th. Wildermuth: I ' ll make that October 26th. Batzli : And we don't want to say something like changing the name of the I street designated Eagle Circle to something approved by the Public Safety Department. Is that just going to be handled between. . . ' Wildermuth : . . .check with the Fire Chief. Conrad: It' s not here is it? I 1/ Planning Commission Meeting November 1, 1989 - Page 10 I 1 Batzli : No . It would be something they'd do. Conrad: I 'm just happy keeping it out of here unless you want to put it in. 1 Batzli : That' s fine as long as they, I remember seeing something actually from the Fire Chief or somebody at the Public Safety saying that they 1 didn' t want the same names in different locations in the City but I don' t recall them saying anything about this instance. Do we want a condition 7 indicating compliance with the wetland alteration permit? 1 Emmings: Yeah. Wildermuth: It' d probably be a good idea . Wildermuth moved, Batzli seconded that the Planning Commission recommend ' approval of Subdivision Request #87-36 as presented on the plat stamped "Received October 26, 1989" with a variance to allow a 30 foot lot width on Lot 1, Block 2, subject to the following conditions : 1 1. Provide final detailed plans of the streets and utility improvements . The plans should be modified as follows : a. Increase the paved cul-de-sac radius to 42 feet . b. Replace the existing 6" sanitary sewer to Lake Lucy Road and utilize an 8" line exclusively to serve the plat. c. Extend water main service between Lots 2 and 3 with a stub ending at the east property line. 1 d . The fire hydrant at the end of the cul-de-sac is to be provided with a 10 foot clear radius. I2. Lots 1 and 6, Block 1 are to gain access solely by driveway to Eagle Circle. Access to Lake Lucy Road is prohibited. A notice of this limitation should be placed in shared title of both lots . 3. Provide final erosion control plans acceptable to staff. Type III erosion control will be required along teh western perimeter of teh site adjacent to the wetland. Prior to the initiation of grading, staff will walk the site with the developer to mark out trees designated for preservation. Staff will modify the plans as required to improve tree preservation efforts . Drainage swales are to be provided around eafch of the homes. The berm located in the Lake Lucy Road right-of-way is to be relocated onto Lot 1, Block 1. 4. Provide final drainage plans for approval by City Staff. Provide a skimmer device on the sedimentation pond. Redirect the pond outlet directly into the wetland providing the City with such easements that may be required to cross an adjacent property. Watershed District approval of the plat is required. 1 Planning Commission Meeting 1/ November 1, 1989 - Page 11 I 5. Easements to be provided : 1 a. Right-of-way for Eagle Circle. b. Request the City Council vacate right-of-way for existing streets and easements approved under the original plat. c. Utility easements are required for the proposed watermain and ' sanitary sewer alignments including the watermain stub between Lots 2 and 3 to the eastern property line. d. Drainage and utility easements are required over the pond and storm sewer pipes on Lot 6, Block 1; Lot 1, Block 2 and based upon final engineering design may be required over an adjacent parcel to the west. e. Standard utility easements around the perimeter of each lot. , 6. Enter into a development contract with the City. 7. Compliance with the conditions of Wetland Alteration Permit #88-7 . ' All voted in favor except Erhart and Emmings who opposed and the motion carried with a vote of 3 to 2. Conrad: And the reasons? Emmings: I think I set them forth enough. It seems to me that this plan could be modified by moving that cul-de-sac along the contour or something. I think it' s short sighted to have the only access to that large lot in the II rear come along that existing driveway. Conrad: Tim, your feelings? ' Erhart: Pretty much the same reasons . I guess I don' t strongly oppose it but I'd sure like us to try a little harder to find a way to avoid having that driveway between those lots . Lot 6, 5 and 4 and that wetland and also 11 to avoid future problems with access in the Lot 1, Block 2. Conrad: Paul , in terms of future use of that driveway that access the back 11 lot, there's no way that the City has to restrict it's use. Krauss: You can' t bind the actions of future Councils either . ' Wildermuth: The topography is going to pretty well restrict the use right? Conrad: Probably. I Emmings: Give me a bulldozer . I IIPlanning Commission Meeting November 1, 1989 - Page 12 I II Krauss : At this point in time Mr . Chairman, the only way to get additional building back there is to come back and ask for additional variances . The way things are structured right now and that ' s certainly nothing that you have to automatically have to approve. IConrad : I think it' s imporant and obvious things change and Planning Commissions and Councils change but I think it has to be a real clear message that , at least as I voted in favor of this , it was pretty much with the assumption that that back parcel would not be changed. Now you may sell and that' s obviously your right and that future developer or whatever could do whatever but I just don' t, I would not be of mind to allow any I increase traffic on the current one driveway going back but there' s really no way to enforce that posture to my knowledge. Anyway, any other comments? I PUBLIC HEARING: ZONING ORDINANCE AMENDMENT TO AMEND THE CITY CODE WITH REGARD TO IIESTABLISHING THE MAXIMUM LOT SIZE FOR CHURCH DEVELOPMENT AT 15 ACRES. Paul Krauss presented the staff report . IIConrad: It' s a public hearing. It was published. Peter Beck obviously knows that this is an item. I kind of thought he'd be here. Wildermuth: It didn' t give any reaction to it which I 'm surprised at. Conrad : And he is still under retainer? IIOlsen: I showed him the ordinance when Roger first had drafted it when it had 25 acres . When he was still involved with Eckankar , with the IIdevelopment contract and such and that didn' t concern them. Conrad : So the public notice was sent to Peter or was it sent to Eckankar ' or how? Krauss : I think it was sent to Peter . 1 Conrad: And we would send it to him versus the property owners? Olsen : It just was given to him because he happened to be in the office Ithe day I received it actually. Conrad : Are we comfortable that that' s. . . Krauss: Legal notice is published in the official newspaper . Conrad : And there is no other policy stating that we individually identify Ithose that are impacted by the Ordinance? Olsen : We've done it in the past . I Planning Commission Meeting November 1, 1989 - Page 13 Erhart: There' s some other churches that own property in this city. There's the, what is it? Krauss : There' s the church that owns the property down by the apartment building that's up for sale right now. ' Olsen : Lakeview. Emmings: And Westside Baptist has that piece out on TH 41. I Erhart: But that's not down here. Krauss : But there' s no church building on there. Erhart: No, but they would be impacted by such an ordinance. I Olsen: Westside Baptist already has approval . Well we could do that. We can notify them. I Wildermuth: If we passed this , would we have to grant a variance to those people? Krauss : Well it's a matter of conjucture. You don' t have to. If you want to see the rest of the property develop, you may. There's different ways of subdividing that property up and if there was an internal street built on their property to serve the church and to serve whatever development might be proposed , then the probability of it is that the site could be less than 15 acres. If they want to plat out a large enough piece of II ground possibly for expansion or whatver but to get their site extended out to the street that exists now, we think it would be something in the order of about 25-26 acres . Erhart: Paul , would this have any immediate tax impact on the Eck property? Krauss : No. According to the information we've received from the City ' Attorney, it shouldn't have any at all. According to Roger , churches are entitled to a tax exemption for property that they' re using for church purposes. Erhart: I know but if we' re defining that now to be 15 acres instead of 174, isn't that the intent of this ordinance? ' Krauss : I don' t believe that it would have any impact on that. Olsen: The intent was that another church couldn't come in and buy another II 100 acres and possibly got that whole 100 acres tax exempt . I think we' re finding that even if they have 100 acres, that that would not all become tax exempt anyway. Erhart: But that's exactly what these guys have done. They've come in and bought 174 acres . , I Planning Commission Meeting November 1, 1989 - Page 14 11 Olsen : It' s not determined that that 174 acres will not be taxed . ' Erhart: Okay. So the object of the ordinance then is what? Krauss: Presumably to put an upper cap on the magnitude of the church development that you might see in the community. Conrad : To restrict the non-taxable. Krauss: That would be the net effect. If the church site was 15 acres , that would be what it would be taxed on. Erhart: Okay, you' re saying if someone came in with just a huge church. Wildermuth: Even a small church on a very large parcel . . . it says a church on church property. Erhart : What portion of the Eck property now is exempt from tax? Olsen: I don' t know that that's been determined . Batzli : It' s all being taxed right now. Erhart: Wouldn' t they come in and apply for tax exemption for the whole thing? IIWildermuth: Not until they get a structure built and start holding services . Olsen: They' re going to try but it' s not sure if they' ll get it. II Erhart: Then at least this would give us some basis to argue for not giving exemption for more than 15 acres so it is, what we' re trying to do. Olsen: Carver County the taxes. Krauss : It ' s also a question of, I don' t think anything like this has ever been tested. Emmings: Why wouldn' t it be grandfathered? Why wouldn' t they, or would that be their argument that they' re grandfathered in because this ordinance was passed after their approval . Krauss : Well yeah but they wouldn' t be grandfathered in because they're coming in for subdivision presumably after this ordinance. Emmings: I see . When you came in for subdivision is when this would apply? Okay. Krauss : I mean if you had an existing church site that was 20 acres , you would be grandfathered in, yes. IIErhart: Are we still in the public hearing? Planning Commission Meeting November 1, 1989 - Page 15 Conrad: We still are. 1 Wildermuth: . . .right now because when they do come in for building their 11 structure, for a building permit. Olsen: It' s already out. Krauss: It's already issued. 