CC 2006 02 13
CHANHASSEN CITY COUNCIL
REGULAR MEETING
FEBRUARY 13, 2006
Mayor Furlong called the meeting to order at 7:05 p.m.. The meeting was opened with the
Pledge to the Flag.
COUNCIL MEMBERS PRESENT:
Mayor Furlong, Councilwoman Tjornhom, Councilman
Labatt, Councilman Lundquist and Councilman Peterson
STAFF PRESENT:
Todd Gerhardt, Roger Knutson, Justin Miller, Paul Oehme, Jerry
Ruegemer, Todd Hoffman and Kate Aanenson
PUBLIC PRESENT FOR ALL ITEMS:
David Jansen Chanhassen Villager
Debbie Lloyd 7302 Laredo Drive
Thomas Schwartz 7376 Bent Bow Trail
PUBLIC ANNOUNCEMENTS:
Mayor Furlong: Thank you and welcome to everybody here joining us this evening and those
watching at home. I’m glad you took the time to join us tonight. I’d like to start with, have one
item and ask for other modifications to the agenda. There was a distribution of consideration of
a change order to the Highway 212 project relating to the Powers Boulevard bridge
improvement, and we’ll add that as item number 6. Without objection. Are there any other
modifications or changes to the agenda?
CONSENT AGENDA:Councilman Lundquist moved, Councilwoman Tjornhom seconded
to approve the following consent agenda items pursuant to the City Manager’s
recommendations:
a. Approval of Minutes:
-City Council Work Session Minutes dated January 23, 2006
-City Council Verbatim & Summary Minutes dated January 23, 2006
Receive Commission Minutes:
-Planning Commission Work Session Minutes dated January 17, 2006
-Park and Recreation Commission Verbatim & Summary Minutes dated January 24, 2006
b. Lake Ann Beach Lifeguard Contract: Approval of 2006 Contract.
c. City Code: Approval of Amendment to Chapter 18 Concerning Park Dedication
Requirements.
City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Resolution #2006-09:
e. Capital Improvement Program: Authorize Purchase of 2006
Vehicles and Equipment, PW016LLL.
g. Southwest Metro Transit: Approval of Amendment to Joint Powers Agreement.
Resolution #2006-10:
h. Sand Companies Housing District: Call for Public Hearing on
Proposed TIF District #9.
i. Campbell Knutson, P.A.: Approval of 2006 Legal Services Agreement.
Resolution #2006-11:
j. Hazard Mitigation Planning: Approval of Resolution to Participate
in Carver County Planning Process.
k. Stonebridge Wireless: Approval of Lease Agreement.
l. Approval of Joint Powers Agreement for Carver County to Act as the Absentee Ballot
Board.
m. Approval of Contract with CBO, Bank for the Fourth of July Street Dance.
All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously with a vote of 5 to 0.
1(f). APPROVAL OF APOINTMENTS TO SLOW-NO WAKE TASK FORCE FOR
LOTUS LAKE.
Todd Gerhardt: Mayor, council members. I’d like to pull off Rick Eberhart from the task force
and make it a 7 member board.
Mayor Furlong: Okay. Is there any discussion on that?
Councilman Peterson: Motion to approve.
Councilman Lundquist: Second.
Mayor Furlong: Made and seconded.
Audience: Is there a reason for that?
Todd Gerhardt: He’s not a resident of the City of Chanhassen and it was my belief that we
shouldn’t have somebody outside the community helping us create policy.
Audience: And why not if there’s still other people who have expressed interest…
Mayor Furlong: If I could, sir just a minute. We will discuss this. Be happy to discuss it.
Please come up to the microphone and state your name and address.
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Dave Susla: My name’s Dave Susla. I’m at 7409 Frontier Trail. Wondering why you would go
to 7 versus just electing another one of the interested parties onto the task force.
Todd Gerhardt: I wanted to have an odd number just in case the task force decided to kind of
vote among themselves on how a policy might be presented or discussed and that you had an odd
number. Versus an even number of 8.
Dave Susla: Okay.
Mayor Furlong: Is there any other discussion?
Steve Donen: Steve Donen, 7341 Frontier Trail. Just a quick one. The other option was, there
was 16 people who did sign up for it so you could add 2 of those 16 people who were concerned.
Todd Gerhardt: That’s, you know we try to keep the group smaller but it’s up to the City
Council if they’d like to add more. But as you get more people on there, it’s a little more
difficult to make decisions so that’s why we went with the smaller group.
Mayor Furlong: I think one thing too Mr. Donen with regard to that, we can make it as big or as
small. This is not the only opportunity for residents to participate. The meetings that I suspect
will be open, as well as we will, before any changes take place in terms of ordinance we will
have a public hearing after the task force as an opportunity to meet and come back with
recommendations. So it’s nice to see that there was a lot of interest in people participating but I
think at the same time Mr. Gerhardt’s standpoint, staff was recommending to keep the group
manageable and also recognizing that there is no limitation to public participation on this issue.
Steve Donen: I mean my, just my concern is that the large amount of the voice will be from this
group and when you reduce the numbers now you reduce less of the voice of the group. I
imagine you’ll have a lot of weight on what this group comes out with and we could have a little
larger group than a smaller group. Better representation of the people on the lake.
Todd Gerhardt: Well I would encourage anybody that doesn’t agree with the recommendation, I
hope to see a multi recommendation from the group but we will hold the public hearing at the
council level and people can come before the City Council an express their views to them on
what they think should happen. It’s just you know not the task force’s recommendation that the
City Council will hear from.
Councilman Lundquist: I would also encourage those other people on that list of 16 and other
residents to give you feedback to those neighbors and others as well.
Tom Devine: I’m a little unclear. Is this the point at which we would be open for discussion on
(f) at this point? Or is just as part of the consent agenda. I’m trying to understand the protocols.
I have a couple comments I’d like to make about it if I could.
Mayor Furlong: We’re discussing this matter. There’s been a motion made and seconded so
we’re in discussion at this point and so if you’ve got comments.
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Tom Devine: This is appropriate?
Mayor Furlong: Yes it would be.
Tom Devine: Okay. Well first of all I’d like to thank you Mr. Mayor and.
Mayor Furlong: If you could just Mr. Devine, no. State your name and address that’s all.
Tom Devine: Okay, I’m sorry. Tom Devine, 7640 South Shore Drive on Lotus Lake. Mr.
Mayor and members of the council I’d like to thank you for addressing the issue of the water and
the water quality on Lotus Lake. It’s obviously seen an issue of significance to a number of the
owners as well as the lake users and the leadership that’s now being extended I think is an
important one. The task force is going to have some voting and some recommendations. I think
what we should maybe consider doing, instead of going back one, we should maybe consider
going up 2 if you want to get to an odd number or just replace, like for 1 if we have 8, just add an
additional 1 off the list of 16 that applied or if you want the odd number, then go up 1 and then
keep it because I think you do want the participation of the people and I think you want the
voting participation of the people to participate in the issue. I noticed, I didn’t notice until
tonight when I got the agenda that both Lake Susan and Lake Riley are undertaking the same
issue right now, which I think is positive. I think the other issue that I think that I want to, that I
really wanted to address, not as part of the make-up of the committee or the task force as such,
but I think the larger issue is, we’re dealing with the issue of the water once it gets to the lake in
terms of what do we do to react to it. But I think the broader issue really is, what are we doing to
address the issue of the water before it gets to the lake, and what are the issues of cleanliness or
the quality of the water that’s reaching the lake because that I think if my memory serves me
right, we’re up 3 inches now over the last 12 years. So the lake has risen to historic levels and
why is that? Was there something going on and that’s beyond just the fact that we have these
two 100 year storms this last year which I think is in partly what we’re reacting to in part, but
really the broader issue is what are we doing about the water because the water is up
significantly on the lake over a long period of time, and we’re not really addressing the issue of
where’s that water coming from and what are we doing to try to clean up that water before it gets
in the lake, and that was the issue that I hope the task force also includes as part of the agenda
and that wasn’t really outlined in the materials that were presented on the web site but I hope
that’s one of the issues so.
Mayor Furlong: And I guess just to comment on that, prior to coming into tonight’s meeting at
our work session we just spent an hour with the Planning Commission reviewing the current
progress of our storm water management plan update, which is dealing with city wide storm
water. Surface water quality. Lotus Lake was discussed at length for the reasons that you
mentioned and that’s beyond the scope of this task force to deal with that. We’re trying to focus
this on the issue that as a result of those storms last fall and that was the no wake issue. However
we have another citizen task force that’s working with the storm water management plan.
They’ve been working for a number of months on that and the council and planning commission
will continue to work on that as well, so that is not being ignored here. It’s just this group, you
know the history behind this was with the storms last Labor Day and again in, Labor Day
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
weekend and again in October, the water level went up significantly. It went down slowly.
There was an issue of when and how to put a no wake restriction on the lake. Whether it should
be put on. Whether it shouldn’t be. If it is, under what conditions and when does it come off and
those are the issues that our current ordinance, I don’t believe and I think the council and staff
don’t believe is responsive enough to what the needs are of the homeowners as well as the other
users of the lake and so that’s what this task force is trying to address specifically. And it is
going to be specific to Lotus Lake because the issue with Lake Susan, Lake Minnewashta, Lake
Riley are different and each lake is unique and so that’s why we’re looking at each lake
individually with the task force. That’s also the reason that Lotus Lake is the first task force
because of the issues that we see there as a priority.
Tom Devine: Yeah, well I’m very pleased to hear that and I think the two issues, before we set
public policy or ordinances, the two issues are definitely intertwined because we have this
increase, this 12 year increase of 3 inches of average lake level that’s increased which is bringing
us within those historic or within I guess it’s 6 inches of that 100 year mark and so when we put
the issue together, it’s not, I mean you can’t address one issue without looking at the other issue
at the same time because if we’re going to set an ordinance policy and what we’re going to do
after the fact, we’ve got to look at the issue of what are we doing before the fact to try to do it,
because the two things are going to fit together ultimately when we make policy decision. And
that’s the point that I make, and I understand maybe not wanting to combine, you obviously
don’t want to combine the two task forces but maybe the ordinance issue then is ahead of the
game before we get the reports or get the feedback from the task force that’s going to deal with
the issue of what the runoff is that’s coming onto the lake that I think is the problem.
Mayor Furlong: Well I think to that point, there’s also, you know there are things that we can
control. Things that we can’t, but there’s also timeframe. We can react more quickly on this
issue if there’s a problem. When and until the issues that you’ve mentioned become improved.
Whether it’s the out flow or the quality of the water coming in and those types of things, those
are longer term projects, and part of our overall storm water management plan that we’re
working on so.
Tom Devine: The last point I make is, you know most of last summer the lake was within an
inch and a half or 2 inches of the 100 year mark all summer, and last summer was a fairly dry
summer and so what we’re looking at, if we put into effect an overlay grid of an ordinance right
now, we’re talking about being within 2 inches on the outside of what it was last summer, and I
think that’s the issue that we’ve got to really look at because it’s going to be very difficult to put
an ordinance into effect that in essence establishes or creates a no wake zone on the lake which
in essence renders the lake something to look at rather than a recreational lake, which is.
Mayor Furlong: And I think what you’re mentioning Mr. Devine are issues that this task force
and other residences are looking at this are going to be considering and the pros and cons of
potential recommendations. So without getting into what the task force is going to be doing and
what residents have been dealing with, those are issues that they will be looking at and making
recommendations on.
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Tom Devine: I would urge you then to have to have 2 more people if you want the, if you want
an uneven number or at least replace the one and keep it at 8 as such then. Thank you.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you. Is there any other discussion? Public discussion. If not, will the
council make comments or discussion on the motion.
Councilman Peterson: I’m not generally biased towards smaller groups than larger just to get the
thing done so I think 7 would probably be more effective and seemingly reasonably represent the
people of that area and so I support staff by going with 7.
Mayor Furlong: Okay, thank you. Any other comments?
Councilman Lundquist: I would echo Councilman Peterson’s sentiments. Prepared to move
ahead.
Mayor Furlong: Okay.
Councilwoman Tjornhom: This seems to be kind of a hot issue with everybody on the lake and
so how is it, I realize people volunteered for the task force but how were they chosen necessarily.
Todd Gerhardt: We tried to get a cross section of people on the lake and people off the lake and.
Councilwoman Tjornhom: So is it an even amount? Obviously it’s not now with 7.
Todd Gerhardt: It was an even amount before. Now it’s not and a majority is for those people
on the lake. 4 people on the lake and 3 people off.
Councilwoman Tjornhom: Okay. Then I think I also feel comfortable with keeping it at 7 and
being a small group.
Mayor Furlong: Any thoughts?
Councilman Labatt: Onward.
Mayor Furlong: Okay. Very good. This is an important issue and I’m glad we’re making
progress. I appreciate staff moving forward and very appreciative of the interest, the level of
interest and being on the task force or off is not necessarily a limitation to residents involvement
and that’s important and gives me comfort to go forward with staff’s recommendations. So with
that, if there’s no other comments, we’ve had a motion. Is there any additional comments before
we take the vote? If not the motion is to eliminate the one member that was recommended and
go with the 7 member task force.
Councilman Peterson moved, Councilman Lundquist seconded to appoint the following
riparian and non-riparian property owners to the Lotus Lake Slow-No Wake Lake Task
Force:
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
1) Bob Ayotte, Cascade Pass
2) Doug Bitney, Horseshoe Curve
3) Mary Borns, Frontier Trail
4) Steve Donen, Frontier Trail
5) Greg Fletcher, South Shore Drive
6) Dave Howes, Santa Fe Trail
7) Shelly Strohmaier, Sandy Hook Road
All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously with a vote of 5 to 0.
1(o). APPROVAL OF AMENDMENT TO CHANHASSEN FIRE DEPARTMENT
RELIEF ASSOCIATION BYLAWS.
Public Present:
Name Address
Randy Wahl 6891 Redwing Lane
Jack Kreger 7606 Kiowa
Raymond G. Peitz 7607 Kiowa
th
Paul Rojina 220 West 77 Street
th
Bob Meuwissen 206 West 77 Street
Mayor Furlong: I think that was pulled off because some residents wanted to speak on it so at
this point maybe, why don’t you come up to the podium but I’ll ask Mr. Gerhardt to just give a
brief background on this matter.
Todd Gerhardt: Sure. Mayor, City Council members. Before you is an amendment the
Chanhassen Fire Department Relief Association Bylaws and we are looking at a 3 year contract
with the current volunteers and looking at approximately, a little over 8% increases for the next 3
years. 8.75. Those increases are recommended for approval as long as the funded ratio does not
go below 75%. That will take us over the next 3 years so, what the fire board originally
recommended was also to give the 10 current retirees that were on a defined contribution plan,
also an increase with a lump sum check. Not adding to their monthly allotment but a one time
payment over that 3 year period of about $400. My recommendation was not to make that
payment and the reason I recommended that was that under a defined contribution plan, when
you elect to take the defined contribution, that amount is set at a monthly rate and as the word
defined is called out, it’s to set that amount and then you can do a calculation over the life period
of those retirees of what that amount would be, so it was my recommendation to the City Council
not to make that payment. What my report calls for.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you sir.
Jack Kreger: My name is Jack Kreger. I’m a charter member of the fire department. I was on
for 20 years and I understand that at the work session that a couple of the council members were
against giving the retired members an increase in their pension. Over the years from all the past
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
mayors and councils, we were promised this. At the time that we retired there wasn’t a lot of
money in the fund and the years before that there was hardly any money in there, so by taking
the annuity we kept more money in the fund at the time. And I think we deserve to have an
increase. I think if you read the letter that I sent you, I hope you did, we tried to give you some
history on the fire department and the organizing of it and I hope you have and consider bringing
us along with the active firemen. Any questions?
Mayor Furlong: Any questions for Mr. Kreger? No. Okay. Thank you sir.
Jack Kreger: Thank you.
Mayor Furlong: Is there anybody else that would like to provide comment to the council on this
matter? No? Okay, very good. Bring it back to council for discussion and a motion. Thoughts.
I guess from the issue here is, that was raised was the lack of an increase in the, I may screw up
my terms here but the multiplier of years of service. The dollar amount multiplier over the last, I
think it was 4 years there’s been no increases at all. The last increase, as I understand it was
2000-2001 and was a very substantial increase, an amount approaching 50%. And within the
plan right now there’s a vesting portion as well as a years of service multiplier such that the
active members receive full vesting at 20 years of service. Partial vesting at 5 years and then a
scaled portion inbetween. And the lack of an increase over the last 4 years I think justifies
increasing that, the amount that’s being recommended to the council here even though it sounds
substantial at 8 ¾% for a one year increase. I think when we look back over the proposed
increase over the next 3 years and bring that back to the last time there was an increase, it turns
out to an annual increase in the 3 to 4 percent which is to me a very comfortable, reasonable
increase. I think the issue here is, as for those, those retired fire fighters who are all, who are
receiving the monthly increase, unlike those retired fire fighters who took a lump sum at one
point in time should there be any change. Now it’s my understanding that when the last increase
took place back in 2000-2001 timeframe, there was no increase for the monthly retirees and if
I’m saying anything wrong somebody jump up and tell me here because I don’t want to mis-
speak but that was, so I think from a precedent standpoint at the time that that was done, it was
my understanding that the increase was just with this multiplier, which is what is being proposed
by staff this evening.