1 Olsen: They're constructing . Wildermuth: They've already started? Olsen: Yes. 1 Wildermuth: Steve, I think you' re probably right . They probably will be grandfathered in. f 1 Emmings: I don' t know. What they're talking about is when they come in. . . Wildermuth: Until they subdivide. 1 Conrad: They're grandfathered in . If they ever subdivide. This is still a public hearing so any comments city council members? 1 Councilman Boyt: I do have a comment. I 'm against this. I think this is , I said it at the Council meeting, I think this is a bad move for the City II to make. I personally don' t think the city should be in the business of telling churches how big they should be. The tax impact as I think you noticed during the Eckankar situation is actually a plus in terms of expenses. They have this land sitting vacant than to have individual homes II go on it. But the bigger issue for me is I don' t believe the City should be in the business of limiting the size of churches. Batzli : Can I ask one question Bill? How does that square with your 1 argument of not allowing churches in the CBD and taking them off the tax roll in that case? Councilman Boyt: I think that' s a good question. In the central business district we're talking about property that is definitely a revenue generator for the City. If you were talking , I think there' s a good zoning 1 reason to say that churches don't belong in the central business district . The land is simply too valueable but I wouldn' t say that about the residential single family. I Wildermuth: The same thing' s going to apply to that property along TH 5 though or along the Boulevard. Councilman Boyt: I don' t disagree with that. I 'm also not in favor of going in and removing churches that already in the central business district. I mean they're there. I wouldn' t encourage more to be there. 11 IIPlanning Commission Meeting November 1, 1989 - Page 16 I I Wildermuth: I don' t think there'd be any legal way to do it even if you wanted to. Councilman Boyt : I don' t know. That' s a good point to think through. Does I it make a difference not having them in the zone at all versus controlling the size and I do think the City has the ability and should use it to determine where businesses should be with the zoning ordinance. I 'm just I not comfortable with limiting the size . I don' t particularly want Chanhassen to be the first suburb in the country to do that. Certainly the first suburb in Minnesota . IIConrad : How did you conclude Bill that it' s saving us money? Councilman Boyt: Well they' re not putting any tax demand on the City. IConrad : So you make an assumption that there would be smaller , cheaper houses going in? ICouncilman Boyt : If they build houses that are above the City average, it' s my understanding that it would probably generate income for the City so that' s possible. The tax argument may not hold a lot of water . I guess I I just base mine more on the concern that I don't want to be telling churches how big they can be. IIConrad: Don, any comments on this one? Mayor Chmiel : No . I guess I look at it from the aspect of looking at what I we have in town presently such as St. Hubert's and the local churches . Neither of those exceed 15 acres . I think what I was looking at was that we not have that much acreage available such as the Temple of Eck is looking at. Them putting in their church and trying to have it totally I exempt, that's not going to happen. At least. . .County Attorney' s office but I think we should have some limitations as to what can be within the community as far as taking the total amount of tax off of the rolls for the I properties . I think that' s somewhat of a concern that I have basically. what I see too is we have a lot of things within our city that are all tax exempt. Many of the things like the Arboretum. Parks . There' s a lot of land that's . . .so my major concern is potential of having a restriction I on. . . I Batzli moved , Wildermuth seconded to close the public hearing . All voted in favor and the motion carried. The public hearing was closed . I Conrad : Tim, we' ll start down at your end . What do you think about what' s proposed? Erhart: This was initiated in Council? How long ago was that or is it Ijust that it came in conjunction with the public hearings for Eck? And the Attorney has, according to your report here, reviewed it all? IOlsen: He wrote the ordinance. Planning Commission Meeting November 1, 1989 - Page 17 Erhart : Yeah but he' s satisfied that there' s precedent? I have a hard time reading these things. There's two ways to look at this thing. One that' s from the tax standpoint. The other one is from a standpoint, are we trying to prevent some church organization from coming in and doing a great big development? For what reason would a church want to use more than 15 in acres for a church? Would it be a conference center then also? Krauss : Presumably a church with an affiliated school could take up that 11 much property. A church with some other facility, be it a camp or whatever . I 've worked on a number of churches over the years and I 've never seen one bigger than 15 acres. Including one that relocated out of Hopkins into Minnetonka, that old Apostolic Lutheran which had a congregation of upwards to 1,100. They were on a considerably smaller site than that. Conrad : We' re really restricting a campus type of environment. The 11 question is, do you want to extract that or do you want to. . . Erhart : There' s two questions I think. It' s an offsetting question. I think what we' re trying to do is strengthen our tax position with this ordinance. The offset, what does it do if someone comes in and says I want to build a church campus, a legitimate church campus. I guess my reaction is, they come along and we can always review the ordinance at that time so I guess if we' re strengthening our position with regard to taxes, I have no problem with the ordinance and it seems to me that if 15 acres makes sense, give them what we have here today. Lastly, I guess we probably ought to go out and give this to the existing church owners in the City that have more than 15 acres. I know they' re going to tell us, they' re all going to tell you, even the church I go to, they' re going to say we don' t want any restrictions we don' t need but we ought to probably do that but I guess I 'd support the ordinance. This issue is a big one. Conrad: Steve, you've got to have some interesting opinions . Emmings: I don' t have any opinions. I agree with the general notion that we don't want a lot of land off the tax rolls for churches and I think we want to allow people to build their churches and 15 acres seems like a lot to me. I probably would have picked a smaller number but I just wonder if 11 let' s say that you have some clever church person come in and they buy a 45 acre parcel and they subdivide it into 3 15 acre lots and they put their church on one. They put their church school on the next one and they put a church camp on the next one. Aren't they now all exempt? All three of them. Wildermuth: No. ' Emming: Why? Wildermuth: Because if they meet the State requirements for the test , at least one of the factors for the test, they have to conduct church services on the site. Emmings: I don' t think so. I IIPlanning Commission Meeting November 1, 1989 - Page 18 II IIIOlsen: Church purposes. Krauss : Church purposes and one of the questions . . . IEmmings: Now wait a minute. I don't get the exemption just because I 'm a church. I get it because I 'm for a whole bunch of reasons . There are a I whole bunch of non-profit organizations that get tax exemption for the various reasons . I think that it wouldn' t be too hard to get around this. Now I don' t know if that's. . .by Roger . This only deals with churches. It doesn' t deal with the other activities of religious organizations and I I think I could put together 45 acres like I said and I don' t think you could tax me. I don' t know. Maybe I 'm wrong or maybe if we thought about it more, we could think of a better example that would do what I 'm suggesting I could be done but like Tim, I 'm in favor of attempting to limit this . I don't think this does it and I wish maybe you'd get some comments from Roger on that before it gets to City Council . I 'm going to vote for it I hoping that it will do something but I don't see how it will work. Erhart: If I could comment . I think in your example there, it seemed to understand that we have an ordinance that says that two pieces of property I that are under the same owner , two contiguous pieces of property under the same ownership is treated as one parcel in the city which I don' t agree with that but that ' s the ordinance. I don' t agree with it but that is the IIordinance. It may apply there. Emmings: But I guess the point is, if I have a 15 acre limit on one activity and it may be that I have a 15 acre limit on my church and have IIall my other activities on a 30 acre parcel next door and since it isn' t specifically a church, maybe my non-profit charitable status will get me tax exemption on the 30 acre parcel . IWildermuth : Well yeah it will . Under the State Subdivision. . .exempt property, all acadamies, colleges, universities. . . IIEmmings: So it seems very easy to get around to me. It does not seem effective to me but Roger 's probably thought this through and would know better than I for sure but that' s the only comment I 've got. Oh, I 've got I one other comment. Sorry. I 'm not concerned about what Bill 's concerned about. About telling churches how big they can be because I think number one, it's hard to imagine a church wanting more than 15 acres. With 70% II coverage, that means a church that ' s 10 acres. That ' s a big church. That's almost a Cub or a Fleet Farm so I 'm not concerned about it and if this would work, you still wouldn' t be limiting their size. You'd say, but you're only going to get exemption on 15 acres and the rest are going to IIhave to pay taxes on. That doesn' t bother me at all . Batzli : I don't like this ordinance. I don' t like it before or after the II amendment. They've deleted one portion of the ordinance which appeared to determine whether this section applied to churches both within and outside of the MUSA line and I would clarify that by adding something to the start M of this such as the following applies to all churches since the next section applies to those churches outside the MUSA line. I don' t think r 'n Commission M Planning Comm sszo Meeting November 1, 1989 - Page 19 residential concentration is defined anywhere. The structure must be set back 50 feet. Well , what structure are we talking about? Are we talking about the church which is a defined definition or what are we talking about when we say structure? Are we talking about developed or undeveloped non- residential property? Are we talking about net or gross maximum lot size? If we' re going to change the ordinance, I 'd like to see us change the whole ordinance and make it a working ordinance. I don' t think this is it. I don't even like the principle of limiting the maximum lot size of churches. II So I'm going to vote against it. Wildermuth: I don' t see that this ordinance really. . .so basically I 'm in favor of it although I think Brian' s comments and the ordinance itself are II very worth while. It seems like there should be more. . . Better definitions to put some teeth into it. Conrad : I don' t have too much of a concern with the ordinance. The things II that I think it would restrict are the campus uses. I guess I 'm not real interested in encouraging, I don't see a net benefit for those campus uses. II The trade off is being more acreage closer to town possibly or for development and for taxes. I do have a question though. Do we want this to be a blanket, across the board restriction by all zoning districts or are there exceptions? Wildermuth: That' s a good point. Conrad : Supposed agriculture. Is there a case to be made out in the agricultural district to put a church out there or would we never, well we did allow a church outside the MUSA line. r Batzli : On TH 41 there? Conrad : On 41. r Erhart: Even there it's less desireable to have bigger churches. You just don't have the services. r Conrad : So is that a case where it would never happen? I can make a real good case for the Eckankar property. It really is taking out some land that I think should be used for other things in the long run and I think it's real unfortunate that, it' s going to force us to develop other lands earlier than they should. Therefore, I think it' s really unfortunate that that's happening yet if there's an agricultural area that a church wants to move out on, I'm not sure that I care. Batzli : I don' t think that owning a lot of property necessarily means that II the church is big either. I think that' s a mistaken assumption. A church may want to build on 200 acres and only have a 5 acre spot that' s really landscaped and developed and has a church on it. They may want to be isolated. Erhart: Yeah, but that' s zoned. r i IIPlanning Commission Meeting November 1, 1989 - Page 20 II Conrad : It' s still not taxable but the agricultural taxes are Isignificantly lower . Wildermuth: They can still own the property. . . IIConrad: Yeah, if they subdivided it. I don't know. Councilman Boyt: The question I 'd like to ask, in listening to your I discussion about why you support this, it seems as though it' s tax related so why isn' t the ordinance aimed at all tax exempt organizations? Why are we signaling out churches? IEmmings : Wait now. Didn' t the impulse for this thing come from the City Council? Maybe you could fill us in? 11 Councilman Boyt : No I can' t. Emmings : I can' t either . My initial reaction to this was that this was I retaliatory because members of the City Council who, it had that appearance at least that it was retaliatory in some ways because people on City Council were opposed to that church for whatever reason. This came out II immediately thereafter and just the timing of it made it look that way and I didn' t like it for that reason but nevertheless it fits with my own instincts that tell me that that churches shouldn' t own big pieces of land II that are tax exempt. So I agree with you to some extent. That would be better to have it broader . Erhart: The difference I think though is that the other exempt parcels, II arboretums, universities, parks are public owned land where this is private owned property. I think that' s the difference. That ' s why you wouldn' t apply this to those. IIEmmings: But are there other privately owned tax exempt? Batzli : Camp Tanadoona . 11 Emmings: The campfire girls. IConrad: They' re not tax exempt are they? Emmings: Oh yeah. IIBatzli : They' re non-profit. Emmings : Sure. They' re tax exempt. They couldn' t survive there. They Ican't survive as it is. Erhart: The other question I had is why are we writing this Section 2 that I says this ordinance shall be effective immediately upon it's passage and publication but shall not apply to churches which have applied for building permit or which have received City Council approval before it's effective IIdate? Why does that have to be in there at all? r Planning Commission Meeting November 1, 1989 - Page 21 Olsen: To grandfather in existing uses . To grandfather in the Eckankar . ' Erhart: Why do we want to do that? If we have to do that, why have the ordinance? The probability of having another church coming in with 200 acres. Krauss: Any time you adopt an ordinance that has a standard different than something that's in the ground, it's automatically grandfathered in. , Erhart: Yeah, so I 'm just saying why do we have to make it. . . Olsen: We probably don't because they already have their building permit I now. Emmings : Are we really talking about churches or are we really talking I about maybe privately owned tax exempt activities? Batzli : I'd feel much better about it if it was that rather than just churches. Conrad : You feel we' re treating churches unfairly? Signaling them out? Emmings: Yeah. Batzli : If you' re really doing it for the tax base, I would make it I broader . Emmings: That would be consistent. I Wildermuth: Cover all the tax exempt organizations. Erhart: Privately owned tax exempt uses . ' Conrad: I 'll go back to my opinion. I feel that the Eckankar, because of it' s proximity to downtown Chan is a real problem. I don' t have the same problem if it was located 2 miles west. Then I don' t really care even though I 'm putting maybe off a problem to the future. I think my concern is inappropriate use close to where we're encouraging development. I Erhart: The way to look at it Ladd, if it' s outside the MUSA line they' re probably not paying that much tax for farmland anyway. With green acres it' s pretty reasonable. Then at that point when that land gets in the MUSA line and that area gets developed and the tax rate goes up, then in fact we want this kind of ordinance to sort of automatically take effect, which it will. , Wildermuth: I guess I would be in favor of giving this back to Roger and having him look at extending this. . .impact on property. We' re talking about. . .rather than just single family churches. Conrad: What kind of impact on Roger ' s time would that be, and staff time? Krauss : I don' t think it's terribly significant. 11 IIPlanning Commission Meeting November 1, 1989 - Page 22 11 I Conrad : This is not a real high priority for me right now but if it' s not a major review and cost. IIOlsen: We can do that. Conrad : And you'd want to just look to private ownership but what would you be telling them to do? To review it? To draft and ordinance that II would encourage all of that and then if that went to City Council and they weren't happy, they could keep the part that they wanted couldn' t they? II Erhart: Additionally, just to find out if there' s some problem we don' t perceive at this point with expanding this to privately owned non tax paying organizations . Maybe there' s something we' re not thinking about . 11 Batzli : The more I think about it, I just don't like the idea at all . I mean I don' t know that if Camp Tanadoona wasn' t there and it came in tomorrow, I wouldn' t be in favor of them setting up a camp on the lake. IIErhart: How many acres do they have? IIConrad: It must be over 15. Emmings: Oh yeah . IIErhart: I bet it's more like 80. Emmings: Oh yeah , I 'd say so. IIErhart : Camp Tanadoona . How many acres do they own now? IIOlsen: I 'd say almost 100. Emmings: That' s a big parcel . It goes all the way out to TH 5. IIOlsen: It's just like Zimmerman's property almost. Batzli : So I guess my earlier statement that I 'm not in favor of limiting 1 churches and I don't know that that really does it for me. Privately held non-profit. I Emmings: Or maybe we should ask Roger too if there is anything to the idea that if they' re limited on one parcel , if they couldn't simply subdivide and have it on contiguous parcels. IIKrauss: We can get that clarified. Conrad : I think for sure Steve' s comment is, I think we've got to research IIthat. I think Brian brought up some wording and things that I think we might as well improve it or at least send it along to City Council with a little bit improved wording if we go with either a positive or negative II recommendation . I guess the other question is to research the other parts that we've been talking about. I 'm not sure if that will , by including II Planning Commission Meeting 11 November 1, 1989 - Page 23 more. . .coverage that may take my vote away from a positive vote on this one but I don't know. Emmings: It's tough because what Brian says is right. What if the Campfire organization came in and said we want to put in a camp for kids here and a conference center that' s going to be tax exempt . I think we'd be all for it. I really do. Wildermuth: But not on a site like 175 acres. ' Conrad: You wouldn't put it close to downtown. Emmings: You wouldn' t want it close to