Councilman Peterson: I think there was a lump sum increase but it was told at the time that that
would be the last one and I think that was how it played out, and they can correct me if I’m
wrong.
Todd Gerhardt: I did negotiate the last one but I think Randy had mentioned that at our last
meeting. Randy Wahl, Assistant Fire Chief.
Mayor Furlong: So I guess to that, and that’s, you know I’m comfortable with staff’s
recommendation and in no way in doing that diminishing or somehow degrading the level of
service for all the retired fire fighters, whether they’re here this evening or not. And whatever
their retired benefits are, they provide a great service to the city and it’s the founders of the
department back in the late 60’s and others really built the foundation that’s been built upon over
the years to give us the good quality service that we receive today, and we have a great
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
organization and we’re in no way diminishing that, that I see here. It’s strictly a question of
recommendations with regard to going forward. So I’d be happy to, if there’s any other
comments, Councilman Peterson or.
Councilman Peterson: No, I mean I don’t want to reiterate everything you said Mr. Mayor. I
think it’s appropriate. There is no disrespect. It’s a matter of doing, doing what was agreed to
previously and even though we moved on that in 2000, we said in 2000 we weren’t going to do it
again and now it’s back in front of us certainly defined benefit plan as the city manager said is
defined benefit plan. You know what you’re going to get and that’s it. It’s no different than if
one of our city employees were to, had been retired and now we’re going to say we’re going to
up their defined benefit plan which isn’t done.
Mayor Furlong: Yeah.
Randy Wahl: I’ll just make a comment to probably help the retired members along. My name is
Randy Wahl. Assistant Chief Chanhassen Fire Department. President of the Relief Association.
Just to also, and I know Craig’s made the point that we came into an agreement in 2001 that the
retired members would no longer receive an annual or an increase in the future. We also entered
into an agreement that, we did so because there should have been or was going to be agreed upon
further increases to the special fund for the active membership and we never saw it. So to say
that we entered into an agreement in 2001 indicating that we were going to hold the retired
members at their current level, we also agreed upon that we were going to contribute further
dollars to the special fund and that never took place so I just want to make a comment for the
retired members.
Councilwoman Tjornhom: Who was responsible for contributing those extra funds?
Randy Wahl: The City. We had a general fund that the membership, the active membership
took a $1.00 of their call money and put it into the general fund and that was actual labor hourly
rate that went into the general fund that we could at least give back to some of the members that,
if they left after 3 years, 4 years of service, we could at least give them some sort of monetary
thank you for helping us out in those years. But the State of Minnesota said we could no longer
do that so we couldn’t increase our labor rate, our hourly call rate, but rather we felt that if we
took that funding that was going into the general fund, and transferred it over to the special fund,
we would then enter into an agreement that we would hold the retired members in 2001 for
further increases so long as there was annual money coming into the special fund and it would be
a net net for both parties. But having seen that not happen, in all fairness for the retired members
because some of them probably don’t know but that never happened. So I just want to make that
point on their behalf.
Mayor Furlong: Okay. Thank you.
Todd Gerhardt: Mayor I’d like to add to that. I wasn’t a party to that discussion and if that was
something should have been included in the bylaws to let future councils, managers, fire chiefs
know of that, and so that language was not included and I just want to make that point.
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Mayor Furlong: Okay.
Councilman Labatt: So Mayor, are we under a time crunch here? I just wonder with that being
said if we can wait a couple more weeks to get the City Manager together with…additional thing
made here and it wasn’t and maybe we can figure out a way we can make it good for all people
including the 10 retired people. Somehow, some way.
Randy Wahl: As far as the fire membership goes and the way the relief association goes, no.
Our audits take place in May which wouldn’t make this effective. Nothing would be effective
until our annual’s audit done to determine our funded levels anyway. At which point then it
would be retro back to the beginning of the year so, we, the fire department has some time.
Mayor Furlong: Yeah I think, to your point Mr. Labatt, I don’t think taking action here tonight
on this matter in any way, you know I guess Mr. Gerhardt your thoughts.
Todd Gerhardt: As to reference what Randy was talking about the special fund, that would be
money that would go into the retirement fund which would not play into the situation of should
we increase the defined contribution or not. Those are two separate issues. The fire relief
association has got $1.8 million dollars and that money is used to pay the current retirees that are
on a monthly annuity, and also for those that may choose to retire here over the next several
years, the lump sum amount. So we have two separate issues going here.
Mayor Furlong: So I guess to that point, I don’t know if we’re precluded from going forward on
this and if there’s something more to look into. If there’s something that I’m understanding was
known by some but not by others and to evaluate that, we can do that. Or we can, I don’t want to
wait til May on this. I mean let’s, people need to know what we want to do and I think this has
been overdue by a few years and so I’d like to move forward but I’d certainly listen to thoughts
from council.
Councilman Lundquist: Mr. Gerhardt, when these were made by the current or…had a choice of
lump sum or annuity? I know right they have, we only allow a lump sum but at that time did
they have a choice of either or?
Todd Gerhardt: I believe some of the members had an either or. I don’t know if all of them did.
Jack Kreger: Yes, yes we did. And at the time there was about 12, 13, 14 people retire all at
once. The charter members.
Councilman Lundquist: So you would have cleaned it out if you would have all taken a lump.
Jack Kreger: …starting over.
Mayor Furlong: Councilman Labatt.
Councilman Labatt: Can I ask a stupid question? I mean maybe it’s not stupid but, so how much
money are we talking about here? Bottom line. I mean what, what impact on these 10 retired
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
fire fighters, what does this have for them? I mean can somebody put a dollar amount on it for
me?
Todd Gerhardt: I think you’ve got 10 members, it would be roughly $430 per each member.
$5,000 a year over the next 3 years.
Councilman Labatt: So we’re going to increase their payments from $410 to $430?
Todd Gerhardt: No, it would be a lump sum payment so their monthly annuity would not
increase. So they would receive a $430 check per year extra from their $400 a month payment.
Councilman Peterson: Because Steve you weren’t at the work session where we talked about it
and really it’s not the money. It’s purely the principle of adhering to what it is that defines
benefit plan and trying to understand the different merits of the request. Understanding that but
it’s just more difficult from a principle standpoint and when their payment is supposed to set…
Mayor Furlong: I guess at this point what my thought would be, make a recommendation to the
council, we can either act on this tonight. If there’s something, my sense is we’re probably going
to go forward with the issue of increasing that multiplier, or we can just table the action and give
Mr. Gerhardt the opportunity to learn about more about some of the history that 2001 or 2000
increase, whenever that occurred, and bring additional information back to the council on this so,
there’s a thought or some combination of there.
Councilman Peterson: Todd, I mean you understand the intricacies of this better than any of us.
I mean if we gave you more time, do you think you can get more information or are you pretty
much, are you comfortable with your knowledge of what is being requested and the background,
etc, etc.?
Todd Gerhardt: Well as I stated earlier you have two separate issues here. Really three. You’ve
got one that you know the additional money that would go to the pool and that Randy had
mentioned. And that would not have a factor or a defined contribution portion of it. That would
just be the City may have to allocate more money based on past agreements. As to the defined
contribution plan, that’s pretty simple. It’s a defined contribution. It calls out that you are to get
this dollar amount until the end of your life. The third one that the membership brought up was,
you know there wasn’t enough money in the account if they were all to take the lump sum
amount, and so they all chose to take the monthly. And you know that basis I don’t know how to
make heads or tails from that. The only thing I can think of is to work with somebody to
determine whatever the dollar amount back then was for lump sum and what that annuity is
today and determine a present value of that.
Councilman Peterson: Yeah, how do you figure interest rate.
Mayor Furlong: So I guess given that, the recommendation from staff tonight with regard to
increasing the years of service multiplier is one of various issues and my sense is that we can act
on that. That doesn’t preclude us from going back to this issue of some of the history that we’ve
heard tonight and try to decipher our way through that.
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Councilman Lundquist: And we always have the option of doing another amendment down the
road if we wanted to as well, correct?
Todd Gerhardt: You always have, Roger would always say you always have the option.
Councilman Lundquist: So I guess from a.
Mayor Furlong: You’re saying with regard to, I think it’s important for the issues that we’re
discussing tonight which are the increases of the years of service multiplier, you know I think
we’re subject to your investment account maintaining a minimum level of funding so we don’t
find ourselves in an unfunded pension liability situation, you know committing to the increases
that have been proposed over the next few years is something the staff is recommending and I
think I would, you’re not suggesting going back and revisiting that?
Councilman Labatt: No.
Mayor Furlong: It’s other aspects need, if we decide to revisit other aspects.
Councilman Lundquist: Correct. I’m comfortable with staff’s recommendation of the increase
and the multiplier as laid out in the report. And as we were at work session I also fundamentally
have concern with the concept of an annuity and then increasing that annuity. I don’t, it’s
difficult to say you know, it’s not like we want to keep money away from a deserving group,
especially the fire fighters, active, retired. Whatever they may be, but the concept is, you have a
choice. The annuity. The lump sum. Understand that the choices were made for a variety of
valid reasons and, but you know an annuity by definition is a static payment. The benefit of an
annuity is it’s forever. You know until that person’s, the end of their life and so the lump sum is
a lump sum so you make those choices but, I’d be comfortable moving forward with where
we’re at now. Certainly always open to discussion and feedback as well, and if we want to come
back at and consider after we get some more information about an increase in the annuity. I
mean I’d certainly be willing to listen to that but I’m comfortable with this piece of it and would
be ready to go forward with that.
Mayor Furlong: Okay, thank you. Any other thoughts or comments?
Councilwoman Tjornhom: I agree with Councilman Lundquist but I want to thank you for the
letter that you sent and the historical information that you gave me. I didn’t know any of that
and so I really appreciate you educating me on the history of how everything kind of got started
and how you really made a strong foundation for what we have right now in Chanhassen. That’s
why I think it’s, you know I will support what staff is recommending tonight but I do think it’s
important to go back and revisit the history of what was talked about tonight. I don’t think in
work session we addressed this special fund that was supposed to be contributed to. So I’d
actually would like more information on that and investigate that and see where we are today
with that and what can be done with that.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you. Any other comments?
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Councilman Labatt: Well I would totally agree with both Brian and Bethany. I think that for
their reasons of taking the annuity, cleaning out the fund would have probably desecrated the fire
department service back in 19 whatever it would have been, but I think the way it right now can
take some time and review and look at what was agreed upon and somehow we can make this
close to being right or right with the 10 retired people.
Mayor Furlong: By looking back at the history.
Councilman Labatt: Yeah. And seeing what we can do to honor their decision to take that
annuity back then and see what we can do.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you. Any other thoughts? If not, is there a motion?
Councilman Lundquist: Motion to approve staff’s recommendation.
Mayor Furlong: For item 1(o)?
Councilman Lundquist: Item 1(o).
Mayor Furlong: Thank you. Is there a second?
Councilman Peterson: Second.
Mayor Furlong: Made and seconded. Any discussion on that motion? Hearing none we’ll
proceed with the vote.
Resolution #2006-12: Councilman Lundquist moved, Councilman Peterson seconded that
the City Council approve the resolution amending the bylaws and authorizing a $4,350
increase in 2006, a $4,700 increase in 2007, and a $5,050 increase in 2008 to the Chanhassen
Fire Department Relief Association with the condition that the funding ratio remains above
75%. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously with a vote of 5 to 0.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you and we will work Mr. Gerhardt on that other matter with Assistant
Chief Wahl as well. Thank you. Thank you gentlemen for everything. Not just being here
tonight.
VISITOR PRESENTATION:
Mayor Furlong: There was one item that we had somebody scheduled and I don’t know if Mr.
Smith is here. No? Okay. Okay. Very good. Yes, please come forward and state your name
and address. Good evening.
Jay Johnson: Good evening Mr. Mayor, City Council. My name’s Jay Johnson. You may have
gotten something from me. I don’t know if it’s in your packet or not. I gave it to Todd here, but
I’m representing a group called Isaiah Southwest Caucus and we’re inviting all members of
13
City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Chanhassen, the City Council, Mayor, city legislators, business leaders, people from all over the
southwest area to join us for a round table discussion on education funding in the, in Minnesota.
What the discussion is going to be based on is the Itasca Project minus the gap. Reducing
disparities to improve regional competitiveness in the Twin Cities and that the Itasca Project is a
collaborative work of 40 CEO’s and mayors and university leaders that research educational.
And we have a group that’s coming to get together and it’s going to be at Westwood Lutheran
rd
Church at 9001 Cedar Lake Road South, St. Louis Park on Thursday, February 23 at 7:00 in the
evening. That’s just a little bit east of 169 off of Cedar Lake. If anybody’s, I’m just putting out
the open invite to everybody and especially would like to get some of our community leaders
there so.
Mayor Furlong: Very good.
Jay Johnson: Any questions?
Mayor Furlong: Any questions of Mr. Johnson? Are you a member of the Itasca Project?
Jay Johnson: No I’m not.
Mayor Furlong: Or what’s your affiliation?
Jay Johnson: I’m with, our church is with Isaiah and I’m one of the organizers or whatever you
want to call it for Isaiah. Do volunteer speaking and whatever as well.
Mayor Furlong: Okay, very good. Well thank you. Appreciate your invitation and I know a lot
of people watch the council meeting so, it’s a good advertising. Thank you. Anyone else that
would like to comment during visitor presentations this evening? Thank you very much. Visitor
presentations are offered each council meeting so feel free to come.
PUBLIC HEARING:
2006 STREET IMPROVEMENT PROJECT 06-01: CONTINUATION OF PUBLIC
HEARING FOR CHANHASSEN HILLS AREA, STREET REHABILITATION AND
ORDER IMPROVEMENTS AND PREPARATION OF PLANS AND SPECIFICATIONS.
Public Present:
Name Address
Mike Schmidt 6470 Yosemite Avenue
rd
Willard & Shirley Johnson 1660 West 63 Street
Marcus Thomas Bolton & Menk
Kent Louwagie Bolton & Menk
Mike Timm 1101 Lyman Court
Kelly Morrison 1060 Lyman Court
Laura Fridgen 6291 Blue Jay Circle
Scott Schutter 8691 Chanhassen Hills Drive No.
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
John & Jacqueline Meyers 1011 Barbara Court
Judy Ford 1711 East Koehnen Circle
rd
Paul Oehme: Thank you Mayor, City Council members. January 23 council held a public
hearing for the 2006 street improvement project. At that public hearing at that time the Koehnen
area improvements were discussed. Tonight we’d like to continue that public hearing and talk
specifically about the Chanhassen Hills neighborhood that’s also included in this year’s project.
The Chanhassen Hills area has been rated as needing a rehabilitation or thin overlay, and this
was through the pavement management that the City had. Utilities in this area are in generally
good condition but the street is over 15 years old and minor maintenance improvements or
techniques can no longer effectively be implemented, so at this time I would like, I would invite
Marcus Thomas of Bolton & Menk to give a brief overview of the Chanhassen Hills area, and
open it up, open up the public hearing or continue the public hearing and take testimony on this
area at that time.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you.
Marcus Thomas: Good evening Mayor, council. Thank you for having us back this evening. I
don’t know if I introduced last time I was here, Kent Louwagie, my colleague that’s been
assisting with the design on the project so I just wanted to introduce him and let you know that
he’d be available to help with any questions tonight as well. As Mr. Oehme noted this is a
continuation of the public hearing of the 2006 improvement project. Opening of the public
hearing at the last open meeting, we discussed the Koehnen area. This evening I wanted to just
give a quick overview of the improvements scheduled for the Chanhassen Hills area as well as
the Lake Ann Park parking lot and road improvement project as well. We did have a public or
an open house for the Chanhassen Hills, similar to the Koehnen area that was held on December
th
15. Staff headed that meeting up and we have received input from the residents on this project
as well so we appreciate their effort. Their participation. There will be future informational
meetings as well prior to any construction on this project so just wanted to make note of that.