downtown but how do you ever define that? Conrad : I don' t know. I don' t know how to do that. Emmings: Eckankar, you're right. Eckankar is a simple example and there are a lot of hard ones . I think we should table it. Batzli : You know that old legal maxim. Hard facts don' t make good law. Conrad : Is there a motion? Wildermuth moved, Emmings seconded to table action on the Zoning Ordinance 11 Amendment to amend the City Code establishing maximum lot size for church development to 15 acres and referring the item to the City Attorney. All voted in favor and the motion carried. APPROVAL OF MINUTES: Batzli moved, Wildermuth seconded to approve the Minutes of the Planning Commission meeting dated October 18, 1989 as presented. All voted in favor and the motion carried . OPEN DISCUSSION AND CITY COUNCIL UPDATE: Erhart: What's Cenvesco going to do? What's their next move? I Krauss : We're waiting for them to come back with a revised plan. The item was pulled at their request. I Conrad : Pulled for what reason? Krauss: Cenvesco pulled it. If you read through the staff report, we raised a number of issues regarding the accuracy of the plan and various criteria. Apparently on the advice of Peter Beck who' s been retained by the developer, they pulled for approximately 30 days. We asked for and received a letter stating that this delay is at their request. Erhart: This Peter Beck is the Attorney for Eck or is he Eck? IIPlanning Commission Meeting November 1, 1989 - Page 24 11 Krauss : He' s with Larkin-Hoffman. rErhart : You mind if I have a question on your critique of the things. II Emmings: You' re not going to go into this? Mr. Chairman. I have never sought a ruling from the chair for the years I 've been here but now I want you to shut him down until the meeting is adjourned and he can talk to them all he wants . I have had a belly full of Cenvesco. IIErhart: This has nothing to do with Cenvesco. IEmmings: You' re looking at a Cenvesco packet. Erhart: I know. You have a statement, in addition there is a Class B II wetland with a 75 foot setback and wooded area cannot be used towards the net density calculation. Where did we start excluding wooded areas now? Is this a mistype? IIOlsen: Yes . Krauss : It ' s out of context. 1 Erhart: You had me worried . I'm planting all these trees on my property so when I retire. II Krauss : That was one of the few items they raised at our meeting that we agreed with them on. II Olsen: We' re going to be bringing that up to you because in the definition of net density, it' s any area unbuildable. Well , we need to discuss what does that mean because sometimes that ' s been implied to mean steep slopes , Ivegetated areas. Conrad : Paul , just a real , you had some, or staff. You and Jo Ann had some good comments on Cenvesco. There was more substance in this analysis I that gave us some numbers to shoot for . Numbers that they should shoot for. One that was missing however was the number of access drives. That was sort of left open but if it came back, I think it' s really good and I II think maybe you can negotiate that wetland but again it' s really neat when you have some magical formulas and say here's what you've got to hit. So I really appreciated the staff report from that standpoint. However , you have so many good arguments against the poor design that I would have had a II hard time going with your positive motion because there were so many good arguments that said hey, I don't know what it is. I don't see a site plan that reflects the good arguments. 1 Wildermuth: It seemed like it should have been tabled again. IConrad : I think it should have been turned down based on that. Krauss: There's a couple reasons for that and we can discuss some of them after the meeting closes but one thing that you need to be concerned with IIon this and on several other projects is that State law gives you a certain I Planning Commission Meeting November 1, 1989 - Page 25 period of time on which to act on projects after which it' s approved . And 11 you' re oftentimes in a stronger position laying out exactly what you' re looking for and voting to affirm it with those conditions than you are to either let it drag on or to deny it. Erhart : If the guy keeps coming up with the same plan and you keep denying II it, after a while. . . Krauss : We haven' t denied it. We' ve continued it. ' Erhart: But if you deny it, the clock is reset? Krauss : That' s right and in fact we think we' re going to resolve another one, Vineland Forest in the next few weeks but if we did not, we were going to bring recommendation to the City Council that they deny it just to stop II the clock. Conrad : I guess if this comes back, even so, I would have a hard time going for, when you bring up all the valid points which basically means that they don' t have that many restrictions up there. They just simply don't. They have a lot of acreage. Their only restriction is finances and to present what they continue to present is just not, it' s not worth my 1 dime to show up and give them an hour of my life every third night. I just want to clear them out. I really can' t afford to talk to them anymore until they start meeting the intent of our ordinances and they' re not. I just offer that as my comment. I certainly couldn' t have gone for this one in the positive mode after some of the persuasive arguments that you've created in here. I don' t know. I don' t know what that tells you for the next time through. I guess we have to be prepped if we should pass it on through just to stop the clock but I really don't want to spend my life reviewing Cenvesco anymore. Erhart: I 'd just support everything . I think you did a nice job of analyzing this thing and I also agree I 'm getting tired of looking at it. My question is , we were given the opportunity I thought in the joint II meeting we had with City Council to do some pre-emptive strikes here and to get some of these things quickly into the ordinance and make these guys comply to them such as requirements for double car garages and. . . Is there any reason why we shouldn' t be doing that? Krauss: No. Now in reviewing Cenvesco, we looked at the existing ordinances and interpretted them the way we felt we could and found some latitude in those ordinances that wasn' t exercised before but to more direclty answer your question, we scheduled public hearings on a number of ordinance amendments at the next meeting. In particular we've redrafted the entire parking and loading section in the entire site plan review section. Filling in what I perceive to be a lot of significant holes. Now we've also discussed that two car parking requirement but rather than just , come up with a one sentence ordinance change we've changed the whole thing because we felt it was just a deficient section. Erhart: I was referring to the two car garage. I r IPlanning Commission Meeting November 1, 1989 - Page 26 II Krauss : Yes , that' s in there but it' s in there with a lot of other things. IErhart: You're going to make us think? II Conrad : One other thought and then we' re ready to either move on or go home. As they bought the 5 acres to the north, I 'm interested in what those 5 acres do to the property to the north in terms of densities. In IIother words, did we approve anything to the north? Olsen : That was already separated as an outlot. I Conrad: It was an outlot but would it have been used to calculate densities that we granted to Saddlebrook? It wouldn' t have? 11 Olsen: And even then it was single family and they wouldn' t have exceeded in densities . Krauss : Cenvesco is not pushing the density cap in terms of the number of IIunits multiplied over x number of acres . Olsen : But what you' re asking , it doesn' t. . . IIConrad: See I 'm not worried about Cenvesco. I 'm saying well I want to go back, if they' re giving that land, I don't want our decision for density on the lot to the north may have included . IIOlsen: It didn' t. It was already a separate R-12 piece. Separated as a part of the Saddlebrook subdivision so that was never included . 1 Conrad: But it would have been bundled into the overall net density though right? IIOlsen : No. Emmings: It's R-12? IOlsen: It was zoned to R-12. They have the R-4 strip and RSF and then R-12. 11 Emmings: Of course it' s R-12 on the other side of it too isn' t it? The one that's existing, is that R-12 or is it R-8? IIOlsen: That' s R-12 and that' s why Saddlebrook became R-12 is because it' s pretty much all up on the same hill. I Conrad : Any other thing for discussion other than Planning Commission interviews. Do we have anybody? I Olsen : We've got a couple but could you meet like a half an hour earlier next time to interview them or how do you want to do that? II Conrad : What kind of agenda do we have next time? The ones that are tabled here? 1 Planning Commission Meeting 11 November 1, 1989 - Page 27 Olsen : Long. There' s a _lot of those zoning ordinances. Krauss: There's only 2 planning items but there's 4 ordinances . Erhart: Only 2 applicants so far? Olsen: I 've only seen 2. ' Krauss : I've only seen 1. In fact tomorrow morning Jo Ann and I are going to put, I think the closing date was today. I want to see that if we got a II significant number . If we didn' t. . . Erhart: Would it be worthwhile going back to previous applicants? Krauss : We did that. If we didn' t, what we may want to do is talk to the newspapers and ask them to put in an article about it. Conrad : Yeah, I'm not comfortable interviewing two people. We need to interview more than 2. Not that those 2 are bad. I don't have a clue but it' s just, we need 5 to pick from and I don' t now if that' s the magic number . I guess I 'd prefer to wait until we had some choices out there. I can' t believe it. Sometimes nobody wants to be on and then other times, we get 15. Erhart: Wasn' t last time during an election time or something that it brought so much interest in perhaps? Emmings: How many did we have last time? It was 15 to 20. t Krauss : Do you interview all of them? Conrad: Yeah. It was a lot. Olsen: I' ll check. Maybe today wasn' t the deadline but it seemed like we II tried to. Erhart: I'd like us to continue to put out that list of projects . Status II of projects with each meeting. Olsen: The ongoing list. Erhart: Jo Ann you know what I 'm talking about? Olsen: Yeah. You always ask where is that? , Erhart: We kind of like to review whether we' re moving on any of these things. Conrad : On another subject is priorities for this year . Goals. We started and if you recall one Planning Commission meeting we kind of laid out some things we wanted to do. We got City Council input but we never merged the two together and if you took a look at the City Council input, I 0 ?.fanning Commission Meeting November 1, 1989 - Page 28 I there was some consistency in what they were saying we should do. So far I some of those things we've really not addressed. I think we should take a good look again even though, well , I think we should take a good look at what we' re around here to do. fKrauss : I do have one addition thing too. We need to schedule another meeting on the Land Use Plan. I 'd like to distribute a map to everybody that' s involved highlighting those areas that we had some questions about 11 so hopefully people can go walk the site and get a feel for it and Mark and I can develop whatever additional information you need but we should set a meeting date 2 to 3 weeks hence. 11 Emmings: Our next agenda you said only has 2 planning items. IKrauss : And 4 ordinances. Emmings : Do you think that' s too much to put it on? IConrad: Yeah . Olsen : It deals with the parking and the site plan. Conrad: Let' s talk about the week after that then. Do we have one week we' re off. Oh yeah that' s right . IKrauss : Could we do it possibly on a Tuesday that week? Tuesday the 21st? Emmings: I don't know without my calendar . IIOlsen : We can have Vicky call . 1 Conrad : We've got to move it on. We can' t sit on it. Let' s try that week. Let's try Tuesday. I don't want to do it next week. Krauss : No , and quite clearly when we have enough time to prepare Isignificant amounts of information, more is accomplished . Conrad : I went out and took a look at the land that we' re playing around with. The residential little pocket out there and looking at creeks . What' s funny about barriers or things that divide, in the wintertime they' re not as strong as they might be so the tree line that would divide il the houses from the industrial , it ain' t there in the wintertime. It basically has a real nice elevation to look down over the industrial park. You' ve got to get out there and take a look. I don' t know if there' s any magic. I got really confused. I don't have a clue is what it boiled down I to down there but I do know that the residents would have a real good gripe for the 5-6 winter months that we have here. And the trees to the west are intriguing but there' s a lot of residential tucked in here and there. IInteresting. Olsen: This is moving ahead a lot faster than originally thought too . When those people moved in there, I think they were being told, at least IIthe year 2000, 2010. Planning Commission Meetin g 11 November 1, 1989 - Page 29 Emrriings : Why do we ever tell .people stuff like that? Why don' t we just 1 say there are, no one has submitted any plans but when they' ll come we really don' t know. Olsen : Well we tell them that the soonest that it can be and we always say that it can happen sooner. It can happen later . Krauss : You've got to hedge it a little bit but the unfortunate thing is, II people buying real estate hear what they want to hear . Olsen: So they see that there' s a year 2000 on that map. I Conrad: I don't mind you giving out opinions. Geez, I would want. Who else are they going to talk to to get some kind of feel about development? II They can't talk to a developer or other homeowners around. They don' t have a clue . City staff has got, as long as it' s not given in the form of a promise. As long as it' s saying our best guess is and I 'm sure, I have the II utmost confidence that staff wouldn' t be promising something . I think they have to give a feeling to these people. Olsen : And actually that time is when we discussed whether or not we should be pushing for the MUSA line to be amended and that's when the Planning Commission was saying, no let' s wait. Are we ready for that yet and I think that' s where it' s . . . I Krauss : Does Wednesday the 29th work for a meeting? Batzli : Yeah. 1 Conrad : That's not bad . Krauss : Why don' t we shoot for that then and we ' ll get you some information and some maps. 1 Emmings moved , Erhart seconded to adjourn the meeting . All voted in favor and the motion carried. The meeting was adjourned at 9: 25 p.m. . Submitted by Paul Krauss Director of Planning I Prepared by Nann Opheim 11 1 I I PUBLIC SAFETY COMMISSION II REGULAR MEETING OCTOBER 12, 1989 IIChairman Wenzlaff called the meeting to order at 7: 00 p.m. . II MEMBERS PRESENT: Bill Bernhjelm, Craig Blechta, Wayne Wenzlaff, Candy Takunnen, Barb Klick and Bill Boyt MEMBERS ABSENT: Richard Wing IISTAFF PRESENT: Scott Harr , Asst. Public Safety Director and Bob Zydowsky, CSO IAPPROVAL OF MINUTES: Takkunen moved, Klick seconded to table the Minutes of the Public Safety Commission meeting dated September 14, 1989 as the I Commission hadn' t had a chance to read them yet. All voted in favor and the motion carried. 1 VISITOR PRESENTATION: Mary Jo Schaak from Hennepin County gave a presentation on carbon monoxide poisoning and Hyperbaric Chamber . ICARVER COUNTY SHERIFF: I Bob Pagelkopf: I don' t have anything to report other than Doug Chenke was, I wanted to have him here tonight. Our newest officer working here in Chanhassen but he's on his days off and he' s out of town so he will be here at the next meeting in November. As probably most of you know, Jim 11 Castleberry who was our Chief Deputy has left. Blechta: Has he gone now? IPagelkopf: He' s gone now. Friday was his last day. He' s working for the FAA as an investigator but there's a possibility he may be coming back. I He's on leave of absence until the first of the year or so. Depending on how that works out, he may or may not get back here. Klick: I have a question for you. You know the instance that came up with Ithe hunting thing. When you have a new officer that comes, is there a certain orientation to local ordinances and stuff that you do go through? Pagelkopf: They go through a 2 month field training program. Klick: I mean specifically in Chanhassen I guess I 'm saying. Pagelkopf: Well, possibly that's something that wasn't part of his training but I 'm sure it will be in the future. Klick: I mean that's usual routine is what I 'm asking for people that come through, when they come on with your department? Pagelkopf: Right. MIK IIPublic Safety Meeting October 12, 1989 - Page 2 I CHANHASSEN FIRE DEPARTMENT: IHarr: Craig, unless you know of anything. 1 Blechta: The Chiefs are attending a chief' s conference in Rochester . They left today, this morning and I really don' t have a lot. We are having the open house. A reminder to anybody on Sunday the 25th. IIHarr : What time? Blechta: I believe it' s from noon until 5:00 so if you want to come over I and take a look, be our guest. Other than that, there' s not a whole lot. It's been pretty quiet. ICHANHASSEN PUBLIC SAFETY: Harr : The only item that I 'd specifically like to comment on is we had our drug awareness seminar last night. Three speakers. Myself on symptons of drug use and things. Rod Peddycoart on the DARE program. Fred Talbot from South Lake Minnetonka had more drugs here on display than I 've seen in a II long time. It was excellent. We had a rather low turnout but we' ll provide it for whoever will show. It was good. Part of the plan to do that for surrounding communities again for a chance to work together . IBlechta: How many people Scott? Harr: There were 7 citizens and about 8 or 10 city employees. The ' sheriff. Deputy. City Council people. A good chance to give some education. Takkunen: Scott, let me just add that something happened and has happened in the last few weeks to make me aware of the fact that it's important also when talking about drugs to talk about the abuse of drugs that would normal circumstances be fine. Specifically things with increased amount of caffeine or those things that cause you to go to sleep more easily. It would appear that kids don't see that as drug abuse and that that may for many be more of a problem than illicit drugs are, especially for getting I kids. They just don't see it as abuse and they take numbers of over the counter kinds of medicine. IHarr : I think that' s a good point and we included both licit and illicit drugs in the discussion last night, including alcohol. A lot of people think it was just those illegal drugs that Sgt. Talbot was showing but a II lot of the legal drugs or even over the counter medications are subject to abuse. Good point. Takkunen: And that kids can purchase on their own. It's okay for them to 1 do that. Harr : That' s all I have specifically to report Wayne. UNFINISHED BUSINESS: IIWenzlaff: Do we have any unfinished business? Public Safety Meeting I October 12, 1989 - Page 3 II Harr : The one item I wanted to bring up here was regarding animal control . •, We started to discuss the expanded program last month and you wanted to have some additional information. Tonight's a timely time to at least provide a little data because we met with representatives from the other II communities today to discuss the first full month of operation and to look toward the end of the year to determine whether we' ll discontinue it or look at the possibility of continuing it. I think everybody there left II feeling great. People loved it. It was positive. It's been a chance to work with these other communities and interact. Bob's just done a spectacular job. Everybody really appreciates it. The problems have gone II down because there's a central way of dealing with it. Even it's cut back on our work because we'd get animals that wander into our jurisdiction that we didn't know where they came from and we'd spend a lot of time looking elsewhere or impounding and possibly euthanizing it and our impound costs II and euthanizing costs have gone down because now we've got the central records for the area and it' s turning out to be a time saver and a money saver that we hadn't looked at in that respect. Every community said that II they would do anything they could to have the program continue. We kept