The general approach to the Chanhassen Hills improvement is basically as Mr. Oehme
suggested, a mill and overlay of the neighborhood. The streets are over 15 years old. They are
due for typical mill and overlay maintenance, whereas we worked on a simply mill off, do an
edge mill along both sides of the road, adjacent to the existing curb. Milling about a 2 inch thick
mill, about 8 feet wide on each side of the road, and then following over it with an overlay of, a
bituminous overlay of 2 to 3 inches on top of the existing bituminous pavement. Throughout the
neighborhood we have identified certain areas that have deteriorated a little bit more than the rest
of the roadways. More severe cracking or potholes that were found, whereas a regular mill and
overlay wouldn’t be sufficient to rehabilitate those sections, so in those areas we propose a full
depth mill and overlay whereas we would mill off the entire thickness of the existing bituminous
and just re-pave on top of the existing aggregate base, a new layer of bituminous there.
Additionally we would replace any severely cracked or sunken curb segments that would be
identified within the project area. And if there were any catch basins castings that were noted to
be settled along with the curb, we would replace or re-set those castings as well. Additionally
it’s come to the staff’s attention that there may be some properties that have some pump
connections that go into the sanitary sewer system as opposed to into the storm sewer systems, so
as a part of this project we’d want to identify those properties and extend drain tile to those
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
properties to be able to pick those sump pump connections up and have them drain into the storm
sewer as opposed to sanitary sewer. Finally the other, I guess the last improvement that we’ve
got scheduled is with regards to a gate well within the neighborhood. Actually at the intersection
of Lake Susan Drive and Chanhassen Hills Drive North. We just need some, as staff has
indicated that there’s some maintenance needed on particular gate wells so the utility work is
pretty minimal on this project. It’s mainly a structural mill and overlay improvement within the
Chanhassen Hills area. I guess before I move into the Lake Ann Park parking lot improvement
I’ll solicit any questions on I guess the design improvements on Chanhassen Hills.
Mayor Furlong: Yeah, let’s go to questions if there are any and then I’d like to take public
hearing on this before we get into the Lake Ann, so we try to keep them isolated and coherent.
Any questions for Marcus this evening?
Councilman Peterson: When you had mentioned that we’ve got some that might be putting
excess water from the sump pumps into the sanitary sewer, is that at our cost or their cost or I
hadn’t heard that before so. I’m assuming that would be at their cost.
Paul Oehme: Well under typical street projects we have installed drain tile in the right-of-way
and in back of the curb under certain areas, and typically that is a utility improvement so we
generally have utilized City funds for those type of improvements and it’s more or less a utility
within the right-of-way. Now from the right-of-way to the house, that’s a different story. That’s
the City or a private issue so.
Councilman Peterson: That’s what I was kind of clarifying. I was assuming you weren’t going
to drain tile up to the house.
Paul Oehme: Correct. Yeah we will not consider that in the project.
Mayor Furlong: So does the drain tile then run along the back of the curb? It doesn’t run
perpendicular to the curb, it runs along the back.
Paul Oehme: It runs perpendicular to the curb in back of the curb and then it discharges. It runs
parallel to the curb in back, behind the curb.
Mayor Furlong: Behind it. Okay. So it would pick up any sheet draining across the front yard
then of the homes.
Paul Oehme: Typically there’s no inlets for the drain. It’s more sub-surface drainage that that
drain tile is taking up quite a bit of the drain tile from the sump pumps would be generally
connected into that drain tile.
Mayor Furlong: You would plumb those in?
Paul Oehme: Yep. That’s a typical permit that the resident would pull to make that connection.
Make that connection. That water would discharge into the storm sewer system.
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Mayor Furlong: So those have been identified or will be identified?
Paul Oehme: Well we’re continuing to try to identify those. We know one property current and
we’re continuing to work on other areas as well.
Mayor Furlong: Alright. Other questions at this point. I’m sorry.
Marcus Thomas: If you’ve got a question that’s fine. Just before you open the public hearing I
was going to suggest I recap some of the private costs as well for the people to comment on.
Mayor Furlong: I guess in terms of the condition of the pavement, we do across the city we do
pavement condition indexes I believe. What is the, what’s the grading on this pavement and in
terms of where it is and what’s the high and the low or where does this area come out?
Paul Oehme: Do we have that in the report Marcus?
Marcus Thomas: I’m looking to see if we have it in the report.
Paul Oehme: I don’t know that number off the top of my head but I know it did rate in the lower
spectrum of the mill and overlay section. As I alluded to, there are several areas within this
neighborhood that have significant alligatoring or pot-holing which does impact the PCI,
Pavement Condition Index in this area so.
Mayor Furlong: So for the layman, I mean the scale goes from new to gravel or nothing I mean
and somewhere it reaches a point that it falls into a mill and overlay and some place below that it
falls into a reconstruction.
Paul Oehme: You’re correct. The system that the City has adopted is a scale from 100 being
virtually a new street to 0 as indicated gravel. Non-existing street so, the mill and overlay section
I believe is from.
Marcus Thomas: It’s right around those 50’s to 60’s for those PCI’s.
Mayor Furlong: And then the question is, where did this neighborhood fall in to that scale?
Marcus Thomas: I believe we were right in those 50 and 60’s. I don’t have that information in
our report in front of me but as Paul was suggesting, those numbers did coincide with what we
just recently observed as well with some of those areas actually being a little bit worst than a mill
and overlay. Which is somewhat, which is somewhat kind of expected I guess going 15 years
into a pavement life, usually you’re seeing that mill and overlay necessity come in between 10
and 15 years, so we’re kind of at the tail end of when we should expect to see a need for mill and
overlay and the PCI values we’re suggesting that we would see more deteriorated pavement as
we found as well so.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you.
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Marcus Thomas: You’re welcome.
Mayor Furlong: Any other questions? You wanted to talk about the costs.
Marcus Thomas: Yes Mr. Mayor. The project cost for the Chanhassen Hills project are
$661,300. Actually I’ll just quickly show an overall project cost. This actually, again this is one
part of a larger city project that includes the Koehnen area that we discussed last time, as well as
the Lake Ann Park. Those areas aren’t itemized in this table, so I just wanted to bring to your
attention the total project cost for all three areas estimated today versus the 2006 CIP budget.
The estimated cost today are just under $3.9 million. The 2006 CIP budget was just under $3.8
million dollars for the overall project. For the Chanhassen Hills project then, funding would
come from special assessments, according to the City’s assessment practices whereas 40% of the
assessable cost, street cost would be passed onto the adjacent benefiting properties. In this case
there’s itemization of 170 properties with a proposed assessment amount of $1,698.15. With that
I’d take any other questions on cost or assessments from the council.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you. Any questions from the council at this point? Okay. Alright, thank
you. At this point then we’d open up the public hearing and invite residents and other interested
parties to come forward and comment about the proposed project for the Chanhassen Hills area.
If you come to the podium, please state your name and address. Good evening.
Kelly Morrison: Hi, Kelly Morrison. 1060 Lyman Court. Perhaps this was discussed at our
previous meeting but I’m kind of am wondering why we’re footing the bill for Lake Ann
refurbishment or whatever. And so maybe that’s a misconception or perhaps other
neighborhoods that are being redone are helping out with other parks or something, but I’m kind
of.
Mayor Furlong: No, that’s a fair question.
Kelly Morrison: …I don’t know.
Mayor Furlong: Well I think it deserves clarification, yeah.
Paul Oehme: And you’re not footing the bill for any portion of the, or directly for the…
Kelly Morrison: Thankfully it was that. Along with other neighborhoods.
Paul Oehme: Right, but the City has done, or practice has been to try to lump projects together
into one bid package because we receive better bids from larger project areas, so in your case the
Chanhassen Hills area, the assessments are based on just your project area and your costs and
approval of the improvements along likewise the Koehnen area costs for that particular
neighborhood, those costs are based on the improvements, yeah. We tabulate or get bids from
one contractor for, or all the contractors bid for each of those particular areas and knowing those
costs for each of those areas, we base our assessments on the cost that come in for each of those
areas, so yes you’re not…
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Kelly Morrison: Thank you for clarifying that. The one other concern I have is, I don’t know if
any of you live south of 5, we kind of got a lot of stuff going on right now. And it’s just like
golly, does this have to be done now? Part of me says if you’re going to pile it on to make noise,
go ahead and get it all done at once. But I mean there’s a lot going on and we just had 24 hours,
they said it was 23. They said there’d be no backing up but none of that happened. There was
backing up in 2:00 in the middle of the night and it’s been noisy and I’m just wondering what is
the time frame for this. When is it going to be done? You know we’re talking about street
closing. There’s lots of issues with this area and so I’m just curious.
Mayor Furlong: Okay, thank you. Why now and what’s the schedule for the project?
Paul Oehme: Well, and again based upon the pavement condition being already discussed, you
know we think the time is now to do the improvements before the street deteriorates to a greater
level and more costly improvements are required at that time. Another item that staff has
discussed was, to get the project done now and when there is construction out there, instead of
having this project and coming in at a later date when maybe 212’s done or continuing the
construction, it’s more opportunity to do it when all the construction’s done. Get in and get out
and get it done so we’re trying to time this project before Lyman Boulevard is closed. Lyman
Boulevard is talking about closing a segment of Lyman south of this project area for 2 months
this summer so we’re trying to get the roads improved before that closure happens as well so
there is, we’re trying to work with the 212 project as well to make this thing happen.
Marcus Thomas: The construction window on this particular project is scheduled from June to
October of this year as well, and again as Mr. Oehme suggested, we’ve got multiple project parts
so ultimately we’re working with a contractor to determine what sequence things get done but
that’s the overall construction.
Mayor Furlong: And I think I know the answer to this but I’m going to ask it anyway, because
of all the construction traffic down there for 212, as we improve these streets, they aren’t going
to be running, the 212 contractor’s not going to be using these neighborhood streets. I know I
don’t think they are now and I don’t think they would.
Paul Oehme: No, no. The 212 tractors aren’t allowed to go on local streets.
Kelly Morrison: The tractor’s not but we’re seeing some construction usage of our, we live a
block…I’m speaking for us.
Mayor Furlong: No, and that’s fine and if that’s the case we need to talk to the contractors to
prevent that so if you could talk to Mr. Oehme and let him know what’s going on so that we can
get that information back to the 212 contractor, regardless of whatever we do with this project,
that needs, that information needs to get back to them. Thank you.
Councilman Peterson: I think one of the other questions too was, obviously this isn’t going to
take months to complete. Once we get started on it and the contractor’s are let, you know to mill
and overlay this area, you’re talking about days not weeks I assume.
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Marcus Thomas: We’re probably talking, we’ll probably be talking weeks but not months. I
guess I would, if you want to generalize it like that. There isn’t a lot of excavating and things
like that to do to slow down progress so it is rather a quick operation. It’s relatively clean
compared to a full reconstruction so it’s a process that hopefully has lesser impacts than they
expect with a typical reconstruction.
Mayor Furlong: Residents will have access throughout the process to their properties.
Marcus Thomas: Much easier to keep, maintain access continuously to all properties during this,
yes.
Councilman Lundquist: You won’t hear the backs of the big dump trucks banging at 2:00 in the
morning either. They wake my kids up too. I hear you.
Kelly Morrison: You live there?
Mayor Furlong: Thank you. The public hearing is open so I would again extend an invitation
for residents to please come forward to come forward and address the council and ask questions
of staff.
John Meyers: John Meyers, 1011 Barbara Court. I had a couple questions. We are seeing
increased traffic so part of the question is, would patches work short term until the 212
development’s done and then get some of the cost in one piece? And I guess the other question
is, the 40-60 split on cost as well. Lived in multiple different places and where the cities picked
up these expenses and so the question is, the 40-60 split on cost. Because if I have control of the
40%, because I’d like to see what my options would be before we go to a full cover up of the
streets.
Mayor Furlong: Okay. Alright. Mr. Oehme? Marcus?
Paul Oehme: The City has adopted a practice of assessing 40% of the cost to benefiting
properties for any street improvement that we do. The City does maintain minor, or does pay for
minor pavement improvements such as seal coating, crack sealing. Filling of potholes. That is a
City cost but you know every city sets up their practice a little bit different but the practice the
City has chosen is consistent with several other cities but it’s something that we’ve used in the
past to some success. So to just be consistent with other projects in the past so.
Councilman Lundquist: It’s not a 60-40 in the entire project cost either. Just in portions of that.
Paul Oehme: Right. Like we had talked about the drain tile on the, as part of the utility
cost…those things come out of our utility funds. It’s just the street improvement project that
we’re assessing a 60-40 split.
Councilman Lundquist: And those are generally speaking the neighborhood portions as well
versus the major roadways and other things.
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Paul Oehme: Correct.
Marcus Thomas: If I may just comment on the cost effectiveness of complying an improvement
this year as opposed to doing something temporary and try to sustain it for another year. Again
when we see the roadways starting to deteriorate beyond the need of a traditional mill and
overlay, as we have found in certain areas, that deterioration happens a lot quicker than it does at
the top of it’s life when it’s deteriorating slowly. So what I would expect to see, if we put off
construction until next year is a good amount more of that heavy duty, the full depth bituminous
patching needed then than we do this year, adding to the project costs along with typical
escalating construction costs. Ultimately raising assessments so I think from a cost effective
perspective, it’s in the best interest of the City and the residents to take advantage of the cost
today and the level of work that’s needed today so.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you.
Todd Gerhardt: Mayor, there was one other comment Mayor regarding just filling the potholes
until 212 is completed. We’re going to send a strong message to the contractor on the 212
project that they should not be driving trucks through that area or employees driving through that
area so if you see that in the future, please contact either Paul or myself and we will take action
on that.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you. Other discussion or public comment.
Scott Schutter: My name is Scott Schutter. I’m at 8691 Chanhassen Hills Drive. I have two
questions. One is, the length of the viability of this project. So basically you know mill and
resurface versus reconstruction. How long is that warrantied per se or until it needs to be done
again? Is that a 10-15 year range that we’re currently looking at? And then the cost of this is a
one time assessment to the, or a one year hit versus deferred over several years to the $1,700?
Paul Oehme: Sure, I can try to address that. Mill and overlays are typically we’re shooting for
about 15 years on the mill and overlay projects. It all depends upon again the traffic volumes.
The type of traffic that’s out there. The sub-soils that we see out there so we shoot for 15 years
and that’s typically what we see with the streets here and the soils that we see are in Chanhassen.
The assessment question, yes it is assessed over a 8 year period. 8 year period at 6% interest so,
so it’s 8 years over 6%. 6% interest so and that would typically go on your taxes if the project
goes through.
Mayor Furlong: As a point of clarification. If the property owner decides to pay off the total
assessment right now they can do that and avoid the interest charges as well so it’s the property
owner’s choice on whether it is paid at one time or whether you pay it off over time. Over the 8
year period but then there’d be the interest as well.
Councilman Lundquist: No pre-payment penalty.
Mayor Furlong: I think that’s in the staff report for this project, 8 years at 6%.
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Paul Oehme: 8 years at 6%.
Scott Schutter: Normally what you see is after a mill and overlay process, so we’re 15 years into
it now. We do a mill and overlay. It’s 15 years from now most likely they do a complete
reconstruction for the next process because of deterioration of utilities underneath generally, is
that how it works?
Paul Oehme: It has to do a little bit with the utilities. We look at how the infrastructure’s
holding up. Your streets will be 30, maybe 35 years old. We look at the condition of the curb
and gutter at that time to see how all the, how the area’s draining. Again the utilities and then the
pavement too. If we have significant deterioration, if it’s deteriorating faster than we think it is,
maybe we let it go and do a recon at 35 or 40 years out so, it all depends. We rate our streets
every three years to get benchmarks every 3 years for each of the streets and we rate them
accordingly.
Mayor Furlong: From best practices standpoint, is it a section of road or a neighborhood street
such as this limited to only one overlay, mill and overlay in it’s life or can you do multiple to
keep extending it?
Paul Oehme: Yep.
Mayor Furlong: That was an or question. So there’s not a limit? I mean this isn’t the only time.
The next time we do anything it would be a reconstruction.
Paul Oehme: There is a lot of factors going into the decision in terms of what streets need to get
reconstructed and which ones don’t obviously. Utilities is, plays a huge factor into that. Another
one again is the curb and gutter. Seeing how things are draining out there. The pavement
condition. Those type of things so in the deterioration from one mill and overlay to the next mill
and overlay, if there’s a rapid deterioration that tells us that there’s something going wrong with
the sub-grade and we’ve got to re-think doing a mill and overlay in the future.
Mayor Furlong: Anyone else who would like to comment during public hearing here on this
matter of the Chanhassen Hills project?
Mike Timm: Hello. Mike Timm, 1101 Lyman Court. I have a hard time believing him that
we’ll be able to access our residence when the concrete’s wet but how many days will we be
parking on the street? I noticed there’s a lot of curb and gutter that probably needs to be
replaced, according to where it’s marked you know. That was my concern I guess.
Marcus Thomas: Thanks for the question. By the way the curb and gutter that was marked was,
I think it was our own tabulation of everything, if we could replace everything that was, had any
problems, that’s what we want to do, so the extent of that replacement, I don’t think it’s going to
be that vast so I just wanted to clarify that. As far as access is concerned, the paving process is
actually a pretty quick process whereas once the bituminous is laid and rolled, it’s essentially
ready for driving on, so we’re probably talking once the paver starts on your, I see you’re on a
cul-de-sac. Once the paver would start on your cul-de-sac, I mean it’s just a matter of hours
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
before you’re able to drive on that again. Now if you have curb replacement that’s in front of
your driveway, that would, we’re probably talking up to about 3 days for cure time on a high
early strength quick curing concrete before you could drive over that into your driveway so, there
is a replacement that needs to happen right there, that you may have to park outside of the
driveway for up to 3 days.
Councilman Lundquist: Mr. Thomas, can we do provisions of laying plates over the top of those
curbs so that you can drive from the street to the driveway without having to drive over the curb?
Marcus Thomas: You know with a, if we were doing something a little bit different with the full
reconstruct it might be easier to accomplish that but typically I’m not aware of an easy way to do
that without damaging those curbs. Now if we do have larger segments, we could do them in
halves to allow you to kind of come in at one angle and do the other half 3 days later.
Mike Timm: I know mine’s one of them but I have 3 vehicles, live on a cul-de-sac and you do
everybody’s at once in that area it’s going to be tight parking all at once.
Marcus Thomas: Well that’s something that we should pay attention to during construction and
work with the contractor. To do it in perhaps multiple pours. Half one day and then half 3 days
later. If we anticipate a large number of people having to park out on the cul-de-sac so we can
certainly work with them.
Mayor Furlong: I noticed here that on the proposed schedule there’s a neighborhood meeting for
the Chanhassen Hills area in May. End of May and I guess at that point would you have
information so that you can let the residents know whether or not the curb in front of their
driveways is scheduled to be replaced and then we can address the individual concerns? Is that
information going to be available at that time or would it be at a later time that that information
would be made available?
Marcus Thomas: It’d probably be at a later time. I guess, and perhaps Paul can let me know if
I’m wrong with our approach but I was anticipating that because there is such a large amount
that could be done out there, and we’re going to have to narrow down our scope to keep things
within budget, we’d probably end up kind of working with the City and the contractor right
before construction to mark these locations that we want to attack and at that time you might see
the fresh pink paint out there and that kind of tells you right then and there, this is what’s going.
This is what’s not going to go so, there will be a visual indication at that time.
Mayor Furlong: Okay. And so then at that time Mr. Oehme or Mr. Thomas we can contact
those residents if the concrete in front of their driveway is going to be replaced in it’s entirety,
contact them and work with them…
Paul Oehme: Yeah, we give our newsletters on a monthly basis, on this case it will probably be
more or less on a weekly basis since this project will be a little bit quicker than the Koehnen area
project but, the property owners will have our numbers. The inspectors numbers. City staff
numbers and if there are areas on their driveway or in front of their driveway where the curb has
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
to be replaced, we always try to work with those property owners to make sure that they
understand what the schedule is and what we’re trying to accomplish with that.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you. Please come forward.
Jacqueline Meyers: I’m Jacqueline Meyers, 1011 Barbara Court and first of all just want to say
thank you for the communication. It’s been excellent and really appreciate it on behalf of the
residents. Just a quick question…neighborhood so I guess I want to just check the assumption,
this will be staggered against the closing of Lake Susan Drive and Lyman.
Marcus Thomas: Lyman.
Jacqueline Meyers: Yeah, I mean just because there is so much going on and there’s just one
layer to add complications so just wanted to check that assumption.
Mayor Furlong: Okay.
Paul Oehme: Yeah, we’re trying to work with the 212 contract and try to stage this to try to get
it done in a reasonable amount of time with the least disruption to the property owners.
Mayor Furlong: Pull the microphone over please Mike. Can you speak into the microphone so
those at home can hear as well.
Mike Timm: Oh, I was wondering what that does…are you going to be doing any.
Councilman Labatt: That’s that guy’s private driveway to that garage.
Mike Timm: So you’re not going to be putting improvements there for me?
Marcus Thomas: There’s no garage modifications as a part of this project.
Mike Timm: Then I guess, we all received notice that they were closing Lake Susan Drive in a
week.
Audience: Through September.
Mike Timm: …Well your construction trucks I guess are, whoever does the contract in there
will have to come from the other end. I don’t know if that’s related you know to tonight here or
not but there’s probably a concern there I guess. If we can’t use it, you know they’re not going
to use it?
John Meyers: The continuation is the same. It starts with the, there will only be one entrance
and egress point from Chanhassen Hills from February to September when you’re also going to
be doing paving. Also around June to October, and so you know how are the residents going to
be getting into and out of the community during the course of the summer, early fall?
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Paul Oehme: Well access will always be provided off of 101, so that access point’s never going
to be closed. So there will again, the property owners will always have access to their property
and like Marcus had alluded to, the mill and overlay project goes fairly quickly. We want to get
in and out of it as quickly as we can so I think just based upon the project scope and how the
need for the project at this time, it just seems like it’s a good opportunity for us to do it in
conjunction with the 212 project and get in and get out and get it done and not disturb the
residences on a prolonged basis.
Mayor Furlong: Any other public comment? Discussion. Okay. Seeing none at this point, why
don’t we move onto Lake Ann.
Marcus Thomas: Okay, the figure that I have up now illustrates the proposed improvements to
the parking lot and roadway improvements within Lake Ann Park. The general approach to the
Lake Ann Park improvements is relatively simple as well. Whereas we’ll just mill up the
existing roadways and parking lots where indicated in yellow, full depth. Not just an edge mill
but full depth in this case, grinding them up in their entirety. Re-compacting the milled material
and then re-paving the roads and parking lots within the park area. The only reconstruction that
would be proposed as a part of this project is at this irregularly shaped existing intersection
where we’ve got 4 legs of an intersection kind of coming in at very odd and awkward angles.
What we propose to do, which is overlaid in yellow here, is to reconstruct that in a typical cross
shape intersection where it’s coming in perpendicular so. That’s the only reconstruction that we
propose within the park area. We do propose to expand the existing parking lot by the ballfields
by an additional 12 stalls to offer additional parking up there as well. Finally the staff would like
to put together an alternate bid package for an additional mill and overlay work within the park.
Additional roads and parking lot that are in the park as an alternate bid. This being what we
want to move forward with for sure, getting an alternate bid of additional work and if bid prices
come in low enough and budget constraints aren’t over extended, then we may expand on the
scope of the work beyond what’s shown in this drawing here. That in essence is the scope of the
improvements for Lake Ann Park. The total project cost for Lake Ann Park improvements are
$321,235 and again there are no assessments associated with these improvements. Any
questions?
Mayor Furlong: Questions for Mr. Thomas. Pavement condition, again from a, using an index
standpoint, what’s the condition of the pavement out there justifying this project at this time.
Marcus Thomas: I don’t have anything in the report. I’d have to defer to Mr. Oehme if there
was PCI values taken on the parking lot areas. I know that what we were mainly going on in this
case was a visual analysis where we’re seeing severe alligator cracking where it’s not eligible for
mill and overlay because if you try to do a surface milling, it would crumble below you so
visually we can see that, so the PCI’s, I don’t have any PCI information on that.
Mayor Furlong: Okay. So it’s justified based upon inspection?
Marcus Thomas: Absolutely, yeah. We didn’t see any severe rutting though that would indicate
sub-grade failures and the need for a deep reconstruct. Just old, old, oxidized brittle pavement
that is just kind of broken up so.
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Paul Oehme: That was part of their Bolton-Menk’s scope was to evaluate the parking lots and
see what type of improvements were necessary at this location so, and they came back with the
recommendation of that reconstruction.
Mayor Furlong: Okay. Then the other question, the timing of this would also be in the similar
time frame as the other projects?
Paul Oehme: It follows the schedule that’s outlined in the packet. We would not anticipate
starting this project until the end of the summer months though, on the usage of the park.
Mayor Furlong: And that’s leading to my next question. Are we aware of any conflicts?
Paul Oehme: Right. That’s what, we worked with the parks department on any schedules.
Planned events at the park. Like we said, we’re probably after Labor Day or someplace in there.
Maybe want it close to Labor Day. Sometime in August timeframe.
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Councilman Lundquist: July 2 work for you?
rdth
Mayor Furlong: The 3 and the 4 of July would probably be a good time to avoid. Any other
questions for Mr. Thomas at this time? If not, then I will open up the public hearing and invite
interested parties to come forward and comment on the Lake Ann proposed improvements.
Okay, seeing none. We’ll continue now, Mr. Oehme in your staff report you discussed a number
of items that were brought up by residents in our last meeting, discussing the Koehnen-Yosemite
area. Would you like to take a few minutes to talk through that as well.
Paul Oehme: Sure. We have identified about 5 major topics that were brought up at the
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Koehnen portion of the public hearing. They included the retaining walls on 63 Street, the
speeding on Yosemite, the pond, proposed pond on Koehnen East Circle, the proposed impacts
to the surrounding neighborhoods. The issues of the pond in general. And then also street
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lighting on 63 Street and then also the assessment costs as well so, I don’t know, would you
like to go through each of them individually?
Mayor Furlong: No, that’s fine. I guess, unless there are questions by council on any of the
items that were raised.
Councilman Lundquist: Not on those specifically Mr. Mayor, but still would like to, once we
bring this back in the next stage, have a question answered. The potential if Yosemite
recommended to widen that out to make it MSA eligible is what, if we chose not to widen that
out, obviously we wouldn’t be able to use those MSA funds. What does that do to the total
project cost and you know does that, how does that affect individual resident assessments so, you
know the retaining walls wouldn’t be necessary and some of that staff along there. Just looking
for the impact of that.
Paul Oehme: Well in terms of residential assessment costs, the costs would be virtually the same
but we would pay, the City or the staff has proposed that the City would pay for the over sizing
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
of the cost for the extra widening. The extra height of the potential retaining walls that would be
necessary to pave that 32 foot wide roadway and the extra on the increased structural strength of
the pavement section to meet the MSA standards as well, so in terms of the cost, there would not
be any difference between what, from a 28 foot wide road or 27, what it is now, to a 32. We did
meet with several, staff did meet with 2 property owners on Yosemite last week to discuss that
retaining wall specifically and it’s been our practice to try to reduce those walls as much as we
can. Just do the cost of it and the aesthetics of it too, so what we did similar to Lake Lucy Road
project, we did have significant amounts of retaining walls in that project that we did last year.
We did work with the property owners in that case to obtain temporary rights of entry so we can
grade back into their property to eliminate those walls. Under this scenario too, we’d like to
work with the property owners to try to reduce those walls where we can as well. So, because
the property owners don’t seem to like the walls. The City doesn’t like to spend money on it so,
try to work with the property… But unfortunately at this time you know we have to stay within
our right-of-way. Once we have a contractor on board that we can meet with, we would like to
meet with the property owners at that time and review those case by case areas and try to reduce
those walls as much as we can.
Councilman Lundquist: As I, so clarification on the MSA. If the, okay let’s say we don’t widen
Yosemite and it’s just a regular 27-28 foot wide road. We’re going to do a reconstruction on that
regardless, correct?
Todd Gerhardt: Yeah. I think if I understand where you’re going Councilmember Lundquist is
that if we don’t use the MSA funds, then the City would have to look at some other funding
source to pick up the City’s portion because we use the 60-40 percent on the road also. So no
matter what the width of the road is, the residents are going to pay for that typical road section
and then the City’s picking up the excess through MSA funds.
Councilman Lundquist: So when we picked up the, when we put the assessment cost together
for the Yosemite piece we said, essentially that the assessed piece is going to be 40% of a
reconstruction of a 27 foot wide road.
Todd Gerhardt: That’s correct.
Councilman Lundquist: And then everything else over and above MSA and the whole rest of
that widening and retaining walls and all of that staff does not contribute to the assessments one
way or the other?
Todd Gerhardt: That’s correct.
Councilman Lundquist: Okay.
Paul Oehme: But again, you know the MSA costs that we have allocated for this project do…
Councilman Lundquist: …understand and I just wanted to make sure there wasn’t an impact one
way or another to the assessments. I would have expected actually that the assessments would
have gone up by not using the MSA because that would have taken kind of some of the pool
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
away so, so I just wanted to make sure there wasn’t an option there to reduce those assessment
values by using that or not using that so, understand where you’re at.
Todd Gerhardt: Mr. Mayor, council members. The reason we don’t do that is both Paul and
Roger will tell you you’ve got to show benefit and you’ve got to have a baseline or assumption
and that’s your typical road section is what you use for that. If you go up and above that you’re
going to have a difficult time showing what the true benefit of widening and adding some of that
stuff back to a resident would be.
Councilman Lundquist: Understand.
Mayor Furlong: I think on that point, Mr. Oehme in your report you brought up that the City’s
standard width for a road, for Yosemite for the type of use that we expect, currently it’s 20, the
standard is 31 feet. This road is physically 27 feet, and if I understand your staff report correctly
what you’re saying is that, based upon the current usage, which is there, that if that road were
built to current standards it’d be 31 feet wide. MSA requires 32 feet wide, so there’s just a little
bit more. A foot more width required to make available the MSA funds.
Paul Oehme: That’s correct.
Mayor Furlong: Okay. Alright. And yet what I’m hearing here is the assessment’s still on the
existing width even though that doesn’t meet current standards.
Paul Oehme: Right. We, like Mr. Gerhardt alluded to, we try to keep it at the baseline.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you. Any other questions from council on the information provided in
the staff report? Follow-up to the public hearing.
Councilman Lundquist: No.
Mayor Furlong: Okay. At this point then, I would invite, is there any additional comment from
residents with regard to this project? Sir, would you like to come forward. Mr. Johnson.
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Willard Johnson: Willard Johnson, 1660 West 63 Street.
Mayor Furlong: Good evening.
Willard Johnson: One question. People that have two lots, are we picking up the freight for
them or are they going to be assessed for two lots?
Todd Gerhardt: I can handle that question Mayor, City Council. That was another item that I
think the council had asked staff to do research in the area to see what we have for lot split
capabilities. Kate Aanenson, our Community Development Director reviewed that area and she
found approximately, you know the possibility of creating 6 additional lots outside of, 5. Sorry.
5-6. And to go through the process of trying to justify those with each individual homeowner,
we felt it was something that we should not pursue, but it’s a good question.
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Willard Johnson: Like back in ’72 when you put it through, we picked up the freight from
Minnewashta. Our’s was the cheapest area in the whole city at $3,000. We wound up paying
$5,000 because we had to pick up Minnewashta. I don’t think that was fair at that time.
Todd Gerhardt: Yeah, I understand.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you. Yes, good evening. Come forward.
Laura Fridgen: Hi. My name is Laura Fridgen and I did send an e-mail and I would like to
thank Mr. Lundquist for responding to it. I did not hear from anybody else. I have a letter here
from my neighbor across the street. She’s wheelchair bound and could not make it. She’s not
doing well so I don’t know who to give that to. She had some comments that she wanted to
make… I think I’m a little bit more clear on the MSA funds but still unclear as to why it does
not extend all the way to Lake Lucy. There was some discussion in the notes from the previous
meeting. Something about private sewer and water.
Mayor Furlong: Right. We can, we discussed that a little bit at the last meeting but maybe we
could clarify the scope of the project.
Paul Oehme: Sure, Marcus. If you could point out.
Laura Fridgen: I came to the resident meeting. It’s not like I’m unclear.
Paul Oehme: The scope of the project or the limits of the project extend to the property south on
Yosemite that is currently serviced by sewer and water. Farther south than that there are
potential lot splits and properties that I don’t think have, or they don’t have sewer extended at
this time. For those properties the sewer and the water are planned to come from the south, north
to, from Lake Lucy Road. And it had been the City’s standard that those streets don’t, aren’t
improved at this time until utilities are brought in. You know including curb and gutter and
storm sewer, so just following what we’re, what we have done in the past, you know we have not
included that section of roadway at this time in this project. If council would prefer to have that
section of roadway brought in at this time, you know that’s something we can easily
accommodate. Just obviously haven’t budgeted for it at this time.
Councilman Lundquist: We want to make sure that we don’t tear up the road, put in a new one
and then 3 years down the road when those people subdivide their lots and get city sewer, that
we’ve got to come in and bulldoze it again and, to put some pipes in the ground and then put it
back over again. There’s a potential that they’re going to come back in soon and we don’t want
to double do the road and you know incur that double expense and have those residents incur that
double expense. That’s why it’s not.