saying, well we' ll have to consider this or that. Everyone said no problem. We like what' s happened so much that we' ll do anything so where we left it was that Jim and I will put together a proposal over the next 2 I weeks to look at the possibility of continuing it for another year . We' re going to meet with this group again in 2 weeks to look at what the possibilities are and then we' ll return it here and then to the Council for II consideration. Other than a couple of people that I understand approached Don Ashworth that we haven' t heard from personally, everybody' s exceptionally pleased with it as are we. As is the Chan Vet and the I citizens. Every city' s gotten calls from citizens saying hey, this is great. Wenzlaff: Do we know the substance of what those two people were I dissatisfied with? Do you have any idea? Harr : No. I Wenzlaff: Just hearsay? Takkunen: Citizens from other communities? I Harr: I'm not sure Candy. Don just said he'd been called by two people who were concenred that this was an expansionist move. What can you say? Wenzlaff: I noticed from last month' s agenda that there was the concern about the car sales on 78th and TH 101 and we said we would talk about it II again this time. Harr : I think it' s cleared up. We started putting warning citations on every vehicle and it's amazing how fast that works. If one person does it, II people assume gosh , it must be okay. Somebody dumps some garbage along the road so people figure oh, well this must be a new city dump. People park a car with a for sale sign, suddenly there' s 4 or 5 sprouted up so I 've II requested that the deputies and Deb and Bob keep putting warnings on first timers or tagging others for parking violations. Takkunen: So we found out that whatever they were doing was illegal? II Public Safety Meeting October 12, 1989 - Page 4 I Wenzlaff: Have we tagged anyone yet or just warned? Pagelkopf: Just warnings. IWenzlaff: Another education process . Any other unfinished business? Boyt: I don' t know if this is new business or unfinished business but I I should let the commission know that as it stands now, the Council will be discussing the, I don't know exactly what to call it. I guess I 'd call it the enforcement limits on street speed, road speed and I think the ' Commission has discussed it a couple times. I personally think I have a pretty good idea about what the Comission feels about it but if you want to discuss it further before the Council sees it, you might arrange to do that. I Takkunen: Are you saying you intend to put it in writing what the tolerance level is over and above the speed limit? ' Boyt: I don' t know what the resolution is going to be. I just know that I think it needs some public discussion and apparently enough of the rest of • the Council did so it' s on the agenda. Wenzlaff: For the next meeting? I Boyt: I don' t know. Those agenda items have a way of not always ending up on the agenda but I might anticipate them but it could conceiveably be the next meeting . IIKlick: Are you talking enforcement or actually changing speed limits or both? Boyt: No . What I 'm talking about is, what we've talked about I think before is something that might be called officer discretion in terms of when are citations written or not written. I don' t know what the answer I is. I 'm not coming at this with a pre-conceived notion other than that maybe in disagreement with some of the commission members, I think that this is a topic that warrants public discussion. I think the public has a ' right to have some input about what this discretion should be. That's my opinion but you know, if any of you want to clarify your position. I think I have a pretty good idea of what it is but if you want to do that for the record. I just wanted you to have the opportunity. ITakkunen: I guess I 've always been reluctant that I think everybody should think that the speed limit is exactly what it is and if there happens to be I in the minds of a deputy some amount of discretion, I would prefer that it not be written in the newspaper what the discretionary amount is so that the majority of the people who actually drive the speed limit still think Ithat that's what they have to drive. Wenzlaff: I find it real interesting that we're were w orrzed about whether it's 3 miles or 10 miles or 30 miles, whatever it is. The difference between I what' s posted and what gets enforced and we don' t for instance take any active involvement in when we bring a new officer into the community, we don' t know what the training program is. We don' t know how many hours they 11 spend being trained on Chanhassen Statutes and yet we' re worried about Public Safety Meeting October 12, 1989 - Page 5 whether they ticket at 3 or 5 miles over the speed limit? I find that rather unusual. Boyt: Well , let's do both. I don' t think one excludes the other. Wenzlaff: I certainly think the priority level is a great deal more 11 valuable in one area than it is in the other . Barb and all of us I think have been familiar with officers who are new in the community, which is a I problem we' ll always face. We better have some additional or turn over in officers and to for instance not be concerned about how they're trained and how they're made aware of the Chanhassen ordinances that the Council has II acted on and put into place and yet be concerned about a situation that in all other communities that I 'm aware of, that doesn' t mean all . That just means the ones that I'm familiar with, this other part is not even an issue. I think we' ve got our priorities mixed up Bill . , Boyt: Well Wayne, I don't quite understand how you'd come to the conclusion we' re not concerned about the training officers receive before they're assigned to Chanhassen. Wenzlaff: We're certainly not addressing it with the same degree of ferver we are as to what is, I think you termed appropriately an officer discretion issue. I think if you want to deal with officer discretion, you can deal with it as an entire subject and we should have the sheriff' s department and probably the head officer of the sheriff's department there 1 to represent the side of the officer on an officer discretion call. That' s a very fundamental point in police work and yet in things where it should be well defined and we ought to know. If what we're trying to do here is I take control of the contract, which I think is one of the issues, is making certain that we're getting the enforcement that we're asking for and paying for and I don' t mean that as any kind of implication against the sheriff' s department. Not providing it. I mean providing clear information to them what we want. I think there are certainly other points that we would be better off defining long before we get into a discussion over whether we tag at 3 miles or 5 miles or 8 miles over the speed limit. I think that' s I awfully picky compared to a lot of the things that could very well be addressed . Boyt: Well , let' s do that. ' Wenzlaff: Okay. How do we do that? I 'd like to see the focus changed from enforcement limits on street speeds or officer discretion to taking a I look at the entire contract issue and saying, the contract appears to be working well for us but there are some concerns over how new officers are integrated into the program and issues like that and I'd like to take a look at the entire contract issue and say, okay what things would we like to spell out more clearly so the sheriff's department knows what it is that we expect out of them. I think officer discretion is way down on the list of things that we ought to be meddling with. Boyt: I don't consider it meddling. If you want to look at the contract, you have my wholehearted support. This happens to be one issue but it's ' not the only issue I 'm sure so if this commission wants to do that, I think all you have to do Wayne is as a group decide that' s what you want to do. Wenzlaff: Any other discussion? , IIPublic Safety Meeting October 12, 1989 - Page 6 I Bernhjelm: I don' t know what the issue is about the training? Wenzlaff: It was used as an example. We had an officer who was not aware of an ordinance apparently and I don' t know if there was an enforcement issue. I 'm not aware of the incident. I only know that there was some confusion because an officer was not aware of an ordinance. My point is, if we're going to be concerned over giving clear instructions to the Carver ICounty Sheriff Department, I think we ought to start with things that have a more substantive impact on us such as the training program and orientation for new officers than to try and determine whether they ought ' to be tagging at 3 miles over the speed limit or at the speed limit which is I think what this other discussion is about. Bernhjelm: I guess I see it as separate issues and I don't know where the impetus is coming from at the Council level to discuss it. How did that come about Bill do you know? Boyt: Well , it spun out of a, it came out of a traffic survey done on Pleasant View Road. One of the issues was, if we have a 25 mph limit and someone goes through there at 36 mph, should they receive some sort of I citation? Having thought a lot about it, I 'm not sure what the answer is. I 'm not entering this with anything other than that I think this is an issue that as we've talked before and I know we disagree about this Bill I but I think it's an issue that warrants public discussion. I think that people who live along that road and other roads would like to have some input as to what that is. So it comes out of my motivation but I 'm not capable of getting the City Council to do anything that they don't want to I do. Bernhjelm: I guess if we're going to draw an analogy here, I think the I issue of traffic speed enforcement and the existence or non-existence of a tolerance is like the CIA. I know they're out there but I don' t want to know a whole lot more about it. I don't know that a whole lot of the public wants to know a whole lot more about it. The problem you get into in a public discussion is that if you say that, if you take a view that says that we don' t want deputies out there terrorizing the public at 1 mph over the speed limit, then the public gets the impression that the speed Ilimit is something other than what is posted. If you tell the