Mayor Furlong: At the same time I think we talked about some possible alternatives as well and
whether those could be included as a bid alternative as well so we could, and would it be easier
for the council to make a decision on doing that depending on what the costs are.
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Paul Oehme: And we could easily include say maybe a mill and overlay in that section too to
just bring it up to the other roadway condition.
Laura Fridgen: I’m just curious you know you look at, if you’re saying that this road, Yosemite
is so bad that it’s, it needs to have all the street construction, it would only make sense that the
other part is bad too all the way to Lake Lucy so.
Mayor Furlong: And to Councilman Lundquist’s point, the reason not to do it now is because
property owners could come in in a year, two, three. Require utility service which would require
ripping up the entire new road and putting another one down. So it’s an issue of timing.
Laura Fridgen: Okay. The other thing that with the MSA funds is you know, it’s going to be,
the widening of the road, the tax dollars. You’re indicating what I heard that the cost is equal or
the same as if it was 27 or 32.
Paul Oehme: The assessment dollars.
Laura Fridgen: Right. I understand that but ultimately we all as taxpayers pay for this because
you’re getting state funds to do this, correct?
Councilman Lundquist: MSA funds are use it or lose it. If we don’t use the money that the state
gives us, we don’t get it back.
Mayor Furlong: The MSA dollars are generated by gas taxes so every time any of us.
Laura Fridgen: Yes, and I’m sure we all drove here tonight.
Todd Gerhardt: Mayor can I just clarify that one issue? When you use MSA funds there’s
restrictions on the City that you have to build the road to a certain width if you’re going to use
your state aid dollars for that. If the City decides that they want to keep it at the 28 foot, we can’t
use the MSA dollars so then we’re going to have to look at other forms of revenue to make up
the loss of those MSA dollars. So if you’re not using the MSA, then you know we’d have to
look at probably levying up additional dollars.
Laura Fridgen: I understand. I understand that part but, it’s going to be quite an odd road where
you had a certain width. It widens. Speed is going to increase, and I’ve read the last meeting
notes and somebody indicated that they would have a hard time believing that somebody would
be able to get to a high rate of speed in such a short distance. It already happens. We don’t ride
our bikes on that street. It does happen and I don’t understand it. You’re going to increase the
width. Increase the speed because you know that people drive according to road conditions, and
if you can see farther and it’s wider and the road is such, you’ll drive maybe a little faster.
That’s, I’ve read about that and so that’s that. The other thing, I actually have a few things. I’m
sorry because I wasn’t here last time.
Mayor Furlong: No, that’s fine.
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Laura Fridgen: I read in the notes and as my neighbor across the street indicated about her
property value increasing, and the previous meeting somebody, a resident indicated their value
was going to increase because of these improvements. That’s, I don’t see how that’s going to
happen. I’ve been in real estate for, since 1988. Sold houses. I currently appraise houses. I
work for local government. I understand a lot about how funds are distributed. But I have never
sold a house or appraised a house and even looked at the curb or gutter. On the other hand
you’re taking out a lot of trees and they do add value. Wooded lot. You see it in listings all the
time. So that’s a concern with the curb and gutter. I don’t understand why it has to be done now
and maybe I’m being a little bit selfish but I don’t see a particular problem with our cul-de-sac,
Blue Jay Circle or Audubon Circle. With increasing the radius, that’s what I understand on the
notes on the meeting that I attended, that they want to widen the radius and the turn around for
the fire trucks.
Mayor Furlong: I’m sorry, go ahead. I think on that issue, has that been changed?
Paul Oehme: Yes, we previously approached the property owners and discussed with them the
possibility of increasing that radius to facilitate our fire trucks. Due to the lack of the right-of-
way that we have out there and the property owners input on that, we have gone back from that
and basically proposing to put the cul-de-sac or the roadway back in that area to it’s existing
condition.
Laura Fridgen: Okay, thank you. That’s good because when I saw some of the trees that were
going to be removed in the original plan will not be removed.
Paul Oehme: That’s correct.
Laura Fridgen: Okay. I hear talk about this mill overlay and I’m not an asphalt person or
anything like that and I would be curious to know, you know there’s 4 houses on my cul-de-sac.
So it’s a very little traveled road and I’m wondering about my street, because to me, not being a
person that is an expert, and what my street calls, because the way I understand it, if I’m not
mistaken. Correct me. You’re going to take up the whole asphalt and redo it, not overlay it? On
Blue Jay.
Marcus Thomas: Correct. The street will be reconstructed.
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Laura Fridgen: Okay, because I would think that Yosemite and 63 which, what a higher
number. Is that how they go? Higher is worst?
Paul Oehme: Higher is better.
Laura Fridgen: Higher is, okay. So I would assume that mine would be better than most other
streets and I, I guess my main problem here and it’s, it may be selfish but I do not see a benefit to
my house from a curb and gutter. I don’t have a water problem. I don’t have, I don’t have a
problem with the way it’s set up. I understand runoff.
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Paul Oehme: Okay. And again, the curb and gutter is to handle, we’re trying to address water
quality and water quantity issues in this area as well. And bring the streets up to our city
standard. This area has been rated in general, your street I know is in a little bit better condition
than maybe some of the other streets but in general, you know this area is recommended for
reconstruction. Now on Blue Jay Court, the sewer we know is in poor condition. The watermain
is cast iron. We feel that it should be replaced soon because of the watermain breaks that we’ve
had in this area. We’re not, it’s not a good practice to go into a neighborhood, reconstruct a
street and make improvements to the whole, to the area and not address everybody, and not just
overlay say a certain street here. We need to be consistent with our improvement projects in
these neighborhoods.
Laura Fridgen: And it is my opinion that other people on other streets, maybe on Cardinal.
Maybe 1779 Cardinal or maybe that’s Koehnen, I’m not sure. Some areas will benefit far more
from this construction because there is constantly a pond out there. So I’m wondering what is
my cost benefit? What do I get for my $7,100? Nothing basically.
Paul Oehme: Well again, the City has drafted a report and I can definitely share that report with
you. We did have an appraiser come in and look at cost benefit for this whole area and he has
coming up with a benefit for the properties in this area. So and that’s how we justify our
assessments as well so. So, go ahead.
Laura Fridgen: Is that report available?
Paul Oehme: Yeah.
Laura Fridgen: This appraisal report that shows me how much my property’s going to increase
in value due to this?
Paul Oehme: Yeah, you can schedule a time we can run through that.
Laura Fridgen: Okay. I, as an appraiser and in the real estate business for a long time, I don’t
see that but… Curious on this Lake Ann parking project. There’s no data on that. It’s a visual.
You know it looks like it needs to be done whereas here where there’s taxpayer dollars involved,
I mean what my money versus the City’s money, there is, it’s just a visual on Lake Ann parking
lot. You indicated that. I made a note of it and I don’t understand why. I don’t know, maybe
it’s different when it’s a city parking lot.
Todd Gerhardt: Mayor, maybe I can address that one. You can’t assess a parking lot in a city
park. That you definitely can’t show benefit back to you, the Lake Susan people so Lake Ann
Park is a city responsibility. Like your driveway from the right-of-way to your house is your
responsibility, Lake Ann Park is the City’s responsibility to maintain and replace or do mill and
overlays on. City Hall parking lot we did last year. We have a capital improvement plan that
we follow and this happened to fall on this year to do the Lake Ann parking lot. So that will be
general taxpayers dollars from the entire community to pay for the Lake Ann parking lot.
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Laura Fridgen: I understand that. The other thing that I was thinking that all these projects, I
have never been to a City Council meeting before. …didn’t affect me. I’m here but all these
projects that I’ve seen tonight have been handled by one company. How were the bids, I mean
was there a bidding process? I mean why…or is there some.
Mayor Furlong: Mr. Thomas might like to address that. No, I think that’s a fair question. This
was a process that we went through some months ago, last fall I believe it was Mr. Oehme.
Paul Oehme: Last I think August we solicited 5 quotes for bids on engineering design
construction administration for the projects we’re talking about here tonight so, and we did select
Bolton-Menk out of that group.
Todd Gerhardt: Mayor, and to take that one step back is that we pre-qualify any engineering
firm that works in this city so Bolton-Menk, SEH, we had 3 or 4 engineering firms that we may
ask for quotes for this, and we pre-qualify those engineering firms to make sure that their history
of working with cities, residents and road reconstruction projects, that they had success in doing
that. So Bolton and Menk came out strong in that review process, plus they gave a competitive
bid so it’s not like we’re out just looking for the cheapest engineering firms. We pre-qualify
that.
Laura Fridgen: I didn’t mean it like that.
Todd Gerhardt: No, I just wanted to make sure everybody at home understood how we go about
selecting engineering firms.
Mayor Furlong: I think the other response to your comment about one firm doing all the
projects, historically or sometimes in the past I should say multiple firms were selected for
different projects within the city during the same year. It was our observation that that created
inefficiencies and added costs, both in terms of staff time. Now staff is working with multiple
firms rather than one. And as Mr. Oehme talked about before, just as with the construction by
grouping projects together, the expectation is that the overall construction process costs will be
less for everybody. So it’s, by doing some things together, by working with one firm of the
many qualified firms, the overall cost should be less which will save everybody, not only the
taxpayers but also those residents that are subject to assessments.
Laura Fridgen: I just, I know that it’s irrelevant but I saw something on the news and it was the
City of Minneapolis and they had X amount of dollars to spend on these types of improvements
and they selected a firm. They did all the improvements and maybe that’s not the case here, and
they had to spend the money so they found projects to do, so that’s where I’m coming from and
when I see all these projects and I don’t see… That’s what I saw on the news so. So that’s my
history. Anyway, the other thing is I am, now Bruce is not really a friend but an acquaintance.
Bruce Koehnen and I know he was at the last meeting but he complains about his sewer line not
deep enough, which when we moved in we had sewer back-up and it was not because the sewer
wasn’t deep enough. It was because it was clay tile and tree roots had grown in there and it was
time to replace it. It was not, and the thing that I was wondering about here, it’s okay. We can
try to accommodate him if we’re already in this area but in my experience it was not from the
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
sewer, you know from my house to the main being slow. It was because of tree roots. And I
just had a little problem with helping out one person, you know nobody was there to help me
when my sewer backed up into my basement. It was tree roots and they tore down the tree for
that very reason, right at the corner where the sewer extend pipe is. I mean it’s, I don’t know
what…underground, I can’t say right now so.
Todd Gerhardt: Mayor, council I just want to answer that question. We are not making
improvements to his private system. If he is going to replace his private sewer line, that will be
at his cost. We, I think we made point that we were going to look at the depth of the sewer line
and the drop in that line to maybe get a little more drop for him, so it reduces that potential of the
sewer back-up due to the drop in that line.
Laura Fridgen: Yeah…so okay. His sewer…
Todd Gerhardt: Probably the only thing I’ll get right this week.
Laura Fridgen: So I guess, basically I’m asking you to reconsider the scope of the project
because there are, I do not believe there will be any added benefit to Blue Jay, Audubon. I don’t
know about Koehnen Circle. The north side of it. From curbs, gutters. We don’t have a water
problem. I don’t know if anyone else…pond here that you’re going to add. If you’re going to
put a retaining wall anywhere, it should be there because there’s a steep slope. I mean there are a
lot of concerns and you could, I could keep talking a long time because $7,000 is a lot of money
for what you would consider a fairly modest house. A 1958 rambler. It’s not like we live in a
mansion so, that’s my…
Mayor Furlong: Alright, very good. Thank you. Is there anybody else who would like to
comment on any of these projects? Okay, seeing no one.
Councilman Lundquist: Mr. Mayor, I’d move that we close the public hearing.
Mayor Furlong: Okay. Thank you. Is there a second?
Councilman Labatt: Second.
Mayor Furlong: Made and seconded. Any discussion on that motion?
Councilman Lundquist moved, Councilman Labatt seconded to close the public hearing.
All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously with a vote of 5 to 0. The public
hearing was closed.
Mayor Furlong: We’ll bring it back to council. Are there any follow-up questions for staff?
Points of clarification based upon the comments received in the staff report. If not, we’re being
asked by the staff tonight to consider approval of the project and authorization for plans and
specifications so at this point is there any discussion on that request?
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Councilman Lundquist: Mr. Mayor, I would like to, I don’t want to create extra work I guess but
you know I have some concerns about the widening of Yosemite and the retaining wall and all of
that. Those things as well and as I just said before, the MSA dollars are use it or lose it but
again, if we are, I want to make sure that we’re using them wisely as well too so, and whether
that’s a bid alternative that we look at or something in those pieces as well to just, to leave
Yosemite as is and, versus widening that with the MSA dollars and putting in all of the retaining
walls. It does obviously create a lot of extra work and things as well. I’d like to see that as a
consideration at least.
Councilwoman Tjornhom: I have a question. Have we heard from the City of Shorewood?
Paul Oehme: We are still working with the City of Shorewood. They had some, they have sent
in their resolution to the State for designation Apple Road as a state aid route. They have not
submitted a letter requesting the designation of Apple Road as a MSA route at this time. It’s
something that we’re still working with the City of Shorewood and MnDot, getting that issue
resolved.
Councilwoman Tjornhom: Because if that issue doesn’t get resolved, then I take it we would
not.
Paul Oehme: Well we’re kind of under the gun here trying to get these projects, get the MSA
route designated within the city of Chanhassen and finishing up the plans and the specs from the
forum here tonight and getting that over to the state aid for their review and approval of the plans
as forwarded by Bolton-Menk. There is a time crunch right now. There is somewhat of a
backlog at MnDot in terms of plan review. They are limited in staff so, I don’t know if you had
any feedback from MnDot last week on how back logged they are yet but we do need to get
going on getting those plan reviews out and trying to stay on task here because we don’t want to
push this project into later months in the summer. August and September. We try to have these
street reconstruction projects wrapped by the end of August, Labor Day. Before school starts.
Councilwoman Tjornhom: And if we go ahead and use these dollars, are we bound? Do we
have to use them or at the time when the project comes near and we decided it’s not feasible we
can not use them or how does that work?
Paul Oehme: Yes. I mean we always have the option of not using them and going with a similar
design.
Councilman Peterson: Mr. Oehme, what have we done recently when we’ve done total
reconstructions on streets that don’t meet our 31 foot standard? Have we recently widen those
streets? Can you reference any examples?
Paul Oehme: Well Santa Fe for example. That neighborhood did request that the streets
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maintain their current width which was I believe 28 feet at that time, and likewise on 63 Street.
On this project, Koehnen Circle, Blue Jay, we are limiting the street width down to 28 feet which
is it’s current width too so. In those situations we have limited the street width, but in this
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
situation where we do see a larger volume of traffic on Yosemite, and we feel that this is a good
designation for a MSA road.
Councilman Lundquist: And then Mr. Mayor, the other thing, just for my own edification would
be if we can get the, put the speed hoses out there to see what the traffic volume and average
speed that we’ve got on Yosemite now. I’d just be interested. Curious to see what that is. I
can’t remember if you had, I know those traffic counts and things in the report but, you don’t
need to park a deputy out there but drop the hoses and get close enough.
Paul Oehme: This time of year it’s problematic to put out the hoses for speeding because of the
snow and plowing situations and things so.
Mayor Furlong: As long as it doesn’t snow, the plows don’t have to go out.
Paul Oehme: And the hoses freeze too so that is another problem with that.
Todd Gerhardt: We need a new speed hose anyway.
Paul Oehme: So I mean we do have the speed trailer, if you’d like to see the speed trailer out
there for a couple days and take readings that way. I mean it’s not a scientific method of taking.
Councilman Lundquist: I’m looking at just more for volume and, volume and average speed
more than you know traffic control at this point I guess. I don’t want to come back in 2 weeks
and see 15 speeding tickets.
Mayor Furlong: I guess a question, Councilman Lundquist brought up the issue of the option of
not widening the road out to either current city standards or a foot wider to allow for MSA
funding by keeping it 27 to avoid retaining walls. If we keep it at the same width that it is today,
are the grades sufficient? My understanding is we’re still going to have to take out trees. If we
don’t put in retaining walls we’re going to have to come up with a reasonable grade off of that.
The existing road is I think in some places is pretty sharp drop off right now without a retaining
wall so, even if you keep it where it is, what’s going to, I think there might be a false hope here
that if we don’t widen it, we’re going to save trees and, if we don’t put in retaining walls we’re
going to save trees. I guess my question is, what’s your expectation there?