deputies that you want the speed strictly enforced and the public seems to support that, then the deputies get the idea, well rightly or wrongly that people Iin Chanhassen advocate strong speed enforcement and they will start to tag at 1 mph over the speed limit if they feel and they are ordered to do that. Which creates other problems. This is an issue that is a lose-lose situation. It' s again my position has been and always has been that it 's a Imatter of officer discretion. It's a matter of internal department policy. Training . Guidance. Common sense. Awareness of the legal climate in the area that you're working. Awareness of public expectations. Traffic ' conditions. Road conditions . Time of day and 10,000 other things that go into a discretionary decision. My feeling is that a public discussion that would result in a policy decision of 5-10-3, whatever , is inappropriate. That's my position. ' Wenzlaff: I suspect this position has been discussed before, or actually I know. I was here and I agree with Bill Bernhjelm. I think the discussion 11 is inappropriate but as you aptly pointed out , we don' t have a whole lot of Public Safety Meeting I October 12, 1989 - Page 7 effect over what City Council does or does not discuss and decide. I will ' volunteer with the help of Scott or Carol , if you could let me know when that shows up on the agenda in case I miss it. I would like to be present at that meeting to represent the Public Safety Commission and I ' ll commit here to do that as long as I 'm in town. If not, I' ll contact somebody else ' to see if they can be present. Additional new business? NEW BUSINESS: ' Blechta : The only other new business that I had was that a contact was made between myself and Art Kerber to Scott and to Jim requesting a speed I limit for school zone at St. Hubert's. Evidentally Barry Schneider , Father Barry has been requesting it through Gary Warren for I believe he's been over 2 years now trying to get something done there and Gary' s schedule has been such that it's been either a low priority in his eyes or he just doesn' t have the time to get around to it. I believe Scott' s working on that now through the engineering department so. Harr : Just in response to that Craig. What we did as you' re aware, as soon as we got the request from you and Art, we immediately requested that the Sheriff' s Department pay particular attention to that area during school and other events which I know they've been doing. The last traffic safety committee supported your request and forwarded it onto engineering and it is in the process of being deemed a school zone. One of the problems is that engineering is absolutely swamped as you know with all the I changes going on. They've brought on 3 new people in the last year I believe it is and all you do is continue to make dents in the system because it's so clogged and that' s one of the reasons that I think the I traffic safety committee that we set up is really helped move things along. Sometimes it just voices a support so that engineering merely has to go through the formalities rather than doing the study but that's been recommended and as I understand it, engineering is now pursuing that to accomplish it. You had also asked about TH 101 and Sandy Hook. I talked to Senior Engineering Tech Dave Hempel and he said that he has expected a response this month from MnDot and hasn' t and so that's one of the issues he' s following up on and as you know, I 've got the request in for the signs. Blechta : Great. That' s all I had. Klick: I had something quickly. I was interested by the last two memos here about tobacco sales and interested also following White Bear Lake' s ' proposal to ban cigarette machines in their city. Do we have, does anyone know, do we have a lot of cigarette mahcines in Chanhassen and would we be interested in adopting that same policy? 1 Harr: I have a meeting scheduled with the City Attorney next week to, when he' s up here just to talk about what other cities they represent are doing and brainstorm some creative responses. It's been interesting to see what the public response to banning of vending machines has been so we' re going to see if we can't come up with some creative responses to the memo. Blechta: Scott has there been any study or not so much a study but any views on your part as far as how much time the State Patrol has been utilizing the officer here in Chanhassen? IIPublic Safety Meeting October 12, 1989 - Page 8 I I Harr : I'd have to say it' s on a daily basis. They're having squad meetings here. They're here frequently. Blechta: So it has been successful? IHarr : Very much so. It literally doubles our law enforcement protection when they' re up here and there's several of the troopers that really enjoy I the staff and the city and are spending a lot of time here. It' s neat because it's not unusual anymore to see a Carver County uniform here, Deb or Bob in our uniform, State Patrol, DNR. I think we've really responded creatively to increasing visibility and levels of service with the system we have. Blechta : Great. Has there been any comment, and Barb maybe you can answer I part of this too, whether Waconia plans to move their paramedic unit over to the main station to bring closer focus to the part of Chanhassen? I heard some rumor or speculation on that about a month ago? I was just wondering . Have you heard anything Scott? Harr: No, I haven't Craig. IKlick: I don' t work at Waconia anymore but I could find out. Blechta: Okay. I thought maybe you might know something. ' Wenzlaff: Scott , I'd like to go back to a couple thing . I 'm sorry, I did not follow your comment on Barb's question about the banning of cigarette I machines. You' re talking to the City Attorney? Harr: We' re just looking at possibilities in responding to the City Manager ' s note in response to the memo that' s in the file from the County. IIt's just an opportunity to jump on a band wagon that's positive. Wenzlaff: Would it be appropriate to put something on the agenda for next Imonth to address that? Would you have had time to discuss that by then? Harr : Sure. Wenzlaff: Okay. And then back to item 9 (a) . I skipped over . ' SIGHT LINES/WEST 78TH STREET. Harr : I have not been involved in this but I now there' s at least one I visitor here and I believe a representative from BRW to address the issue. It's something that Jim's been involved with that I haven' t been so perhaps it'd be best Wayne to just have BRW begin to, did Jim tell you what specifically he wanted you to address on the issue? ITodd Wichman: No he didn' t and what I told Jim was my hope on this meeting , I had hoped there would be more deputies here. Jim asked, was I going to find out if he could have more deputies here but my hope, my intent was to get out of this meeting is hopefully define or if there are recognizeable areas that the Commission deems major sight line problems Ialong West 78th now. I want those identified to me and I will basically let you know how. . .if that is a problem we' ll talk about it and take Public Safety Meeting I October 12, 1989 - Page 9 corrective action but I didn' t know Jim wasn' t going to be here tonight. ' Harr: He has a class tonight so he' ll be coming in late if he dares this time. I have to plead ignorance and I apologize for that. We hadn' t discussed it so all I know if the brief memo that's on the second page. Wenzlaff: Clark's raising his hand so I hope that means something. Clark Horn: I 'm wearing my HRA hat tonight. Part of the conflict you've heard of downtown is that the HRA has been trying to do quite a bit of redevelopment down there and as anything changes, new things are found as you get into them. One of the concerns that we had asked Todd ' s predecessor to address early on in the project was the safety issue of the types of things that we' re doing with the downtown project. HRA was concerned about many things. We' re concerned about the maintainability of I it. We' re concerned about how functional it is and that type of thing but the safety issue is something that we also asked them to address. And as happens when things get into the ground, they may look a lot different than I what you planned them. We had asked that the Public Safety Committee be involved as part of that in giving us the answers on what are appropriate sight lines in reviewing the plans. That didn't happen. We have a first II cut at this. BRW has now come back to us and said, we understand you have a lot of problems. We're going to fix those problems. The HRA said okay, we can address some of the cosmetic types of things. We' re trying to give the downtown a soft image but we think public safety could best address the sight line and safety issue. We've heard comments that some of the deputies have concerns about specific tree clumps. Todd Wichman is the new landscape architect with BRW now on this project. He' s taken over for the I previous architect and he would like to get some of those specific inputs on that so that the new plan that we do come up with is something that' s going to be acceptable from all of the aspects and not just softening the downtown affect that we tried to achieve and that's I think what he' s going II to look for tonight. If you know specific dangerous intersections or why they're dangerous or if the deputies as we've heard have specifics that they can address, Todd would be willing to address those specific things I with you so I guess you' ve all driven the area. You know what the problems are and he'd be willing to address those. This is Mr. Todd Wichman. Harr: Todd, thanks for coming and I apologize for not having more data on 1 this. Klick: Todd also came last week. Last Thursday also. ' Harr: Were they any better ready? The only issue that we've had come before the Traffic Safety Committee was a general concern that somebody said, oh gee, when those trees grow big, it's going to be a problem and we've just passed that concern on to engineering which I suspect is just one of the things that has come up. Anything we can do to help and I 'm thinking perhaps distribute a request to the deputies to get specific points to let you know. We'd be happy to do that. Todd Wichman: That would help me out a great deal . We could spend 2 hours I walkings through every shrub and tree that needs to be changed out here but I thought it would be to my benefit to try and get as much input from the commission and deputies tonight. I can basically run through some of the I changes that are going to take place. From meetings with City Council and IPublic Safety Meeting October 12, 1989 - Page 10 11 II the HRA, one of the major sight line problems that has been brought to my attention is down on Great Plains and West 78th where the island is by the clock tower . Now in our review of that area, staff had asked BRW and myself to remove some of the, I think they' re like river birch in the area . II could point to them specifically but there is a birch on the island that's separates the two lanes on Great Plains as it turns onto West 78th. The plant material there, the trees right now aren' t so much of a sight I line problem as Scott mentioned. As they mature it will be and it's going to be an ongoing maintenance. The importance of ongoing maintenance to limb these trees up so we can keep the sight lines open. But we are removing some trees in that area. That island has plant material on it I right now. Woody shrubery, the plant material that can get up to a height of 5 to 6 feet if you let it go. That ' s unacceptable from our point and that plant material will be removed and hopefully changed out with a low ' type of evergreen shrub. Trees that we deem as a probolem with sight lines are going to be relocated elsewhere in the project. There have been mentioned that I 've located on my documents and on the field several trees that are very close to intersections for radius point of intersections and as those trees mature, they will become a problem. Those trees in addition will be removed and relocated because the thing that is, most of those trees are all understory or ornamental flowering types trees. Typically IIthey will have a lower canopy than the over storage shade tree. Much lower branching characteristics and it' s just not the place for them. We' re hoping to address a lot of the problems without, our goal is not to so much Ireduce the impact of the planting because that's one thing that sets the downtown Chanhassen apart from any other municipality is the landscaping so we don' t want to reduce the impact. However , we do want to solve the problems with sight lines and since we are involved right now in making changes , replacing dead plant material , it' s most certainly an appropriate time to handle those. ' Wenzlaff: Todd , I 'd like to ask the members of the commission, does anyone have a specific complaint that they'd like to register with Todd tonight before I move onto the next step? Takkunen : None that he hasn' t, I mean he already knows . Laredo and 78th and Great Plains and 78th and if the trees could start at zero and go up someplace down, that would be better than having them all be tall all the way down but you already know that. You don' t need us to tell you that. Harr : I think the fact that you're back with an eye to the safety issue Iwill help. I ' ll be happy to work with Bob and we' ll get a memo out to everybody that works Chan for any specific input. Include the Fire Department. Klick: I was going to say, maybe you could include fire and ambulance in that. ITodd Wichman: Some of the changes will be implemented this fall but the bulk of the changes will be done next spring so we do have ample time to address your concerns . IHarr : If you could be sure to leave me a card or something, I ' ll give you mine as well after the meeting and we' ll talk the next week. Public Safety Meeting I October 12, 1989 - Page 11 Blechta: What type of a height do you people look at as being the critical I height level for line of sight? Todd Wichman: Line of sight in your car granted is significantly lower then you are when you' re standing. Your eye level is probably about 3 1/2 to 4 feet. The ornamental trees on the medians would pose, in addition to that the shurbery in the median is going to have to be maintained, the center median much more so than the boulevard areas on the side streets. The over storage trees granted will grow and become a canopy over the street but the shurbery is going to have to be more or less maintained at a given height level which is certainly easy to do. The ornamental trees, the birch, the aspen I don' t think will be a problem with sight lines but some of the river birch, there are new river birch going to be put in in replacement of some of the other things that have died. I'm going to try to address some of that before it goes in. Make sure we've got plant material that' s branch minimum of 5 feet above the ground. Above grade. You don't want a clump birch that starts out at grade level. That could potentially, if there' s 3 or 4 of them in a group. The plantings on the I median, the way they're spaced out, I don't see that as a significant sight line ,problem. As they mature, if there' s any more than that there may be but I think density of the overall plant material will allow sight lines to cross sight lines as long as the maintenance is kept up and that' s the key. Bernhjelm: What was the rationale for using the medians for tree planting rather than the boulevards? Just to soften the image or it seems to me for I maintenance perspective and everything else, it's a lot more difficult to maintain. You run the sprinklers out in the middle of the road instead of on the sides. It seemed to me like a strange way of doing things. ' Todd Wichman: Part of the concept there was to have a variety of oranmental plant material with an arcade if you will or a boulevard affect with the street trees on the side to give a more or less smaller scaled ' feeling or intimate scale for the downtown area. I 'd only been involved in the project for the last 2 months. I did not design the landscaping there. Bernhjelm: The guy who did isn't here. Todd Wichman : He doesn' t work at BRW. But, that's how I perceive the overall concept. Clark could probably address that as well. The design concept was more or less to keep the small town feeling and reduce the scale and openness of the streetscape. Boyt: Have you changed the plans since you met with the Mayor and me and the consultant from the Arboretum? Todd Wichman: No. There' s been more plant materials to be replaced based I on my last inventory but no, they have not changed. They're in negotiations right now. Boyt : One of the things that we cleared up before we 9 of into the second round was that there's certainly a lot of input wanted from everybody we can get input from but this particular decision is going to be made by the City Council as to what the final plan is so we know who to hold accountable. Has that changed? I Public Safety Meeting October 12, 1989 - Page 12 I 1 Clark Horn: The final decision is a purview of the HRA. They' re the ones that are paying for it. Boyt: Well Clark, this is what Don Ashworth was very clear about at the IICouncil meeting is that it was the City Council 's decision. Clark Horn: Well he' s changed his mind since then. IBoyt: Well okay. As long as we know which group has got the final decision because I think one of the things that's important is that Isomebody have accountability to get it right this time. I don' t really care which group it is as long as it's one group and not 5 groups . Clark Horn: The plan was already decided at the City Council and the HRA I asked that this issue be brought to them. We have not seen the final plans and we were sure that Public Safety had not reviewed the plan and that's why we' re here tonight. We want to make sure everybody gets involved because apparently the decision was made before all involvement. . . Harr : When will you need a response from us? I Todd Wichman: If I could something from you the next couple of weeks, it would be great. IIHarr : Okay, 2 weeks from today I ' ll have it to you. Todd Wichman: Yeah, 2 weeks. IWenzlaff: Todd , I 'd like to suggest too that you contact Craig or one of the people from the Fire Department and take a ride in one of the engines where your eye level is 7 feet above the ground and take a right through Ithere because I suspect, you I sure are trying to visualize that but as Clark said, once it gets in it looks different. If you could take the ride from there, you may make a couple of changes yet and that's certainly I something that the patrol cars are not going to differ greatly in eye level from your family sedan but the fire truck will. ITodd Wichman: Now is their input specifically part of the Public Safety Commission? Wenzlaff: Absolutely. They're part of the Public Safety but I think it's Ikey for you to get in one of the vehicles and take a ride. Harr : And that' s why I' ll include them in it as well . ' Blechta: What time frame are we looking at Scott? 2 weeks did you say? IHarr : We should be able to get all the deputies that work Chanhassen by then and that should be able to get two Monday night fire meetings as well . The reason you' re here is because you're really looking at the safety issue, as Clark articulated and we appreciate that and we' ll respond . ' Klick: I appreciate both you guys , Clark you too for taking the time to do it right. Public Safety Meeting October 12, 1989 - Page 13 Blechta : One real quick question and Clark, maybe you can answer this. Who's responsible for maintaining these plants? Clark Horn: The City' s. Blechta: Is it going to be the street department? Park and Rec? Who' s it going to be? Clark Horn: It will be the City utilities. . . The City maintains it but they do not assume responsibility for. . . Todd Wichman: If you'd like me to come out after you've got some responses I and meet with whomever . Harr : Why don' t we plan on that at the end of 2 weeks and we' ll review it 1 with whoever wants to join in. Wenzlaff : Thank you Todd and thank you Clark for taking the trouble to show up tonight. That' s the end of the formal agenda unless anybody has any addition comments? Blechta : I would like to put it on the record that Bill was here only 5 ' minutes late but he did show up and so did Jim Chaffee. Blechta moved , Klick seconded to adjourn the meeting. All voted in favor and the motion carried. The meeting was adjourned. Submitted by Jim Chaffee Public Safety Director Prepared by Nann Opheim 1