Paul Oehme: Well, maybe Marcus can help me out here too but on Yosemite Road specifically,
I do not believe that we are needing to take out any trees specifically for the widening of the
road. Not for the road but the trees that we’ve identified for removal on Yosemite are related to
water services, where we bring the water service and connect it to the curb stop box, and those
type of situations we try to work around in the field too when we have a contractor so, the tree
issue I don’t think is a concern for the property owners shouldn’t be because of the widening of
the road. And like what we talked about previously the retaining wall issue, we’re going to try to
work with the property owners as much as we can to try to reduce those walls or eliminate them
in certain situations and if we can get temporary construction easements from property owners to
decrease those walls as much as we can so.
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Mayor Furlong: I mean absent a retaining wall, if the road is, I mean if there’s a fall off, the
topography changes, you have to either grade out further out or build the retaining wall. So
you’ve got limits on right-of-way and/or just practical.
Paul Oehme: Exactly. We would want to stabilize those slopes out there as much as we can to,
if we build the road back to 27 foot wide roadway, we still recommend putting a retaining wall in
those areas. Maybe not to the height that they are right now, but nevertheless they are, would
require retaining walls.
Todd Gerhardt: Mr. Mayor, council members. The retaining wall that is on the east side of
Yosemite, I’m surprised we don’t have one there today. That road is in jeopardy of eroding. I
mean you walk probably one foot past the blacktop and it’s straight down into the Bogema’s
front yard so, the reason for the retaining wall is to preserve that erosion that would undermine
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the road in that area. Paul had mentioned that the intersection, the southwest intersection of 63
and Yosemite, there is potential of almost eliminating that retaining wall if the property owner
would allow us to grade back into their lot. That’s one of the lots that could eventually split. So
that’s something that we need to meet with that property owner. They may want the retaining
walls because that would make that lot more buildable then not having the grades into it so it’s
up the homeowner in that corner of what they really want.
Mayor Furlong: Any follow up questions for staff? Discussion. Other discussion topics.
Councilman Peterson, thoughts.
Councilman Peterson: Yeah, I think that the MSA widening if the reasonable and prudent thing
to do. We’re going to get I think a better road. Safer road. We’ll be able to park on it where we
can’t do that now. I think too the residents who spoke this evening and the previous nights,
nobody wants to have assessments but to the best of our knowledge, if we don’t do these now,
the assessments will be higher later. I think that’s an important factor to consider. So I think
what staff and our consultants have provided us with is a reasonable and prudent that we move
forward that is truly in the best interest of all of the citizens today. So I’m in favor of moving
ahead and particularly with the MSA route.
Mayor Furlong: Okay, thank you. Further thoughts, comments.
Todd Gerhardt: Mayor, I had one additional thought. As I was out inspecting the area, the buses
were letting the kids off on Yosemite and as you have snow piled up on each side of the street,
there was not enough room for two vehicles so a wider street would give us a little more
pedestrian, since we’re not putting a trail or a sidewalk in this area. It does allow for a place for
pedestrians to walk in a safer zone. Just wanted to make that point.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you. Other discussion? Councilman Labatt.
Councilman Labatt: I would agree with Mr. Peterson and I would tend to err on the side of
supporting the MSA on this road. I think it would be a safer road and look now to the long term.
And then just what Marcus said, I think as the residents noted and me personally, I think these
last 2 weeks have been very good. Thank you for your presentation.
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Marcus Thomas: Thank you.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you. Anything else? Other comments? Discussion?
Councilwoman Tjornhom: If I just want to clarify for the rest of us. The MSA dollars, whether
we use them or don’t use, or if we do use them, it’s not going to change the assessment amount
of the homeowner.
Todd Gerhardt: That’s correct.
Councilwoman Tjornhom: Okay. And I realize they still are coming out of our tax dollars but
they’re not being directly assessed to the homeowners. And these assessment models that we are
assuming are going to be used, are they chiseled in stone?
Paul Oehme: No. No, these are just estimates at this time. Once we get, as we move forward
and get a contractor to give us bids on this project, we’ll look back at the bids and adjust the
assessments accordingly based upon the actual dollars for the improvements.
Councilwoman Tjornhom: Because I certainly do feel your pain. $7,000 is a lot of money to be
assessed for street improvements and so I hope that we can try to chisel that down as much as we
can for our residents.
Paul Oehme: Absolutely.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you. I think, you know Councilwoman Tjornhom your comment about
the MSA dollars, they are tax dollars and I think you know, all of us have paid into it through our
gas taxes. They’re available to cities of our size. Not all cities have these available. They’re
available on certain roadways such as this one. If we, if our standard for a city width, the width
of the city street is 31 feet and what I’m hearing tonight is that the traffic volumes suggest that it
should be 31 feet. Forget the funding for a minute. It should be 31 feet based upon volumes.
We can accommodate the narrower streets as we did in the Santa Fe project a few years ago, and
as we’re doing throughout the rest of this project because the traffic volumes are just not there.
In a new construction, if this area was being developed new, they’d still go in at 31 feet so I think
that’s an accommodation staff is recommending? So if Yosemite should be at 31 feet based
upon it’s traffic volumes, and 32 is required for the MSA, then you look at it from a funding
standpoint. If we build it at 31 feet, we can’t use the MSA dollars so then we have to use
property taxes. So we’re paying then, we’re going to ask residents to pay taxes twice because
we’ve already paid gas taxes. So to me the real choice is 31 or 32 feet, and then it’s really no
choice given the funding option. Because otherwise we’d have to use property taxes or not do
something else perhaps in the parks or somewhere else in our city needs and services so, I think
the other thing with regard to that, to the 32 feet is, is it will be a safer road. Even if speeds
increase some, you have greater width and we heard tonight from a resident that she prefers not
to walk, ride bikes on that street. I know other people do and a wider road will help. There will
be no trail system throughout this area and in that area there are curves and there are hills and a
wider road will make it safer, and I think that’s important. I mean when I look at these projects,
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
and I have stood at that podium before I sat up here and commented on my neighborhood going
through, in that case it was a mill and overlay. And so I fully empathize with the residents
coming forward here. So the first question I ask, is it needed, because I asked that question that
night. And the, what I’m hearing back from staff and from Mr. Thomas, the engineers and
others is that, and most of the residents, is that it’s needed. And I think in all these cases, having
driven through each of the neighborhoods visually I’ve confirmed what I’m hearing here tonight
is that these roads need improvement and that the roads in Chanhassen Hills are not as bad as
those up in the Koehnen-Yosemite area. So I think from, so the first question is, is it needed?
Second question is are we designing these with best practices? The roads were all built before
our current standards for road construction were in place. They don’t have the concrete gutters,
which we need for the storm sewer. It also, as I understand, lengthens the life of the road itself
so we’re not back here sooner with more assessments or more cost to Councilman Peterson’s
point, you know we’re trying to minimize the overall cost and what we’re trying to accomplish
here with this project too is improve our storm water management up in this area, and that’s
something that we spent time on tonight and we heard it from other residents earlier this evening,
and so I think what we’re doing here makes sense. It’s a lot of money. It’s a lot of money for
the taxpayers. It’s a lot of money for the residents, but the option is more money or a street
condition that generally I think most everybody would say would be unacceptable. Doing
nothing over time so, so are we fairly funding what needs to be done and is being done with best
practices? There I think we can look back at prior projects, since now as a city we have a short
history at least of looking at it, for the reconstruction area. Those costs as I understand it seem
consistent with what we’ve done in the past. For the Chanhassen Hills area, I think those costs
are at or below what was done in a similar type of project, at least a few years back and I think
most recently as well. As a city we’re getting…doing these projects each year and I can see that
and so we’re gaining efficiencies and so from a funding standpoint, you know we’re fairly
funding the road improvements that need to be done and are being done in the best possible way
to build roads and to manages storm water so. It’s the public hearing from last week and again
tonight, the neighborhood meetings that we had, improvements were made. The process I see it
working here. The best example is initially there were a few cul-de-sacs that were going to be
widen out to current standards. By the staff working with the residents, they realized you know
it’s not necessarily necessary. We don’t have to do anything so we can reduce it and that’s part
of what the neighborhood meetings, the public hearing process is about. It’s getting the best
project design in as well given the needs of the residents and I hear, I see us doing that here and
so that also gives me comfort. So I think it makes sense to move forward with this. We don’t
have all the answers. Some have been raised tonight. We will get answers going forward,
whether it’s bid alternatives or other issues but we can’t sit and wait for all the lights to turn
green before we back out of the driveway either. You have to go and I think tonight, given our
schedule in other issues coming up, to get these done it’s time to go. So I would support staff’s
recommendation on this in terms of the ordering the plans and specs. I think it makes sense for
all reasons mentioned and my sense is from the comments from the council as well, most or all
of you would agree so at that I would ask if there are any other comments on this? And if not, is
there a motion?
Councilman Peterson: Motion to approve as submitted by staff.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you.
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Councilman Labatt: Second.
Mayor Furlong: Made and seconded. Any discussion on that motion?
Resolution #2006-13: Councilman Peterson moved, Councilman Labatt seconded that the
City Council order the improvements and preparation of plans and specifications for City
Project 06-01. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously with a vote of 5 to 0.
Mayor Furlong: And thank you everyone for coming to the public hearings and public meetings.
I would encourage staff to, and I know they will, continue to work with the residents over the life
of this project. We will be seeing this again and appreciate everybody’s comments as well.
Given the time, let’s take a short recess subject to the call of the Chair.
(The City Council took a short recess at this point in the meeting.)
ORCHARD GREEN, 2611 & 2621 ORCHARD LAND, PETER KNAEBLE: FINAL
PLAT APPROVAL AND APPROVAL OF PLANS & SPECIFICATIONS &
DEVELOPMENT CONTRACT.
Todd Gerhardt: I’ll take this one Mr. Mayor. The applicant has asked that this item be placed
back on the agenda that he may ask you to reconsider staff’s recommendation on extension of
sewer, stub sewer lines. Staff continues to say our practice has been to extend that sewer line to
the property line. I think the City Attorney also sent a letter to the applicant explaining that.
However he wanted to come before you and request that assistance. So with that I would ask the
applicant to come and speak before you.
Peter Knaeble: Mr. Mayor, members of the City Council. We realize it’s late and we’ll be brief
in, or I’ll be brief in my comments and I appreciate the time tonight. My name is Peter Knaeble
with Terra Engineering and we’re responsible for the development. We’re also the developers of
this small project in Chanhassen. We’ve been working with the staff for a number of months and
just want to reiterate, I think we mentioned this at Planning Commission, also at City Council as
part of the preliminary plat that the staff, engineering and planning staff has been very
cooperative all through the process as we’ve been going through, so we appreciate that and one
of the things we want to note, especially compared to the other staff’s work with a number of
cities around the Twin Cities is that, with the cooperation and the fact that they will even return
phone calls when you call, which is not unlike a lot of the staffs that we work with so we
appreciate that. It’s just, there’s two items that we want to bring up tonight. One is the extension
of the sanitary sewer and again we understand the staff’s position. We just want to bring it in
front of the City Council for final reconsideration of that point. And the second item we want to
talk about and have again a second or final consideration from the City Council is the calculation
of the park fees. So those two things are what we want clarification of from council tonight.
Again in regards to the sanitary sewer issue, again we don’t want to necessarily beat a dead horse
but we think there’s, or will be inordinate costs assigned to this project as a part of this sewer
extension. Our calculation or our estimates from our contractor’s about a $60,000 cost assigned
to these 4 lots is approximately $15,000 additional cost per lot. Again the basis and the
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
requirement of staff is to extend the sanitary sewer on Orchard Lane about 185 feet. The way we
are proposing to serve the 4 lots on this project. 2 lots have existing services. We’re proposing
to build 2 new services. The service for Lot 3, we propose to come in from the south side.
There’s a sewer extension or existing sewer system on the south part of the property that would
accommodate that. The reason we’re doing that is, there’s a couple of reasons. One, there
would be no tree removal or significantly less tree removal as a part of that service. It would be
a shallower service so less cost to do that for the service on Lot 3. We understand again from the
staff that coming in a rear of a lot versus the front of a lot and having an easement across Lot 4 is
not the usual situation but it’s a reasonable alternative from our point of view. And we would
plat an easement as part of that. So given the fact that we want the sanitary sewer easement,
prefer the sanitary sewer easement in the back, or the sewer service in the back of Lot 4, we
don’t see the need to extend that service on Orchard Lane. And in fact that 185 foot sewer is
going to benefit the property on the north side of Orchard Lane versus our property so that’s the
basis for our request for your review and reconsideration as part of the City Council. Again we
learned just recently that in the past project, or the property across the street had been approved
for a lot split and as a part of that approval from the City Council they required that property to
extend that service as part of that. The staff report requirements to accommodate that lot split.
That has not been done to date, but we would expect that that project gets reactivated. That
requirement or that project would be required so again we see the benefits for the north, not to
the south. That is again one kind of a quick synopsis of that item and we can talk about that a
little bit. Second of all I just want to make a brief comment on this. The calculation of the park
fees for this project, and I think the council is aware of what the issue is. It’s our interpretation
of the city ordinance that the park fees are based on the number of new lots, not the number of
whole lots created as a part of a project. We’re proposing…from 4 lots but it has 2 existing
homes on it. So our interpretation is that we should be assessed for 2 additional park fees. Not 4
fees. And the reason we say that is that’s consistent with what the City’s done in the past. A
couple projects that we were charge or assessed just that way. Both Crestview and Highview
were assessed only for the new lots and the existing homes were excluded as part of that, so we
would like similar consideration on this project. And again, those are the two issues. We realize
it’s late so we would just respectfully ask reconsideration of those two items.
Mayor Furlong: Okay. I guess probably the first thing to do is let’s understand what staff is
recommending, or asking for inclusion and then, and the reasons for it.
Paul Oehme: Thank you Mayor, City Council members. This project is, I don’t know, it’s about
3 months in now and it’s, the sewer and the services to this development have evolved over this
timeframe. When the developer first came in, he had proposed to extend service basically from
this manhole. These are the three lots. Orchard Lane would be, sits right here. Here’s the black
for the new development. Originally they proposed coming to service Lot 3 via the manhole that
currently exists out there and crossing this property line. Staff had recommended that the, as we
have in all developments that the sewer is extended to the property, the farthest property so that
new developments can take off from there and not disturb the existing properties in front of the
utilities. We had recommended putting a manhole here. They came back with setting a manhole
just past the service line here to Lot 3, and they had originally you know agreed to that. Agree to
that proposal. That manhole, which was, which they had proposed was about 43 feet from the
manhole that is shown here at the property line. The new proposal from Terra Engineering is the
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
sewer extension from Lot 3 to the back of the lot through Lot 4. This is a sub-standard design in
my estimation and is problematic for future service, or maintenance in the future as well.
Whenever we have an opportunity to service a property correctly with perpendicular service
lines, you know going directly into the house, those are the type of services and designs that we
like to see so. You know we’re consistent with other developments that we’ve built here in the
past, and we’d just like consideration on this project as well. The gentleman did bring up the fact
that the property to the north has subdivided and at that time, when that subdivision went through
he was required to extend the sewer past the original location here. That was never extended and
no letters of credit were obtained at that time. We have changed our practice since then. It was I
think 10 years ago. Now we require that letter of credits are issued before any permits are
released or projects are approved so that in the event that the developer walks away from the
project, the City has the funds then to build the infrastructure at a later date so. That’s kind of
the synopsis and the reasons why we’re proposing the design as it is. This is, I’m showing you
the plan that Terra had put together too. This is not the City’s drawings. This is the actual
engineer’s drawing that is working on this project.
Mayor Furlong: I guess a question then, it looks like, if you can put that back up please. Right
now there’s a manhole. Is the middle out there with the 3-2? Is that, or of the 3 lots, is the
middle one 2?
Paul Oehme: Middle one’s 2.
Mayor Furlong: Okay thank you. Right now the sewer line extends to it in front of the second
lot, is that correct?
Paul Oehme: Correct.
Mayor Furlong: And your initial request was that it extend all the way across Lot 3. From
engineering standpoint, correct?
Paul Oehme: Yes.
Mayor Furlong: We said well we don’t want to go that far.
Paul Oehme: Correct.
Mayor Furlong: Why wouldn’t you go that far?
Paul Oehme: To, where it’s shown here?
Mayor Furlong: Yeah.
Paul Oehme: That’s where we’re requesting it.
Mayor Furlong: Is that what’s included in this right now?
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Paul Oehme: That’s the request and that’s the condition that we’re proposing.
Mayor Furlong: Okay.
Paul Oehme: And you know, they had previously had approved, or had requested that the
manhole stop just short of this service line here. That’s, you know so they had originally
requested that. That’s about 43 feet from where we’re talking about manhole 1 here. It’s not
$60,000. It’s, that extension is more like $8,800 to extend that sewer main another 43 feet so.
Mayor Furlong: Any other questions for staff on this matter?
Councilwoman Tjornhom: Are we discussing the sewer right now?
Mayor Furlong: Well if you’ve got quick questions for Paul because then we’re going to go over
to Mr. Hoffman for the Park and Rec.
Councilwoman Tjornhom: No, that’s.
Mayor Furlong: Just questions at this point. Clarify questions. Okay, thank you. Mr. Hoffman,
on the park fees.
Todd Hoffman: Mr. Mayor, members of the City Council. State law, city code allows for the
collection of park dedication fees at the time of subdivision. In this case you have 2 existing
homes that are going to be combined with other property or 4 new lots. The 2 existing homes
did not pay park dedication fees and so by that we’re making a recommendation that all 4 pay
park dedication fees. There has been instances, Mr. Knaeble is correct, where it has not been
charged and when that has been done, it occurred in error. There also have been plenty of plats
that have come through where there’s been existing homes in subdivisions where we’ve charged
that fee to that existing home.
Councilman Lundquist: Todd, can you give me an example of one where we, on an existing
home where there was a subdivision where we did collect park dedication fee.
Todd Hoffman: Just have to go to a file and pull them out. Not off the top of my head I cannot,
no.
Todd Gerhardt: I typically don’t see those. Sorry.
Councilwoman Tjornhom: When you said that the home, the 2 original homes didn’t pay park
dedication fees, when were they built? Like in the 60’s or 50’s or something or? Where that
wasn’t the general practice.
Todd Hoffman: Park dedication fees have been around in this city since about the mid 1980’s.
Councilwoman Tjornhom: Okay.
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Mayor Furlong: At this point, and this is 2 lots being combined to create 4. 2 existing homes
going to 4. But our normal subdivision process, maybe this is a question, because these fees are
generated out of our subdivision ordinances, is that correct?
Roger Knutson: That’s correct.
Mayor Furlong: Okay. In a normal subdivision process, if we’ve got a, I mean if we’ve got 20
acres or 15 acres or 40 acres being subdivided and there’s an existing resident on there, my
experience has been that we haven’t given a credit back for that first house. Is that the issue
here?
Roger Knutson: That’s right, they’re asking for a credit because there are existing houses. The
response is, our subdivision ordinance says it’s based on the number of lots in your plat, and then
these lots are in the plat and we would give them a credit had they previously paid. You don’t
want to.
Mayor Furlong: And that we have done before? Similar to our utility fees and.
Roger Knutson: There’s no credit due because the park dedication charge was never paid for
these homes before.
Councilman Lundquist: What did we do on Carlson’s property? Pemtom building a park south
of Lake Lucy. Or Mancino’s property that we had up there?
Councilman Labatt: Well I think those homes were destroyed.
Todd Gerhardt: Well no, Mr. Carlson’s home.
Councilman Labatt: But the Mancino’s house was moved…
Mayor Furlong: The question is whether they paid before or not.
Councilman Labatt: Well her house was there before 1988.
Councilman Lundquist: Well right, which is the same scenario as this one.
Todd Gerhardt: And the key thing is, is was the property subdivided. I don’t believe the
Mancino property was subdivided when that home was built. She bought a 20, or I don’t know if
she did, but somebody previously to her bought a 20 acre parcel and built a home. The only time
that this ordinance kicks in is if you go through the subdivision process. And under the Pemtom
one, he should have paid for the creation of that existing lot that Mr. Carlson’s house is now
sitting on.
Councilman Lundquist: Right, I mean that’s similar one to this where, the house sits a lot, I
mean yeah it’s 40 acres or 80, whatever the parcel was. The house was built there. It’s still
sitting there on a lot that was newly created as part of the subdivision. The house was there
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
previous to park dedication fee collection. It’s the same thing. Bigger scale obviously but same
thing. Same with Mancino’s. That house was there a long time ago on a 20 acre parcel but they
sell the property…
Mayor Furlong: But the park dedication, whatever number of lots, as I’m hearing staff tell us
here, whatever number of lots were created, that’s how it’s based.
Councilman Lundquist: Yeah but there again, it’s one big 20 acre parcel. You cut it into, you
know whatever it was, 40 lots or 37, whatever we made out of that thing, there’s you know
similar circumstances.
Mayor Furlong: Okay. Any other questions? For staff on either of these two matters. Is there
any discussion?
Councilman Peterson: I think that the…disagree with staff that we’re setting, we already have
set precedence and I understand there’s a little gray area but not when it comes to what we’ve
done and what we’ve tentatively tried to do is so I respect they asked for reconsideration but…
Mayor Furlong: Thank you. Any other discussion?
Councilwoman Tjornhom: I have to support staff too that the sewer project just seems to
certainly make sense that we would do that and the ordinance, an ordinance is an ordinance. If
that’s what our ordinance says then I, I have to follow that ordinance.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you. Councilman Lundquist.
Councilman Lundquist: This sewer thing I think is a cut and dry for me. I’m not at all in favor
of granting easements across somebody else’s property for your, for another house. I think
you’re setting yourself up for issues down the line. Seems like a pretty standard thing. I guess
the cost of doing business when you’re developing new developments and I’ll go with staff’s
recommendation on the park dedication fees although Todd, I’ll give you a call and check into
the ones and just for my own edification, just to make sure that we’re being consistent there so,
for now I’ll go with that and then do some follow-up and we’ll see where we at. So I’m in favor
of staff’s recommendation.
Mayor Furlong: Okay.
Councilman Labatt: I concur with staff.
Mayor Furlong: Okay, thank you. Well I as well and to Councilman Lundquist’s point, just
confirming the policy that we have in the past and there may have been some oops in the past but
I think Councilman Peterson made the comment that that’s not the intent so, I think here it’s
clearly that this is the intent and so with regard to the dedication fees, to me there’s not, we
shouldn’t be spending any time on the sewer. The staff is designing the city and doing it well
and that’s the right way to go so. Any further discussion or is there a motion to approve?
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Councilman Peterson: Motion to approve.
Mayor Furlong: Motion’s been made to approve staff’s recommendation in the staff report for
both items (a) and (b).
Kate Aanenson: Can I make a clarification on one motion. This is for final plat so your
recommendation actually follows on page 7.
Mayor Furlong: Do you want us to read it?
Kate Aanenson: Well you can just, the motion should be approving the final plat and the
motion’s in the…
Mayor Furlong: The development contract and.
Kate Aanenson: Correct, in the recommendation.
Councilman Peterson: As is usually the case, that’s what I meant to say.
Mayor Furlong: And the minutes will so reflect what Councilman Peterson meant to say. Okay,
so Councilman Peterson has made a motion. Granting final plat approval as presented in the
staff report on page 7, is that fair?
Kate Aanenson: Can I just double check with Paul…it refers to plans and specs. I’m assuming
that plans and specs are with the sewer.
Paul Oehme: Yep.
Mayor Furlong: Plans and specs with the sewer the way he wants it.
Kate Aanenson: Correct.
Mayor Furlong: Okay. And was there a second to that?
Councilman Labatt: Second.
Mayor Furlong: Councilman Labatt, thank you. Motion’s been made and seconded. Is there
any discussion?
Councilman Peterson moved, Councilman Labatt seconded that the City Council grants
final plat approval of Planning Case #05-42 Orchard Green, for 4 single-family lots as shown
on the plat stamped ‘Received January 23, 2006’ and construction plans stamped ‘Received
January 26, 2006’, subject to the following conditions:
1.Applicant shall submit a landscaping plan showing 19 trees as replacement plantings. Plan
shall specify size, species, and locations.
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
2.All areas outside of grading limits shall be protected by tree preservation fencing. Fencing
shall be installed prior to grading and excavation for homes on each lot. Any trees shown as
preserved that are removed or damaged shall be replaced at a rate of 2:1 diameter inches.
3.The water and sanitary hook-ups for lot 2 must be moved to the driveway in order to preserve
the 12” maple.
4.The developer must obtain all permits necessary to remove the existing homes.
5.The grading plan must be revised as follows:
a.All proposed contours must tie in to existing contours, particularly the 992’, 990’ and
988’ contours on the west side of Lot 1; and the 996’, 994’ and 992’ contours on the east
side of Lot 3.
b.Staff recommends that the low floor elevations for Lots 1 and 2 be lowered one foot to
achieve an 8 foot walkout. Staff recommends that steps be installed in the garage on Lots
3 and 4 to achieve an 8 foot walkout.
c.A drainage breakpoint elevation must be shown northeast of the building pad corner on
Lot 3.
6.Any proposed retaining wall over four feet high requires a building permit and must be
designed by a Professional Engineer registered in the State of Minnesota.
7.If importing or exporting material for development of the site is necessary, the applicant will
be required to supply the City with a detailed haul route and traffic control plan.
8.The developer must acquire a Work in Right of Way Permit from the Engineering
Department before commencing work in the right of way and shall submit a financial
security to ensure that Orchard Lane and Forest Avenue are properly restored after the
services have been installed.
9.Detailed grading, drainage, tree removal and erosion control plans must be submitted with
the building permit for each lot.
10.Permits from the appropriate regulatory agencies must be obtained, including but not limited
to the MPCA and the Watershed District.
11.Erosion control blanket shall be installed on all slopes greater than or equal to 3:1. All
exposed soil areas shall have temporary erosion protection or permanent cover year round,
according to the following table of slopes and time frames:
Time
(maximum time an area can remain unvegetated
Type of Slope
when area is not actively being worked)
Steeper than 3:1 7 Days
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
10:1 to 3:1 14 Days
Flatter than 10:1 21 Days
12.These areas include constructed storm water management pond side slopes, and any exposed
soil areas with a positive slope to a storm water conveyance system, such as a curb and gutter
system, storm sewer inlet, temporary or permanent drainage ditch or other natural or man
made systems that discharge to a surface water.
13.Street cleaning of soil tracked onto public streets shall include daily street scraping and street
sweeping as-needed.
14.The plans shall be revised to show the location(s) of the rock construction entrance(s).
15.Based on the proposed developed area of approximately 2.02 acres, the water quality fees
associated with this project are $3,232; the water quantity fees are approximately $5,858. At
this time, the estimated total SWMP fee, due payable to the City at the time of final plat
recording, is $9,090.
16.In the absence of parkland dedication, it is recommended that Orchard Green pay full park
dedication fees at the rate in force upon final platting. At today’s rate, these fees would total
$23,200 (4 lots x $5,800).
17.The developer shall install lateral sanitary sewer to the east property line. The cost to
complete this work is the developer’s responsibility.
18.The developer shall pay the $10,544.00 lateral water connection charge with the final plat.
19.The first two building permits issued for this development will be charged the trunk sanitary
sewer and water hook up charges and the $1,575.00 SAC fee.
20.Demolition permits must be obtained before demolishing any existing structures.
21.Provide a cleanout on the sewer service for Lot 3.
22.The site must be mass-graded. The developer must post a security for this work with the
final plat.
23.Final grading plans and soil reports must be submitted to the Inspections Division before
building permits will be issued.”
All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously with a vote of 5 to 0.
Councilman Peterson moved, Councilman Labatt seconded that the City Council approve
the construction plans and specifications for Orchard Green dated January 20, 2006,
prepared by Terra Engineering, Inc. and the development contract dated February 1, 2006,
conditioned upon the following:
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
1. The applicant shall enter into the development contract and supply the City with a cash
escrow or letter of credit in the amount of $66,589 and pay a cash fee of $44,937.50.
2. The applicant’s engineer shall work with city staff in revising the construction plans to meet
City standards.
All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously with a vote of 5 to 0.
CONSIDERATION OF CHANGE ORDER TO HIGHWAY 212 PROJECT OF THE
POWERS BOULEVARD BRIDGE IMPROVEMENTS.
Paul Oehme: Thank you Mayor, City Council. The, just wanted to apologize for the late notice
on this. We did receive a quote on these improvements very late in the game here. We have
been working with MnDot and design road contractor to try to get these costs to us sooner but.
Councilman Lundquist: They’re too busy hauling dirt all night.
Paul Oehme: It’s been a struggle.
Todd Gerhardt: And driving through the Lake Susan development.
Paul Oehme: So anyway, the improvements that have council consider tonight is installing
footing foundations or blisters and conduit in the Powers Boulevard bridge section that’s being
built in connection with the 212 project. That bridge is currently being built right now as we
speak at this location here. The pilings have been done. The beams are in place and they’re
starting to work on forming the decking right now. One of the improvements that we, staff has
talked about was to facilitate a future lighting of that bridge, and the bridge is shown on this
sheet here. North is this way. There’s bridge sections here. This is westbound 212 and
eastbound’s over here. Trail’s on the west side. 10 foot wide trail. And to facilitate potential
lighting on the bridge, we have asked…MnDot to do us a cost of putting in the foundations and
the conduit and those are shown in the highlighted areas. There’s 7 in total for, on the trail side
and 3 on the opposite side of the bridge. Now is the time if council wants to put lights on this
bridge, now’s the time to at least consider putting in the infrastructure to make that happen in the
future. We don’t have to put in lights at this time but it’s very problematic to put in the
foundations, the blisters and the conduit in the future. The cost for that, those improvements in
your background are $46,500 to pay for that. For those improvements at this time. And the
funding would come from the state aid loan agreement that the city has entered in with to fund,
to pay for the improvements that are being built in conjunction with the 212 project. So at this
time I stand for questions. Give maybe a better idea of what a blister is. This is the bridge
section here. Railing is along the bridge section and the…would actually sit out in back of the
wall section so.
Mayor Furlong: Okay, good. Any questions for staff?
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Councilman Lundquist: Paul, understand why now is the time to do it. What I’m confused
about is how come MnDot didn’t do it to start with?
Paul Oehme: Well, under the 212 project MnDot has, in their generosity given one bridge in
which they’ll put lights on and that bridge is 101. That’s what we have requested that those
lights be put on. We are putting in street lights on 101 north of Lyman as well, all the way up to
the 101 gap and the 101 gap project. When that is bid out, that will also have street lights on it.
But that’s the reasoning. MnDot gave us one bridge to put on and 101 is the one we’re, those
decorative lights will be put on. The other bridges, it’s up to the city’s at their discretion to put
on lights if they so choose.
Councilman Labatt: How many lights you putting on?
Todd Gerhardt: 7.
Councilman Labatt: 7?
Paul Oehme: 7.
Councilman Lundquist: So it’s noise mitigation walls or lights on the bridge?
Mayor Furlong: Any other questions for staff?
Councilwoman Tjornhom: Did they anticipate what’s going to happen with these lights?
Paul Oehme: Well we had talked to MnDot about you know installing lights throughout the
corridor here, Powers Boulevard and Lyman. We did receive costs on that early on in the game
when the cooperative agreement was being negotiated. Those costs came in extremely high so
we did not feel at that time we would put in the lights. After working through the process, you
know trying to get bids, or trying to get costs out for the bridge sections and the challenge now,
we’re trying to get there in terms of the cost for these type of improvements. Staff has scheduled
a work session with the council to talk about future lighting along this corridor to, and some
other improvements that staff might be requesting council to consider in the future also, and that
th
will be on the February 27 council meeting where we talk about additional improvements and
what do we want to do with the bridges, Lyman and Powers… If we want to put the lights in
now or wait until development takes place as well too, so kind of the staging and funding of
those improvements.
Councilwoman Tjornhom: And this is like our one shot to put lights in or never have lights in?
Paul Oehme: Well no, it’s not, it’s never you know. Bridges can be retrofitted to have that,
those improvements put in there. It’s more costly. It’s harder to retrofit those. It doesn’t look as
nice either. It looks kind of piecemealed together so.
Councilman Lundquist: So Paul, are you asking for 46.5 or 121?
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Paul Oehme: Right now 46.5. We’re having the council consider just for the conduit and the
foundations and these blisters to be put in. And then we can make a determination at a later date
in terms of what, what should the rest of the scope be.
Councilman Lundquist: Because as I look at it, it doesn’t do any good to spend 46.5 to put some
foundations and conduit if you’re not going to put lights on top of them. Is there some
consideration on what type of lights or something that would change that? I’m looking for a
reason why we wouldn’t just go ahead and say, I mean if we’re going to put in conduit and
bases, we’re going to put in the lights. Let’s commit to the one…
Todd Gerhardt: Yeah Paul, now you could go for the whole thing right now. We threw out this
recommendation after the fact. I think we were more concerned about trying to get the blisters in
now as they’re out there forming the bridge and we still have some lead time in adding the light
standards so, I asked Paul to put that quote together in hopes that you may choose to go ahead
and tell us to put the light standards in now. As to the rest of Powers Boulevard, we got a quote
of over $400,000. One of the things Paul and I talked about is developments occur along Powers
Boulevard. We may make it a requirement for the developers to install lights adjacent to their
properties so that.
Councilman Labatt: Would that be on Powers?
Todd Gerhardt: And that would save us some money on that. There may be some gaps in there
where we’ll have to add after the fact but I thought that the best was to wait until development
occurred and have them pay for it.
Mayor Furlong: I guess to that point, if the estimate of the 74.5 for the lights that you have here,
is that if we go for it now or would that increase if we did that later?
Paul Oehme: No, that’s the quote that I received from MnDot if we go forward now.
Mayor Furlong: And so is it reasonable to believe that doing the wiring now is going to be less
money than having to pull it through the conduits later and.
Paul Oehme: I’m not an electrical expert but.
Mayor Furlong: You’re our engineer.
Paul Oehme: Yeah, just based upon other cities along the corridor that are putting in, that are
going through this same process, they are putting the lights in at this time. So based upon the
other city, Chaska particularly, they are, they did request the same blisters and the conduit be put
in and the light structures and they are, I believe they are going forward with the whole shooting
match. Putting the lights in there so.
Todd Gerhardt: You’ll save money doing it now.
Mayor Furlong: Yeah, that’s my thought so.
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Paul Oehme: And they, you know they have their own electrical you know.
Mayor Furlong: Do they have an electrical engineer?
Paul Oehme: Utility…
Todd Gerhardt: I heard they’re looking for a good chemical engineer…
Mayor Furlong: Well I guess you know in that regard I would suggest that we go forward and
authorize the change including light standards, unless staff finds out in the next couple weeks
that there’s some reason not to, but I think we authorize them, let’s do the whole thing. It’s got
to be more cost effective now. We should have lights on our bridge so. Well, otherwise we’re
going to be putting more in later, and with regard to the rest of the corridor, let’s talk about that
at the upcoming work session and make sure we design the corridor well. I think that’s
important so. Is there, any other discussion or questions?
Councilman Lundquist: Write this down on your calendars. The day I offered to pay more for
something.
Todd Gerhardt: I feel a little light headed.
Mayor Furlong: It’s obviously the late hour. Okay, have you got any other questions for staff or
discussion from council? If not, is there a motion?
Councilman Lundquist: Move to approve change order for $121,000 for blisters, conduit, light
standards and wiring for the Powers Boulevard bridge.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you. Is there a second on that?
Councilman Labatt: Second.
Mayor Furlong: Made and seconded. Is there any reason from a discussion standpoint, is there
any reason to, you can have them spend time looking to see if it was less cost effective, okay.
Then we’ll just move forward with that. Any other discussion on the motion?
Councilman Lundquist moved, Councilman Labatt seconded that the City Council approve
the change order for $121,000 for blisters, conduit, light standards and wiring for the
Powers Boulevard bridge. All voted in favor and the motion carried unanimously with a
vote of 5 to 0.
1(N). APPROVAL OF CITY CODE AMENDMENT CONCERNING PROHIBITING
FIRES OR COOKING DEVICES ON PATIOS AND BALCONIES OF
VERTICALLY STACKED MULTI-FAMILY DWELLINGS.
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Councilman Peterson: Mr. Mayor, I guess I just wanted to vote on that separately. As I had
discussed at the work session where we reviewed the merits of this item, I am personally not
uncomfortable putting an ordinance out there mandating what I think that the marketplace can do
as effectively as we can, if not more effectively, i.e. give people of apartment complexes, the
owners, etc, etc, who don’t want their people to be barbequing on their grills and think they can
more effectively deal with that than we can, and in many ways where do you draw the lines
saying what our residents can and can’t do? I think it would be, certainly I can argue the fact
that it’d probably be safer if we say don’t do it in an apartment complex. It would also be safer if
we disallowed it on resident’s decks too. We’re not doing that. I mean I don’t see it as a big
difference but essentially it puts more discretion of would I rather have them using the situation,
let the residents effectively deal with it and the apartment owners so I just wasn’t prepared to
vote for that on the consent agenda so. So that’s my decision.
Mayor Furlong: Okay, thank you. Any other thoughts or discussion?
Councilman Lundquist: I would echo Mr. Peterson as well, as we’ve spoken in the work session
again. I think we’ve got the what, 2, 4, 6, 8, 10 apartment complexes. 8 of them already have it
in their lease policy so defacto their residents already can’t do that without violating their lease
anyway. And as we spoke, this effectively prohibits anyone who lives in an apartment building
from being able to barbeque on their deck, and I just fundamentally have a problem with you
know, you take that little Hibachi grill and put the thing out on your deck. You know recognize
that I just, if that’s an apartment complex’s wishes for insurance reasons, clutter or others, then I
would recommend that they put that in their lease and enforce it. So I just think that’s an
onerous regulation to put on someone because they choose to live in an apartment building that
you can’t barbeque on your deck.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you. Other thoughts? Councilman Labatt.
Councilman Labatt: Well, I guess just in my line of work I’ve seen more than my share of
apartment fires and caused by careless people who grill on decks and so, and I’ve seen more and
more cities go into this ordinance so I’m in favor of the ordinance.
Mayor Furlong: Okay, thank you. Councilwoman Tjornhom.
Councilwoman Tjornhom: You know for once I don’t know what to say because I agree, I hate
to take away civil liberty to do what they want to, in their own apartment. I understand that they
do have in their leases laws that say they are not to grill. And so obviously they should not be
having these devices on their decks to start with, but for me I can also see that it is one more way
to back up that rule and support the fire department in that, in giving them one more tool just to
say, you can’t do this. And I think at work session they gave us some examples of why it’s the
stacked apartments that have the problems with the updraft of the deck fires so, I guess I’m going
to have to just side with the fire department on this one and respect their wishes and I’m prepared
to vote for it.
Mayor Furlong: Okay, thank you. My thoughts are with Councilman Peterson and Lundquist. I
agree with, and always get concerned when we limit individual freedoms and people’s ability to
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
enjoy the use of their home. I think where I became convinced that this makes sense to approve
was again to Councilwoman Tjornhom’s position, the fire department and the issue with an
apartment building where you have one resident living above another. A fire goes up. In side by
side units there are, because of construction standards, protections from one unit to the other and
a single family home, somebody wants to grill on their deck and burn down their house, I guess
that’s part of civil liberty. You know the individual rights and freedoms that we’re not
restricting. I’m not, I don’t enjoy this but I think from a safety standpoint and to Councilman
Labatt’s comments about these things happen and the more tools we can give the apartment
owners to limit the risk I think as much as again I agree with the sentiment, and philosophy of
Councilman Peterson and Lundquist, I would, I will support this because I think from a safety
standpoint, unfortunately that’s one of the things that, not unfortunately but one of the rules of a
government organization is to protect other people’s safety based upon the potential, either in
advertent risk created by someone else so I will be supporting this motion.
Councilman Lundquist: Clarification. Roger, is it possible to add additional language in here to
require apartment complexes as we band these to provide a public or a resident amenity for
barbequing? Can we add a must have an area, community barbeque within 700 feet of the front
door or whatever? Within somewhere along the premises.
Roger Knutson: For new construction you certainly could put that kind of provision and it’s put
into your zoning ordinance a condition of giving multi family housing approval.
Councilman Lundquist: But retro, not a lot?
Roger Knutson: They have the right to continue. That would be a non-conforming property at
that point because they wouldn’t have your requirement or it might not.
Councilman Lundquist: Existing non-conforming.
Roger Knutson: It has the right to continue.
Councilman Lundquist: Understand.
Mayor Furlong: So we don’t have that in place but if we put that in our ordinance, then they’d
be existing non-conforming.
Councilman Lundquist: Right.
Mayor Furlong: But then that would create the opportunity for future development.
Roger Knutson: But to do that, just to be clear, you’d have to go back through the process.
Councilman Lundquist: Right, understand.
Roger Knutson: You can’t do that tonight.
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Councilman Lundquist: Understand.
Councilman Peterson: Another point of clarification. I can’t remember when we talked about it
at work session or not but, what about the electric outdoor grills that you see now days?
Councilman Lundquist: Permanently wired, this reads permanently wired is okay. This
excludes permanently wired electric and hard piped into natural gas. So if I lived in one of these
apartments, and I hard wire in an electric grill on my deck, it’s okay. Or if I pipe it into the
existing building.
Councilwoman Tjornhom: Unless your lease says you can’t.
Councilman Lundquist: Well yes. Obviously, but one provision.
Councilman Peterson: A hard wire is an interesting definition.
Councilman Lundquist: Well it’s not a plug.
Councilman Labatt: Or running it from your neighbor’s outlet.
Councilman Lundquist: Or hard pipe it into the existing natural gas supply in the apartment as
well, so if you’ve got a gas furnace right there in the corner, you know it doesn’t take much to
pop it up a wall.
Councilman Peterson: On these electric grills that you plug a 3 prong into an outlet, I can’t
imagine why being hard wired would decrease the fire aspect of it so are we over regulating on
this one? Talking about electric grills or not.
Todd Gerhardt: The only thing I can think about, you know the hard wiring or the gases that the
coals, the embers from the charcoal would fall onto the deck and start a fire.
Councilman Peterson: Well but the hard wiring aspect of these, you plug it into the wall. The
difference between hard wiring and plugging in the electric into the wall…
Councilman Lundquist: Ask Paul, he’s the engineer.
Todd Gerhardt: I think we’re going to have to get an electrical engineer on staff. I think the
only thing I can think of on that is if it’s hard wired, it’s permanent. It’s considered permanent
and you plug it into an outlet it’s portable. The only two differences I can make out of that.
Mayor Furlong: There would be an electrical inspection. The same with running a gas line.
Okay. Okay.
Councilman Peterson: I think we’re over ordinancing guys and gal.
Mayor Furlong: Okay. Any other discussion? If not, is there a motion?
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City Council Meeting – February 13, 2006
Councilman Labatt: I move approval.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you. Is there a second?
Councilwoman Tjornhom: Second.
Mayor Furlong: Made and seconded. Any discussion on the motion?
Councilman Labatt moved, Councilwoman Tjornhom seconded that the City Council
approve the City Code amendment prohibiting fires or cooking devices on the balconies of
vertically stacked multi-family dwelling units, or within fifteen feet of any building on the
ground level. All voted in favor, except Councilman Peterson and Councilman Lundquist
who opposed and the motion carried with a vote of 3 to 2.
COUNCIL PRESENTATIONS:
Councilman Lundquist: Mr. Mayor I would just like to publicly thank the park and rec
department for their annual, what are we, however many years in a row now of the Daddy
Daughter Date Night, which I had the pleasure of attending with my daughter. We had a pretty
significant turn over in personnel recently. Corey always did a fantastic job and Nate did a nice
job of picking up. It didn’t seem like it missed a beat. Went off well. Everybody had a good
time. I think the only tears were when it was time to go so that’s usually a good thing. So thank
Nate and the rest of his crew for putting on a great event.
Todd Hoffman: Sure will. Thank you.
Mayor Furlong: And I would concur with that. I had 2 of my daughters with me Friday evening
and it’s a great event. The dads were having fun as were the girls so, and it went off without a
hitch so well done.
Councilman Lundquist: And the Mayor did the chicken dance.
Mayor Furlong: There were no pictures. I have plausible deniability.
Councilman Lundquist: There were witnesses though.
Mayor Furlong: There were witnesses also doing the chicken dance Councilman Lundquist.
Any other council presentations?
Todd Gerhardt: We need a mother son date night too. Equal opportunity park and rec
department here.
Mayor Furlong: I’d also like to comment and recognize and thank the park department for
excellent Feb Fest that occurred since our last council meeting. It was a wonderful event. I think
the Chanhassen Villager did a good job of covering that story, both before and after and I think
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that encouraged attendance. It was well attended. The weather was nice and, but for the
potential nepotism with the prize winning fish, and the concern about the quality control in terms
of measurement and weighing, I think that everything was done without a hitch so.
Councilman Lundquist: Because as Todd.
Councilman Peterson: Can you send me a few copies of the pictures of the chicken dance please.
Councilman Lundquist: I guess Todd phrased it, he left one in the tank after Dave caught his.
Todd Hoffman: That’s right.
Mayor Furlong: So, job well done there. Any other council presentations at this point? I’ll
move over to Mr. Gerhardt then.
ADMINISTRATIVE PRESENTATIONS:
Todd Gerhardt: I’ve got two items tonight. The night hauling on the 212 project has stopped so
now they’re just hauling during the day. So everybody can sleep again in the neighborhood.
Councilman Peterson: They got done or it just got to be too onerous?
Todd Gerhardt: Nope, they got done.
Mayor Furlong: They got done early.
Todd Gerhardt: For the amount that they needed to get done. They’re still moving dirt around
out there during the day but the, what was it? How far did they have to go down? 35 feet. That
area got completed. We’ve got another little problem down off of Pioneer and Powers that
they’re going to probably have to do substantial, you’re going to have to go down 65 feet there.
Paul Oehme: They’re looking at other.
Todd Gerhardt: Other options now? Because I think we might end up somewhere close to
China. Yeah, and then the last item I have is that the Chamber of Commerce recognized the City
of Chanhassen as the Business of the Year, and here’s the award and I thought maybe Dave
could take our picture and maybe put a little blurb in the paper, since I didn’t see it in there in the
last couple weeks.
Mayor Furlong: Hint, hint, nudge, nudge.
Todd Gerhardt: Dave didn’t attend the event but I think there was somebody else from the
Villager there, but it was a great award. The Mayor came in and spoke to employees and we had
a little cake and celebrated this event and it’s pretty cool so.
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Mayor Furlong: I think it’s quite an honor I think for the Chamber to be recognizing the City
such as this, for this type of award. I think it speaks very well, not only to the work that’s been
done over the years in creating a vision for how we want our city to grow and following our
comprehensive plan and supporting our business community, but it also speaks very highly of
our city staff and the work that they do day in and day out, across all departments. And I think in
large part it’s a recognition of the work that they’ve done over the years and I give the Chamber
credit for recognizing that work so, to all of them, congratulations and the Chamber is really
clicking and doing well. They have their home show coming up I think in a couple weeks with
Chapel Hill Academy, which is very successful for them and they’re really doing a lot of good
things so we’re very fortunate as a city to have an organization that’s operating as well as they
are right now.
Todd Gerhardt: Linda Waltman has done a great job in taking the board up and the Chamber to
a new level so give her credit for that. Got her name right that time too.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you. Any questions of Mr. Gerhardt?
Todd Gerhardt: And I got the mayor’s name right.
Mayor Furlong: That’s right. Any questions for Mr. Gerhardt? Administrative presentations.
CORRESPONDENCE DISCUSSION.
Councilman Peterson: Mr. Mayor, just a quick…you look at both the recycling activity that was
2005. It went up a lot. Paid back that…but I think it’s notable that the numbers are turning up
year to year. In addition our building permits from 04 to 05 were up by a few hundred as well…
so I think that the trend is, if you took a simplistic view of the economy and the growth of
Chanhassen, we’re doing some good things, both from an ecological standpoint…which is
always a good thing.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you. Points well made.
Councilman Lundquist: Have to go to the recycling center because that twice a week common
thing is not working good, is that what the deal is?
Mayor Furlong: No, I think it’s the efforts of our staff and Environmental Commission and
others. You know looking at the numbers, we were spending, the dollars going out now in these
last couple years, besides growing significantly over the last few years, are comparable to what
was being spent before and we’re getting a lot more done with the same dollars so, I think it’s to
everybody’s credit and Councilman Peterson, thank you for bringing that up because it is
important to see those numbers improving.
Kate Aanenson: I was just going to add on that. Along with the education that, like you stated
Mayor, the Environmental Commission is working on the next maple leaf newsletter is going to
be specifically Arbor Day, we’re kind of heading into that season. Recycling so they’re always
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attempting to find other ways to educate the residents regarding the coupon use and trying to get
those numbers off, so people do have an opportunity to find out what’s that like.
Mayor Furlong: Thank you. Any other comments or discussion this evening?
Councilman Lundquist: Motion to adjourn.
Mayor Furlong: Motion made to adjourn. We will, do we still want to complete the last item on
our work session or hold that over?
Todd Gerhardt: I leave it up to you. I don’t know how much information you need. I think
Todd did a pretty good job of explaining everything. If you have any questions or concerns on
that, maybe give me a call or Todd and, but I know the Park and Rec Commission was active in
helping prioritize those projects for the year so.
Mayor Furlong: If that’s acceptable to everybody, get your comments and thoughts into Mr.
Gerhardt and then depending on those, we can proceed accordingly. With that, a motion’s been
made to adjourn. Is there a second?
Councilwoman Tjornhom: Second.
Councilman Lundquist moved, Councilwoman Tjornhom seconded to adjourn the meeting.
All voted in favor and the motion carried. The City Council meeting was adjourned at
10:15 p.m..
Submitted by Todd Gerhardt
City Manager
Prepared by Nann Opheim
59